Feeling Better

We all seemed to have survived the bug. Tom is back to working his normal schedule.  Nathan has been sleeping more, but I think he's mostly past the sickness.

Monday Tom and I drove to Hollister and then on to Springfield looking for flooring and other goodies for the new house. Hollister has a new Menards store. Tom had gone to one in Iowa and was impressed. It's like Home Depot but somehow feels more upscale with more variety. we found cement-board for the tile floor and tiles for the entry way and the kitchen, dining room, and laundry room. We also looked at exterior and interior doors and got two exterior ones for the garage and back door. 

We looked at Menards and at a hardware store in Harrison, and then drove to the ReStore in Springfield. They had a TON of doors, but not what we were looking for. They only had a small selection of tile. Some might have been nice, but there weren't enough of them. So we just bought a few bits of things at the ReStore and headed back to Menards for the things that we had liked. It pretty much filled the back end of the truck!

We wanted to stop at Aldi's for some groceries on the way home, which we did. But we were rushed. The Empty Nester's Family Home Evening was that night and we said we'd be there. But we could see we would not be on time. We also had to make sure the tile grout and bagged tile cement were out of the elements as rain was forecasted. So we raced home, backed the truck (mostly) into the garage, grabbed and wrapped our gift exchange items and the fudge Tom had fixed the night before and raced off. Tom thought the food would be all gone by 6:30 (1/2 hour late) but there was still food and they were just getting ready for singing Christmas carols. One sister brought chimes so 18 of us got to "chime" in during the songs. Then we enjoyed the gift exchange.

After we got home, we changed, drove the truck over to the new house and unloaded a gazillion pounds of tile, backer board and doors. It seemed like that set the tone for the race through the rest of the week.

Oh, we'd been watching Barb's dogs while she went to a show on Saturday and Sunday. When I went over to feed them Sunday evening, two were missing. So Barb came home that night to two fewer dogs. She, of course was distraught. I was less so as those silly dogs kept jumping the fence and getting out. And they were such a worry to her. It was dark and so I didn't go look. Monday I was gone. Tuesday I walked around our back pasture looking for them. Barb put up notices, notified the humane society, put it on the radio... and Wednesday someone called about two dogs sleeping in a ditch about 3 miles from us. I think they went too far and couldn't find their way back. But the nights had been below freezing, so I expect they were cold.

Tuesday I continued my massive editing jobs. I finished one book Wednesday and send it to Deborah. She worked on it for the next three days. Sad note. She edited through chapter 4 on Thursday. Then on Friday she could not find a trace of it on her computer. Not even the original download for the book! Poor dear. It was back to re-editing. We used Dropbox from then on. I've put in about 25 hours since I started these projects and I probably have the same amount to go by Tuesday Dec 22 when they are due.

Wednesday a friend's husband died. He had been bed-ridden for the last months. Tom did the funeral on Saturday and I lead the music.

Tom has been busy doing bishop things-- like funeral prep, tithing settlement, visiting sick members in the hospital, and meeting with members needing help. In between, he's been working on the new house. He gutted the bathroom-- at least the tub area. He fixed the bay window. Progress is happening, but slower that what he'd like. I went over Saturday for a little bit to help him with both of those projects. We put drywall up in the bath ceiling where he took out the old dropped ceiling. 

I was asked to sing in a trio on the 18th so I got the music and practiced some on that. Friday night was our ward Christmas dinner. I had volunteered to help serve and to bring two pies and 4 dozen rolls. Our poor RS president was stressed about the dinner and I wanted to help her. Tom went in a bit early and called to ask me to come in and help with prep. They actually had things pretty well under control, but I did spend about 1/2 hour stirring gravy to try to bring it to a boil. the pot was very large, and I don't think it sat on the burner very well. It was a lovely evening.

We decorated the house in dribs and drabs. That is, one day we got out all the decorations. One day we put up the tree. One day we put out nutcrackers and other non-tree decorations. The tree got lights. And finally yesterday, I put garland and ornaments on the tree. I was tired of all the clutter of stuff all over! Tom still plans to do outside lights....

I suppose that's a bit like my Christmas shopping. A bit here and a bit there and I really don't know if I have everything or not. sigh. Remind me next year not to take on two big projects just before Christmas. It's a good thing the books are interesting.

Today... I had a hard time staying awake today, even though the talks were good. We had a great Relief Society lesson on teaching using example, the scriptures, the Holy Spirit and love of the students to change hearts. Tom had bishop's youth discussion at our home after church. He offered them brownies, ice cream, grapes and bananas. The locusts took over... there was nothing left.