Nadine

Before I get this started, shout out to Laura!!!! Today is her birthday! Happy Birthday!!! Yet another celebration we have to make up for thanks to this pandemic.

Well here we are, 2021. I am relieved that we made it through 2020…but also terrified of what the new year has to bring. I feel like everyone just thinks because the calendar year changes over, everything is going to be ok. In reality, nothing has changed from this week to last except the holidays are over and we are back to reality. Probably even more reality in another week or so when the cases rise again with all the get togethers that have occurred over the last two weeks.

I have mentioned before, I am coming in to this year with zero expectations. I was never really one to set new years goals anyways. Every year, I tend to get back on the healthy eating bandwagon after riding the sugar dragon through the month of December. I am doing the same starting this morning. Luckily, I kept up with my workouts through the month of December, so I am good on that front for once!

New Years Eve came in quietly over here. I worked most of the day, actually. I made sweet and sour meatballs, pasta salad and seven layer dip for us to snack on. Chris and Zoe had a dance party while I finished up a few work things, then we all hung out downstairs for a little while.

We had purchased tickets to virtual Tomorrowland, so after Zoe went to bed we poured some drinks and pulled that up on our projector in the basement. Laura and B had gotten tickets as well, so her and I texted some through the beginning of it. It was almost like we were watching it together.

The graphics were insane!!! They definitely made some improvements from the virtual they hosted earlier in the year. Chris and I both agree though that the energy is off and it just isn’t the same as streaming it live in a normal year with real people. After a few hours, we switched over to just watching our usual music videos and calling it a night.

New Years day was all about football, Roll Tide Roll!!!!! We made some BLT Burgers for lunch. I made a special sauce and guac to go on top of them from the Celebrations cookbook. (I get a lot of amazing recipes from here. Lots of gluten free, dairy free options.)

I made sausage balls, black eyed peas, hot dogs and sourkraut to snack on for the games. We watched the Tide take on Notre Dame, and Ohio State kill Clemson.

Saturday morning I was at it early taking down all the Christmas decor. It took me about a week to put up, and just a few hours to take all down and put away. Usually I am tearing it down on December 26th, but this year I wanted to enjoy it for a few more days. This is the longest we have ever had it up. I loved all the joy it brought, but this past week it just made me sort of sad. The holidays are over and we are entering a new year that we have no clue what it will bring. Normally we are in Gatlinburg after Christmas with Chris’s family, and it was sort of depressing to not get to do that. Zoe mentioned a few times that she remembered being up there last year and when can we go back. I think she just wants to go to the arcade again, lol. That was her favorite thing to do.

We did get to play several rounds of Zingo and Monopoly Junior. We have a sore loser on our hands. Zoe is super competitive, but watch out if she loses a round. I am not the parent to “let her win” or let her make up rules. I am trying to teach her out to be a team player and win with grace. How do you teach those things? Any tips? It is rough when she loses. Really rough.

Chris and I took care of winterizing the landscaping around the house, cutting down some tree branches and finally cleaning out our garage and organizing the attic spaces. I did so much heavy lifting on Saturday that I was sore as hell and could barely move Saturday night, and most of yesterday. We did manage to get a few more good meals in. I made cheesy chicken and brussels Saturday for lunch, some baked ziti for dinner, and homemade chicken enchiladas for dinner last night.

I feel really accomplished having all that done, our house back to normal, and I worked both Saturday and Sunday morning to keep myself floating this week. The end of the year is always insane in my world at work, but I am hoping we keep the momentum going. We have a lot to make up for after the several slow months in 2020.

I am working on what I want to do going forward with nutrition in 2021. I don’t want to do a keto diet, or anything that isn’t sustainable long term. It wreaked so much havoc on my body last year. I have been doing lots of research and watching lots of YouTube videos lately. Definitely going for more whole foods, avoiding processed things. Trying to eliminate white sugar white flour, more veggies, more meatless meals, etc. Do you have any nutrition goals that you are working on right now? How do you feel going into 2021?

Oh 2020. You were a weird one, that is for sure. I can sit here and talk about all the ways that I hated 2020. All of the things we missed out on, the things that were taken from us, the people taken from us. The fear, hate and bickering that was brought upon us from the media and each other. But I don’t think any of us have the energy for that anymore.

Instead, I want to remember the good I saw in 2020. How much extra time I got to spend with Zoe this year, that I would never have had in a normal year. Working from home, not having to put on real clothes and drive 45 minutes to my office was lovely. Even though every last bit of my sanity might be gone trying to juggle my job with my kid at the same time. My alcohol consumption has definitely increased this year, not going to lie.

