Busy time of the year, huh, guys?
I hope your production goes well this weekend, Lisa. Even with some longer nights coming up, I guess it's good that the job allows for making up sick time.
I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving as I don't have to do any work.
We just drive down to Dean's and enjoy a full spread. He doesn't even really allow for donated dishes, so it's completely work-free (unless you count the endless running around I do, keeping track of Kadie and what she's terrorizing within their massive house - although, admittedly, she's gotten better with that now that she's older, but they have 4 cats that aren't completely kid-friendly). I usually do a dinner for our family sometime during that extended weekend so that we have the leftovers, but there's no time pressure. In fact, it dawned on me yesterday that I had yet to pick up a turkey. Oops!
Jeff was offered (and he has accepted) the position of team lead in his office.
He says that it doesn't come with a lot of new responsibilities - he wants nothing to do w/ the personnel side of things - but he now has "final say" on the technical things and he has been asked to help in the hiring process (reviewing resumes and interviewing) of a new person for the team.
My job search continues. Apparently, I'm harder to place than I thought. There is one position (possibly two) that looks like it might work out, but I haven't yet talked w/ the primary guy in charge of filling the slot. Wish me luck! My original goal was to be out of this office by Christmas. Depending on how this most recent thing works out, I just might make it.
Kadie is doing well. She's still very much enjoying her school. Parent-teacher conferences are coming up and Jeff and I are both looking forward to hearing an in-depth report on her activities.
We have a new pet - a female beta fish. Kadie's favorite spot in Wal-Mart is the aisle with the fish tanks and she's been bugging me to get one. Last weekend, I gave in. I told her we could get one of the beta fish (they're always in a separate section in their own little bowls) because, if you set them up in the fish bowls/water plant vases, they and the plant pretty much take care of themselves. You have to feed the fish and add about a ¼ cup of water to the vase every week, but the plant gives the fish oxygen and the water remains fairly clean w/o outside help. She picked a female beta though. If you don't know, it's the male betas that 1. are that beautiful blue/purple color with the long, flowing fins and 2. are extremely aggressive. The female betas are a rather plain little white fish. The one Kadie picked out is about half the size of my pinkie. Her name, of course, is Jessica (as is about ½ of Kadie's stuffed animals). Kadie has done a wonderful job all week of feeding her. It's usually the first thing she runs to do in the mornings and when we get home. She doesn't spend much time with the fish, but she still seems to enjoy having her.
This coming weekend we have an appointment to get Kadie's Christmas pictures done. I have all her birthday pictures cut out and separated into individual envelopes (all addressed, of course) - I have just never gotten around to getting the envelopes to the post office for the postage.
Thankfully, I didn't close any of them so you will be getting birthday and Christmas pictures all at once.
I'm gearing up to hold our 3rd annual birthday party for Jesus (15 Dec). We have a few things we'd like to spruce up in and around the house before that time, so we're planning on a couple of work weekends coming up. Hopefully, the weather will cooperate. We need to do some outside work and it's been raining a lot lately.
Mom - we got our package. Yum!
Thankfully, Jeff doesn't really care for the applets and cotlets - so more for me. I hope you hadn't meant the dresses as gifts because Kadie got one glimpse of them from the box and was all over me. She has already told me that she's wearing the black one to church this weekend.
Speaking of which, I'm suffering from a bit of a dilemma in that area. I got a recommendation from my old church's pastor for an "equivalent" church up where I live (there was only one - apparently, the Westminster area doesn't have a lot of non-denominational followers). Unfortunately, it's not a good fit. The doctrine is fine - perfect, in fact - but they're non-instrumental and have a very small congregation (which makes for very awkward and not-so-harmonious singing) and they keep the children in the main hall until after communion (a good 30/35 minutes). The room is pretty small and sparsely populated so every small noise and movement that Kadie makes as she squirms next to me feels/seems highly amplified and it makes me extremely self-conscious and uncomfortable. They also appear to only have one class for kids. All the kids, from preschool-age to middle school, go into one room for the kid's class during the sermon. The other church I've been attending has several glaring doctrine flaws but their children's church (several different classes for the various ages and age-appropriate materials, etc) and musical program are 200 times better than the other. I'm really torn about this. I don't know how much Kadie will pick up in Sunday school at this age, but it's not like she's going to remain 4 forever and she will, eventually, be old enough to understand such concepts as baptism and the revelations, etc.
Hope the southern-family travels are going well.
Our love and hugs to everyone.