December update

Well, it's almost been a month, so time for another update.

Jacob spent a few hours in school early this month getting his speech re-evaluated. He made 10 months of progress in a six month span, so the good news is he's catching up. The bad news is he's only speech at an age level of 2 years, 10 months, so we're going to be working with him a little more intensely. He'll be visiting with the speech therapist at school once per months to see how he's doing and get new assignments to work on.

One thing that is maturing is his attitude. He thinks he's the boss and is learning how to talk back. It's gotten him sent to bed early on more than one occasion.

Nate and I left December 12 and spent a few days in Las Vegas with Nate's college roommate, his wife Crystal, Scott's brother Joe, and a few of their friends from Michigan State. It was a nice trip and even though I lost a little bit, Nate broke even and probably came out a little ahead when you figure in he was paying tips and bought a few drinks with his winnings. We stayed at the MGM Grand for 3 nights and the Golden Nugget for one. We saw Bill Engvall at TI and went to an adult show at Luxor. Crystal and I were both a little nervous, but it was actually very good. In addition to the boobies, they had a really good singer and a guy that came out for comedy relief between dance numbers. I'd recommend it to anyone over 21. I swear, you don't even notice the dancers are topless after a while. It was cool out there, windy Saturday and it snowed a little Monday. We left before the big snow hit. The only thing I was disappointed with is they didn't have the giant screen on Fremont Street playing and the Christmas tree there wasn't lit because it was raining Monday. Wimps!

We returned to snowplows and a traffic jam on 494 Tuesday night. I had the rest of the week off of work, so I used it to do some Christmas shopping and spend time with Nate and Jacob. It was tough to go back to work on the 22nd!

Christmas isn't over yet for us, but here's what we did so far. We went to the Christmas eve service at Nate's church. The Lutheran school kids did a program for the service, so it was more like going to a Christmas concert than church. It only lasted 45 minutes so I didn't mind. Jacob got a giant treat bag on the way out, so he filled up on goodies on the trip home. Nate's mom, dad and brother came over to our house for Christmas eve and we exchanged gifts. Jacob got a toy Craftsman tool bench and a giant fire truck, among other things. The funniest moment was when he opened up his Bob the Builder underwear from Nate's aunt. He brought it over to me to open, and when I showed them to him, he dropped his pants, undies and all, stripped down and put them on right there. Just a warning for any of you thinking about giving him underwear anytime soon.

On Christmas Day, Jacob awoke to find more presents and that Santa had put together his tool bench. We opened a few more presents, then headed to Nate's parents for their celebration with relatives from both his mom and dad's sides. Jacob and I left there at about 9 p.m. because we had to get home and finish wrapping presents for my family and do laundry before we head south today.

I woke up this morning to a fun combination of drifting snow and freezing mist. Nate called and told me to take the truck today. He didn't think the car would make it out of the driveway. I almost turned around when I was going down 97 and felt like I was either going to get stuck in the middle of the road or go in the ditch, but luckily once I crossed the county line they had plowed it. I would had stayed home today except the news editor is on vacation and we have a short week because of the holidays.

Wish us luck and good roads as we head south today. Merry Christmas!!