Umm... yeah... sooo... 2020, am I right? It was a crazy, unique year for everyone! We wish you all good health and hope you are staying sane, whatever that looks like for you. Here's a look at our year!
2020 started off great with our annual NYE bash - so much fun!
Who knew this would be Nate's and Kelly's only trip without kids in 2020? We enjoyed a weekend away visiting friends and riding the tram to the top of Sandia Peak
Donovan won an award at the Science Fair!
Lovely ladies
Awesome dad!
Troublemakers
Three generations
Ski babes!
Amazing kids
The whole family at the top of The Ridge
This kid is amazing!
This group has WAY too much fun!
Spring skiing with the Meisters
Then there was the early birthday celebration - thank goodness because it was Kelly's only birthday celebration!
Who knew that one could Irish dance in ski boots? At 42 years old?!?!
We all got fun goggle covers
We didn't know it then, but this was our last day of skiing for the season (March 14)
When the world shut down, we did our best to work while kid chaos happened all over the house
Nora "helped" Dono with his school work
We enjoyed daily walks as a family during lunch
The festivities were canceled but we celebrated Kelly's favorite holiday anyway
The kids built a leprechaun trap
We basically gave up on any semblance of cleanliness during the week. As was true for so many people, we struggled to ensure Donovan got some learning done while maintaining full-time jobs and keeping Eleanor occupied. We tried to remember how grateful we are being able to hunker down safely at home and still keep our jobs!
Kelly tried to cancel her birthday but learned that she would turn 42 whether she celebrated it or not. It had previously been planned as a day off work, spent at Loveland with Donovan, so we tried not to think about how awesome it would have been skiing on almost 9 inches of fresh powder!
Nate and the kids made these beautiful cards and gluten free cupcakes using what we happened to have at home
Other than work and remote learning, we filled our days with painting, puzzles, bike rides, and Nate started baking sourdough bread (LOTS of it!)
We had an Easter tea party
We had lots of movie nights
After 6 weeks of quarantine, we were happy to see Nate's parents again! We're glad the weather was great so we could stay outside.
Nate kicked off his birthday with a run followed by a bacon Bloody Mary
Kelly and Barb did their best on a strawberry rhubarb pie - Nate's favorite!
Nate got a fancy smoker that we have been enjoying ever since!
Yummm - smoker bread!
We spent a lot of time in the yard and garden
Nate built a bridge and some great trails all around our yard - we now have a mountain bike course!
Nate scared Kelly when he shaved his whole face
We found two American Dagger Moth caterpillars that the kids named Tom and Tomasita. They are now cocooned in a jar in our garage, waiting for spring so they can emerge as moths
In August we spent a week in Carbondale. Our rental house had an incredible view of Mt. Sopris... until the wildfire smoke came. We enjoyed everything as much as we could given the nearby fire and COVID. What a beautiful area!
RBG and an Oompa Loompa
Dono lost 4 teeth in just a couple of weeks!
We did a family turkey trot
What Thanksgiving looks like in 2020
Even Santa Claus is virtual this year!
We're always ready to go!
In August, Donovan turned 7 and started a new school. He did two weeks of remote learning before going back in-person - on a snowy day in early September! He is obsessed with reading and likes playing soccer, riding his mountain bike, and can't wait to start skiing again.
Eleanor started a new preschool in July and turned 4 in October. She is just plain crazy! She can count to 99 and is learning to read. She loves owls, unicorns, rainbows, wearing mismatched shoes, and anything sparkly.
Finn just turned 12 in December. He's getting pretty gray and gets up a little slowly but is otherwise doing well and still loves the sun!
Darcy turned 9 in November and hasn't had the best year, unfortunately. She's been battling a mystery illness since early 2019, causing coughing, reverse sneezing, and rhinitis. She had pneumonia in August and has been on medicine since then. As I write this the week before Christmas, she appears to have pneumonia again, and we're not sure how well she may recover. We sure love our Darcy girl and just want her to feel good and be happy!
Nate is still working as a Principal Mechanical Engineer at Array Technologies. One of the bright sides of the pandemic is that he has not had to travel for work since February. He was already working from home mostly full-time but it's a little different with the whole family at home so he's been grateful for the flexibility Array has provided. He loves traveling in general so he's going a little stir crazy this year but gets outside as much as possible.
Kelly is still working for FirstBank and moved from the PMO (Project Management Organization) to IT as a Software Delivery Manager recently. She has been working from home full-time since March and is also incredibly grateful for the support she has received at work. Kelly is sort of a homebody so she's somewhat enjoying all of this time at home but is also getting stir crazy and tries to get outdoors a lot.
We wish you all a very merry, healthy, and safe holiday and New Year!