Feliz Nuevo Ano!

After taking Spanish in both h.s. and college sometimes I feel the need to test out my rusty memory! I don't know how or where to find the appropriate foreign language punctuation on my computer so that will have to be all for my Spanish speaking today!

Anyway, it is the 3rd day of the new year already! Yee haw! Blonde rascal and I got back from Houston yesterday evening. We had a good time relaxing with family. Much to my delight the weather in Houston was nice....completely bearable...no humidity...I did not have to wear shorts!!! Blonde rascal was inundated with more presents, his every whim was indulged by his grandparents (he is the only grandchild on my side of the family) and Aunt Jill let him loose on her laptop. He found the onboard camera....

The picture captures the end of the holidays, ate too much, worn out, sugar high, tired & silly feeling perfectly! This would be blonde rascal and I with my Dad and sister. Blonde rascal requested that this picture make its debut on my blog. So there it is for all the world, well ok all 3 of you readers, to see!

Today I am feeling motivated to finish getting the decorations down, make the house sparkly clean, do laundry...get back on track for the real world. School does not start again until Tues. so we still have a few more precious days of down time.

I got in trouble in my previous post for not showing my gift from hubs. I am such the amateur photographer and a ring is a hard thing to capture, but here it is...

It was a complete shock of a gift. Hubs now has a "out of the doghouse" pass for at least 12 months, heck maybe even more!
It is a sweet and beautiful gift...I love that man I tell you!

So, resolutions. I don't like resolutions. I mean if you need to change something, just do it, don't put it off until January 1st for crying out loud! I do like the clean slate feeling of the new year though. One of the things I want to work on is my house! I have been a FlyLady follower in the past and sort of fell off the wagon. I am not anal about it and don't read 10,000 of her emails daily, but if you follow her basic principle then the house miraculously is perpetually neat and fresh. It really saves a lot of time and eliminates the one dreaded awful full day of cleaning.

We took an opportunity to help someone out this Christmas. Not anything earthshattering by any stretch of the imagination, but we knew of a small need and anonymously blessed someone. That was the best feeling. I thought why just do this during the holidays? We can bless people all year long. Just simply giving of our time, friendship, or cooking a meal for someone, sending a card... any random act of kindness. It is so easy, but I tend to get caught up in my own life. I want to give more of myself this year. I may start with making some simple quilts to donate to the women's shelter or CPS.

Another area I want to work on is our yard and patio. It is a bit of a challenge as we live in an area that is dry, windy and dusty. But if I stick with the local flora and fauna it will be simple! I really like simple and cheap! I want to make our patio a usable area. We have speakers mounted and a ceiling fan on the patio...both of which these damn little finches have taken over. Now don't scream at me...I love the little finches, they are adorable! But they build nests on top of the speakers and perch on the ceiling fan both of which lead to...poop! Everywhere you look is bird poop and that my friends is disgusting and so NOT sanitary. This is the year of me taking over the patio! The speakers have to come down, we didn't use them anyway, and the fan has to be replaced with a light fixture. I am through with bird poop! I hope the little finches take that hint...or I may have to use more drastic measures!!!!