Goodbye January! You were a long and tough month this year, and I am happy to put you in the rear view!

Onwards to February! The month of the Full Snow Moon, as traditionally February is the snowiest month, and well, looking at our weather forecast I believe it. We could get 16 inches of snow in two days! I know I was wishing for snow, but maybe not this much all at once on a very important week?

I mentioned celebrating small things, or having small celebrations, in one of my last posts, and this week is full of things to celebrate if you wish. The Lunar New Year, Groundhog’s Day, the New moon. The beginning of February even, and all that could be. Tonight we are having a little celebration for the Lunar New Year and the New Moon. We pulled out all of our Kid’s Moon Club materials and are beginning again this month. We did it for a year, took two years off, and now I am excited to revisit it. There are facets of it that we never did as Wyatt was too little to really be interested but should be now. We are also going to wassail our apple tree tonight! We usually do it on the traditional day of Jan. 17 but we forgot this year. It is a fun reason to drink cider even though our neighbors probably think we are nuts. I’ve also got my thinking cap on for Valentine’s Day! Billy and I don’t ever do a ton for Valentine’s Day, but we do like to do a little something or other for each other. Last year I made heart pancakes for Wyatt – I have a different idea this year that I saw online, so I have one plan ready. And we are almost done with his Valentine’s for his homeschool group exchange – they are super cute! I will share them with you all soon!

I hope to really dig into my garden plans this month. I don’t need to order many seeds this year, but I do want to design a plan for the yard overall. I want to do so much to our small yard – but it can be a pleasant place to dream and read and grow food and attract all the bugs and bees and butterflies. I hope to add a pond at some point, and a few more apple trees. I am really hoping for some frogs if I add a pond. And what about a turtle? Is that too much to hope? I think so but I can pretend.

I’m also daydreaming about summer vacation. I need to get on it if I want to rent a place for the family. We are hoping to find a house near the beach in Michigan that our family, my brother’s family, my mom, and my SIL’s mom can all retreat to for a few days this summer. We don’t need much, just beds and sand, so hopefully I can locate something for our little crew.

That’s all wintertime dreaming right now though. We will do a good deal of that, but I also hope to get outside more, to go to the zoo which I love to do in the winter (the animals are so cute playing in snow), try a few more trails, maybe even build a snowman this week if we get all that snow. I feel like we were such slugs in January. We had a nice cozy month full of baking and creating which that part was fantastic, but now this family wants to get outside.

How are you all? Do you have any plans for the month? Are you thinking spring and summer already too?

My Sunday Post is hosted by Kimba the Caffeinated Book Reviewer
Sunday Salon is hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz
It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? is hosted by Kathryn at Book Date

Last week I feel like we accomplished so much! It was one of those really awesome homeschool weeks, as well as just getting other stuff around the house done. Nothing exciting but a good week nonetheless. This week is the big week – Wyatt’s ambulatory EEG. We go Thursday for the hookup, bring him home, and head back on Friday for them to remove all the wires. I am super nervous about the whole thing; it is going to be a really long 24 hours. It needs to be done though so we will do it!

Read Last Week:

Finished up my bear books! I plan to review them both this week.

Reading this Week:

I am loving the look of this book. I can’t wait to start it – but I need to wait for my Kindle to charge. I am so not good at keeping it charged.

Posted Last Week:

How I Deal with Winter

Mini Post – Burrowed In

Watching and Listening:

Miss Scarlet and the Duke! We binged this all week and I am so very sad that we watched them all! I loved it so much. Thank goodness a second season will be aired this year at some point. I need more Miss Scarlet and William! We are also watching All Creatures Great and Small – sigh. I just love it so much. Although Billy and I had a moment of panic – we forgot that not all of the episodes have been released yet and after we finished the latest episode, thought for a wild moment that that was all of them! Then when we realized we had more to go, we just had to wait, we exhaled in relief. We also started Around the World in 80 Days. I am going to tell you a weird secret about me- I loathe hot air balloons. Like I have some strange aversion to them. In photos, on television, in person. Ugh. I am not sure why this is. And weirdly, my brother has the same hot air balloon prejudice. I wonder if something happened to us in a past life or something? Lol. So, I am watching Around the World in 80 Days but that balloon. (imagine an eye roll here) Other than that, I enjoyed the episode that we watched. We did not have a movie night last night, instead opting to finish up Miss Scarlet. Maybe tonight. I think we might watch Kiki’s Delivery Service, which is another Studio Ghibali movie.

