not necessarily in this order

  Well, we made it through the holidays! On the other side of New Year’s, I’m happy to “countdown” a few favorites from the Christmas —> New Year’s season! 4 advent calendars The Mr got a snack one with flavored nuts and meat sticks. It was good for the first 6 (varied nut mixes) and meh for the latter 6 (the same 3 meat sticks repeated.  LM got one of her favorite YouTuber’s Christmas advent which had 12 little plushies of some of the characters in holiday outfits. Now, as a Moriah Elizabeth forward family, there was some sadness with missing favorites, but overall a huge win and great for decorating LM’s pink tree.  I had a 24 day calendar with miniature versions of classic literature each day. It’s super cute - each one has a quote on the back and a loop from the spine so I’m going to make a garland for my office - and I may have squealed when I opened  Anne of Green Gables .  As a family, we also did the  Taskmaster  Advent calendar which was th...

  Day 2! And in-office day with a dance class and feelings at the end… 6:35   Alarm goes off. I deeply contemplate the in-office requirements that require me to wash my hair this morning, sigh. Randomly scroll of my phone. Regret not getting gas yesterday.   6:45   Quietly head into the bathroom to shower; hope I don’t wake Lil Momma up…   6:5X  Lil Momma comes in while I shower and asks to skip school for the rest of the week since she has state testing on Thurs and Fri. She leaves when I say no.   7:05  Get dressed, remember jewelry, grab my laptop to pack in my bag   7:10  Pour my coffee (the Mr. left me a nice setup!); make my smoothie; pack my lunch and backpack – all while the Mr. makes LM her breakfast.    7:25  Sit down with my coffee and chat with the Mr.   7:35   Start my car; head upstairs to brush my teeth, put on some make up, fluff my curls.   7:48   Leave a handful of minutes early to get...

What a week, what a week… I have been seeing all these memes about the audacity of people still sending emails and work tasks when it’s basically the limbo that is Christmas week into New Year’s and I feel like life doubled down to make it super real to me!     Work has been oof the past few days as I found out me (and a bunch of us) are  losing our assigned workspaces  in the office and need to be cleaned out by mid-January. I always knew it was a possibility, but such a bummer to hear about this of all weeks (and with no warning / appeal) (and right before my 10 days off) and have to communicate to 30+ unsuspecting folks I sit nearby. I mean, I have no intention of going  in 4 days  a week just to ensure I can be assigned a desk again, but it’s hard to deal with change when there’s no good reason. This all may be my hatred of packing, too, haha! There are worse things, but airing a small grievance felt right? Random penguin to transition into holiday top...

  It kind of is right on brand to not have any “hot goss” to spill (as my daughter refers to it) but have actual tea reviews to share, haha! But, two things from this week first to balance off the tea reviews below!   Lil Momma had   December recital   #1 of 2 last weekend! Her dance studio walked in a local parade and then she performed with her jazz and hip hop teams. It was pretty epic: for jazz, they did   the Heat Miser song   from   A Year Without a Santa Claus   (dressed as the Heat Miser) (they kind of looked like Beaker from The Muppets, which was amazing!) and for hip hop, they did a   remix of Ice, Ice Baby , a seminal song from my youth. LM has been walking around randomly saying “to the extreme!” for weeks and it was so great to see her having such a wonderful time dancing on the stage. I’m   back in the office 3 days a week   after being in and out of remote work since we lost my mom; I usually go in on Tuesdays and Th...

My Lil Momma and Luke both are creatures of routine and love Christmas something fierce. Although we have been challenged with a lot of life in recent November/Decembers, I do my best to rally the troops and focus on these rituals that they thrive on - even though giving up our nightly   Taskmaster   watching for holiday movies is making me a little Grinch-ish, sigh, haha. Last year, for the first time, I got each of us an advent calendar to brighten up our cold December mornings; mine was Marvel figurines, LM’s was Harry Potter figurines, and Luke’s was  A Christmas Story  figurines.  You might note the amount of figurines there… It was a lot. Just so many. And what do you do with them after?!?!!   This year, Luke has horror movie figurines and LM has rubber ducks (she felt so strongly pulled to them), but I decided to something different for myself:  a month-long tea trying adventure! Although I love tea and it’s part of my daily habits, I haven’t tr...