New Year's Eve 2023

We had a fun time saying goodbye to 2023 tonight. Dude and I made it all the way, but Matthew and Luca only made it to about 10pm. The past several years, we've rung in the new year with my sister Melissa's family, but with most of her kids in town, the Jones decided to do their own thing, which meant we were doing our own thing. If left to our own devices, the Marlers are prone to board games and movies. But with New Year's Eve falling on a Sunday, we were forced to reach deep and get slightly more creative. 

We had Matthew's brother's family over for dinner which was fun. They were supposed to come the Sunday before for Christmas Eve, but as their whole family was out for the count with bad colds, we had to reschedule. They left about 6ish to start getting their babies ready for bed. By about 7 we were ready to kick off our own festivities. We had gone to Target earlier in the week trying to come up with a game plan. We bought slime, a new game, silly string, and a yummy snack.

It ended being a really fun evening, even if we did spend twice as long cleaning up the silly string as we did battling it out with it. The kids declared it a rousing success and claimed the silly string needed to become a new annual tradition.

After the silly string battle of 2023, we did bedtime. Everyone went to their respective bedrooms. I promised Dude nothing, but said, if I was still awake at midnight, I would celebrate midnight with him, which we did, just the two of us. There wasn't a lot of fanfare. Just the count down and a few poppers Dude bought with his own money. And just like that, we made it to 2024. 

2023 ended up being a pretty great year; it honestly makes me a little nervous that 2024 might not live up to its predecessor, but here's  at least hoping that we finally make it to the financial goal that has loomed so distant for so long.

Happy New Year!