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2015 In Review - Home & Family
For the most part, home life has been pretty stable. Neither Michael, Kent nor myself have died, the house hasn't burned down, the cars didn't explode and family drama has been relatively minimal. We've all had some health challenges, but we're still here.
Sadly, this year, we said goodbye to Kent's mother Zoe who passed away August 19. She had been in relatively weak health since her stroke a couple of years ago but this still caught us all by surprise. We scattered some ashes near their home in Maryland this fall and plan to scatter more of her ashes in Florida near their winter home in March 2016. We miss her.
We also had an addition: Michael's youngest daughter & her husband welcomed their first child, Elodie, June 13. She was a month early but needed only minimal observation at the hospital before being released. In the time since, she's grown quickly, is interacting with people, has expressed interest in her environment, and is on the cusp of crawling. And she's a total delight. She's on her way to being the most photographed baby in human history.
Because her family lives on the east side of DC, we get to see her much more frequently than we have the other grandkids in Ohio, and we're close enough to be an alternate daycare for her while the parents are working. Elodie is a lot of fun, at least when she's not in a crying mood anyway.
I'm currently 48, creeping to 49 next month and, naturally, will hit 50 about a year from now. By way of celebrating my pending 50th and Michael's pending 60th (Kent is somewhere between), our plan is for the three of us to spend 7-10 days in London & the English countryside in September 2016. While I've wanted to do something like this for a long time, there has always been some family crisis which drained my chequing account before I could escape. That will not be permitted this time.
In mid-2014, we put solar panels on our house. They are still pretty damn cool. Our accumulated electricity expense since installation about 18 months ago is less than $20.
I still have no car. My Civic died a year ago; we decided to struggle through with just Kent's Dodge Caravan and Michael's Chevy Cobalt. And so far, while some planning & coordination has been needed, we've done pretty well with only the two vehicles. We have no plans for a third vehicle at this time.
The state of Maryland kinda downgraded our house this week. The valuation of property by the state government for purposes of establishing property taxes by counties & municipalities is conducted every three years. In 2012, our home was valued (land & buildings) at $495,800; this week, we were notified the revised value is $433,200, a drop of about $60k. Of course, this is only for tax purposes: actually sales price if we were to sell would probably be closer to the former than the latter. Still, since it is for tax purposes, I'm more than happy to take the lower value. And we're not planning to sell or move anyway.
Sadly, this year, we said goodbye to Kent's mother Zoe who passed away August 19. She had been in relatively weak health since her stroke a couple of years ago but this still caught us all by surprise. We scattered some ashes near their home in Maryland this fall and plan to scatter more of her ashes in Florida near their winter home in March 2016. We miss her.
We also had an addition: Michael's youngest daughter & her husband welcomed their first child, Elodie, June 13. She was a month early but needed only minimal observation at the hospital before being released. In the time since, she's grown quickly, is interacting with people, has expressed interest in her environment, and is on the cusp of crawling. And she's a total delight. She's on her way to being the most photographed baby in human history.
Because her family lives on the east side of DC, we get to see her much more frequently than we have the other grandkids in Ohio, and we're close enough to be an alternate daycare for her while the parents are working. Elodie is a lot of fun, at least when she's not in a crying mood anyway.
I'm currently 48, creeping to 49 next month and, naturally, will hit 50 about a year from now. By way of celebrating my pending 50th and Michael's pending 60th (Kent is somewhere between), our plan is for the three of us to spend 7-10 days in London & the English countryside in September 2016. While I've wanted to do something like this for a long time, there has always been some family crisis which drained my chequing account before I could escape. That will not be permitted this time.
In mid-2014, we put solar panels on our house. They are still pretty damn cool. Our accumulated electricity expense since installation about 18 months ago is less than $20.
I still have no car. My Civic died a year ago; we decided to struggle through with just Kent's Dodge Caravan and Michael's Chevy Cobalt. And so far, while some planning & coordination has been needed, we've done pretty well with only the two vehicles. We have no plans for a third vehicle at this time.
The state of Maryland kinda downgraded our house this week. The valuation of property by the state government for purposes of establishing property taxes by counties & municipalities is conducted every three years. In 2012, our home was valued (land & buildings) at $495,800; this week, we were notified the revised value is $433,200, a drop of about $60k. Of course, this is only for tax purposes: actually sales price if we were to sell would probably be closer to the former than the latter. Still, since it is for tax purposes, I'm more than happy to take the lower value. And we're not planning to sell or move anyway.
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