Long Day at Practice

So it was a long day of working towards our big production, and there's the reminder:  "keep it in the hat." We're talking worries, of course.  Don't let that hat leak, either.  Mom has been working hard on costumes, and there are so much going on in so many directions - I'm getting background music, learning a lot of lines, blocking, gathering props, writing material for new segments, and of course we're doing a lot of that for the Spectacular production in a few weeks as well.  It's a lot, and of course there was practice tonight.  It was the final practice before Saturday's all-day event, where we're practicing and leading up to a version of the production to show friends and family.  So tonight's practice went deep into the night.  Maddie was at home tonight, and we hardly saw her at all today.  

One thing I brought in to my office today is a big stack of Christmas VHS movies.  I found these the other day and thought this would be a good season to watch a few of them at work!  Some of these I haven't seen in ages.  If it's a Christmas movie or special available on DVD, I no doubt bought a copy of it.  But some of these have never been transferred, and are really vintage Christmas specials and movies - like "The Night They Saved Christmas."  That's a classic movie with Paul Williams as an elf, trying to stop some Arctic oil drillers from literally blowing up the North Pole.  Art Carney is not a happy Santa in that movie!  There are others, and in fact some that Mom taped off the television set.  Yes, that's what we did back in the day - we'd use our VCR devices to record what was on the television set.  That's why there are also all these dated commercials to look at to, which in some ways are just as entertaining.  In a way, this is like the old record player I have where I can listen to vintage vinyl albums.  But these are VHS tapes, and yes there's that less-than-perfect screen image and the high-pitch sound when the old television set turns on.  But it's nostalgia, and it's fun.

Anyway, it was a long, long day.  We got back in time for reading tonight with Maddie, and read just enough to see that the Wintersmith has some lessons to learn, and Tiffany Aching no doubt will be the one to teach Winter a thing or two.  It's been a good read, and Maddie will probably be wanting to go to book four next, which is likely to be started next week once we find out the conclusion of this story.  Which I don't remember at the moment, but we'll get there!

We had a busy day.  It's stressful, but things are falling into place.  There have been some big casting changes at the last minute, namely me now doing a much bigger role.  But it will all work out in the end.  All my worries are in the hat!

Noodles and Pie

We had to hastily put together Maddie's lunch tonight because it was pretty late getting home, and she suggested picking up some noodles on the way home.  

And perhaps because we're in such a Christmas spirit, that brought to mind immediately the scene from "The Santa Clause 2," where Scott Calvin invites Carol Newman out for some noodles... and pie.  Because that's his idea of a good time.  When packing her lunch, she got the noodles in there, but snuck in a small pumpkin pie.  And on top of that she's got her spicy pickles too.  Pretty good lunch if you ask me!

Tonight Maddie had a good evening at FCY, although the photographer wasn't there for any pictures at all.  That's because the photographer was backstage at the main campus with the rest of us, helping out with another night of tech week.  It's been a long night - we practiced a few times tonight, and the big stressful thing that worried me all day has come and gone, and all is well.  I am now the host, the narrator, and a few other changes have been made.  Things are moving along well, and we still have a few more nights of practice to go, so that's good.  November is drawing to a close, isn't that wild?

Speaking of Carol Newman and Scott Calvin, we watched another episode of "The Santa Clauses" tonight,  just because we wanted to watch one thing before settling down for the night.  We've been enjoying this show, actually.  It's been a lot of fun seeing the characters again, and there's been some questions answered that a lot of people have long wondered.  It's been fun!

We're heading towards the end of "Wintersmith" this week, as I read another chapter before bedtime.  The Nac Mac Feegle have a mission, so you know the ending should be fairly wild.  The plush entourage came down the hall to listen in, and then everyone got tucked in after prayers.  It was a busy day - lots of work with the play.  But we're heading to bed, ready to get another good night's rest.

Put it in the Hat

Tuesday of Tech Week is here, and we're just so busy with preparations.  As with any tech week, some challenges popped up, and they're not insurmountable.   We just watched the "Prep & Landing" Christmas specials, and there's one where Lanny is intensely worried about a mission.  Wayne takes off his hat, points at it, and tells him what do we do with our worries?  Lanny knows the answer already, and answers timidly, "We put them in the hat?"  The payoff is that later on Lanny worries again, and mutters to himself, "I think my hat is leaking!"

