What's better for the day after Thanksgiving than getting your ears pierced? Well that's what Missy (and Sydni) had done today. Both girls have been wanting to do it...kind of...for a while but been too scared to have it done. So Jessica and Beth and I took the girls to Claire's and they both had their ears pierced today! Missy is so grown up.

For the first time in years, Beth and I hosted Thanksgiving for her family this year. The Wiessners and Pinksters both came down and spent the day. That  hasn't happened since Alex's first birthday, I think.

I love this. The kids and I went to the Komets game tonight in Fort Wayne, where they were hosting the Kalamazoo Wings (I've wanted to see the Komets play the K-Wings ever since they got back into the same league) where they were having a teddy bear toss! It's a minor league hockey thing. They have a toy drive, collecting new and gently used stuffed animals for needy kids for the holidays. You bring them to the game, and when the Komets score their first goal, throw them on the ice and the team collects them! So cool, and so much fun!  And the Komets won, too, including an empty net goal with 1.7 seconds left in the game to make it a 3-1 victory. What a great time.

Today I applied for a refinance mortgage for the house. As low as rates are, I think I can save us some money and get out of the HELOC. And never get another HELOC again. I'm going through Navy Federal, that should work pretty well for us. I'm probably already approved.

For the second year in a row I rented one of those giant walk-behind leaf blowers to clear the backyard. I can't believe we spent hours and hours clearing leaves the old fashioned way before finding this. Two hours with the thing and it's done, including the hard parts on the fence line. And including the adjacent yards so the leaves don't just blow back against the fence. Since we have the ditch and brush at the back of the yard I just blow the leaves back there and leave them (get it?).

Tonight was the Veterans Day dinner at church! Since I'm a veteran I got to go and be treated to a nice dinner and show courtesy of the SOS kids group. Very nice evening; kids played patriotic songs on the piano or trombone, read poetry or sang. Alex and Missy led the pledges at the beginning.

Today was the Veterans' Marathon / Half Marathon (that's the one I ran) in Columbia City. I got up early to head over there, and I will admit I had butterflies. I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to finish the whole race (or at least, run the whole thing). And I didn't quite. First bad sign was the battery in the iPod died somewhere around mile 5, which makes everything a lot longer. Well, there were really no other bad signs, I guess, except I had to walk a few times throughout the race. There is a wicked hill at about mile 10; doesn't seem fair to have a big hill that late in the race. But anyway, I just walked the hill. And otherwise, I just walked whenever I got to an aid station. I took some Gatorade, drank it while I walked, got another, and walked until it was gone. I did that a few times. I also got at one of the stations a packet of something that was kind of a goo but tasted like a caramel brownie. Not sure what that was but I liked it. I finished the half marathon in 2 hours, 8 minutes, 40 seconds. Not bad for my first attempt.