Category Archives: Family

A Big Family Day! (or A Birthday Party and Meeting Presley)

Posted on April 6, 2021 | Comments Off on A Big Family Day! (or A Birthday Party and Meeting Presley)

This past weekend was my nephew Rory’s first birthday! It’s so crazy to think that it’s already been a year since he was born, but then again it was one of the craziest years of almost anyone’s life with the pandemic. But even with the pandemic, I knew that there would be a small party for Rory to celebrate his birthday. Plus, we had to celebrate my niece Presley being born!

The birthday party was just going to be family. My parents and my sister-in-law’s parents have all been vaccinated. The day of the party was going to be 1 day before I was considered fully vaccinated (which is pretty close to being there). And my brother was vaccinated at the end of last year. So even though we all still have to be careful and cautious, this was a pretty safe gathering since everyone except my sister-in-law and the babies would be vaccinated.

I got to Santa Barbara as Rory was opening his gifts. He got a lot of really adorable things. I got him a set of fabric tents and tunnels that can be used by themselves or combined to make a bunch of different things. He seemed curious about them, but I’m sure the gift will be a bigger hit with him when he’s a little older. I think his favorite gift was the kid cleaning kit that my sister-in-law found for him!

I hadn’t seen Rory in a while, so I had no clue if he’d remember me or not. And he takes some time to warm up to people, so I knew that he might not want me to be super near him. And my guess was correct. He wasn’t upset by me being there, but he didn’t want me to hold him or help him with toys. But that was ok because I had my new niece to hold!

Presley is about 6 weeks old and she’s very tiny! And she stayed asleep almost the entire time I was there, so she was calm and quiet. I think she looks a little like Rory did when he was born. She’s got the same long fingers as Rory, so I wonder if they will both be piano players one day. And I thought she was super cute and adorable. Hopefully, the next time I’m in Santa Barbara she will be a bit more awake and alert. And I can’t wait to see what her little personality will be like.

The birthday party was a very low-key day. After Rory was done opening presents, my brother cooked burgers on the grill and we all ate lunch outside. It was fun getting to hang out with my family and I hadn’t seen my sister-in-law’s parents in a while. I was supposed to see them this past November, but I missed that trip to see everyone since that’s when I got vertigo. I haven’t had a lot of social time with people lately, so any meals I get to have with someone is great. And having it be with family makes it that much better!

And of course, Rory had to have a birthday cake. I joked that he was going to act like their cat and push the cake over the edge of his highchair tray. And that’s exactly what he tried to do! I don’t know if he was trying to get more frosting or what, but it was really silly. And of course, we all took a ton of photos of him with frosting all over his face. The cake wasn’t Cookie Monster themed, but I joked that the photos looked like he ate Cookie Monster.

And of course, I had to get a photo of Rory with my brother and sister-in-law.

After he was done smashing his cake and eating some of it, Rory was having a bit of a sugar crash and it was time for him to take a nap. Since he was going to be sleeping and Presley was still asleep, that pretty much was the end of the party. So I went with my parents over to the rental house they were staying at so I could see Tucker since he was at the house during the party.

Tucker was as silly and goofy as always. He is finally recovered from his knee surgeries, so it was great to see him running and bouncing around without him being in pain. But he also looked a lot older this time because he now has a ton of white fur on his face. It’s like he became an old man overnight! But he still has so much energy and he was so happy to see me there.

I spent some time hanging out with my parents and the dog outside before I headed out. I actually had something else to do that afternoon in Santa Barbara (more about that tomorrow).

I only spent a few hours with my family that day, but it was one of the best days I’ve had in a while. I don’t know how much more often I would be seeing everyone if we didn’t have a pandemic, but this past year has made me appreciate any family time I get at all. And I appreciate having anything to celebrate right now as well. So having 2 things to celebrate with my family really made the day that much better!

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I’m An Aunt Again! (or Welcome To The World Presley!)

Posted on February 24, 2021 | Comments Off on I’m An Aunt Again! (or Welcome To The World Presley!)

