Steve Serres' Blog

Friday

2011-06-04T22:12:00.000-05:00

The day started out pretty normal. Trying to wake Grace up wasn't so easy. By the end of the week she's tired and usually can't get up on her own. Getting her on the bus is pretty easy though as she's becoming more and more self-sufficient. She was having hot lunch at school so she only needed a snack in her backpack and no homework to turn in so she was off to the bus stop in plenty of time.

The morning was warmer than the rest of the week had been. Preview of how warm it would be later? Yes. After Grace is on the bus and off to 2nd grade I usually check my email and twitter. Right after I was done with this Riley was waking up already. She isn't usually up that early, so I was hoping she'd go back to sleep, but she didn't. After she was up I made us some breakfast. Scrambled eggs for her which she proceeded to throw most of on the floor. And a 3-egg omelette for me. Adding bacon made all the difference in flavor. It was an excellent choice.

We're guessing that Riley hasn't been eating as well as normal lately because she just got a new tooth a few days ago. The interesting thing is that one day she'll eat pretty normal and the next she won't. I'm wondering if she isn't getting another one. I think we'll find out pretty soon.

After breakfast Riley and I set out on our errands. We headed to the shoe store and actually found some baseball cleats that fit me. And they were on sale. That was great. Riley was a little stir-crazy sitting in her stroller but she did pretty good. After this we headed to my favorite store, Lowe's. We planted a new Bradford Pear tree in the front yard last week and then right after I planted it we had a big storm so it hasn't been straight and it's also flopping around. So we stopped at Lowe's to get a tree support kit so it can grow straight.

After Lowe's we ran to get milk and rushed to beat Grace home. After she got home I actually got them both in the tub and cleaned up. Then Riley went down for a nap and Grace finished up shampooing her hair. After that I actually got to sit down for a few minutes before starting dinner. It was taco night. Put the meat on the fire and starting shredding lettuce and chopping tomatoes. Realized I forgot to buy avocados, so no guacamole for us. About the time dinner was ready Julie was home from work. We sat and talked for a few minutes and out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw a butterfly land on a bush in our front yard. Then it hovered and it's wings were moving really fast. I couldn't believe it. A hummingbird! In our yard! That's the first time since we've lived in this house that we've even seen one. We used to put hummingbird feeders out and they never came. But apparently they like our bushes out front.

After that excitement I got everything packed up to go and we headed to the in-laws for dinner. Dinner was good and Grandma even had dessert for us. So it was a good day. Now on to the weekend. Yay!

Crazy week

2011-05-15T23:05:00.009-05:00

This last week was crazy. Not so much for Grace having a super busy week, just a lot of little things going on. Last Sunday was Mother's Day and I got Julie tickets to 42nd Street. We're going in a few weeks. She's pretty excited.

Monday turned out pretty normal. Riley and I did make it to the bike shop and got some new tubes for the trailer. I also used a LivingSocial deal from our bike shop and got a new helmet. I was lucky to get that. Got a cool helmet for much less than it would have normally cost. My old helmet was 10 years old. I think it was time for a new one!

I was able to change the tubes while Riley was napping so it was all ready on Tuesday for her first ride. She was really excited and she really enjoyed it too! Here's a photo of her all excited about going.

We rode down to the village hall and paid our bill and saw a canadian goose family. She just loves birds and was excited to see them up close without a window between them and her. Here's a shot I took of them swimming away from us.

Then we went over to this "new" business in our town that sells gardening plants and supplies. They've been there a year and I had never visited it. Riley liked this too. Then on the way back we happened to go past the park so we stopped there. She finally got up the nerve to climb this by herself this time. I think it was because she saw another girl that was there doing it.

She did get a little nervous for this last step that she's doing here in the photo, but I just told her to hold on to the bar further up instead of the ladder and she was fine. This girl just love, love, loves the slide! It's definitely her favorite. That's why she was going up the ladder here instead of going all the way around the playset and going up the steps.

She enjoyed the ride home too but was obviously disappointed that all the fun was over when we got home. We actually took a family bike ride after dinner on Tuesday also. Riley was super excited. Now if it would just warm up again (the high today was 46 I think) we could do this more often. I know it's coming soon, but it's hard to wait when it's still so cold here in mid-May.

Here are my girls before we had dinner.

Wednesday and Thursday Grace had dance class and brownies. I suppose the rest of the week was pretty normal. Especially considering that it was cold and rainy. We weren't doing much outside. On Friday we finally made it to the eye doctor for us to get Riley fitted for her new glasses. They had been waiting for some other frames to come in that were more her color, but they were backordered. The frames we picked out were the cutest ones they had but were blue. That's alright as they are still really cute. My only concern is that people will mistake her for a boy. Hopefully her clothes will give her away. Here is a photo I took of us when she tried them on.

This weekend was crazy as well. Our nephew graduated from our community college on Saturday and Julie took Grace while Riley and I stayed home. Well actually we ran to the Home Depot for a few things. Wow was the graduation ceremony long. They didn't get home until 4 hours after it started. So Saturday was more like a weekday. Then today we took Grace to get her Nintendo DSi after church. She's really excited about this. The funny part is I think she's really only excited about the built-in camera. I don't think she realizes all the extra things it will do compared to her DS.

Well, I'd better try for a decent bedtime. The shuttle Endeavor is launching in just 7 hours. And Grace will be going to school just before that.

May? Really?

2011-05-08T23:28:00.002-05:00

Sorry for the delay since my last post. Obviously I don't have a good track record though, so I suppose it doesn't come as much of a surprise. We have been super super busy around here. Grace had something going on each day last week. And her first communion was yesterday.

Fortunately for our house, we keep having company, so we've been keeping it pretty clean. I won't go so far as to say it's spotless (ha ha, yea right,) but it's cleaner than we normally keep it and I have every intention of keeping it this way and working towards getting it cleaner yet now that it is as good as it is.

Our entertaining started with having some of Julie's relatives over last Saturday the 30th. We were originally going to have them over for dinner back in February I think. But then Julie got the flu. Really bad flu. So we cancelled that get-together (surprise!) After re-scheduling it, we had them over last Saturday. We had gumbo and it turned out really good. I've never actually made gumbo before, but I got my Uncle's recipe (his family is from New Orleans) and it turned out great. They even asked for the recipe.

After this Grace had her last REP class (religious education) on Monday and a practice on Thursday to get her ready for her first communion on Saturday (yesterday.) Tuesday she had softball evaluations and Julie wasn't home before we had to leave so we brought Riley with us. It hasn't been so very warm here so we had to bundle up. Poor Riley's little hands were freezing. Actually all of our hands were freezing. Grace did well and saw another girl that was on her team last year. She wants her to be on her team again, so I have to remember to call and see if they can do that.

Anyway, Julie came by and picked up Riley a few minutes after Grace had started and got her home to warm up. Wednesday is dance class and Friday she had more dance stuff as she was practicing for the finale of her recital coming up next month and then she had a pizza party after that.

Yesterday was super busy for Grace's first communion and the party was afterwards at our house. Remember the clean house? Yea, we did spend some time "refining" the house in the morning, but the day went really well. We had to be at the church a half an hour before the service started and we were actually early. Yes, you just read that, we were early, by a full 12 minutes. This never happens. The only glitch was not getting back to the house in time for the catering to be delivered (taking pictures.) We had to send my cousin home ahead of us leaving the church so that someone was there. Actually I think they had to wait a few minutes as my neighbor called wondering what to do. We do have good neighbors!

We even made it to church on time today. Not early, but not late either. I can't say I made this Mother's day super special for Julie, but I think we made the day about as good as we could. This week is much less hectic and that is certainly welcome. And actually a lot of things are starting to wind down as Grace only has a few weeks of school left. Then we'll move on to the summer schedule. As always, right now I'm looking forward to it. The summer...no schedule or at least a limited one. Sleeping in...or at least mostly sleeping in. Grace doesn't seem to sleep in anymore. In fact Riley hasn't even been sleeping in all that much any more either. I really miss that. Clearly it would help if I'd go to bed earlier so I can get more sleep, but I can't seem to break this habit of staying up late.

The good thing about this summer is that Riley is old enough to go and do things we couldn't really do last year when she was only one. I tried to get our bicycles and the trailer ready for us to use today. Since Grace and Julie got home so late this evening we didn't have time to go out for a bike ride anyway. We haven't used the trailer since Grace was like 3 or 4 probably so I'm guessing about 4 years. I had been cleaning it up and airing up the tires as well as airing up the tires in all of our bikes. As I was working on Julie's bike I hear this pop and then a loud sound of air coming out. Maybe it's their age or something, but the tube on one of the trailer tires had blown a hole. I think I'll replace them both. I have a feeling that the other one will go at some point anyway so I might as well just replace them both while we're not in the middle of a trail with no pump to air up a new tube.

Grace will obviously be playing softball this summer and I'll be coaching again. I'm really looking forward to it. I feel much less anxiety than last year as I didn't really know what I was getting myself into. Now that I know how it all works and how everything fits together I'm guessing it will be much more fun as most of the stress will be removed. She's also going to a half-day day camp for a couple weeks. I'm going to try and get us outside a lot more this summer. We all need it and the kids both really enjoy it.

Better start implementing my earlier bedtime. Gotta go.

Did I Mention Rain?

2011-04-28T23:49:00.006-05:00

So today it rained most of the day. Seems like we're living in Seattle. Today was day 21 of rain this month (28 days.) Luckily tomorrow will allegedly be rain-free. I hope so as I still need to plant those darned blueberry bushes.

Yesterday was a tragic day here in the States. There was a massive storm front that spawned hundreds of tornadoes and they went through 6 states just destroying everything in their path. I've never been through a serious tornado like this one, and luckily few have as most tornadoes aren't this bad. These were just insane. A mile-wide swath of destruction is just crazy. And scary.

Riley seems to be feeling better as she is acting a little more normal. The only thing that wasn't normal today was her nap; it was a bit short today. I know she was tired since she was laying her head on my shoulder. That's what she does when she's tired. One of the cutest things she does when she's really tired is to just lay on the floor wherever she is and act like she's sleeping.

Some other "big" news yesterday was President Obama releasing the long-form version of his birth certificate. For some reason certain politicians believed that the POTUS (President of the United States) wasn't born in the United States. Some people say it's just because they disapprove of or hate or something him so much that they are just looking for anything to get him out of office or discredit him or whatever. I believe that. I don't see any other reason for this whole thing. I don't see any racism as everyone is saying now. It's interesting that they are only now saying this. How long have there been these "birther" allegations? A year?

What I find especially interesting is that the POTUS waited so long to release the document. The way I look at it, either he releases it right after the allegations are first brought out, or he ignores them and moves on. Why wait all this time and then produce it now? That doesn't make sense, especially since during his press conference after having released his birth certificate he said he found the allegations amusing. I read somewhere that he did it yesterday to try and take media attention away from his announcement about the new Secretary of Defense (Leon Panetta) and Ben Bernanke's historic press conference. That I can definitely believe. The Obama administration has used the media very well for their benefit.

On a lighter note I was excited to see that OT Gabe Carimi from the Wisconsin Badgers was drafted by the Chicago Bears today. Being a Badger fan that makes me happy and being a Bears fan I'm happy too as we have needed offensive line help for a few years. Am I convinced that Jay Cutler is the perfect quarterback for our team and the offense we run? Not completely, but Carimi will certainly help.

Did you hear about the "elders" in Korea today? The name you'll recognize is former POTUS Jimmy Carter. Sounds like his visit their wasn't very productive as the headlines afterward read "thanks for nothing, Jimmy." I've been reading a lot about Korea and specifically our involvement in the Korean war lately. I'm not sure North Korea (DPRK) will ever really cooperate with the south. They just have this deep-seeded hate against the south almost as if it's from back in the days of the birth of communism, even though they didn't get communism until later. And the nuclear situation just ruins everything. If they would lay off the development of nuclear weapons that would really help their stature in the world and especially with the south.

I saw an article just today that their was new construction sited at a nuclear site in the DPRK. The world and especially South Korea will not take anything seriously from them if they continue to develop nuclear weapons. What I did learn from former POTUS Carter's visit and press conference is that the humanitarian conditions in the north are pretty bad. Unfortunately this is what happens when you have an evil dictator like Kim Jong-Il. He doesn't care about his people at all. He has his own agenda and that's what matters. I also find it deplorable that the DPRK refuses to take responsibility for the sinking of the South Korean ship and the attack on the South Korean military base. Oh, but they have deep regret. Whatever.

Today the DPRK was threatening the south with "merciless fire" if the launches of balloons, which contain pamphlets ridiculing Kim Jong-Il & family, didn't stop. With that attitude how can they expect the south to want to meet for any kind of summit or have any food distributions. Craziness.

So Grace has off school tomorrow, but she has a birthday party to go to. We still haven't purchased a gift yet. She has started the card so she should be able to finish that up pretty easily in the morning. Looks like we'll be heading out to Target to get that gift taken care of. I'll also need to decide on something for dinner as I haven't planned anything.

Tonight I made blueberry pancakes and you'd think I had made everyone's favorite meal. I made two batches (Julie cooked most of the second batch) and they are all gone. I think I could have made more and at least some of them would have been eaten also. That Riley just love, love, loves pancakes. If I feed her them for breakfast she will eat like 6 of them. In her defense I do make them a little on the small side, but she had at least 5 I think for dinner tonight. She is pretty much the same way though with a waffle. Those seem to be some of her favorite foods. She gets very excited.

You should have seen her tonight. It was just too funny. After she finished her fourth pancake I think it was, she was actually licking her plate. And I don't mean a little bit, I mean really cleaning it off. She had blueberries everywhere: pants, shirt, face, table. This girl really enjoys her food. Here is a cellphone photo of her after she enjoyed a marshmallow bunny a couple days ago.

You can really see her eye crossing in this picture unfortunately. Try to focus on the messy face. Most meals this is how her face looks. Today she took her "extra" yogurt and was rubbing it all over her arms and hands and calling it soap (hope.)

I have a few more cellphone photos I can share. These next two are from a walk we took. She was walking her bear in it's stroller. In the second one you can see Grace racing down the hill way out in front of Riley. This was just before Grace crashed. It wasn't pretty.

This last one is Riley in a shoe box. She's almost getting too big to do things like this anymore, but she still tries. Sad to see her growing up, but I have to admit we're spending the time to enjoy watching her grow up as opposed to when we had Grace at this age. It's amazing how different you are with a second child. I'm not even sure it's only that she's the second child so much as that Grace is 8 already.

Alright, I must go and get some sleep.

Rain

2011-04-26T23:05:00.002-05:00

Today turned out to be a little more rain filled than the weather man would have had us believe last night during the news. But the amount of precipitation wasn't really all that substantial so I guess he wasn't all that far off. Unfortunately that means I didn't get the blueberry plants I need to get planted into the ground yet. They're leafing out in my kitchen. And I haven't even watered them since they are in plastic bags and not pots.

I suppose I'll get them planted one of these days. Right now I'm watching the Blackhawks game against the Canucks. I'm not impressed so far. The Canuck defense has been pretty strong so far. We'll see how it turns out. Only a few minutes left and they're down 1-0. They're certainly capable of winning this game but they haven't displayed that yet tonight.

Everything else today went a little more normal. Except Riley was awake for a lot of the morning while Grace was getting ready for school. Lucky for me she went back to sleep again. You know you're in trouble when she's asking for a book to "read" in her crib at 8 in the morning. Like I said yesterday, she's normally up between 9 and 10. This week has not been normal for her because she's been awake early but then sleeping late. I think she might be getting another tooth. Guess we'll find out soon enough.

She did do something really exciting today when she was eating lunch. She has this terrible habit of throwing the food she no longer wishes to eat. Leftover macaroni and cheese? Throw it on the floor. Little extra applesauce from Dad? That goes on the floor. So what did she do today? She actually said she didn't want any more and handed me her bowl. BTW "bowl" is one of her favorite words. She's been trying to say "more" the last couple of days too. It's really cute. She really emphasizes the "r."

She also did the same thing when she was eating her apple (app-al.) She would be chewing off the skin and putting it in her bowl instead of throwing it on the floor or across the room. This is a very welcome change. I'm really tired of cleaning the floor and the table and her and the tray on her booster seat and the booster seat every time she eats. One fewer thing to clean...very exciting!

Now the true question is whether it will continue. Obviously I don't know but I can hope right? Thank goodness we're officially past the whole undressing in her crib thing. OMG. This went on entirely too long. It's nice to not have to change her sheets every day. And I clearly don't miss cleaning up poop from all over her and the crib and the wall. That's not fun to wake up to.

She also said a semi-sentence today. She said "Ri-Ri app-al nummy." Or maybe she switched nummy and apple. Apple is one of the few words she uses for food besides nummy. Generally ALL food is a "nummy." She really likes apples! That's good considering we have an apple tree in the back yard.

Alright, the Blackhawks lost in overtime. That stinks. Guess I can concentrate on baseball now.

Julie is much better today. I hope it was just an anomaly yesterday where she ate too much of something she shouldn't have. I still haven't gone to the grocery store. I have to go tomorrow now. We have nothing to eat and Riley has no milk to drink. Guess I'll have to start working on that menu...

What?

2011-04-25T22:00:00.002-05:00

So today was kind of a strange day. I never knew what was coming next. Got up at my normal time but when I went to get Grace up for school, Riley was awake and whispering "daddy." I just said to go night-night in hopes she'd go back to sleep. She's never up that early. Each time I tried to wake Grace up she'd snore and complain so I left her to sleep a little longer.

After giving Grace an extra 20 minutes of sleep I went to get her up and she actually woke up this time. I don't know why I then bothered to tell her that she had 15 minutes to get ready because two minutes after we normally get ready to walk out the door she was starting to brush her teeth with her pajamas on. I was thinking there is no way she's going to make the bus, but it seemed like only one minute later she was running down the stairs with her clothes on and heading to get her shoes on. I was surprised. Good thing she had her clothes picked out already.

She did make the bus, and we didn't even have to run. Talking to the neighbor at the bus stop and she had some similar issues this morning. When I got back in the house Riley was saying hi to me. Luckily she did fall back asleep. And she slept for quite a while as she didn't wake up until 11:45. Actually that's later than normal nowadays. Normal for her these days is between 9 and 10. But Monday's are hard because she's sometimes recovering from the weekend when she doesn't always get a very long nap.

When Grace got home from school she was in a very good mood. She even watched Sesame Street with us...of course while she was doing her homework. I swear she can't do her homework without the TV on. Last week was turn off the TV week (which reminds me, she was supposed to return the paperwork for that today.) So she can do homework without the TV being on, but she seems to feel she can't. It was about this time when Julie said she was leaving work and coming home because she'd gotten sick and it wasn't getting any better.

After she got home she put Riley down for a nap and went for a nap herself. Unfortunately it was only a few minutes later that our neighbor started playing volleyball outside of our bedroom window. They practice by bouncing the ball and then "serving" or hitting it up against the side of their house. But our houses are pretty close together, so it also inevitably hits our house too. So anyway, she didn't get much of a nap. And unfortunately Julie really didn't get much better for the rest of the night. Oh, she felt better, but she still couldn't eat anything. Let's hope tomorrow is a much better day for her.

We made a ham for easter and so we have leftovers. Julie leaves this note this morning that maybe we could have ham for dinner tonight. If you read the last paragraph, you know she didn't even eat dinner, but the problem I had is that we don't really have anything else in the house to eat. So I had it for lunch and dinner. And I'll probably have it for lunch tomorrow. I haven't planned any meals for the week so I'm not certain what we'll do for dinner. I'm just hoping I don't have to plan for ham again.

I try to go as few places as possible these days. I don't want to pay to put gas in my car unless I have to. So I've been going fewer places. I'll be happy when the weather is warmer and Riley and I can get out on my bicycle and go places. Right now it's raining and the high today was a cold feeling 50 or so. Not such great bicycling weather, especially with a 2 year old.

Anyone out there use Twitter and/or Facebook? I have to say I'm addicted. But my addiction has changed. I'm not so addicted to Facebook anymore, but much more so to Twitter. I find myself posting completely different things on each one and spending much more time with Twitter. Facebook has mostly become a Mafia Wars habit and a good goto for checking in with my friends to see what they've been doing and to see pictures and things like that. With Twitter, you have a window into things you're interested in as well your friends. So I can still keep up with friends plus I can add in some news and fun interests.

I wonder why everyone isn't disenchanted with the gasoline situation. Certainly if you're very wealthy a 25% increase in gasoline costs probably isn't a big deal. But this is seriously a big expense for us. With Julie driving so many miles to work each day it really adds up if you look at it from a monthly viewpoint. 60-70 miles a day for 20 days at least each month. Luckily her car gets pretty good fuel mileage, but it's not THAT good. She doesn't get what I get and I wouldn't get much better mileage than her driving where she does every day anyway since I get my best mileage around town which is what I mostly do. So lets generalize and say Julie uses about 3 gallons of gas a day for about 20 days a month. That's 60 gallons at the new price today of $4.29 that's about $250. Then add in the gas I use and it's at $400 or so. That's like having another car payment. And what do we get in return?

Well sure, we get the money we need to survive in the lifestyle we want to live in. I definitely understand that as I pay the bills and see the money come in and the money go out. It goes out quickly when you have only one income, I'll attest to that. But let's look at a year ago when gas was "only" $2.85 a gallon. That same scenario would have put us at around $250-270 a month. Compare that to now and all my gas would be free since Julie is buying that much just for her car.

Julie was just saying tonight after the gas prices went up today that we need only wait and the price will come down. And she's absolutely right as they just play this game with you. This morning gas was $4.07 and they raised it to $4.29. Tomorrow it probably won't change, but if it does it will come down to $4.28 or maybe even $4.27. Then in another day or two it will be down to $4.20 maybe or $4.19. Then it will come down as low as it will get going forward; probably something like $4.10 or $4.14. Then it will start all over and jump 25 cents the next time to $4.35 or $4.39. So this cyclical up and down shows the general trend of only going up. It never really goes down, it just comes down to a false low that only feels low compared to how high they raised it a few days prior. The actual trend is up, up, up. I'm not surprised at all that they're calling for $6 gas by summertime. Around here we'll pay more for the summer blend of gas plus all this price gouging for gasoline made from crude oil that cost less than the gas we bought a few months ago for $3.25. It's just a big ripoff that lets oil companies get rich and crude oil producing countries get richer. And the gas we use to get to our jobs continues to cost more so our pitiful little raises are actually decreases in income because it's costing more to get to our job every day.

And how is all this going help our economy? I'm not going to spend money on anything I don't absolutely need because quite honestly I don't have extra income anymore. That all goes to the oil companies.

And...I'm off my soapbox. Have a good night.

Happy Easter

2011-04-24T23:44:00.003-05:00

Believe it or not, I do remember I have a blog. I know...surprising.

We scored a bonus (in my mind at least) by getting my favorite priest at church today. Of course all the people that only come to church on Easter and Christmas kind of ruin it for the rest of us. I really wish us regulars could get priority seating. Is it wrong to want that? And saving seats for people coming ten minutes after the service has started? Really? What is this, high school?

I think I surprised Julie today. We parked a block away and walked into the church. As soon as we walked in you could see they had set up rows of chairs in the outer area (sorry, I can't think what that area is called.) We walked into the sanctuary and tried to see if we couldn't squeeze into one of the pews, but their just wasn't enough room. So we came back out of the sanctuary and tried to find a spot in the chairs that were set up. But those were all taken also, so I just sat down at the spot I was in when I realized there just wasn't any place to sit. It's very disappointing. Not being able to sit in a seat. I have to admit we aren't exactly early to church on a normal week, but we actually got to church a few minutes early. It made no difference.

Oh and then after church we were leaving and had made it a whole block away from church and were at a stop sign. There was a little cross-traffic, but I was hesitating at the stop sign because of the volume of traffic we'd be turning into compared to a normal Sunday service. I wasn't certain if I should go the normal way or turn and go the long way to avoid the traffic. There was this "older" person behind me and after I hesitated when the cross-traffic had passed, they honked at me. Well, let's just say I wasn't nice back to this lady (nothing illegal mind you, just a little rude.) Is this what the world has come to that even people in their 60's are in a hurry and can't wait an extra 2 seconds at a stop sign? Grrrr.

We had Easter at our house today. It went really well. The food was good and I'm pretty sure everyone had a good time. Here's to more low-stress holidays!

Really excited that the Chicago Blackhawks won game 6 of their playoff series tonight against Vancouver. It was a pretty darned exciting game. I can't wait for game 7 on Tuesday!

Grace will have her first communion in a couple weeks. We're getting ready for that now with both the things that have to be done for her actual communion service and also for the party afterwards.

We took little Riley to the pediatric ophthalmologist on Thursday and our own personal "not-a-doctor" analysis was spot-on (spock-on.) She needs glasses for now for her lazy eye with a follow-up in a month to see how she's doing with them. The good news is that we're treating her earlier than Grace was treated so there is a possibility that we could avoid surgery.

Hopefully I can start writing more regularly. Only time will tell.

Softball

2010-06-24T23:09:00.000-05:00

On Monday Grace had an orthodontist appointment. We just learned last week that our orthodontist is suddenly retiring. Some of you know that I had braces as an adult and in fact had them when Grace was born and for a few years after that. Anyway, I used this orthodontist off a recommendation from someone...I can't remember who anymore. He is an excellent orthodontist and has specialty brackets made for him that are smaller than typical brackets. He also has a different philosophy in regards to how fast you move teeth and expand palates.

We just started Grace's treatment about 6 months ago and I think most of the hard work is done already and her teeth are looking really good. The teeth that didn't have room to come in have started to break through now too. So anyway here we are in the middle of her obviously early treatment as she will have to have more treatment when she's older just like everyone else, as that is the normal age to get braces. Our biggest concern is that we get an orthodontist with a different philosophy than his that likes to just shove teeth around with little regard for pain or the future structural integrity of the palate. He's recommended an orthodontist that is in the complex we go to now and she also has a similar philosophy and uses the same brackets, but does to a few things differently. So I'm not sure what to do. We meet the orthodontist he's suggesting we use on Wednesday but I'd like to also talk to him about someone a little more similar to him that might also be closer. It's a real bummer and it also sucks that it's so suddenly. I'd really like to find out why he's doing this so quickly.

I usually go to bible study at my Dad's house on Monday nights and this week Grace came with me. I honestly thought she'd get bored at some point, but she really hung in there. I'm not sure how much she really understood, but was mostly paying attention and appeared to enjoy being there. It was cute as she brought her study bible with her and was reading along as we read through the scriptures we were discussing (2 Samuel Chaps 5, 6.) I think she especially liked our snack this week which was ice cream.

Tuesday was kind of crazy. We had plans to go swimming at my Aunt's friends house also with my Sister and her kids. The night before, Grace's friend from across the street asked her to go to Great America with her as it was the last day to use their bring a friend for free coupon. We decided to let her go with her friend and reschedule the swimming (sorry Nancey.) My Sister-in-law also called and wondered if we could go swimming on Tuesday. So she asked when we could swim at her house later in the week. I said either Thursday or Friday and they said Thursday sounded great. But not long after that my Aunt called and wanted to reschedule our swimming with my Sister and Thursday was the day as my Sister was busy on Friday. So now we have to reschedule with my Sister-in-law. It's hard to be popular...ha ha ha. I know it's the girls, not me, that are popular.

Yesterday we only had plans to take Grace to the library for a meet the author event. This local author was coming to read her book to the kids and then sign copies for them to take home. We couldn't do much during the day because the weather was still not cooperating. We've had a lot of severe weather here lately. In fact I'm concerned that the only large tree on our property which is in our back yard might have to be cut down. I think there is a crack in the middle of it now which would mean it's too weak to be left up. It probably wouldn't hit our house if it fell, but it would still affect us. It is actually over three properties, but the trunk is in our yard. I'd really hate to lose it as it provides a lot of shade for us. Speaking of storms and my Aunt, they did get their power turned back on Monday morning - close to Noon. Then when we had the severe weather today it went out again but came back on within a few hours. We're really lucky that it never went out for us.

So Julie wasn't home before we went to the library so we brought Riley with us and she acted about exactly as I expected...she was all over the place. She hadn't had much of a nap and so was tired and just didn't want to sit and listen or anything like that. I tried to let her explore in the back of the room, but of course she wanted to go up by the kids. That would have been fine, but she wasn't quiet so we just couldn't stay in there and keep disturbing everyone trying to listen. That's why they were there. So I didn't hear really any of the story because Riley and I were walking all over the library. Then Julie got there and picked up Riley and took her home. I forgot to ask her if she had any cash on her so we could buy the book so after it was over Grace and I ran to the ATM and got some money and hurried back to have the author sign it before she left.

Today we had our rescheduled swimming with my Sister and her kids. Also my step-Mother came and of course my Aunt was there. We all had fun I think but it was just a lot of work and I was tired afterwards. Because of road construction it took us about twice the normal time to get home so we didn't have much time between swimming and softball practice. But we got there and we both made it through. I was really feeling it during the stretching let me tell you. I was worn out.

I named this post softball because of what I found out at practice tonight. Remember my last post where I mentioned that I wasn't so happy with my pitching at Grace's game on Saturday? Well, apparently I wasn't the only one as another coach on our team said that the coach from the opposing team asked her during the game if we wanted them to pitch to our team. Wow! Maybe I should end my pitching career now.

Remember Me?

2010-06-20T22:08:00.001-05:00

Alright, so it may have been nine months since I last blogged, but believe it or not, we're all still here. Things are going well. Grace is finished with first grade which actually makes her sad. She just loves school and is not so happy that she's not going now. Hopefully that won't change too much as she gets older.

Julie and I have decided to give her a little "summer-school" over the summer by having her do some work that we give her each week so that she has something to do and to keep her up on her school skills. We don't want to teach her everything that she'll learn in second grade before she starts, just keep her skills up and help her be more ready for school when it starts up again at the end of August.

Oh, speaking of school, why do we have to pay a "registration" fee for our child's "public" education that we pay a LOT of taxes for? And why does this fee go up so much each year? I find it ridiculous. It's hard to plan how much money to save up each year if it goes up so much.

We're trying to plan a vacation for later in the summer before school starts again. We don't want to spend a lot of money which probably will also translate to not travelling very far. Unfortunately we haven't decided what to do exactly yet. We have ideas, but nothing is written in stone yet.

