After hosting Thanksgiving a few weeks ago, Wendy and I spent the rest of the weekend hunkering down at home. Thanksgiving evening was spent watching a family movie with Taylor and Suzanna (This is Where I Leave You). We enjoyed the movie, though Suzanna fell asleep, which is not unusual (see featured photo of this post).

One of the priorities on the honey-do list since moving into our house has been getting shelves built in the storage room downstairs. So, on Saturday I was up early finishing walls and beginning the task. It took me about 10 hours without break, but we have 24 feet of shelving for all of our “stuff” (and Taylor’s “stuff” and Madison’s “stuff” and Suzanna’s “stuff”).

Needless to say, I was fairly tired and sore, so Sunday would have been a day of rest and routine. It started out routine: Breakfast with CBS Sunday Morning and church, but then we headed to the Community Center to sell tickets for USP’s production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Wendy and I stepped down from our Board positions, but we’re continuing to volunteer our time in other ways. Wendy heads up ticket sales and I am doing web and social media. Once ticket sales were done we headed home to watch the Vikings (they won!). In the evening we walked down the street to McQuade Pub for cocktails and conversation which was the perfect cap to the holiday weekend.

The weather continues to be unseasonably warm. Highs have been in the 50’s the past few days. Wendy and I continued to sell tickets for the USP show on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday evenings. We stayed to watch the show on Thursday.

On Friday night we were invited over to the Burch’s for a late dinner and stayed late into the evening. On Saturday morning I drove to Des Moines for the funeral of Doug Appleby. Doug’s brother Dan was in my class at Hoover. We and our siblings were all in the youth group together at First Federated Church back in the day. It was a bit of a sober homecoming of sorts with friends I hadn’t seen in many years. Doug was a great kid, a veteran, a family man, and a man of faith. There was a lot of love and hope at the funeral.

Kev, Beck and the kids came to Pella last night. The kids went to the play with grandma and grandpa while we adults enjoyed dinner together. After the kids returned we all hung out downstairs in V-Dub Pub and watched the Iowa Hawkeyes blow their lead and lose the Big10 championship game.

We’ll help with tickets for the closing USP performance this afternoon. It’s a sell-out. We’re hosting the cast party here at Vander Well Manor. Looking forward to celebrating with the cast and crew.