HELLO 2020

I usually hate New Year's Eve, because I never know what to do. Thankfully, I have a friend who says...let's do something. So the Douglas crew came over to help us ring in the new year. Having an official party meant that we had to go and get some decor because...obviously pictures!

We had dinner, we took pictures, we rang in the new year a few hours early for the kids. We used confetti poppers and sparklers to make it more thrilling. Cali slept over and so those two were still awake to say Happy New Year for real. It was a fun little night.

 Reflecting back on 2019 this far into 2020 is a bit tricky. But 2019 was a hard and beautiful year for me personally. It was the year I started truly taking accountability for my own life. No more blaming a certain someone for the struggles in my world. It was a transformative time. Thankfully, my insane self esteem made it easy to look inward and really analyze the ugly parts of myself that I didn't love. The main ugly part being, my reactive behavior. Taking ownership of how you feel and act...in a true and for real way is pretty empowering.  I am grateful for the growth that will help me face future challenges, and help me be a better mom.

Right before it was officially 2020, Christy and I got on the phone to purchase some plane tickets to Long Beach for a February visit to Disneyland. It seemed wild and reckless at the time, but I am so glad we did that. We could have had not idea what 2020 was going to look like as we cheered and celebrated on New Year's Eve. Every year is full of so much joy and blessings bu this has been a challenge to say the least.

THE NIGHT OF CHRISTMAS

On Christmas night we went over to my parent's house for dinner and a few gifts. We didn't have Ava and Finn, and that is always a bummer. It wasn't a ton of gifts which was good and it was a nice time. I got stuck on this post as well because of the pictures of Brent being asleep and I didn't know how to handle this post because this made me so irritated. I'm playing it off as a joke in these photos, but really I found it so absolutely rude how he would just check out from people when ever we got with anyone. Usually my family, but his as well. Here we are in this small space sharing the joy of Christmas and our girls are opening gifts and he's decided to not participate. It's been my reality for five years now, and I'm tired of ignoring it on my blog. Maybe one day I'll change it, but for now this is how I'm posting about the evening so I can move forward and get caught up again.

I do love my family so much and I am so grateful for their support always.

CHRISTMAS MORNING 2019

I'm so behind. I swear it is almost Christmas again. But it is unsettling how much I can't get done when life is in a bit of a crisis. Anyway, thankfully we have video footage of this day so I can remember some details of our Christmas morning 2019.

The girls came down and grabbed their stockings. Vivi was thrilled and squealed with delight over every item in her stocking. Vivi got real excited about the wrapped gifts from Santa and gave them a hug. She started to open them and got yelled at poor darling. But she recovered. She was adorable as she opened her presents. She was the perfect age. So thrilled. So joyful. 

 

Stella was adorable and happy as well. Both girls got plenty of things they technically didn't need. I took both Stella and Vivi on special adventures to get their dad a gift. Stella gave him lots of different chocolates, and Vivi got him a new key chain to hold oil for blessings. Stella got a new internet-less phone...that was probably her favorite. I can't say what Vivi's favorite might have been since she seemed to love each gift equally.  

But the real question on everyone's mind, was would Santa hear Vivi's last minute request for a Boxy girl? Turns out his magical powers prevailed and he was able to get one to our house in the nick of time. Whew...so glad that worked out. 

After we took our traditional paper toss photos, Brent surprised me by blindfolding me and taking me to the computer to reenact his proposal to me back in 2003. He played the song he wrote and then presented me with a key to his new car. And I cried and cried. It was a symbolic act since when he bought the car he was planning on it only being his. I was a super thoughtful and romantic gesture. One of the reasons I'm stuck on the blog is that he moved out a month ago, and writing about that moment makes me very sad. If only it had been that easy to give me a key to his car and everything could go back to those early days of when we first met.

The rest of the day was spent hanging out. Stella was giving everyone her new phone number, Brent was helping Vivi put all the stickers on her new Barbie plane, and I was eating sugar cookies for breakfast.