Happy (Belated) Birthday, Veronica!

Olivia tried to help Veronica cut the frozen cake from Freddy's. Yep, the calendar says it is Nov. 1.

Not Sept. 19.

Veronica says at this rate, we will be celebrating Julia's birthday on Dec. 8.

Yes, we just might.

It's not easy to pay for a $19.99 cake when you are having money difficulties. So I really appreciated Veronica's patience and upbeat attitude.

By the way, the cake was good. And the Styrofoam base that we cut out with the first piece was, well, funny.

Back to the Future: Mid-City Bank

There was plenty of goofiness going on as we shot our second "Back to the Future" location.

The old Mid-City Bank that once sat on the corner of Saddle Creek and Dodge for years was torn down earlier this year.

In its place will be a hotel for Nebraska Medicine patients and family.

We stopped by the site after shooting photos and video of the demolition of the Omaha Civic Auditorium.

We tried to use some existing landmarks to make sure the "after" photo matches.

Apparently, the hotel could be up to six stories tall.

The property has been a dirt lot since May, when the bank was demolished.

Ok, look closely at this one. I didn't see it until after the photo was taken.

The End of the Civic Auditorium

Watch the final 30 seconds of the demolition of the Civic Auditorium.

We rushed from picking up Lauren from art club today to get our "Back to the Future" photo of the Omaha Civic Auditorium. Little did we know, we were under the gun to catch the final parts of the building being demolished.

Unfortunately, Lauren was not a willing participant in the shoot. While she moped and complained about not being able to work on her homework, I hustled the other four girls across the street. Then the fun began.

This was cute.

No Lauren in these photos, unfortunately.

We know there are photos like this from our "before" shoot. We just have to find them.

Check out Emily, trying to scale the fence.

And The Winner Is...

Julia helped tally the NCAA brackets (about two weeks after the title game).

It seemed a "dumpster fire" had broken out on everyone's NCAA Tournament brackets due to a host of first round upsets.

But, as you can see from our scoring system, it is the games near the end that really matter and help you pile up the points:

First round win: 1 point
Second round win: 2 points
Sweet 16 win: 4 points
Elite Eight win: 8 points
Final Four win: 16 points
Correctly picking the champion: 32 points

Julia helped tally up the points today and it was pretty close between Cole, Julia and me. In the end, I won with 165 points, with Julia in second (152), followed by Cole (140. Julia said I only won because, "Dad cheated. He copied off of me!"

Anyway, enjoy these final photos – and this year's "One Shining Moment" video.

Here's the final point totals from each round.

There were more brackets to tally this year.

The winning bracket.

Christmas Is Here!

The girls show off their presents.

Christmas Letter Time!

Veronica decided to "decorate" someone's face...

Things came together rather quickly when we got down to business on this year's Christmas letter. From Friday night to Saturday afternoon, we finished everyone's text portion, got the letters printed at CopyMax, addressed more than 140 envelopes and stuffed and mailed them off. Emily, Julia and Veronica were the biggest of helpers, with Olivia chipping in and Lauren ... well, being Lauren.

Thanks to a trip to the main post office, we expect the letters to start arriving in the Omaha area on Monday and faraway places after that. The only regret this year? That I did not have time to write a personal message on each one of them. Sorry!

Veronica (right) handled stamps and return address labels this year.

How Emily addressed envelopes while wearing my glasses is beyond me...

Bell Ringing Fun

Veronica (far right) was one of several students collection donations outside Hy-Vee on Tuesday.

As part of Veronica's election to student council, she earned the opportunity to be a Salvation Army bell ringer this week.

Her half-hour shift began at 4:15 p.m. at the Hy-Vee at 50th & Center. So we had really had to hustle to be there on time. Fortunately, traffic was light once we escaped the maze that is the area around the school.

Sporting a Santa's hat (borrowed from Aunt Bridget), Veronica had a great time taking shifts ringing the bell. Fortunately, the weather was on the mild side.

Another nice aspect of the volunteer work was watching the generosity of people young and old. There was a near constant stream of people stuffing cash into the red kettle. And each time, Veronica and her classmates thanked the people who were kind enough to donate.

Veronica was all the more cuter, thanks to her Santa hat.

A (Long) Season of Joy

"As seen on SnapChat," Veronica was in the front row during the chorus performance.

For the first time in years, I was able to attend Veronica's holiday music program. Two performances were on offer today and I chose the morning one.

The cover of the program.

I was particularly looking forward to this event because I got to attend a music class during a "parent's day" at the school last month. It was quite an eye-opening experience, considering music classes were typically out of control when I was in grade school. (Mostly because the students acted up and didn't respect the teacher.)

But what I didn't know was how ambitious this program would be. That is, until I opened the program. Wow. This was going to be a show of shows. As it turned out, the first three songs took 15 minutes and, after 65 minutes of performances, there were still 10 songs still to go.

Here's a sampling of Veronica's performances (three songs in one video) and a few photos.

I usually figure three minutes per song. This was shaping up to be a long show.

The chorus sang four songs in the morning performance but only three in the afternoon.

Yes, Veronica, we wish you were, too!

Veronica's New Look, Part II

Veronica sent over a few more photos of her "new do."

New Look For Veronica

How do you like Veronica's haircut? She got quite a bit chopped off.

Student of the Month

Check out the backdrop for Veronica's "Student of the Month" photo.

Earlier this week, we received a nice note from the school telling us that Veronica was chosen as "Student of the Month" for her classroom. Wow!

It read:

"We have high expectations for our Jefferson Elementary students. In order to be selected as "Student of the Month," students must excel in all of the following areas:

• Be a good citizen who is responsible and respects others.
• Be a hard-working student who always turns work in on time and always does his/her best.
• Be at school on time and attend regularly.

"Veronica has demonstrated all these traits on a daily basis. We are so very proud of your childre and we hope you are too! Students cannot be successful without the support of their parents. We thank you for being a supportive parent. Congratulations to you and Veronica for a job well done!"

Veronica got a sprinkle donut with juice. (My donut was plain and they gave me water.)

The certificate sure is nice.

These two food cards were a nice – and unexpected – bonus.

Veronica showed off herself on the classroom's door decoration.

Isn't It Too Early For This?

It will not be too many years before this is a reality for Veronica.

Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony

Watch the lighting of the tree.
This year's tree lighting ceremony at Shadow Lake Towne Center was a special one.

While I don't believe we have ever attended one at this popular shopping place in Papillion, we had good reason to be there this year. That's because the tree that is on display came from the yard where Jon Brooks grew up. His dad donated it in memory of Patti, who died a few years ago. Because of this, we enjoyed a nice view from the VIP section next to the stage.

We enjoyed pretty moderate weather conditions (though the wind did kick up a bit at the end) and the ceremony itself was very nice. It included a concert by the "Peppermint Elves," as well as several characters from "Frozen" and other Disney movies – plus the entirety of the Papillion-South Titans marching band. That was impressive.

Here are a few photos: 

Santa Claus was there, along with radio personalities Chris and Ricky from Star 104.5.

The tree looked much larger on display than in Jon's front yard.

Julia got her picture taken with the Grinch. Well, kind of.

Olivia (right) and Julia posed in front of the tree.

Lauren was helping out with Neil's children and Emily was in Colorado.

This was a nice sign to help remember Patti.

I felt like I was live tweeting an event...

Here is Santa's arrival.

As Seen on Snapchat: Friday the 13th

This is how you know it is Friday the 13th.

Away We Go!

With a day off from school, Julia was a front-seat passenger for my drive to school with Veronica.