Happy New Year!

I think 2005 was a decent year for me. We have reached some of our goals, which mostly involve updating this house. We've made quite a few new purchases this year, and I hope we can continue to fix things up as we go along. We have a beautiful new dining room set. It's oak with yellow accents, a nice china cabinet that's 5 feet wide with glass shelves, mirror back, and a drawer for silverware. I am finally using the set of silverplate my MIL gave me when we first got married, and I'll be inheriting the sterling silver she now has in her apartment in Utah. It's really nice to have the silverplate. Some of it was not used so much, like the soup spoons and the ice tea spoons. DH likes ice tea spoons for milkshakes. We also bought a new washer and dryer, and spent a lot of money fixing up the old 1995 Plymouth Voyager, hoping to keep it for a few more years. We had to spend a lot of money on the A/C. We bought some cabinets for the family room and a counter top for below the cabinets because that is where my computer and DD's computer will be after it's installed. DH is working on it as I am typing this, so hopefully, next week all will be done.

The one thing lacking this year was a nice family trip. We bought the Aliner camper in 2004, but still have not used it. The registration held us up a bit because DH had to 1. install the trailer hitch to our minivan, 2. install the brake light kit and 3. Have the trailer inspected. There was always a holdup with each of these steps, but we finally have a trailer we can pull behind our 95 Voyager. We plan on a trip in March, because all 3 of our birthdays are then.

DD is looking forward to her 16th birthday and I promised she could have a sleepover party. I'm thinking she could even have a regular birthday party with some boys invited, then after that party is over, the boys can go home and the girls commence with the slumber party. She has a good set up downstairs, with her bedroom being downstairs, her very own bathroom and the family room. We have to clear some things out of the family room, but I pretty much know where I am going to store the boxes once they are sorted out.

Tonight we are having a friend over for dinner because she has family out of town, she had to work, and she had no where to go on New Year's Eve. We are having steamed shrimp, corn on the cob, salad, and DH wants to buy some cream of crab from a restaurant, but I think I will look for a recipe to make at home. Shrimp and corn are easy to make, so it shouldn't be too much trouble to make the crab soup.

We found the cream of crab at this new branch of a restaurant in the Fredericktowne Mall. It's called Jug Bridge West, and we had the soup, plus the Maryland Crab soup, some crab cakes, french fries, and some cole slaw. It was all pretty good. The crab cakes were decent for $5.95 - that included the fries and slaw. It did have some filler, but it was pretty tasty.

I was trying to think of three bad things that happened this year, and three good things, but I decided the exercise was not very productive. I think sometimes I can more easily recount the bad things, and I really don't want to be so morose about life. I have a nice life, really, if not a more traditional boring one (to some people.) Lately I have been watching "Sex in the City" in syndication and I am more clothes conscious than ever. I have a lot of nice skirt patterns, cut one out of a beautiful brown velour material given to me by my MIL, and haven't started the sewing yet. I have plans for a green cordoroy blouse to go with it, and I've just been on the lookout for newer clothes in general. I will be glad when I can get something else done besides the usual holiday decorations, parties, and cooking.

I bought a new brown velour jogging suit from Boscov's, but I am taking it back Monday. For one thing, I have to hem the pants a lot, and even though it was a good buy at $16 for a $66 designer jogging outfit, I could have saved at least 20 percent more if I'd had a store coupon. Well, back it goes, and maybe I'll consider buying the black version because it has the rhinestone zipper front and pockets, and I love the bling. I also found a cut green faux suede jacket with sweater sleeves at Good Will of all places. It was only $5, and it looks nice on me. I wouldn't normally buy anything from there, but we were dropping off a donation, and we went shopping in the Bargain part of the store. They had some nice things, including 6 books I wanted, one for DH, a set of 8 cobalt blue drinking glasses, a shirt from LLBean for DH, a glass that matches my set of Corelle dishes (Chutney), and a Taebo video. We spent $24, and I think we got quite a bargain. I plan on shopping there again by myself, because DH hates to wait for me to shop.

I also found a pair of bronze colored pumps for church or otherwise dressy wear that I really like. I have a new shoe rack in my bedroom, so I have room for more shoes now.

Well, hi to everyone at SBOT and Happy New Year!!!! *smooches*