It's a Fine Life

Wrapping up a week of holidays. Everyone has been sick with a cold except for me. The kids are very stuffy nose, coughing, etc but I have been diffusing eucalyptus oil the last 2 days and that stopped them from coughing.

Christmas was really lovely although the kids finished unwrapping their gifts in about 20 minutes, and I tried new recipes for both breakfast and dinner and neither one worked out according to plan. Still, a great day and nice to be at home together.

Cousins came to visit on Friday and we had a really good visit and dinner.

Last night was New Years Eve and we watched Newsies (the Broadway version) on Netflix and now Carrying the Banner is stuck in my head. We let the kids stay up til midnight and I was able to tune in the Beat Bugs countdown about a minute before midnight. Libby and Mae knew it was a real countdown, because right at midnight someone started shooting off fireworks, so they could hear the loud booms and they were very excited.

Today we did our New Years resolutions, which I just love to do. This year we did them as a family, although many of the resolutions are just for me or for Mike. We were going for 19 resolutions, so we could call it "19 for 2019", but I believe we ended up with 30. They are not all fascinating, but here we go (some are business secrets and I left those off the list here):

1. Meet with tax accountant to plan 2019 because I know there were some tax changes in 2018 and I think I'm too late to change anything for 2018, but could use advice for 2019. I will still be our accountant because I know WAY too many people who have burned by their tax accountants. 
2. (ownself) Read at least 1 novel and 1 non-fiction book per month. To further keep myself accountable I will take book notes on the non-fiction book and post them here.
3. Watch at least 1 classic movie each month. I'm defining "classic" as 1970s or older.
4. Mike put this one in: Family game night at least once a month.
5. Go whale watching.
6. Go to Seattle (Mike's idea).
7. Book one more night on hotels.com because we're only one night away from our free stay.
8. Go camping.
9. Fill the freezer with freezer meals.
10. Schedule and complete Libby's 3rd grade exam.
11. Mike attend at least 2 local networking events.
12. Use our dental insurance. This year we all have dental insurance.
13. Mike and I to do our 23andMe DNA tests and check if we have the Alzheimer's allele.
14. Mike to do a Y-DNA test.
15. Plan our 2020 vacation. We are doing Mayflower 2020 and so need to do some detailed planning for the New England area.
16. Set up a record player. I have a record player, but the speakers are terrible, and I need to fix the situation.
17. Set up Mae's YouTube channel.
18. Arrange for Libby to play Minecraft with her cousins.
19. Go to Great Wolf Lodge for New Years Eve.
20. Eat fish twice a week. Expand this one to a superfood checklist for kids and adults.
21. Mae participate in a piano recital.
22. Mae requested: set off our own fireworks on July 4th.
23. Cardboard racing in the summer. The kids put that one in. It's like sledding, only instead of a sled you slide down a hill on a big piece of cardboard.

There are 7 more that are business secrets at this time. So I guessed right, we have 30 for 2019.