The Year is Done. The Year has Begun.

Monday morning, we all drove out to Patrick and Shelby's. By 'we all,' I mean Kathleen, Stu, Cole, Evelyn, Tenley, Carrie, Shane, and I.

That's a lot of people in a small apartment! The SC bunch stopped by on their way home for a fun break.

Shane asked straightaway about Minecraft. We don't even own the game and he's addicted!

It kept him and Cole busy while everyone else talked.

Wave one left after a couple of hours.

Wave two stayed long enough for Gigi to think it was safe to come downstairs.

We spent a little over two hours in Staunton before dropping by a CFA on the way out (If it was public, I'd buy stock in the company).

The rest of our New Year's Eve was filled with rest and recuperation. We did laundry and cleaned up some after slacking off to adventure.

Shane asked me to wake him up at midnight (after I rejected allowing him to stay up). I took a break from folding clean clothes to say "Happy New Year's," but he didn't remember the next morning (I didn't even try to wake Carrie!).

New Year's Day started off quiet. Carrie was well rested enough to try an escape room in a box with me! We escaped the Abandoned Cabin.

Shane was really eager to be a superstar with his recorder. "You know this will take a lot of practice and patience to get good with, right?" I prefaced things.

One look at his face showed Shane didn't understand. He got frustrated fairly quickly, but kept at it for a few minutes with lots of encouragement and an audience from next door.

Then there was bike riding. Shane's wheels were flat, so he borrowed Will's pump. He got angry and claimed the bike was defective when Henry could make a hairpin turn he could not.

I pointed out Henry rides every day and Shane was out of practice, but that made too much sense. I offered to ride the bike to prove it could handle the turn, but that was out of line, as well.

I eventually got the bike and discovered three things. First, Shane only pumped up the back tire. Second, the turn was possible with an inflated tire. Third, I had all sorts of sore muscles from riding that tiny bike in spots I didn't think I was that out of shape!

We played outside for hours with Henry and Sam.

I loved it when Shane got creative with the chalk underneath the boys.

Shane would have been a fantastic older brother.

We didn't see Raheem, though. He dropped by when Carrie and I had just put Shane on the computer so that we could play our game. I told him we'd be out in a couple of hours, but he moved on.

Happy New Year everyone!