So that's been the running joke of the week for us, particularly when I'm worried about any aspect of the production.  Mom turns to me and goes, "Where do we put our worries?"  Yes, we put them in the hat.  I kind of want an elf hat right now.

Anyway, it's been a busy week.  Maddie didn't see us much today, as we were at practice tonight for a long time.  Practice was until around 9pm or so, but there were plenty of other things to do afterwards, discussing lighting, microphones, props, set issues, and so on.  It was a late night.

Maddie had a good day at school.  This morning as we were going out to the car before school, we were literally marching.  That's because I hit the button on the Main Street Electrical Parade ornament on the tree, which immediately starts to play that parade theme, and sure enough there's this fun little march out the door.  We're doing okay - just busy.  The birds are really flocking to our back deck now because it's getting cold out there and food is getting harder to come by.  The bluebirds are tapping on our windows to let us know when there's a refill needed, and even the chipmunk is climbing up the railing to get to the safflower seeds. 

Just to let you know, we still have about four sea monkeys left in the tank.  These hatched back at Easter time, and I've been good about giving oxygen each morning to them, and food once a week.  This is the longest I've ever had sea monkeys - they're doing pretty good!

And I'm still doing the iFit thing, staying on the treadmill each day.  Since I've gotten the machine back in October, I've done seventy workouts on it, according to the stats.  Lately I've been walking in Antarctica with penguins, which is fun because they're penguins and what's not to love about penguins?  And we read from our scriptures each day too - currently at Genesis 16 with this commentary Bible.  God is testing Abraham to see far he'll go to help his family, even if Lot keeps getting in trouble by hanging around the wrong people and areas.  This Bible commentary has been super interesting at points, discussing mysteries like who exactly Melchizedek is - we were learning a theory about it actually being Shem, Noah's son.  Interesting stuff!

Maddie's been playing her new game, an extension of the Animal Crossing game that she's enjoying.  She's also been making origami flowers and leaving them everywhere.  Also, she spends a lot of her time talking with her groups on the phone.  She's keeping up with her school work of course, and this has been a good week for her spirits in pre-Calculus because she got an A on a big test, and that was a big help.

Meanwhile, Mom is working tirelessly on costumes and props.  Ordering things, wrapping things, sewing things... always busy.  Less than a week to go.

We closed out the day with prayer, and we did spend a little time reading from "Wintersmith" again, plowing forward (through the snow) as we attempt to save a big part of the Discworld once more.  Time for sleep.  It was a good day - just a busy one!

Persimmon

This weekend we had time to go grocery shopping, and we picked up a persimmon.  Of course I know these fruit and heard of them before.  But there was some advertising there that I didn't know - it was a "holiday favorite."  So I got one, and perhaps it was a bad one?  I don' know.  It seemed solid enough, and the color was ripe, and I got in the grocery store and... well, it seemed okay on the outside.  And it smelled nice, a familiar pleasant fragrance of fresh fruit that made you want to take a bite.  But just one bite of this fruit was like experiencing a black hole that sucked every milliliter of moisture out of your mouth, and perhaps your head.  It was like a dry bomb that went off in your mouth and immediately vaporized any moisture whatsoever.  It was not a good experience!

So this morning - once we got some more liquids in our system to counteract the one bite of a persimmon - we were doing some more decorating.  The Nativity set is in place, and all that's left are the wreaths.  Those are usually a pain, but we'll get to them.  There's so much to be done, but a lot of that gets tossed aside because there's so much more to be done with our production.  In just one week it will be the day after "How the Grinch Found Christmas," and we've got so much more to do until then.  Tonight was the start of Tech Week, and that just means practice every night.  The families involved, however, are full of gratitude and encouragement and positivity.  We've got a lot to do, but we've also gotten so much done.  Things are shaping into a really nice play.

Maddie had her taekwondo tonight, and she's getting ready for her performance with Team Edge.  That will be good - they've been working hard towards that.  This week is the last week before yet another testing cycle - she's getting a lot of these in.  At this rate, it may be that she gets her third degree belt right about the time she graduates from high school.  Whoa.  That was too much, too soon.  Let's just stay in the here and now.

We're trying to get in Christmas specials and movies where we can, and we're fitting them all in.  We've been watching these shorter ones after the late nights, but they're perfect before bedtime.  We read tonight, and we said our prayers.  Tech Week is here!