At the beginning of the pandemic, I became an aunt to my nephew Rory. When my sister-in-law was pregnant, my family had planned on being in Santa Barbara when my nephew arrived (not necessarily at the hospital, but nearby so we could meet him after he was born). Everything changed so fast and obviously, we couldn’t be there when Rory was born. And when my sister-in-law told me that she was pregnant again, I had hoped the pandemic would be done by the time the baby was born, but I had no clue if that would be possible.

I only got to see my family a few times since my nephew was born. And there weren’t any of the traditional celebration things for a new baby coming. There wasn’t a baby shower this time (although, that’s not always done for a second kid). But I did get my niece similar gifts to what I got my nephew (a few books and I custom made some bookplates). I wish we all could have celebrated my niece before she was born, but that’s just not the world we are currently in. But I still tried to celebrate virtually however I could.

As much as I would like to say that my niece was born at the end of the pandemic so they would be bookends of this weird time, I’m not sure this is exactly the end. But either way, my niece arrived last week! And it’s so exciting that she’s here!

She was born a little earlier than we all expected, but since my family knew we couldn’t be there when she was born, it was ok. My sister-in-law’s parents live near them, so they watched my nephew when my niece was born. And I guess I’m used to becoming an aunt during a pandemic because it seems very normal to me now that I won’t be meeting her for a little while. I should be able to meet her around my nephew’s first birthday (my family will be together again then), so I just have to be ok with the photos that are texted in my family text group. And I have to say that my niece Presley is super adorable!

I can’t wait to see Rory and Presley together and to see them bond as siblings. I’m sure there will be some adjustment time for Rory since he’s used to having all the attention. But soon, having a younger sibling will be all that Rory really knows and he will forget the first year of his life when he was an only child.

It’s crazy to me that a year ago, I technically wasn’t an aunt yet. And now, I have both a niece and a nephew! And while there hasn’t been much I could do with my nephew before (both because of the pandemic and because he was so little), I can’t wait until Rory and Presley are older and I can do some fun things with them. I already want to help be a part of their first trip to Disneyland and get them some cute Disney ears to wear! And I can’t wait to see what their personalities are like as they grow up. It’s going to be so fun to watch them get older, especially when it will be easier to see them and my family will be able to get together more often.

So many people in my life have had kids in the past year, and it’s been a bit weird to think they are being parents and I haven’t met their kids yet. It’s another element of the isolation of this pandemic that is hard to remember at times. I know I will get to meet all the babies eventually and will be used to my friends and family being parents, but for now, I don’t know if it’s totally hit me yet. But even if it doesn’t always feel real, I’m always so excited to hear someone else had their baby. And knowing that baby is my niece is just that much more exciting!

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Another Hangout Day With My Parents (or At Least I Wasn’t Dizzy This Time)

Posted on February 17, 2021 | Comments Off on Another Hangout Day With My Parents (or At Least I Wasn’t Dizzy This Time)

When my parents visited me in November, it was right after I was hit with vertigo. They weren’t originally supposed to come to LA to see me. I was going to go to Santa Barbara to see my parents as well as my brother, sister-in-law, and nephew. But because of my vertigo, I was stuck at home. And I’m so grateful that my parents took a day and drove down to see me so I didn’t completely miss spending time with them. But because I was so dizzy when they were here, we didn’t really do much. I spent most of the time on the couch trying to make the room stop spinning.

When they left, I wasn’t sure when I’d see them again. I knew I’d see them around the beginning of April when they will be in Santa Barbara again for my nephew’s birthday (and I’m planning on going up for that too). But I didn’t know if there would be another time they would be down this way before that. But they decided to go to Santa Barbara again this month because they wanted to spend time with my nephew (I don’t blame them!). They asked me if I wanted to come up for a day to see everyone, but now that I’m working again I can’t really do that. I could technically drive after work, but I wouldn’t have that much time before I would have to drive back home. So my parents said they’d come down to me again for an afternoon!

I really appreciate my parents making the drive to see me. While I’m close to Santa Barbara, it’s still not super close. It’s about 90 minutes of driving each way. And I know that when they come that also means it’s one less day that they get to spend with my nephew. I know they want to see me too, but it’s easier to stay in touch with me since I can be on the phone. So I just always am grateful when they take time out of their trip to Santa Barbara to come to LA. Plus, I know they don’t really love LA, so it’s even more special that they come here for me.

