Emily Bloss

It’s been a good year… some of the highlights for me are, in no particular order:

• Getting my 101 Things in 1001 Days list going.
• Trav’s new gym habit, which will extend the number of wonderful years I get to spend with him.
• Bleys did very well in school (4.0!!) and made it into Phi Theta Kappa honor society.
• Tia journeyed to England… I’m excited and scared for her all at once.
• We made some great new friends this year, reconnected with others, and lately I’m actually seeing people I know at the store!
• All of our family & friends survived medical crises and just normal life, too.
• Our customers are awesome… genuinely nice people who are good at business and always pay on time.
• Gramma & Aunt Susie are here!
• Frewsburg Gramma & Marv are here!
• Steve got engaged to a lovely woman who we all like very much. Kathy will be a good sister-in-law.
• Trav’s brother Mike did really well with work this year - he’s moving up in the ranks of the Navy.
• This year’s Christmas theme of digital frames was very well-received. Each frame was personalized with pictures for the recipient(s), with plenty of room left on the memory card to add more stuff. I do so love giving meaningful gifts.
• I’m very happy to be posting regularly, so I can share my life and keep in touch with family & friends (and whoever else might care!).

What are you grateful for, over the past year?

I’m a big fan of Morgan Spurlock’s TV show 30 Days, and also I find Scott Young to be quite inspirational and interesting. Recently there was a post by Scott discussing The Power of Less, and it really made me think about the whole 30-day challenge idea, where you do something every day for 30 days straight so it becomes a habit. Here are challenges I’ll attempt to complete in 2009… 30 Days of:

• Unaltered Reality - Decaf coffee and no alcohol. I’ll miss you, wine with dinner!
• Daily Exercise - Gilad’s 3 days a week with pushups, crunches and whatever else on the other days. If we get a medicine ball that would be good.
• No Refined Sugar - I keep reading in various places that sugar is a major cause of cancer and if that’s true, I would like to NOT get cancer by avoiding sugar. The only sugar I’ll get will be from fresh fruit.
• Guitar Practice - Surely I could play one song at the end of that 30 days.
• Frugal Living - One month of a spending shutdown, to see how much money we could save.

That’s what I have so far. Although, if I go by the system, those things may take all year… if you miss one time, you start from the beginning and do 30 days until you get it done.

Anybody have ideas on stuff to do?

We’ve caught five Norway rats in the last five days… two big ones (a female and a stinky male) and three little ones for which I couldn’t determine gender. Apparently we’ve found a good location for the trap… under the front windows just behind the skirting, in front of a little dug out place they must be using as an entrance. We’ve released them all in the same spot at the park, right next to where we feed the squirrels. I wonder if they’ll meet up and become a little rat family again?

Update on 12/29: The trap has been set but no catches. Did the babies move on after the parents disappeared?