Another year come and gone. At the beginning of the 2019, Boxes in Fields stated they did not have any resolutions. As resolutions never get fulfilled, we opted instead for one simple goal. To be happy. Having warm, clear winter days in January was a great way to start the new year. Honestly, who can look across the bay with calm water and blue skies and not be happy. Not I.

As the year progressed, I was trying to take as many pictures of the little things that made one of the four (not including the feathered attendants) residents happy like sleeping for the doggo. Just look at her face. She is smiling in her sleep. Hope she catches whatever it is she chases.

Sometimes the happy things are just being married to ridiculous better half. He is laughing his head off and the dog is unfazed at the unfolding of this event. Not being able to recall what this moment was about way back in February doesn’t really take away from the smile it brings to my face when I see it in my photo feed. This man is the best thing to ever happen to me.

Knowing time is running out with family time (forced or not), more game nights were introduced. Game nights were held for bad weather days when it is too cold or too wet. Trio was given to the Kid by our friend, the Sailor. It is more challenging than regular Tic Tac Toe but doesn’t take hours to play. Our other board games are rated from 40-90 minutes and require lots of thought. If not played when everyone is fresh and lively, the game can get ugly.

When I used to work in town, I would bike as much as the weather would allow. It was a great way to start the day and worked well at releasing stress on the way home as there was usually strong winds to ride against. Exercise does a body good. Now we ride as a family and I find that even more enjoyable. And stressful.

Working from home has it many, many benefits. However, separating work from home can be difficult and exhausting. It a Monday morning and the Planner and I have to go to Big City #2 to collect parts and materials and the Kid has to ride along because he can’t stay home alone for the 10 hours we will be gone. Then what should have been a four hour drive to get there took six. Once arrived, the packaging was destroyed and had to be re-wrapped to bring home. And finally, it didn’t make it the trip and our four hour return trip yet again took close to six hours.

When you finally do make it home, work still needs to be done and everyone is tired and cranky. Days like this require a full day of down time on all levels. Everyone does what they want or need to chill out and find their own inner happy. The Planner and the Kid play video games and read books, I bake cookies. It is 90+ degrees outside and summer is in full blown radiant heat, yet I bake cookies.

It is so hot inside the Rainstream the cookies take on a whole new form. What was supposed to be brown butter chocolate chunk cookies are now brown butter melted chocolate cookies. All of this before I even turned on the oven. As I ate cookies and laughed about the ridiculousness of making cookies in the summer. Sweat pours down my arms and face as I smile to myself while eating freshly baked cookies. Happiness.

By summers end, happiness was long gone as the summer heat was unbearable. Humidity vs heat, take your choice of misery. Having both with not once drop of rain for months and the world seems bleak. Bleak. The only place to cool down is dinner at a fast food joint where you then freeze.

Solace from the misery can only be found for a few hours in the early morning and late evening. It is in these few late evening hours the Planner can be seen with the glimmer of a smile returned to his face. Sailing. Smiling. What a great combo.

Just as one thinks the heat will never end, a sudden cold snap works it way across the state dropping temperatures upwards of 40 degrees. Even better, a visit during this cold snap to the Doubters house where the Kid got to shoot his first ever gun. Other than a BB gun. His nose was running, his cheeks were pink, and his fingers were frozen but there was a smile across his face!

Not wasting the opportunity of a cold snap and a four day weekend, we traveled from the Worriers to a local state park for a hike in East Texas. East Texas unlike the rest of Texas still has had rain all summer and the trees and flowers are still vibrant and green, even as they turn fall colors.

Hiking has been known to produce happy endorphins. Seeing the Kid taking pictures of nature and watching his face alight with glee was the best part of the hike.

I don’t what he thought when he saw these formations but whatever it was it was worth it. Seeing the Kid smile unabashedly was worth the four hour drive. Knowing the summer is finally over and fall is finally arriving to South Texas in September brings a smile to the Planners face. Having a happy, stress free family for just a few days brings a smile to my face.

Sometimes, life requires a reset. These past four days were just that. Partaking in a work free, four day vacation was relaxing for everyone. It was a great reset. A reset that everyone needed and greatly benefited from. Everyone except the doggo. She came back just as tired as before. She did not reset nor was she rested.

Coming back home with cooler temperatures, it was easy again to find simple things that made me happy. Even if it just for the moment. Like driving with a lizard on the hood of the car. He rode out the driveway and down the street. By the time I got to the highway, he had ducked back under the hood for safety. Later at home, I saw him on the hood sun bathing. Guess the 70+ winds were too much and he needed to reset. To find his happy.

Happiness can be found every where, any where, at anytime. You don’t even have to look. It just rolls into your hands. Like a whole bag of heart potatoes at Thanksgiving!

“Why does watching a dog be a dog fill one with happiness?” Years ago, before the age of memes I saw this written on a card. Today, even though, the quote can be found everywhere on the Internet it still holds true as the sun is warm. When this doggo is not driving me crazy with her old age eccentricities, she makes me happy. Happy, happy.

Yeah, I would say Boxes in Fields did fairly well at trying to be happy. It was a goal worth pursing. Waking up at the crack of dawn on the weekend to take your kid on a bike ride to the beach is not always fun. Seeing his face light up when two squealing hawks fly over and land on the telephone directly above his head or watching his uncontained excitement at seeing his first ever opossum, priceless. These are the happy moments I cherish. They are not forced or bought or momentary. They are happiness being etched into memories for years worth of cherished smiles.

So as the Planner and I sit around our pallet wood campfire and watch/listen to the neighborhood fireworks, we smile at the new happy memories being created by nothing more than just being. Happy. Content. Smiles to a new year, a new decade.