Overall, Thanksgiving went well, though the kitchen didn't actually regain pristine levels of cleanliness til about 10PM last night. We still have a few small loads of laundry to finish, but hey, we're getting there.

I did get the house Christmas decorated. I got lights strung outside. I just put the usual icicle lights across the front and I have this cool angel which I really dig, which also got hung. It looked pretty cool, actually. I've got two light up candles in the window -- just plain clear lights, and the tree of course.

On Friday, Mike went with LaDawn's husband to get firewood. I had jokingly mentioned he should get a Christmas tree while he was out there and then told him, no, nevermind, I'd get one at a grocery store for $20, after remembering last year'sfiasco. He brought home a 12 foot tree. I reminded him that we only have a 7.5 foot ceiling. He said he'd chainsaw it down to size. On Saturday, when he finally brought in what was left of our Christmas tree, I suggested that he take it back outside and I'd go buy one as I had originally planned. He said,"But it's a Charlie Brown tree and we shouldn't fall victim to blatant commericialism." I said,"That's not a Charlie Brown tree, that's firewood. It has no bottom, honey and at this point, only one-third of a front." He tried to tell me that the branches would relax and it would fill out. I gave him that "you've got to be freakin' kidding me look" and got in the car and drove to Raleys, where I bought a nice bushy tree for $24.99.

I have decorated many Charlie Brown trees. I'm good at it. I've spent years broker than hell, so I'm the Queen of the Bargain Christmas Tree, but this was beyond repair and there was no amount of decorating that would have brought it back from the abyss. We're talking about one good branch, here folks. We spent Saturday evening with Genny breaking lots of glass ornaments, decorating the store-bought tree. It was Sunday, before Mike admitted that indeed he'd butchered the tree and that the store-bought one was really nice.

Yesterday, our last day before returning to work and school and the same old routine, we went to the cheapy breakfast place -- 99 cents for eggs, toast, hash browns, and bacon. We walked across the street to the ice rink and rented skates. Mike decided after making it about 20 feet hugging the wall that he was too fat, tall, and old to learn to skate. I was in agony with the figure skates that squished my feet, so I asked a woman wearing hockey skate if she liked them and traded my figure skates in for hockey skates and did a lot better. It's not quite like riding a bicycle, but after a few rounds, I got more steady on my skates and had fun. Genny really couldn't hack the whole skate thing and Mike and I were unsteady enough to not really be able to help her much. I tried to skate a little bit with her, but that was when I had the figure skates and the pain was unbearable, so next time we're going to buy her those adjustable strap on skates for kiddies and let her hang with momma that way. I just don't skate well with a 35 lb weight around my knees, regardless of skates, and honestly, I was terrified that I'd fall on her and kill us both. The mercy was that a woman who was really good on her skates, grabbed Genny and let her piddle around on the ice and took her on little "rides" and Genny loved that. We'd tried hanging over the side and taking her up and down, but she really loved the rides. Russell did pretty well on his own, once he got past the initial bitching, and he made several circuits of the rink.

Then we braved the mall, which was a bit crowded, but not bad. I had to go to the body shop and get some shampoo and while I was there, I picked up presents for folks. That's kitty corner from the Disney Store, so of course, I went there, too. We ate lunch and headed home.

Truthfully, I could have stayed out longer, but that's only because of my escapism. While Grammy and Pop were here for Thanksgiving, the parole date for Mike's dad was mentioned. He'll be out in 10 days from today. No hearing, he'll just be released. We've already discussed that we'll start locking the house, something we've never done where we live because we're out in the middle of nowhere and everyone knows everyone. We're also going to have to inform daycare and Mike's employer, so that no information inadvertently gets released. We've been very careful whenever we've been up by his grandparents not to use my last name for anything. We've either paid with Mike's credit card or with cash.

They are going to limit what county he can reside in, and we're hoping that he'll actually stay there, but that's only for 2.5 years. He could learn a lot about us in the interim. He may even learn that he's got grandchildren and that's what we fear most.