As for our wake up songs, it was my turn last week to pick! I chose 9 to 5 by Dolly Parton, Into the Mystic by Van Morrison (one of my fave songs ever), Come on Eileen by Dexie’s Midnight Runners (fun fact: when Billy and I were in our 20s we always said we would name our first child Eileen TooraLoora), and Someone Like You by Van Morrison. Today we listened to the song Brandy by Looking Glass, one of Billy’s favorites.

How are you all? I hope wherever you are, you are doing well!

It’s wintertime in Michigan, and that means cold weather, snow, ice storms, freezing rain, and months and months of having to get all super bundled up to just go outside for ten minutes. And I love it. Well not dangerous driving weather, that scares me. I don’t like or love that. But I do love winter, I find the cold invigorating and I just feel so much more alive in the winter. I always tell people it’s because I was born in the middle of a snowstorm , on a night where the moon was surrounded by a halo of ice, which is true, but my brother was born in December and he is not a fan of the winter. He is all about the hotter the temp the better, which repulses me. I hate being hot and sweaty and avoid it at all costs. He jokes that my family is snow and moon people while his family is summer and sun. And there is truth to that.

I remember one week while I was attending Central Michigan as a freshman, the temps dipped so low that they cancelled classes. There were signs on the door telling us to stay inside and not go out unless we had to go out, so my roomies and I only left the our dorm room to venture downstairs to the cafeteria. The rest of the time my roommate Bethany Lopez read to us. For real. She read us young adult romance books and randomly changed the names to our names and those of a few more of our friends. My other roomie and long time bestie Lori and I were very content to sit and listen for hours. Now Beth writes young adult romances so go figure. Maybe that week had an impact on her as well.

I lean in to winter. I embrace it. I feel that is the only way to really get through it. When I learned about hygge, I felt like I had found my people and lifestyle ideal. Getting cozy in the winter is one way to combat the cold temps – I mean you can’t go wrong with hot drinks, warm soft blankets, books, and pastries. My family also enjoys hiking through the woods in the winter and in general being outside in the snow, which I know is not everyone’s cup of tea. Appropriate layering of the right clothes is the key to enjoying the cold outdoors. But.. we can’t always be outside. And in these pandemic times, we can’t always be inside crowded places or even sometimes with our nearest and dearest. So what have we been doing? Some of these ways are probably crazy, but we keep busy and happy.

One thing I have always done is create a culture of celebration in our home. I like to make a fuss over things that other people may not, like our tradition of takeout on the first snow. We wassail our apple tree, we try to make things fun. Next week is a great week for celebrations – the lunar new year, the new moon, and midwinter all fall on the same night, February 1st. I have a whole day and evening planned for us, one that includes just small little celebrations of cheer. Find things to enjoy and make a big deal over, even little small things. And your big deal can actually be quite small – warm soup and homemade bread eaten picnic style in your family room, hot chocolate pancakes for breakfast, making cards to mail to friends, dropping off baked goods (jeez I have a lot of food related ideas this morning). Whatever floats your boat, it’s up to you!

Maybe you have seen the meme that says people are like plants, we both need water and light to be happy. So make sure you are drinking enough water and getting enough daylight – and even fifteen minutes of morning sun (before noon) is said to have great benefits, including sleeping better at night. And then, add plants to your home. Trust me the green in the middle of winter brings a smile to my face whenever I see my plants. Start small if you need to- one plant, or even a small pot of dill or basil or whatever on your kitchen counter, a succulent in the study. Or go big and crazy. Follow your heart on this. Make a wish list. Go crazy. As for me, I am a fan of the humble pothos. Easy to care for, and pretty inexpensive. They also can get very long! I have one I named Rapunzel, one named Sam Elliot, and one named Poppy. I also love naming them, and it has gotten to the point where Wyatt thinks all plants have names besides their species/type because all of ours do. When we see one somewhere he asks me its name. Lol.