This time, they came after I was done with work so I didn’t have to worry about being too distracted when they arrived. We didn’t have much planned for the afternoon, but as always my dad and I had a few projects we wanted to work on. For example, there was an automatic light timer we installed when I moved into my house 11 years ago that no longer worked. But because it was hard-wired into my light switch, my dad didn’t want me to do anything on my own. So he helped me turn off my electricity and change the switch back to the standard one. There was also a cleaning tool holder I wanted to hang up and I knew we’d have to drill into my walls. And this decorative letter holder/key hanger I had by my front door happened to fall off right before their visit and because I used foam tape on it, it took some of my wall with it when it fell. So I had to get some stuff to fill in the walls.

Fortunately, most of the projects around my house went smoothly. We had a few glitches and issues, but nothing that was too difficult to fix. We also took some time between projects to all go for a walk around my neighborhood. My mom has gone for some walks around my neighborhood with the dog before (the dog wasn’t with them for this trip), but she usually goes a different way than I do when I take walks. So I took them on my route that I like to do and it was a nice and relaxing way to spend some time.

We also ordered dinner to be delivered and got a nice family meal from Tender Greens. It was a pretty huge meal with 2 giant salads and a lot of steak. But it was delicious and nice to have a family dinner together. I usually don’t have a lot of people over for dinner, so it was a rare moment that I had 3 people eating at my dining room table. But it was nice to do that and spend some time together as a family.

And getting to catch up was really good. Even though I don’t have a ton happening in my life, things have changed since they were here in November. I do have a new job and some new things coming up with my old jobs. I will be starting some new work with my data entry job very soon so I was updating them on that. And I’ve gotten a few updates about my box office job and the potential of that coming back in the next month or two. And I did get to tell them a bit more about my new job and what I do with each part of my job. And we talked about some medical stuff happening with me and how hopefully I’ll be able to get the vaccine soon (because of their age, both of my parents were able to be vaccinated already which makes me so happy).

I didn’t want my parents to stay at my house too late because they had to drive back to Santa Barbara that night and then they were driving home the next day. But I got to spend several hours with them and accomplish everything that we had on our list. Of course, it would have been amazing if we could have done more outside of my house, but that’s not really the best thing to do right now. But maybe by the next time they come to LA to see me, things will be different and we can do more out and about.

But even with being stuck inside my house most of the time and my parents only being able to be here for a few hours, I can’t explain how wonderful it was to have them spend time with me. I rarely see anyone these days. And the few people I do see tend to be employees at the few stores I go to. I almost had the most social week in a year between getting my hair done and seeing my parents. And while spending time with people does make me miss what life was like before, I also have learned to appreciate any moment I get to spend with people I love. And I hope that appreciation is something I remember for the rest of my life.

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Maybe I’m Too Good At Figuring Out Gifts (or At Least I Didn’t Already Buy It)

Posted on January 29, 2021 | Comments Off on Maybe I’m Too Good At Figuring Out Gifts (or At Least I Didn’t Already Buy It)

I’ve said it a few times before on here, but I love buying gifts for people. If I had more money, I would buy more gifts. I love figuring out the perfect thing to get someone. And I usually end up planning gifts almost a year in advance. I keep a running list of websites in a favorites tab of all the gifts that I want to get for people. And I get so much joy out of seeing someone’s face when I get them a gift that ends up being perfect for them.

A lot of the time, perfect gifts also end up not being the most expensive things. But I would like to be able to buy more extravagant things when I see gifts that are more expensive. But maybe because I have to work on a budget, that’s why I work so hard on finding gifts and feel so good when the recipient ends up loving them.

I tend to be better at buying gifts for people I’ve known longer, but that’s not really possible with my nephew. Then again, he’s a baby so he doesn’t have a ton of likes and dislikes. So I just have to find good baby gifts. I’m still so happy with the busy board that my dad and I built for him for his Hanukkah present. And as soon as my dad and I finished that project, I realized I needed to start working on what I was going to get him for his first birthday.

And I figured out the perfect gift right after that last visit. I wanted to get Rory a ball pit! I had seen a kiddie ball pit on someone else’s Instagram and they had posted where they bought it. I didn’t need to buy it right away, but I found the shop online and saved it to buy later.