Grace is playing softball this spring and I am her coach. We just had our third game yesterday. Since they're so young and most of them are playing for the first time we don't keep score. They really are just playing to learn and have fun. So far it's been a lot of fun. I pitch to the girls and I have to tell you...I need to improve. Grace had vacation bible school this last week and so we were super busy all week and I never had a chance to practice pitching and it really showed during the game yesterday. Obviously I will need to keep up my practicing so as to maintain some type of consistency for the girls.

We had some big storms here on Friday and my Aunt and Uncle still have no power at their house. Unfortunately they really need electricity as they both use c-pap machines to help them breath at night and my Grandfather uses oxygen at night and those machines don't work without electricity. My Grandfather stayed with us last night so he'd be cool and so he could breath. But he was ready to go home today even though they are saying the electricity won't be back on until sometime Monday.

While Grandpa was with us we took him and my Dad and step-Mom out for dinner last night for Father's Day. We went to Outback Steakhouse. We don't go there very often and they've really changed the menu. I have to say I wasn't so impressed. The bloomin' onion was good and the sample I had of the cheese fries was really good, but the food just wasn't the same. I'm not sure why that is, but I'd say we won't be going back anytime soon.

Is it the weekend yet?

2009-09-03T22:57:00.002-05:00

Another day is done. Riley and I took it even easier today; we didn't go anywhere.

Grace woke up on her own again today. I had to convince her to eat something for breakfast though as she's just not hungry when she just gets up. She got to the bus in plenty of time and when I got back in the house Riley was still sleeping but not for too long. I got her up and she ate and really didn't play for too long and she got tired again. Then she proceeded to take a 3 1/2 hour nap. This was time for me to finish mowing the grass by mowing the back yard and other yard stuff. Then a sealcoating guy came by and so I got the driveway sealed.

By this time Grace was home with her friend and Riley was waking up. So she was really tired by the time Julie got home which was actually a little early today. I never decided what to make for dinner; well that's not entirely true as I had intended to go to the grocery store but since Riley took an early and long nap I didn't have time since I couldn't go once Grace got home. So we just basically had breakfast stuff.

Speaking of Grace...she's so funny. She played with her friend for like 3 hours after school. Then when she went home Grace saw the next-door neighbor outside and told him she would find out if she could play with him after dinner. So she comes in asking if she can play with him after dinner. Since it was 6pm and her bedtime was fast approaching we said no. You would think she hadn't been allowed to play with any friend for a week and she had this great opportunity to play with him and we said no. Oh the drama. "It's not fair," "he's going out of town for the WHOLE ENTIRE weekend." There were more, but you get the idea. Julie was able to squash it by letting her play right then for 10 minutes until we had dinner ready. Crisis averted; Mom's are good at that.

Anyone else following this whole issue regarding the alleged "torturing" of al-qaeda detainees after 9-11? I don't feel waterboarding is torture because no permanent physical harm is done. What the Japanese did to American POW's in WWII was torture. Waterboarding isn't torture. But that's just my opinion which I'm entitled to in our country. This has spawned a criminal investigation into the Bush administration whether any laws were broken and if any punishments should be handed out because of enhanced interrogation techniques following 9-11. My feeling is they should thank their lucky stars that this was done because it could possibly be the reason they are alive today.

I'm SO SICK of hearing that Obama has "inherited" all of these issues from the "previous" administration and that everything bad about our country is because of the previous administration as well. When Obama took office and even to this day he continues to state he only wants to look forward. Yet how many times has this whole issue of what the Bush administration left them been brought up? And now Atty. Gen. Eric Holder had been allowed to pursue this investigation and the rest of the administration is basically saying that it's Holder that's doing this and anything that comes of it is entirely on him. They had nothing to do with it.

There were three...yes, THREE detainees that were waterboarded. Thats all. No more. I hate to be the one to break it to people but war is hell. This is a war whether Obama wants to change the name or not, plain and simple it is a war. Things done in a time of war are quite honestly horrible; war is about killing people after all. Understand that not everything done on a battlefield would be acceptable to the common citizen. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was waterboarded something like 185 times and after this he gave in and starting teaching his interrogators how to fight a terror war. He didn't just provide information about other plots that were to follow, he gave them a glimpse into how it all works and what they are ultimately trying to accomplish. I don't know about you, but to me that was worth the price of admission, legal or not. Of course I've already stated that I believe it was legal to begin with.

I'm officially off my soap-box now.

Have you also been following the case against David Earls in Oklahoma? He raped a 4-year old girl and received one...yes, ONE year in county jail (not even prison) for this. He is scheduled to be released on September 24th but now they are bringing about new charges for other child crimes he's committed in hopes of keeping him in jail. Thank goodness.

And did you see that the Netherlands have told Laura Dekker that she can't sail around the world yet? I think if the Dekkers had approached this differently by stating that she'd have a support crew following her in case anything bad happens they wouldn't be going through this legal proceeding right now. That's what the kid that just finished sailing around the world did. I think this would help ease a lot of concerns. Just my 2 cents.

I don't miss summer

2009-09-02T20:46:00.002-05:00

Everyone here is complaining it's not hot this summer but personally I don't miss the heat at all. I had enough of that when I lived in Oklahoma. Why would I want to sweat all day or stay in the house in the air-conditioning? Why not just have it be nice outside like it has been? Ever been to San Diego?

I do have to admit it really hasn't been warm enough to swim very many days this summer so for that, I can understand someone missing the warmer weather. But otherwise, I don't miss it. I think the high today was 74 and right now it's already down to 58.

Here's a fun article (and short) for you to read about pink flamingos. This just happens to be in the town we'll be going to in a few weeks for our football game. I just ordered the tickets a few minutes ago. Yea!

Well I did a little research on the whole student-to-teacher ratio thing and I've found this study: Project STAR which pretty much clearly states that smaller class sizes equal better students in the long run. So I guess I don't have anything to complain about. I guess we should just go with the flow. Not sure if Julie will agree though.

As far as today was concerned Riley and I took it easy. Grace woke up on her own today and ate breakfast again. She was excited that I had gotten Captain Crunch cereal. So she was off to school and Riley still wasn't up yet. She finally started to wake up around 8:30 today. I had another chiropractor appointment today (I'm going three times a week for another month until things straighten out.) After that we just came home and hung out. She got tired and I put her down for a nap which unfortunately wasn't at the best time. I probably should have kept her up a little longer and fed her lunch and then put her down for a nap. I say this because she slept until Grace and her friend came home from school. So I got her up and fed her and we played for a while again and then only about a half an hour before Julie was going to be home she started to get sleepy again. But I put her down and she fell asleep for about 30-45 minutes so actually it all worked out just fine.

We just had left-overs for dinner so that was easy. Then after I did the dishes I ran outside and mowed the front yard and pulled a few weeds. Now I just need to get outside tomorrow and mow the back yard.

Now for tomorrow I still need to figure out what we'll eat for dinner. I'm still not liking this new "diet" thing. It's really hard to cut dairy and garlic. It sounds silly but pretty much EVERYTHING has either milk or garlic in it. Try and find a salad dressing that doesn't have one or the other. I think I'll just have to start having oil and vinegar for my salad dressing.

Cruising along

2009-09-01T16:52:00.003-05:00

Can you hardly believe that Grace finally took her school supplies out of her backpack on Monday?!?!!! I'm so glad that's over with. She even got a few papers back yesterday too and one said "great" and one said "wow." I think school is on track for Grace this year. I made it to my Chiropractor's appointment yesterday morning with little Riley. She was so cute; I had to wait a few minutes and so I took her out of her car seat and was playing with her. Then when it was my turn I put her back in but didn't strap her in. About half-way through the treatment she fell asleep. She was just so cute; she had turned on her side and fallen asleep almost cuddled up. I wish I had my camera so I could show you how cute she was.

After stopping at Target on the way home to buy some food and Riley taking a good nap I made BBQ Chicken and corn on the cob on the grill for dinner. After dinner was bible study at my Dad's house where we finished up studying Joshua (chaps 20-24.)

So yesterday wasn't so eventful but at least Grace finally left her school supplies at school. Today was a pretty good day too. I had to wake Grace up again today (yesterday too) but she had breakfast and was out the door in plenty of time to catch the bus. Then I came back in the house and was expecting Riley to be waiting to get up but she had fallen back asleep; possibly a remnant from not enough sleep the day before. So I read the paper and did some other stuff while I waited. After she finally got up I got her fed and then like clockwork my sister shows up only 2 minutes after the time she says was the approximate time she might be over. She's funny!

She was just dropping off some clothes and stuff that doesn't fit April anymore for us to use for Riley. After that Riley and I played for a while but she was ready for a nap pretty quickly so she went down for a nap around 11am and while she was sleeping I started cooking some sweet potatoes for her and while they were cooking I did some research on the places we are wanting to go. We have decided to take Grace to her first Badger football game (yeah!) So I was researching tickets and I did find some but I need to check with the person that usually watches Riley when we leave to see if they can actually do that on the day we are planning to go. If so then I think we'll be able to get some pretty good seats for a pretty reasonable price. I can't wait!

After that Julie and I want to get away for a night. We haven't had a "date" night in a while, but also our anniversary is coming up. Since we didn't really do anything for our anniversary last year (our 10th) we've decided to do something nice this year. It is a little pricey, but it will be SO worth it! The biggest problem with going away is obviously the person that usually watches Grace and Riley but also hotel availability and our busy schedule. We haven't worked out an actual date yet, but we ARE going. We deserve it.

In Grace's folder today was a note from her principal and no she isn't in trouble (how could you think that?) Apparently there has been a significant increase in the number of kids enrolled in first grade this year which they didn't expect. Personally I thought that's why you enroll so early in the year so that this isn't a problem but maybe people wait until the last minute. What they want to do is add an additional teacher and spread the kids out among the four teachers instead of three. Right now in her class there are 27 kids and there are two other first grade classes. So it sounds like there is approximately 80 kids or so and they want to get the teacher-to-student ratio down. Honestly for both Julie and I when we went to school we usually had this many kids in our class every year. So I don't see what the problem is unless the classroom just isn't build to hold that many students. What the letter that was sent home was asking was if we wanted them to do this. The options were a) no preference b) keep it the way it is c) add an additional class. I guess ultimately the lower your teacher-to-student ratio is the better their education would be, but I don't know if that's necessarily a proven fact; especially with kids this age. We'll see what happens.

The rest of the day was pretty normal today. I made dinner early (egg salad) since Tuesday is my night out. I had dinner ready for Julie so she didn't have to "find" something around the house or make anything. Plus then we'll both have lunch for tomorrow as well. Then I headed to a new place in the area that felt like home. In a town about 14 miles from our house they just opened up a new SONIC! You read that right, a Sonic! Unfortunately if you read my post a few days ago you know that I can't have limes so no limeade for me :-( But the burger was good.

Now I'm at the library which is where I usually end up each Tuesday night. It's quiet and I can read or surf the internet or whatever. Did I mention it was quiet? :-)

Fridays and Hard Drives

2009-08-28T22:23:00.003-05:00

Grace has officially made it through her first week (although only a partial week) of first grade. I think she likes it just as much as she liked kindergarten last year except she did say tonight when I was putting her to bed that she hopes she isn't so tired at the end of the school day next week. I told her she'd get used to it pretty quickly. It is a big difference as kindergarten was only about 3 hours and now she's in school for about 7.

Now tomorrow she has gymnastics at 8am so she'll be getting up at the same time as all week for school. But that's for 3 hours, not 7.

Hold on, watching the shuttle launch...

Discovery (STS-128) made it up tonight. Looks cool at night.

Anyway, back to blogging. So you might be wondering what Grace may have brought home with her in her backpack. You would be right if you thought that she still has pretty much everything in her backpack. She took out her 3-ring binder today, but she still has 22 glue sticks, markers, pencils, all kinds of stuff in there. She says she just forgets to take it out and that she doesn't want to take it home with her every day even though she has been doing that. Hopefully Monday we will see better results with this.

She had what they call "Buddies" today. I'm still not really certain what it is but it has to do with 3rd graders and them getting together and it just so happens that the 3rd graders they are teamed up with include our next-door neighbor. So she says she'll get to be teamed up with him. That's pretty cool. She also had art today and I can tell she enjoyed that because she has some marker on her forehead and all over her hands. She's not the neatest kid, but she enjoys what she does. I do really think she enjoys art because when she came home she started on some art project of her own with a bookmark we picked up at the library the other day that you're supposed to color yourself.

Riley keeps waking up each morning as Grace isn't the quietest kid either. I don't want us to have to tip-toe around the baby when she's sleeping so honestly I don't mind her making noise but for some reason she keeps waking up pretty early. And that would be alright too as she doesn't need to sleep until some set time each morning but if she gets up too early then her nap schedule won't really work. Honestly she hasn't really been on a wonderful nap schedule yet as she is usually just taking one long nap. Today since she got up fairly early I put her down for her nap early and she almost slept until Grace got home. So this would be alright too but she can't stay up from 1:30 until bedtime. That's just entirely too long. She was acting sleepy around 4:30 so I put her down again and she got a little nap it before Julie got home, but it wasn't a normal nap. Maybe I'll have to start getting her up from the first nap if she sleeps too long so we can split them up better.

But then we run into problems if we aren't home. It's always give and take like this. If we aren't home she pretty much just doesn't take a nap although she will sleep in the car typically. So if we aren't home then she would generally only get one nap anyway and it would be good for her if that were as long as possible. Oh who knows, we'll get that all figured out as time goes on.

So if you looked at the subject of this post you'll notice more computer related stuff. Can I just say before I start this part that Western Digital drives from my personal experience fail and pretty much always before you would expect.

When I bought my HP desktop last year I had a 400 GB Western Digital hard drive that I just transferred over to use as my main drive and used the larger drive that came with the computer for storage. It started to act funny so I took it out and put in a 500 GB Western Digital hard drive I had to preempt any problems that may have happened. Several months later the 500 GB drive dies so I buy a brand new 640 GB Western Digital hard drive to use for my main drive. In less than a month I think it failed. So now I have 3 drives (all in warranty) that have failed. Thank goodness they are under warranty, but honestly how does a person go through 3 hard drives in one and a half years? I'm starting to think this darned HP is cursed. I'd just like to burn this thing.

So anyway I go on the Western Digital website and find out that the 500 GB hard drive's warranty is expired unless I can prove when I purchased it. They go by manufacture date unless you have your receipt to show when it was actually purchased. Well I do have the receipt so when I put that information in, I only had a few weeks of warrantly left. So I sent that one out on August 17 and they received it on the 21st of August. They mailed the replacement drive on the 25th and I received it today. The only problem is I have to do this two more times but at least I'll get 3 new drives. All I can say is to ensure you backup your system regularly. Luckily I have been except when I lost the 500 GB hard drive I did lose 2 months worth of emails. But it could be much worse.

Does this mean you shouldn't buy Western Digital hard drives? I don't think so. Just keep your data backed up and pray it doesn't die after the warranty period is over.

Just a couple of photos

2009-08-28T17:37:00.002-05:00

I wanted to get these pictures online before I forget.

Here is Grace from her first day of school.

Here is Riley from last week where she's only almost 7 months.

1st Grade

2009-08-27T22:17:00.001-05:00

So Grace had her first full day of school today. She says she likes it and can't wait to go back tomorrow. Yeah! But...guess what she brought home with her........again!?! Yes, she has all of her supplies in her backpack still. Silly kid. She claims her scissors are no longer in the backpack. We asked again if everyone else emptied their supplies out and she says not everyone and that she forgot. I can't believe this chick. Why would you want to bring a full backpack of supplies back and forth to school everyday? She's pretty silly.

She still needs to bring in a picture of herself to put over her locker. Their lockers are open (no door) and at the top there is a little cubby where instead of putting her name they are supposed to bring in a framed photo of themselves. I got the picture printed tonight, but unfortunately the frame we had got into a little accident this morning (apparently when attempting to turn off the light) and we no longer have a piece of glass in the frame anymore. :-0 Hmmmm, what to do...

Last night at dinner Grace said her day was good. When she got to school she went to the cafeteria and everyone was finding their teacher and then their teacher took them all and showed them their classroom. After that they took a tour of the whole school. She said they went past the map that I helped paint last year and that she told the teacher I helped to paint it. I, of course, wondered what the teacher said in response to which Grace replied............."I don't remember." Should have seen that coming. Honestly as I write this I can hear myself as a kid....hmmm, very fitting I suppose.

So today she says she had a good day too. She got to eat lunch in the cafeteria for the first time. She went to P.E. for the first time this year. She has the same teacher as last year. I think there was some kind of rumor last year that this person wouldn't be back or something this year. I think it's good to have consistency so it's a good thing this teacher is back. (Plus I hear they like the Wisconsin Badgers!) What could be wrong with a person that likes the Badgers?

She did say a few other things about what she did but honestly at this point I don't remember what they were. Who's bad at remembering here? Lets just hope AGAIN that she doesn't bring all of her supplies home for the weekend. I'm guessing she's just getting out what the teacher tells her from her backpack since that's where her supplies are and then puts them away in her desk or wherever, and then never takes the time to put all of her supplies away and then all the sudden it's time to leave.

I had an appointment with my new chiropractor today and took Riley with me. She didn't do as well as the last time I went, but she made it through just fine and of course got more comments about how cute she is, such nice blue eyes, etc. She's still got it. We think she's pretty darned cute. I think she didn't do as well because she's starting to wake up earlier since her sibling is up earlier and isn't exactly quiet it the morning.

Who knew that Grace could turn out to be a morning person? She woke up at 6:30 all by herself again today and comes in the bathroom where I'm showering and says "Good morning Dad." She was even pleasant sounding. She was talkative all morning long. She's never gotten up that early two days in a row as far as I can remember. She's never been an early riser and usually is quite cranky by the end of the day if she does happen to get up early one day. But so far we're doing well with the new school schedule. Let's hope it continues. We have school tomorrow and then Saturday morning is gymnastics. Sunday is church, but we don't go too early; usually around 10:30am. So that's her "sleep in" day. She will have R.E.P. (used to be called C.C.D.) on Monday nights. I'm not sure when that starts yet. I just dropped off her enrollment form with the tuition payment today (finally.)

So that's the school situation so far. It's early I know but so far things are going well. I continued my new diet restrictions today and I have to say that so far this really sucks. I did read the instructions that come with it and it says you may not feel well after you start this and so far I'm not feeling so great. Not flu-like symptoms (which are possible) but I just don't feel good. And yesterday and this morning I've just been REALLY hungry because we just really don't have many foods in the house I can eat so I haven't really eaten much. I used to eat two eggs, some cottage cheese and a yogurt for breakfast. That's been cut down to only two eggs. I don't have anything else to eat with it. I could have a piece of toast but I'm really not thinking I want toast without butter.

I bought some soy milk today so hopefully I can have some cereal or at least some oatmeal tomorrow. That should help. I made the mistake of looking for some snacks to eat at Target today. I was looking down each isle trying to find something I could eat (anything, really) and found not one snack I could have. Nothing in cereal bars, granola bars, chips, snack foods, nothing. I found NOTHING to buy. And by the time I was done looking at all that I was depressed and just left. I had had enough. I'll have to sit down this weekend and work out some type of menu so I have things around the house I can eat but right now it's pretty much slim pickings.

Has anybody seen these news stories about the girl in the Netherlands that wants to sail around the world solo at 13? Actually she will start next week on the 1st which is apparently her 14th birthday. Family services or whatever it's called in the Netherlands is trying to take temporary custody of her so that they can prevent her from doing this as her parents have given her their blessing to do this. Her name is Laura Dekker. I actually think if done right she could do this, but I'm not so sure they're approaching this the right way. A UK teenager just finished doing this (he was 17) and he had support sailing with him the whole way. Many people are saying she doesn't have the experience to tackle such a daunting task. I don't know for sure. From what I've read she has been doing this for many years including sailing solo for the last 4 years or so. But is this enough experience for such a major task? I can't say. But if she does end up embarking on this adventure I certainly will root for her and hope she accomplishes her goal. I do think it's great to have big goals in life and to pursue them with all your heart.

I'm sure you have heard about the finding of Jaycee Lee Dugard after 18 years. Amazing. I'm so glad she's finally been found. What a horrifying experience she has lived through. I'm just glad she finally got out of there and that the people that took her and have held her this long have been taken into custody. They deserve all the justice system has to offer. Simply disgusting. I hope she can return to a fairly normal life soon.

One more little note...it's STILL raining. Even Grace is complaining about it raining so much now. We're up to 2 1/4" so far over the last two days.

First Day of First Grade

2009-08-26T15:22:00.002-05:00

Grace had her first day of first grade today. Of course it was only a "half" day which translates to around 3 hours. Since our school district is low on funds (okay lacking funds) they have reduced the school day as much as they can in order to pay the teachers as little as possible and try and save money that way. So a normal full day is around 6 hours with them getting home around 2:20 in the afternoon. That's fine for a family like us that has a parent home when she gets off the bus, but for the average family I would consider that a hardship. You have to find after-school care for 3-4 hours possibly.

I know most families have to pay for some type of after-school care but it just seems to me that this is a long time to have to get child care each day. I know I didn't get out of school too recently but I remember getting out of school around 3:30 I think every day (honestly can't remember that far back either...maybe I am getting old???) By the time you're either home or at after-school care it would be close to 4 and if your parents get off work early maybe you'd only have to get an hours worth of after-school care. She gets out of school at 2 and is home before 2:30. If you get home at 5 that would be 2 and a half hours (I'm not saying you the person reading this can't add, I'm just spelling it all out :-).) I don't think most people are really home by 5 each day. Julie can be some days if she gets out of work on time and doesn't hit a lot of traffic. If it's the winter and we even have snow flurries, forget it; she won't be home until probably two hours after she leaves work. Just think if we had Grace in after-school care and Julie couldn't get there for a couple of hours. It's like watching the checkout people at the grocery store when they're scanning in your food. Just watch the amount of the total bill going up and up and up. (I hate spending money at the grocery store.)

So anyway she had her first day of school and we of course had to buy a bunch of supplies for her to take to school with her. We had them all stuffed into her backpack to take to school today. When she got off the bus her backpack looked just as full. That's because it was. She didn't take her stuff out yet. She brought it all back home. I don't know if she wasn't paying attention at school and didn't hear that she was supposed to do this or maybe just didn't or if she will just be doing it tomorrow. She said that some people took the stuff out of their bags. Maybe they were listening or maybe they were the one's that weren't listening. Who knows. Hopefully we'll find out tomorrow as hopefully she won't come home with all that stuff again.

She hasn't said how school was yet as she's been playing all afternoon with her friend. They don't have the same teacher but at least they are on the same bus and can sit by each other every day. There was some worry today because her friend didn't come home on the bus. Grace says she saw her outside when school was over but then she disappeared. Her Dad was waiting for her at the bus stop but she didn't come home so he made some phone calls and turns out she stayed at school for after-school care because she will be using that in the future...just not today. The school wanted to be safe, not sorry. I think that's good, but maybe the paperwork they have should better specify when she needs to go there so they are sure where she needs to be each day. I don't know.

Julie and I will try and get Grace to tell us how her first day was at dinner. She's honestly quite vague about everything school related. Without specific questions it's simply a vague answer like "alright" or "okay," nothing with much emotion that's for sure. But at the same time, tomorrow will be a much better day to try and judge how she likes first grade as it will be her first full day. In my opinion - her first true day of school. Sorry for not having a picture like we did last year. I did take one before she got on the bus though and I can post that later.

If you read my entry yesterday, you know about this ALCAT test I took. You should read the comment I got. It helps explain better what it's all about. Thanks "yenvy"! That helped me understand more what's going on. The results actually use the words you say, intolerance, etc. but it still didn't really hit home until you posted your comment. Thanks again!

Today is a rainy day - we've had an inch and a quarter already and I see more rain on the radar coming this way. This will be good for the grass and our plants. It was so nice going to bed last night...I just love the sound of rain hitting the roof when I'm going to sleep.

You're probably wondering why I'm blogging in the middle of the day. Okay...you probably didn't even notice the time but I point it out because Grace is playing with her friend, Riley is sleeping, dinner is already made and the dishwasher and washing machine are running (towels on Wednesdays.) So I had a few minutes to sit and relax DURING THE DAY! WOW! I know it's surprising, but hey I'm just as surprised.

ALCAT

2009-08-25T22:57:00.000-05:00

Anyone heard of an ALCAT test? I got my results today from my test. It is a food allergy test and as it turns out I'm allergic to MANY foods I eat every day.

The worst foods for me are limes and the spice nutmeg. So no Corona's and no pumpkin pie - certainly not together as that sounds disgusting.

My moderate intolerance foods are apples, beets, garlic, green peppers, iceburg lettuce, sage, SHRIMP and watermelon. Who is allergic to iceberg lettuce? I mean seriously. And apples? I have an apple tree in my yard with incredibly good apples each year (which will be ripe in just about two weeks by the way.) Craziness! Garlic is going to be hard I think because it's in a lot of things and shrimp are one of my favorite foods. Not that I eat them all that often, I just really like them.

Mild intolerance foods are almonds, bananas, bass, brewer's yeast, buckwheat, eggplant, mustard, parsley, pears, pineapple, sole, string beans, tilapia and turkey. Guess Thanksgiving won't be as exciting this year. And whenever we get to Hawaii (one of these years...) I can't eat too much fresh pineapple either.

As far as chemicals I don't have any severe reactions to any of them. But for moderate intolerance there is benzoic acid, red dye #3 and sorbic acid. Both of these acids are food preservatives. My mild intolerance chemicals are aspartame and MSG; chemicals that I believe everyone should avoid.

Lastly I show an mild intolerance to casein which is found in milk/dairy products. Now that really hurts.

These analyses are certainly going to change everything for my diet. We'll have to change pretty much everything around here for me. For example I usually have cottage cheese and yogurt for breakfast every day. Good thing I'm not allergic to eggs like my Mom is because that's the other thing I have for breakfast most days.

WiGig - Very Cool

2009-05-06T16:17:00.002-05:00

You should read this short article. It sounds pretty cool to me.

Intel, Microsoft and Dell band together for WiGig

Rosco P Coltrane Serres

2009-04-07T22:55:00.002-05:00

More sad news from our family as our trusty beagle lost his brief but difficult battle with cancer today. He was only diagnosed, we believe, on March 14.

Rosco P Coltrane Serres
27 March 1996 - 7 April 2009

Serres Family Genealogy

2009-04-02T23:08:00.003-05:00

So I've been working on researching our family tree, both Julie's and my side of the family. In doing so I re-discovered (my Dad had told me a long time ago, but I forgot) that my Grandfather is just buried about 7 miles or so from our house. So one week on the way home from gymnastics I stopped to look at the grave and get the information off of it. After doing research on this information I found out that an eagle scout had done a research project painstakingly photographing and cataloging all of the headstones at several local cemeteries.

I guess I read too much into this project as I thought it said he also did some research on each of the families. I went to the local historical society to look at the project and all it was was a photograph of the headstone. This would have been very helpful if I wasn't anywhere close enough to go and look at it myself, but I had just done this. It wasn't a complete waste of time however as the ladies working there were giving me hints about doing genealogy research.

I have to say that doing this is very rewarding. I have currently discovered 257 relatives as far back as 1700 in Luxembourg. I didn't even know our family was from this country. I knew we were German and French, but not Luxembourgian. I've also discovered that two of my Grandfather's brothers are buried at a national cemetery because of serving in the military. My Grandfather's Dad served in the Marine Corps in WWI. So we have at least two Marines in our family (I would be the other.)

We also have a lot of farmers (some listed as dairy farmers) going back to the 1800's as listed on the census forms. I never knew any of my relatives were farmers prior to starting this research. What I do have to share is that this is very addictive! Once you start you will have difficulty not doing it all the time. It's hard to stop researching and go to bed. You think the next page you look at will have some bit of information that you need. And sometimes one little bit of information can open up an entire can of worms to reveal dozens of relatives you didn't know about.

I'm using dynastree.com for our family tree since it's free and it has a lot of nice features. And so far I've only used ancestry.com for my research. I will be expanding to other services when I feel I've gotten pretty much all I can out of ancestry.com (at least for the time being.) The ladies at the historical society suggested a particular library in the area as it has a genealogy section. I may have to spend a little time there... ;-)

I also got in contact with a relative up in Wisconsin that has done a TON of research on our family and purchased the book he published about our families histories. This is a serious tome at about 400 pages! But it's complete with a LOT of information. I even found newspaper articles in there describing life events for many family members. That's just really cool! It's interesting to know what was going on way back in the 1800's.

So anyway, that's about it for now.

Hewlett Packard - Part 2

2009-04-02T22:34:00.002-05:00

So after talking to this lady, I agreed to have her send me a replacement hard drive and video card even though they weren't the parts I needed. When I got both parts in the mail, they were both the wrong parts. The video card wasn't for my model of computer and the hard drive was the wrong size. So guess what? I got to call again. This time I got a guy and he was pretty helpful in getting me the correct parts. While I had him on the phone, I read him what the form says (as you can see in the first post) about not removing any added components before mailing. His reply was that this was wrong and wasn't HP policy.

A short time after mailing back the defective products I received an email stating I hadn't returned my defective hard drive so I got to call again (yea!) This was really getting fun now. I'm calling HP more often than I call my wife it seems. I was told it was just a mistake and it would be taken care of. It was as I never heard about the issue again.

After all of this aggravation, I wrote a letter to the President of the company, Mark Hurd (Mark Hurd, President, Hewlett-Packard Company, 3000 Hanover St, Palo Alto, CA 94304-1185) explaining everything I've described here in these two posts. I mentioned everything that is still not right with my computer and how I will never purchase an HP computer ever again. I did receive a phone call from some "HP Executive Office" stating that they were escalating my issue to a case manager and to expect a phone call with 24-48 hours. I never heard from them again.

So I don't know what the lesson learned is from this. I guess it's that HP doesn't stand behind their documentation or their repair department. You're on your own if you have a problem. Basically the warranty is pretty much useless in my opinion. Why even offer a warranty if you aren't going to repair your computer products properly? They could have resolved my problems pretty cheaply and avoided losing a customer and the word-of-mouth advertising I was already providing. I will never recommend an HP computer again. I will never buy an HP computer again. I will also suggest to anyone considering purchasing a computer to not buy HP and explain my travails.