A Cowboy and His Ostrich

This morning's skit about the Cowboy riding an ostrich went very well, and as you can see the costume turned out pretty fun.  Maddie and the team did very well, and there was a lot of laughter in the audience, as well as learning a message about misfits.  We're not misfits, and in fact God chose the ones the world world call misfits in the Christmas story, rather than royal families or wealthy ones.  

 

We're doing our "Cowboy Christmas" this year, so the cowboy riding an ostrich from "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" fit within this theme, as did the cactus you see above.  Mom ordered that for the stage, and it'll be up there now as our unofficial tree for a few weeks.

Here are some pics Maddie took this morning with her phone:

Pretty fun day!  We got home and had ourselves some Chinese take-out, this after a super quick trip to a department store so we can pick up more props and costuming for upcoming productions.  Tomorrow starts Tech Week, and there's a lot still to do.

But today was about staying home after we got there.  I did my walking, and Maddie spent some time on Forensics homework.  We were playing some games on the N64, and for the life of me I can't remember racing against a giant penguin in Mario 64 being this much of a pain.  Maddie played the original MarioKart 64 though, and it was her first time - and she liked it.  We spent a pretty long time in the battle mode, and there were a lot of screams and laughter.  We even tried Goldeneye 64, although it took us a while to figure out the controls, and by that time we were ready to watch something else on television.

We did have a seat to play a Christmas card game, "Chip 'n' Dale Christmas Treasures."  We watched a video of how to play it first, but it doesn't take long at all to learn.  Usually one full game is all it takes to really figure out the play and the strategies.  We played that card game a few times, and it was easy and actually pretty fun.  We'll return to that one for sure.  Maddie one once, and I one once - another fun Christmas game.  We have about six or seven Christmas-themed games.  We've done three already this year, but these others are a little more complex - we have "Home Alone," "Jingle all the Way," and "A Christmas Story Card Scrabble," in addition to "A Charlie Brown Christmas" and the "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer DVD Game."  Lots of Christmas spirit with board games!

Tonight we watched "Babes in Toyland," and since we watched it on the Disney streaming service, it was a much better version than the DVD we have.  I mean wow.  I've watched this movie dozens of times and was noticing all kinds of new things because of the framing and the color and quality.  We really enjoyed it - it's a secret love of mine, that movie.  It's so dated, but lots of great songs and performances.

We closed the day out with "Wintersmith," and prayers too.  Tomorrow Maddie's back in school - she packed her lunch, and we all got ourselves snuggled in bed.  It's cold out there, and those covers feel nice and warm!  We're getting closer to seeing Santa...!

Radio Days: "It's a Wonderful Life"

This afternoon was a fun trip to the past as we visited the Holly Theater for a radio performance of "It's a Wonderful Life."

The production was done as if we were watching a radio drama, which is to say all the actors were performing as if they were at a radio station doing a performance live on the air, one that happened to be the classic Christmas story.  They were dressed as the characters from that story, and the set looked as if we were back in time.  Maddie remembered an episode of "Agent Carter" where there were radio performers, so she had the general idea of what this was like.  One fun thing of note was that we had front row seats at the dead center.  The theater was full, and there we were right up front to enjoy it all.  Mom and I got some hot chocolates, and the obligatory chocolate bar from that theater, which just made the visit more like a Christmas thing.

It was a nice time there - they all did a very good job!  We had a great time at the theater, and given that dusk was only an hour away, we did some walking around Dahlonega afterwards, heading over to the square and visiting the shops like the general store, the British import shop, the toy store, and of course the fudge shop too.  We were in a few more stores than that, and as the sun went down, the lights in town became more evident, streaming all over in the trees and outlining the buildings and courthouse on the square.  Here are a few of the pictures Maddie took along the way.

It was a fun night!  We got ack and watched "Home Alone 2," along with some other Christmas-themed episodes, before heading off to bed.  We read some of "Wintersmith" tonight, said our prayers, and got ready for another big day tomorrow at KidPak!

