My dad and I went to breakfast this a.m. to Mr. A's this little greasy spoon diner on Central road. It's the type of place that doesn't do small dainty breakfasts but serves everything in threes - three eggs, three pounds of hashbrowns, three pieces of toast and the largest piece of ham you might ever want to have.

Tasty, just about an entire year's worth of calories in one breakfast.

Dad's not one for many words but our conversation helped me realize a few more things that are bugging him...stemming back to his retirement. I think he thinks he's been forgotten. I can't help but wonder how many men and women of his generation who may have worked hard their whole lives at one place retire and feel a bit like their work family has deserted them? He spent a lot of time at work - working from 5 a.m. most days until well after 6:30...and on saturdays too from 5 a.m. - 3:30 p.m. or so. So really for as much time as he spent with us (and I'm not saying it was a bad thing...more because he did try and get to as many of our events and milestone moments as he could)his work was his family and now, he doesn't even get a christmas card from any of these people. (For those of you who have seen White Christmas suddenly I think back to the song "what do you do with a general when he stops being a general...)

Pete and Sara got here around 3:00. We ended up going to Faith for church. (That's the church I grew up in.) It's so interesting to see all of my friends from youth group now corraling their own children to sit relatively still in their seats. In particular Doug has two adorable girls and they sat in the pew directly in back of us. And at a quiet moment before the service started in a really loud voice the one daughter says...daddy - where's the bride? Apparently they had just been to a wedding. And doug patiently leans down and says - it's not about the bride honey, it's jesus' birthday. Throughout the service he patiently explained different things to her to help her worship alongside of him and his lovely wife and well...it just was neat to see. We also sat behind the same family who had a baby last year and this year the same baby was a flirty one year old...very cute but kind of distracting.

I will say, you get used to a certain tradition at christmas eve candlelight service. I'm not nearly as big of a stickler as my brother about certain things but there is a certain order of music or build up that I appreciate in celebrating Joy. And while it always moves me to tears to sing silent night by candlelight to be followed by a rousing Joy to the World...this year they moved Joy to the World to the middle of communion and replaced it with a hymn that was so slow and somewhat depressing that it just didn't really work for me. I tried, I really did, but somehow I've been spoiled a bit by faster, really nice sounding music and this was okay but could have been better.

Pete and Sara are already in Madison. They came, they unwrapped and left. Arrived around 3 p.m. and left around 8:30. It was great they stayed that long however sincerely when it seems like they see her side of the family ALL THE TIME...it would be nice if they could have stayed longer. Not my call.