I will work on getting that video edited and posted here soon. I guess in the future I will just go back to what I know and build my own PC so I know it will work and that the company that made the product will stand behind it. It's amazing how long some of the parts manufacturers warranty their products. It's much longer than the big PC companies. I've even considered going to the dark side (switching to a Mac--gasp!) :-0

Hewlett Packard - Part 1

2009-04-01T21:15:00.000-05:00

This will be the first of several posts about the Hewlett Packard Company. In February of 2008 I purchased a new desktop computer system from them off the recommendation of a friend that currently works in the IT industry who said they made the best desktop at that time. Up until now I had always made my own computer.

I was very happy with this computer initially. I even recommended HP computers to friends who bought one also. But my problems began in November when the sound stopped working. After trying everything I knew to try and fix the problem I contacted HP's "award-winning" Total Care customer support department. As you would expect, I had to go through a barrage of troubleshooting measures to ensure there was truly a problem. While this took time, I realize it's necessary so the repair department doesn't get computers in that don't really need repairing. Anyway, they issued a bench repair order which means they mail you a box with postage inside; all you do is put your computer in and put the postage on the box and mail it to them.

My error was reading the literature/instructions that came with the postage in the box. These instructions lay out in detail what you need to do in order to mail it to them the right way. Here is what it looks like:

Notice what the second and third sentences in item #2 say: Please do not remove components from within the computer before shipping (hard drive, memory, video card, etc.) Any additional hardware added to the PC will also be analyzed and returned.

Some key words from these sentences to take note of: "DO NOT REMOVE components", and "additional hardware ADDED...will...be analyzed and RETURNED."

I received the computer back from HP just before Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving to me right? No. One of the added components in my computer was a 5 1/4" to 3 1/2" drive bay rail converter that allows you to mount a 3 1/2" hard drive in a 5 1/4" drive bay. When they repaired the computer, (replaced the motherboard), and mailed it back, they didn't secure this little wonder in the drive bay at all, so it was free to move around inside the computer case during the entire shipping process to my home. Not surprisingly, this damaged the hard drive and also the video card. None of these three products came with my PC. I installed an additional hard drive, the drive bay converter and also a new video card after I purchased the PC.

Since this damage was clearly not my fault, all I wanted was for the hard drive and the video card to be replaced. This is where my true problems began. I again called HP's customer support department and was issued a second bench repair. I mailed it back on 5 December and didn't get it back until 19 December (2 weeks.) I see the box and say "Merry Christmas to me," right? Not even close. Want to hear the diagnosis listed on the paperwork enclosed in the box? "No Trouble Found" -- could not duplicate the error.

Are you freaking kidding me? I was livid. You would have been too if you would have also seen the condition the computer was in when I took it out of the box. This technician simply stopped analyzing it at some point, shoved it in the box and mailed it back; literally. Here is a list of things that weren't right when I examined it closely:

1. 5 1/4" drive bay exterior cover missing (hole to look in and see the processor working????)
2. Hard drive still damaged, mounted in a new location, and not connected to the motherboard
3. CD-Rom drive not connected to the motherboard
4. CPU (processor) fan not plugged into the motherboard
5. CPU (processor) fan not screwed onto the motherboard (this is serious folks)
6. Video card also still damaged (ie: doesn't work at all)

Since I have fairly extensive experience building computers, I fixed no.'s 2-5 as best I could and then I videotaped my 6 year old daughter as I talked her through the process of hooking it up and turning it on so we could see how difficult it might be to duplicate the problem. Keep in mind that most consumers wouldn't know how to do this. The video will be forthcoming, I just haven't had the time to prepare that as of yet.

After all of this and allowing myself enough time to cool off I again called customer support. You'll be surprised to hear what this representative told me. She said (in as many words) that anything I have added to the computer is not their responsibility in any way and that the best she could do was to ship me a replacement of the original hard drive and video card that came with the computer. She even went so far as to say that any additional hardware that is added to the computer was generally disposed of and she was surprised they were even returned to me.

When I asked her about replacement parts for the parts that weren't returned, she looked them up and said she can't order them because they are no longer available. After explaining my distaste for what she was telling me she stated that she has all the authority to make these decisions and doesn't report to anyone; this is HP's policy. She then asks if I've submitted a claim with FedEx. I said no one had ever suggested that before now (realizing in my mind this has absolutely nothing to do with FedEx; they did nothing wrong.)

However, sensing that I wasn't going to get my products replaced I filed a claim with FedEx which is still not resolved (filed 22 Dec 2008). All I wanted from this claim was enough money to pay for the replacement parts that HP damaged and refused to replace properly.

I'll continue soon with Part 2. I need a break.

"Other" drivers

2009-03-26T23:31:00.003-05:00

I just wanted to share an observation with everyone about driving these days. Since when is it perfectly acceptable to not stop at any stop sign or any red light? Especially if it means you can pull out before the person coming the other direction actually gets to the intersection?

Am I the only one that considers this annoying and, I don't know let me think, ILLEGAL? I know the police have "real" crimes to prevent, but personally I feel this is becoming a bigger and bigger issue. I don't know if the person is going to even slow down sometimes; because sometimes they don't. Why is this not a crime? Why don't police enforce this? Oh, that's right, the police do this too. Have you noticed this as well?

Has our society really become so "hurried" and in such a need to get where they are going (instantly) that stop signs and actually following what a stop light tells you to do are merely suggestions? I'm equally annoyed when the person behind me as I approach an intersection; be it a stop light or stop sign, expects me to just roll through as everyone else does, I come to a complete stop (as I always do) and then add a second or two before pulling away from the intersection.

I also am annoyed when I'm driving the speed limit or 5 miles over and someone is riding my rear bumper like I'm out for a Sunday drive and I'm in their way. If they get close enough I start slowing down. One guy (in a 30 mph zone) didn't really get the hint until I had slowed down to around 5 - 10 mph.

Is driving at a reckless speed and ignoring stop signs and red lights really going to save anyone enough time to make their lives any better? What is the real reason everyone drives this way? Did they just leave late and are trying to make up time in the hopes of still getting to their destination on time? Do they not realize that if they get in an accident that they will be even later? Not to mention they could injure someone, possibly even enough to kill them? Would that even weigh on their conscience? It sure doesn't seem that way.

Another pet peeve of mine is when you're approaching a place where the right lane ends and it becomes one lane (4-lane road to 2-lane road.) You know everyone in the right hand lane knows their lane ends but they make every effort just short of pushing you out of the way to get in front of as many people as they can. Why? We're all still waiting in line anyway. What's the difference if you crawling down the road at 10 mph in front of me or behind me? Does my car smell bad? Is the color of my car offensive? I actually had a lady yesterday in this very situation race up in front of me and cut me off (mind you I wasn't even trying to block her) and then slam on her brakes to let the guy that was just in front of her in the right lane get in front of both of us. I so wanted to get out of my car at the next intersection and ask if she didn't care about the 8-week old I had in the car when she cut me off and then slammed on the brakes.

I will admit this is an area that really annoys me. It's just simply people trying to get in front of you for very little reason. One time when leaving O'Hare airport I was tired of how people had been cutting me off so when a taxi wanted in front of us I blocked them and they proceeded to "push" us out of the way. Note to anyone out there, taxi drivers don't give a s&*(. Their car is a weapon and they aren't afraid to use it.

Why are people like this? When will it stop? Does anyone care about their life or other's lives any more? My thought...no, not really. It would not appear as if they do...

Honestly, just spend a few minutes at the stop sign nearest your house and watch traffic as they come through that sign. Count how many of them actually make complete stops. I guarantee it won't be many - if any. And as I mentioned earlier, don't expect the police to make a complete stop either; they don't in our town, even though I know for a fact they enforce this law some of the time (ask my neighbor.) And keep in mind this is in a residential area (assuming your house is in a residential area as most are.) Just think what it's like out on the road. And don't even start with speeding in a residential area. I tell you; our road sometimes feels like the Indy 500 the way people drive by our house. I have complained to the police, but I've never seen them do anything about it even though to make me feel better they say they will. And being a stay-at-home-dad, I'm home quite a bit and I see when the police are around and it's not a lot (since the chief left the department, but don't get me started on that either.) It's all just ridiculous if you ask me. But then again, no one ever really asked me so I guess I'll just go back to my life now. Thanks for hearing me out.

comfy cozy

2009-02-08T20:51:00.001-06:00

snugly little Riley...

Seeing Momma

2009-01-26T10:40:00.002-06:00

Finally seeing Momma - 36 minutes old.

Riley Erin Serres

2009-01-26T10:23:00.000-06:00

10:04am 8 lb 3 oz 20 1/2 in.

At the hospital

2009-01-26T09:27:00.001-06:00

At the hospital all night...won't be long now.

It's Done

2009-01-25T12:09:00.003-06:00

Ok, so my computers (both desktop and laptop) currently aren't working. My laptop I will have to take in for an estimate to see how much it will cost for repair. I'm guessing the motherboard is dead, so we'll see if it's worth fixing. Then two days ago my desktop started acting worse than it has been working. The USB ports haven't really worked right since I got it back from HP. And then over the last few days I've been having problems getting pretty much anything to work.

I started Thursday afternoon trying to burn a DVD and it just wasn't working at all. It keeps locking up. I tried Windows Repair and that didn't really help, so I rebooted (ok forced it off because it won't respond) and went back into the repair console and using a command prompt (DOS prompt is what I still call it; for all you computer geeks) ran CHKDSK. This too locks up. So I'm assuming it's the hard drive.

When I originally had a problem with my computer after HP "repaired" it and returned it to me, that was one of the problems; they had damaged the hard drive I use for the system. They sent a new one and I sent the damaged one back to them. Instead of using the new drive (750 Gb) for my system, I used the smallest drive I had (400 Gb) for my system drive and installed the one they sent as a storage drive. So that gave me 2 Tb of storage and a 400 Gb system drive. Apparently this drive is about to die, so I'll have to do something else here. Guess I'll use my 500 Gb hard drive for my system drive now and buy another storage drive. So anyway, with a little work, I can get my desktop working again. The laptop, I still haven't taken that in for an analysis, not sure when I'll have time either...

So on to the subject of this post...the babies room. Yes, as the title of this post implies, IT IS DONE!!!!!! I touched up the ceiling and OF COURSE, the ceiling wasn't white--it was apparently some kind of off white. So I taped off the walls and painted two coats of ceiling white and now the ceiling looks really nice. I bought the correct trim paint and repainted the doors and the window sill in the room again (two more coats - so four coats total) so they are the correct finish - semi-gloss. I don't care about the baseboard trim, it can stay satin finish - I don't think anyone will really notice anyway. So don't come over and complain that the baseboard trim isn't very shiny! ;-)

I had to clean any paint spots that had fallen on the floor and put everything back in the room which I did yesterday. We still need a new shade and a new ceiling fan, but I went to my favorite store, Lowe's, and they didn't have any fans that really got me excited about putting them in the babies room. So we'll have to look around and see what we can find. The shade we'll probably order from where we ordered Grace's shade and that way they'll match. Speaking of Grace's shade, the cord is broken and I need to get that replaced at the same time we order another shade. Better write that down...

I've also gotten the baby's car seat installed in my car and our bags are packed and all the arrangements have been taken care of including the dog so now we're just waiting for when the new baby is ready to join us. It seems like I've been working on this room for so long, it's kind of a relief to be done. I feel like I don't know what to do now, but of course I have a list of things to do a mile long, so it's a little strange that I feel that way.

Who likes the Cubs? I do! Who is a Tom Ricketts fan? I am! Here is an honest opinion of him and what the sale means: Cubs sale: admitting we just don't know. Obviously I agree with what corncobdress (ccd) says, but hopefully we can all breath a sigh of relief and be excited for what this could mean for the organization. Personally I'm excited for what COULD happen. Let's all hope that is what happens--good things and only good things. I have to say that personally I'm extremely happy that it's just not Mark Cuban! He scares me after his movie about the Iraq war...especially as a veteran.

Grace hasn't lost anymore teeth yet. Let's continue to hope that it falls out soon, it's killing me! Alright, that's about all for now. Back to that mile-long list of to-do's. Again, pictures will be coming later--sorry!

Painting, painting and more painting

2009-01-18T22:15:00.001-06:00

So I ended up having to paint all the trim in the babies room (two coats of course) because I didn't have any paint that matched the old paint. So now everything except the ceiling is painted and it should only need touch ups (hopefully.) I have to buy that paint because we don't have any.

The crib is up and all ready for the new little one. We just need to get a new ceiling fan and a window shade plus that paint I mentioned. I've been procrastinating going to buy these things because it's been so darned cold around here. Today's high was 19° and that's considerably warmer than it has been over the last week.

Last week when it snowed I didn't snow blow because I thought it was going to snow some more. I usually wait until it's completely done snowing so I don't have to do it more than once. But that snow never showed up so we still have probably around three inches on the driveway and sidewalks that I need to get off. It is supposed to snow tomorrow night. I suppose I'll just wait until Tuesday (wouldn't want to rush into anything...)

Grace lost one of her front teeth last week. The other front tooth is just hanging from one side and I just want to pull it out. I hope it comes out soon!

The reason I've not posted this in a timely fashion is because as I was typing this on my laptop...it........died. It won't even turn on. I have to tell you, I have been having the worst luck with computers lately. Lets hope that will turn around pretty soon!

Whenever I get my computers working, I'll get some pictures posted.

New Year...better days ahead?

2009-01-12T22:51:00.005-06:00

After all the death in our lives in December of last year, we're looking forward to a happier and healthier 2009. Now that Christmas and the New Years holiday is over, we're busy getting ready for our new baby (due in 12 days.) The room for the baby is painted except for a few touch-ups of the trim and the ceiling. All the furniture is in the room except I need to put the crib together. We also need to buy a couple of things for the room like a new window shade and to replace the ceiling fan; it didn't matter what the ceiling fan looked like when it was just a spare room, but now that it'll be our baby girl's room, it's just ugly and it has to go.

Besides the baby we're working on getting our house organized and trying to deal with these crazy economic times. Any family with one income like ours has to pay particular attention to how any economic event may affect us. If you have a 401(k) or likewise and you've looked at it's value recently (maybe stupidly as I have) it's scary. We've easily lost 50% of our current retirement stash. I've heard that's pretty much the average so I suppose we aren't doing any worse than most people, but it doesn't make it any better.

We already have about 11 inches of snow on the ground and were supposed to get about 4 additional inches tonight, but we got about an inch in about an hour when it first started snowing and then it changed over to freezing rain even though the temperature was 24°F. Now they're talking a blizzard warning as the wind is going to really pick-up overnight.

FYI about Barnes & Noble

2009-01-01T02:04:00.004-06:00

Just an FYI about something I learned today. Personally, I don't plan to shop at Barnes & Noble any more.
------------------------------------------------------
Barnes & Noble Refund Policy Change

Beginning March 3rd, 2009, Barnes & Noble will be changing our return policy to reflect the following:
All returns must be made within 14 days of purchase and accompanied with an original sales receipt. After 14 days or without an original sales receipt, returns will not be permitted (nor permitted to exchange).
------------------------------------------------------

I guess buying a gift for someone is out of the question at this store.

Hannah Eileen Salcher

2008-12-31T21:30:00.001-06:00

More sad news...

Our "niece's" daughter lost her battle with MPS-1 disorder on Saturday at only 17 months.

Hannah Eileen Salcher
7 July 2007 - 27 December 2008

...or I'll shoot the car

2008-12-09T16:37:00.002-06:00

Here's a fun commercial for the Audi R8:

Benno Martin Freund

2008-12-06T12:36:00.003-06:00

Sadly, my father-in-law lost his battle with cancer this morning. Please keep our family in your prayers.

Benno Martin Freund
20 July 1932 - 6 December 2008

Misc. Musings

2008-11-19T23:05:00.000-06:00

Interesting website:
howobamagotelected.com

Something I just found:
paperbackswap.com

Sunday

2008-11-16T20:51:00.004-06:00

So the weekend is over already. Time surely flies by when you least expect it to...or maybe it does it all the time.

How is everyone today? Me? Not so great really. Not only did the Bears lose, but both of my fantasy football teams are falling apart at the seams. Of course it doesn't help that I'm selecting the wrong players to put in my lineup, but that's an entire other conversation.

We went to see Grace's ophthalmologist yesterday and my fears were warranted as he decided to have Grace wear a patch on her good eye for 6 hours a day until when we go back in March of next year. Surprisingly she was excited about this and wanted to put one on right away; but it only lasted a few hours as before we were even home she was complaining and wanting to take it off.

In her defense though she isn't feeling well and has a horrible cough. Hopefully she will feel better tomorrow or she might not get to go to school. We don't want her whole kindergarten class getting sick. This is her last week before Thanksgiving break next week so hopefully we won't miss any days this week. Especially since she enjoys school so much.

I tried to buy a new study bible this weekend but bought the wrong one. I needed the hardcover version to put in a book cover and accidentally bought the leather bound version. So I'll have to return that one and get the right one. The biggest difference is the cost as the leather version is about twice the cost of the hardback version. I suppose I should be a little more observant.

Wow - I really stink at keeping up with this blog

2008-11-14T20:34:00.002-06:00

Here we are in mid-November already. Thanksgiving is just under two weeks away and the baby will be here in just over two months. My how time flies.

Things have been going as usual around here lately. Nothing out of the ordinary really. We still haven't painted or even really prepared the babies room. We have selected the paint colors and I will be starting on that shortly. Then there is the matter of the bed that's currently in the room. We need to let it go so we have room for the babies things in there. It doesn't bode well for our future visitors but we'll figure something out for them when the time comes I suppose.

For Halloween Grace was a cowgirl. Here is a photo:

She was pretty darned cute. She did quite a bit of trick-or-treating this year and likewise got quite a bit of candy. For some reason she really likes to eat it. Ha-ha. Of course her parents would never eat any of it...

Since our town celebrated Halloween with trick-or-treating on Halloween day this year instead of on the Sunday after like it has always been since we've lived here, we had considerably fewer trick-or-treaters as well. I didn't count the number of trick-or-treaters this year but we bought much less candy than we normally do and still had some left over. It's a little disappointing but at the same time it's alright because we didn't have to buy as much candy and it didn't interrupt the Bears game. :-)

Also, for one of possibly several reasons our pumpkins were not smashed this year. It could be that since we now have our own police force that the hoodlums decided to abandon their previous mischievous ways. It also may be that the kids that have done this in the past are simply older now and don't find joy in it - or are possibly away at school now. No matter the reason, I stood watch over our pumpkins until 5 am on Halloween night ensuring that we didn't lose any pumpkins. I tried to stay up the next night, but for obvious reasons I couldn't really stay awake.

So a crisis was averted and Grace had a great Halloween. Certainly better than last year when she had her eye surgery. Speaking of which, Grace has a follow-up with her eye surgeon/doctor tomorrow morning. Hopefully her lazy eye is still strong and not wandering. At the last visit the doctor said that her lazy eye was showing signs of returning and he was considering patching again but that he'd give her a few months to see how it does. I think his biggest concern was that possibly she wasn't wearing her glasses as often as she should, but she wears them pretty much exclusively all day long. Personally I'm worried about this since I know she wears her glasses all day. Hopefully it won't be an issue, but we'll find out in about 12 hours.

I can't really say much about the election except that I was disappointed that Senator John McCain lost. But at the same time I must say I'm impressed so far with how President-elect Obama has carried himself and how he's assembling his staff and just in general going about his current task of preparing for the transition to the presidency. That's not to say I'm not worried. A democrat as liberal as he is, to me, is very scary in the white house. And the signs we're seeing now with the gay marriage activist's not only picketing in San Francisco, but attacking an elderly christian woman holding a cross. That's unacceptable. The bill (proposition 8) in California was defeated and there isn't anything anyone can do to change that right now. They can bring about a new proposal in the future but for now the issue is moot.

Personally I don't feel gay marriage is a civil right that is provided for in the constitution. The constitution doesn't mention this at all and so therefore they have no right (in my opinion) to demand this as a civil right.

If you aren't familiar with the underlying reasons behind this picketing let me enlighten you. This is the beginning of the all-new and much improved culture war in America since the liberals now have someone in power at the highest level of government. This is their (secular progressives) calling to try and put into law their radical liberal ideas and it's beginning before President-elect Obama is even in official power. These are some of the things they are going to try and get enacted during the president-elect's tenure:

gay marriage (obviously)
limiting gun possession
legalizing narcotics
unrestricted abortion
revocation of the patriot act

It could also include socialistic ideas such as sharing of wealth and more of our freedom and capitalistic ideas being overturned. The very ideals that our country was founded on.

Did you hear about the ad campaign being put on the sides of buses in Washington, DC? These are anti-God or anti-Christian ads. Here is one of them:

Is this another secular progressive move? Who knows, but personally I take offense to this.

Alright, that's enough for today. Until next time...

Free VM software TODAY ONLY

2008-10-28T10:33:00.002-05:00

Press Releases

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CODEWEAVERS' SOFTWARE FREE FOR DOWNLOAD THANKS TO GEORGE W. BUSH AND FALLING GAS PRICES

Giveaway Triggered in CodeWeaver's Great American Lame Duck Presidential Challenge; "We take full responsibility for global economic collapse," says CEO

SAINT PAUL, Minn. (October 27, 2008) – The catastrophic cratering of the global economy, falling gas prices and President George W. Bush's recent executive activities have indirectly prompted Saint Paul gadfly software developers CodeWeavers, Inc., to provide free software for every American on Oct. 28, company officials reluctantly announced today.

In July, CodeWeavers – whose software lets Mac OS X and Linux users run Windows programs without having to Microsoft for a Windows OS license – launched the Great American Lame Duck Presidential Challenge (lameduck.codeweavers.com) to encourage President Bush to make the most of his remaining days in office by accomplishing a major economic or political goal by January 20, 2009.

The goals focused on President Bush making specific positive accomplishments in areas such as the economy, home values, the stock market, the war on terror and other key issues. Specifically, one goal called for President Bush to help down bring average gasoline prices in the Twin Cities to $2.79 a gallon.

On Monday, Oct. 14, gas prices in Minneapolis and St. Paul did just that.

"That morning, I was filling my tank at Big Steve's Gas Palace in St. Paul," said Jeremy White, president and CEO of CodeWeavers. "I had just finished my morning corn dog and 64-ounce Dr. Pepper when I looked at the pump and noticed gas was at $2.79. I screamed ‘Woohoo,' then I yelled ‘Oh, crap!' as I realized every American can now have my software for free. Kind of upsets my fourth quarter revenue projections..."

White admits this is not how he foresaw the Challenge unfolding.

"I launched the campaign to inspire President Bush to make the most of his final days in office. Who knew that our Challenge would have this kind of impact on the country?" White said. "On the other hand, who knew that the economy would implode, causing oil demand to drop into the abyss and gas prices to plummet as well. Clearly, investigating Bear Stearns, AIG and those guys is misplaced – CodeWeavers is responsible for this mess. So it's free software for all!"

How to Get the Free Software
On Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2008, any one visiting the CodeWeavers' Web site (www.codeweavers.com) will be given a deal code that will entitle them to one free copy of CodeWeavers' award-winning CrossOver software. Each copy comes complete with support.

"I realize that by giving away all my software, I've caused horrific damage to my company's bottom line," White said. "In fact, our vice president of sales wretched Starbucks all over his shirt when he learned the news. But, I figure, the way the economy is going, in a few months everyone might be out on the streets, wearing potato sacks and standing in line for squirrel soup, so why not?"

White also noted that if other Great American Lame Duck Presidential Challenge goals are met, CodeWeavers will once again provide free software. Goals include:

* Return the stock market to it's 2008 high
* Reduce the average price of a gallon of milk to $3.50
* Create at least one net job in the U.S. this calendar year
* Return the median home price to its Jan. 1, 2008 level
* Bring Osama Bin-Laden to justice

About CodeWeavers

Founded in 1996 as a general software consultancy, CodeWeavers today focuses on the development of Wine: the core technology found in all of its CrossOver products. The company's goal is to bring expanded market opportunities for Windows software developers by making it easier, faster and more painless to port Windows software to Mac OS X and Linux. CodeWeavers is recognized as a leader in open-source Windows porting technology, and maintains development offices in Minnesota, the UK and elsewhere around the world. The company is privately held. For more information about CodeWeavers, log on to www.codeweavers.com.

Obama

2008-10-27T22:45:00.002-05:00

Just in case you didn't know, redistribution of wealth is SOCIALISM.

From wikipedia:
Socialists mainly share the belief that capitalism unfairly concentrates power and wealth among a small segment of society that controls capital and creates an unequal society. All socialists advocate the creation of an egalitarian society, in which wealth and power are distributed more evenly, although there is considerable disagreement among socialists over how, and to what extent this could be achieved.

Additionally raising taxes for some won't help the economy.

Just my 2¢

hello

2008-10-26T21:54:00.003-05:00

Sorry for the time away...we've been extremely busy. Not that being busy is some kind of great excuse, but anyway, I digress...

Things are going well here. We've been getting ready for Halloween; Grace is going to be a cowgirl this year. I will post pictures after the fact but it's a really cute costume.

I'm already on the prowl looking out for the mischievous pumpkin smashers that appear each year and smash everyone's pumpkins here in our subdivision. Last year I was very close to catching them. If they come around this year, I won't be close, I'll catch them. I'm tired of wasting my money each year on our pumpkins only to have them be destroyed by some kids in the neighborhood with nothing better to do. Not only is it the money we lose but it's devastating to Grace because we work hard going to the pumpkin farm and pick out just the right pumpkins. Then she colors them and we put them out on the porch as our Halloween decorations. When she has seen that her pumpkins have been missing in the previous years she has been very disappointed. I'm tired of seeing her little disappointed face.

Enough of Halloween...this also means we're approaching the end of the year. Can you believe it? It's hard to believe there is only about 66 days left in the year? WOW! Which means it's only around 90 days until our new baby will be here. WOW! Guess we should start getting ready for that huh?

We did do some house planning today by finally coming up with a plan for our kitchen. If you'll recall we closed in the wall between the kitchen and the family room downstairs so that we could put cabinets on that wall in the kitchen. We went to my favorite store and saw a kitchen planner and between her ideas and our ideas we hammered out a plan that I think will fix most of our problems. As we had originally envisioned we'll put a pantry on our new wall. That wall will also get lower cabinets with a counter on top of them and upper cabinets above that. The wall with the stove and refrigerator remains unchanged and the other wall will change by moving the sink under the window (thank you!) and moving the dishwasher over at the same time between the sink and the sliding door. This opens up the area to the left of the sink for more counter space.

So with all of these changes we'll gain more counter space and a lot more cabinet space. And our kitchen should actually hold our food and cooking utensils and devices. Plus I was impressed with the total price for all the cabinets in the kitchen; much less than I expected, not that we have that much money...

As far as the playset and landscaping are concerned, my "expert" analysis was correct as the landscaping company came the next day and took away six inches of soil so that we could put in the playset and mulch. It took 2 1/2 days to put the playset up and then it took another day to put the mulch in. It will probably end up taking more time and effort to remove the old playset. Not because it was well constructed or well put-together. But the years it had been there made it more difficult to take apart plus there was the cement on the bottom that had to be broken up. I've done all of that and moved the cement pieces behind the shed to hide them. Now comes the problem of disposing of the pressure-treated lumber that made up the old playset.

I made it a point to call our disposal company and specifically ask how they would like me to handle getting rid of this wood. They asked how much I had and I tried to describe as best I could over the phone. After this they stated to just put it out with my regular pickup and the driver should take it. They didn't so I called back. They said they'd have the driver return on Friday (Wednesday is our normal pickup day) and pick it up. The next day she calls back and said the driver stated it was not a small playset, but a LARGE playset and that it couldn't possibly be picked up with our normal garbage pickup. Are you kidding me? A LARGE playset? It's not even an entire playset! It's just the tower portion of a small playset to begin with. I didn't even put the whole thing out because I couldn't have anything longer than 5 feet and I didn't have the time to cut those pieces down.

Anyway, it all boils down to the fact that they want $15 to pick it up our old playset. Expensive - not at all. A relative bargain when you consider my other options: 1-800-got-junk would probably charge over $200 to do this, although they would also remove the cement that the garbage company won't take, and if I take it to the dump myself they have a minimum charge no matter how much you bring there and while I don't remember what that charge is, I know it's significantly higher than $15. If you think about the garbage company not taking cement, it really doesn't make sense, they won't take cement and they specifically told me to take it to the dump myself. However, where does our garbage go? The dump maybe???? Anyway, maybe it's just a weight issue with carrying cement along with all the other garbage.

So I've played along, but I'm going to document photographically everything that I'm putting out this week for my $15. Which I will be putting everything out for that extra charge. And I will share my documentation with the office staff so that they know exactly how much the driver is considering "excessive" for a regular pickup. My contention here is that the driver didn't want to pick it up and just said it was too much for a regular pickup and/or they just want more money from me. Whether I get my $15 back...who knows, but it's worth a shot. Why waste $15 just because I might have a lazy garbage driver.

Grace's birthday turned out great. We decided to have a horse-themed party here at the house instead of the actual horse farm in exchange for inviting more people to her party. So we invited 15 kids to the party. It turned out really well; almost everyone came and I think they all had a great time. I know Grace had a great time! Which reminds me...we have to get those thank-you's out.

miscellaneous observations

2008-09-17T22:03:00.002-05:00

I just found this article about DNA testing on dog poop that isn't picked up. I've wanted to do this for the neighbors that don't pick up after their dog in my yard.

The next thing I found was this article about the new Chevy Volt. Wow that sounds really cool. It would be perfect for me - except that it's a car instead of an SUV so I wouldn't be able to carry as much cargo as I'm carrying in my Escape. But otherwise it would be perfect because I don't hardly ever drive over 40 miles at a time. If they can get this thing going and then other manufacturers follow suit...

Around here things have been pretty typical. We're recovering from a LOT of rain. Personally here at our house we got about 9 inches of rain over the last week or so. It's unfortunately delayed the landscaper from coming out and finishing preparing the area where we're going to put the new playset for Grace. I'm hoping they come tomorrow as in my "expert" opinion the soil should be dry enough to dig now: we'll see. What I do know is my patience is growing thin with them. They have already been out and did all the work, it just wasn't the work we had agreed to. So now that have to come back and finish it but it just keeps raining.

