Mike, Kevin and I celebrated John's last day of vacation on Nov 18th by going out to lunch at Brick3, a great pizza place, downtown. We really enjoy the camaraderie we have when our boss is away. As it turns out, John didn't come back the next day anyway.

For my birthday (Nov 19th) Jeff prepared a super delicious meal from my Rachel Ray cookbook. It was a halibut dish atop smashed peas. It was so yummy! Then he even had cheesecake for dessert! That was a real treat. This was my first birthday where I was on Facebook and all those well-wishes were awesome to hear!

Nov 20th was a gorgeous day and we all headed to Madison for the high school state football games. Paige rode the high school fan bus. There were 9 fan busses from our high school! Jeff and I rode out with Dave and Carrie while Bryn followed behind in her car with her friends. We arrived early so we could see part of the Division 2 game where our nephew's team, Kimberly, was playing. We were able to meet up with Terry, Debbie, Bobby, Richie and Kayla and watch the 2nd half with them. Kimberly lost. We had to travel around to the opposite side for our Division 1 game against Marquette University High School. Menomonee Falls was tough and held Marquette to only 1 touchdown, but we couldn't score against them. We ate dinner at the Stadium with Bryn and her friends before heading back home.

Saturday Nov 21st, Bryn played in a quintet at our local Sentry store. The Sentry store allows the Menomonee Falls bands to come in to the store to help celebrate the holidays. Paige had another Tae Kwon Do demo practice and I worked at Kohls. I went right from there to the grocery store. Then to the couch where Jeff and I enjoyed watching Australia at home.

I decided not to spoil my day off Sunday Nov 22nd and opted to go in to work (Norman Design) an hour early Monday and Tuesday to get my biweekly cleaning in. I had enough cleaning to accomplish at home!

So Bryn and Paige had off school for the week. Excellent. I put them on maid duty because I had a busy week ahead, plus company coming for Thanksgiving. I attended conferences for Paige and Bryn at the high school Monday night Nov 23rd. All good reports. Very weird to hear Paige being described as "quiet". At the Art Guild meeting Tuesday night Nov 24th, I am still getting rave reviews on the new website as more and more members are becoming acquainted with it. Jeff ran the concessions stand at the high school first basketball game of the season Wednesday night while I worked at Kohls. Luckily Abby, Bryn and Paige were home to welcome Meg, William and family when they got in from Indianapolis. Abby, Bryn and Paige really did a top-notch job getting the house cleaned up!

Jeff, Bryn and Paige drove up to Appleton to celebrate Thanksgiving with his family. They ate out at VanAbel's, then went to visit with Debbie and her family afterwards. Abby and I drove over to Waukesha to meet my family at Kristin's. We really teased my mom about the turkeys this year. We ended up not having turkey with our Thanksgiving this year. Not done. And we couldn't get over one of the turkeys which was all breast meat and seemed to jiggle. Abby, Meg and I got the lowdown on where to meet Friday morning and we were all back home around 6pm to tuck in early. (Of course, I didn't sleep that night.)

Friday morning Nov 27th we met Kristin and Mom at Kohls at 4:30am. The store was not as crowded as other years. We found lots of early bird specials there and felt good. We were already hungry and stopped next for our annual McDonald's breakfast. From there we went to Target, ToysRUs and Brookfield Square mall. It was 10:30am and knowing we still had to work that day, Abby and I bowed out and went home to nap. We were so relieved to see Jeff and William packing up the kids to play at Flabbergast so we knew it'd be peaceful for us to sleep. The kids had a blast there, relieving their cabin fever. Abby and I got back home to enjoy pizza with everyone at our house.

Meg cut Abby's hair Saturday Nov 28th before Abby and I went off to work again. Meg, William and family left soon afterward. Abby was able to get together with her close girlfriends that night while they were all home on break. Kendal came over for a Saunders-exclusive visit before they went. I pooped out again that night and Jeff and I watched Gladiator.


Today Sunday Nov 29th we all slept in in the morning. Very busy doing laundry, paying bills, catching up on the blog! Abby's boyfriend, Mark, got back from his family vacation and was able to see Abby this afternoon before she went back to La Crosse. She was very happy. They baked cookies together for Abby to bring back with her.