Signs of Life : The Brownie Chronicles

  Just before the storm blew in, we celebrated Lunar New Year.  The plan had been to have some extended family join us, but once we knew the weather was going to be a problem, we shifted gears and made it a celebration for the 6 of us in the house.  I'm typically a procrastinator but was so proud of how well I had prepared for this celebration.  I had ordered food a week in advance.  We weren't able to reduce or cancel or food orders but were happy to support these businesses and ended up eating almost all of it over the next few days anyway! It was so good! I'll let the pics do the talking. Red "lanterns" and cutouts Papercut-looking designs Traditional Chinese banners wishing prosperity and health on the home and people in it. Plow Bao serves delicious plant-based dim sum, bow, etc. We ordered 2 of their sweetboxes.  "egg" tarts, mini sesame seed balls, mochi, and donuts Next, we picked up dim sum from Shanghai . The food was delicious! I want to go b

TJ and Tian enjoying a warm fire.  We are not built for this.  I say this a lot when referring to cold weather in Texas. Also, personally, I've spent the past 20 years in either Las Vegas or north or central Texas where it rarely dropped below 30 and when it gets that cold, it's short-lived.  Since quarantine, we've been pretty good about keeping our food supply stocked up to last at least a couple of weeks or even a month if push came to shove.  We have a deep freezer and we use a water delivery service.  That's about as far as have gone with prepping.   Then, early in February, we learned of record-breaking low temperatures headed our way.  While we knew it would likely snow and be very cold, we had no idea what was in store for us. We certainly put too much trust in the state and city infrastructures that provided basic essentials such as electricity and clean water.  We also didn't imagine the cold would knock out internet services and impair our cell service a

Before this week, I had drafted a blog post titled "Among Us - 2020 Memories."  I had planned to reflect back on the neighborhood walks, hikes and baking we did early in the pandemic, then how the routines became so mundane after 8 weeks or so. Then this storm blew in and I couldn't even focus. But before I move to February 2021, let me start with a few ways we've stayed distracted and busy during the past 11 months.  The upsides to the hellish year of pandemic. For years, Ken had been looking at electric bikes, so he decided to take the dive and order a couple of Rad Power Bikes . That was something fun for the people over age 16 in the family.  Eventually, we got a child seat for the bike so our grandkid could also enjoy getting out.  We also found other family fun distractions like: playing Among Us having video chats on the Facebook Portal jumping on the trampoline that was handed down to us the week we moved to Austin. (Thanks, Suzie!) chalk art on the driveway d