I had told my parents what I was planning on getting for Rory and they loved the idea too. The ball pit had a bunch of color options and I discussed which ones I thought would be best and they agreed with me. I was so excited to find this gift and couldn’t wait to buy it and see his face when I gave it to him.

I was getting ready to purchase it because I knew it would take some time to get to me. I had it in my cart and ready to purchase, but I was going to finish the purchase a little later. And then I got a text from my brother and sister-in-law of Rory playing that day while it was raining outside.

They got him the exact same ball pit in the same colors that I was about to order! I couldn’t believe it! I was a little disappointed because I was so excited to Rory this gift. But also, it was so cute to see how much he was already enjoying it. And I took it as a sign that I was on the right track for what types of gifts would work well for him. But I obviously knew that I needed to work on finding a new gift for his first birthday.

I think I’ve figured out what I’m going to get Rory instead. I’m still super excited about the gift and I think it’s something that he will love. I also have been working on presents for my niece because she will be born in about a month! I’m getting my niece almost the same present that I got Rory when he was born. I’m finding some great books and also making custom bookplates. My brother and sister-in-law know that I’m getting my niece these as gifts, so my sister-in-law helped me decide on a few things for the bookplates so they match what her nursery will look like.

I think I’m going to see Rory around his first birthday, so I should be able to give him his gift in person. And hopefully he likes it as much as he enjoys the ball pit!

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Making The Month A Little Less Lonely (or Still Trying To Find Challenges To Do While Isolated)

Posted on January 6, 2021 | Comments Off on Making The Month A Little Less Lonely (or Still Trying To Find Challenges To Do While Isolated)

I got another Volt Planner for 2021, so I’ll be doing another year full of goal setting! I love using this planner for setting weekly, monthly, and annual goals as well as monthly challenges. I also use it to track my daily intentions and my gratitude list. It is a planner so I can track other things, but that’s what I mainly use it for. When I was able to work out at the Orangetheory studios, I would also use it for some workout tracking. But since I’ve been working out at home, I don’t really do that.

It really is the perfect planner for me and I’ve been using them for several years now. I keep all my old planners because it’s interesting to see what I’ve accomplished and how far I’ve come. My collection is pretty decent so far.

My monthly challenges used to be much more excited. But since we’ve had to isolate at home, they are not as grand and much more personal. For December, my challenge was to get myself ready for 2021. And I did a fair amount of preparation with things I wanted to do like getting different parts of my house organized. But the plan to prep was sidetracked a bit by getting a new job. I think that’s a very good excuse to be sidetracked. And in a way, getting a new job was preparing me for this year. I needed a new job so I wouldn’t be struggling as much. But there was some other stuff I wanted to do that I didn’t get a chance to, like doing some rearranging of things in my kitchen. But nothing I didn’t do was urgent so I can get them done this month.

And for this month’s challenge, I was a bit inspired by the idea of how we’ve all been isolated for so long. And being isolated at home doesn’t have to mean being completely isolated from the people you love. I know that I have been isolating myself more than I’d like to, but it’s what happened to me when I was feeling low. It’s so much easier for me to ask a friend to get dinner or hang out if I’m lonely compared to asking if we could have some sort of virtual hangout. But virtual hangouts are really all we can do (with few exceptions).

So my challenge for this month is to not isolate myself from my friends completely and to make sure that I connect with someone that I care about every day. This means I can’t go run an errand like go get groceries and count seeing people in the store or talking to the cashier as a connection. This has to be with a friend or family member.

And I know there are different levels of being able to connect with someone. Right now, the thing that would make me happiest is seeing someone in person (outdoors and keeping a distance between us). This isn’t the easiest thing to do, and also not necessarily the safest for now. If I can make this happen, awesome. But I also understand that for now, I might not be able to do this at all this month. But it’s something to hope for. Next, would be doing a video call. These are totally safe, but so many people have Zoom/video chat fatigue. I get that. Then I would put phone calls next on my list and texts/message groups last.

My goal is to not just do texts every day with friends, but I know that there will be days where texts are the best I can do. I hopefully can have more phone and video calls with friends and family this month and continue that beyond this month until we can all safely meet in person.

