Lots going on right now. I am thankful that Rebecca, Melanie and I have been given such a supportive family and so many friends that can share in our joy.

Had Rebecca's baby shower earlier today -- the third of four we apparently get to have. We are very blessed in that regard. The first was my work, the second her work, the third family/friends and the fourth our church family/friends. Right now, the living room is entirely filled with stuff we got from family and friends.

Ordinarily, this would annoy Rebecca to no end. However, she is going off to her parents, while the bathroom is being gutted and redone. We had the opportunity to wait until Melanie was a few weeks old, but Rebecca decided she wanted the work done ASAP. The contractors are telling me it'll take about a week to do the work, and hopefully we'll have a nice new mold-free bathroom to enjoy by Friday or Saturday. In the meantime, she'll be at her parents, and she will not be all by herself. Her parents seem a bit worried about that.

Our youth minister's wife agreed to babysit Melanie at her place when she is 6-8 weeks old and Rebecca is ready to go back to work. This is truly a blessing as she loves working with children and was looking for a job in the first place. The two women we interviewed for the nanny position wanted to work under the table -- which might have been fine but we can't really do that.

In the realm of Scholastic Bowl, the folks in the Central Region caught a math error in Match #7, and the folks in Region IV decided they had better things to do than use the VHSL questions I produce. Never mind that the Region has ordered from me every year since I started doing this or that the Region handbook itself says "order from the provider for the state tournament." The tournament was run by a school that considers Academic Hallmarks to be the pinnacle of academic competition. (Never mind that I produce enough questions for their county competition as well.) Hopefully this will get cleared up shortly.

Well, right now there's the Super Bowl to watch. Go Bears!