Happy 3rd Birthday, Cooper!!!

(and Cecelia and Yolanda!)

OMGMYBABYISTHREETODAY!!!

Wow. It's almost the time of day where three years ago today my baby Cooper was born. At 8:41 a.m. our second son arrived. It's hard to believe he'll be starting school next year. This weekend is a logistical nightmare trying to assemble the family to have a party for him, not to mention it's also my office staff party this evening, so we're just going to keep it low-key around here and have everyone over for cake hopefully on Monday, since I'm hitting the road on Tuesday again for three days.

So far the kids have been decently civil to each other today, but Cooper is spouting off the word 'stupid' pretty much non-stop. It's better than the word he was trying to use last week, but he knows stupid isn't nice. I also have him in real underwear again today; I've been trying this every so often and he sporadically uses the toilet to pee, and most often to poop, which is a huge bonus for me!

The remainder of my travels this week was good. But on my way back from my overnight trip, I left town without any thought of how much gas I had in the Jeep. I thought about it after I left town, and figured that the quarter tank I had would be more than sufficient to reach the next town. When I got to the next town, I couldn't see a gas station on the main road, and didn't know where to turn off, so I kept going, knowing that there was definitely a gas station or two in the next small town. The next town? Had NOTHING OPEN. Anything there, if still operational, is seasonal therefore was closed. By this time I had about an eighth of a tank left, and sixty kilometres to the junction where I could definitely get some gas.

I called my Dad to comment on my situation since he used to work in this particular town and did the drive daily. He was a combination of amused and concerned with a side dish of 'duh what were you thinking?' and was prepared to rescue me if necessary. I phoned Chris too, to ask if he thought I could travel that far on that little gas, and to let him know I might need to be rescued. I was making good time at least and since it's not a great highway, it was a good thing to get as much daylight traveling in as I could. I trekked along, getting closer to my service station destination, but with growing anxiety. The fuel light came on when I had about seventeen kilometres to go, but by this time I had run out of windshield fluid too, and the traffic I caught up to had made my visibility limited by spraying up all the road salt. It got so bad that I had to pull over and throw some snow on the windshield to continue. ::sigh:: I was feeling very sheepish. I got going again and had to stop once more for cleaning the windshield, this time with a bottle of water.

I made it to the gas station with a heavy sigh and a little thank you prayer for my prayers being answered. But with the gas prices higher in smaller towns (part of the reason for my not getting gas in the first place!) I decided to just put in a few bucks to make it back home to the gas station. This last leg of the trip went fine, since I had also purchased some windshield fluid. All was well. I filled up the Jeep for my next trip which was the next morning (Thursday) and gladly went home. I was greeted with the smell of dinner (SUPPER!!!) cooking. Chris had put the extra meatloaf in the oven that I made last week. I cooked some potatoes and corn and we had a great meal.

Thursday was a day trip to a town I will visit twice to service all the computers there. Hopefully I will finish everything on my next visit, since I came across some of the worst computers I have had to deal with. Hopefully they're in the budget for a few new machines. I had lunch with a few of the girls from the office and with Michelle and her new baby Cambel, who is delightfully adorable. We had a great lunch and headed back to the office. I ended up staying a little late, which made no difference travel-wise, since it was already dark out at the end of the workday. I got on the highway and left town by five-thirty and had a good trip home, again without seeing any wildlife on a highway notorious for plenty of it.

Friday was a no-travel day, since I had no coverage available for my job. It was nice to get back to my own desk. It was a great day, including the Christmas pot luck luncheon we had with the other agencies in the building. Chris showed up with a coffee for me and announced he had taken the day off since it was quiet at the shop. I promptly asked him to run a couple errands for me so that I would have a contribution for the luncheon.

I did a quick eat-and-run and went to my eyebrow appointment before returning to work. The afternoon went well also. On the way to pick up the boys I picked up Chris and we ran a few errands before coming home. I rented a couple movies and we ordered pizza when we got home. First we watched Hancock (Will Smith) which was pretty good. Next we started watching Narnia but I was getting really tired and needed to work on a couple projects. I dozed off a couple times but finished off a couple little Christmas projects before falling into bed.

This afternoon when Chris comes home I'll do a bit of shopping. I need to get Cooper a birthday present, something for the steal-a-gift exchange at my office party and some type of hors-d'oeuvres to bring to the party. The babysitter is bringing over her easy-bake oven to bake some little cakes with the kids and since she's long outgrown it, she plans on leaving it here. The kids are going to love it. I'm going to pick up some little icing decorating tubes too so they can have fun decorating their creations. Sounds like good times ahead!