Back to school

The kids are finally back to school and we are working back into a routine. I'm so glad. There is always so much to do and so little time to do it and I seem to get everything done faster when I am doing it solo. With them back to school, I can at least focus on projects better and think through them more. I am glad that Rachel blogged during the break but she left quite a bit out so I'll try to bring you up to speed.
We survived all the programs during December. I think that I had previously mentioned 3, I don't remember putting anything about the 4th which was a puppet program that both Rachel & Stephen were part of. Rachel has been part of the church puppet team for almost a year now and Stephen decided to join in October or November. The team performed on Wed. Dec. 20 for our AWANA program. I'm told they did well. I was busy cutting cakes and didn't get to see the performance. It's on tape though and I'll watch it later.
Also, Rachel failed to mention that after the band concert the director had each child perform a piece in class. He then assigned them "seats" and Rachel is the second seat for the saxophones. Not bad since most of them have been on that instrument for 2 years and she just went to it in Sept.
For those that did hear, I had quite a surprise for my birthday. Dad managed to find out what Meijer I'm decorating cakes at (There are only about 8 in our area.) and called and talked to my manager. He placed an order and paid for it over the phone. I was a bit surprised when the main decorator handed me an order and it specified that I was to decorate it. I sort of thought maybe someone from church wanted me to look good to my manager. Then I looked at the name (Roger) and it had a 569 area code and it was a Pooh cake. I figured out it was for me by then but then I was wondering if he was coming to pick it up! He didn't but I got paid to decorate my own birthday cake this year!
For Rachel's birthday, we went to see the Santa Clause 3 on Saturday the 23rd. She brought 2 friends from school and all had a good time. She didn't like the idea of a store bought cake even if I did decorate it so I had to do hers at home.
We had very pleasant, relatively quiet, holidays. We were right here and didn't even have any family in. Usually part of Mark's family will come for New Year's but that didn't happen this year. We were so busy with things this fall that we didn't go anywhere except his family party for the day of the 16th. For New Year's Eve, we went to a church family's home and played games till the ball dropped. We then hurried home as I had to be at work at 7 a.m. on the first!
As for the car incident, we have been able to get $500 from the girl that hit us! She didn't have insurance so we really didn't think we would get anything without a trip to small claims court. It took some doing but I was finally able to reach her by phone on 1/3. She claims that her boyfriend was to have paid it and she didn't know that he hadn't. Anyway, I told her that all we were wanting was the $500 we would have gotten from her insurance company if she had had insurance. She agreed and came over with a personal money order the very same day! This should cover the parts needed and so we have moved the car to a friend's house who has a barn to work in. He also has a son & son-in-law to lend him a hand on the repairs. He's also the same one who has loaned us his Neon to use until our car is back up and running!
We were also able to go see Charlotte's Web over the holidays thanks to Nate. The movie was really cute and we all enjoyed it. Since we were at the theater the weekend before for Rachel's birthday, I picked up the tickets without the kids knowing it. I then put them in a popcorn bucket under the Christmas tree with the card that Nate had sent. After most of the presents were open, they saw the bucket and couldn't figure out what it was doing under the tree. As Stephen picked it up, he saw the tickets and the whole family was excited. They just couldn't figure out how Uncle Nate had gotten tickets for our theater all the way from Utah.
Our Christmas is all packed up just not put away yet. It is hard to do things in our attic after dark and Mark fell asleep Sunday afternoon while I was at work so the tubs are still in the living room. Of course, I have found several more items that needed put in the tubs since Sunday so I guess it isn't all bad.
We have a lot of things coming up so maybe I'll try to make my next post a look ahead but that is all the time I have for now. Time to pick up the kids.