feelin the pressure!

I just read my brother’s blog and he talked about writing even though he is so busy.  So I thought: “pressure’s on!”  ha ha.  I had better get something written so you don’t think we’ve been lazing about and eating bonbons all day!  So this is a quick run down of the past ten days or so.  Let me think… We had the post-failed-budget meeting with results that I cannot yet post since they are not yet public to the … public.  Suffice to say David doesn’t lose his job, so that’s all good and he has great colleagues.  So Christmas should be jolly this year.  We had a combined, art gallery opening / jazz night / forum (topic = environmental stewardship).  That was all good.  Lots of people came.  Let’s see… We’ve both been working our little buns-ies off just trying to get ready for Christmas.  Term ends at Christmas so there’s lots to do to get everyone ready for that.  And there may be a snow day tomorrow (last day) which would throw a major wrench into things as far as assignments etc go.  David has been getting ready for the big old Christmy extravaganza we have every year at church.  Lessons and carols this year on Sunday morning.  Last Sunday it was the children’s version of the Messiah (Handel) which of course was cute and so forth. Plus he has the extra services and the regular services.  Always a busy busy time of year at church although possibly not as busy as Easter.  The rest of what we have been doing I think I shall explain through photos.

Jan has been busy trying to avoid learning how to crawl forward.  Backward seems to be okay and rocking violently on hands and knees seems to be good too, but crawling forward is apparently uninteresting.  Thus: .He has also been learning new words, such as “cloisons sèches” which means “drywall,” and this is why he is learning that:

   Our friend and invaluable helper, Joel, came over (is here at the moment actually) and is helping us put up the ceiling in the family room.  Then it will be walls in the family room, ceiling and walls in the laundry room, then toilet and sink and we’re practically done!!  Here is a photo of the drywall lift that tried to kill David:   Notice its inherent poo-like qualities.  We should have been tipped off right away.  But it was unsuccessful so all is well.  We also should have been tipped off because it tried to kill Troy a couple days ago (it’s Troy’s).  Fortunately, it was unsuccessful there as well. David and Joel have been proceeding  without it.

We also had a couple moments of fun when the whole Bible study (almost) came over for the annual white elephant gift exchange.  There were a couple total winner gifts this year that I think will be permanent re-gifters, oh my goodness.  Here are a couple photos with the same gift, different people.  May I just say that this one was an actual gift to every Sunday School teacher from the director of Congregational Ministries.  (oh my.)   .  We think it’s a planter????  Here is another photo of Joel opening his lovely lovely gift of a “man bag” from Lowe’s along with Anna and her new gift: the accordion (yes, it’s real).   .  It was a truly hilarious time.  This final photo shows another thing we have been working on:   . What could be inside that mysterious, large brown box?  Could it be a present (a presnie)?  For whom?  It’s so exciting!!!  Everyone has been asking what we are getting Jan for his first Christmas.  Well, I have to say that since he isn’t even aware of it, he is getting the next size up in cloth diapers and that is about as exciting as it gets.  I know he’ll just be ecstatic.

So that is the news from the construction zone.  Who knows, maybe there will be a snow day tomorrow and you’ll hear further ramblings and musings, but I wouldn’t count on it; I haven’t done the snow-day dance.