2020 Year End Wrap Up

<<< Flip Back

• January ~ Boring
• February ~ Bought a CR-V for hubby
• March ~ COVID-19 quarantine, bookshelves! Hubby laid off, I turn 52
• April ~ more bookshelves!, projects galore, had many trees come down (on purpose)
• May ~ new grandbaby!, hubby goes back to work
• June ~ Trip turns 21
• July ~ trip to Ohio, 2 yr anniversary of dad's death, George turns 35, hubby COVID positive
• August ~ Hubby lands a new job
• September ~ adjusting to hubby's new job, Anna turns 23, hubby turns 52
• October ~ Kyle turns 20, Halloween!
• November ~ The Neverending Election
• December ~ room renovations, organization, and...Christmas!

Page Forward >>>

•  January ~ All about Organization ~ Cupboards, closets, drawers, house, sheds. And omg, my filing cabinet. Okay, so this was also last year's, but some of it still needs done. Hopefully our skylights will finally come in (we got on the wait list in November!) and we can get the old leaky ones replaced. Also, need to start looking for a car to replace the Accord we got rid of this year. 
• February - December ~ I'm just going to wing it. I do know we will be building a garden shed and raised beds for vegetables. Other than that? Yeah, winging it.

--- AVR News Update ---

On the Home Front: It's been quite the year. Between COVID and that piece of shit tRump it's been a stressful year. The kids and I loathe him and apparently my husband thinks he's the greatest thing since orgasms. We do not discuss politics because he believes all that right wing bullshit and I just don't understand why. Anyway, that's been stressful. Moving on...

We've been super busy with projects this year. We finally built bookshelves in the Exterior Library that we started in 2010. We put up plywood over the studs then built bookshelves. A lot of bookshelves. And they are big. As we built, we unboxed books and shelved them to make room. The consequence is the books are in no kind of order. So that will possibly be a project for when it's warmer out. We'll also need to start a new database since we lost ours when my PC took a shit back in 2015.

We also had some trees taken down. About a dozen of them. Mostly pines but a twin poplar that had rotten crotch and a tree we called the Buttcrack Tree because it looked like it had a buttcrack. That tree was left standing when the builders did the house 20 yrs ago and I have no idea why. It was structurally unsound and worried me every time we had a bad storm. When the guys came out to take down the pines I said let's get rid of that thing now. Good thing we did. Inside was full of water and it was rotten and hollow for about 8 feet up. It was only a matter of time before that fucker landed on the house or a vehicle. The buttcrack part was saved though. LOL We built firewood racks for the split wood and there is no way 3 of them are going to be enough. Need to figure out where to put more of them.

I've burnt a shitton of brush and hubby is still cutting up the trees with his chainsaw. He converted his old Ford tractor from 6 volt to 12 volt and it started right up (yay!) then blew the head gasket. Oops. To be fair the old head gasket is ancient. Seriously ancient. So we need to fix that. A project for 2021. Like we need more. lol

We built shelves for my laundry room. I've only wanted them for 20 yrs. So, yay! Hubby built a table for the living room because Trip was using 2 tv trays to hold his laptop and various crap. It looked like shit and took up too much room. He stained the new table with the black walnut stain we made ourselves last year. It looks nice! But I need to go over it again and then varnish it because it's gotten some condensation drops on it and faded the stain. Should have varnished it when it was built. Oops.

We have replaced all of the appliances except the dishwasher which is only 5 yrs old and the hot water heater which is 20. So, new washer, dryer, and stove. Then we got rid of the kitchen fridge, the laundry room fridge, and the small chest freezer and replaced them with a bigger fridge for the kitchen (with a drawer which is so fucking awesome!!) and for the laundry room, an upright freezer and mini fridge. Omg, I love them so much. All of them. Our appliances were ancient and I saw an ohmprovement (hehe) in the electric bill the very next month. We also bought a new loveseat and couch to replace the 19-yr-old, cat-scratched, screws-falling-off-every-time-we-moved-them ones we had. So nice!  

We welcomed a new grandson in May. Oliver Kol was born and we waited to see him until we felt it was safe. Kyleigh and Boone spend the night at Grandma & Grandpa's Fun Camp at least once a month, but we'll wait until next month to start having Oliver over, too.

In July we debated about traveling to Ohio with COVID running rampant, but it wasn't as bad then as it is now and we went. We wore masks and practiced good hand washing and all that jazz. We saw hubby's family in Southern Ohio and my family in Northern Ohio and had a 4th of July picnic outside in honor of dad. But a week and a half after coming home hubby had a high fever and exhaustion, so he got tested. Came back COVID positive so the rest of us got tested, but we were all negative. So he must have some how picked it up from someone at the club since some customers were belligerent about wearing masks in the club. Who really knows?

