Kissin' Cousins

My brother and his wife and daughter arrived Friday night for the weekend. They are spending the week in SC for Thanksgiving, then stopping back by on their way home to NH. Saturday morning we went to Cracker Barrel for breakfast and headed off to Hershey. We had a good trip and got to see a lot of Amish horses and buggies and the country side. The last time Lucie and I were out that way was when we had to race to see Elliott get his finger tip sewed back on. At Hershey we did the free tour and ate some chocolate stuff there and picked up some Christmas presents. Then we hit the outlets for a while. For supper, we went to Sonic (they had never been there either). So we ate there and then when I went to start the car, I had a dead battery! I guess my headlights were on the whole time and the auto shut off didn't so there we were. The Sonic workers were great and came out with jumper cables and jumped me and we were on our way.

After church on Sunday, we went to another place they had never been to: CiCi's Pizza. The service was poor and the selection wasn't that great but we had some friends from church join us so that was fun. After that we roamed the mall and watched the Patriots on TV. For our family viewing night, we watched a National Geographic special on Amazon headshrinkers... This morning they continued on their trip to SC. Lucie is off this week and I am taking a few days off so I don't lose them. No plans besides creating excuses on why NOT to put up the Christmas decorations.

In other fascinating news, I did a day of volunteering at a Habitat for Humanity site. Part of my new hire requirements. So the other new hires and I spent the day moving dirt and mulch for a multi-tenant condo in Wilmington. It was a nice day and fun. When I got home I blew the rest of the leaves out of the pool area and into the woods.

The kids brought home their report cards. Ashleigh remains in the top 10% of her class and Elliott is in the top 2%. Ashleigh's field hockey season is over but she may play indoor lacrosse over the winter. Elliott is still practicing in the city basketball league and doing well.

We are going over to some friends' for Thanksgiving but I think Lucie is making turkey dinner for us to have here also. Her birthday is Wednesday so I hope she makes herself something reaaaal nice...

Sod And Soggy

This picture has nothing to do with anything but I thought it was kind of funny. This is how I found Lucie in bed the other night - sound asleep with the book in her face.

We have had nothing but rain for several days. A cold, soaking, miserable rain. But a friend of mine gave me 59 rolls of sod from his yard (he cut it from where he is putting in a shed). So I placed it around some low areas in my yard. With all this rain, it should settle in nicely.

Ashleigh finished her field hockey season. Another year with a losing record but their intensity was much better and their skills greatly improved. Elliott just started playing basketball for the Newark city league. He had the option of playing one more year in the division he has played in for a few years or moving up to the next bracket. He wisely chose to stay in his division. So now he is one of the veterans and is the team leader. He is really hitting his shots and has some skills. Must be a genetic thing...

I upgraded Lucie's church computer to Windows 7 the other day. That went very smoothly. Elliott had saved up his money and bought a new Xbox game. Ashleigh had a firepit party here last week and hooked the Xbox up to the 52 inch Sony HD in the living room so they could play Guitar Hero World Tour with her friends. So Elliott was playing his game when he got the dreaded red rings of death on the machine. So we contacted Microsoft and will ship it in for free repair. But he is bumming because it may not be back in time for Thanksgiving break. Now all he has time for is reading and cleaning his room... He did just win a $3000 scholarship for doing so well in the state tests so I can't get on his case about studying!

Work is going really well. I seem to be creating a lot of work for myself as I dig into things. But in this company, initiative and not going with the flow is actually encouraged and hopefully rewarded. I really enjoy going into work every day. Well, make that most days. The other day of my co-workers was let go. She was like the buddy you first make when you move to a new school. We hadn't worked together long but we had some good laughs in that short period. So I guess that even though I lost a co-worker, I didn't lose a friend...