Hello, 2026!

The girls actually let us sleep until about 9am today, which was very much needed. Not because we had a wild New Year’s Eve last night or anything, since I personally fell asleep in the recliner before midnight even hit 😉 We had some cereal for breakfast, then turned on a Jonas Brothers playlist on YouTube on the tv, and did some cleaning around the house.

We spent a lot of time in Emerson’s room, cleaning out the drawers in her dresser, setting aside the too-small clothes to save for Addison, and getting things tidied up again. She found this little paper hat she made at school, put it on to wear for a while, and then once I took pictures, we decided we didn’t need to save it forever. It was very cute though.

Ok then there were about six un-photographed hours of lunch, nap, cleaning, playing and laundry. Sometime right before lunch time, I put a pork loin with sliced onions in the crock-pot. Then at dinner time, I got out my brand new rice cooker my mom got me for Christmas, and microwaved a can of black-eyed peas, and everything was ready to go. The rice cooker has been on my wish list for a while, and I was glad to get one. It was super easy and the rice came out perfect and delicious.

We watched some of “Abominable” while we ate dinner, and both girls ate really well. We could hear people setting off fireworks outside, so the girls put on some layers and went into the backyard, hoping they could see it. It was all too hidden off behind the trees up the hill, so they couldn’t see, but they could hear, and Addie still thought that was pretty cool.

Addie needed a snack when she got back inside, so Jeff got her the last of the black-eyed peas warmed up again, and she climbed up to sit criss-cross applesauce on the coffee table to eat them. Then, both girls helped me with the puzzle for a few minutes, before getting started on bedtime.

They had stayed up a little later than their usual bedtime, so both were super sleepy and fell asleep very quickly and easily.

We did in fact finish the puzzle tonight, which was good, since I had wanted to do it before Christmas, and obviously didn’t. So I have this giant list of big cleaning projects/chores I want to do over the next couple of months, and I put “finish the puzzle” on the list, so that would be one easy thing to cross off 😉

One of the other things on my January 2026 chores list was to clean Emerson’s room, so I get to check that off today already too, since we finished up in there right before dinner time tonight.

Love that we had a chill, but also productive first day of the new year. We plan to do more around the house over the long weekend, and see what else we can check off our list. I want to go into the new year with the house as clean and tidy as we can. But I’m also looking forward to a few more days just spent hanging out with our little family, and visiting the grandparents another time or two as well.