We're struggling to decide what to do for Grace's 6th birthday party. We want to do something special considering this will be her last birthday without a sibling. We've been considering doing a party at a local horse riding place but for the cost it just doesn't give you a lot in return. So we're not sure right now what we're doing.

If this is true...

2008-09-16T21:04:00.003-05:00

...then it should make the election a slam dunk for Senator John McCain.

Here is the article from the New York Post: Sen. Barack Obama...Wants a Delay In Negotiations For Removal

What the article basically states (if you don't want to read it) is that Senator Barack Obama's trip to Iraq in July was a secret meeting in which he demanded (not requested) that they break off negotiations with the Bush administration about troop withdrawal until after the election was over. Seems he doesn't want the Bush administration to look good in any way and wants the situation in Iraq to look as bad as possible so that his platform still has legs to stand on. The Iraqi's are worried that if Obama is elected president that he will purposefully try to ruin their country to try and prove that the "Bush Doctrine" of preemptively striking other countries before they strike at us is a bad idea.

This is definitely not "new" politics; sounds more like the same old type of politics that no one appreciates and this country does not need. Speaking of politics, don't expect to hear of this at all from the mainstream media since they're so much in the bag for Obama, they will do everything they can to hide this story.

Explain these gas prices again...

2008-09-15T16:51:00.003-05:00

Explain why gas prices have shot up in the last week from $3.67 a gallon to $4.35 a gallon when this was released today:

Oil refiners in Texas and Louisiana prepared to restart plants. Ike caused minimal damage to facilities in an area that supplies about half of the fuel and crude used in the eastern half of the U.S. Crude oil fell to a seven-month low and gasoline futures fell.

We'd better see gas prices falling soon - this is ridiculous. I'm so tired of prices rising because of speculation and supposed short supply being forecast. These aren't actual conditions they are made-up "market" type conditions and don't reflect the current conditions the oil companies are facing it's only what they "might" face in the coming weeks. Since when does a supply and demand commodity like oil have prices rise on speculation that conditions may change? The current price should be what it cost the oil company to purchase the crude oil and the actual cost of refining it into gasoline plus their markup and of course the city and state tax added on top of that.

Crude prices are around $100 a gallon as opposed to over $200 a gallon only a month or two ago and yet gasoline prices have really not fallen.

While I'm on my rant I'll complain about the airline industry as well. Not only are ticket prices going up, but they're (some are) increasing the prices for bags you check. I don't care if gasoline prices remain around $4.50 a gallon it will still be cheaper to drive somewhere (assuming you can actually drive there) than to fly. I completely understand that the airline industry has seen a downturn in their profits and probably overall ridership as well, but increasing your overall ticket prices as well as adding these crazy extra fees is just going to push ridership down more.

Just my two cents. Thanks for listening...

What Makes a Great President

2008-09-14T19:52:00.002-05:00

I read this article in Parade magazine that comes in the Chicago Tribune on Sunday's today and I thought everyone that votes should really read it.

The Secrets of America's Great Presidents

I found it very enlightening and it made the candidate that I'm planning to vote for stand out even more.

Super Busy

2008-09-07T21:18:00.002-05:00

Wow was this a busy week! Monday I had my fantasy football draft and then Julie and Grace came home. Grace then had school all the rest of the week as well as her dance and gymnastics. Julie's Aunt came back here on Wednesday and left on Saturday. So she came with us to see her brother (Julie's Dad) on Friday night. We were enjoying talking so we got home late on Friday night. Then yesterday Aunt Pat went home and Grace had her first soccer game of the season for this fall.

Later last night my Sister came over with her two girls and we attempted to have our family movie night, but the DVD player didn't cooperate. It ended up being a Jon and Kate plus 8 marathon. So Grace was up late last night too and then we got up fairly early today to get to church and she has just been super crabby for most of the day. At church I wasn't sure we were even going to make it into the building. She was throwing such a fit. But we made it through and for most of the day she really wasn't so bad but then again tonight around dinner time she just lost it again. Now she's in bed though and I'm sure she'll be back to normal by the morning.

Looks like I'm going to win both of my fantasy football games today. I've already won the Fox Sports league I'm in and as long as Adam Vinatieri doesn't score another 13 points in the fourth quarter for the Colts I'll win my other league too. It's a better start than last year. I had probably the worst fantasy season ever last year so it feels good to have a strong start.

School Rocks

2008-08-30T22:23:00.002-05:00

Grace has only gone to school for two days now but each time she gets off the bus she can't say it any more excitedly about how good her day was. She absolutely loves school and enjoys every minute of it I think. She was so excited to go on Friday (her second day) we had to go to the bus stop 15 minutes before the bus was coming. She just couldn't stand to be in the house when the bus would be coming "soon." I'm imagining the excitement wearing off at some point, but hopefully she'll enjoy her whole year.

We've been getting handout after handout each day (all two of them.) One of the things we got yesterday was called "Parent Information Exchange." It's a form that we have to fill out and return to the teacher and one of the questions on there is "Three goals for your child's school success this year." I'm not sure what to put for that. In fact most of the questions on this sheet are very thought provoking and neither Julie nor I were absolutely certain how to answer them.

We've already had to read through several things including the Student Handbook which is like 47 pages long. We've already gotten our first fundraiser package which is to sell entertainment books. If you need one let me know. We can order you one for pretty much any area of the country. I can't imagine how this will work out when she's in higher grades in future years.

School is pretty good from my perspective as well. I got a few things taken care of yesterday while Grace was in school and it will be nice to have this time every weekday. It's especially nice considering it's basically twice as much time as I had for the previous two years where Grace was in preschool. It was two hours but it took 20 minutes to get there and 20 minutes to get back so it was a lot of wasted time in the car.

Today Grace, Julie and my Aunt went to Michigan to see my Grandpa. They were going to see how he was doing. He's been having problems being dizzy and just with his general health I think. They'll be back on Monday and I'm holding down the fort while they're gone.

Today was the first Wisconsin Badger game of the season...and they won...Yeah! In my opinion their first challenging game will be on September the 27th when they play Michigan. They haven't looked so good yet. Let's hope they continue that trend.

It's raining but we're on our way...

2008-08-28T11:46:00.002-05:00

Wouldn't you know that just an hour before Grace was supposed to go to school today it started raining. It's not raining hard - more of a hard sprinkle, but enough to annoy. So she got off on the bus just fine. She seemed really happy (as you can see in the picture.) I can't wait until she gets home to see how she likes it!

Ready for our first day of Kindergarten

Getting on the bus

Home (and happy) after school

I'll explain more later; but when she got off the bus she said it was her best day ever!

Kindergarten is tomorrow!

2008-08-27T22:51:00.000-05:00

Yesterday we didn't do much really. Grace had a play-date with her friends down the street and I was trying to get caught up around the house a bit. In the morning we went to my favorite store; all together now...Lowes, and got some weed killer and some electrical stuff. After that we went to the Oberweis store for some milk.

After that we had lunch with two of Julie's sisters; our last lunch before Grace starts school :-( and Grace had her play-date. While she was playing with her friends I sprayed all the weeds in the cracks between the bricks and so those pesky weeds will be dead...SOON! Yea!

After picking Grace up we went up to register her for gymnastics for this year. When we got back we had dinner and that's pretty much our day. Today was a little different although we weren't particularly busy today either. Grace's kindergarten open house was this morning. She got to go and finally meet her teacher Mrs. Fitzharris. She had a little "treasure hunt" we had to complete together which was basically finding her locker and finding the office and then finding her classroom again. And finding the bathroom and putting her supplies in the bins and checking her birthday and address and just simple things that will make tomorrow easier for her. I think she enjoyed it and I think it helped her too.

After that we came home and I started cleaning the house as we have a visitor her for the night; Julie's Aunt from Omaha is here for the night tonight and then she'll be back again next week. We had still not put everything away from having removed it from the office and the family room when we were painting everything. Unfortunately when we got everything out we liked how open the rooms felt and honestly didn't want to put it back in those rooms.

So anyway I got a lot of those things put away and cleaned the house up. Then this evening was dance class. Grace is in a new dance class this year and she's pretty excited. She was supposed to move up to this class last year but it conflicted with her gymnastics class. Since she's moving up in her gymnastics to the next level this year (to the pre-team level) it allows her to also move up to a new level in dance. As a side note she's also signed up for soccer this fall too. She did it last fall and loved it and has been wanting to do it again ever since, but we didn't get her signed up for the spring and thought we'd sign her up during the summer. Yeah, they don't have soccer in the summer for little league. So here we are signing up again this fall. Oops!

So she had her first dance class tonight and I think she did pretty good. I think she'll do better next week because she knows more of what to expect now and it is different. It's much more intense and pretty advanced but I think she held her own this week. We'll see how she does next week. Next week she also starts her new gymnastics class but she's been practicing with the competitive team all summer so that should be pretty easy I think. Plus she'll be back to a two hour class instead of three.

Now the real challenge will be fitting all of this in with school. Granted her school is really only about 2 and a half hours long each day, but she does have it every day now instead of only three days a week for preschool. And I think she will have some actual homework now as well and then there's the whole scheduling thing that we need to adjust to. Her school will be during her normal lunchtime and I'm guessing the easiest way to deal with that is to eat breakfast earlier and then have lunch just before getting on the bus. I had talked to her friends parents who went to afternoon kindergarten last year and that's what they did. But it's a big change especially considering Grace has never been an early riser and eating breakfast much earlier than we have been will basically mean she's going to need to get up earlier. So I foresee that being our biggest challenge as we enter this new year.

Oh so getting back to today, we came home from dance class and Julie was just leaving to go to a Arbonne party at my Dad's house and that really upset Grace since she wasn't going to get to see her Mom tonight. But right after we got home her Aunt Pat got here and then we had dinner and then we talked to Aunt Pat for a bit before getting ready for bed. Just as we were finishing up our prayers Julie came home and Grace was pretty excited about that. She still had a little difficulty going to sleep tonight, but not nearly as bad as last night. I think it might have taken her over a half an hour to fall asleep last night.

Oh speaking of Grace being anxious I actually caught her being shy today. We were at the kindergarten open house and this other girl walks up and asks if she can do the same activity that Grace was doing and she didn't say a word. I was shocked! Honestly she's usually the one that will go and ask someone else to do things and play with her and when they say no or something she'll come and tell me and I say just find someone else. So it was very interesting. Maybe all those no's from the past are catching up to her.

So now the day is finally arriving. I hope she does really good tomorrow and has a fun day. I think she will. We'll see.

School is coming...

2008-08-25T22:40:00.002-05:00

We're in full "get ready for school" mode now. Grace and I had to take a quick run to Staples today to get a couple of supplies she still needed. I was silly and let her pick out a pink 3-ring binder and the list specifically states "white." So we exchanged that and got the markers they had listed incorrectly on the supply list and some colored pencils they didn't have on the supply list before the revised list came out. I hope everyone else reads the revised supply list. School starts on Thursday and we got the revised list on Saturday.

Oh and speaking of our school district, I read in last weeks Sunday paper about how our school district is in heavy long-term debt. The article is about paying for the special needs school that is being built in Gurnee to support the special needs children of our county. What it basically says is that we're in such a debt-laden situation as it is we don't know how we'll come up with $1.1 Million to pay our share to help build this new school. Here is the article if you'd like to read it. So I guess I'll try to get involved in the school district as well; at least to find out what's going on. For all the money we pay in real estate taxes that goes to this school district ($2,386 this year) that is just ridiculous. In fact this amount is more than we pay to the high school district.

Anyway, we're getting ready for school (back on topic--sorry.) Grace is excited but she also says she's scared because she won't know anyone. I can understand being afraid of the unknown (I think we all are) but she's such a friendly outgoing kid it's just hard to believe she's afraid of meeting new people and making new friends. That's the one thing she's always been good at. I think we need to work on her self-esteem a little...or maybe it's just what I said before: the fear of the unknown.

We had a nice relaxing weekend this last weekend. We went to church on Saturday night so we didn't have to get up at any particular time on Sunday morning. Sunday I mowed the grass...which is news because it's been dry and hot here so the grass hasn't been growing much. So it's been some time since I last mowed, but I got it done yesterday evening. While I was doing that Grace and Julie went to our friends house for a good luck/going away "party" for their granddaughter whom is going to Children's Hospital for treatment for her condition (can't remember what it was exactly except that it has to do with her skull and the rate at which it's growing--she's only just turned one.) Her treatment was going to begin with chemotherapy and then stem-cell transplants. Bless her little heart--I truly hope and pray that she pulls through.

This afternoon there was a PTO popsicle welcome at her school and we went. Grace was anxious to meet her new teacher but there was no guarantee that she'd be there and of course she wasn't. So Grace was pretty upset about that. What did happen was one of those stay-at-home-dad moments where the moms treat you like you're just there because you got out of work earlier than the mom or something. I was looking at things to sign up for to help the PTO out and one of the things was a bake sale. The lady that was behind the table said "you could help with the bake sale if you like to bake" and then a loud belly laugh. I just walked away. Julie said I should have told her I do the cooking; but obviously I didn't.

So that's been our last few days. I'll get this posted and get to bed. We have a busy week ahead of us.

Summer sure goes fast...

2008-08-22T12:47:00.002-05:00

Well, it's near the end of August already and Grace will be starting Kindergarten next Thursday. Can you hardly believe it? She really is growing up fast. Everyone tells you that when you have a child and I have to say in the beginning I didn't really believe them because in the beginning it's not so easy and the days seem so long when you don't get much sleep, etc. But as she gets older and is into more activities, time really seems to be going faster.

Julie had the last week off as we tried to shoehorn in everything we hadn't gotten done over the summer that we wanted to do. We went to the Rolling on the River ride on Friday the 15th. We went on Friday to volunteer and get things ready for Saturday. We ended up camping at Jellystone and I have to say it's great if you have kids. It's very kid friendly with numerous kid-oriented activities and a really nice campground. It really is worth the premium price to stay there. We started out with the intention of camping at a retreat center for free. We also went with the thought that we were going to stuff goodie bags and then I was going to do route sign checking. When we got there which was only about 20 minutes after they were supposed to start stuffing the goodie bags, they were already done. So we helped set up the expo center a little and then they asked us to drive the 100 mile route to make sure the signs were easy to follow. Since we needed to set up our tent for the night we decided to start driving the route and when we got to the retreat center we'd set up our tent. The retreat center which was about half-way through the 100-mile route was also a rest stop. We get there and the camping is in a soccer field. And we can't put our tent close to the outside of the field because that's where they're going to drive the hay ride later that evening. We weren't so excited about this setup so we decided to go to Jellystone. It wasn't free, but like I said; well worth it. After we set up the campsite we finished driving the route which prevented me from cooking dinner. And it was so late at this point that restaurants are closing; we ended up eating at a family restaurant which was quite good.

Then Saturday was more volunteering and the ride itself. We started the route a little late because we were helping out at a rest stop. Turns out the port-a-potties weren't delivered to this location. And the winery (which was where this rest stop was) was several hundred yards away from the road. So if a rider wanted to use the facilities they were going to have to ride or walk quite a distance. At first they just moved the entire rest stop up by the winery building. Then they decided (logically) to keep the rest stop by the road and if anyone needed the facilities they would need to go up to the winery itself.

The problem we were helping with was that you came around a corner and the corn was high and the rest stop was off the road a few yards and you couldn't really see it until you were practically past it especially if you were riding fast. Some of these riders were easily riding 20+ mph because they got to this rest stop pretty fast--like 1-1 1/2 hours to go 27+ miles. So we were here to direct the riders into the rest stop since they couldn't really see it while they were riding by. Grace really got into this and was yelling out "Rest Stop" as each rider was getting close.

After we were there a few hours our replacement arrived and then we headed back to the start/finish line to start our ride. I think we started our ride around 11 am or so and it had obviously warmed up a bit. It wasn't a hot day, but with the sun beating down on the black pavement it was quite warm. And by this time Grace was getting tired because we got up early and she kind of went to bed late the night before. So Grace was hitting a wall and with Julie being pregnant the beginning of the ride wasn't so pretty. Grace was complaining that she wanted to hook her bike up to Julie's and Julie saying no and we weren't even to the road yet. So when we finally got to the road Julie let her hook her bike up.

If you're wondering what I'm talking about when I say hook up her bike to Julie's, I'm talking about the Trail Gator. It's a really cool idea that in my opinion works exactly as advertised. Some people on Amazon have complained about it, but we had no problems...except what I mentioned about the hot pavement, the pregnant wife and the tired and cranky child. Oh and did I mention the hills? Yea they don't call it "rolling" on the river for nothing. There are quite a few hills and some are quite steep as well. As soon as we left the fairgrounds and turned onto the road there's a big hill. Julie was like you've got to be kidding me. So anyway, Julie and Grace made it somewhere between 6 and 7 miles and I ended up doing the whole 15 miles.

We stayed Saturday night because we had planned to go canoing on Sunday but we ended up taking a little too long to pack up and missed canoing. On Monday we went downtown Chicago to the American Girl store and had their lunch with Graced. She brought Josefina with her and it was a complete surprise. We took the train and the bus and then walked around the corner and there was the store. I think she was really surprised because she was very excited. The food was really good and there was a lot of it. Just a warning to other fathers; you will be one of the only men in the room. After lunch we ended up buying Grace a couple things and then we stopped at Garrett's Popcorn on the way back to the train station. Man do they make good popcorn.

Then on Tuesday we went to gymnastics for only an hour but at least Julie got to come and see Grace do stuff she's never seen before like her back handspring. Then we drove down to Marriott's Lincolnshire Theater for the play "The Princess and the Pea." After that it was lunch at Red Robin - I love that place.

Wednesday we went to Great America (Six Flags for the younger folks) with one of Julie's sisters and a cousin and their 4 kids. It was a lot of fun and a pretty much perfect day to go there as they weren't that busy and the weather was good.

Yesterday we just relaxed and went swimming at one of Julie's other sisters houses. Before that we all went to lunch. Today Julie had to go to work and Grace and I have just been hanging out as it's been raining off and on and we're both tired after a busy week. And no plans as of now for the weekend sound really good too.

Rolling on the River Ride 2008

2008-08-04T22:34:00.002-05:00

Once again this year we're planning to go to the Rolling on the River Ride which is a bike ride that benefits Illinois' environment. You may recall us doing this last year; we camped and tried my new Escape out with the roof carrier holding our bikes.

This year we're going again and we're also riding...15 miles. All three of us are doing this and as a requirement for riding we each have to raise money as a donation to the three nonprofit charity organizations that are sponsoring the event and that help Illinois' environment: Prairie Rivers Network, Illinois Environmental Council Education Fund and Illinois Stewardship Alliance.

Why these charities?
Experience-Each group has more than 30 years of experience in Illinois

Scope-Each group works throughout the state

Effectiveness-Recognized as leaders in their fields. Efficiently run, professionally staffed organizations.

Mission--Collectively their missions address the key environmental concerns in Illinois today including global warming, air and water quality, water supply, protecting the parks, rivers and other natural spaces we all enjoy, and developing policies for healthier food production and more economically sustainable food markets.

Please note that all donations are tax deductible to the full extent of the law.

Here is each of our donation pages. Please help us out!

Steve
Julie
Grace

Thank you for taking the time to read this and for considering donating.

Ah, carpet

2008-07-18T22:22:00.003-05:00

Unfortunately I don't have any pictures to show you because we have moved all the furniture around and my PC isn't plugged in. However, our family room is really coming together now.

Back in March just before Easter we finished putting the lights up and I think around Memorial day we put the drywall up for the ceiling and the "new" wall that we closed in. Then we hired a mudding and taping drywall guy to finish it up so it looked nice. Then we hired a wallpaper person to put the wallpaper on the ceiling. During all of this I managed to paint the entire room (four different colors) and put up wallpaper on the lower sections of the wall and we actually got shades for the windows. Oh the humanity.

We had to order the carpet and then after it came in we scheduled the install which ended up being today. Yeah! So now that we have carpet all that's left is the drapes and the cornices. I'll be making the cornices myself so the only thing we have to get done is having the drapes made. Surprisingly this is proving to be a difficult task. Where does one find a person that will work with velvet? We want to have red velvet drapes in here to make it look like a theater and then cornices above that for more color and contrast.

I'll get some pictures up of the family room in the next few days. Gotta go as my laptop battery is dying.

Please add your signature to this petition

2008-07-15T21:42:00.002-05:00

Please read the story on the Daily Herald website and if you feel the same as I do, add your name to the petition.

Wow, forgot how to write...

2008-07-06T14:41:00.001-05:00

Apparently I have completely forgotten how to write in my blog. Sorry about that. In my defense things have been quite hectic around here.

Since I last wrote a lot of things have happened and I'll get to that but first I want to share something I read in the newspaper today. As a hybrid vehicle owner I find it an odd request. My intention here is not to offend anyone who happens to be blind because I certainly respect what you have to deal with on a daily basis, but again this seems like a strange request...here goes:

Advocates for the blind have asked the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to set minimum sound standards for new cars and trucks, pointing to potential safety hazards for blind pedestrians who can't hear silent hybrids. The National Federation of the Blind says hybrids don't register among traffic sounds the blind use to determine when it's safe to cross the street. In one experiment, blindfolded listeners couldn't hear a 2006 Toyota Prius until it was about 11 feet away, compared with a 2004 Honda Accord, detected from about 36 feet.

I like that my hybrid is nearly silent at times and quite honestly I don't know of a way, barring putting a speaker on the car with engine sounds being played, of "creating" a sound that the blind can hear. Again, no offense to the blind, but it just seems like another thing we've found to complain about in our society. Usually it's noise producing things that get complaints though, not nearly silent vehicles that help the environment and my wallet.

Wednesday

2008-04-23T23:04:00.001-05:00

We were surprisingly running a little late for dance class this morning and stopped at the McDonald's on the way for some breakfast. The drive-thru lane was anemically slow and then after we finally get our food I pull away to the Wal-Mart parking lot and stop to put jelly on Grace's biscuit. But there is no jelly in the bag. So we turned around and went back, ran inside to get our jelly and then came back to the car and I got the jelly on the biscuit so Grace could eat. Then we pulled out of the parking lot and got stopped by a freight train. So apparently we were supposed to be late to dance class because everything was working against us this morning.

We finally did make it and it's quite the coincidence that I decided to bring the camera today because they got their costumes for recital today. So they tried them on and did their two dances in them to try them out and see how they worked. They looked SO cute. Here's the picture:

After dance class one of Julie's sister's called and we had lunch with her and some of her kids since they didn't have school today (testing.) Grace was really excited about that. But since she had really just eaten breakfast she didn't hardly eat anything. Then Julie called and said she was taking a half day, so not long after we got home she did too. Grace was REALLY excited to see her Mom come home so early. So when she got home and had lunch and Grace had a snack, the two of them went for a bike ride and not long after that it was time to go to gymnastics.

At gymnastics I was starting to read my next book about Mark Felt who was Deep Throat but this one is penned by him mostly. This is all a result from having read Bob Woodward's book about Deep Throat so now I'm interested in Watergate and such. I wasn't so thrilled by what I've read so far from the LONG introduction where the author of the introduction says that basically he didn't trust Bob Woodward and that he wasn't a very good person. If you read his book about Mark Felt, I think you might feel differently as I do, but I guess to each his own.

After that we stopped at a new (to us) restaurant near Grace's gymnastics for dinner but it wasn't all that. We probably won't be going back. But by bribing Grace with ice cream we were at least able to get her to finish her grilled cheese sandwich for dinner. Then we ran and got her some ice cream at Dairy Queen because that's what she wanted and she sat right down and ate the whole ice cream cone without hardly saying a single word for like 20-30 minutes. It was kind of peaceful.

Then we came home and I forgot to stop at the library for a CD I had put on hold, so while Julie put Grace to bed I ran down there (unfortunately I had to drive or I wouldn't have made it before they closed) and picked it up. It's the music to Seussical the Musical. It's for Grace because she enjoyed the play when we saw it so much I thought she'd enjoy the music. I think she will.

Alright, I've got to clear an area in the basement so my Uncle and I can do electrical work tomorrow. Gotta go...

Happy Earth Day

2008-04-22T23:06:00.003-05:00

I've got such exciting news. We have some friends that moved to Zimbabwe (which you may remember) and we wanted to send them some Christmas presents but true to our style we got them sent out a bit late near the end of January. They just got it TODAY. We had given up hope of them ever receiving it and ironically our friends emailed us just a few hours before getting the package and said that they thought that they would never receive it which is exactly the sad conclusion we had come to. Lo and behold they got it today. Julie and I are SO relieved that they got it. I'm super surprised that it took three months for it to get to them, but nonetheless happy they finally got it.

So today was Earth Day and all I really did to celebrate was ride my bike to the village board meeting tonight instead of driving. I slept late this morning which also says that Grace did too because she didn't wake me up. She's supposed to be to school at 9 am and I woke up at 8:30. So she was about 10 minutes late, but we made it. While she was at school I ran to get a few things from Lowe's and I went to the grocery store to pick up the ingredients we needed for dinner. Julie got her favorite meal tonight which is an italian sausage, mushroom and tomato pasta dish.

So I'm wondering what exactly would explain the gasoline prices right now. Does anyone really know? Are you as appalled as I am? I don't want to drive anywhere anymore and I'm driving a hybrid vehicle. And the way the prices are changing just astounds me; you go to bed and the price is $3.44/gal for regular unleaded. You wake up the next morning and it's $3.67/gallon? And then two days later it goes up to $3.74/gal. I don't understand and I don't know who is raking in all these millions of dollars, but it's at the point now where it is affecting the way I live my life. You do realize that the gas companies have had (brace yourself) record profits into the hundreds of millions of dollars since prices started to rise last year. I can only imagine what their profits are now. Just incredible and disgusting.

I really wish we'd stop relying on foreign oil for our gasoline consumption and use the oil we have but aren't using. And I wish the government would remove the restrictions stopping the gas companies in our own country from building more refineries that would reduce supply and demand issues. If the government really wanted to turn around the economy this would be a great first step.

You may have noticed my new "feature" in the column to the left which lists the book I'm currently reading, but the book I just finished is called "Real Change" by Newt Gingrich. If you're tired of bureaucracy and the current state of "politics" in our country, you need to read this book. I highly recommend it; it's amazing. Also see the website where they have created the red, white & blue platform - The Platform for the American People. Please read it - it's great for our country and it's something we all need to read and be a part of to make a difference.

It's definitely spring

2008-04-21T23:28:00.004-05:00

This last week has been fairly normal. Monday was preschool story time at the library and Grace had a great time as usual. She just loves going there. I found out that there is another session after this one is over so I signed her up for that session in May so she'll have a week off and then start over for more story times. She was starting to get sick over the weekend and wasn't much better on Monday coughing a lot and just not feeling good. But of course if you ask her she felt fine.

Tuesday was preschool and she added sneezing to her repertoire of sickness symptoms. One of the hardest decisions I've found that as a parent you have to make is whether to take your child to the doctor. Not to say that sometimes it's obvious that you have to, but when it's a borderline sickness like this where it's basically a cold or maybe allergies, what good is a doctor visit except wasting money on your insurance deductible? Tuesday I chose to not go but rather to try and slow her down a little especially since on Wednesday she has dance class and gymnastics and she needs to be well rested for that.

Well with Grace, trying to slow her down is like trying to get your grass to grow during a drought without watering it. If you get her to slow down it isn't usually for long. She fights it -- which is actually good, she needs to be active but not when she's sick. So obviously she didn't rest much but she made it through the day. On Wednesday she was about the same but again made it through. So when Thursday came and she wasn't really any better I'm starting to think, take her to the doctor. So I ask Julie what she thinks and neither of us are sure whether to or not to take her there so again I don't take her.

Instead, I take her to school. Now just so you know I'm not a negligent parent, her symptoms aren't any worse, just not better. And she isn't exactly lying around not doing anything because she feels terrible, no she's up running around and complaining that she wants to play more is mad at me for trying to hold her back as I try to get her to rest since she has these symptoms. So anyway I take her to school and again she seems to be doing just fine except she's still coughing a lot and has a runny nose; the sneezing has pretty much gone away by now.

While she's in school, I run over to the in-laws house because my BIL has gotten a new (used) set-top box for DirecTV that needs to be installed since the box they had stopped working. I'm not sure if I mentioned this last week, but their old box died and so my BIL got a used box off of eBay and I went over to get it working for them. I called DirecTV and had them activate this box with the card we had ordered from them for $20 and had been using in the box that died. They didn't complain one bit and did exactly that, but this "new" box didn't work. So he ordered another one and had called me on either Tuesday or Wednesday to say the new one had come in and needed me to get this one activated.

So after I dropped Grace off at school on Thursday, I run over there and get everything ready and call DirecTV and the lady I got was completely the opposite of the person I had talked to the previous week. She can't activate this box with an old card, I need to order a new one. I'm saying that this is a card that I ordered from you for $20 and was just using a week ago AND that another representative had activated with another box just a few days ago. "I'm not supposed to do that sir," was the response I got. Well then why did this other representative do it? "I'm don't know why they would do that." Are you freaking kidding me? I'm just going crazy trying to comprehend why I'm being told this now and not last week. Why would different customer service rep's tell me completely different things only days apart? I know they don't like us buying used boxes on eBay because they want everyone to pay a monthly "rental" fee for leasing new boxes from them. They apparently don't want anyone to own equipment anymore.

So as I'm going crazy about this situation she says she's "noticed" that I qualify for a free upgrade to the new HD receiver and that she could also have it installed for free. And then I could use my old HD receiver (that I have currently disabled somehow with my whole wiring issue) that we're currently using on this TV and then we wouldn't have to order anything or pay for anything. So I agree to this and everything is OK now, but I don't get why talking to a different customer service rep provides different results. So we'll see what this install brings as far as getting the cable I couldn't get to work to start working. They are coming on Monday morning.

So after I cool off I go to get Grace and we had a pretty good day and we were finally able to go to bible study for a change this Thursday. The babysitter came over and since there were no cancellations for bible study we got to go. It was really good and as usual, it's always nice to get away without Grace for a little bit. It's nice to feel like an adult every once in a while. As far as bible study goes, it was very enlightening and enjoyable. We're studying the book of Peter or at least we're starting to now.

