What's up with Rich, Marci, Riley & Maddie

Easter Fun

2009-04-13T07:09:00.000-07:00

Saturday Riley was almost as excited as he was Christmas Eve. At 6pm he asked, "Is it time for bed yet?" LOL! Actually, he was so excited he didn't get to sleep until 10pm!

He and Maddie got up around 8:30am and quickly ran downstairs to see two Easter Baskets waiting for them. Then they hunted around the house for eggs the Easter Bunny hid - plastic ones rather than real ones, we didn't want the dogs running off to some dark corner of the house leaving them for us to discover when they started to smell. They were very excited and had a great time.

Later we got in the car and headed down to Corvallis for Easter with my Aunt Joan, my Mom's sister. It's always a great time there with lots of excellent food - they always have a fantastic ham! Maddie slept on the way down and Riley watched his new movie the Easter Bunny brought - "Bolt!" We got there just as food was being served and filled our tummies. Then it was time for the Easter Egg hunt. It was raining a little and this year they decided to hide them under their covered porch in the backyard so the kids wouldn't get wet. That was nice. TONS of little kids this year who were all wide-eyed with excitement as they found eggs. Riley and Maddie again had great fun finding a bunch.

Then we went back in, visited with relatives, and finally left for home. On the way back Riley fell asleep - and stayed asleep for several hours at home. Maddie decided she needed to almost ALL of the chocolate she got in her basket from Grammie. She was fine for quite awhile, then all of a sudden it was like someone switched on her hyperdrive mode and she was bouncing all over the place! I've never believed that "sugar-high" theory too much because I've just never seen or experienced it the way some others describe. But this time I became a believer. haha Riley was having a hard time finding a comfortable way to sleep and Maddie kept trying to wake him up. Marci climbed in the back to help Riley be more comfortable, and occupy Maddie. Then we hit very slow traffic, actually coming to a stop a few times. Grrr! In all, we lost 12 minutes, which really wasn't that bad. And there was enough rain coming down combined with the spray from the cars on the road that it was rather hard to see, so driving slow with LOTS of cars on the road was actually kinda OK.

Made it home, Riley still slept, Marci finished her school paper, and with that this class, and Maddie and I played with the rats. Riley woke up, Marci finished, we all chatted and had fun for awhile, then went to bed. It was a really nice Easter this year with even Riley still believing in the Easter Bunny. :)

Geocaching

2009-04-11T20:04:00.000-07:00

Last weekend Riley's Cub Scout den went for a hike to fulfill one of their Tiger badge requirements. One of the parents brought a GPS to do some Geocaching. For those that don't know, geocaching is using a GPS to find something others have hidden. See, people hide stuff in parks and other places, and upload the coordinates to a website. Others then download those coordinates into their GPS and set out hunting for it. It's really quite fun. Our GPS for our car can run on batteries AND I can download data to it.

It was fun trying to find the stuff with the other parent last weekend and we all got hooked. We joined the website, downloaded some places close to us and have had fun looking for them. So far we've found three. Two of them were big enough to hold stuff and had a piece of paper in them for you to write your name and date of when you found it. One was just a piece of paper. The others had a pen with them, this one didn't. Now we know we need to carry 1) a pen, 2) something to put in there in case it's one of those type.

Our car GPS is cool, but not really made for walking. Now that we're hooked on this, we're looking forward to the warm weather and doing it all over Portland! And we're starting to look at some good GPS's for walking. Gotta have the right toys, er, tools. ;)

What's really fun is this is something all of us can get into, even Maddie!

What a great weekend!

2009-04-06T11:22:00.000-07:00

Man, what a fantastic weekend! The weather was amazing, a taste of summer. Saturday Riley's Cub Scout Den took a hike in some woods next to us. They brought along bags to pick up trash while they were hiking. Evidently, some kids use that area to play with little plastic bb's because there were TONS on the ground, which the kids LOVED to pick up. At least they aren't using paintballs and ruining the woods. haha

Our weekend shopping which featured a stop at Cold Stone - both kids got cotton candy ice cream. LOL! Riley helped mow the lawn while we pulled weeds and cleaned up. We have a push mower which I use when I'm not in a hurry because it saves on gas and gives me a little more exercise. Riley loves to use it and did a great job, though got tired about half way through - it's tough to push it.

Sunday the weather was even better. Riley had a birthday party to go to in the afternoon. He wanted one of us to stay there with him, but we talked him into just letting us drop him off. He's at that age now where we can do that, and we would have been bored staying there. He had a GREAT time and didn't miss us at all! COOL!

While he was gone, we did more yard work, pulling more weeds, spraying weed killer on some, fertilzing, etc. It was sooooo nice to be able to wear shorts again! I turned on the sprinklers and made sure they were all pointing in the right directions.

When Riley got back, he and Maddie took turns driving his electric Jeep. He almost doesn't fit anymore! And after a few times of needing some help, Maddie was doing really well! She really liked that, and having Riley drive her around. Riley got bored with that and started racing Marci on their Razors. From about 9am until we went to bed at 8:30pm, we had the windows in the house open. Ahhhhhh.....

Today (Monday) it's supposed to be about 72 (it's 65 at 11:20am). I was tempted to call in sick and stay home to have some fun. But Maddie's at her preschool and Riley is at school. So I probably would have stayed inside playing Guitar Hero World Tour all day. haha

We got a lot of stuff done but also had a blast doing stuff as a family. It was really a great weekend!

What a weekend!

