I went ahead and unlocked all the songs on Beatles Rock Band last night.  I was looking over the achievements and saw that there was one for doing that within 24 hours of starting a new game and figured I might as well go ahead and do that now.  I wasn’t up any later than usual to accomplish this feat.

Scott, my boss, gave me an extra check with my paycheck.  He usually gives me a bonus at Christmas, but I don’t expect him to do it, you know?  This year it was bigger than it’s been in previous years and should help pay off the Christmas-inflated credit card bill I’ve got.  I called him to thank him and he told me I deserved even  more than that.  I definitely feel appreciated in my job.  I feel a sense of ownership and pride with my job, and Scott has always done a good job of encouraging that.

All that said I’ve been feeling a little stressed with work this past week.  It’s usually pretty slow this time of year, and I think I went into the week expecting that, but it hasn’t been the case.  I’ve got a few things I’m going to try to knock out tomorrow morning.  On top of that, Amanda’s got some stocking stuffers she wants to pick up, we’ve got Milly’s presents to wrap and some laundry to do.  Then there’s the packing, going to church and heading to Amanda’s grandparents’ house.

We moved small group this week back to today (it’s usually on Tuesdays) so as many people as possible could make it there.  We went over to the Nowaks, hung out, talked and had dinner.  Jenny was able to come, but her hubby was working on getting things ready at church tomorrow.  They’ll be back after a class-induced hiatus next week.  Anyway, we had a really good time hanging out with everyone.  Our bigger topics of discussion included Santa Claus and baby names for Felix Kay.

Kirsten watched Milly tonight.  We had just put her down before Kirsten got here, but Milly was fussing as we were leaving and Kirsten was heading upstairs to get her.  We were worried that Milly might be a bit of trouble for her cousin tonight, but Kirsten said she was fine.  She really loves that baby.  It’s funny too, because she wasn’t nearly as excited as other people during the pregnancy and at first she was very iffy about holding Milly, but she just adores her now.  I think it’s really sweet.

After Amanda went to sleep I wrapped her presents.  One from me, one from Milly and one from “The Boys”.  (That would be Bruce, Harvey and Cobb.)

Zach Dotsey
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