It was nice to see people rally behind local restaurants and stores, doing everything to try to keep them swimming in an unprecedented year. I just keep thinking about how local business owners worked so hard to make their dreams come true, only to have this year shit all over them. I hope that curbside pickup sticks around, it is a lovely concept.

This year we baked a lot of banana bread, resurrected tie dye, started saying words like quarantini and had drive way parties and birthday parades. The it accessory was a facemask and the most purchased items were hand sanitizer, clorox wipes and toilet paper.

I am not completely mad about this year. Chris and I probably had more “date nights” than normal, since we would go downstairs after Zoe went to bed, pour some drinks and listen to music a few times a week. We really settled in to our new home and made it work for maximum comfort. I got my home office set up, we purchased outdoor furniture back in the spring, Zoe got a big girl bed, we became holiday blow-up yard decor people, we enjoyed Christmas for an extra month. We found a reason to celebrate all the little things and had daily parties of Zoe’s chosing. This year definitely made us all slow down some.

I read more books than I had originally intended and watched way less TV. Zoe and I have mastered some moves in Just Dance. We walked and walked and walked. I really love to walk. My fitness was on point all year, finishing out the last day with a hard AF workout this morning. Even if my nutrition went to shit the last two months. I will pick myself up, dust myself off and start back better on Monday.

Of course. OF COURSE. 2020 has to go out with a bang, as we are predicted to have bad weather tonight. I am really excited that we purchased virtual tickets for Tomorrowland 31.12.2020 and hope that we can just enjoy that and not have to turn on the news to stay weather alert. Ugh.

I don’t know what 2021 has in store for us. I am going to enter it quietly with no expectations and hope for the best. I am going to give others and myself more grace, and just take it day by day. It has been one hell of year, and it has taken an incredible emotional toll on all of us, if we realize it or not. I hope that we have all learned a few lessons to take in to 2021, and that we can all just be kinder and more tolerant of each other in general.

Christmas looked a lot different this year for a lot of us. I enjoyed the slow, lazy days at home in our jammies. It was nice not rushing off to be anywhere, and really soaking in our cozy home, all our decor, Christmas movies, good food, and letting Zoe just play with all her new stuff and not worrying about the mess everywhere. But I couldn’t help but think about how we should have been at Chris’s parents on Christmas Eve. Or that I should have cooked a Christmas dinner for my mom and sister and crew the weekend before. Or on Christmas Day, I kept thinking that usually Chris’s parents came over to see what all Zoe got, and then that evening we always went back to their house to see his brother and nieces that would come in from out of town that night.

This year I had an outdoor driveway Christmas with my mom, sister and two nephews the Saturday before. Laura and Sheff came over a few days before Christmas for a driveway Christmas party as well. It was only my second time seeing Laura in person all year. (The other time being when we celebrated Christmas, Zoe’s birthday and her birthday in January.) A damn shame, since we used to do lunch together weekly. Chris’s parents and sister dropped gifts for Zoe in our garage on Christmas Eve. We ended up doing Facetime calls with them while she opened her presents so they could see her.

Usually we have cinnamon rolls Christmas morning, but we made them Christmas Eve instead.

It was a real struggle to get Zoe to bed that night. She wanted to play with all her new stuff, and we got a late start on baking chocolate chip cookies for Santa. Because apparently Santa has to have chocolate chip cookies and not sugar cookies, according to Chris. Zoe was also really upset that she had to saw goodbye to Jerry. She went to bed sobbing, actually.

After all that, I came down to start laying out all the presents. It was a real chore to dig them out from all their hiding places. Some were out for Zoe to see for months and she had no clue. How am I going to swing this when she is older and more suspicious, I will never know! Also, I noticed that all the Santa cookies and milk had disappeared already. And I got none….interesting how that worked.

Christmas morning I was up early getting our breakfast stuff prepared. We had sausage pinwheels and hash browns, and the pinwheels have to sit in the fridge for at least an hour before cutting and baking. We waited and waited for Zoe to finally wake up around 7:30. She was shaking with excitement, upset that we told her she wasn’t allowed to come out of her room until we came and got her.

We played all day with all our new toys. Several rounds of Zingo, which is super fun! Even Chris and I have really enjoyed playing it. Zoe is a sore loser though, we need to work on that big time! I didn’t realize she was so competitive!

Chris had a blast (LOL!) putting together this LOL house. I think it was worth it in the end to see how excited Zoe was to play with it. It has an elevator, a pool, hot tub, flushing toilet, huge closet/makeup room, rooftop deck. Everything a little girl could want. Even a working lamp and disco ball!

