Busy, Busy, Busy

Hello everyone!

I hope that everyone had a nice holiday. It has been really nice having last week and this week off. It has been pretty crazy around here, but thankfully, we have found some time to relax and spend time with each other, too.

We had our traditional Christmas again this year. I spent the night at my parent's house on Christmas Eve. We stayed up until pretty late in the evening playing Mexican Train (Jon kicked everyone's behinds this year) while eating WAY too many Chocolate Chip Jubilee cookies that my sister made (grandma's recipe). It was a really fun night. On Christmas morning, Lance came over pretty early and we opened presents. This year, we decided to do Secret Santa because some of us were a bit short on money. We revealed ourselves to our secret person and opened our gifts. My mom's "stocking stuffers" ended up not quite fitting in our stockings, so we ended up getting pretty spoiled anyway. My dad made is usual OUTSTANDING breakfast and then we headed out to a matinee. This year, we saw Charlie Wilson's War. We all really enjoyed it. We went back to my parent's house for a fantastic ham dinner. Everything was really nice and we all had a really great time spending time together. It's really fun to have a family tradition.

My dad started working on our master bathroom last week. Basically, our shower was starting to fall apart. As much as I'd like to say that this was something that we just wanted to do for the fun of it, it turned out to be something that we couldn't ignore. In the master bath, we have a stall shower (no tub). The people who lived here before us put in a really cheap shower and not long ago, it began to peel and chip and the back walls started to peel away from the wall. There was also a water leak which started causing mold to form in the bottom corners of the shower on the wall. Not a pretty sight! This bathroom also had a vaulted ceiling which made it almost impossible to put in a fan. Because of this, we constantly got water dripping from the ceiling after one of us took a shower. Pretty yucky. So, my dad closed off the ceiling (making it flat), put in a new shower, and is going to be putting in new floors (tile). Today he also added crown molding and a new window casing. It is starting to look amazing!!! I can't wait for it to be completed. Oh...we're also painting the bathroom and also the master bedroom. Lance has been dying to paint our bedroom since we moved in 2 years ago. My dad has done an amazing job! We're so lucky that he is willing and able to do this for us. We're really grateful!

Lance has been doing well lately. Some of you might already know, but for those of you who don't, we think that he may be dealing with seasonal affective disorder. It has been apparent for the last few years that something with him changes during the winter months, but this year has been especially hard. After both of us did a little research, we have decided that SAD fits him better than anything else. (Depression didn't end up fitting him at all). The lightbulb moment for me came when I would come home from work after dark and he would have almost every light on in the house and he told me that it "made him feel better". He has had a few bad days but mostly good ones. According to the websites that I visited, it said that SAD usually starts in October or November (his started in early November) and lasts throughout the winter months. So, hopefully come February or early March, he'll be feeling more like himself.

We're making some progress with Oliver (the cat) and Willy (our inside dog). We knew that it would take a while to get them used to each other, but lately, Oliver has shown that he is no longer afraid of the dog. In fact, yesterday he was so comfortable with him that he decided to fall over on his back with his bell exposed and started to clean himself. All this while Willy was only 3 feet or so away from him. Lance has said that a couple of times, they have played "kissy-face" (as he likes to call it) and will go out of their way to greet the other one. One step at a time, but we're definitely making progress.

I've decided that in the next week or so, I'm going to be buying a stationary bike. It is really hard for me to go on walks with Lance and Argos as my back starts to hurt like crazy after about a half a mile. Last summer I was told that I had a bulged disk in my lower back, so I'm sure that's contributing. I know that I need to do a bit more exercising and since I don't go to the gym anymore, I thought this might be a good investment. Lance and I went the other day and picked one out that we like. I got a few gift cards and some money for Christmas, so they will cover most of the cost to buy it. I'm really excited and can't wait to use it!

I think that's pretty much it for now. Our Christmas pictures didn't turn out this year, so I don't really have anything to post. Please check out our Christmas video below if you haven't already! Lance will be in the next one...I promise!