In with the new

It's amazing how fast two weeks can fly by when you are having fun. Our winter break came to an end yesterday and it is back to the grind now - we are at work, Liam is at school, Mallory is at Cindy's, there are dance lessons and hockey practices and skating lessons... things that are challenging, things that are fun, but things that move at a much more frantic pace than we'd been keeping for the past few weeks.
We spent most of our break at home, and that was really nice. We played lots of board games, as that seemed to be a big theme this Christmas. We spent many hours out on the creek until the ice finally broke up right before New Year's. In fact, the day before the temperature soared and the rain came down, I told Liam it would likely be our last skating day. We headed out to the creek and didn't come in for an hour and a half, until it was almost dark and I pretty much had to pull Liam off the ice.We went swimming several times and we also went to a showing of E.T. at the Capitol Theatre, which is a beautiful old movie house that has been restored for music and theatre and, yes, the occasional film. It was packed that night, and the kids loved the movie. (Props to Chad for recognizing the potential 'scary' factor, and showing them some YouTube clips in advance to prepare them.) We spent New Year's Eve at a house party we've attended for the last few years. This was the first time that our kids made it to midnight and we were able to stay long enough to see the balloon/confetti drop and silly string mayhem that the hosts then spend months cleaning up! It was a lot of fun, though the kids were pretty much zombies by then and we have had to spend several days re-acclimating to normal bed and waking times.

Now, it's 2011. I don't have any resolutions, per se, but I do have a few things in mind for this year. I have some personal challenges I am looking forward to taking on - a half marathon in the spring, three triathlons this summer, and perhaps one more slightly goofy goal that I haven't quite committed to yet. I want to complete some projects around the house that I have been contemplating for months or more, and just haven't found the motivation to start - something about it being January makes me want to dive in. At the same time, I want to be more mindful of my time with my kids. At times I am very involved with them, but I also find that as I get invested in my own projects, I can lose track of time and it's all too easy, now that they are a bit older, to let them entertain themselves. We are starting to talk birthday parties, and I can hardly believe that Liam is almost six. These are days that I don't want to miss out on, no matter what else I am trying to accomplish.