We bought hubby a 2016 CR-V in February and the gas mileage savings is such a relief. His 98 Ford Ranger is a gas hog and the 97 Accord had some issues we decided not to fix. So it's gone and I need to vehicle hunt for a replacement. He started a new job in August (he says he misses the bare breasts at the Gentleman's Club and I'm like, who wouldn't? lol) and it's a bit further than the old job. Plus this job has more $$ per hour, health benefits, and 401K. So, after 9 yrs in the Marines, 25 yrs in manufacturing, and a year at a Gentleman's Club, he's back in manufacturing. lol

In...October? I can't fucking remember. lol A bracket in our closet shelving pushed through the wallboard (because the builders are so fucking shitty they didn't make sure it was on a stud so after 20 yrs of weight it went boom) causing the long shelf to tilt and things fell down. Luckily only 1 Christmas knick knack suffered a broken arm which I healed with super glue. So...we completely rebuilt the shelving in our walk-in closet with wood. I had no idea how much shit we had in there!! No, seriously. HOW?! Anyway it took a couple of weeks due to waiting for the shelving pipe pieces, but we got it all organized and I LOVE IT!

In November Anna and Alex talked about renting a place until they could buy a home, but I said that's a waste of money. So they weighed the pros and cons of living here or with his parents while they saved money and our place came out ahead by a bit. So, Alex will be moving in, probably next week. In the meantime, Anna and I have been rearranging the spare room (AKA the cat room) and her room as well as configuring a new bigger bed and taking out her twin loft bed. That also meant getting rid of the treadmill and the elliptical which made me kinda sad even though I haven't used them in forever. Sorting through all the crap in that room and the closet (which I don't think I've been in for a decade or more) took a LOT of time, effort, and chaos. But it's mostly done now and things are shaping up around here. We just need to build his desk and figure out where he's going to put his mini fridge.

Fuck. I had no idea how much change we had this year until I started doing this post. Despite such a shitty year in general we've been really blessed and we know and appreciate it.

We have a long list of projects for 2021. I wonder how many we'll get done? I also wonder what happened to my nice quiet boring life? Stay tuned for next year's wrap up to see how much we managed to accomplish.

Touching Nature: Lots of rain this year. Or so it seemed. No hurricanes affected us. Weather has been not too bad, considering. It got way too warm in Februay and confused the daffodils. They bloomed and then it got below freezing for a week and fucked them all up. So I didn't have much of a crop this year.

Book News: I read 111 books. I have 4 of those reviews left to write. 25 of those books were from book tours with The Write Reads. I raised my NetGalley ratio to 94%. I only have 9 books left on my shelf there. I got bluetooth headphones for Christmas (from my wish list hallelujah), so now I can sync it to my newest Fire and listen to audios! WOOT!

Don't Touch That Dial!: The Mandalorian! We watched the entire DVD collection of Perry Mason. Other than that, I've pretty much got nothing.

At the Flicks: None

Cyberspace Playground: I bought an iPad to Facetime with mom and I found a jigsaw app that I LOVE. I use it every day.

Randomness:  We have a long way to go.

Carol's Nuggets of Wisdom: 

1. You do what you can when you can and keep on keeping on.

2. If you are house hunting and the realtor website only has one photo, you can pretty much guarantee the house is a shitfest and you should run far away from it.

Nuggets that I say all the time and they're from my dad: 

1. If you get a tool out put it away and make sure it is clean when you do. 

2. If a job is worth doing, it's worth overdoing. 

That's it for me. AVR News Update signing off. May all your books enthrall you.

∞ Shelf Additions ∞

From the library

Only 1 this year, mostly because I have so many already and because of COVID restrictions the library was closed for a time.

Physical books

We did go to a modified Friends of the Library book sale this Fall (to accomodate COVID restrictions) and picked up many many books. I also purchased Peace Talks and Battle Ground by Jim Butcher and rec'd BtVS: The Watcher's Guide Vol 2 for Christmas. I also donated to Bad Ass Moms and rec'd a physical copy. And I rec'd a couple for review.

Tour Books

25 of them!

Review Requests

Probably about a dozen, but for the most part I've been working on the back log.

Kindle Unlimited

I still have a subscription and I've been using it. A lot!

Tried several new-to-me authors with it.

I went with the discounted 6-month special this month,

so I'll have it until June then I may scrap it.

Freebies

I cut back again. A lot.