I’m still without my Kara – my laptop, my love – and I’m devastated about it. Still. Mike has had no time to take it somewhere to see about getting the hard drive (with hello! 30 pages of my book and all of my blog) and whole dealy fixed. (It’s a good thing he’ll be the one to take care of it since I don’t exactly speak the Computer Nerd Lingo…known as Nerdese).

We’ve had some interesting and fun festivities lately. Here goes:

Thanksgiving was great though, as always, the Martins got sick. Matthew greeted his Aunt Jamie (Mike’s big sis) and Uncle Dan with a fever. Welcome to the Martin Sick House! So, our neighbors who were also to join us for Turkey Dinner decided to stay far, far away. They told us to just keep our “flu food” to ourselves. Zachary came down with the fever on Friday, but even when he was feeling well, he still wasn’t overly pleasant to his Aunt Jamie. He adored Dan, but poor Jamie, was lucky to get a half-smile from him.

We spent the weekend after their visit, decorating and turning the Martin Home into the Christmas Mania Abode it now is. It’s great! We’re all decked out and have the Christmas music blaring 24-7! (Yes, I even have a Christmas-themed drop cloth for under Zach’s highchair).

On Monday night, we had my parents, brother Chris and priest friend, Father Steve over for dinner. Nothing like attempting to make dinner and set a nice table when your children are going absolutely bananas and driving you up the wall. At least dinner was like two-for-one: food and confession. “So, Father Steve, I sometimes want to seriously injure my children. Is that a sin?” I was telling the fam and Padre about my upcoming Saturday fun. I get to be Larissa’s date to her office party. And we’re talking MICROSOFT Christmas shin-dig. Yeah! We’re going to a $70/plate Italian restaurant in downtown Seattle, followed by a ride in the Party Bus to the Key Arena to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra concert. I’m SO excited that Larissa (sorry, sweetie) didn’t find anyone better to take than me as her date! Father Steve said, “So, it pays to be bi-sexual these days!” We pretty much had to pick my parents’ jaws up off the floor. I reassured everyone, “Father Steve, she’s Mormon! So, she’s not even my type!”

My best friend from high school – who currently lives in London – is in town this week to find and buy a wedding dress. So, I’ve gotten to go on some really fun dress-hunting expeditions. She’s the perfect bride to dress – tall, thin, redhead, gorgeous…it’s like dressing up Barbie!

When Mo was here hanging out on Tuesday afternoon, she called to me from the stairs, “Uh, Jenny? So, does Zach usually stick his head through the stair railing like this? ‘Cuz he can’t seem to get it out.” Crap. Mo immediately launched into Super Woman – or attempted Super Woman. Her first thought was to attempt to pry apart the railing – the IRON railing. I watched her fail miserably and said, “Yeah, I’ll get the butter.”

We managed to butter him up and Mo wiggled his big ‘ol cranium out to safety. Thankfully we didn’t have to call the fire department – though Matthew would have LOVED to see the fire truck in our driveway. When Zachary was in the tub, I finally realized what Mo had tried to do. “Did you seriously try to pull apart the IRON railing?!” She said, “Hey! I could’ve done it if it was my own kid!” (You know that whole lift a car off of someone adrenaline that kicks in during an emergency). I agreed I owed her one and would someday save the life of her child.

Wednesday night was very possibly the most magical night of my existence. With three girlfriends, I fought through traffic to go to the Everett Events Center for the So You Think You Can Dance Tour show. I’m fairly certain that Molly and Erin were completely humiliated to be sitting with me and Larissa. As soon as those dancers walked (well, danced) on to the stage, Larissa and immediately turned into screaming twelve-year-old girls. At least neither of us fainted or wept with joy. We just may have squealed a lot. It was SO fun! And I was surprised that we weren’t the oldest there by about 10 years. There were plenty of teeny-boppers, sure, (and no, I don’t mean us), but there were lots of older people, and families and couples as well. My favorite though was seeing the dad who was there with his probably nine-year-old daughter. He was wearing a home-made SYTYCD t-shirt – puffy-painted and all. Now that’s a dad!

Too bad we hadn’t thought of puffy-painting shirts beforehand! Bummer. Well, I suppose Larissa and I could always make some for tomorrow night –for the Trans-Siberian Orchestra show, though I don’t know that that would go so well with my little black dress. And I don’t know that that’s quite the look Larissa would want her date in.