Last year was the year of letting things go.

Which is a BIG DEAL for me. I don’t just let things go.

I wrestle with them until they are shreds of scraps, and by then I have nothing left to wrestle with. So, I figure I’ll move on. I guess.

For instance, last year we finally got rid of old furniture we brought with us that fit in our home before just fine, but here they were large and cumbersome. Now, we have smaller furniture to fit in our smaller rooms, and we aren’t squeezing past dilapidated IKEA couches in order to get the laundry into the laundry room. Those days are OVAH!  We now have a charming gray loveseat with colored buttons, and it sits neatly *next to* the doorway, instead of covering the doorway.

Look at all this room for activities!!

Change. Change is good.

Last year I bootstrapped our homeschooling (again) and we have done everything that I wanted to do. We are creating, writing, studying cell biology, learning about world history, figuring out state history (which is nuts), and we are organized… we are on a darn-near military agenda…I say laughingly, since the military might also make their beds every morning. And not march in pajamas. And the marines probably finish their work quickly and don’t lose all their pencils by the end of the week….okay, okay. Maybe not “military grade” agenda, but it’s still an awesome agenda we have working!

I have started painting again, which I really didn’t think I’d get into any more…even though I think about it all the time. But at this point of my life I’m not nursing anymore, I’m not pregnant, I am officially out of toddler season since my youngest just turned 5, what, and things are pretty solid. So, I’ve painted a few things…and I love it just as much as I remember:

However, the word is my passion…and I am happy to report that I am over halfway finished with my second book of poetry.

And I am planning on finishing it and submitting it to publication and all that mess sooner rather than later.

This year I already have a load of plans and projects on our calendar.

The boys are building like crazypeople. They built some moving crane the size of a coffee table last month, are always putting together stop-motion videos, and have rearranged their bedroom and removed doors from their closet in order to fully utilize the space so they can have a better and more efficient work environment.

Just sayin’: they don’t get that from me.

The girls, on the other hand, are a beautiful chaos of creating, sewing, painting, drawing, ripping up, recreating and storytelling.

That’s from me 😉

I might actually need to clean my desk.

So what are we going to do this year?

Well, we have to wait until TOMORROW  to watch the Rose Parade, because they don’t do it on Sunday. I remember having this dilemma 7 years ago…

Otherwise:

A little of the foundational…exploring, inventing, discovering.

And a little of the new…we’ll see!