So on Friday I took our HD receiver to the in-laws house and got it set up and it worked just fine. I didn't need to wait until Monday because it doesn't work at our house anyway. So that made them happy. But since Grace still wasn't feeling much better, we canceled going back to their house Friday night for dinner because we don't want them getting sick. Today was my biggest day for feeling I "should" take her to the doctor mostly because she's not really any better and the weekend is coming up and if she ends up getting worse over the weekend our options will be limited as far as taking her to the doctor.

But again we decide not to take her as she hasn't gotten worse and she's really not "acting" sick at all, she just sounds sick. So we make it through Friday and then on Saturday Julie goes to yoga in the morning and Grace didn't really sleep in so the morning wasn't so good because she's never happy when it's the weekend and Mom isn't around. I actually think her coughing is a little better on Saturday, but she's now whining and complaining about everything, but of course still doesn't want to just sit around.

We had this painting company come over Saturday morning to give us an estimate for painting the outside of our house. The estimate was great and their references seemed really good and I've never heard anything bad about this company, so I'm 95% sure we'll go with them, but they aren't calling us to see what our decision is until Wednesday so we have a few days to decide still. Then Grace had a birthday party to go to; her friend from around the corner turned six so she went over there for several hours.

After that I finally got started on staining the new bookcase/toy box we bought Grace back in December when one of our favorite furniture stores was closing. They used to be called "Naked Furniture" and then they changed their name to "At Home Furniture." They sell unfinished furniture directly from the manufacturers. We bought a lot of Grace's bedroom furniture from there before she was born and we bought this piece to kind of go with that. It's not from the same collection as her dressers and night stand, but it is the same wood; ponderosa pine which we love. So anyway I was able to get the first coat finished and then Julie and Grace had gone to pick up dinner and they got back as I was finishing up. So then we had family movie night with dinner downstairs in the family room while watching "Air Bud: Spikes Back." Grace loved this movie. I think with this whole family movie night thing that Grace might finally be re-embracing movies again; we'll see.

So on Sunday we had church obviously and then later we went to a friends house for dinner. Julie was helping them make announcements for a family member whom had just had twins and Grace was playing with their kids and their Dad and I were hanging out watching sports and cooking, talking, etc. Everyone had a great time and hopefully we can continue to do things like that together.

So now it's Monday and this morning the DirecTV guys came over to install the new HD receiver down here in the family room. First thing, they were told they were upgrading, ie: replacing, an older box which they weren't. They were just installing the new box where the old one used to be. Once they figured that out they were pretty excited that all the wiring was already done. Except there was the little problem of it not working right, but I'll get to that in a minute. So they're scoping everything out and they start installing everything and they're wondering about all the wiring I've done but the guy that "got" to go up on the roof isn't having a great time because our roof is quite steep and he's not wanting to be left alone for fear of falling off the roof. He says if he falls he at least want someone to see him falling. I'm telling you these guys were really having fun and they made me laugh a lot.

So once the roof work was done; the new HD receivers provide more HD stations because they're accessing 2 additional satellites, so instead of "only" three satellites being brought in, it's now bringing in five satellite signals on the one "large" dish; they moved inside to determine how well everything inside the house was working. Not so well was the determination. Even the box up in our bedroom was not finding any signal so they started to work diagnosing the problem. I had already told them about how I had brought the line in to the attic from having been previously wrapped around the house and that ever since then the HD feed hadn't worked. It took them some time, but it was a couple of things. Something with a switch they installed and then the culprit for why the HD didn't work after I brought it into the attic. I feel like such an incapable coax cable installer after this one. It was completely my fault that this didn't work because when I brought that line that had been wrapped around the house into the attic and attached it to the cable that had been run down to the family room as the HD feed, I made a sloppy mistake/oversight on attaching the connector to the end of the cable.

How RG6 coax cabling works is it's got a central copper wire and then insulation and shielding around the outside where there is the stranded wire. When you use the stripping tool, it cuts the insulation off the very outside revealing the stranded wires and also trims the interior insulation to reveal the central copper wire. Once you put the connector on the end it covers the stranded wire so the only exposed wire remaining to the eye is the central copper wire. Well, there was one stray stranded wire that somehow got dislodged/disconnected from the rest of the stranded wires and was askew and when I put the connector on the end it was exposed on the outside of the connector and was touching (wrapped around even) the central copper wire which is obviously a BIG no-no. So it was this tiny little stray wire that caused all these problems. I've run how many hundred feet of this wire in my house and made many many of these connections and this had never happened to me before. So I can chalk this up to a learning experience because I certainly won't let that happen again.

Here is a picture of the culprit:

They were VERY impressed with all the wiring I had done and were especially excited at how easy everything was for them (except the whole connector issue.) So it took them some time, but they figured out my problem and everything works wonderfully. So for now everything is good in DirecTV-land and we're satisfied customers again. After this I told Grace that maybe we could ride our bikes to the library today since we needed to go to story time and it was such a nice day and gas prices are just out of control. But she ended up watching some show about organizing or something and wasn't ready to go until too late really because we drove and were still about 4 minutes late getting there. Next time we'll ride there...

When we got home from the library we had lunch and then were going to go for a bike ride, but I had mentioned to her that maybe we could take her training wheels off and see if she couldn't learn to ride her bike without the training wheels and she seems pretty excited about that. So we tried and she worked at it a bit, but I don't know all the right things to say and she wasn't really getting it I guess, so finally she just wanted her training wheels back on so that we could go for a bike ride. So we did that and she wanted to ride for like - ever. She wanted to go like 3 miles down the road to the new forest preserve but I stopped her from going that far and diverted her to the next subdivision and then surprisingly (not) and just as I predicted she was suddenly "so tired" and couldn't hardly go on, but we made it back home. I don't remember exactly, but I think we went close to 2 and a 1/4 miles in addition to the riding she had done earlier trying to ride without training wheels.

Then not long after we got back Julie was home and I hadn't prepared anything for dinner so we ended up going out for dinner which actually turned out to be a pretty enjoyable time. Grace is coughing considerably less now than she was and seems to be getting better. Unfortunately Julie isn't feeling very good now. She said when she got home that she should have called in sick today.

I've also been walking the dog each night now so that I can get some exercise and so that he can too, but mostly it really is for me. We've worked our way up to about 20-25 minutes now and I think we might have gone a little too much tonight because he got up to go to bed a looked REALLY stiff; poor guy. I'll see how he is in the morning. He seems so willing when we're actually walking...

Notre Dame Frozen Four

2008-04-13T22:28:00.003-05:00

I can't say I'm a huge college hockey fan but my BIL is and Notre Dame made it to the frozen four this year but lost in the finals yesterday. I have to say Notre Dame did really well with most of their sports teams this year (except football.)

Anyway, Friday was a normal day with Grace going to school again. I was starting to clean up the house because my Mom was coming on Saturday for a few days visit on the way to a conference in Ohio. So I got the spare room pretty much all cleaned up and the only thing left for that room was cleaning the sheets so my Mom had a place to sleep. A short time later she called and said that she was affected by the American Airlines MD-80 maintenance issue and that she had verified with the airlines that there was a 99% probability that she wouldn't be flying on Saturday.

So that ended my cleaning spree and so Grace and I just hung out for the rest of the afternoon. Then I started completing some of my around-the-house wiring tasks. I finished running the cable line from the TV in the family room down to the basement. So now we can watch things recorded on TIVO on our television in the exercise area of the basement. I tried to connect the network cable to the area where we're moving the server in the basement, but the cable I pulled down there was too short to reach over to that area. I thought I could just tape additional wire onto the wire I had already pulled and use that to pull the new wire down there, but it doesn't let me pull it for some reason.

I even tried to pull it back towards the router and distribution box and the line wasn't budging that way either. So I suppose I'm stuck trying to run an additional line down to the basement for the server. That really stinks because I thought I was done pulling wires. Then there's the problem with the HDTV cable that doesn't work for some reason. It was part of the large bundle of wires I pulled originally from the distribution box to the TV in the Family Room and then pulled up from the distribution box up to the attic. All the other wires work fine but for some reason that one doesn't.

On Saturday I worked on the wiring going out to the garage. I'm taking everything out there just in case I ever need it. I got the wires all out there and an outlet in place. The cable is hooked up although I haven't tested it yet. I still need to hook up the phone and network lines and then test them. I also still haven't set up the other router I got yet which I'll be basically using as a switch. I'll need to move the new washing machine to install that now because I'll have to move a network cable from an outlet to this new router so the two routers are connected to allow more physical connections throughout the house.

Today was church and then we had a birthday party for our nephew who turned 16 today. That was pretty much our day and tomorrow Grace has her preschool story time at the library. She so looks forward to this each week. Julie actually asked at breakfast this morning when the story time program was over and Grace just about cried. She obviously won't be happy when this is over. I actually think next week is the last week. I guess we'll have to prepare her for that. She gets emotional about most everything. I've been told it's because she's a girl and that boys aren't like that. From what I've observed of other peoples children that are this age, I'd say that's about as accurate as you can be.

I've also got to finish our taxes as they're due on Tuesday. The sad part is we're expecting a return so we're allowing the government to keep our money for all this time without earning interest. So that will be my day tomorrow I suppose; taxes and the library.

Recovering from vacation

2008-04-10T21:44:00.003-05:00

We were on vacation from the 1st through the 8th out in Arizona so we could visit with my Mom and step-Father and my Gramma. We were originally planning to drive because of the current costs of flying but Julie was able to find a sale on orbitz.com where we got the tickets for about the same price as just the gas to drive out there (and don't get me started about gas prices.) The only problem with our tickets was that we couldn't select our seats when we purchased them as they were allegedly to be assigned at check-in. Oh they were assigned at check-in alright as all of us got separate seats on the plane. Luckily on the flight out to Phoenix the airline representative that was printing our luggage tags was able to also change our seats so that Julie and Grace could sit together and my Aunt and I could also sit together. Unfortunately on the flight home we weren't so lucky.

So we got out there Tuesday around rush-hour time and rented a car. I made a wrong judgment call and went the wrong direction on I-10 and wasted about 20 minutes, but we finally made it to my Mom's house. On Wednesday we took Grace to the park and ate at In-N-Out Burger, Thursday we went to the Boyce Thompson Arboretum near Globe which is one of my favorite places. On Friday we went to the Goldfield Ghost Town by Apache Junction. We went here because it sounded interesting, but I wanted to go because I've been wanting to go back to Jerome, AZ which was a copper mining town. I loved it years ago when I went and have been wanting to go back and show Julie and Grace but it's several hours from my Mom's house and it's just a big time commitment when your five year old gets bored quickly. This place is considerably closer and worked out really well.

On Saturday Julie and I got to go out on a date where I ended up buying a new cell phone since we had the time without Grace. I got the LG ENv (VX9900) and so far I really like it. Then we ate at one of our favorite restaurants before going to see a movie. Unfortunately it took a little too long for me to buy the phone (there was a slight difficulty with the "network") and then we tried to eat quickly, but we ended up getting to the movie theater too late to see the movie we wanted to see, "21." So we ended up seeing "Leatherheads" which was a good movie, but it was just basically a sports oriented love story.

On Sunday we ate dinner at Organ Stop Pizza (I just love that place) and then on Monday we went to the Arizona Science Center which was really cool and Grace just loved it. And then it was time to come home on the next Tuesday so that was our vacation in a nutshell. You know me so you know I'll be going into more detail than this, but wanted to put an outline here to start with.

One of the funniest things that happened on the trip to Phoenix happened at O'Hare Airport when they were first calling passengers to begin boarding. As you may know, they of course call first class passengers at the beginning of the boarding process and Grace turns to Julie and asks "Mama, Am I first class?" It was just the cutest thing. The flight out went pretty darned well and the flight crew was pretty into the whole "April Fool's" thing and kept everything light. The captain comes on the speaker and says we'll be departing shortly but that they've had an equipment problem in that they can't fill the fuel tanks completely we will still be leaving on time but this will affect how long it takes to get to Phoenix because we'll need to stop in Springfield and Oklahoma City and Las Vegas en route and who knows when we'll finally make it there. There were other things he said during the trip, but that was my favorite.

When we got to Phoenix and had our luggage we headed out to the car rental area which is quite a ways from the airport. Julie nixed the idea of renting a Hertz Shelby Mustang so we stuck with an Escape which was adequate for our needs and gets considerably better fuel mileage. Actually I tried to upgrade to a Freestyle because it seats more people and is a larger car but they didn't have any so we got the Escape. We had a choice between gray and white; I chose gray. I only make bold decisions.

We went to the park on Wednesday where they have a sprinkler area. We've never seen the sprinkler area actually be open because we don't usually go to Arizona so late; normally we're there in March. To our surprise the sprinklers turned on about 15 minutes after we got there. We let Grace run around in the water a little bit even though she just had her regular clothes on. She was pretty happy about that. They were installing shades over the playground equipment so that was closed for the day, but when we went back a few days later it was really nice as it kept the equipment in the shade so it wasn't too hot for the kids to play on and it was nice for me too as I didn't have to stand in the sun and watch her to make sure she was alright.

The Arboretum on Wednesday was great; just perfect weather. This place is like the combination of a botanic garden of desert plants along a hiking trail. It's really fun and you can actually learn a few things. The gold mining ghost town was different. The train ride was fun and informative and the food we ate was good. We didn't have time to go down into the mine itself for a tour but we checked everything else out. We weren't very impressed with the shopping; the things that were available for purchase didn't really entice us to buy anything. Grace got to ride a full-size horse named "Candy" though and she thought that was just the best thing ever. They offered horseback rides in the desert for reasonable rates, but you have to be six to do it so we'll have to bring Grace back next year. They just put her up on the horse's back and let her around the corral for a few minutes. But she got the biggest kick out of it; especially with her new pick cowgirl hat that we had just bought her. That was one of the few things we found worthy of purchasing there.

At any rate that day was certainly a success and I'm sure Grace would rate it as one of her favorites of the entire trip. Organ Stop Pizza is one of her favorites as well and she had a wonderful time there on Sunday as well. If you've never been you really are missing out. The pizza isn't "to die for" but it is good and the Wurlitzer is just so cool. I would recommend sitting upstairs however. Normally they are really busy and we end up having to sit upstairs because all the seats in the lower section are already taken. But since we came later this year more of the "winter visitors" have left to avoid the hot weather and we could basically have sat anywhere we wanted too. Now this doesn't affect the overall experience sitting downstairs as opposed to upstairs, but I'll tell you this: when you sit upstairs you feel you are part of the music more for some reason. The low bass shakes the floor and you just feel more immersed in the music and I personally enjoy it more; just my two cents.

On Monday - our last day in Arizona - we went to the Arizona Science Center which my step-Father has been apparently been wanting to take Grace to for years; I don't think I knew that before now. Anyway, the sad part is that my step-Father had the day off but was sick and couldn't really go with us. We saw the movie "Grand Canyon Adventure 3D: River at Risk." I have to say that short of actually going to the grand canyon, this movie is almost like being there it was really cool. It was narrated by Robert Redford whom doesn't really do a whole lot for me, but it was nice. The premise is what we've done to the whole area of the Colorado River and the Grand Canyon and the effect that has had on both of them. I have to say I knew that the Colorado wasn't what it used to be but I had absolutely no idea the extent to which we had affected the entire region because of mans doing. It all starts up at Lake Powell with the first dam of the Colorado, the Glen Canyon Dam. This stopped all of the silt, salt and other material that the water used to carve out the grand canyon to no longer flow down the river. Then after Hoover Dam was built for Las Vegas to have water the river really declined. Down by the U.S./Mexican border the river used to be 200 yards wide and provide the fisherman of the village there with a living. Now it is a stagnant stream with no fish or anything of value to them. It's an eye-opening movie that really everyone should see; I obviously liked it.

On our trip home we returned the car right on time and they bused us back to the airport where we learned of our fate for flying home - we all had separate seats again. The difference this time was that the lady printing our luggage tags wasn't able to help us at all. She said we would have to discuss it with the agents at the gate. As soon as we made it through security (my Aunt got flagged for her C-Pap machine) and got to our gate I went up and requested that at least one of us be able to sit with Grace because she couldn't travel alone. They couldn't do anything at the time but said they would try and would let us know. It didn't sound very promising. So we all had breakfast as we waited. Finally just prior to boarding they called me up and said that they couldn't do much except give me a different seat that hopefully someone on the plane would want to trade me for so that Grace and I could sit together. She actually called was calling it something like trade-bait; a seat someone might be interested in so that it would entice them into trading with me. But then at the last second two seats were available in the very last row so Grace and I were "lucky" enough to sit at the very back of the plane. We left late because the plane was late arriving from San Francisco I think; so we weren't able to board the plane on time which obviously left us to leave later than we were scheduled to.

The flight itself was mediocre at best. The flight crew wasn't saying hardly a thing to us. They never came on the speaker and welcomed us aboard, no mention of expected flying time or a possible arrival time which would have been nice considering we were leaving late. They never even came on to mention what our cruising altitude was or anything like that. The flight attendants weren't very friendly either; about as friendly as the lady in front of me reclining her seat before we even took off and they feigning that it was broken when we were preparing for landing so that she didn't have to put it in the upright position - "God forbid." So during both flights of this trip I wasn't able to use my computer at all because when the seat is reclined my laptop doesn't physically fit between me and the reclined seat-back in front of me without angling it such that the keyboard is practically vertical which makes typing a bit awkward. I was at least able to set it up in front of Grace so that she could watch her Strawberry Shortcake movie which made her quite happy; until the battery was dying, but at least she was able to enjoy it for a while.

About an hour outside of O'Hare we hit the weather system that we weren't looking forward to upon arriving home; rain, wind and general ugly weather. The turbulence was so bad that the flight attendants said that they would be collecting everything they had given out and that everything needed to be put away and we all needed to be in our seats for the remainder of the flight. I've never been on a flight where they've done that; so it was a little nerve wracking, but we made it just fine. The only problem, and the only time the captain spoke, was as we were making our approach to O'Hare the air traffic controllers apparently "lost" us on radar. The captain came on and said that we were just in our flight pattern following the plane in front of us at the prescribed distance but somehow they "lost" us on radar and were forcing us to circle and land from the south. This added about 20-30 minutes to our flight and put us on the ground around 2:45 instead of 2:15. The good news is that we made it before the real storm started between 4:30 and 5:30 with a lot of lightening and just pouring down rain. In fact the rain we've gotten has begun the flooding around here as that was the lead story on the local news tonight.

So anyway, we made it home in one piece with all of our luggage and made it home before the storm; so bottom line - good travel day. Will we use orbitz.com again? Yet to be determined. One good thing about the flight home was that I was able to finish the book I was reading: "The Secret Man: The Story of Watergate's Deep Throat" by Bob Woodward. You may remember the last book I read was about President Ford: "Write It When I'm Gone" by Thomas M DeFrank and that piqued my interest in Watergate so I'm reading up on that now. This book was really good although not as good as Write It When I'm Gone. Now I've moved on to "Real Change: From the World That Fails to the World That Works" by Newt Gingrich. I didn't know what I thought of this man until I started reading this book. Wow! this book is an eye opener so far and I've only read a handful of chapters. So far - highly recommended.

Yesterday Grace had dance class and gymnastics and we had lunch with two of Julie's sisters. I think Grace was really happy to be back in the routine of her normal week but she was really tired. She was still tired today for preschool, but she was better than yesterday. I was the busy one today; I ran some errands while Grace was in school and then afterwards we took my rear bumper cover to the repair shop to be painted. Then we came home for a few minutes and then headed to the eye doctor as I needed my annual checkup. It's been seven years since I had lasik surgery and everything is still looking great. After that we came home and crashed; the unintended consequence of which was that we ate dinner at like 7:30 - too late for Grace really but at least we got through the day and almost the week since tomorrow is Friday...yea! Hopefully in the next day or two we'll be over the whole two hour time difference we had gotten used to in Arizona and start eating at regular times and sleeping longer.

Sears Tool Sale

2008-03-31T22:07:00.002-05:00

So last week was Spring Break around here and we didn't go anywhere because Julie had just gotten back from California. Since we didn't have any school or anything planned for the week, I loaded up Grace's schedule and I think she had a great week. Monday she played with her friend from across the street as her Dad was on Spring Break too.

Then on Tuesday she had a play date with her friend Kailei from school at our house. It was the first time they've played together and it went really well. They got along just perfectly. Then on Wednesday she played with her friend from around the corner and Thursday with another friend from school that she's been really close to but hasn't played with before outside of school. Her name is Nevina and they've been close for a very long time but for some reason have never been able to play before now. Then on Friday we went with our friends from down the street to see Seussical the Musical.

I don't know if you've seen it but it was really fun. Grace had a great time and was even dancing along in her seat. I think she might actually be interested in seeing Horton Hears a Who! now since that is the basic plot line for the show.

Then over the weekend we didn't do a whole lot. We're trying to clean the house up a bit so our house-sitter doesn't have to live in a filthy house. Today Grace and I had preschool story time at the library. I think she really enjoys going to this. She always looks forward to it. I'm guessing she'll be disappointed when this class is over. I'll have to keep my eyes open for future classes.

As far as the drywall contractors is concerned, the two estimates I've gotten are night and day. One was more than twice as much as the other. I'm waiting for a third contractor to be available so I can get an estimate from him but that will have to wait for us to come back from vacation.

So you are probably thinking that the subject of this post is about tools and wondering when I'm getting to that. Well, I got the greatest deal yesterday - even Julie was impressed with the deal I got. I'm taking this auto restoration class in May and I am going to need certain tools to do the class. One of them is a pneumatic cut-off tool. I got my Craftsman Club flyer in the mail last week and they had this cut-off tool on sale for 50% off. I couldn't believe it. The sale didn't start for a while so I was waiting to buy it until the weekend. Then I get an email from Sears saying that on Sunday night from 6pm to 9pm they were having a 10% Friends and Family sale. So I got it for 60% off and was pretty excited about it. Maybe not so exciting for you, but for me it was great.

Ready for drywall

2008-03-25T20:48:00.002-05:00

Sorry again about not writing for almost a week. As you can imagine things were a little hectic with Julie gone and then there was Easter, etc., etc. So here's a rundown of the last six days. On Thursday my Uncle came over to help with the house again. Grace went to preschool and Uncle Bill and I got the exhaust fan ducting replaced and a new vent hood put outside which turned out to be a great idea because birds had taken up residence inside this ducting. This explains why the fan in the downstairs bathroom was basically useless. I still feel we need a new fan, but at least the fan we have should work better.

I drilled holes for conduit in the garage and installed the sub-panel for electric out there. Then we got all the electrical conduit in place and started pushing some wire. However we ran out of wire so we'll have to finish up on Friday. Thursday night I took Julie's brother to O'Hare Airport as he was heading out to sunny Arizona with some of his friends. They were going out for spring training to watch some Cubs games. So I didn't get to go to bible study again this week. Hopefully next week...

So on Friday Grace had preschool again and my Uncle came back to finish up the electrical work we had begun on Thursday. We pushed all the wire and got the new circuits working: one for the low-voltage distribution box I put in for my cable and telephone lines and for the new outlets in the kitchen and then another for the server that will be moving into the basement. There aren't any more spaces left in the breaker box for the garage sub-panel, so we'll have to add that when we expand the box to a 200 amp box. But the really good news is that the family room is officially ready for drywall! I'll talk to my BIL on Easter and see if he has time for us anytime soon.

Saturday we were re-acclimating to Julie being home and enjoying being together again so we didn't really do much. Sunday was Easter so obviously we went to church as did the rest of Lake County, WOW! We've never seen that many people at our church at one time before. Thank goodness we got there early - really early. Otherwise we would not have been sitting for the service.

After church we had some time for me to make some cinnamon bread and then head over to Julie's parents for Easter dinner. We were there and one of Julie's sister's and our BIL that will be helping me with the drywall in our family room was there. The rest of Julie's family is on vacation/spring break. So anyway I mentioned to my BIL that we were ready for drywall and he said that he couldn't do it until he gets things done at his own house. So now I'm searching for a drywall company to come and install this for us so we can move forward. I'm tired of not having a ceiling in my family room and we need this done now.

So starting today I've begun researching contractors and will be getting estimates soon. I'm anxious to get this room done so we can do other rooms in our house. We have so many ideas and so little time and money which is why we have been doing so much ourselves to save money. I just don't feel comfortable doing drywall on a ceiling myself if I want it to look nice. It wouldn't be a flat surface if I did it. I could probably get away with doing walls, but ceilings are (at least in my opinion) much more difficult.

That's about it for now. We're going on vacation ourselves soon so we'll be busy getting ready for that. But I'll try to update soon.

Hump Day

2008-03-19T21:15:00.002-05:00

So it's Wednesday and it's been a long week already. Monday was pretty good; Grace had her preschool story-time at the library. Since it's from 1:00 to 1:45 and we normally eat lunch at one we got to the library early so that we could spend time at the library before her story-time and then leave as soon as class was over and get home to eat lunch. But I suppose we got there a little too early because she spent time with the computer that reads books to you and then picked out a few books (at my prodding) and she was already asking if it was story-time yet. I'm guessing that we shouldn't get there quite so early the next time we go. Next week is spring break so it will be a couple of weeks before we're back there.

After that we just came home and hung out. Grace has been congested and coughing this week, especially on Monday, so I really just wanted her to rest so that she'd get better without really getting sick. Tuesday was preschool and she was so happy it was nice to see. She got up and did her homework before going to school so we didn't have to struggle with that. I had stayed up late Monday night baking cupcakes for Grace to bring to school because she was the snack person Tuesday. One of the kids in her class who is actually a friend of hers, Kenny, is allergic to eggs and tree-nuts. So I had found a recipe some time ago for cupcakes that doesn't have eggs and I used it to make these Monday night.

They were actually pretty good. The frosting was incredible. Honestly the cake part of them tasted pretty good, but I thought it needed something. And I'm not saying they needed eggs, just that it needed something and I couldn't figure out what it needed. Anyway, they were a big success as Grace came home and couldn't wait to eat the leftovers. But she saved one for her Mom to have when she gets home. Speaking of Mom, Monday was her birthday and she "got" to celebrate all by herself on her trip.

Tuesday was preschool for Grace and she brought her cupcakes with her. Apparently they were a big hit as there weren't many left. I honestly don't remember much else we did on Tuesday. After staying up so late making the cupcakes the night before I was too tired to do much on Tuesday.

Tuesday was my Mom's birthday (Happy Birthday Mom!) and Monday was Julie's birthday--yes she celebrated all by herself in California--and yes she's a St. Patrick's Day baby. Now on Wednesday Grace has dance and gymnastics and we went through the day as usual. But as the week is progressing I'm noticing that she is missing her Mom a little more each day.

So that's where things stand so far this week. Julie is supposed to come home on Friday, but we are also forecast to get 5-8 inches of snow so hopefully that won't affect her flight home.

Boyd Coddington

2008-03-17T00:42:00.003-05:00

Anyone watch American Hot Rod on the Discovery Channel? I was an avid watcher. I didn't always agree with the direction Boyd took on things or his design ideas; although he was a genius designer. But he seemed like a down-to-earth guy and just an all-around good guy. I just found out today that he died back on February 27th. I can't believe I didn't hear about it at all and I find that ridiculous. Someone as important to the automotive industry as he has been, I can't believe it wasn't covered by the news media.

Here is the article I found: Boyd Coddington Statement

Rest of the week

2008-03-16T21:44:00.002-05:00

On Thursday Grace had school and we were supposed to have bible study that night with my Dad but it turned out that he was sick so we didn't do that. On Friday Grace had school again and then we had dinner at Julie's parents house. Saturday Julie and Grace went shopping at Kohl's while I worked on the house. Then we went to a friends house for dinner and were there too late as Grace completely lost it when it was time to come home. Then Julie packed for her business trip before we went to sleep. She left this morning and will be learning all week.

So for Grace and I we're on our own for a few days. So far things are going well. She listened pretty good today. It was Palm Sunday so we started the day at church and brought our palms home. I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before, but when Grace goes to children's mass, she calls it Children's Mask - very cute. She was so cute right after that because the boy sitting next to her was making crosses with his palm and she wanted to make one with hers. I said I didn't know how to do that but we could try when we got home or she could offer to trade her palm for the cross he had made. She was shy and didn't want to ask, but then a few minutes later she went to ask him and he offered her the cross before she could even ask. It was really cute. If my memory serves me correctly I believe he was the boy that did the very same thing a few years ago. It's kind of funny that we were sitting by him again. We also saw Grace's god-parents there today. They usually go earlier I think so we don't normally see them at church. Which reminds me I forgot to ask Sharon how her Mom was doing after her surgery...

Church went long today and we parked in a spot we don't normally so it took awhile to get out of the parking lot. When we got home Uncle Bill was already done installing the solid vent piping to replace the existing flexible piping for the lower level bathroom fan. And we now know why the fan wasn't moving much air; some birds had set up shop in there and had it packed quite full of just about anything they could fit in there. So while I want to replace the fan because it's useless and loud, it will work at least a little now.

We also started trying to get a 220 line out to the garage to place a sub-panel out there. We ended up not having enough materials, but at least we determined a route to get it out there and got it started. Now I have a set of tasks to complete before Uncle Bill comes back (hopefully Wednesday) so we can move forward with this part of the project.

After he left I started working on the railing in the kitchen by pulling it out and trying to determine the best way to install the half-wall there. The issue is that you need to extend a 2x4 down below the level of the floor to provide support for the wall so it doesn't wobble. The problem with that issue is that under where the half-wall will be is a double 2x10 support beam/joist and at the end of this support beam is another double 2x10 support beam/joist at a 90 degree angle. To determine this I had to trim out the underlayment so I could see the support beams under the floor. I think my only option is to extend the wall a few inches past where it originally ended so that I can extend a 2x4 down against that second set of support beams. You never want to make walls protrude further into a room; especially a room that is already small and that you want to be as big as possible, but I don't see any way around it. But it's only a few inches right?

So that's the current state of the family room project. Things are close to getting to the next phase and that's very exciting. Hopefully we can get things moving along on the family room and make some serious progress. We've got to get this room done so we can move on to other rooms -- kind of like double jeopardy where the scores can REALLY change.

March has arrived

2008-03-12T22:20:00.002-05:00

I forgot to mention in my last post that people who feel as I do about Berkeley California are boycotting any products being sold from there. Just check the address of the companies website you are doing business with and if they are headquartered in Berkeley simply choose not to do business with them.

