02 NOV 25

Shades are lifted to thick mist on a frozen world early that morning pre-church...

It's morphed towards sunshine by the time I sit down to our Bible study table and receive a text from Carrie-Bri to the sibling group chat... something about Grandma “burning down her microwave” last night... though in this case where there's smoke there isn't always fire...

An hour later Yali experiences his own kind of emergency when I pick him up from Sunday School where he's just popped a button off his suit coat and lost it... but not to worry... he's found a back-up sewn to the inside...

The fam is then briefly cozied back into the warmth of home before driving west for a late lunch with extended family before Z&M shove back to Nashville...

There is steak and “home fries” to share and a pack of cousins who all simultaneously seem to realize they don't have much to say or play that afternoon so they get busy browsing tablets while the adults chat around homemade cherry crisp...

Home again where Puck is ready for more bacon...

...Yali for “Stranger Things”...

...and Patience for “Once Upon a Time” and... a later confession... “Uh Mom...? I uh... well I used your bed pillow for a footrest... so uh sorry about that but... at least my feet are clean!”