I am a nurturer by nature. I think it is why having plants and animals and gardening and cooking makes me happy. I love to be surrounded by life as well, my reptiles and frogs (we are hoping to add to our menagerie this spring..), and also..sourdough starter. Ok this is weird and I know it. I have issues. I love to make and name sourdough starters. (If anyone wants one let me know..)

Frankenstarter is mine, I am making Mordough for my brother (can you guess where I got the name inspo from?), and Edgar Allan Dough is currently homeless. I have made the Grateful Bread for my stepmom and I feel like I need to make a Nostradoughmas… I am full of dad jokes and bread ideas.

Look at that aeration though- chef’s kiss.

We also love to create together. We put on some music, paint or draw, color, sew, whittle (Billy’s newest hobby). We are a content people over here. We plan our garden. We think about summer and the adventures we will have. I am already thinking about my butterflies in anticipation, of rearing them and recording them and tagging them this year.

Anyway, these are just some of the things we do that get us through these cold months. What are some things that you do?

This weekend was cold and snowy – a proper winter weekend, in my opinion. It was a good weekend to stick close to home and burrow in, under blankets and with books, baking, and of course, some fun outside in the snow.

It has been a winter without snow around here, and even this snowfall was pretty minor compared to winters in the past. I had ordered Wyatt snow pants just the week before and Wyatt was excited to have the opportunity to use them though, despite the snow not being super deep. It was enough for us to play around in! Wyatt does have two matching gloves, but I am not sure what Billy was doing when he dressed Wyatt. Lol. Whatever works I guess!

We didn’t however have a sled. But no sled no problem around here! Because when it finally snows, you make do! Wyatt had a blast!

When we came in, Billy made fantastic hot chocolate on the stove. Because is there anything better than playing in the snow followed by hot chocolate when you are a kid?

I also spent Sunday making Vatrushka buns as part of the Russian study unit Wyatt and I are doing in school. I am not the best baker all the time, and these turned out ok! It was a bit to get them there though. The dough has to rise for two hours, and our house was just not warm enough to get a rise out of the dough. So Billy again came to the rescue with his improvisations. This time we put the oven on low, set the bowl with the dough on top covered per the instructions, and Billy arranged a cookie sheet shield at the front of the stove by standing it on edge, so that the heat coming from the back of the oven would be somewhat trapped. And it worked! I waited another two hours and this time it doubled, and I kept on with the directions.

They needed to stay in the oven a smidge longer, and I forgot to put the wash over the edges to brown them, but they turned out not too bad. I was excited to be able to use this china set my dad picked up in Russia when he went with his school years ago. He went on a school exchange trip with the high school he was the principal for while I was in college, and man, I was so bummed I couldn’t go too! He did bring back some awesome souvenirs though, like this little plate and cup and saucer. I used to have one of those big hats but it got lost in a move which is another bummer because Wyatt would have loved that. Anyway.. these turned out ok. We had a little tea party and read a book called The Bun by Marcia Brown, which is just like the gingerbread man story but with a bun, and is based on a Russian folktale. So now I want to know which story was the original!

How was your weekend?

My Sunday Post is hosted by Kimba the Caffeinated Book Reviewer
Sunday Salon is hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz
It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? is hosted by Kathryn at Book Date

It’s snowing! I feel like I have been waiting all winter for some snow! We are planning on sticking close to home and baking today (Vatrushka buns and Dr. Bird Cake) but I am also thinking we will give Wyatt an opportunity to get outside in his new snow pants!

Read Last Week:

I am about halfway through this delightful middle grade story. I am hoping to finish it today during a certain someone’s quiet time (maybe after that time in the snow!). I had a weird week last week and didn’t get as much reading in.

