Christmas "Miracles"

Well, we're not in Missouri, like I'd hoped we would be by now - but more on that later. This Christmas season has been one disaster after another. All of the problems started after my dad left for Missouri. The day after he finally left, there was a huge snowfall. My mom, sister, brother, and I all spent several hours digging ourselves out. It wasn't fun. But luckily, that, combined with the ice on the road, caused the superintendent to cancel school on Monday. The whole situation was kind of weird - they canceled school the night before, which never happens. It seems that everyone got the news at the same time, and they were all texting us. My mom had to make sure, so she called the phone number for school closings, and we all listened on speaker phone as it said that school was closed. Even though it didn't snow as much was expected, it was probably for the best because the roads were really bad. I don't know if it was because of cut-backs, but the roads weren't cleared nearly as fast or as well as they usually are. Our subdivision was completely cleared until about week later. Okay, the first problem that occurred was that on Monday, the wind blew so hard that it swung our storm door out, and something happened so that it wouldn't close. We texted my dad in Germany, and eventually fixed it. Then on Tuesday morning, when my mom was going to drive us to school, the car wouldn't start. My mom got our neighbor to drive over with her jumper cables, and my sister called her friend, and she drove us to school. Then, to top it off, our water coming out of the faucets turned brown, and then stopped working at all. Apparently, there was something wrong with the check valve of the well or something like that, but we didn't find that out until my dad came home, and the well people came out. Until last Monday, we had to take sponge baths and flush the toilets with snow that we melted on the stove. Not fun. But on Monday, we got it fixed, and we thought all our problems were behind us. Little did we know what was in store for us.
With our well fixed, we got ready for our trip down to Missouri to see my grandparents. Every Christmas, we go down there, and spend some time with my family, and as usual, my mom didn't want to go. We were all packed, and ready to leave - which we did yesterday about 7:00-ish AM. We ate breakfast at Panera Bread and picked up our call-in order at Zingerman's. From there, my family drove straight to this Fort Wayne Starbucks that we always stop at. We stopped there to go to the bathroom, and get some drinks, and left. Our next stop was a Steak N' Shake in Indiappolis, but when my mom went to get her wallet out of her purse to pay for the meal, she couldn't find it. We searched everywhere - and I do mean everywhere. We called the Starbucks to see if anyone had turned in, but to no avail. With no credit cards, license, and much more, we drove back to Fort Wayne to look for ourselves. That's a two hour drive between the two cities, so even if we found the wallet, we would be extremely late to my grandparents' house. But as (un)luck would have it, we did not find it. Mom mom called in to cancel her credit cards, which showed no extra activity, filed a police report, and left our name and number at everywhere possible. And that is how we managed to drive for 12 hours, only to end up in the same place where we started. Yeah! Now we're stuck in our boring house, with no Christmas spirit (even though it is Christmas Eve), all bored and grumpy. To cap it off, when we unpacked the Zingerman's order, we found they had messed up our order - instead of one four-pack of brownies, they gave us four four-packs of brownies. So now we have 16 brownies, 3 pounds of corned beef, and a whole sour cream coffeecake with no one to share it with. The last problem is that basically everyone is feeling sick, and my brother threw up several times last night. Merry Christmas.

P.S. I changed the background to the map, per the poll, which like the map background over the book.

Catch-Up

Wow. It's been a while since I last blogged. I know I said I would tell you about what happened during Thanksgiving, so I have some catching up to do. First of all, on Wednesday, my family went on our usual day-before-Thanksgiving-outing. We first went and got our turkey from this organic turkey farm. Usually, there are a bunch of turkeys outside when we go to buy ours, but not this time. I guess they were all killed or something. Maybe it was too cold. After that, we went to REI for an hour or so. Depending on the time we get there, we either eat lunch first at Papa Vino's, or go to REI. It was too early when we arrived, and no one was hungry, so it was an unanimous decision to go to REI first. Out of the several things that we bought, I got a new pair of snow boots (which I actually used for the first time today). Until this year, we've all been sharing one pair of boots, and my parents finally decided that it might be helpful to get some new ones. I tried on two pairs, but decided on the ones I got because the other ones, while better looking, weren't as practical. They were only waterproof at the very bottom - they were more for warmth and style than practicality in snow. Per usual, when we ate at Papa Vino's, my dad and I split the calzone of the day, which this time was three meat. And as usual, it was delicious. Now, let's continue onto the actual day of Thanksgiving. Let me tell you, working all day on the food was worth it. The turkey was juicy and flavorful, we had two different kinds of pumpkin pie - pumpkin chiffon in Graham cracker crust, and my dad's homemade whole wheat crust with regular pumpkin filling - my dad made throwed rolls (Lambert's Cafe recipe!!), and a bunch more. By the end of the night, I had definitely had my share of food - I was stuffed! On the Sunday after Thanksgiving, and the last day of break, we went over to our family friend's house and helped put up their ornaments on their Christmas tree. It's been this tradition, that started waaay before I was born, to come over to each other's houses and put up decorations, and then just hang out. Needless to say, I had a good time.
And then just like that, the break was over and we had to go back to getting up at 5:45 in the morning. Surprisingly, though, even without any days off, the week after our Thanksgiving break went by quite fast. It was over before you even knew it. The next week, though, not so much. Maybe it was because some things actually happened, or the reality was just setting in, but this past week has felt like on of the longest. It just kept on dragging on, and I was always tired. The first substantial event was that on Tuesday, on the way to school, my sister and I crashed into the side railing of the road. It had just snowed the night before, and the roads were slippery, so when my sister went around a curve a little too fast, we lost control and hit the railing. The accident wasn't that bad - the airbags didn't even go off, and no one was hurt- but the car was banged up, and we were a little shaken. For the rest of the week, except one day when the roads were clear and we couldn't get a ride, our parents drove us to school. We don't get the car back until next Tuesday, at the earliest. Another event this week was that I went caroling with the French Club at a retirement home, which was really fun. We sang Christmas carols in French, and then sometimes in English, and I had a solo. I went last year, as well, and it's just nice to see all these elderly people made happy by our (sometimes off key) singing. It was really nice. The last main event of the week was that my dad, sister, and I drove all the way out to Kalamazoo (which is 2 hours away) to see the musical Wicked. We had to leave several hours early, and didn't get home until 1 AM, but man was it worth it! Even though I know all the lyrics from my sister's incessant playing of them, it was nice to actually see them acted out, and in context. I just realized while watching it that Fiyero, who turns into the Scarecrow (from the Wizard of Oz) sings about being "brainless", which is what the Scarecrow wants when he goes to see the Wizard of Oz. There is just tons of things that explain why things are the way they are in the Wizard of Oz, which was quite interesting. I would definitely recommend anyone to see it, if it is available. It was pretty awesome.
Last on my list of things to catch up on is that my dad departed for Germany last night for a business trip. He was supposed to leave at 7 PM, but that didn't happen. The first plane he was supposed to be on had some kind of electrical problems, and I believe the second one, as well. By the time he actually left, he was on his third plane and 4 (or more) hours late. It was lucky that he had brought his left-over sandwich from our lunch at Panera Bread right before he left for the airport. He was going to just leave it with us, but we said that we wouldn't eat it, so he brought it with him. At least he was lucky in that case. The last thing I want to mention is that we had our first big snow overnight. I'd have to say that there's at least 2 inches out there, and it's still snowing. Unfortunately, the roads will probably be cleared in time for tomorrow's school, and there won't be a snow day, but you never know. I'll just have to cross my fingers that the roads ice over or something weird like that. It truly is beginning to feel a lot like Christmas! And that's it for now - until my next insanely long blog!!!!