Recently

Updates which may bore people who aren't my mom --

Gary has been teaching a class at the Waukesha campus of Concordia--Wisconsin.  Enjoyable.  But a LOT of work when he has to read all the texts for the first time, prep for class, and grade papers and quizzes and online discussion.

We had Katie's family and Philip here for dinner on Thursday.  It was a nice day.  Rachel and Matt's plans ended up being changed for them, so they ended up not being here for half of Friday as expected.  We'll have to plan for another time. 

I think next year I'll plan to make the turkey ahead of time as I did this year.  It's wonderful to come home from church, cook the vegetables and the mashed potatoes, reheat the turkey, and sit down to eat.  No carving.  No bones to deal with.  No stock to make.  No messy, greasy pans to wash.  Easy breezy!

We had a friendly argument at work on Monday as to whether the Christmas music should start up on the day after Thanksgiving.  My vote was to wait at least two weeks after Thanksgiving, but couldn't we pleeeeease wait at least until December?  But no, the Christmas music has begun.  And it's not even the good stuff that played last year, when two or three times each hour I heard "Son of the Father, now in flesh appearing; oh, come let us adore Him" and "veiled in flesh the Godhead see; hail the incarnate deity" with a grateful heart.  No, this year it's about sleighing and fireplaces and shopping and stuff like that.  And I'm already perturbed about it, and it's still a full month until Christmas.  And I work full-time next week.

Last night I was reading the first chapter of the first Fred book to Alia.  All of a sudden, she just fell over and smashed her head against the table.  We got the ice pack for her.  She cried from the hard bump.  But what was more of a concern was why she crashed that way.  Eventually she mentioned to Katie that everything got black right before she hit her head.  They ended up in the ER because there was no explicable reason for a 4-yr-old to faint out of nowhere.  Follow-up appointments are scheduled for Monday.

Zoe is just barely beginning to talk.  She also has a new "thing" at church: she grabs my finger after chapel and drags me up to the altar rail and wants me to show her the candles and the lamb on the altar and wants to talk about the crucifix.  Happiness!

Maggie is going to drag me to the neighbor's barn now.  So I have to quit typing.