I’ve been isolated at home for almost 10 months now, and it’s really getting to me. It’s easy to avoid people, but I know that it’s not the best thing for me to do. So hopefully this challenge this month will get me back to being more social in whatever ways I can and I can feel much better about the current situation. I need to figure out how to be happier while I wait for things to be safer. And I know having time with friends and family will help do that.

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Family Zoom Time (or Thanksgiving After Thanksgiving)

Posted on December 3, 2020 | Comments Off on Family Zoom Time (or Thanksgiving After Thanksgiving)

On Thanksgiving Day, I spent the day alone. I knew this was going to be how I spent the day. While I didn’t love it, I had accepted that would be my holiday and made it the best that I could. Cooking gave me something to focus on and I’m glad I wasn’t too focused on missing my family. But there was no way not to miss everyone. When you do something every year of your life, it’s weird to not have it happen.

About a month ago, my family started to discuss what we could do as a family for Thanksgiving since we wouldn’t be together. We had decided to do a Zoom hangout and had to plan when everyone would be available. Not everyone was going to be free on Thanksgiving Day, so we planned the Zoom to be on the Saturday after. I knew that I would only have an hour before I had to run the Netflix Party group that I have, but we were planning on trying to keep it under an hour. So it would work out perfectly for me!

On Saturday, I decided to try to look a little nicer than normal. I put makeup on and moved my computer to a place in my house that has better lighting. Even though my family wouldn’t care if I was backlit, I wanted to try to look nice. This was us trying to celebrate, so I should make an effort. And I logged into Zoom a few minutes before we were supposed to be on there and a few other people from my family had already joined in.

Once we were all there, it was almost everyone in my family. One of my cousins was working so he couldn’t be there. But everyone else was able to be online. And that included everyone showing off their pets (we have a few cats and a few dogs in the family). I tried to get a good screenshot of the family, and I think this one is cute. But the pets weren’t in this particular shot.

For a lot of my family, this was their first time getting to see Rory outside of pictures posted online. And occasionally, he seemed to be really into what was happening on screen and I think he recognized my voice and my parents’ voices. I’m still sad I didn’t get to see him again in person a few weeks ago, but I know I’ll get to see him again in a few months.

This was the first time we were all on a Zoom together. We tried to use the time to catch up on what everyone has been up to. That’s usually what we do when we are together at Thanksgiving, so that seemed normal. And a lot of people did have things to update us about. One of my cousins moved and bought a new house. Another cousin moved right before the pandemic and she was telling us about what they’ve been doing to their house and her kids were telling us about online school. And of course, Ross and Krystle had updates on Rory and Krystle’s pregnancy. I didn’t have much to update everyone on since I’m not doing much. But I liked hearing everyone else and feeling connected to my family. That was something I missed from my Thanksgiving and I’m glad I didn’t miss it completely.

I wish I didn’t have a time constraint, but I really did have to log off after an hour. I stayed on as long as I could, but I had to leave before everyone else did. But they all knew that I was running a Netflix Party so they understood. And from what my parents told me, everyone else logged off only a minute or two later. They were just all saying goodbye to each other.

I am very grateful for technology because it allowed us to be together virtually. It’s not as good as being together in person, but it’s better than having nothing at all. I can’t imagine what this time would be like if we couldn’t be together on Zoom. I can’t imagine how I’d be dealing with things if I didn’t have my virtual hangouts. But at the same time, I hope this is the only time we have to do Thanksgiving this way. I want to believe that by next Thanksgiving, it will be safe to travel and be together. I know we will be ok if we had to do another virtual Thanksgiving next year, but I’m hoping this was a one-time thing.

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Cooking My First Thanksgiving Dinner (or Having More Success Than Expected)

Posted on December 2, 2020 | Comments Off on Cooking My First Thanksgiving Dinner (or Having More Success Than Expected)

I got to have a little taste of Thanksgiving with some of the food my parents brought me when they came to see me a few weeks ago. I had missed an early Thanksgiving dinner with my family, and I was really grateful for the leftovers they had for me. But that was a few weeks ago and I wanted to have something special on Thanksgiving Day.

