The Scotts: 2025

Secret Buddies 2025: Juliet had Patrick, Patrick had Juliet, Eleanor had Nathan, Bradley had Eleanor, Anne had Bradley, and Nathan had Anne

We started the month off with a big snowstorm. And in a fun surprise move, school was not canceled!

The kids had strong feelings about this.

They had just enough time to play in the snow after school

We had a bunch of free laser tag coupons for Bluhawk and Patrick had an hour break between basketball games while playing there so it was the perfect time for his basketball team to make good use of them.

They had a great time and we credit the fun activity for them playing well and winning their next game.

Eleanor had a winter band concert and looked quite festive

Then she had a choir concert. All the Christmas concerts for us!

I hated the girls doing this almost as much as they enjoyed doing it. Great danger for Juliet.

Eleanor had a debate tournament and I got to go watch. She did great!

Debate is intense. I'm impressed by how comfortable she was with it. They had to debate about the use of AI in the school and they had to switch standpoints over multiple rounds of debate.

Patrick had his first swim meet!

He had to rush off to a basketball game after the swim meet but we stayed and collected his ribbons for him. What a champ!

Nathan came home to find me reading to a cozy Juliet

Juliet went to a pajama themed birthday party and made a gingerbread house.

A friend sent me this picture of Juliet's creation and I told her I got diabetes just from the picture.

Patrick is cute and I like playing Yamslam with him even when he is a punk and beats me.

Cookie Swap holiday party! We had such a good time.

I handed out beautiful spatulas to the winners. I actually should have won one of the prizes but I thought it was in poor taste. It was for my gluten free dairy free Nutella chocolate chip cookies I made for Nathan. Those suckers are amazing. I think I should have gotten second or third place - it's okay.

Jodee Cloud got first place

Anika Manderfeld had to leave early but her chocolate cookies got second

And Annie Rutherford got third!

With my cute hubby and the cookies I made this year - strawberry shortbread thumbprint cookies and the Nutella ones for Nathan.

Crowd pics!

Cozy time the next day

Girl Scout caroling!

Bradley loves cuddle photos with pets

Meg had a rough time - she was in Eleanor's room and peed against her closet door. We knew something was wrong, she had never done anything like that before. She was pretty upset and was breathing heavy and just cuddled hard into Eleanor afterwards. I called the vet and they diagnosed a UTI over the phone, we got her meds and she felt much better. Poor kitty!

Pictures from Nathan's holiday party. We're so fancy!

We were given a cookie kit which was quite popular with the kids.

Napping with kitties!

I don't know that I have many pictures of Bradley without a pet at this point

A beautiful birthday song for Aunt Diana

Patrick was sick for the church Christmas program so he and Nathan watched it from home

They did such a good job! I begged to have a Christmas program and Juliet was quite the darling angel

Juliet helping me cat sit my friend Corinn's cat after the performance

Picking secret buddies. So exciting!

Juliet came down with the flu the day after the Christmas performance and this is her pile of tissues. She was quite proud.

Eleanor helped me quite a bit with secret buddy projects. She would join me at the cat sitting house and do art. The cats enjoyed this quite a bit.

Christmas Eve presents. All the kids besides Eleanor came down with the flu leading up to Christmas so we had a pretty mellow holiday season. Lots of shows.

We caved and got the kids a Switch 2. This is the moment they found out. It was actually pretty great, we had both Patrick and Bradley open a Switch 2 game and Bradley pointed out our error because we only had the original Switch. I said "OH no, WHATever shall we do? We are so silly! We'll have to return your games and get other games!" and the boys were surprisingly good sports about the mixup. Then we had Ethan open the gift for him and me and it was a Switch 2. The boys were thrilled.

Eleanor had an anime themed Christmas and got a ton of Demon Slayer figurines for Christmas.

Assembling

Christmas morning

Patrick was a genius and got me Saja Boys pajama pants

Meg being knighted by the ridiculous sword Eleanor got for Christmas

Juliet had an Aphmau themed Christmas

A Christmas Sookie!

Bradley enjoyed the kazoo from Aunt Diana and Uncle Bill. The rest of the kids were just a little too into the voodoo doll ... oh dear

Eleanor opening the card telling her about the one present she really cared about for Christmas: a subscription to Crunchyroll so she could watch all the anime she wants.