Black Friday

We're not much into the getting out there shopping with pushing and shoving and constantly feeling like you're in someone else's way.  I get a little claustrophobic with shopping crowds, for sure, so we're actually pretty happy to do much of our shopping online.  We were out for a little bit today, but not too much.  The George Department of Health finally got us that document - it took them three months, but way to go gang.  Apparently there's only one person working in this one area there serving the entire state.  We got the call, so Mom and I went out to get that certificate, and then while out we thought we'd drop by the tractor supply place there for a quick trip picking something up.  It was later in the afternoon, so surely there wouldn't be as much traffic, right?  WRONG.  Wow, there were a lot of cars out there.  We did manage to make it to our destination, and the idea was to pick up an amaryllis bulb, as the tradition is to "plant" it by Thanksgiving weekend so that we'll see blossoms by Christmas.  We'll see - if it is just afterwards, that's okay too.  

Anyway, we picked that up and some bird seed too.  The birds have been absolutely loving our seeds we've put out.  Our back porch has become this busy dining area as some colder weather sweeps in.  Speaking of colder weather, I made it to Everest Base Camp today, at least on this iFit journey of late.  It's an eighteen-part series, and after all this walking, I'm finally there.  I've still got a couple more walks around at the base of Everest, and we'll conclude that series and move on to something else.  Sixty-five walks so far and counting.  I'm getting good use of the device, and once I'm done with Everest, I'm hoping to get a few more 5k races in, a few with a Christmas theme.

We had a nice skillet breakfast this morning, and that was nice.  Mom made this massive meal for us that carried us through the day.  I finished up the piano room tree today, and that looks really nice now.  One more tree to go, the little one for Maddie's room.  This weekend I'll get the Nativity set put out and we'll have the wreaths after that.  So many decorations to go!

One thing I did today was take advantage of an expansion pack on the Nintendo, and now Maddie's playing this new game within her "Animal Crossing" game.  But I'm getting access to all these old-school N64 games, and wow.  Tonight I was playing Super Mario 64 again, and I'm loving it.  I cannot wait to get to Goldeneye and Banjo and Kazooie.  And there's Ocarina of Time too, which is still my favorite game of all time.  I haven't played it in probably twenty years, so I can't wait to revisit Hyrule.  

We've gotten a lot of our shopping done, much of it online.  Packages are left on the front porch all the time, although much of it is related to the upcoming production.  Mom has been up late and up early, working all the time on costuming and props and so on.  

Tonight we took a break to watch "Home Alone," moving forward with our Christmas movie marathon.  We've been watching a lot of Christmas stuff lately, some new things and some classics.  "Home Alone" has become mandatory viewing each year.

After that, it was just about bed time.  We read from "Wintersmith" some, and then said our prayers - time for bed.  G'night!

Thanksgiving 2023

Thanksgiving is here, and it was pretty chill this year, as you can see above.  We started our day out with the parade as always, and it was actually a pretty smooth and nice parade this year.  We enjoy watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade each year, and this one was a nice one!  How great to see it on our streaming service too.  Mom was putting finishing touches on her sweet potato casserole, which is legendary, and soon enough we were off to Nana and Ye-Ye's house for a really great Thanksgiving Day meal.  There was turkey, cranberry sauce, peas, mashed potatoes, rolls, and some other new elements too this year.  Aunt Shain was there with her three kids, and there were five other guests there too - lots of people, and lots of food!

After eating, we went over to see Aunt Shain's house, and it's really nice.  It's super close to the church there, and it was built in 1967 with some pretty awesome retro-architecture.  I love this place.  You can see the turkey in the front too, which is fun.  

We came back to Nana and Ye-Ye's house for dessert, which were the usual holiday pies and cakes, and I"m just getting a full feeling remembering all that food today!  It was so good!

Afterwards, we went home and were ready for that Thanksgiving afternoon nap!  We had some Christmas programming on, watching the rest of the "Hawkeye" episodes again, followed by "The Santa Clause 3" as well.  And we played some board games, including the Peanuts Christmas board game, which is something like Chutes and Ladders, and also a few rounds of the "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" DVD board game, which uses a DVD and mini-games on that to earn misfit toys.  The idea is to get misfit toys from different areas before the Abominable Snow Monster of the North gets them.  We did pretty good with that, and I even got the cowboy riding an ostrich, so all is well!

We closed out the day reading "Wintersmith" again, and saying our prayers.  I managed the treadmill again, and Mom did a lot with costuming and props for the Christmas production.  It's so much work.  We've only got about a week to go!