I’ve always been with my family. It’s our big gathering each year and the food is part of the tradition. And while I like almost everything that my family makes (except cranberry sauce in both the homemade and can forms), I knew that if I wanted to make some Thanksgiving food myself that I wasn’t going to make most of it. I had to decide what was most important to me and then go from there. So I thought about what I like and what seemed easiest to do in my little kitchen. And I decided I would do sweet potatoes, green beans, and something with turkey.

I wasn’t expecting to find a lot of turkey options at the store. First, by the time I was shopping, it was close to Thanksgiving. And second, I didn’t want something huge. I was hoping I could find a turkey breast or half turkey breast. But if I couldn’t find that, I knew I could find turkey meatballs and thought that would work too.

But to my surprise, when I went to the store, there was 1 half turkey breast left! So I grabbed it without thinking too much about how to prepare it. I figured it would only require the basics that I knew I had at home, and I could always go to the store again to get spices if I really needed them. Once I got all my groceries home, then I started to figure out how to make them.

The sweet potatoes and green beans were pretty easy. I baked the sweet potatoes the day before and prepared the base (everything but the pecans and marshmallows) and put it in the fridge. And I knew I would do the green beans the day of and it only required me to steam the beans and cook some bacon and onions. But for the turkey, I did a lot of research and found some pretty basic roasting recipes. So I combined those ideas and used that.

Preparing the turkey started the night before. I did a dry brine with salt, pepper, sugar, and garlic powder; and I let it sit uncovered on a platter in my fridge overnight. That was easy enough to do and I tried to stay confident that I could cook it without screwing it up. But I also kept in mind that I was only cooking for myself so if I did screw it up, I could eat a microwave burrito or something.

On Thanksgiving Day, I didn’t have to start anything until a few hours before I wanted to eat. I took the turkey out of the fridge and started to heat up my oven. I put some carrots and onions on a sheet tray to be like a little rack to hold the turkey up. And I added some olive oil to brown the skin. Then into the oven it went and I set a timer to check on it about 45 minutes later (I based the time on what it said online). 45 minutes later, it wasn’t at temperature yet so I let it keep cooking. And I started to get the sides together. I knew I wanted the sweet potatoes to go in while the turkey was resting. And I started to cook the bacon and onions since that would take time.

I was optimistic that I would be done around the same time for everything, but it didn’t work that way. I was pretty off with the timing, but this was the first time I had cooked anything like this. But it was all done at a decent time and I think that I did a pretty good job with my first Thanksgiving meal.

It wasn’t a ton of food, but it was still a lot and it lasted me for several meals. And it came out pretty great. There were a few things I would change if I made this again. The turkey was juicy, but a little salty so I think I needed to use a little less salt in my dry brine. And I forgot to add an acid to the beans, which I think they really could have used. But everything was still really delicious and tasted like Thanksgiving to me! I didn’t make gravy since I didn’t think I needed it. And I didn’t, but I still missed it. Same with stuffing. I missed it but I wasn’t going to make a ton of stuffing just for me.

It was weird eating Thanksgiving food alone, but I’m hopeful that this will be the only year I have to do that. I missed my family and all the stuff we usually do together, but at least I got some food that reminded me of Thanksgiving so I didn’t feel like I skipped the holiday completely. And I did have some family time over Thanksgiving weekend. But I’ll be writing about that tomorrow!

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Not My Usual Thanksgiving Week Workouts (or Trying To Keep The Tradition Going)

Posted on November 30, 2020 | Comments Off on Not My Usual Thanksgiving Week Workouts (or Trying To Keep The Tradition Going)

This post is mainly going to be about my Thanksgiving workout. But I did have my 4 workouts this past week. I changed up my schedule a bit to work around Thanksgiving, but I still got the 4 in. I’m still dealing with vertigo a bit and have to modify things, but I’m noticing that it is getting easier each workout.

I’m still trying to push myself so that I can start doing outdoor workouts soon, but I’m also starting to wonder if I should do them. I know they are doing everything they can to keep things safe, but cases are increasing and I have to keep that in mind. Also, things are starting to lock down here again, so I’m not sure if that means outdoor workouts will have to close. Right now, it seems like they can stay open. So keeping the idea of going to an outdoor workout as a goal is a good one. Even if I don’t end up doing one for a while, it still will help me push myself.