Reading This Week:

Oo I am so excited to start this one! I read A Solitude of Wolverines last January and loved it. Maybe I will start this today instead…

Posted Last Week:

Homeschooling: Russian Unit Week One

Hanging in There on a Tough Week

Book Review: A History of Wild Places by Shea Ernshaw

Watching/Listening:

We are still hopscotching around depending on how we feel at night. If we are tired and need a laugh we watch Mr. & Mrs. Murder. Cobra Kai if we are feeling fairly happy. (even though at times it gives me secondhand angst) We watched Queens of Mystery Season 2 because we were excited that the new season was out. We finished Dalgleish which was awesome. Wyatt and I tried Masha and the Bear but he wasn’t into it. I thought it was cute though. Then for our Saturday night movie night we watched The Secret World of Arrietty and I 100% loved it! Can I just make my house look Arrietty’s? My brother has suggested that we watch the Studio Ghibli movies and also a cartoon called Maya and the Three so we put those on the list.

As for our morning listening Billy took over our morning wake up songs on Alexa and it’s been different. This week we have heard Wham! Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go (took me way back), Whistling in the Dark by They Might Be Giants, Violent Femmes (an old favorite band of mine), and Friday I’m in Love by The Cure. This week will be my takeover!

Last week pushed my limits a bit. Everything was just off, if you know what I mean. I like our little routine life, and I have a hard time recovering when things get off kilter. Who knew a sick gecko could throw such a wrench in things? But, this week is a new week!

Read Last Week:

This book did not disappoint. It was excellent. I actually got it when I joined the Book of the Month Club in December – it was the entire reason I joined, to be honest. This book was only $5 if I joined then, and I felt like it was the perfect enticement to pull the trigger on signing up. However, I promptly skipped the month of January. Lol. I hope to review this one later this week!

Reading This Week:

Wyatt’s curriculum is starting geography/literature combined unit studies, and we are beginning with Russian folktales and stories. I found this one while perusing the list of stories out there, and thought this might be an interesting addition to the middle grade library I am building. I am looking forward to reading this myself first, then hopefully as a family read aloud.

Posted:

The State of the Menagerie (my poor Harry!)

In Other News (and a small Harry update)

Watching:

We finished up the Witcher, and I think we are getting pretty close to finishing Cobra Kai as well. In our quest for a new British mystery series, we tried a few and while they were good, they were not quite what we were in the mood for. Then we started Mr. and Mrs. Murder, and it was perfect! We wanted something a little funny and not as intense, and these two make us laugh. We are also getting ready to start All Creatures Great and Small. I can’t wait! Our movie night last night did not go so well. We started The Electric Life of Louis Wain and it was good and beautiful but also so sad! We ended up having to turn it off because I just kept crying and didn’t see that changing for me.

And that’s about it from around here! Hope you are doing well!

I had originally planned this post for earlier in the week but the week has gone a bit sideways! Just so hectic and crazy that I barely have had time to do the things I need to do. Oh who am I kidding? I haven’t had time to do those things and I have dishes piled up and library books that need to be returned and picked up and prescriptions waiting at the pharmacy, not to mention the groceries.. however, I have big plans for today after we finish school. I am going to knock it all out so that tomorrow we can just do fun things.

This past weekend was pretty relaxing at least! On Saturday Billy and I dropped Wyatt off at my mom’s for some grandma time and we went for a hike all by ourselves! We love our time with the kiddo, but it was also nice to be just the two of us for a change. And the hike was cold but lovely, and we saw deer! We were walking along and I caught this doe just laying down off the trail, looking at me very calmly. Then we saw three more near her. We looked at them, they looked at us. It was a peaceful moment. Why are deer so beautiful?

When we were leaving we saw a few more along the roadside, and then one standing among the trees, the branches framing her so perfectly that she looked like she had antlers.

