October

 

Yikes, it's been almost 2 months since I posted - bad Jonni.

I'm not even sure I remember everything that has happened in the last 2 months but it's all been good. Chris and I are still happy, still planning a future together, still enjoying family life with the kids, still moving ahead on selling my house and now we're renovating one for us to move into by the end of the year. We've been on a very long road trip to Texas and back, right through a hurricane, and we never had a cross word between us, maybe because we were too busy laughing and joking or maybe because we had very little sleep so we were just too exhausted to fight - who knows. LOL

 My man doing something manly with a circular saw in the backyard.

New puppy #1 

They lifted the nursing home restrictions a bit so I finally got to visit with my mother in person after not being able to for 6 months. Of course, each time they get a new COVID case they lock the place down for 2 weeks so in 2 months we've only had 2 visits but I've got another one scheduled for this week. I totally understand and agree with all the restrictions, it's kept the residents safe, but I also know that her precarious mental health was slipping and it's been good for her to see me.

Our new house is a bit of a hot mess right now (and I'm being overly complimentary, believe me) but we're making (slow) progress and I can't wait to share "after" pictures with you in a couple of months. It's SO much bigger than where we're currently living - 4 bedrooms, 2 baths, huge living room and a nice sized dining room. It's going to be awesome and it sits on a big piece of land with so many possibilities. My favorite part of the renovation process is sitting with Chris and dreaming about all improvements we want to make. My least favorite part is standing for hours in a house with no air conditioning (or electricity or running water - no toilets!) painting and cleaning - I was not cut out for manual labor. LOL And yet, I love that we're doing it together. Chris probably wishes I could learn to love it quietly with no grumbling...yeah, like that's going to happen. Dream on, big guy.

At the beginning of October we celebrated this guy's 6th birthday with a weekend at my place and everybody loved spending hours in the swimming pool. All along I wanted to have my house back to myself for a couple of months so that I could make some happy family memories before having to sell so this weekend was everything I could have hoped for. The fact that we've done it another time since then and we have another weekend coming up is just icing on the cake. Speaking of cake, the birthday boy's oldest sister made this cake for him and it was amazing.

The birthday boy got a puppy as a gift so that's new puppy #2. She's teeny tiny and a bundle of energy with a BIG personality. The two puppies together are double trouble, believe me. By the way, I literally "woke up like this" because the kids thought it would be funny to open the bedroom door and let the puppies in while I was still sleeping and then take a picture. Have I mentioned how "adorable" they are? Yeah, I'm loving every minute.

Scenes of hurricane damage on our way home from Texas.

Us before leaving for Texas and us 80 hours later on the side of the road with a blown tire 25 miles from home just being goofy for the camera. We got about 4 hours sleep in the truck in a Waffle House parking lot during the whole trip, I think I changed my shirt but I don't think he changed clothes the whole time. My hair was horrible and I was tired and hungry but I'd do it all over again in a heartbeat.

My first drive-in movie! We did have another child with us but she was in the bathroom when we took the picture. It was fun but a little hot, the kids couldn't see from the backseat so I switched places with them so then I could barely see so we ended up out at the picnic table by the concession stand which kind of defeats the whole purpose of a drive-in, I think. At least now I can say I've done it.

We took the kids to Legoland and had such a great time that we ended up getting annual passes so we can go back as often as we'd like. It was my first time in any sort of theme park since the pandemic and I can see they are taking precautions to keep people distanced and safe. It's hot wearing a mask all day in Florida but we did it - the kids were even better at it than the adults were.

There, I think you're all caught up now. In between home renovation and fun, I'm at work every day, keeping my head above water, dreading next month's 2 year anniversary a bit, trying out my cooking skills, figuring out I really don't have any cooking skills, waiting for the cooler weather to start and looking forward to Halloween this weekend even if it will look different than it usually does. It's still my favorite holiday and will be even more fun with kids this year!