We Skyped with Katrina for nearly two hours, our first video chat with her since she returned to Michigan in August. I know that she and Alex still have a few more years of school and that we don't have a big enough of a place for them right now anyway, but I really would like for our girls to be here with us. Rather than being cathartic, the call intensified that feeling. Still, I thank this technology that allows us this type of communication.
We went for our normal Saturday dump run and were greeted by amazingly clear skies and gorgeous mountain vistas on our trip. We also spent a while at the Soldotna library so that all of us could get local library cards. Janelle and I didn't pick up anything as Janelle is currently in mid series and I am on book six of the twelve young adult books for Battle of the Books. Trevor, however, was able to find an Orson Scott Card book that the school library didn't have (our copy is in one of our many boxes either here or in Michigan) and Connor picked up a number of chapter books that involve dragon stories which he and the librarian picked. Rowen also chose a few. The library has a large play area for kids and a good sized seating area around a fireplace for its older patrons. Unfortunately, it does not have as good of a DVD collection as Jackson's libraries do.
We concluded our trip by picking up some more snow equipment, although we did not yet find the windshield screens that my mother has wisely suggested that we get. For a rather late lunch, we made a rare stop at Subway, using more of the gift cards that Mary Malewitz and the choir gave us (as well as a generous buy one get one free promotion).
Our early evening was spent unsuccessfully looking through boxes for our missing Wii nunchucks and doing some more reorganization. We did find a fourth (and more) Wii-mote so that both Connor and Trevor could race Janelle and me. Unfortunately, without more nunchucks, Trevor had to use the Wii-mote in its "steering wheel" configuration to play MarioKart (as I have been doing. Much to Trevor's rather loudly-voiced irritation, this allowed Janelle to get second overall and for Connor to come in third.
It's been a good day.