Beth's staff Christmas party was this Tuesday at the Boathouse; I got to go along (you pay your own way) with her and there was a white elephant gift exchange. We brought jars of soup (which were highly coveted as stealing targets) and brought home some Chuck Norris folders and half a globe. We'll probably take those to Michigan when we visit family over Christmas break and play dirty bingo.....Wednesday was the annual church "gingerbread" house build/decorating event. Alex and Missy were at the Revolution white elephant / Christmas party so I just hung around the building going on and watched, and was asked to be a judge for the ugly sweater contest; ugliest and most creative categories. The kids both found some old junk toys (and the Hamster Dance CD) to give away in the white elephant gift exchange; Alex got some candy as a gift, and Missy got an almost working tablet. It supposedly did not work, but it came on when she powered it up. For a while. And the battery did not hold a charge. Seems Jeremy hasn't used the thing since 2012 when it wouldn't work any more. But, Missy did a factory reset and got it to do a few things before she gave up on it.....Beth's book club met at our house on Thursday. I took that opportunity to make myself scarce; I've put the blankets up in the stairwell again so it's like the house is divided and I wasn't even there.....As of Friday evening, I am now on vacation until next year. Christmas is coming up fast. Friday we all went to Fort Wayne to go to Burlington because Alex and Nat don't have winter coats. We found a bunch of stuff, but the coat selection was pretty minimal and we weren't that impressed with it. It was no better/different than TJ Maxx to my eyes. We had dinner at Fazoli's and happened to meet the Monsma's there, also having dinner and doing some shopping. But we had to get back to Warsaw in time to drop off Natalie at the bowling alley at 9 where she was going to a birthday party (o the drama associated with that) for cosmic bowling. We were back in plenty of time. She did have a great time although she is a terrible bowler.....We've spent most of the week doing online shopping for Christmas