This whole year I have kept up with my diary every day but instead of posting it daily I took to doing a weekly update called "the week that was..." so I thought is was only fitting to title this post in the same vain as it will be a summary of my year.
Scrapping
I've been very busy with scrapping again this year. Done loads of challenges for Gingerscraps, Sweet Shoppe, The Lilypad, Pickleberry Pop and Oscraps. Then there was all my CT team work too for Adrienne Skelton, Buzzbee Scraps, Digital Scrapbook, MissFish Templates, ninigoesdigi and Rachel Etrog. I haven't been as diligent keeping up with my tally as I haven't had that much free time as I did in the past... with all the scrapping I do, updating the tally takes a few hours. I did managed over the last few days to just add it all up and found that I've done 486 single and 5 double layouts which gives me 491 total pages done.
Reading
Based on last year's reading I set myself a high (but attainable) goal of reading 70 books this year... and I managed to do that and then some! I've read 87 books (though Goodreads only shows 82 as some were multi-book sets) which was 22668 pages. Not to bad considering work was busy and I did all that scrapping too that I mentioned above (hehehe).
Family
Some of the highlights for our family this year are:
Aaron quit his job at the end of January and spent the next three months studying matric physics and chemistry. He rewrote this subject to improve his mark so that he can enrol in an Aviation Aeronautics course. Unfortunately the results were released on in August so he missed the midyear star and has to wait till March 2026 before he can begin. This has been okay as he started a new parttime tutoring job in September which he thrived at.
Aaron has continued with his flying this year too. He had to change flight school midyear as the one he was at had all their planes in maintenance at the same time and he couldn't wait for them to be able to operate again because his PPL requirement would have lapsed (has to fly once ever three months). So the new school saw him learning to fly a new type of plane and he managed to get the rating on that as well as his PPL renewal done in December. We've also been blessed out of our socks with a sponsorship through my work for his flying for next year... a true blessing from God.
Keith has enjoyed his retirement this year. He has done a few projects around the house as well as spending many hours pottering around the garden.
Mom saw the eye specialist in March and was told that there was no further treatment options for her eyes. Her macular degeneration is still progressing but is fairly stable from the bleeds point of view. Her actual sight is still iffy and challenging, but Mom is very positive in tackling her disability. She has adapted to do what she can... listens to audio books, still does crocheting (by feel), bakes and cooks.
My year was busy... work has increased as we've had new projects come on board. We employed a new lady in our billing department, whom I trained in January. Since then I've taken on a new region for billing and possibly even a second. We are also in the process of getting a more AI driven system (not my cup of tea!) which we will have to get to grips with in the new year. My private drawing work has continued this year too... not as much as in the past couple of years, but enough to help to pay for my scrapping supplies and a few extra flying expenses.
From January to March, Keith's brother and his wife were in South Africa from Canada (escaping their winter). We saw them a few time during the two months. My brother, his wife and daughter visited us from New Zealand in April. They stayed with us for two weeks. Mom and I did our annual trip to Wyndford in April. In May, and again in November, Mom, Aaron and I attended Lay Witness Mission weekends ministering to two different communities. The one in November was over Aaron's birthday too... we had a long roadtrip to Empangeni and back that weekend. So even though we haven't had any family holidays this year, all my little weekend trips and the family visits felt like they were holidays anyway. In December my niece and her family moved to Jhb from Bloem and we spent the day with them too just before the end of the year. Hopefully we will see a lot more of them now. Keith's Mom has not been well this year. She turned 90 in November.
The plan for 2026:
It's going to be a busy year for Aaron with his new course. For me it will be extra busy at work with all the new billing regions I will be doing, plus learning the new system. Not planning to do any trips (besides Wyndford again). So I guess the main plan will stay in place for next year... lots of scrapping, reading and family time.