Anyway, March has finally arrived and the temperatures are actually starting to rise...yea! Looks like the high today was about 42 which is a very welcome change. Of course Grace is all ready to spend time outside since it's "a nice sunny day." The only problem is that it doesn't quite feel that warm when you're outside as the perpetual Chicago wind makes it feel much cooler.

On Monday Grace and I went to see her pediatric ophthalmologist and the appointment went very well. I'm not sure if they even checked to see how her eyes looked as far as healing from her surgery back in October, but if they did it must have looked fine because it wasn't mentioned. What the Doctor did say was that she looks really good, her eyes are still perfectly straight and her eyesight is still very good too. He changed her prescription so we'll be getting her some new glasses, but he's very happy with how she's doing. So happy that he wants her to come back in three months for her next checkup and then it will be nine months after that before she'll need a checkup.

After this appointment we had to rush to the library for preschool story time. This week was the first week of a six-week program. Considering how far away we were from the library while at the doctor's office and how much time we had to get there, we did excellent by only being 10 minutes late. We went about 30 miles in about 40 minutes. That's not easy to do with road construction and traffic, but we did it. Good thing we don't go during high traffic times.

Yesterday I managed to drop Grace off at preschool and drive all the way to Waukegan to the County Clerk's office to get an original copy (oxymoron) of her birth certificate so we could register her for kindergarten. This is the only document we still needed to get her registered, but there are a couple other documents we'll need to get before she'll be able to attend in the fall. After I got those copies, I went to her school and picked up a registration packet so I could fill out the forms during the day and be prepared for the registration in the evening. Then I had to run and pick her up from preschool as she's only there for two hours.

So I was able to do all of that in the two hour time-frame and I spent a good part of the day filling out all of the forms they required. Some of the questions they ask are quite honestly difficult to answer because they involve knowing your child in situations that you normally don't see them in. Like "how does your child react to discipline?" This was an especially difficult question because how she responds to us is completely different than how she responds to other people of authority. Also the sheer volume of questions and documents they require was a little enlightening to me.

Here is a list of the documents I had to (or will need to) supply for Grace to be able to attend kindergarten at her school:
-Original county birth certificate (they make a copy and return it)
-One of the following:
- - Real estate tax bill
- - Mortgage papers
- - Signed lease agreement
- - Affidavit from local resident attesting registrant is living with the owner at no cost.
-Two of the following:
- - IL Driver's License/State ID Card
- - Voter registration card
- - Residence Insurance document
- - Vehicle registration
- - Public Aid card
- - Gas or electric bill
- - Cable TV or Credit Card bill
- - Other (as determined by Superintendent)
Also the following health documents (by the time the school year starts):
-Health examination form filled out by pediatrician
-Eye examination by an eye doctor (not general physician)
-Dental examination form filled out by her dentist
Plus I had to fill out the following forms:
-Registration form
-Affidavit of Residency
-Session request form (AM or PM class)
-Textbook loan request (borrow text books)
-About your child (getting to know you information)
And $100 registration fee.

The documents I haven't completed yet are the Eye and the Dental exam forms. We just need to get them filled out and turn them in before school begins in the fall.

Grace is really excited about going to kindergarten in the fall. She asked this morning if we could go there today-so cute. I said no obviously and that didn't make her happy. But today was a normal Wednesday, we were busy. Dance class this morning was good. She's learning two dances for the recital in June. One is "Limbo" and I can't remember the other one. They are really cute though.

After that we came home and my Sister stopped by so that Grace and my niece could play while she ran to the grocery store. Surprisingly she didn't want to take both girls grocery shopping. I'm not sure if I've talked about this here before, but I just can't deal with taking Grace grocery shopping. It's much much easier, and faster, to do the shopping without your child in tow. It's just not worth it. It's just aggravating and time consuming.

Anyway, after that we ran back up to Antioch for gymnastics. We were actually early for that class - amazing. I was reading the book I'm currently reading while she was there. It's called "Write it When I'm Gone" about President Gerald Ford. It's really interesting and has piqued my interest in Richard Nixon and Watergate which will be the subjects of the next books I read. Grace worked on the routine she'll be doing in her gym show next month. So far it looks really cute. I think she really likes doing it.

After gymnastics we ate dinner at Culvers. Believe it or not we don't really eat there very often any more. You may have noticed I don't mention it here that much any more. That was not an omission on my part as we've been eating at home as often as we can. Of course she's still only eating her usual array of three options, but we're doing that at home to save money and so that Grace doesn't get bored with eating out which was beginning to happen.

Julie didn't join us this week because she was out shopping with Aunt Connie. We finally decided when we were going to Arizona this year and got the tickets - yes tickets. I was thinking we would just drive out this year because it would save us a lot of money over purchasing airline tickets, but then Julie got this email from Orbitz about a big sale they were having and we were able to save a ton of money. It'll actually be cheaper than driving as we're flying for about the same price as just buying the gas, not including the hotel stays and food along the route. So we'll end up getting there faster and cheaper and everyone is happy. Oh and did I mention that Aunt Connie is joining us? My Mom has been telling her to come out to see her for years and she's finally decided to go out there and she's going with us this year. We're going next month and actually that time is approaching pretty quickly.

So anyway Julie and Aunt Connie were shopping for luggage for Aunt Connie to use for the trip and some other stuff too I think, so I put Grace to bed.

Berkeley CA Special Edition

2008-03-10T23:30:00.002-05:00

I'm not sure if you've heard about this since the regular media isn't covering this but as a former Marine I'm just appalled. The Marines put a recruiting office in Berkeley CA in January of 2007. Sound crazy? or sound pretty normal? Sounds pretty normal to me especially since I served in the Marine Corps and I appreciate what it means to have the armed services that we have protecting our country and keeping us free. I don't care how you feel about the current situation regarding our involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, or how you feel about the current President of the United States, you have to be proud to live in a country that is free and to have our military protecting us.

The City of Berkeley CA however apparently wants a communist government and no military to protect them from foreign or even domestic threats. They have asked, no told, the Marines to leave their city -- that they aren't welcome there. I suppose if some type of emergency happened they wouldn't be welcome to help out either right? I find this appalling and completely unacceptable. First of all what happened to freedom and equal opportunity? And that's beyond the fact that this is a government agency charged with protecting our very freedoms they are abusing.

Personally I feel like these people are hurting our country and are fighting a losing battle as Marines NEVER give up. Trust me I know because I am one. If they studied the history of the Marine Corps or any branch of the military for that matter, they would understand in a very short time how many soldiers have fought until their death in order to ensure our freedom.

And now two city council members are encouraging everyone to come out to the recruiting station to "help" protest. These are the city council members that said during a council meeting that the Marines weren't asked to come to Berkeley and it would be nice for them to just leave. What is this country coming to? I would love to see these people protest in the face of an entire platoon of Marines in full battle gear, loaded weapons including mortars and vehicles including tanks. How do movements like this start anyway? How do citizens of this country start thinking that the very soldiers charged with protecting us are the very problem this country faces. I just don't understand.

There is a group taking on this threat to our countries armed forces that is called moveamericaforward.org. If you feel the way I do please check out this site and help out however you feel is appropriate.

Home from Michigan

2008-03-09T20:15:00.000-05:00

I'm behind again here and I'm sorry for that. Last week (first week of February) was crazy busy. Last Sunday we went to our nephew's birthday party. I don't remember what else we did that day or on Monday. On Tuesday Grace had preschool and then I went to the village board meeting that night. It was a crazy meeting as usual; I still want to go to another village's board meeting to see how different it is which I'm guessing it will be quite different.

My personal feelings about this last meeting are that while I respect and appreciate one particular trustee's efforts, I don't think deriding the new Police Chief is going to prove or change anything. The Chief was embarrassed and annoyed by the line of questioning that he was bombarded with. I believe his thoughts were that he could concentrate on creating an exact budget or he could actually work on getting the department up and running. Those weren't his exact words, but were the gist of what his sentiments were after the meeting was over. I'm not discounting the fact that an actual budget isn't important and I'm not saying that the chief couldn't have just said that we will have one by such-and-such date, but I don't think what occurred at the meeting was necessary and it was definitely not productive.

Enough politics; on Wednesday Grace had her dance class where we were told that she will be dancing (or can if we like) at a church Fashion Show and Mother/Daughter Tea Party in March. Then we had to get home because the locksmith was coming over because we lost one of the keys to our house and so we had the locks changed so we can sleep at night. Now we begin the process of having extra copies made and then to re-distribute them to everyone that has a key. Quite honestly I didn't realize how many people had keys until I sat down and tried to think how many copies to make.

After that we went back to Antioch for gymnastics. There were so many parents there this week in the waiting room that I didn't even have a place to sit. I had only brought a book and a magazine to read and I ended up sitting on the floor reading my book instead of reading in a chair because I didn't have room.

Thursday was Valentine's Day and Grace had preschool. At school she had a Valentine's party. Grace was excited about "Valentime's" Day this year; that's what she calls it. This was also our last day at home before leaving on vacation. So throughout the day I was starting to get things ready for vacation, but most of our preparation was at night. We both went to bed late after getting almost everything ready for Friday.

Friday we finished getting things ready and brought it all downstairs but then weren't sure if we were going to even go. Grace was coughing and didn't really feel very good. Obviously in the end we decided to go, but for most of the weekend she didn't feel very good. So with the decision made I loaded up the car (albeit a little late after making the decision to go) and we ran up to Julie's sisters house and picked up our niece.

After that we all went to the Chicago Auto Show. I don't have any of the pictures ready to show you yet, but overall it wasn't so exciting. There were some good cars there to see, but for the most part it was just another auto show. I made sure I saw the Audi R8 which was really cool. It's an exciting car and looks really nice. Wish I had a spare $120,000 to just throw away to purchase one. Ha-ha.

With our late start we got to the auto show late and likewise left a little late from there as well. So we ended up driving later up to where Julie's brother lives and we ended up getting there sometime after dark. So we didn't even "see" the house until the next morning. On Saturday we went to a winter festival just a short drive from their house at a local resort. It was pretty cool even though I didn't get to go on a horse draw carriage ride. Grace and Julie and our niece all got to go on a snowmobile ride. Grace got to go on a pony ride and we watched a cherry pie eating contest. It was about that time that Grace decided that she just didn't feel well enough to be out there anymore so we headed out to go back to Julie's brother's house.

Speaking of the house it is really nice and quite large - larger than our house. I especially liked the yard - quite large and a nice neighborhood too from what we could see. Obviously since it's winter people are just like they are around here - you only come outside for brief periods. Most people you just don't really see in the wintertime until it starts to warm up in the spring.

Saturday also happened to be their daughter's first birthday so we were lucky to be able to enjoy the celebration with her. She's really cute and fun and puts up with her brothers quite well too. So after a day outside we had a nice party inside with a huge meal, a great cake that our niece wasn't sure what to do with at first and great times. I was especially enjoying the movie selection that the boys were watching. Not movies that Grace would normally watch, but for some reason while it was on there, no complaints. If we turned on those movies here - most movies really she complains. I'm not sure why that is but she'd rather watch a 30 minute program on TV than to watch a movie. That's why we don't really buy her any movies anymore because she doesn't really like to watch them.

Sunday we were heading down to see my Grandpa in Grand Haven and isn't it our great luck that it was freezing rain. It was pretty bad up there in the morning before we left with about an inch of ice on the ground. It was an ice skating rink in the driveway and getting the luggage into the car wasn't so easy, but I managed and it was actually warming up outside so the ice was coming off the car as I was filling it with all of our stuff.

Then after we got on the road (late again but mostly because of the weather this time) the further south we got the better the roads were. We made it down to Grand Haven before dinner and stopped to get our condo rented before heading over to see Grandpa. He decided to join us for the night as well and we headed out to get some dinner on the way back to the condo. We spent the evening talking and enjoying the really nice condo we rented and then finally to bed for the night. Grace got to sleep up in a loft that actually has a loft. So there is the loft upstairs where almost all of us slept but then there is a ladder up to another loft that Grace just had to sleep in. It worked out pretty good, but I think Julie and I would have been more comfortable up there instead of where we actually slept, but I was so tired it didn't really matter.

I wish we could have spent more time there, especially visiting with Grandpa, but we needed to get home because Grace and our niece had school the next day. And actually our niece had dance class that night. This trip was truly uneventful and we ended up getting home a little earlier than we planned. The next two days Julie had taken off work so we could do things around the house. So since my laptop's touchpad hadn't worked in some time and I finally had the opportunity to take it in for repair I did that on Tuesday morning.

This would explain why I haven't posted this blog until now. I took my laptop in and they kept it until Saturday the 8th of March. That's about two and a half weeks. The problem wasn't really the touchpad at all, it was the motherboard where the touchpad connects. So they had to order a new motherboard and it was backordered and so I had to wait that long to get my laptop back. I really missed it! Especially since I didn't have a desktop computer either. I was computer-less for several days.

But then President's day sales occurred and I was able to finally get my desktop computer, which is incredible! It's so nice to have a computer again. Especially after having nothing for a week or so. I suppose I could have timed that better, but I didn't, oh well. Only the strong survive right? ha-ha.

So anyway, back to what I was talking about. That was Tuesday that I took my laptop in and then on Friday Cubs tickets went on sale. Grace and I are going to two games by ourselves this year. Plus one with Mom (Julie) and one with my Dad (up in Milwaukee.) So all total we'll get to see four games this year. Any more and we'd have to start selling things on eBay (actually I've been selling some things anyway.)

Then the next morning my sister had her baby - April Josephine. She was 9 lbs and all cheeks - very cute! Then next day was the Oscars. I have to say that I thought they were pretty good. Especially considering the writers strike but I've heard many people saying how they feel the Oscars are just old and aren't really needed anymore. Obviously I disagree since I like them so much (and we're decorating our family room with that theme.)

Anyway, the next week we were busy again as usual but nothing out of the ordinary if I recall. We did have another village board meeting on Tuesday but it was much more civil than the previous one. I have to say though that there are some unhappy people in this town. That's all I'm saying.

Really nothing else happening that was out of the ordinary until this last Sunday, the 2nd. Julie had put a load of laundry in the washing machine and started it as we were leaving for church. When we came home from church, the machine said it was spinning, but it clearly wasn't. It was broken, and lucky for us (great planning) we let our extended service agreement lapse almost a year ago. So we had no way of getting if fixed under any warranty. I called Sears repair and they were able to come out on Tuesday. He reaffirmed our fears that it was pretty much dead in the water and that he personally would buy a new one considering the steep repair costs on this one.

So I set out to determine which washing machine would be the best for us and I thought I had it all figured out, but the guys at Best Buy helped us out a little and we ended up getting the Whirlpool Duet Steam washing machine. They delivered it on Friday the 7th. Best Buy was great (found out our neighbor went with them the last time he needed a washer too.) They matched the price of a local company which was at least $200 less than their sale price and they got it out to our house first thing the next morning. Plus one of the delivery guys found my keys that I lost outside snow blowing.

I've been purposefully not mentioning this for fear that someone would find them before we did, but one time when we got over a foot of snow and I was out snow blowing, I had done the walkway out to the driveway, and then moved our cars out to the street so I could get the driveway done. Usually after having done that, I put the keys in my jacket pocket and zip it up to prevent them from falling out. When I was done snow blowing I went to get the keys to Julie's car out but they were gone as I had forgotten to zip up my pocket.

We rented a metal detector, looked every time the snow melted (it still hasn't completely melted) and still we had not found them. That's why we changed the locks on the house because we weren't sure if someone else had taken them after finding them in the snow or something. Well, the one guy is finishing the hookup for our new washer and the other guy is bringing in the drawer that goes underneath it and comes in carrying these rusty keys asking if we had dropped them. What a revelation! What a day! I took the rusty key rings off and cleaned everything up. The inside of the remote wasn't even wet after all that time in a snow bank-amazing. The remote still works and we have our peace of mind again. I'll definitely be more careful about that zipper when snow blowing!

So the universe is now back as it should be because the next day CDW called to say my laptop was ready! I've had my laptop now for almost two days and it's just nice to have it back. So now I finally have a desktop computer again (after two months), my laptop works again and the keys to Julie's car have been found. Ahhhhhhh, so this is calmness and peace in the universe.

Now tomorrow Grace goes to see her pediatric ophthalmologist to see how her eyes are doing four months after her surgery. Then we have to hoof it home because she has preschool story time at the local library shortly after that. I'm going to try to get to the doctor's office early so that will hopefully help with the time constraint.

Then Tuesday is preschool, but in the evening she has Kindergarten registration. I think she's getting excited about kindergarten already. Her and Julie were pretending to be riding the bus tonight as I was cooking dinner. Actually Julie was driving. So I think there are a few things I need to procure so that Grace can go to school. I have some things, but they need things like her original birth certificate which we don't have or can't find. Neither of us really remember getting the actual certificate, just what the hospital gives you when she's born that you basically fill out yourself.

So while Grace is in preschool I'll try to get some of those things and see if we can't get her all set on Tuesday for the fall. There is a village board meeting on Tuesday also, and then the Chicago Flower and Garden show is going on right now too. I've been wanting to go to this for several years and have never made it. Maybe Grace and I will be able to go by Sunday which is the last day. We'll just have to see how everything goes this week. It should be jam-packed as usual.

Alright, I'll stop rambling. Sorry for making this such a long post but I just haven't been able to write for some time now.

Getting somewhere

2008-02-09T23:48:00.000-06:00

Friday turned out pretty good as Grace was able to go to school; we weren't sure at first because she was coughing and was sneezing too. But when it was time to go, she was up to it which was great news for me as I needed to get out of the house; I hadn't left the house since Tuesday. This gave me time to go to my favorite home improvement store...all together now...Lowe's! More miscellaneous stuff for the family room.

After that I picked Grace up from school and we ran a few errands on the way to the chiropractor. I really needed to go there as I had slipped off the couch while working on the lights in the family room and I had been a little sore for a few days. The chiropractor was really busy; we always go on kids day because Grace is free. But normally when we go there is hardly anyone else there. This time we had to wait quite a while before we were seen. This gave Grace plenty of time to get more toys out and befriend everyone. She was really cute; she took a stuffed turtle and was walking around to the staff members saying "Hi, I'm Mzee." She was referring to a story we had read from the library about a hippo named Owen that had gotten washed away to sea somewhere in Africa I think. After he was finally rescued, he was taken to a zoo and put in an enclosure with a turtle named Mzee that really didn't like anyone else except his handler. After a few days, they were best friends and have been inseparable ever since. Anyway she loves that story and every turtle she finds or sees is suddenly Mzee.

After getting McDonald's on the way home, we pretty much just vegged out for the rest of the day.

Today was a good day too. We sold our weight bench on eBay and the buyer was coming today to pick it up. He was supposed to come around 11 am, but for some reason he didn't come until around 4:15 pm. I got up kind of early to move the weight bench from the basement upstairs to the living room. Then I was doing projects around the house. I got the cabling completed for two of the satellite lines that come in from the roof. They both now come in the attic and down through the wall into the distribution box and then through the walls again over to the TV. Before, one of them went from the attic over to a wall and down into the family room, but then the cable was wrapped around the room to get to the TV. The other went from the attic all the way across the house and then back through the basement to the family room, but across the room from the TV, so it was wrapped around the room too. So both cables are considerably shorter now plus they aren't on the floor anymore. I still need to fix the cable that goes to the other satellite receiver. It's our HDTV receiver and they installed it later and instead of running the cable through the house at all, they wrapped it around the house and brought it in behind the TV. So I need to bring this cable in from outside into the attic and that'll be another so many yards of cabling gone from our view.

So anyway I was hooking these wires up today which was thankfully easy. I mentioned that I ran the wires up to the attic the other day and then it was as easy as connecting the wires coming in from the satellite dish to these wires today. Luckily I had no problems at all. Next (besides the HDTV cable) I need to finish running the wires out to the garage; I've already run them into the attic of the garage and now they just need to be brought through the wall to a box where I can connect everything. My uncle is going to help me run a 220 line out to the garage to install a sub-panel out there. That way we'll have plenty of electricity to run the power tools and everything else. That will be really nice. The electrical situation in the garage is entirely inadequate.

After this we can concentrate on other areas of the house. But that will only be after we're actually done with the family room remodel. We still have quite a ways to go before we're done with that.

After that I was fixing the driveway since I had received complaints from a certain family member about it's condition. After we got all that snow a few days ago, I had cleared the driveway but then when the snowplows come by they just push the snow from the street onto the end of the driveway. Since I didn't remove that snow in a timely fashion after they put it there, it had frozen into a huge chunk of ice. So I spent a couple of hours chipping away at it with the ice chipper and then using the snow blower to remove the chunks of ice from the driveway and street. I'm guessing the post office was down a few mail carriers today as the mail didn't come until 5 pm or so. Usually it's not later than Noon or so and it wasn't our normal carrier either.

After that I relaxed for a while and then we had dinner at Applebee's. Grace was really good there. She ate her meal and was good and was listening. That's even bigger considering we went so late. We didn't get home until after 8:30 which is after her bed time.

Tomorrow it's a birthday party for our nephew. After that I'll keep working on the family room...

Thirteen and a half inches

2008-02-07T22:58:00.000-06:00

We got a wallop of a snowstorm yesterday that dumped 13 1/2 additional inches on us. Thank goodness we have a big snowblower because it's just a lot of snow! Julie didn't go to work yesterday and Grace didn't have dance class. We're not sure if she had gymnastics or not, but she didn't go; It wasn't worth the effort.

We had a fun day though since we all spent the day together. It felt like vacation almost, except we were just at home. And we didn't feel like leaving the house either. So it was mostly a family day and I again didn't get much done around the house, but I did a few things.

Today the girls from across the street spent the day with us as their babysitter was sick. So Grace stayed home from school and the four of us just hung out. Again I got a few things done, but not much. A couple of things here and there. We played out in the snow for quite a while and I finally started building an igloo. Wow is it a lot of work and I'm not done, but it's really cool. Hopefully I can finish it before anything happens to it like some kids coming and knocking it down or something.

Let it Snow

2008-02-05T22:13:00.000-06:00

Grace was much happier today. She slept in a little and we were a few minutes late for school but she was pretty darned happy. While she was in school I ran and voted and then went to Target for a quick grocery shopping trip. After I picked her up we went to get some vitamins and then to get one thing from a regular grocery store that Target didn't have.

We brought lunch home with us and ate real quick before going outside to play in the snow. Then we watched a little TV before going back outside to play in the snow again when it started to snow. Then our neighbor "A" came home on the bus and she asked or maybe Grace asked if she could play over at their house. So while she was over there I did a super quick snow-blowing and then ran to church to pick up our Market Day order.

After that we waited for Julie to make it home from work. It took her over two hours with the snow and rain and traffic. Plus then she stopped to vote on the way home so she wasn't home until after 7 pm. We had dinner and then Grace was happier than ever - she was running around and singing and just having a great time. It's amazing what a day (and a night of sleep) can do for one's attitude.

Tomorrow is supposed to be Grace's dance class and gymnastics class. We're also supposed to get eight to fourteen inches of snow by tomorrow evening. For how the roads were tonight, the schools are already talking about canceling school tomorrow. So there is a possibility that Grace's dance class will be canceled too. She'll probably still have gymnastics because it's so late in the day anyway. So tomorrow is up in the air, but worst case, we don't get to go to dance class is my best guess.

I read today that my favorite "museum" downtown is closing for about a year for renovations. It's the Oceanarium part of the Shedd Aquarium that is closing in September until sometime in mid-2009. They are shipping/lending out most of the animals/mammals that are there while the exhibit is closed. So we'll have to be sure and go to the Oceanarium this summer before they close it.

I didn't get anything on my list done today as I spent my time at the grocery store and outside mostly today. So hopefully tomorrow will bring a little more time to do a few things on the list.

Lights On

2008-02-04T19:39:00.000-06:00

My uncle came over yesterday and my neighbor also stopped over and between the three of us we got all the lights wired and working. So now we can actually see down here in our family room - it's kind of strange. We've just had these two table lamps for years. Now we have more light than we know what to do with. We installed two switches: one for the main lights and one for the accent lights. We're decorating this room like the Academy Awards/Kodak Theatre and we have the posters from the Academy Awards on the wall and the accent lights are lighting these up.

Here are the main lights:

Here are the accent lights:

And here are all of the lights together:

Now there are just a few things to finish up before we can re-drywall the ceiling:
1. Replacing the downstairs bathroom vent fan ducting (currently flexible ducting) with solid ducting. This ducting goes through the ceiling in the family room on it's way outside.
2. Fixing one of the heating and air conditioning vents; when the builder installed this vent, it didn't have a place to screw one side in so they just kind of shoved the screw between the joist and the vent and hoped it would stay up there.
3. Running a little more speaker wire to the back of the room so that when I'm able to upgrade to a 7.1 speaker system, it will be easier to hook it up.
4. Closing in the open area between the kitchen and the family room (we're doing this so that we have room for more cabinets in our fairly small kitchen.)
5. Plus I'm sure there are other things I'm forgetting and other things that will probably come up.

When we were done working and I had finished cleaning everything up it was time for the super bowl so just the three of us watched. Actually Grace and Julie weren't really into it so much, but I was watching. I wanted the Giants of New York to win because they were so bad last year and they just had an incredible year this year and as most people are, I like to see the underdog win. But I also wanted the Patriots to win because then the '72 Dolphins wouldn't be celebrating any more about having the only perfect season. So basically it didn't really matter to me; I don't really like the Patriots and was just hoping for a good game. In the end it turned out to be an exciting game, but there were a few quarters there (the second and third) where it wasn't so exciting. I read today where this was the most watched super bowl ever. I'm guessing it's mostly because of the Patriots bid for a perfect season more than anything, but I think it was touted as that it was going to be a good game. I'm sure that helped with ratings as well.

Today Grace and I slept in (she really needed that extra sleep) and then we went to Panera Bread for breakfast. After that we ran over to Lowe's (my new favorite home improvement store) and got some of the supplies to do the projects I mentioned above. But I have to tell you she was so cranky today. It was a challenging day. Lets hope tomorrow is better. Hopefully this is just fallout from not getting much sleep Saturday night when she was supposed to spend the night at her aunt and uncle's house. Tomorrow she has school so that should help too.

As an example of how today was, when Grace got up around 9 am, I told her to get dressed while I took a shower and then we could go to Panera Bread for breakfast. I got out of the shower and she was watching TV...in her pajamas. So I went out and started the car and wiped the snow off too. I came back in and she wasn't watching TV anymore, she was picking out a necklace to wear...in her pajamas. So after much discord we finally made it to the restaurant at 10 am. She was pretty good while we were out but returned to her cranky self when we came home.

If your state votes tomorrow (22 of them), please get out there and cast your vote! That's what our country is all about; every vote counts! So I'll be dropping Grace off at school and then running over to vote. After that I can work on the projects I listed above!

Have you heard about a rise in animals being given up to shelters or being abandoned because of foreclosures? It seems there has been a large increase in these animals being given up because their houses are being foreclosed upon and they can't take their animals with them. Speaking of foreclosures, there has been talk that this is similar to the depression from back in 1929 and the years afterward. But this doesn't even compare number wise to the devastation of the depression. Here are some facts to consider: "Back then, about half of all mortgage debt was in default. Unemployment had reached 25 percent, thousands of banks and savings and loans had failed and annual mortgage lending had fallen by some 80 percent. Similarly, new residential construction had dropped by 80 percent as well. By comparison, only 3 percent of all today's mortgages are labeled seriously delinquent, meaning roughly 1.5 million loans are 90 days past due or in foreclosure. In sheer numbers, that's a lot of troubled borrowers. But as a percentage of a much, much larger base than in the early 1930s, their number is relatively small." These quotes are from this article. I don't think we're anywhere near where we were then, but clearly regulators have let some things be swept under the rug that shouldn't have been.

Announced today was Microsoft's bid to purchase Yahoo!. That's scary. Yahoo needs to remain independent in my opinion. How will Google be able to search anything under Yahoo!/Microsoft control after that? I'm not sure how fair and open Microsoft would be in that situation. They hate Google and the fact that Google is a more popular search option than MSN is. Plus something else I read today is even scarier than that; Yahoo! openly supports open-source software development. Why would Microsoft continue that? And how would Yahoo!'s purchase of Zimbra fare as an open-source competitor to Outlook? This is just not right. I would be very sad if this happens. Hopefully something will happen to stop this or find someone else to take over Yahoo!.

Ground Hog Day

2008-02-02T23:01:00.000-06:00

We took a break today and sent Grace to her Aunt's house and set out to enjoy a little time together. We had dinner at PF Changs in Schaumburg and then saw the movie "Juno." Dinner was incredible; I've never eaten there before and Julie has only had an appetizer before for lunch. We had the calamari for an appetizer, Julie had Kung Pao Scallops and I had Crunchy Honey Shrimp. All the food was just great. I also tried the Johannesburg Riesling wine from Hogue Cellars. They are our favorite Riesling right now, but we've never tried this particular varietal (sounds official huh?) of Riesling from them. Wow was it good! Highly recommended! Our usual favorite is the Late Harvest Riesling.

So we had a great dinner and then we saw Juno. Not sure if you've seen it, but we loved it. It was funny and fun and heartwarming. There were lots of good lines and it was really good. Here's one: "Well, honey, doctors are sadists who like to play God and watch lesser people scream." The movie is about a 16-year old girl who finally has sex with this boy that she toys with and gets pregnant and then the ensuing issues that follow. There were many good performances in this movie. I have to say Juno herself was very well played - Ellen Page played Juno. Her father (JK Simmons) was a great character too although he didn't have a huge role throughout the entire movie, Juno is the real star of the movie. Her step-mother (Allison Janney) is just hilarious; she played the part really well and I liked her too. Here's another line: "There's no guarantee they'll do a better job raising this child than my dumbass step-daughter will." And OK, just one more: Vanessa: "Your parents are probably wondering where you are." Juno: "Nah... I mean, I'm already pregnant, so what other kind of shenanigans could I get into?"

Then we came home and got a call that Grace wanted to come home so Auntie just brought her home a few minutes ago and now she's sleeping here. This has never happened before; she's always happy spending time over there. We're guessing she was just overtired and couldn't get to sleep.

Tomorrow my Uncle is coming over to do the electrical work, so I can't wait for that. I'll write more tomorrow.