Cowboy and Ostrich

This weekend's message is about this guy here, the misfit toy from "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer."  He's riding an ostrich, and a red one at that.  Given that we were doing a western-themed Christmas series, I started looking through Christmas movies and specials, and sure there are some made-for-television cowboy Christmas movies, this one here is known by all.  Okay, sort of known by all.  Okay, so he's a pretty obscure character.  But he's in a classic Christmas television special, and this weekend's message and skit are inspired by him.  Today I put the finishing touches of the script, which of course involves a cowboy riding around on an ostrich.  We found an inflatable version of that online, so it should be a fun visual.  As for the message, I'll include that here because why not?

Every year we gather around the television set to watch a few classic Christmas specials, but have you seen that one with the cowboy riding around on an ostrich? Now in case you might not have a clue what I’m talking about, this is a toy cowboy from the 1964 Christmas special “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” He rides around on an ostrich, and that’s why he thinks he’s a complete misfit.

Sadly, a lot of people feel that way about themselves. Not that these folks ride around on ostriches, of course. But some people do think they’re complete misfits. So let’s clear that up: they’re not. The cowboy riding an ostrich found out he wasn’t, and you know something? Neither are you. God made us all unique and special, each one designed by His hand to do an amazing work. God doesn’t make misfits.

Of course, there are times that people don’t act right, and treat others like something less than themselves. In other words, they act like ostriches. What am I talking about? Well, in the Bible, ostriches are birds that don’t seem to care for others at all. Additionally, the book of Job describes them as not being wise in any way. Look here: God didn’t make you an ostrich, so it’s best not to act like one. If you want to be wise, one of the best things to do in life is not treat others as a misfit.

Many years ago, an angel came with a special message to those who some would call misfits. These shepherds were not kings or wealthy men, and yet there they are at our Nativity sets each year, chosen by God Himself for something wonderful. In fact, countless times throughout history and in the Bible, God has chosen the lowly to do something really great for Him. You see, He lifts up the lowly, and isn’t that interested in using anyone full of pride.

So remember this at Christmas time, and all throughout the year: you’re not a misfit, and neither is anyone else. And another piece of practical advice: don’t act like an ostrich.

Moving on!  Today was a day of much preparation for Mom, who was working on costumes for the big upcoming production with the Grinch, and also working on sweet potato casserole.  I picked up some big sweet potatoes on the way home and even helped mashing them for a big as Mom go things ready.  I also got more candy can ice cream, because you never know when you'll need that!  Oh, and some egg nog too.  I found some lactose free egg nog that makes me super happy, so there's that.

Maddie was actually doing a little forensics work today, and we were also doing a little Christmas shopping online.  Black Friday sales abound, and we took advantage of that.  Today an anniversary of several things, the biggest one happening back in 1963.  Mom got me a book about that terrible event, one I've been reading lately.  But it's also an anniversary of an event in 1987 involving Max Headroom, which I completely forgot about until someone posted that online.  Finally, and more humorously, it's the anniversary of the 1978 Turkey Drop, which was featured on an episode of "WKRP in Cincinnati."  Mom got me this t-shirt to commemorate the episode, and many people have no idea what that even is, but there are some that get it, and those people crack up at the shirt.  It's a fun Thanksgiving shirt - with all the other Christmas stuff going on, it's good to have some Thanksgiving items to wear.  And watch:  I've got a little section of Thanksgiving movies too.  Recently at play practice that topic came up - what Thanksgiving movies are there?  And someone gave me a funny answer, something they said their family watches every year at Thanksgiving.  My mind was racing towards some of our choices: "Free Birds" or "The Charlie Brown Thanksgiving Special."  But no, this guy brought up "Addams Family Values," and I laughed at that, because I completely forgot about the entire play that Wednesday and Pugsley Addams put together.  We probably won't be watching that one this year at Thanksgiving time.  No, tonight we were watching the latest episode of "The Santa Clauses," and then going back to "The Santa Clause 2" for more Christmas themed fun.  We're squeezing in all these Christmas movies while we can!

So it's Thanksgiving Eve, and it's a quiet one.  Mom is working feverishly, and I was doing a good bit too, although she's been working into the night on these costumes and props.  Maddie's been relaxing a bit, talking with friends online and playing games.  She did do some school work today, but tomorrow we can all head over for a meal together at my parents' place.  That should be nice.

We ended the day with a reading from "Wintersmith" and prayer.  I was also reading from this massive commentary Bible, slowly plowing forward.  But it's been super interesting.  We'll have a good day tomorrow, plus we get to sleep in a little!

