2008 Year in Review

Wow, it's Christmas already? Didn't school just start last week? Well, another year has passed us by, and looking back, I can't help but wonder where the year went.

If you can recall last December, winter seemed to start with an alternating pattern of snow, cold, snow, cold. That seemed to last until mid-January, when a break in the pattern brought us 3 straight days in the 60's. On the downside, such an abrupt change in temperatures brought with it a tornado outbreak that caused major damage to the Eastern portions of the county. After that we went right back to winter. Maybe it was just my imagination, but it sure seemed like it was either snowing or extremely cold every single day.

February was the month of sickness. I got sick Superbowl weekend and it lasted on and off for 6 weeks. Then Liam got sick for a few days, followed directly by Lorelei. She was sick for a few days until Jeanette finally got it and was sick for 4 weeks. By the end of February, Rockford had received a record snow fall of 68". Here in Durand, we were over 80". We also ran out of firewood again. We did better, but not good enough.

Everyone was finally better by mid March, and then Jeanette's cat, Holly, got sick and started losing weight. She had a thyroid issue and had to get medicine everyday for it. Then finally, March 21, the first day of spring….we got 5" of snow. Things got weird at the end of the month, on March 25th, Jeanette got fired from SPX Fluid Power. To make a long story short, Jeanette got frustrated and went outside to get some air and regain her composure. The HR person decided that she must have quit, so she send out a termination notice and fired her. Two days later, Jeanette received her "Final Written Notice" and was reinstated, even though she had never received any other written notices, ever! Jeanette is still with SPX today. (Although her best boss ever left in May and the replacement that started in October isn't off to the desired start.

In April, Jeanette had a wonderful vacation with her parents and sister. They all went to Italy for her cousin Amanda's wedding. They all stayed at a villa in the Tuscany region and got to see at lot of the area, including The Leaning Tower of Pisa, and Michelangelo's "Statue of David." While Jeanette was away, I decided that it was time for the kids to lose the training wheels. After about 7 days, the extra wheels were all gone. It is really hard to believe that they've only been off training wheels for 7 months now. They ride everywhere!

The summer was just plain fun. In May, the kids finished pre-school and we spent a weekend at Coco Keys Water Park in Rockford. In July we had a whirlwind, 3-city, 4th of July tour. We started in Rockford with Illinois' largest fireworks display, all synchronized to music. The four minute finale had more shells than Chicago's entire show. Right after the fireworks in Rockford, it was off to Kankakee to spend time with my mom and dad. We got there around 1AM and spent a day and a half. Sunday afternoon we left Kankakee for Naperville and a pool party at Jeanette's brother's house. Back in Durand Sunday night, exhausted, but feeling that we had a full weekend.

At the end of July, we went to Lake of the Ozarks for a long weekend with Jeanette's mom and dad, and there we met up with her sister and her family for boating on the lake and good times. The kids and Jeanette went tubing for the first time and all had a blast! We had to opt out of the Myrtle Beach trip this year because the date interfered with the start of school. Which brings us to August, Jeanette was on the organizing committee for her 20-year class reunion. The event was a smashing success. Semi-formal dinner/dance on Saturday night and a family picnic on Sunday. It was a lot of planning, but well worth it. The kids started school on the 25th of August. They are both in the same kindergarten class at Durand Elementary. There are 15 kids in each of the three classes. They love school and their teacher.

We really had a pretty non-eventful fall until October. My mom and dad came up to Durand for a visit that included a trip to Edwards Apple Orchard. Edwards has the best apple donuts in the history of mankind. Halloween was spent, once again, with our old neighbors in Winnebago. Lorelei and Liam went as a "Black Widow" and a SWAT team member. In November, Jeanette's dad had much needed back surgery. The day after his operation, her mom tripped and fell, dislocating her shoulder. That sent off a string of very long tiring days for Jeanette. Work, visit dad in hospital at lunch, work, run errands for and check on mom after work, then finally, home. Start routine over again in morning. Then on November 26th, we had to put down her cat, Holly. Jeanette found little kitten Holly in the snow in 1989. She was 19 years old. Jeanette and I didn't even meet until Holly was almost 2-years-old. She will be missed greatly. That leaves us with only Ebony, our 19-year-old black, longhair cat. At this point, we are trying to decide if another cat would make things better or worse for Ebony.

November 30th we had our first snow fall of over 1". We got 4" that day and winter has pretty much picked up where it left off. We've received over 12" of snow as of December 9th and one ice storm. When planning for firewood this year, I did not take into consideration that we were going to have multiple days near zero in the first half of December. I do, however, have way, way more wood cut this year than in years past.

That's about all she wrote as we head into Christmas. We hope all of you are happy and healthy and have a very Merry Christmas and a new year filled with new hopes. Some day I'll update the photos, so keep checking back, you never know when that day will be.