But my 3 non-Thanksgiving workouts this past week were pretty normal for me. Or at least as normal as things have been lately. So that’s good.

And my workout on Thanksgiving Day was the one that was special.

Ever since I started at Orangetheory, my family has had a new tradition to do an OTF workout on Thanksgiving morning. It’s not always the same members of my family at each workout, but we always have a few of us there. This year, when the pandemic started, I was hoping that we would still be able to continue the tradition. But as time went on, I knew that there was no way that we would be together for Thanksgiving. So we wouldn’t have our workout as a family.

But I wasn’t going to let that stop me. I was still determined to do something connected to our tradition. I knew that I would be doing a workout on Thanksgiving Day on my own. My plan was to do the OTF At Home workout like I normally do. But I tried to see if there was another option that maybe would allow my family to work out together. But because we all had very different schedules, coordinating a workout wasn’t possible. So I asked everyone in my family to send me photos of their workout that day and I would do something with it.

Some of us did video workouts, some went skiing, some did chores that doubled as cardio, and some just made sure they got out and moving. I love the photos I got from everyone. And an added bonus to us doing workouts on our own was that 2 dogs got to be in the photos too! Tucker was “helping” my mom shovel snow and Graham decided to be a part of my Aunt Cindy’s video workout.

It’s not what our post-workout photo usually looks like, but I think it’s perfect to represent what our 2020 Thanksgiving workouts were like. We weren’t together, but we were still keeping a tradition alive on our own. And of course, I had to add this photo to the collage with all of our workouts.

If nothing else, we will never forget what this year was like for us. It will be the one oddball photo in the collage for as long as we are able to keep this tradition going. And while I know I would have preferred for us all to be together and to have a photo that fits in with the others, it still makes me happy that we didn’t give up on something that we love to do and we have something to represent this year.

I hope that by next year, it will be safe for us to be together. I missed being with my family this year (more on that later this week). I missed our traditional workout. I’m glad we had something, but it’s not the same as working out as a family. Just like how working out at home isn’t like being at the studio in class. I missed how much fun we have at our family workout. I missed the competitiveness between me and my dad (it seems to mainly be between us). I missed feeling like we did something special together. But as I’ve said several times about things this year, we had to stay apart and stay safe this year so we can be together for so many more years in the future.

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Happy Thanksgiving (or My First Time Celebrating Solo)

Posted on November 26, 2020 | Comments Off on Happy Thanksgiving (or My First Time Celebrating Solo)

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I know there is a lot of hard stuff going on in the world right now, but there are still things to be grateful for. I’m very grateful for my health and the health of those I care about. Even though I’ve had multiple friends get sick, most of them have been able to fully recover or almost fully recover. I know that I am very privileged and lucky that this is the case, and I know that this can change at any time. But for now, that’s the biggest thing that I’m grateful for this year.

For my entire life, I have celebrated Thanksgiving with my family. It’s always been 3 or 4 generations together and it’s our big family time each year. This year, we are all celebrating with our own households. So for me, that means I’m celebrating alone.

I’ve never been alone for Thanksgiving before. I think the closest I’ve had to this was the year my parents couldn’t make it for Thanksgiving due to my mom having chemo and I was the only person from my immediate family there. But I was still with aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents. I’ve never been without a member of my family for Thanksgiving, but I also know that this is how it has to be. Being separate this year will hopefully allow us all to be together next year and for many years to come. It’s been tough to be ok with this idea, but I know it’s for the best.

I am going to attempt to make a little Thanksgiving for myself today. I’ve never made Thanksgiving food before, so I can’t guarantee that I won’t ruin it and will end up eating a microwave burrito or something. But I’ve decided to try to make a few things. I’ve got sweet potatoes so I can make a sweet potato casserole with pecans and marshmallows, green beans so I can make them with shallots and bacon, and a half turkey breast to roast. I don’t have stuffing or a lot of other things that my family usually has at Thanksgiving (and I don’t think I’ll be making gravy since the only thing I would maybe need it for would be the turkey). I also don’t have any Thanksgiving dessert, but I have some other dessert stuff I can have instead. Hopefully, I can make this food without ruining it and I will feel like I have a taste of Thanksgiving.

