New Year 2022/January

Finally ~ I can start blogging about the new year!

 

Since I was still recovering from my bronchitis episode and with omicron really starting to kick up, D, B and I just had a quiet evening at home on New Year's Eve. We ate steak and lobster, watched "Tick Tick Boom!" on Netflix and then watched the ball drop on TV...

Despite the fact I struggled with laryngitis most of January (my voice is back now - about 98% I'd say - it still cracks/is raspy every so often), experienced big time fatigue (and still do a bit) and had a number of friends and family members come down with Covid (which has been quite stressful), we had a pretty good January. I still don't know how Doug, Bri and I have escaped Covid so far, but I know there is a really good possibility we could get it - even being boosted and masking as much as we do.

It took me about a week into January to get all my Christmas stuff down. I had to do it slow but surely - my fatigue hindered me a lot from getting it down sooner. I was emotionally mixed between being ready to get rid of the Christmas decorations and missing the Christmas trees and twinkling lights at the same time.

  Mei was not happy the trees were gone...

January brought some very pretty sunrises...

Bri started a brand new semester of school in January - which meant all new classes, teachers and classmates. She is doing great though adjusting to it all. She has theater and drawing this semester and that makes her quite happy...

Bri drew this super cool drawing for her drawing class (she had to choose three reflective or transparent items to draw [she chose a mirror, glasses and eye shadow case] and incorporate several different line drawing techniques to draw them)....

 Honestly, I am so relieved Bri has adjusted to an extremely crowded high school so well (while wearing a mask!). I think about her spending over a year at home trying to learn virtually. Basically learning a lot of 9th grade on her own. Being so isolated from kids her own age. This girl has bounced back. I'm proud and very, very grateful.

 

Doug celebrated his birthday in January...

We had a nice dinner at our favorite Cuban restaurant, I bought Doug a very cool Star Wars picture from a company called "Frome" and Briana drew Doug a very sweet picture.

The company Doug works for received another huge round of funding and they announced it in January. It will help the company grow even more! Nasdaq then congratulated them in Times Square!

We had our "Mei Mei/gotcha day" anniversary in January. She joined our family 7 years ago and is such a happy, important part of our lives...

January also brought snow (January 16th). It snowed most of the day (and was very pretty), but it didn't stick in our neck of the woods...

About two weeks later, it snowed a little bit overnight and I woke up to a tiny trace of snow...

We also finally watched "The Eternals"...it definitely was a bit slow and long, and there was a lot of (almost too much) information packed into a two hour plus movie - but I didn't hate it. I actually did like it. I know some people really didn't...

Doug and Bri saw Spiderman 3 in a movie theater (Bri couldn't wait to see it anymore). I did not go because I still had a nice cough and didn't want to have some coughing fit in the theater. They went at a quiet time and had no one sitting around them. They felt quite comfortable there. It was their first movie in a theater outside the house in like two years.

And we are now into the month of February, and on February 1st, the CNY began (year of the tiger). I'll be blogging about that soon!