Sunday was another easy going day. Billy made bread, and then later that night we went to my brother’s for soup night. We were hoping to have these every Sunday but decided to hold off for a few weeks until after Omicron peaks. But at least we had this one first! My brother made a vegan French Onion soup which was delicious, the kids had macaroni and cheese, the night was perfect. It was so nice to be together all cozy. The kids had a good time; my niece was having a blast with all of her dolls, and was very imaginative with her Elsa.. and all these plants! It made me so happy.

And Harry: he seems to be doing well! Billy and I have mastered how to do the meds; Billy holds him, I administer. Harry opens right up for me and I think it is because he used to me feeding him. But I have to tell you, it was so cute last night. We had just finished up with his meds, and Billy had set him back down. Well, I wanted to hold him too, which I hadn’t done since the vet’s office. We were kind of leaving him alone to recuperate. Well anyway, I picked him up and he had his eyes closed. I said to him “Hey Harry” and his eyes flew open and he turned around and raced up my arm and was preening and smiling at me. (Leopard geckos smile, it is so adorable. If you want a grin, google it)I think he was feeling good!

I’ve been meaning to write a post about my menagerie for weeks now. And today, well, was an absurdly crazy day. You will see why in a minute.

First up, the cats. All of my kitties are seniors now, how did that happen! I have Marlow, the gray tux, Maggie, the black and white tuxedo, and Miso, the poofy Himalayan. All three are rescues from different situations. Billy and I used to volunteer at the shelter quite a bit before we had Wyatt, and we ended up with three cats and a dog as a result. Penny, my sweet English Setter, passed away when Wyatt was born. But we still have our three cats, although they are now 17, 14, and 14. I’m having a hard time finding a photo of my flibbertigibbet Miso. She is too inquisitive when I go to take photos and gets up and comes to me. Lol. Maggie was a stray kitten, Marlow was abandoned in an apartment when his owners moved, and Miso was from a hoarding house. Now they are all here. And super spoiled.

And, we have the reptiles and lone amphibian. Harry and Luna, the leopard geckos, and Apple Jack the crested gecko.(L-R Luna, Apple Jack, and Harry)

And then finally Freddy.

For the most part, the entire menagerie is fairly easy to manage. This weekend however, a situation arose with Harry. He was acting different, not eating, and when he shed he didn’t eat it, which is not really normal. Then Sunday night, I noticed some sore looking areas on his um..nether parts. Not good. Not good at all. Since Michigan is all arctic right now, with temps zero and below, I was hoping that we would not need to take him to the vet. So, Billy googled it. And google actually gave Billy the right diagnosis, clogged pores in his hemipene plugs. I could go into more detail on that but I will leave that up to you whether you want to google it or not, because TMI. We read we could try some things at home, which we did, but it wasn’t helping. So this morning, I called around to find a vet. And let me tell you, finding a vet for a reptile is not easy. But, I found one, and lucky us, they had a cancellation for today. Woohoo! However, then I had the challenge of figuring out how to transport a desert creature to the vet on a zero degree day in Michigan. I decided to put the carrier and a towel in front of our heat vents to warm up prior to leaving, then fifteen minutes before we left, I started the car to let it warm up. I wrapped the carrier in a blanket and towel, had a hand towel in the carrier, and turned on the heated seat for him. And crossed my fingers. It was only a 15 minute drive so not too bad, and we made it ok. Or rather, he was fine. When I got to the vet, due to Covid, the policy is to wait in your car until the vet calls you to come in. Ok, I can deal with that. However, with the heat at max by the time we got the call I was so hot and sweaty! Yay me. Harry was nice and toasty though and that is what mattered.

Poor Harry was such a trooper. The vet did his exam and he was so uncomfortable he squeaked! I have never heard him do that! The vet came to the conclusion that yes, he did have clogged pores. And that he would require slight sedation and perhaps even an incision. At the very least lanced. In case you are unfamiliar, leopard geckos can also drop their tails when scared or upset, so in order to prevent that from happening we decided that sedation was the right route.