Chris has been obsessed with Fuser for Xbox. You are basically a DJ spinning music for a Tomorrowland type of event. Since Chris was an actual DJ for years, he is like the master of this game and has been having so much fun with it. He has it hooked up to the projector downstairs for the full effect.

Our Christmas dinner menu was turkey breast, gravy, ham, macaroni and cheese, sweet potato casserole and green beans. We had plenty of sugar cookies, chocolate chip cookies, peanut butter snowballs and pizzelles for dessert. I also am carrying on my mom’s tradition of buying an assorted box of chocolates for Christmas every year. Zoe and Chris both seemed to enjoy that!

That evening, we snuggled in for some more Christmas movies and called it a day. Of course, some of our new friends had to accompany our movie party. And took up most of the couch.

Also needed to document my annual peppermint milkshake from Chick Fila!!!! I dont care how much sugar and calories is in this thing. It is pure Christmas magic and I must have one every year no matter what.

And that is a wrap on Christmas 2020. While I enjoyed all of the time with Chris and Zoe, I missed our family and friends and I really REALLY hope that next Christmas looks more normal. But this year we were healthy and safe in our home, and that is all one can really ask for in 2020, am I right?

For some reason, my posts are not showing up on Bloglovin anymore. 2020. Can’t catch a break! Anyways, we are here for reading….so let’s go!

When the year started, I set a goal of 52 books for the year. I forget what my goal was in 2019, I think it was around 75? Anyways, I don’t even think I got to 50 that year. I think a book a week when you are a full time working mom to a toddler is a lofty enough goal. As of today, I read 69 books for 2020! I know I will have the one I am currently reading finished in the next day or two, so I should close out with 70.

In a weird ass year, books were my escape and I tried to read them as much as I could. I can see scrolling through them, that I clung to fluffy romance and a lot lighter reads. Usually I am about half romance and half dark fucked up shit. 2020 was a scary enough story. So if you are looking for some William Shakespeare level reading, my list probably isn’t for you. What I can provide is some lovely love stories, and a few others that really stuck out to me that I have thought about often. This isn’t exactly the best books I read this year, but the ones I enjoyed and remember the most.

Linking up with Steph and Jana. Thanks ladies for your continued support of the reading community! It is by far the best day in blogging each month.

Romance

Shipped, If I Never Met You and Billionaire were all new to me authors in the romance department. Shipped is a debut novel that read like it was written by a pro, highly recommend. Christina Lauren is one of my favorites, and Unhoneymooners was my favorite of theirs I read this year. Tools of Engagement is the third book in a series that I started with, and went back to read the first two because I loved it so much.

Fiction

Layla is nothing like anything Colleen Hoover has ever written. It wasn’t necessarily the best book from her, but it blew my mind and I thought about it quite a lot after I finished.

I love Sally Hepworth, and The Good Sister is everything I expect in a novel from her.

Honorable Mentions

I only read a handful of nonfiction books this year. My favorite is definitely Jessica Simpson’s book. I just love her and everything she touches. I love how raw and honest she was in her book, and when she could have been awful and petty…she kept it classy.

When No One is Watching was really interesting. It took me a little while to get into, but once it grabbed me, I couldn’t stop. The pacing of the book is all sorts of off, but the actual story…wow.

I enjoyed the first two books of Elin Hilderbrand’s Paradise series and just got the third from the library and will start it later this week. I have really enjoyed this series and cant wait to see how it all wraps up.

My favorite Christmas read this year was Christina Lauren’s In a Holidaze. Though I will say I am reading The Twelve Dates of Christmas right now and quiet enjoying it. By the time I finish, it may be my favorite.

Have you read any of these books? What was your favorite from 2020?

These are easy and amazing. You only need a few ingredients and some time to chill, and you have perfection! We prefer white chocolate for these, but you could try milk or dark as well. When I make these for parties or holidays, sometimes I will get fancy and add some coordinating colored sprinkles to make them extra festive.

What You Need

1/2 cup creamy peanut butter

1 cup powdered sugar

3 tbsp butter, softened

1/2 pound white confectionery coating/white chocolate (The original recipe calls for 1 pound and it makes way too much, you could double the other ingredients and make a double batch or dip pretzels or peanut butter crackers in the remainder)

What You Do

-Line a baking sheet with parchment paper

-combine peanut butter, powdered sugar and butter, mix well

-Shape into 1 inch balls and place on lined baking sheet

-Chill for 30 minutes, or until firm

-Melt white chocolate coating in a bowl following package instructions

-Dip balls and place back on parchment paper to harden

This makes about 24 balls if you make one batch. Beware that they tend to disappear quickly once people realize they are there.