Today was my last day of work until next year. I guess we're about ready for Christmas. I even put up a tree this week, mostly out of guilt. Last Sunday I wasn't feeling well and decided to skip church...turned out to be a really good call if you know what I mean...and when Beth and the kids came back Alex was crying his eyes out because his Sunday School class had made some ornaments to put on their trees at home...and we didn't have a tree for him to put his on. He cried and cried. I felt like a bad parent. So, in the evening while Beth and the kids went to the children's program at church (Alex on stage for the first time! He was the youngest by far in his singing group...didn't sing, didn't do the motions, mostly just stood there...so cute though!) I dragged the tree out of the garage and put it up, so when they got home he could put his ornaments on it. It also has a cowboy hat on the top instead of a star or angel...Alex's idea. The day before that, Saturday, Beth and I went to Fort Wayne looking for a toy chest for the kids. Going to Toys R Us on the last Saturday before Christmas weekend was not what we intended to do but it just worked out that way. We broke Alex's heart then too; he was so excited about the toy chest at the store and bringing it home. I wasn't sure why he was so excited about a toy chest. But, when we got home and took it out of the box, he excitedly looked in it and there were no toys in it. I think he thought it came with all the toys that were shown in it on the picture on the box. When he saw it was empty, he cried and cried. (Seems the terrible twos, which I thought were so easy for so long, have kicked in; the tantrums are coming fast and furious nowadays) But he got over it (mostly) when we piled all his toys in it. Now he likes to empty it and climb inside it. We bowled after shopping for the toy chest. My game was pretty good, Beth was very off. Monday the 19th we finally got a new battery in the minivan, after several jumps over the last 2 years (see 7/8/05, 4/17/05, 12/29/03) it finally got time to replace it. Beth called me at work to tell me the thing wouldn't start. I jumped it when I got home, and we took it to Advance for a new battery because they do free installation. Good call; it's a "labor intensive" job according to the sales guy there who did it, and while he was in progress the terminal broke off due to all the corrosion (apparently GM batteries are notorious for that).