In case you are wondering, I took that photo of the vet holding him so that we could mimic that hold later on. Not because I randomly snapped a photo during the exam like a weirdo. Lol.

Sedating him for his procedure, while not cheap and took part of my Christmas money from my dad I had been hoarding for books, was the absolute right call. The vet told me later when I picked him up that he had a lot of back up and that the procedure took a lot longer than she had anticipated. But it was successful! They also told me he was a popular guy while he was there. Before the surgery they gave him a little warm soak under warming lights and the tech told me that everyone kept popping by to see him and pet him. He was the BMOC.

And the after care, you ask? Well, we needed to move him from his bioactive tank to a tank with paper towel or paper anything, that would not get in his wounds. So Harry is temporarily living in my butterfly tank. You see, when you are a nerd you have lots of extra tanks, picked up from free sites and curbside garbage picking. So Harry returned home, a bit stoned, in some pain, but to a clean and sterile tank. Oh, and we have to give him two different medicines as well. We have not attempted this yet, but.. I am guessing it is not going to be easy. Cross your fingers for us!

Today has been a very big adventure for us both!

I have been reading so many good books lately!

Greenglass House by Kate Milford: I read this book the few days before Christmas and it was absolutely perfect for those crazy days. I needed something easy but entertaining and this middle grade was the answer. Twelve year old Milo is so excited for his winter break at his home, Greenglass House. It’s Christmas, there is snow, and usually no guests at the inn this time of year, leaving plenty of time for him to relax all he wants with his parents. Until one after another, guests begin to trickle in. And Greenglass House is not just any inn, but a smuggler’s inn – and these guests seem mysterious and secretive. The whole crew gets snowed in, things start happening, and Milo and his new friend Meddy find a mystery to solve. I absolutely adored every second of this book. It was fun, imaginative, different, atmospheric. Milo has the idea for the guests to tell stories at night to keep each other entertained, and it was such a cool part of the book. I loved all the backstory for the characters – I feel like I could go on and on with how much I loved this book. If you are looking for a snowy middle grade, you can’t go wrong with this one!

The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley: I must have been in “guests snowed in at a mysterious remote location” mode for a few weeks, because The Hunting Party also features a remote lodge where the guests are snowed in. This book! It was my first read of the New Year, and I loved it. Loved it. I read it all in one day which for me takes some skill these days. A group of old college friends are on a holiday trip together to bring in the New Year in the highlands of Scotland, in a very posh sounding lodge, with the hostess and the gameskeeper being the only others at the lodge with them. Then one person is found, dead. This book is told from multiple viewpoints over a period of a few days and the mystery just keeps growing as more of the actions from those few days come out. I could not stop reading it, and when I was done, immediately gave it to my mom to read. The ultimate snowed in thriller!

Crazy Like a Fox by Melinda Metz: I read the first book in this series, Fox Crossing, in January of last year, so it made sense to read this second in the series this January. I loved it just as much as the first one! If you visit my blog, you may know I love foxes, and pretty much pick up anything that is fox related. If only I loved in Fox Crossing, where everything is fox themed! This book is adorable. It is the story of Gavin, a typical Peter Pan, and Lillian, who is a Wendy. I mean not really, but that is who they reminded me of. Gavin is forever hopping in and out of relationships with women, although never actually ending the relationship himself; instead, he acts like a brat and eventually drives the woman he is in the relationship away, forcing them to end things. Lillian on the other hand, has given up so much of her own sense of self in order to stay in a relationship with her boyfriend. She has stars in her eyes (and on her toes) when it comes to Owen, and bends over backwards to make him happy. However, during their time in Fox Crossing, both Gavin and Lillian do a bit of soul searching, and things begin to change. This book also has amazing, fun secondary characters. Kristina/Kiki, Simon and Violet, Ford and Stephanie, and of course Honey and Nick and Annie and Banana from the first book as well. I love this series and can’t wait to read the next installment! (Oh, and if you prefer a clean romance, this one qualifies.)

* Thank you to NetGalley and Kensington books for an ebook copy in exchange for an honest review.