Practice, Christmas doors, ongoing cleanup

Between play and cantata practices there will not be much work done at the farm this week. Mama has play practice tonight after she spends a couple hours working on arranging Grandma’s kitchen cabinets. I did not know she was conscripted to work in Bowie until play practice, so I asked Erin Echeveria if she could work with me on the final song of the cantata before play practice. She agreed, so we will nail down the final parts of the song that have alluded us to this point prior to her having to facilitate play practice. I need the help because we are performing the cantata on Sunday night. We are ready in all the other songs – at least presentably decent in our ability to get through them with some proficiency. I will have a better feel for our performance readiness when we go through the three-hour dress rehearsal Saturday afternoon. When the cantata is done, I will feel like I can relax and begin to enjoy the Christmas season. Mama had been patiently waiting on that.

Yesterday we had a team building event at work. Decorating doors in the office was the objective. There were three categories; most festive, most creative and most original. I am always amazed by the creativity in this office. My team spent a good deal of time getting our door ready – as did all the other teams. We did not win any of the categories, but we felt pretty good about what we had created. I did not include pictures of all the doors – there were twelve in all. However, I picked the three that impressed me the most. All this was done in ninety minutes so many of the teams did some pre-work to facilitate the assembly, but each door had to be ready for the judging within that timeframe. Judging was done by cards assigned to each of us by name. We were not allowed to vote for our door. After that we had lunch catered to the office, followed by the Secret Santa reveal.

With tonight full, I am hoping Mama and I will have a couple hours of daylight Friday evening to mulch the leaves that have piled up around us. It is far more than we can get done in one evening, but I am anxious to clean up the yard and limit the leaves that I am constantly having to blow out of the garage. It is not a big deal, but it is funny how little things can needle you and occupy your focus when they are really of no consequence. I try not to let my frustration spill over into any conversations or interactions, but Mama would have to tell me whether or not I am succeeding in that. Eventually we will get everything cleaned up – but not this week.

Last night at church, Bro Daniel let us know what our grades were for the very difficult test we took a couple weeks ago. I was, again, pleasantly surprised. I made a 101, Victoria made a 96. Mama does not want her score widely known but was the lowest score she has ever made in FBI. She will still make a solid B in the course, but it will break her straight A streak. She is still happy to have completed the courses and will very happily accept her degree. I expect we will do well on the final test – well enough to graduate.

We should hear those grades before Christmas.