November was quite the busy month, all-around! I’m super excited because we have a new family member! Meet Boogie!
Boogie is officially a McWillough now. The (shortened) story goes that Boogie bounced between a few homes all within a span of about a week, and after a few extremely emotionally taxing days, she landed in her forever home with us. From the moment we met Boogie, it seemed like she fit right in, and none of us here in this house really wanted to see her go. Her first attempt at a forever home with her original “owner” was the result of an alcohol-induced decision, and realization that a puppy is a lot of hard work — especially at 8 weeks old. We’re told she’s a pure bred Husky — she looks the part, but we have no papers to confirm any of this. She’ll be fixed soon enough, so I expect that papers won’t ever be necessary for her, since we won’t ever need to show a bloodline.
Out of curiosity, though, we ordered a dog DNA test kit. We’ve been talking about it on and off since she became a member of our family, and wondered if it was possible that she was mixed with anything. She does resemble a Klee Kai, but that breed was designed to look like a Husky, so it stands to reason that she’d look similar. I personally think she’s too large (even though she’s super tiny right now) to be a Klee Kai, and do expect that the test will reveal she is, in fact, a Husky. I suppose we’ll find out soon enough!
Anyway, since we work from home, and Huskies are notoriously high maintenance animals, we decided that we’d be a good fit for her. We’re all navigating puppy training now! Boogie likes to spend most of her time in the kitchen, on the tile, in the corner or under the table. She’s a bit clumsy, and we’re all anxiously awaiting Husky howls as she grows. Later on in the evening, typically between 5-7pm, she turns into a super energetic crazy dog, and will run around the house like a maniac. She’s gaining weight well, is growing nicely, and we’re really happy to see that her energy levels are back to an expected level with puppies since treating her for worms.
Once she’s fully vaccinated, we’re looking forward to the dog beach and hiking with this gal. She’s working on house training — and doing remarkably well — and already knows “sit” on command. It took her less than 24 hours to get it, which is really astonishing. (Plus, she likes to eat, so treat reinforcement has been a huge helper!) We’re working on laying down + shaking next — both of which she’s doing well with, but we can’t help but snicker when we tell her, “Boogie, down!”
When we first met Boogie, her name was Jody. I sorta melted at first sight, and my “no animals, no pets right now” mantra was right out the window. I’d always laughed about how one day, I would have a dog and name it Boogers — mostly because I thought it would be hilarious to have the dog out in public and have to call out, “Boogers!!!” to get the dog’s attention. I decided if Boogie came to live with us, she would no longer be Jody…but after seeing her, Boogie was the better fit than Boogers — it’s cute and goofy, and totally nickname-able. Kate said she looks like a Boris because of her mask, so Boogie Boris McWillough it is!
Our Thanksgiving was typical of how I’ve spent Thanksgiving for about the last 5-6 years. Having a blended family and less than optimal arrangements for the holidays means that we usually spend Thanksgiving apart. Kirsten and Ethan were going to be flying out here to join the rest of us for Thanksgiving, but ticket prices — even months out — were astronomical, and to top it all off, they only got a few school days off for Thanksgiving. Schools here give the kids the full week off. It would have been a really short trip for those two, so rather than make it difficult or stressful for them, Jeff flew out. As a bonus, he got to spend the holiday with his family!
And the rest of us here in Cali, well, we just stuck around and did what we usually do — whatever we want, haha. Here’s a blurry selfie to prove it — I called this Kidsgiving.
Autumn typically spends Thanksgiving with her dad’s family — it always makes more sense because I’d so much rather her spend the holiday with big extended family. We celebrated our Thanksgiving a day early, and since there were only four of us, we opted to go a little non-traditional… I just made everyone’s favorite dish, rather than an elaborate Thanksgiving spread. Plus, that kept me from making ridiculous sandwiches out of leftover Thanksgiving fare. You know, leftover stuffing turned into a waffle, and filled with all sorts of Thanksgiving goodness. My jeans will thank me later.
Our spread consisted of “that pork” (Vietnamese Caramel Pork), mac ’n’ cheese, sweet potato pie, and banana pudding for dessert. Maybe just a wee bit more elaborate than a typical dinner, but delicious all the same. Part of my day was spent trying to get Autumn to leave the banana pudding alone — she could hardly stand it, and at one point, it involved Kate standing guard at the fridge to keep her out of the pudding. See??
Not travel for me, but we had a visitor! Four of them, actually!
My friend Mary and her family were in town for a bit, and we’re really glad to have gotten together with them a few times while they were in town this time!
Mary is a total Disney nut — I am not — so it’s always the greatest thing ever when she invites Autumn to go to the park with them. Malia, Mary’s oldest, and Autumn have a tradition of going to Disney together — it’s been going on for about 5-6 years now, and it’s so sweet to look back on the pics of the two of them together, and see how they’ve grown.
In the first week and a half of November, I finished rolling through the alphabets I had stowed, and can officially say, I have 17 fonts to program! Cursive fonts, rustic fonts, logo fonts, wedding invitation fonts…you name it, it’s there! That’s going to be really awesome for starting next year off with a bang. I’ve been working on programming here & there to get a jump on the releases for next year, and have also been collecting ideas for some upcoming font projects that I’d like to make happen! I’m really freaking excited about what 2019 will bring for my font design.
I find the programming process to be both exciting and tedious — I love dropping my lowercase letters into Glyphs and watching them connect, but everything else is such a drag. Since I have so many alphabets currently, I’m getting a lot of the mindless copy/pasting of letters done right now for all of the future fonts. Some of the alphabets I haven’t even looked at since the summer. I’ve caught myself studying them and thinking, “Oh, yeah!! That WAS a good one.” 🙂
As far as ideas…I have some robust families planned over the next year or so. I have a goal to release one font a month in 2019 — blog about my goals coming soon! — so I think that any families that I start + finish will likely be toward the end of 2019. I feel like I’m in the hurry up + wait stage, and that I’m bursting at the seams with this creative energy.
December will be a lot of fun, and we’re all looking forward to it. We’ve got a Metallica concert coming up (Bucket List material!), and lots of time with the kids off of school.
We’ll be setting up our tree soon — something that I will watch from a distance, since last year’s real tree did a number on my allergies when I came into contact with it. We’ll be having our first California Christmas this year! This will be the first year that we aren’t traveling elsewhere for the holidays — while we’re definitely going to miss our families, we’re also really excited to do the Christmas thing here with the kids. So excited, even, that I have custom wrapping paper that I lettered for each of the kids. Yes, I’m serious.
Happy December, y’all!