Thirteenth Annual Office Thanksgiving

Here we are at our Office Thanksgiving, and you can see Maddie up there with Bailee, both waiting for things to get started.  Everyone brings a little food item, and it was all rather good.  And so was the company and time together.

The rain was pouring outside, cold and heavy.  It was much-needed, so there wasn't complaining there.  It's just difficult to travel with, particularly with food.  But we arrived and set things up, and it was all very nice.  Isaac had some pleasant music playing and all the tables were filled with conversation and delicious food.

We worked for a bit today, particularly on that approaching production, and then the three of us went off to the movies to see "The Marvels," which I think was the first time we've seen a movie in theaters since July 23rd.  I could be wrong there.  Anyway, after literally a half-hour of trailers and before that about ten minutes of commercials, the movie started, and it was decent.  There were some fun moments for sure, and we enjoyed it, the three of us.  None of us would put it up there at the top, or even close to the top, but given that there so many of these Marvel movies out there now, that's not necessarily a bad thing.  The big happy moment for me came mid-credits with the appearance of Beast from the X-Men, which was just amazing.  One of my favorite Marvel characters ever.  Anyway, it was a fun movie, and it was absolutely dumping rain out there while we were in the theater.  Before the movie started, you could hear it just pounding on the roof.  

We got home and spent the rest of the day relaxing somewhat.  We had the tree all lit up and we sat there watching "The Santa Clause" before bedtime, where we read "Wintersmith" again, said our prayers, and were off to sleep.  It was a decent day.

Hallmark Chocolate

We had our quick stop at the chiropractor this morning, and that was good for all of us.  Maddie has been doing a lot with taekwondo of course, and we've been all stressed out, and I've been on the treadmill every day - it was good to get an adjustment.  We drove over there, and Maddie and I always do the Star Wars Alphabet game, to this day, each of us naming a character or place starting with each letter of the alphabet, going through in alphabetical order.  We're geeks.  We met Doc Williams of course, and Maddie always cracks up at the adjustment part, laughing as she's getting pressed down on the table there.  

We had to do some shopping afterwards, some looking around for items for the KidPak Production - we were at Hobby Lobby for a good bit getting a few things, amongst them a few Christmas presents for Mom.  Afterwards, we got to the Hallmark store there just to get a special adapter cord for an ornament we got earlier.  These have always had the small batteries, and for some reason we didn't notice this one needed an extra cord, and in fact hadn't heard of an ornament needing an extra power cord.  Yeah, so we had to go get one, because this new ornament is pretty awesome - it's a Main Street Electrical Parade with that killer soundtrack blaring out loud.  And while we were there we were looking at the other ornaments, and wow - there was one of the Mayor of Halloween Town, riding in his car with that terrible news about needing to find Jack.  Great stuff!  But while we're there, we always pick up some of those chocolates too - Maddie was with us this time, so the three of us each picked a chocolate from behind the counter, and my oh my, those things are rich and delicious.

Speaking of which, we were over at Cracker Barrel after that.  We had lunch there, and played a game of checkers there too.  The Christmas decorations were up, and the season is really upon us now!  It was a pleasant visit, and they even had the fire roaring in the fireplace too.

Tonight we got home, and I started one of our last trees, and did some walking too.  We're in the Himalayas on the treadmill, and that's pretty fun.  Maddie's wrapped a Christmas present, and Mom has wrapped some artificial ones for our stage production.  Tonight was taekwondo, of course, the last one this week.  Maddie was sparring and training, while I was reading from that new Bible and also from a new book that Mom got me for my birthday.  It's been a quiet day.  We read from Wintersmith tonight, and then said our prayers... and then it was time for bed.

Willing and Nabal

"A Lone Star Christmas" returned this morning as you can see above, and it was a pretty fun morning!  Maddie was helping to tell the story of Abigail, David, and a guy named "Nabal," which means "fool."  Mom prepared this big feast here, just as Abigail did, and we had the stick horses ready to ride too.  David was on his way to put a whoopin' on Nabal until he saw that Thanksgiving-style feast that Abigail had prepared, and everyone learned it took effort to make peace, but it's worth it.

After church we were racing over to Pearce Auditorium, returning once again to see "The Nutcracker" there, the newer version by Gainesville Ballet.  The production itself was great, returning to some of the more traditional elements of the story that weren't present before - for many years, Gainesville hasn't had an actual Nutcracker costumed figure fighting against a Rat King and his minions.  This production did have that, and it was fun to see.  Everyone worked hard, and we remembered the days of practice and effort and costumes and tech week and all that... the end product was wonderful.

