The year that was 2024

I thought I'd do a little summary of the past year as we say goodbye to 2024.

Reading:

I set  myself a reading challenge goal of 60 books, then upped that to 70. Well at final tally I've read 96 books! That is the second most number of books I have read in one year. Yes some of these were very short books (prequels to full stories) but each story was a good escape from the everyday routine.

Scrapping:

It's been another bumper year of scrapping. I've created 441 single layouts this year. I didn't even do one double! Most of these have been for the Creative Teams I've been on and also for challenges at the various sites I frequent. I have truly found my scrapping passion now with digital scrapping (5 years in!) and am enjoying it immensely. I have switched to purely scrapping using Affinity Photo on my laptop and can use psd files with this which is a bonus as this program costs a lot less than Photoshop.

I am still creating for ninigoesdigi, Rachel Etrog, MissFish Templates, Adrienne Skelton Designs, Buzzbee Scraps and Digital Scrapbook. Gina Miller seems to have taken a backstep from designing as she hasn't released anything since Sept, but I am still on her team so if she comes back I will post most with her designs.

There have been changes to some of the scrapping stores this year too and designers are moving around. One of the big changes for me is that The Lilypad has a new owner (they almost closed!) and so a lot of my favourite designers resigned and are moving on. I will therefore be doing challenges on more sites I think in the coming year as other avenues come available. For now it will be Gingerscraps, Sweet Shoppe, Digital Scrapbook, and then Oscraps which will be a new one for me.

Spotify:

Aaron has paid for a subscription for Spotify so I've been listening to my Christian playlist while driving around using my phone connected to the radio in my car. My year in music looked like this:

Family News:

Mom and I did our usual trip to Wyndford in March. In April, Aaron took his first solo holiday trip to Durban for his friends' wedding (he was a groomsman) and we got to see Keith's sister-in-law Marilyn when she came out from Canada to see her Mom. June saw the 3 of us take a lovely three week trip to Canada to see all the family... I am still trying to finish scrapping this so that I can print a book about our holiday. 

Aaron did do some flying this year to build up his hours towards getting his CPL but he still has a long way to go. I got to fly with Aaron in February and again in November, Keith went up with him in  October and Aaron also took some of his friends for a few flights too during the year.

Aaron worked at Kumon Boskruin for the whole year, putting in lots of hours and getting more responsibility having been there the longest, however he will be stopping at the end of January to do some studying. Another fun thing he did was learn archery and even invested in his own bow. 

Keith enjoyed his second year of retirement (besides 3 days when he almost went back to work in March but decided it wasn't a good idea!) by pottering around in the garden.

Aaron was involved in a car accident in September in which his car got written off... we had to say tata to his Tata! Thankfully he was not hurt at all. The upshot of this is that I used the insurance money and some savings and bought myself a bright orange Suzuki Spresso, and passed the Greenbug on to Aaron.

Mom has still been having the avastin injections for her eyes, but a lot less frequently this year. The doc is doing a treat-and-extend programme so each visit is a week further apart than the last... so we only went four times this year. So far this is working and Mom's vision seems stable.

So on one hand this past year feels like it was busy but then again it wasn't much more than work, eat, sleep and scrap. The highlight was definitely our trip to Canada. Next year will have adventures of it's own and for now we are thankful that God has brought us safely through this year.