I hope that you all are safe and enjoying today. I know that it’s not easy to be happy when many of us are spending today alone when we normally are with family. But I’m trying to spend today focusing on the good and positive and the idea that I will be with my family again soon. And when we are together again, I know we are going to appreciate it so much more than we ever have. If this year has taught us anything, it’s to not take the smallest things for granted. I always assumed that being with my family each year was a guarantee. Now I will appreciate it more and never just think that it’s automatically going to happen.

And maybe next year I’ll have some funny stories to share with my family about how my first attempt at making Thanksgiving on my own goes. If I ruin it, it will be a good story. If I’m successful at it, it will still be a good story and maybe I’ll be able to help out more. No matter what, I’m sure I’ll have something to share with everyone and it will be entertaining.

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Missing Family (or Things Hit Harder This Year)

Posted on November 20, 2020 | Comments Off on Missing Family (or Things Hit Harder This Year)

Today is my grandma’s birthday. It’s not the first birthday to happen since she passed away. But it still feels fresh in a way in my mind. I forgot to turn off the reminder alarm on my phone to buy my grandma a birthday card, so I got the alert a week ago. I think before that happened, I almost forgot that her birthday was coming up.

I didn’t completely forget because I know her birthday is around Thanksgiving, but this year has been so odd that in a way I forgot that Thanksgiving is next week. So that reminder to buy a birthday card (which I have now removed), just brought things back to reality to me. And it hit me with a double punch. First, missing my grandma so much, and second, realizing again that I will not be seeing my family this year for Thanksgiving.

When the pandemic first hit, I know a lot of us tried to stay optimistic about Thanksgiving. It was half a year away so we thought that this might be done by then and we could have a family Thanksgiving. I remember when flights went on sale and I talked to my mom about if I should buy tickets. She told me to wait to buy them because things were still a bit unsure. I think it was over the summer that we finally said as a family that Thanksgiving wasn’t going to happen. I was supposed to have a small family Thanksgiving meal early with just my immediate family, but I missed that last week since I was sick. My parents did bring me some leftovers so I had Thanksgiving food, but it wasn’t exactly the same.

Even though I don’t see my family too often, I feel pretty close to them. I talk to my aunts and cousins throughout the year. Sometimes we are able to see each other more than once a year, but even if we can’t it doesn’t feel like any time has passed when we get together. I know if I needed something, I could call anyone in my family and they would help me. And seeing everyone once a year has been something that I have done for every year of my life. So missing out on it this year is hitting me really hard. It’s the only big tradition that my family has, and we can’t do it. I know that missing it this year is the right thing to do and it will keep us all healthy and able to have many more Thanksgivings in the future, but it doesn’t make it easier.

I am very lucky that everyone in my family is healthy and able to be safe. Even though I have a few family members who work in hospitals, they have what they need to protect themselves. I know that so many people can’t say that, so I am so grateful that is the case with my family. And while I loved my grandma so much, a few of us have said how we feel a little relief that we don’t have to worry about her right now. If she was still alive, I can’t imagine how difficult it would be for my family to be worried about her constantly since she was in a nursing home. And with the type of dementia that she had, I don’t know if she would have understood why nobody could visit her, and she might have been very upset with us all.

And at least my family has been able to be together once since my grandma passed away. We were able to have a little time to celebrate her life and share memories last year at Thanksgiving. I don’t know if you ever feel closure with someone’s death, but it did help me feel a little more closure that we were all together and remembering my grandparents. I think it also helped me come to terms with things because it almost felt like a fever dream when I found out my grandma passed away. I needed that time as a family and I’m so glad we were able to do that. But I still wish we could continue to have that time together this year.

By my grandma’s birthday next year, I hope that I will be having an easier time with it. I know that with other people who have passed away, each year their birthday is a little easier and a little less sad. I still miss them like crazy, but the day is more about remembering them and not mourning them. And hopefully by Thanksgiving next year, my family will be able to be together again and this missed Thanksgiving will just be a blip in our lives.

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