Wrapping up 2013...

This last part of 2013 has been a bit of a fog.  Losing my Papa was of course an extremely hard hit and I’m working on resurfacing and readjusting to life without him.  It’s a bit of a struggle with my grandma, but we’re figuring it out day by day.

So now that I’m emerging again, I wanted to capture the last bit of 2013 before it’s time for the entire year wrap up!  There was my last race of the year in there, Christmas, more crafts and vacation.

Let’s start with the race.  I signed up at the last minute for the Stache Dash.  D and Holly were doing it and I thought it would be a nice workout and the price was quite low.  Plus it supports a good cause – Movember.  Our team was called Selleck Envy and D made fabulous T-shirts for us and got us mustache tattoos.  Here are the pre-race shots:

When we arrived it was a small set up in Costa Mesa at Fairview Park.  I’m finding I enjoy these little community 5K’s almost as much as the obstacle courses.  The people are super friendly and the Movember Organization really went all out!  The race opened with this guy playing the National Anthem Jimi Hendrix style!  So rad!!!

 Then we were off.  I actually jogged longer than I usually do since we were so smooshed at the beginning.  I had my iPod and was listening to Dropkick Murphys to keep my Irish Punk pace.  I fell into my power walk stride and off I went.  The course was nice.  I mean it’s Fairview Park.  You can’t really go wrong.  It was a beautiful warm sunny day and I loved the whole thing.  

 I finished in 37 minutes.  That’s right kids – I walk fast!  I also found out later I was only 2 minutes behind D and Holly.  As I made my way to the bananas and water Shane popped up.  He arrived later to cheer us on.  So rad!    We took our post-race pics:

Then I wandered around and got all my free goodies.  Much more than the last few obstacle courses by the way!  They had a mustache contest which was hilarious and then wrapped things up. 

 I would totally do this one again!



Next up is my Reindeer Wine Cork Craft.  Julie has yet to make a craft night so I asked if she just wanted to make a plan and do our own.  We did just that.  It was a lovely afternoon with her and the kids.  She had it all set up in her living room and her man manages a restaurant so he supplied us with more than enough corks.  We had some nice one on one convo and one of her kiddies wanted to help me out.

We found a few different ways to make these so we both tried different ones.  I was really happy with how they turned out! 

The next craft was the Ornament Night my mom had planned.  Of course everything had gotten a bit out of whack after everything that happened but one night mom was determined to do something fun so we went at it.  She had got glass ornaments, stickers, and glitter.  Julie had told me about the crayon melting one so we got crayons as well.  The glitter wasn’t the right glitter so those ornaments didn’t turn out too well.  The crayon ones were rad.  You cut off a couple of pieces of crayon – no more than two colors we found out works best – and drop them in the ornaments.  Then you blow dry them.  I found tongs works best as not to burn yourself and the easiest to move the ornament around as they melt.  It was a bit of a challenge but I really like the way they turned out!

We did have Thanksgiving.  I won’t go too much into it because it wasn’t that great.  It was so soon after Papa passed, and there was a lot of family drama going on.  Sadly we have found out that we have some greedy family members that don’t give a fuck and it’s breaking our hearts.  But, mom pulled together and made a turkey and we had a very odd uncomfortable lunch at gramma’s.  Afterwards, Shane, D, myself and D’s dad who was in town headed over to my dad’s house.  He and Lori made steak and had wine so it was a nice change and vent session that evening.

Christmas though was awesome!  We weren’t quite sure what we were going to do, but after some discussion thought it best to get gramma out of the house.  Since mom is having some issues with the folks living with her right now, she didn’t decorate.  My place is too small so I asked Shane/D to host which they did.  D had a really cool silver tree and nice set up.  We did a serve yourself brunch and Terri joined us as well.  It was so nice and so mellow and so great to all be together!  Dad and Lori came and we all exchanged gifts.  Shane and D made some amazing presents and one of mine was this wine rack!  D etched the glasses as well with my initials.  

Terri made me a Mandala which set me into tears, and Shane and D also made me coasters with pictures of Papa that made me cry.  

 Dad brought me out of the emotional presies with my new hot pink lava lamp!!!!  I’ve always wanted one!  
I made a few crafts myself:

 Gramma made it till the afternoon then mom took her home.  Dad, Lori, Shane, D, Terri and I then played Christmas Trivia and the Heads Up phone game that had us laughing in hysterics.  Below is one of the best videos ever!

 Christmas was just perfect this year.  I’m so happy we pulled together and even though it was of course emotional at times we had a lovely time.

There was also a baby shower in there.  My friend Charis up in Whitter.  It was a really sweet shower and one of the things we did I thought was so cute, was we each got a letter and had to draw or write things that started with that letter.  The sister is then going to make an alphabet book with it!
I got U:

 The view from the gal's house was spectacular and I got a shot of Charis and another mama to be!

One last mention, my friend Susan and I chose a night and walked my neighborhood to look at lights.  We wanted to hit Pine Street of course which always goes all out.  So she showed up, we filled a water bottle full of wine and had an evening full of laughs and beautiful lights! 

 I’m looking forward to NYE this year since I was just unpacking alone last year.  I plan on going to a friend’s house.  I also may do this Surf City Splash event that sounds like a hoot on New Year’s Day. 

My next blog will probably be next year!  Happy New Year my readers!!!