snow days (general updates!)

It's been awhile since I've had the mental energy or time to blog about random happenings at casa Gokie. Work has been crazy after Christmas, and we're getting back into the swing of homeschooling for semester 2, and wasn't it just Christmas?

Life has also felt . . . heavy. During covid times our family has lost two grandparents (David's grandpa died of covid in October, my step-grandma died a couple weeks ago from sudden onset dementia). I'm not much for light entertainment producing when everything feels dark -- I'm not sure many people are, you know? Although 2020 has been difficult, and 2021 started off a similar way, we're getting through it.

Rounding the corner of 2021 to another quickly-approaching March feels at once impossible and inevitable. We've been stuck in this limbo world for what feels like ages, and yet we're all doing exactly the same things so time doesn't pass normally.

Anyway, this started off depressing when I mostly meant it to just be a general check-in and update for what's happening in our family!

Felix is coming up on his second birthday (May 1), and he is the cutest thing ever. Silent, but cute. He still says maybe only 20 words (when his sisters were talking in complete sentence by this point) and I think he knows he could speak more but just doesn't care to. He's got the important things down: "cookie," "snack," "Leroy" (his stuffed chicken, pictured above, which sounds more like Anya when he says it), and "Husker!!!" (which his father is endlessly proud of). 

He's just getting to the age where he can be naughty and knows it, but still looks so cute that I can hardly get mad at him. His favorite things are jumping on my back, climbing up high using whatever he can to get up, and messing up whatever elaborate pretend play game the girls have set up. It's a hoot. ;)

Cora Jane is 4 now!!! I never wrote her a birthday blog post and she'll probably detest me for it for the rest of her life. ;) She's growing up soooooo much and also figuring out how to test ALL the boundaries. It's very funny when it's not completely maddening. I truly think our kids don't get terrible 2s or 3s but the age 4 to 5 is a STRUGGLE, for whatever reason. It's okay! Just strange!

She's doing "preschool" at home, which mostly involves me finding $1 workbooks in the Target dollar spot and doing one letter a week, in hopes she'll slowly learn her alphabet. She loves being involved and I think she'd sit and do school one-on-one with me for hours, if I had the time. Her brother is endlessly fascinated with her and they have quite a funny relationship.

Kitty is becoming every parents' dream: a smart, engaged, almost 7 year old little voice constantly chirping "what can I do now?" She does things like empty the dishwasher of her own accord, cleans up constantly, entertains her siblings, and shovels snow like a kid much bigger than she is. She's grown approximately 3 inches in the last year, and she's hard on the knees of all of her pants, but c'est la vie.

Homeschooling semester 2 is going well, and even though I still worry she's not learning enough because of flaws of mine, she's definitely advanced in a lot of areas so I'm hoping it evens out (we're doing second grade handwriting, phonics, and her reading level is really high). Most of the time if it's quiet, she's curled up on the couch with a blanket and a book -- it's like looking into a tiny mirror!!!

David and I have been spending our time catching up from the post-Christmas haze, reorganizing everything, and trying to plan out what projects we'll try to tackle in 2021. We spent a couple weekends adding a ceiling to his basement office and then painting it, which I might try to write a post about here soon. And maybe I'll have time to write a post about what we hope to do in 2021, too!

I'm linking up with Rosie for her Just Because link-up volume 2, because I too miss good old-fashioned blogging and I'd love it if more people did it! :) Micro-blogging on insta is all the rage but I like the long-form of blogs -- I have plenty of design blogs I follow on the daily, but most everyone else has moved away from it. Anyway if you need a push to resurrect your long-dead blog, here's your sign. 

January's almost over, friends -- we can do it. We can. We can. We can. (Repeating for my own benefit.)

HG