2026

For some reason I keep writing 2027, instead of 2026.  Maybe that's because I'm sort of getting lost with all these years, ya know?  They just keep coming at us, one after the other.  Time is relentless!

This morning we woke up and Mom was prepping the house for a visit from Nana and Ye-Ye.  We had the Rose Bowl Parade on the television, and as a reminder to myself next year:  the footage from the "Tournament of Roses" channel is much, much better than the one on NBC.  We watched the two, and of course NBC has commercials and so forth, the end result being that you can see a whole lot more on the other channel.  Anyway, moving on, we saw the parade, by gum!  Nana and Ye-Ye were here, and we had all kinds of good coffee, and there was light eating over on the counter - sliders, shrimp cocktail, and bowls for Mom's excellent potato soup, with all the toppings nearby.  It made for a really nice morning together.  We sat and relaxed and talked about their recent trip to Louisville to see this incredible underground light show, and their viewing of a huge bird migration up that way.  

Eventually, Nate came over to say hello and stayed for a while.  The two of them were doing puzzles and playing games of course, starting the New Year off with fun.  It was a quiet day.  We're still taking down decorations and so forth, getting things cleaned up for the new year.  It's going to be a good one, I hear!

We got some new ornaments for the tree!  I know that sounds ridiculous after the fact, but the sale was pretty good and there was this one ornament I really wanted to add.  Mom and I are big fans of the Disney's Electrical Parade, and so we were pretty excited to see another part of the parade, this one being Goofy on a locomotive engine all decked out in lights.  I have it plugged in right next to the one with Mickey and Minnie on it.  Press the buttons on both of these and Mom and I start tapping our toes to the theme song.

We also got a Guardians of the Galaxy ornament, as that's been a small theme this holiday season - this one is Cosmo and Groot.  Groot is about to throw a stick, which is funny because... he's a stick.  Anyway, we wound up with a lot of new ornaments this year, some patriotic ones, a few new "Emperor's New Groove" ornaments, a cruise ornament, the yearly KidPak ornament, a handmade one from Emma, and a Dollywood one courtesy of Maddie.  

Lots of memories!  And looking back on the holiday season, it's been a good one with plenty of happy occasions.  2026 will be filled with even more.  We're looking forward to adding another cruise ornament to the tree this year, but we're starting things out quietly today.  I think our next outing is Saturday with something fun that night.  We were worried that the hockey league's strike would last into this week, but fortunately it got resolved and we'll be heading to a Gladiators game this weekend.  Tomorrow, we're back to work, gearing up for a new series at KidPak.  In fact, we were working on that some today, getting music together, getting slides and costumes together, and just getting our act together! 

Tonight we watched "Wicked" again, mainly because we'll be seeing the sequel probably tomorrow night.  The last time we saw this movie was New Year's Eve about a year ago.  But technically, it was two years ago, right?  2024-2026?  Anyway, it's a good movie, and very well may start out our Oz-fest this year.  Ever since that museum, I've been wanting to see the Oz movies again, and starting out with the two-part "Wicked" series is a good way to start.   

We've had more birds on the feeder out there, more pictures of visiting friends.  It's a fun little device, snapping pictures of bluebirds, mourning doves, and many others.  It does short videos of them as well, which is pretty fun.  You can check in on the camera from time to time and watch it live, although it's a bit choppy at the moment.

We closed out the night with some reading and of course prayers.  It's a soft-opening for 2026, a quiet day for us, and a slightly restful one.  Slightly!