The year 2024 is ending. This was a rollercoaster year for us. There were many pluses, but also many minuses. Let’s unpack the year 2024 in Elfland.

The positives: The kids and I started the year with a bang. We travelled home from India, refreshed and raring to go. Rosie the dog turned 15 in May, which was a milestone that we were not expecting. We spent a few nights at the camp and did our usual things at Elf land. On a personal front, the most significant progress was that I got my stories “The flying boy” and “Animal diaries” edited. “The flying boy” is the only one that is nearing completion and will be self published this year. But that was not all. Tanya and I attempted NaNoWriMo with some good results. I am hoping to have more writings published from the work that came out of NaNoWriMo.

In terms of travel, the girls and I took a trip to Philadelphia. That was short. We couldn’t do more because of Rosie being too old. But the trip was very fun. I went back to India for two weeks in September which was nice too.

A huge change in our lives occurred when Tanya finished school. It was a whirlwind feeling. I didn’t know whether to feel happy or sad about it. After going through a range of emotions, I can say that this is a positive. Tanya took a gap year and will join Penn State to study biology next June. In the meantime, she has taken a seven month course at a local tech school named CPI to study solar tech. Oh ya, and the biggest thing. She got her driver’s license. That was quite an adventure. She is all grown up now, driving to CPI and back.

Leena has many friends at school and is very mature for her age. She is moving along, growing like a weed as usual. Next year I will write about this interesting girl of ours.

Summer was not my favorite. We stayed busy with the graduation and our houses. The street painting was the summer highlight. We also got two new chickens, Oreo and Paisley. Oreo is sweet. Paisley is a runner and won’t warm up to us. But ok, she has good survival instincts!

The negatives: Ok, I promise to keep the negative section smaller than the positive, although that will be tough. We lost three animals. Baby the chicken passed at the age of 8. It was kind of expected, but still sad. Then, finally in October, the dreaded moment came when Rosie got very sick and had to be put down. Though expected, it was painful. We were very used to seeing her pleasant grandma expression. She would no longer play, but she was still there. Her absence is felt by us. Kylo Ren, our other dog, feels it the most. He seems to be bummed out since she has been gone.

Finally, the nasty shock came in terms of Daisy the chicken’s death. Daisy was only 5 and we were not expecting her to die. But a hungry hawk had other plans and got her a couple of weeks ago. It was painful. She was already dead and apart when we found her. Hopefully she didn’t suffer.

The grand finale of negatives was over the last week when Kylo had bad diarrhea and we got scared that we would lose him. We took him to vet emergency. He responded to all the medicines and is back to normal now.

Yesterday Johan fell of a ladder while working on the camper and ended up with two broken ribs. We are super thankful that he is ok otherwise, but it was a very scary situation. He had to go to the emergency room.

Oopsie, looks like the negatives are as much as the positives. I am happy to say goodbye to 2024, and looking forward to our upcoming year 2025. We have big plans for the year, and hopefully will leave the negative energy behind.

All of us are happy and healthy, although Johan has some mending to do. Our family and friends are also doing well. So we have plenty to be thankful for.

Happy new year 2025!