Snowy Day

2008-01-31T23:59:00.000-06:00

It snowed for most of the day today - it's still snowing now actually and it's supposed to snow until tomorrow afternoon. Fortunately we didn't really have many plans for today, just preschool. Grace got to bring her friend Kenny home for a play-date today. They had a great time together. I think he was a little out of his element since he didn't have all of his "boy" toys to play with, but they found lots of things to play and had fun.

She actually had a play-date at his house last week and they had a great time then too. I guess they are also the talk of preschool - the teachers have mentioned that they're pretty funny together. It was kind of funny today because he was playing with things he's never played with before I'm guessing and he was interested in trying them out but Grace has had them for a while and wasn't really interested in playing with them. So I had to try and guide her into playing with the things he wanted to play with. I suppose as they play together more that kind of stuff won't happen.

My Uncle was supposed to come over today and help with wiring the new recessed lights we're putting in but he got stuck at a job downtown and wasn't able to make it. Not wanting to make the whole day a wash I worked on finishing something I started some time ago (I know - big surprise I started something a long time ago and didn't finish it.) I worked on pulling low-voltage wires up into the attic from the distribution box. I pulled wires from here through the office and into the family room in a channel I cut into the ledge in the office and family room just before I built the bookcases in the office. So those wires are embedded in the ledge forever.

Now those were only part of the wiring scheme I had thought up to get the house completely wired behind the walls. The satellite cables coming from the roof end up going everywhere to get to the TV's in the house. I pulled all of those cables from the distribution box to the TV in the family room originally before building the bookcases. Now today I pulled those cables from the distribution box up into the attic right by where they come in from the satellite dishes. So now I should just be able to connect them in both places and have everything work like I wanted--behind the walls instead of being wrapped around the house and/or wrapped around the room.

So I got those cables pulled and then pulled a couple of Cat 5 network cables out to the garage so I can have both internet and telephone out there. I'll pull a video cable out there too just to even everything out (so that all of my options are covered.)

Alright, I've got to get some sleep.

Wow am I behind

2008-01-27T22:21:00.000-06:00

Sorry to everyone that has been looking for updates. We've been busy and I just haven't taken the time to send anything out.

Where to start...December was a whirlwind. We had Christmas Eve at our house for Julie's family and then Christmas day at my Aunt's house for my side of the family. Then a few days later we had dinner at my Sister's new house. As predicted by Santa Grace didn't get her Butterscotch Pony from Toy's R Us. But she did get her two-wheeled scooter that she asked for as well as many other things. She wasn't upset about it but she didn't seem very excited about anything on Christmas morning except the scooter.

For new years we just rented some movies and had a family movie night that we're still doing once a week. I think Grace really enjoys it. But we've made it through most of her favorite movies already so it will be interesting to see what she picks out the next time.

I started a Yahoo group for our town - Hainesville. So I won't be posting any meeting minutes here anymore as I'm sure most people reading this blog don't have much interest unless they live in Hainesville. And if you live in Hainesville you can join the Yahoo group to get that information still.

Grace had gone to Chuck E Cheese for a birthday party for a friend from her preschool class and we went back a couple weeks ago with the stay-at-home-dad's group. She had the best time. I just wish that she would try/eat the pizza especially since that's all they serve there. The pizza really is pretty good. All of us dad's had a good time talking and it was a good time. It's fun for me to see Grace having so much fun. Now if I could only find a way to get her to clean the house with that much enthusiasm...

Speaking of the house, I got the ceiling down (drywall) in the family room last week. Then over the weekend I took most of the screws out that were holding the drywall up and then today my uncle came over and we hung all the lights and started doing the wiring but then he had to go. He's coming back on Thursday (barring any changes of course) to help me finish the wiring.

Also this weekend I bought, put together, and installed a cabinet for the laundry room/closet. Here's a picture:

It isn't the biggest cabinet as far as space on the inside since we converted the center cabinet into a hanging area, but it cleaned up the top of the dryer substantially and just makes the whole laundry area work better and look better. This cabinet is from Lowe's. We finally got one in the area here; it's only 10 minutes from our house! Yea! I was counting down the days. I can't wait for their Grand Opening in March.

I'll be interested in seeing how the Menards and Home Depot's traffic are affected by the Lowe's being here now. I know my business will be moving over to the Lowe's instead. I just love that place.

Alright, I'd better post this and get to bed. I'll be posting more regularly now...even though I still don't have a PC. I will have pictures of the recessed lights soon...

We're still here

2007-12-29T13:49:00.000-06:00

I just wanted to put a quick message up letting everyone know that things are going good here. We've been super busy with the holidays and I've had some horrible issues with my computers. My main desktop computer went kaput last Saturday the 22nd. The motherboard doesn’t even post (doesn’t turn on.) Then while trying to transfer my “server” from a desktop case to a tower case it bit the big one too. So now all I’m left with is the laptop we bought this summer. We just purchased a cheap laptop to use for videos in the car if you’ll recall, so it isn’t going to hold up to much abuse, but at least I still have a computer that works and I can still access my email, etc.

We got the best snow yesterday. About three inches of really wet snow that is perfect for making snowmen and stuff like that. But I didn’t play in the snow because I was still diagnosing my two dead computers and trying to get them running. Julie and Grace made a snowman though. I wish we would get some more. I’m still dying to learn how to make an igloo. I got this igloo “brick” mold a few years ago and it supposedly makes it easy to make an igloo. I’ll have to at least try it with this nice snow and see how it holds up even if I can’t make an entire igloo.

That’s about all for now. I’ll write again soon as I should have some time to write coming up in the next week or two as we slowly get back into a “normal” routine. I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas (we did) and also hope you have a very Happy New Year.

Eye Doctor

2007-12-03T21:17:00.000-06:00

Grace had an appointment today for her one month follow up from her surgery. She was shy/afraid of the doctor again today for some reason. The appointment itself went just great - it actually couldn't have gone any better. Her eyesight in both eyes is 20/20 and both eyes are centered as they should be without being crossed (turned in.)

After that we stopped at Whole Foods in Deerfield on the way home. I love this store. They have the BEST salsa -- called Salsa Fresco -- but they are expensive. I wish it was cheaper but organic food costs more no matter where you buy it. After the grocery store we stopped at Egg Harbor Cafe in Lincolnshire for lunch. They have really good food! And their iced tea is spectacular; the black currant version is my favorite. Grace had the rainbow pancakes which it looked like had M & M's in them. She liked them but didn't eat much.

Then on the way home we stopped at the cemetery in Vernon Hills where my grandmother is buried. Unfortunately Grace never got to meet her. She would have absolutely loved Grace. But it's really because of her death back in 1989 that allowed Julie and I to meet. A few months after she passed on I moved up to the Chicago area to help my grandfather out and was hired at a bank in Libertyville where Julie just happened to work. God does work in mysterious ways. Anyway this was my grandma's favorite time of year; she just loved Christmas. I always think of her a lot during the Christmas season.

Speaking of the Christmas season we had an ice storm on Saturday. It started as an inch or two of snow and then ice to cover it up. It was a mess. Then it warmed up on Sunday into the 40's and rained. Unfortunately it didn't rain enough to get rid of all the snow/ice so I still had to shovel. And now it's cold again and it's supposed to stay cold. I don't mind if it's cold, I just wish it would make up it's mind to be cold or warm; which it looks like its going to be cold for a while now so no need for me to worry.

Hainesville Police Dept

2007-12-01T15:08:00.000-06:00

My observations of the Village of Hainesville Special Board Meeting today, December 1, 2007 at 11:00 a.m.

Here is the agenda:
A. Call to order by presiding officer
B. Pledge of Allegiance to flag
C. Roll Call
D. Establishment of quorum
E. Approval of Agenda
F. Discussion of Police Services
G. Advertising for consultants and/or staffing
H. Consideration and possible action on the conflict waiver
I. Letter agreement between Village of Round Lake Park and Village of Hainesville
J. Adjournment

This meeting was announced only 48 hours before the meeting occurred.

The Village Attorney of the month at this meeting was Paul Keller. Trustees Stilz III and Bonds were absent at the beginning of the meeting. Trustee Stilz III was just a few minutes late.

The Mayor began the meeting by stating that the purpose of this meeting is to explain that the relationship between Round Lake Park (RLP) and Hainesville for police services has been officially terminated as of November 13. The final day they will provide police service for our town is February 10, 2008. He also stated "there will be no public comment allowed during this meeting; only after the meeting has adjourned...you are free to voice your opinion but not at this meeting."

This spurned a great deal of disdain among the residents whom were in attendance. Most people in attendance started yelling that the Mayor and the trustees had already made the decision concerning the items on the agenda -– more specifically agenda item number "F" about Police Services. The general theme was that this meeting was called merely to inform us what decision had been made and the public will have no say in it. Some details of the decision being yelled out were that the initial startup costs for the village having their own police force would be around $2 million with annual costs going forward of $1.5 million per year. The other general theme being shouted out was why the public was even invited considering we had no input.

On a personal note, I didn’t know why we were there considering we had no chance for interaction or input concerning the agenda items. I would have preferred to stay home and have the board meet in private and just provide minutes from the meeting for us to review later. I could have been home putting up my Christmas lights before the snow started to fall instead of wasting my time listening to the officials I elected tell me how they plan to spend the money I haven’t earned yet on a situation while granted, it is imminent, it isn’t occurring today.

Because the Mayor had such uproar in the Council Chamber and since he wasn’t intending to allow any public comment, he first asked the trustees if they wanted to allow public comment. This blew up however and actually made the situation worse. The Mayor thus forth called the very police department we’re running out of town to "restore order" to the meeting so he could carry on with the meeting as he had intended.

After the police arrived and after some more yelling occurred and some people were escorted out of the council chamber as well as many people just getting up and walking out, the meeting went forward as scheduled. There was a point where if any resident said anything they were escorted out of the council chambers.

Again on a personal note, I thought all of us should have walked out but I really wanted to hear what they had to say since I’m not privy to all the behind the scenes discussions (read: executive sessions.) All I know about what’s happening in my town is what is listed on the agenda. All I knew about today’s meeting was the actual words on the agenda (discussion of police services.) I had no idea prior to the meeting finally getting under way that the meeting was about how we will no longer have a police force on February 10 and that the Mayor wants permission to start interviewing candidates for police chief of Hainesville for the resume’s he already has because they’ve already started advertising for the position. And I had no idea that the village was already planning to acquire police vehicles from Round Lake Beach (RLB) to be used for our future police department.

Moving on, the meeting began quietly since most residents in attendance had left. The Mayor began by stating that there is a difference of opinion between RLP and Hainesville regarding police service and the problem has no resolution. We hope to have our own police department and the RLB Police Chief Larson is providing significant consultation and help for us to undergo this endeavor. We possibly plan to acquire two police vehicles from RLB – possibly for free. These vehicles were going to be sent to auction. Our current EMA vehicle has been stripped of its decals and is ready to be repainted and used as a community service vehicle. We plan to hire a police chief which will be coordinated through Chief Larson. The Mayor will select the chief of police and the trustees will approve the selection. He is here today asking the board for approval to interview and hire a chief of police. This motion was approved by the board.

Georgeann Duberstein interrupted asking if this was a legal village board meeting considering the facts surrounding how the meeting was announced and the fact that the public has been given no chance to express their opinion. Kathy Metzler the village clerk says she announced the meeting in the same manner she always does and that it was announced 48 hours ahead of time which is the requirement. The lawyer concurred also stating that the public doesn’t have to be allowed time to comment.

The Mayor opened up this subject for discussion among the trustees. Trustee Walkington asks if we begin interviewing candidates for chief of police is the village obligated to then go ahead and have our own police department. The lawyer responded that by approving this motion today we are creating a new chapter in the village code creating a police chief position and the entire hierarchy involved with a police department as well as establishing procedures for selection and establishment of other officers for the police force. After hiring a chief of police the village will then be bound to the terms agreed to in the contract used in the hiring process as he/she is appointed through the employment agreement unless the board votes to remove the police chief from their position. So basically the village would not be bound to have their own department but he hasn’t heard of a case where a village interviews and hires a chief and then doesn’t follow through with creating a police department of their own.

Gary responded that he was under the belief that this was only intended as a temporary measure at most and that we were still exploring other options. Trustee Stilz III asked whose decision it would be to not go forward in creating our own police force. Mayor replied that it would be all of the trustee’s decision. Wally asked what happened to asking neighboring villages how much they would charge to provide police service to our village. Mayor replied that RLB is assisting us now in setting up a new police force but that they don’t have the staff to support us. Other villages don’t want to take over but would assist like RLP is now. Wally said he thought in executive session that the decision was made to investigate the village’s options not to move forward with creating a police force. Mayor replied that he thought everyone was in agreement to severe agreement with RLP and create a new police force. He then addressed the entire board in asking "what do we want to do?"

Wally states that the next meeting is Tuesday, December 11 and we should put this on the agenda and let the public speak their opinion. Trustee Tiffany states that he would hate to make any decision in haste and doesn’t want to burn any bridges. Trustee Gottsacker says we should do this in the interim and look at options. We need a backup plan when the safety of the public is at question. Mayor says Chief Larson will assist the interim chief after being hired in getting up to speed. Wally says he still wants to see other options. He isn’t turning anything down, but that he’s not convinced this is our best option since he hasn’t seen any other options presented.

Trustee Barrett says he talked with Grayslake Police Department and they don’t have the man power. He talked to Round Lake and they are losing 4 officers to attrition by February and wouldn’t have the staffing either. Lake County Sheriffs department he said isn’t cost effective. The only thing that really makes sense is to create our own police force.

At this point a Lake County Sheriffs Department worker stood up and said that she works for the department and that no one has contacted them in regards to this at all. She said that the Illinois State Statute requires the Sheriffs department to provide service if needed. She was quite upset with everything (false) being said about Sheriffs department slow response time and also that if an arrest was made that it would take the officer on duty out of the area as they would have to take the perpetrator to Waukegan where the Lake County Jail is located. She was summarily escorted out of the chamber.

Mayor says that in 2006 there were 3,002 calls to the police department (not sure if I wrote that number down right, but that’s what I thought I heard.) Wally is complaining that he doesn’t have enough information to make a decision. Georgeann begins to distribute information I believe regarding Lake County Sheriffs Department. The Mayor says that she’s not allowed to do this. She replies that she isn’t speaking as she’s been requested not to do. He orders her to be removed from the chamber as well.

Wally says he has said all he can say -– that you (the Mayor) should just do what you want to do. He then leaves the meeting after discussion of this agenda item was complete.

Since this agenda item has already been approved, they moved on to the next agenda item (I think) which was in regards to acquiring older police vehicles from RLB. These would be considered interim police cars. They were originally intended to be put up for auction. We should be able to acquire them for a low fee at most. Trustee Barrett says that at auction recently 2004 Crown Victoria was going for approximately $4,700 plus taxes, fees, etc. making it over $5,000 for the vehicle. Trustee Gottsacker says that he doesn’t believe legally they can sell it to us for more than $1 considering it’s from one local government to another and that taxpayer dollars have already paid for the vehicles once.

Mayor is looking for motion to proceed with acquiring these two vehicles. Motion is approved pending RLB’s meeting on Monday, December 3 where they will determine if they will sell the vehicles to us for sure and how much they are intending to charge us. And also pending any other decisions regarding starting our own police force (ie: if we decide to not pursue our own department that we also don’t need to pursue purchasing these vehicles.)

Next agenda item is the fact that our attorneys represent our village and also the Village of Round Lake Beach whom we are now entering into association with in regards to helping us with our police department. This agreement between RLB and Hainesville states that both municipalities are aware of this and that in the event that a conflict of interest exists they will notify both villages and they can seek council from another firm. Motion is approved pending RLB approving as well.

Last agenda item is in regards to the fact that RLP and Hainesville don’t agree with the amount due RLP for police services. This billing dispute is under litigation and RLP’s attorney advised the Mayor of RLP to not accept/cash the check as this would signify their agreement with us paying only this portion of the bill. The agreement now before the board is stating that the amount due is still in dispute pending litigation but they will take the money being offered (so they have the income.) Motion is passed.

Now the Mayor opens up the meeting for public comment. He allows Georgeann to address the board (and return to the chamber as she had been escorted out.) She is the only one to address the board and says when she was running for trustee at the last election she personally investigated using the Lake County Sheriffs Department by going there and talking to someone there about it for an hour. Their fee was higher than that which RLP was charging monthly but that overall costs would be considerably less than starting our own department. Please don’t just jump into this without considering all the options available to the village. After this the meeting was adjourned.

There was originally one reporter present at the meeting from the Round Lake Journal. He will hopefully publish a detailed report this week. During the meeting another reporter showed up with a camera and took several pictures. She didn’t stay too long, but she did take several pictures. I only wish I had my video camera. I really think all the residents should see our board meetings in person. You can’t begin to understand what really goes on unless you’re there. They can be very intense as this one obviously was considering the police were called. I’m still not convinced it’s legal to force someone to leave a public meeting involving village business, but the lawyer was advising the Mayor to do as such and the police were carrying out those instructions without question.

My questions would be what the villages intentions are in regards to a police department building considering the old Hainesville Police building was in the old village hall building as far as I know. And I don't believe that building can be used because of asbestos. And what jail would our new police department use considering we don't have a jail either.

Douglas Raul Williams who also ran for trustee at the last election was handing out fliers for his run for Lake County Board. He asked me to include the following information:

www.douglasraulwilliams.com
citizensfordouglasraulwilliams@yahoo.com
Democratic Candidate for Lake County Board of 16th District

> Tax relief for homeowners by proposing a cap on property assessments
> Improve senior citizen property tax exemptions
> Restore funding to Lake County Metropolitan Enforcement Group (MEG) for gang/drug units
> Improve Lake County Court case management system to relieve overcrowding in the County Jail

Only 28 days

2007-11-27T22:45:00.000-06:00

...until Christmas. Can you believe it? I suppose we should really start working on purchasing all of our gifts. We got our tree this last weekend. We went to a new place in Lake Villa called Gengel's Tree Farm. The tree we picked out was taller than we had intended to buy. Usually I want a really tall tree that goes as close to the ceiling as is possible. But to be quite honest it just makes it more difficult to decorate. You have to use a ladder and it takes more time and effort than if the tree were shorter. So we went to buy the tree with the intention of getting an 8' tree and the one we picked out didn't look so tall but when we got it home, it's at least 9'; so maybe next year we'll get a shorter one.

Our Thanksgiving was really good. The turkey I cooked on the grill came out REALLY good. I think it's the best one I've ever made. Then on (black) Friday I went out shopping early in the morning. I was waiting in line at Circuit City at 3:15 am waiting for them to open at 5 am. It was 20 degrees outside and I was number 172 in line at that time. By the time they opened there was six or seven hundred people waiting. I was able to go in and get everything I wanted. I got an LCD monitor (Merry Christmas to me!) Then I went across the street to the Staples and waited in line there as they didn't open until 6 am. I got everything I wanted there too including a new 400 Gb hard drive for only $60. That's about half price. The monitor I got was almost half price too.

So I saved a lot of money but most of what I bought was for myself. Is that selfish? Probably, but it sure was fun. And I love my new monitor. The only thing I haven't figured out yet is how to get the screen resolution to stay. Every time I reboot my computer it defaults to 1024 x 768 and I have to change it to 1680 x 1050 every day. It's annoying; granted I have a new monitor, but nonetheless annoying.

I got the grass mowed on Sunday after church and mostly before the Bears game. I ended up with 6+ yard waste bags full of grass and a lot of leaves. I don't know where the leaves come from in the front yard as we don't really have any trees - at least not mature ones. But I got them all cleaned up and the grass looks good. Now if I could just get the other things on my "outside" to-do list completed I might not dread spring so much. There isn't much left. I really need to dig up my dahlias as they will die in this cold weather we've been having.

The Bears actually won this weekend. I was really surprised after how they played in the first half, I almost wasn't going to watch the second half because there were other games on that looked good, but I started watching and they all the sudden were doing better so I stuck with them.

Grace is officially old enough (alright: tall and heavy enough) to be out of the car seat in Julie's car. So we got her a booster for my car and put the car seat from my car into Julie's. So now she has a few more freedoms in the car and since we just picked it up yesterday and used it for the first time today, I'm not sure how well this will actually go over with Grace. So far she can't do the buckle by herself and she's already discovering that she can move around more and reach things while she's in her seat. But at least she's getting in her seat quickly. That's one thing she does that drives me batty. She will get in the car in a normal amount of time but then she just stands (or sits) there and won't get in her seat. Same thing happens when we get where we were going; she just continues to sit in her seat and doesn't get out. It doesn't help us get places in a timely fashion I'll tell you that.

Did you hear about the safety from the Washington Redskins that they're telling us got shot during a home invasion yesterday? His name is Sean Taylor; and he was only 24 years old and he died today. Very sad. He was too young. Obviously they haven't released many details about the circumstances, but what they are saying is that it's related to a home invasion that occurred about a week ago and that I guess they broke in again and this time he was shot in the groin area and lost a lot of blood and they attempted to do surgery and save him but they couldn't. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the Redskins family as well as Sean's family.

That's about all for now. I hope you had a good Thanksgiving too.

Happy Thanksgiving

2007-11-22T14:59:00.000-06:00

A very Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family.

Here is how it looked outside this morning:

And here is the grill when I was about to start cooking the turkey:

And...Here is how the turkey looks now:

More Rain

2007-11-19T22:04:00.000-06:00

Our weekend was pretty good. Saturday was like a regular day as Julie was at a craft fair for her Stampin' Up business and to help her Mom out. Then on Sunday after church we headed over to the Farm Bureau for our family portraits. Since we have our insurance through Country Insurance we're members of the Farm Bureau and as a "perk" for belonging to it we get to have our portrait taken with no fees, a free 10x13 print and really good prices on extra prints. I'll post some of them when they come in on the 13th of December. Hopefully we'll have Grace's school pictures by then too.

The weather was supposed to be nice today so I had planned on doing a few things in the yard just to button everything up outside. But it wasn't so nice as it was drizzling all day long pretty much. So I never started working on that project at all. I never really started any projects today. There's something about a rainy day that makes you want to just sit around and relax. And both Grace and I took advantage of it.

Julie talked her Mom into letting us help out this year with the Thanksgiving meal for the family. We'll be cooking the turkey (on the grill), making the obligatory green bean casserole and either making or buying some rolls. I found a recipe for rolls that looks good but we could just buy them too; that would be even easier than a recipe that's easy to make.

Our neighbor that helped us out over the summer that I referred to as "A" had her tonsils taken out today. Everything went well and she'll be recovering over the next week. I didn't know this but a tonsillectomy is now an outpatient surgery. She went in the O.R. at 8:00 am and was home before 11:30 am; that's just amazing.

This afternoon Grace and I went over to her friends house up in Antioch and picked up the cookie dough we ordered through her preschool. I can't wait to try it. And then another friend brought over a pie we ordered through his school tonight so we're all set for desserts for a while.

I've actually been working on organizing the office. For those of you that have seen our office, you'll know it's desperately needed. I've only gone through a portion of it so far, but have thrown a lot out already. And last night I made my first homemade notepad. I got to thinking that I recycle a lot of paper from things I no longer need or things I try to print that don't print properly, etc. and that I could reuse that paper to make notepads. So I got all the stuff and last night I finally trimmed some of the paper I had been saving to size and put it all together in the clamp I made and glued it up. It turned out really well. If I had used plain and unused paper it would have looked like anything you can get in the store. I'm really excited how they turned out. Julie and I are going to work together and make some Christmas gifts related to this.

Village Board Meeting Update 11.13.2007

2007-11-17T12:03:00.000-06:00

I haven't been posting my observations and notes from the village board meetings lately. I thought I'd start to catch up on these by starting with the latest one which was just this last Tuesday the 13th. This meeting had the potential of being an "ugly" one as some of the topics up for discussion where controversial.

The meeting started right on time (as the Mayor was watching the clock waiting for 7 pm to start) and one trustee (Trustee Bonds) was absent.

Immediately upon the start of the meeting the Mayor said that he was moving the Executive Session up from the end of the meeting to the beginning of the meeting. So as soon as we started the meeting all of the residents were left alone while the Mayor and trustees all left for the executive chamber. This executive session was labeled as a discussion of imminent litigation.

It was short as they all returned within 5 minutes. Public discussion was next on the agenda and there was quite a bit of discussion this evening. First the Mayor acknowledged that our State Representative was in attendance tonight: Sandy Cole and Lake County Board Member Bob Powers. Then Georgeann Duberstein mentioned that the Great Age Club was taking collections especially toiletries for Winchester House in Libertyville.

Then the real public discussion began when Georgeann's husband George brought up item number J-5 from the agenda (A Resolution Calling for an Advisory Referendum to Determine whether the Village should provide Retirement Benefits to Long-Time Employees.) He was asking the Mayor for permission to talk about this topic when it came up in the meeting instead of at the beginning before any discussion among the trustees had occurred. The Mayor said no that he should talk now.

George went on to say that this is not a resolution that the residents have filed and whether or not the village will provide this to it's employees but that it's a tax that the residents (as tax payers) will be required to pay for and shouldn't be worded as such in the agenda. The plan (through IMRF) as it's laid out now obligates the village to permanently remain in the program they've selected to provide retirement benefits to its employees. This plan also requires that in the first year that the villages contribution would be approximately $20,000 and that this was essentially an unfunded mandate as we will never know in advance how much it will cost the tax payers. George has put up a resolution for the spring ballot (the Mayor verified it will be on the ballot and that representatives from IMRF will be at the December Village Board Meeting.) He also states that a 457(b) retirement plan is much better and the Mayor responded with "We will have our say" meaning the trustees, village employees and himself will have the final word on this issue.

Georgeann then got up again and stated that a misnomer has occurred (which is basically what George said) in that the village isn't being obligated, it's the residents that will end up paying for this retirement plan. She read from the IMRF brochure saying "who guarantees employees pension? - the tax payer." She asked the Mayor and the board to please look at other options as the referendum as stated doesn't have other options.

Douglas Raul Williams stood up and said he concurs with Georgeann.

Kelly Hensley (Treasurer) asked the villages lawyer Dirk if the retirement plan would show up on each residents tax bill as a separate line item. He said no it would not, it would just be included in whatever amount the village needs each year unless the village defaults (goes bankrupt) in which case it would show up as a line item because then it would be solely the residents responsibility.

The Mayor also states that village has the hardest working staff in the state probably and are entitled to this - its about time we did this.

Georgeann responded saying that isn't the issue. To the trustees: if you, having been elected by us, truly feel this is the right plan to implement you are askew. In the corporate world nearly every company has moved away from pension plans and towards 401(k) plans instead which is what a 457(b) plan is (just for municipal employees.) With the IMRF plan the village is permanently obligated to remain with that plan, it's not transferable for the employee even after terminating their employment with the municipality. Please consider other options.

The Mayor states we are investigating the 457(b) plan - but again they are entitled to whatever decision they make. This was the end of public discussion.

The Mayor started his report saying that on Monday the 26th that Kelly Hensley, Debbie Bonds and himself would be discussing a new contract with Veolia and that hopefully they would complete those negotiations before the December meeting.

He also gave an update on the bike path along Hainesville Rd. For the Avon portion between Washington St and the ball fields the bidding opens on November 27th. So it will obviously be done next year and the other portion from the ball fields south to Walgreens would occur next year as well.

Kathy Metzler (Clerk) said she's working on the village newsletter and needs articles from the trustees by the 27th.

Debbie Bonds (trustee - not present) is spearheading a Santa visit to the Village Hall on December 8th.

Kelly Hensley (Treasurer) said the audit's start has been delayed and will begin on Thursday the 15th.

Jeff Gately (Public Works) said there are approximately 60 homes left to convert from the old water meter reading system to the new wireless system. Hopes to set up appointments and complete this task by Thanksgiving.

Jeff also stated that a maintenance plan is being developed for the air relief valves to avoid any further problems with the sewer mains going into the Fox Lake Treatment Facility.

Marcia McCutchan (Engineer) said in regards to the MFT (road repaving and improvement throughout the village and along E Big Horn Dr) that the contractor is having difficulty with the landscaping sub-contractor and are finding a new one and it will be done before Thanksgiving.

Mark Gottsacker (trustee -> Public Safety Coor.) Georgeann wants an article in the newsletter.

Kelly Hensley (Treasurer) said in regards to the Tax Levy: An overall increase of 5.6% which is not per homeowner, this is the overall increase. Public hearing in regards to this will be December 11 with (hopefully) ordinance approval that night at the village board meeting. (approved resolution # R07-11-39)

Set of three ordinances in response to AT&T trying to avoid paying fees associated with the delivery of video by claiming they aren't a "cable" company and that their video service isn't delivered over "cable" lines (it's over fiber.) Basically these bills re-phrase the ordinances to state that any video delivery, regardless of delivery method, must provide a certain level of service to their customers. And also that they are obligated to pay any fees associated with the delivery of video just as any other company must. Approved ordinance #'s 07-11-86, 07-11-87 & 07-11-88.

For the "big question" resolution regarding retirement benefits all trustees unanimously decided to not include this resolution on the spring ballot basically stating that they need to explore all their options before jumping in especially since the IMRF plan is permanent. The Mayor stated "note to Georgeann: we will be looking into the 457(b) plan."

End of meeting - cake time celebrating everyone's birthday for this year. Cake was from Lovin' Oven Cakery in Round Lake with whipped cream frosting.

REI

2007-11-16T23:51:00.000-06:00

Grace woke up early today. I'm not sure why she's been doing this lately; it was 7 am today. She seems tired then for most of the day after she's gotten up early so I don't really understand, but there isn't much I can do about it either.

She had preschool today and then afterwards she was going to a friends house for a play date. That Mom picked her up from school so I had a few hours to myself. Unfortunately I talked for a while and then had to go back home and turn the Crockpot down because I accidentally left it on high and I only needed it on high for an hour, not most of the day. So I ran home and turned that down and then headed to Schaumburg.

Have you heard of the store REI? It's a cool outdoor store - they sell pretty much anything related to the outdoors. I've received their catalogs and shopped online at rei.com for years. And they've had stores kind of in the area but they were a long drive away. Now they have a new store in the town Julie works in so I drove down there and checked out the Grand Opening which today was the first day. I found some replacement gloves for myself since my gloves that I've been using have a hole in them. And I got Grace some new gloves too since she seems to outgrow everything for some reason. I also got a free t-shirt and nalgene bottle that both said Schaumburg Grand Opening on them. After that I picked Julie up and we went to lunch at Red Robin and then I came back home.