We ate some Wendy's on our way to the ballet, just because we had little time.  At church we had this meeting about our own upcoming Christmas productions, and that sort of ate up a good bit of time.  Anyway, we got home late afternoon and relaxed somewhat, although Mom was having to do laundry - washing shepherd costumes, for example.  The shepherds were out watching their flocks by night by the fire, and their costumes smelt like a campfire.  

We've been enjoying some leftover ham from Friday's preschool Thanksgiving event, something Mom can eat with out incident.  And so the topic of Honeybaked Ham came up, and how that would be a fun theme for a romantic Christmas comedy.  Maddie had the plot all there, in fact.  The ham conversation made us think of another Christmas movie, and so tonight we saw "Christmas with the Kranks" once more, watching poor Nora Krank struggle with that Hickory ham.  So much struggle and loss and pain and humiliation and lack of justice and ... no Hickory ham.  And yet, everything works out of course.  She gets the Hickory ham in the end, as it is brought in by a guest to the party that she invited at the last minute.  It's such a picture of life sometimes - things can be such a struggle at times, and in fact look pretty bleak.  Yet, in the end, it all works out somehow, and frequently in ways we don't see coming.  

We closed out the day with reading from "Wintersmith."  I'm moving forward in Genesis with this more intensive commentary.  Maddie makes sure of that, asking each day where I'm at.  Genesis 7 right now.  Did you know they waited a week inside the ark before the flood came?  And from what is in 7:13, it says the day they went into the ark is when things got rough outside, so my thinking is that things got rough somewhere else first, where the fountains of the deep were opening up... and a week later is when Noah's ark went for a little cruise.

After prayers tonight, we were off to sleep.  It's easy to sleep after full days like this!

The Gift, Friendsgiving, and Beating a Bomb

Today was a pretty full day!  This morning we were off and going, over to Team Edge for their weekly practice time, and that's usually a longer thing, which of course today was just the same - two hours.  Maddie and the team are getting better and better as they approach Edgestravaganza, the big day of their performance.  Maddie is doing really well, perfecting her nunchuck skills, which is one of the greatest thing a dad can say about his daughter.  After practice, it was time for another Friendsgiving!  Parents brought different types of food for a pot luck event, all the food lined up on a table for everyone to enjoy.  It was so much food!  And it was good - there were some surprise recipes in there that were actually really great - including a pineapple casserole that was very tasty!  Maddie and the others did some Super Smash Brothers after eating, as Mrs. Hardin set up on the projector a much larger screen for the students to do some battling.  There was one round in particular with five students and Maddie picked Jiggly Puff, avoiding a lot of the fighting the others were engaged in, and then facing off against the last survivor.  He was better than she was at the game, but he was weakened... and it came down to this one final move that he tried on her... and missed ... and off the side he went!  Maddie was thrilled at first to not be the first to lose, but all of the sudden, here she was the winner!  And she won the next round too!  She had a great morning!

Her next plans were to go to a surprise party, going down to a place called "Beat the Bomb."  It was a big escape room party, and Maddie worked hard with the others to escape... or find themselves getting blasted with colorful paints.  Only one group made it that night out of many, many others - and Maddie's group was pretty close... but nope!  They got blasted too!

She had a great time tonight!  Meanwhile, Mom and I went off for our yearly trip to see "The Gift."  This is a ministry we love, and it's a Christmas tradition to go see this production each year.  We met some friends from church, and we just loved it.  Praise in Motion puts on a wonderful performance - it never gets old.  And at intermission, their peppermint bark doesn't get old either!  

This is a wonderful production, and it never fails in fulfilling that mission of worship through dance.  We have been faithful "angel" supporters throughout the years, and in fact have seen this production over twenty years, easily.  Probably a few more than that.  I have a copy of it on VHS from the early 2000's, and we actually watched that this year, reminiscing about earlier casts and the shifting routines within the program, and of course noting the ones that are exactly as they were some time ago.

We got home and we popped in a movie while waiting for Maddie.  We saw "It Happened on 5th Avenue" again, and that's become one of my favorites.  Maddie came home later, and of course she had a lot to talk about - she had a lot of fun today.  A lot of fun!

We said our prayers, and off to bed tonight!