I had about an hour to do whatever I wanted since Grace was still at her play date, and I had planned on doing a little yard work since it wasn't too cold out and ALL of the leaves fell off the big box elder tree we have in our backyard last night because of a fairly hard frost (26 degrees.) But I ended up just relaxing for a while. It felt good, but now I have even more work to do this weekend.

So then I went and picked Grace up and we came home so I could finish making dinner. It was a good one: beef roast in the Crockpot with gravy, mashed potatoes and caramel apple pie for dessert. Unfortunately I didn't have time to make a vegetable but there was plenty of food.

We heard from our friends in Zimbabwe today and things aren't so great there. The electricity is out much more than it's on - if it's on at all. And that means they can't access the internet either. It's also hard to keep food fresh if the refrigerator isn't on.

So that was today in a nutshell. Tomorrow starts a weekend full of work around the house. Hopefully I can get a lot of those things crossed-off my to-do list.

Long Week

2007-11-15T23:03:00.000-06:00

It's been a long week this week. I'll be glad when the weekend gets here. I'm looking forward to relaxing - well not too much I guess. I need to start removing that ceiling in the family room. My brother-in-law stopped by tonight to tell me how to remove the ceiling so that we could put it back up the easiest. So I've got a lot of work ahead of me.

I didn't hear from my uncle so I'm not sure if he picked up the lights today or not. They were supposed to be ready to be picked up today. In fact I haven't talked to him since ordering the lights. I'm not even sure when he's available to help me put them in; hopefully soon as our ceiling will be missing soon! We're looking forward to getting this done not just so that we can begin working on other parts of the room, but also so that we'll be able to see in the room. It's always been a dark room with not enough light to see what you're reading.

Grace didn't do as well today as yesterday. She was happy this morning but she's usually quite happy in the morning anyway. Julie was home for a while this morning because she had a dentist appointment to go to before work. I think Grace was really happy that her Mom was home for a while this morning. Then after she had preschool her and I went to the car wash to clean my filthy dirty car. It looks so much nicer; you can actually tell that it's blue again. When the car was done and it was time to leave she started to have a breakdown because she wanted a candy bar instead of waiting for lunch. We already had a cookie while we were waiting for the car to be cleaned and then she wanted the candy bar too. I knew if she ate it she wouldn't eat her lunch.

She ended up coming home and having some of her halloween candy and she didn't really eat her lunch or dinner after that anyway. So I guess overall it didn't really matter, but I wasn't giving in. I'm thinking she'll be hungry for breakfast in the morning tomorrow.

Did you see today that Barry Bonds was indicted for lying under oath about taking steroids. I guess someone is finally getting caught. I hope more players that have used steroids get caught and have to pay the price. I have no sympathy for them as not only is it against the rules, but it's just generally wrong and it just tears your body apart. It's never worth it in my opinion.

I'll have to keep this short tonight as it's late and I'm too tired to stay up.

Can you believe it?

2007-11-14T20:41:00.000-06:00

Can you believe that Thanksgiving is only one week from tomorrow? Where has this year gone? And Christmas is only about a month away? Wow! Where does the time go? It's hard to believe and I'm not really ready for these holidays. I'm ready for the change in schedule (read: no schedule or obligations) but Christmas seems like it's coming up so quickly. I'm thinking we should decide what we're buying everyone for Christmas and we should start buying those gifts. I hate having to rush around last minute trying to buy things that aren't on the shelves anymore as everyone else has already bought them.

Unfortunately Grace has decided that what she wants is this half full-size pony from Toy's R Us that's $250 on sale; it's name is Butterscotch. She talks about it every day asking when she's going to get it, whether or not Santa is going to make it for her. It's really sweet, but it's just too expensive and quite honestly I don't know how long she'd really play with it; plus it's size is another factor we have to take into account as in where would we keep it in our house?

Grace is still doing really well behavior-wise. We've implemented this new reward chart where she gets check-marks for doing everyday things like listening or behaving on trips out of the house. And she's getting more and more check-marks and fewer X's since we implemented this new program. Hopefully this will help prevent any further craziness like we had at the end of last week. A little motivation to behave well; we'll see.

Grace and I had a fun time together at the library yesterday. I took her there after preschool. She was so excited not just because we were there (she really likes to go) but because she is now old enough to get her own library card. She thinks that's the coolest thing and is very proud of it. She can't wait to show her friend. Of course I had already checked out her books on my card, but she doesn't realize that.

The book I checked out was "Lone Survivor" by Marcus Luttrell. It's the story of (and by the) fire team leader whom was the sole survivor of Operation Redwing in Afghanistan and the desperate battle in the mountains that led to the largest loss in Navy SEAL history. I'm only on page 26 but I'm already hooked. He's a good conversational-type author and I like military books anyway. So I'm finding it very interesting.

The last book I checked out was "Hard Call" by Senator John McCain. It seemed like a good book but I just couldn't get into it and never got very far with it. Obviously I never finished it.

I'm also "reading" a book on CD right now called "3 Nights in August" by Buzz Bissinger. It's about St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony La Russa and is centered around a particular 3 game series against the Cubs. It's very good. The only thing that would make the CD better would be if Buzz Bissinger was reading it himself. I'm learning a lot about the Cubs by reading this book and a lot about baseball and baseball strategy too. Sometimes you take for granted what players are on your team especially since you watch them day in and day out. But listening to Tony La Russa's take on your team's players really sheds some light on them. I'm really glad I'm reading it. Unfortunately it's making me want to watch baseball again which just ended until March/April of next year.

Speaking of things on TV, have you heard about this church in Kansas (Westboro Baptist Church) that sends it's members (there are allegedly only 75 of them) to picket military funerals? They were picketing the funeral of the son of Albert Synder of York, Pennsylvania whose son was a Marine that died in Iraq. They were picketing at the cemetery holding up these signs and more that I didn't write down:
"Thank God for IED's"
"Thank God for Dead Soldiers"
"God is America's Terror"
"America is Doomed"
"You're Going to Hell"
"God Hates You"
"God Hates Fags"

I mean how cruel can people be? First of all aren't they supposed to be Christians? They call themselves "Baptist's" but aren't affiliated with any baptist organization. They are classified as a hate group and possibly a cult and are monitored by the Anti-Defamation League. They feel that every bad thing that has happened in this world is to blame on gay people and since there are some gay people in the military that the military shouldn't exist. The same goes for the government and everything else there is in America. Shouldn't they just move to another country? Clearly they don't like America as they state: "It's too late to pray for America. It's a sin to pray for America", and: "The hell with your flag. The hell with your fag army, your fag courts, your fag-run government".

Personally I think they should be forced out of the country but our laws state they can say anything they want so that will never happen. But I do think that no matter how they feel about the military or the government that they need to be kept at least a respectable distance from funerals out of respect for the people that are there who actually care about the person that has died. Obviously these people don't care about the person who died nor the people that are there mourning nor the country they live in for that matter. I think it's despicable and disgusting and I wish they would have to pay for what they are doing to these people as they are trying to mourn the loss of their loved ones whom just happen to be heroes in my opinion.

The court did award the family in this case $11 million but the church is appealing and I'm thinking it will probably be overturned mostly because of our guarantee of free speech. Plus the church is allegedly only worth about $1 million so the actual payment would probably never occur. However I truly hope and pray that this is not overturned and that this will stop. Let them picket and complain all they want in front of their own "church" but leave the good citizens of our country and our respectable members of the military alone.

Turn around

2007-11-12T22:46:00.000-06:00

Grace is back suddenly and surprisingly today; but of course quite welcomed. She acted completely normal today and we had a really good day except for at the doctor's office. We called Grace's friends from down the street this morning and they came over for a few hours to play. They tried to play outside for a while but the younger sister wasn't letting them do what they wanted to do so they all ended up coming back inside to play. After that we had a quick lunch and left for the doctor's office.

For her five year checkup she had to have her finger pricked for a cholesterol and hemoglobin test that bothered her a lot. She cried and cried and said how much it hurt. This is the type of prick you would give yourself every day if you were a diabetic; a simple tiny needle that barely breaks the skin. She of course was practically bleeding profusely. The nurse only needed a couple of drops and it was running down her finger; and Grace was horrified. I'm not sure if it was more the sight of the blood or the pain. But her cholesterol is 187 I think which seems high but the doctor says is fine as long as it's below 200 for her age. Hemoglobin was 4.6? I don't really remember the number but I do know that her level was fine.

Her weight now is 40 pounds which is about 50th percentile (They told me just two weeks ago that she weighed 41 pounds and that it was 75th percentile.) And her height is about the 70th - 75th percentile. I'm not convinced these percentile figures are very accurate. I'm not so sure that one pound could make a 25 percentile difference. But I do realize that one pound is significant considering she has only gained about 2 and a half pounds over the last year.

She also had to pee in a cup; something else she's never done before. She did quite well as she was nervous I think. This test was for iron, protein, too many white or red blood cells in it and maybe something else I can't remember. Her levels were all normal though. Then she had S. H. O. T. S.'s - three of them. One for chicken pox and something else plus a flu shot. For these she was deathly afraid; as soon as she saw the needles she was afraid. The nurse asked me if she knew what was happening and I replied "no." So she took charge and told her what she was about to do. Grace immediately began to cry so I held her and helped the nurse and we got through it but she cried hysterically and carried on for a few minutes afterwards. But the nurse helped out in getting her to move on and stop crying a little sooner.

After that we came home and relaxed for a little while and then it was time to make dinner. I timed dinner perfectly today and it was ready and on the table just as Julie walked in the door. So Julie and Grace got to spend some good time together tonight after dinner. I spent the night reading the Sunday Tribune.

I found a few articles in there that were quite interesting. Have any of you heard this new story just now coming out about how Saddam Hussein faked having nuclear weapons (weapons of mass destruction) in order to prevent Iran from invading his country. But what he ended up accomplishing was having us invade instead. It did prevent Iran from invading but he didn't get the complete result he was looking for.

Challenging

2007-11-11T23:28:00.000-06:00

For the last three days Grace has just been a bear about everything. Nothing is good enough, nothing we do is what she wants to do, everything is an argument and anything we try to say in reply just makes her upset and starts a whole crying/whining/complaining fit that just seems to go on and on.

And I get to take her to the doctor tomorrow for her 5 year checkup and she is going to get shots. I know that will be a struggle too and she probably won't feel good afterwards and that'll just perpetuate everything.

So I don't know what has sparked all of this or when she will return to the normal Grace, but it's driving both of us nuts. It has to stop or Julie and I are going to go crazy. The good thing about tomorrow is that it's supposed to be fairly warm out (60) and so maybe she can play outside a little bit. Maybe that will help keep her a little happier tomorrow. Who knows?!

So anyway, we are finally moving forward with our family room remodel as we ordered the recessed lights for the ceiling yesterday. They should be in by Thursday so I have a few days to take the drywall off of the ceiling so that installing the lights will be much easier. My uncle is helping me install the lights and my brother-in-law said he could help me with re-drywalling the ceiling. I'll have to call him tomorrow before I start tearing it out to not only double-check, but to also make sure I take it out properly so that it will be easier to put the new drywall back up.

After we complete this part of the project we can move forward with everything else that we have already bought but haven't put in because we've been waiting for the ceiling work to be done. And since we hadn't decided what lights to put in nor had we bought them, we were at a standstill.

Here is the list of things to-do in the family room: tear down ceiling drywall (most of it), install recessed lighting, reinstall ceiling drywall, wallpaper the ceiling, paint the wallpaper on the ceiling, paint upper section of walls, finish filling screw holes on trim, paint trim, wallpaper lower section of walls, paint wallpaper on lower walls.

After all of that work we'll just need to replace the carpet and get new furniture. But that will have to wait as those things don't come cheap. And last I checked I don't have any income. Grace doesn't pay much on the dollar bill side of things. Of course on the enjoying your daughter growing up side of things she pays pretty darned good (except for the last couple of days: see paragraphs above.)

Speaking of doing things around the house I put our patio furniture away this weekend and I cleaned it up first. So it's clean and it's in the basement but the cushions are completely useless; and so we aren't sure what to do with them. There is buying new cushions but that costs about the same as buying a new patio set. We could always buy a new patio set but it isn't cheap and it would render our current patio set useless as it would just be thrown out. I had another idea which was to use the cushions we have as a pattern and make some new ones. I'm not sure how to do that or who could do it for us or anything like that, but it seems like it would be cheaper. I'll have to look into it.

I do realize that they have generic replacements at home improvement and other stores but none of them are the right size and so they wouldn't look right and probably wouldn't feel very good when you sat on them depending what size they are. So that won't really work either.

Email Campaign Thank You

2007-11-10T09:53:00.000-06:00

We want to officially thank everyone who sent emails to Libertyville Lincoln Mercury during our campaign to get our down payment back on the Mercury Mariner that we ordered from them. Obviously Visa helped a lot by agreeing with us and refunding the money but we truly believe that it was the email campaign that convinced the dealership to not fight Visa and allow us to keep our money. We are truly grateful to you and sincerely appreciate you helping us out. Thank you so much!

This lesson teaches us one thing in particular besides the fact that Visa really will go to bat for what is right which is that there is power in numbers. People who stick together to fight an unjust cause will prevail over time. Time was on our side and the email campaign showed the dealership that we meant business and that the internet is a powerful thing.

So we want to make sure that everyone who helped us out knows how much we appreciate it. You truly did help and we want to thank you for all that you did.

Post-op checkup

2007-11-05T23:34:00.000-06:00

We went to see Grace's pediatric ophthalmologist today for her post-op checkup. She kept saying she didn't want to have surgery again the poor thing. Both Julie and I reassured her that she wasn't and this was just a checkup. Once we actually got to the doctor's office she did quite well. She even read the letters for the doctor loud enough to hear her and everything. She's normally so afraid/shy that she either won't say them out loud or she says them so quietly that you can't hear her.

He was very pleased with her progress and said she'll just continue to improve every week. The stitches he said would dissolve in the next week or two. We also only need to apply the ointment once a day at bedtime. She's actually gotten much better with the ointment. At first she was fighting us with all her might but we finally won the battle and she now even holds each eye open for us. She complains that she can't see after we put the ointment in. I think it just makes things blurry for a few minutes.

She is wearing her glasses as she was before with no complaints anymore either. That was actually one of the easier battles. She hasn't fought that hardly at all to not have to wear them. She never did take any of the pain medication that she claimed was "icky." Just that 1/4 teaspoon from the first time we tried. Fortunately for us, she didn't really complain all that much about how they hurt. She only complained a few times a day at first and then after a few days had passed she stopped complaining all together. So I'm guessing that it just didn't hurt that much for her. Maybe she has a good threshold for pain. That may explain why she doesn't complain about everyday things that bother her; maybe she doesn't really even feel it.

So we're pretty much done with all the surgery dealings. We have to go back in for another checkup in a month. She has to wear her glasses as normal and we have to put the ointment in her eyes each night before she goes to bed only for the next week.

Now we're all looking forward to getting back into our normal routine and not worrying about all of these extracurricular activities related to Grace's eyes. Grace is excited to be going to school tomorrow. I did end up taking her for about a half an hour last Friday. She could have spent more time there, but she wasn't moving fast enough to get to her class any sooner so that's about all the time she had was about a half an hour of her two-hour class.

So overall so far this experience has been pretty good. Thanks to the book we found online Grace was super prepared for the surgery and for the most part knew exactly what was going on. The doctors on the surgery day commented on how well prepared she was. I don't know if some parents don't prepare their children because they don't think they'll understand or what but there's a good reason to make sure they're prepared. Get that book "Blueberry Eyes" and read it as often as you need to. Maybe not every night considering it's length, but you need to read it to them and explain that this is what they will be doing.

That isn't to say she wasn't scared to have the surgery, but I've got to say she didn't outwardly appear scared at all. She marched right out of the pre-op room and towards the O.R. without us and without a complaint or hesitation hardly at all. And again, the doctors commented on how well prepared she was as she was doing the gas herself to put herself out making their jobs super easy.

On a lighter note things are really cooling off here. I mowed the grass yesterday for perhaps the last time. I didn't get the lawn mower ready for next year yet just in case it needs one more mowing. It's possible but unlikely. I'd rather be able to mow it again rather than having to pull the lawn mower out of storage to use it and then prepare it for next year all over again.

I've planted some new bulbs for next spring that will hopefully come up. I bought some and planted them several years ago and they haven't done well; Only about 2 or 3 are still alive now. Lets hope these fair better than the other ones did. I planted mostly daffodils, but I planted a few specialty bulbs and then on the south side of the house I've planted some lilies. I've never really been particularly fond of lilies, but for some reason now they appeal to me and so I bought some and they've been planted. We'll see how well they do in our ground next spring and how they look in the spot I chose to put them.

Once again this was a disappointing year for our apple tree. We didn't really get any edible fruit this year either. Only two days before picking day there were 2 apples still untouched by bugs, etc. on the tree. Then the day before picking I noticed a hole in one of them and the other was on the ground and it looked like someone had taken two bites out of it. Then on picking day Grace and I checked the one with a hole in it and sure enough bees were holed up inside there just eating away; darn pests. So apparently using a small amount of the fruit tree spray wasn't effective enough so that we'd get a crop. Apparently next year I'll have to be diligent about spraying all season long. One of the main reasons I didn't spray all season long was because the instructions with the spray say that if it rains or if the fruit is wet that you shouldn't do it (can't remember exactly what it said.) So I sprayed one or two times at the beginning of the season and then stopped because as you can imagine the beginning of the season is the spring and we get a lot of rain in the spring. So I kind of let off doing it and then it had been some time since I had actually done it so I just never re-started.

So anyway I will apparently have to be diligent about my spraying next year if we want to ever see a crop out of this darn tree. I've also noticed that the tree is leaning. So I'll need to brace the tree here before the really cold weather sets in to ensure it will grow at least fairly straight.

I've cleaned out some of the perennials in the flower beds and so basically the house looks pretty neat and tidy. I still have work to do, but I'm considerably further ahead than in previous years heading into the winter season. Maybe our yard will actually look nice next year; I'm sure the neighbors would appreciate it too!

Alright that's enough for today - I've got to get to sleep.

Day after Surgery

2007-11-01T22:25:00.000-05:00

Grace felt much better today. She was hungry and wanted to play outside and didn't complain very much about her eyes hurting either. The challenge today was putting the ointment in her eyes. We never got to it yesterday so we never had to deal with then. We only put the ointment in her eyes twice today and it's supposed to go in three times a day. But it was such a struggle.

No amount of bribing did any good and any kind of leverage we tried to use didn't work either. When she wants to be strong-willed, she has no problem with it. Let's just hope tomorrow is at least a little better than today with the ointment.

Besides that she is feeling really good and seems to be healing really fast. She seems to be able to see pretty well. I tried to give her her glasses but she didn't like how everything looked with them on. I guess we'll try that again tomorrow. I'm not sure how important it is for her to wear them over the next couple of weeks considering the prescription has changed. We'll have to ask the doctor on Monday when we go in for our follow-up.

That's about it for now. I need some sleep.

All done and recovering at home

2007-10-31T18:41:00.001-05:00

We finally made it home around 2:30 this afternoon after we stopped to pick up some lunch for Julie and I to eat at home. Grace slept the whole way home. When we got home Julie put her to bed and she slept for most of the afternoon. The doctor called us this afternoon at home to check on Grace.

She's doing really well. Her eyes definitely hurt and she is letting us know they hurt but she isn't letting it hold her back. She's watching TV and now she's coloring and cutting things out. Her left eye is feeling much better than her right eye. She's basically leaving her right eye closed and just using her left eye; which is odd because her left eye was the one that was turned in and the whole reason we did all of this. She hasn't had any pain medicine since she was in her hospital room. She's definitely ready for some now but it's a real struggle as she's getting really tired now and her eyes hurt and she doesn't like the taste of the prescription pain medicine. So Julie gave her just a little of that pain medicine and then a little more of the same kind that you buy at the store without that special ingredient Codeine.

She's definitely hungry and is wanting to eat a lot of things and drinking lots of water so that's a good sign too. I'm hoping this will all be better in a couple of days because if she doesn't like the pain medicine it might be a long couple of days while we get through all of the pain of her eyes healing and the stitches dissolving basically without any medication to make it feel better. As I already mentioned they gave her some regular pain medicine in the hospital and it didn't help for very long - maybe an hour I'd say and then she was saying her eyes were hurting again. I'm guessing the prescription pain medication would not only work better but would also last longer.

So I guess as with all surgeries only time will tell how fast she'll recover; but overall I'm really happy about how well she's recovering and how she's feeling. I just wish she'd take the medicine she has available so that she'd feel better. Speaking of not doing things you can, those of you that know Grace would know that she loves band-aids. She'll put them on for really no reason and wear them around the house and basically just play with them. When the nurse took the I.V. out today and was asking her what band-aid she wanted she said she didn't want one at all. So here's a real reason to wear a band-aid and quite honestly I'd want one but she didn't so the nurse just held some pressure on it a bit longer and she didn't get a band-aid. She's a pretty silly girl!

Out of recovery room

2007-10-31T11:01:00.000-05:00

We're back in the regular room now. When she feels good enough we'll go home.

Surgery's all done

2007-10-31T09:25:00.000-05:00

She's done - everything went fine. They are starting to wake her up now. Julie will be able to go into the recovery room in about 20 minutes.

Anna and Angel

2007-10-31T08:32:00.001-05:00

Dr's assistant just brought out Grace's animals all prepped for surgery too. It was too cute to not share.

She's in the O.R.

2007-10-31T08:19:00.001-05:00

Now in the waiting room. Dr's assistant (Maggie) said Grace went to the O.R. just fine all by herself and took the anesthetic with no problems. Now just waiting for the doctor to perform the surgery - s/b about another hour (an hour and a half total.)

We've been admitted

2007-10-31T06:34:00.000-05:00

Now it's 6:30 am and we have our room (3320) - just waiting for the surgical team to call for her. Should be about a half hour; around 7 am.

We're at the Hospital

2007-10-31T05:40:00.001-05:00

We're a little early (5:30 am); supposed to be here between 6 and 6:15 am. So we waited until 6 am to go in. Grace slept most of the way down to the hospital anyway.

Day before surgery

2007-10-30T22:29:00.000-05:00

Grace had school this morning although it was basically just a Halloween party. I came back a little early as they were all putting on a little Halloween show. They sang some pretty cute songs! I did videotape it and will get it up here soon. I don't really have time right now.

We ran into the grocery store on the way home as we were out of bread. At home Grace was pretty laid back as she basically just wanted to play on the computer. After I finally convinced her to eat lunch we went down to Vernon Hills and picked up my Grandpa who is visiting from Michigan right now. We took him with us up to gymnastics so that he could watch Grace doing her gymnastics. The last time he was here he didn't get to see her doing Gymnastics.

After gymnastics we all went out to dinner as Julie had joined us there after work and then I ran Grandpa "home." On the way back home I checked out the neighborhood for any sings of our pumpkin smashers. There were two streets that had a few smashed but overall the coast was still clear. Maybe they'll come out later. I'm sure hoping they get caught.

And so that was our super fun day today. Not very exciting and not all that much to talk about. I didn't want to do too much as Grace will need her rest for tomorrow and she won't be able to eat or drink anything after midnight tonight.

So really nothing much to update you on. The hospital did call and we have to be there between 6 and 6:15 so we'll be leaving pretty early in the morning. I'd better go get some sleep.

Pre-operative Evaluation

2007-10-29T20:31:00.000-05:00

Grace had her H&P today which stands for History and Physical. It's her pre-operative checkup to ensure she doesn't have anything wrong that would affect her during surgery like pneumonia. Because of her age she didn't need any blood work. Her pediatric ophthalmologist recommended she have an EKG prior to the surgery, but her pediatrician said he doesn't see why she would need it considering she hasn't had any heart problems and she's only 5.

Speaking of recommendations, we were at the pediatricians today for her 5 year checkup and were needing the H&P for her surgery on Wednesday and they informed me that our insurance company would never pay for doing both things on the same visit. So since we needed the pre-op approval for this Wednesday we had to bypass the 5 year checkup until a later date. I'll need to reschedule that and we'll have to pay our deductible again to go back to the pediatrician again. And they are just going to check all the same things they checked today for her pre-op approval. Thanks insurance companies for making our life easier; sure makes our life less hectic...not.

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Sorry, I had to take a time out because our Hainesville hoodlums were smashing everyone's pumpkins in the street. I really wish these kids would look at it with at least a little empathy as Grace is going to wake up tomorrow all sad that her pumpkins are gone. And I'm mad because I paid a lot of money for those things at the pumpkin farm. I realize that kids will do things that they deem as "fun" but this happens each year in our neighborhood and they never seem to get caught. I was in my kitchen and heard the popping sounds outside and went running out there. They were just down the street so I grabbed my camera and went after them. I was only about 6 houses away from them and I could see them, but then a car came (actually it was the police) and they hid or went home because I haven't seen them since. I was hoping to get their picture and end this thing.
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So anyway, the 5 year checkup is more involved than we thought previously. She'll need to do a urine test and a blood test (just a prick test) for hemoglobin and cholesterol and then she'll get two or three immunizations for chicken pox and something else (can't remember what they all were.) Julie had just asked when making the appointment if Grace would be getting any immunizations and they said not if she'd gotten them at 4, but clearly these are 5 year old immunizations that every 5 year old gets at their 5 year checkup. I guess the nurse didn't want to answer the question. I think a better answer would have been "I'm not sure."

So I called Julie to update her on everything about Grace's doctors appointment. She called the pediatric ophthalmologist's office and asked again about the EKG and they said that if her pediatrician didn't feel she needed it then they were fine with her not having one. That almost brought up another insurance issue. Her pediatrician is associated with a hospital our insurance company won't allow us to go to (where Grace was born) and they had given me an order for the EKG through that hospital. We got the order changed so we could take it to a hospital that our insurance will allow us to go to, but as I just said, it is a moot point since we don't need to have the test done.

I called the insurance company today too because Grace's pediatrician suggested that not only did he not recommend she have an EKG but that the insurance company might not cover it. Turns out they would cover it, but like I just said we don't need to do the test anyway. So we're all set now for the surgery as far as I can tell.

Halloween 2007

2007-10-28T13:41:00.001-05:00

Here is Grace with her costume on. Preview of when she's in college????

Preparation Week

2007-10-16T22:18:00.000-05:00

Well, me Mum went home on Sunday and so now we begin preparation for many visitors this coming weekend. Julie's Aunts from Nebraska are flying in and her Brother and his family are driving in from Michigan. So we will have a full house this weekend. The reason is for Julie's parents joint 75th birthday party. Her Father turned 75 back in July, but Saturday is her Mom's actual 75th birthday.

So we've planned this whole celebration as an open-house format where people can come and go since the number of invites we've sent out are too many people for the size of our house. Hopefully all of the guests won't show up at the same time as it may prove to be a bit crowded in here.

So the preparation comes with making the house presentable. It's far from it. I have been working on my to-do list this week and crossing a few things off each day, but there are some things that I really need to get done to ensure the house at least "looks" presentable. I got the grass mowed yesterday and our neighbor said "thanks for mowing your grass." I was thinking it must have looked horrible but they were like no, that just means that we'll have to mow ours now. So maybe all that extra care I've given the grass this year is paying off. I think it looks pretty nice, but I'm not a bragging sort of person. I always see room for improvement; like the two weeds in the front yard and the bare spot where the momma bunny rabbit decided to put her nest.

The problems lie in the flower beds that we've still not had the money nor the time to purchase the rest of the plants for to fill it up properly. If we would do this then the flower beds would actually be full of flowers and not the weeds it currently is. The places we have flowers or plants the weeds aren't so bad as you might imagine. We need to spend the time and yes the money obviously because plants aren't as cheap as you might think and buy the rest of the plants we need and fill up those flower beds. But this is just one of the issues I just have to deal with before our guests arrive.

Grace today was for some reason quite tired and a bit cranky. She slept for 12 hours which is fairly normal and we didn't have much time in the morning before school. She did her "homework" in the car on the way to pre-school. While she was in school I went grocery shopping at a couple of different stores. We're buying the food that needs to be prepared before the party Saturday. I bought 8 lbs. of ground beef and 8 lbs. of ground turkey for two different types of chili. Obviously regular and turkey chili; plus all the beans and chopped tomatoes that go with all of that meat. Now the challenge is going to be getting all of that food cooked ahead of time. The biggest problem will be storage space in the refrigerator.

After that it was time to pick Grace up and then we came right home to get the food into the refrigerator. Then it was pretty much just hang out and do nothing for the rest of the day. Neither of us had much motivation to do anything today; so we didn't. We watched Dancing with the Stars from yesterday and just hung out.

Tonight I tried to make frozen lasagna that I bought today. The directions say to cook it for 105 minutes but it actually took almost three hours before it was done. It was good, but that's a really long time. I'm wondering if our oven needs to have the temperature checked to see if it's right or not because that's just crazy! We didn't eat dinner until just after 7:30! That's just entirely too late.

Anyway, we received a book we ordered from amazon.com called Blueberry Eyes in the mail yesterday and it's really for Grace as it's about having eye surgery. Julie started reading it to her tonight. We're trying to get her ready for the surgery she'll have on the 31st. So this is our first step. Surprisingly the doctors office hasn't informed us how to prepare her at all for this. I guess as far as they are concerned, we just show up on the day of the surgery and she'll just have it. But any 5 year old is just too scared of the unknown and too curious to just go into something blindly.

So this is the surgery to fix her crossed eye which is the left eye, but apparently they don't just repair the crossed eye, they actually adjust both eyes and let them fall into place on their own. So that's what we're trying to do and this book is a great first step as the girl in the story has done most of what Grace has had to do for her eyes. Actually she did more as she had to wear bi-focals at 11 months. I can't imagine! We've been pretty lucky to not have her eyes be that bad. I'm not sure how Grace accepted the book when they read it tonight, but I did hear in the beginning where they were talking about getting glasses and using a patch. And Grace kept saying "just like me." So she was seeing the parallel in the beginning of the book, I just hope she isn't going to worry about it and be scared about it right up until the day of the surgery.

I'd better get to sleep as Grace has a full day tomorrow with dance and gymnastics; and I obviously have a lot of work to do too!