2009-03-30T12:28:00.000-07:00

It started Friday when I came home not feeling all that great and Marci had a graduation to attend. Marci had also rented a large dumpster for us to fill, some spring cleaning. I was up several times that night getting something to eat or drink, my body was wanting fuel to fight this thing.

Saturday morning we were all still not feeling great but got busy. We spent a lot of time in the garage, then in Riley's room, then Maddie's room, then the backyard, tossing things we no longer needed/used/broken. It was a long hard day of not feeling well, but feeling very good about the work we did. Went to dinner, then home to watch Iron Man on Blue-Ray which I got for my bday. Great movie! That was fun, but it kept us up very late, got to bed around midnight - including the kids.

Sunday was a very slow morning, but finally around lunch time we got going again. Finished the garage (well, still some organizing to do and a few boxes to go through but it's MUCH better now). Saturday Marci got four bales of straw to spread over the backyard. Thanks to the dogs and the rain, there wasn't much grass left and it was just a big mud pit. Finished cleaning the backyard and Marci and Riley spread the straw all around. They did a great job and it looks fantastic! Major plus is now the dogs won't be coming in super muddy!

Got to bed at our usual time, which was nice. It was hard to get up this morning and both kids are home sick. Marci called me at 11:30am and Riley was still sleeping! Poor kids!

It was a very busy weekend with lots of hard work which was extra tough thanks to not feeling well. But we feel great that we were able to get so much done.

My Brithday

2009-03-27T15:15:00.000-07:00

Tuesday was my 46th birthday. Wow, 46. I don't know why but it seems more than one year older than 45. 50 is only four years away but feels more like 40 years away. I certainly don't feel 46, more like 36 or maybe 34 - and many will tell you I act more like 26 or even 16. ;)

It was a great day. I got a lot done at work, then went to dinner at Outback with my family, parents and brother. Had a good steak and a nice free ice cream desert! Got some cool stuff, lots of DVD's and a neat new iPod Shuffle. It's amazingly slim and sounds great! Riley got me a very cool radio controlled car. We had fun playing with it and his cars in the street the other day.

I bought a lottery ticket on my birthday, but didn't win anything. :( All in all, it was a really nice birthday. Thanks everyone!

Mini Golf with Riley

2009-02-23T09:17:00.000-08:00

Saturday was a Father-Son day. Riley and I went to this cool minigolf place downtown. It is in the basement of the Hilton hotel, has a Pirate theme and a LOT of blacklights. We had a BLAST!!

Riley did better than me on many of the holes. I'd watch him hit it and couldn't believe how well he did. Then I'd grab the putter the correct way, line it up, stand correctly, all those proper golf things, and not hit the ball anywhere as good as he did. LOL! It was a great way to spend the afternoon.

Then we walked up to Finneggans Toy Store, looked around, agreed we needed to bring Maddie & Marci here, then went home to some great homemade pizza. After, we played a fun game on the Playstation 3.

All together, a wonderful day and lots of fun.

Marci and Maddie went shopping and had fun of their own. It's wonderful to do stuff as a family, but also nice to do stuff one-on-one now and then.

Monster Truck Show

2009-02-16T08:03:00.001-08:00

Yesterday Riley and I went to the Monster Truck show. This time we went with his Cub Scout Pack. The seats were at one end and I was worried they wouldn't be as good as ours last year (down close on the 50-yard line). Fortunately, the Rose Garden is small enough that there really isn't a bad seat. Not great for the trucks because they can't do a lot, but good for us. I'm glad about that because these tickets were part of a group rate which means they weren't as expensive! WOOHOO!

We had a great time! Some trucks just seemed to be going through the motions, others really put on a good show. This year instead of the dirt bikes, they had two robot transformer cars, one good, one evil. They did battle by shooting each other. We were glad we had our Bose noise canceling headphones on, those canon shots were LOUD! I took some photos, though it was VERY dark. I set my camera to ISO mode and let it figure out what to do. The good news is I got some photos. The bad news is many are at 3200 which is horribly grainy. BUT, as I've come to realize over the years, I'd rather have a photo like that than no memory of the event at all. AND I got lucky - I got a photo of the evil robot getting a hole blown in it, lots of sparks flying all over. I'll upload it later (need to sharpen it up a bit).

We also got the Pit Pass which means we got to see the cars up close. That was fun, Riley likes that part. It was just the right amount of time because as it got long and Riley was getting bored, it ended. And what an ending. Grave Digger was last, did a few things, then was going to do a big jump and ended up crashing his car on its' side. It was great!

I downloaded my photos and saw I took 706!! That's because I changed the setting to sports mode and continuous, so as a truck took off over the cars and went high in the air, I took anywhere from 5-15 photos. That worked great! I was able to get some very cool photos. But of course with that many photos, it means it's going to take me some time to edit them and decide which ones I want to upload. I don't think I'll send all of them to Flickr. ;) When I do get them uploaded, I'll be sure to blog about it.

Pinewood Derby & Chocolate Festival

2009-02-01T20:13:00.001-08:00

This weekend was Riley's first Cub Scout Pinewood Derby. His car didn't do as well as he wanted, but he still had fun building it and racing it. We were very proud that he didn't throw a fit because he didn't win anything!

Not doing well was partly my fault. It has been a LONG time since I built one of these and forgot a lot of things, like adding weights to get the car as close to 5 ounces as possible. We weighed in at 2.5! Fortunately, someone there had some weights, a drill and a hot glue gun. We got it back to 4.75 ounces. Still too light, but MUCH better than it could have been. This year I've been remembering all of these scout things I did and forgot about. Next year he'll do better with his car. :)

The Chocolate Festival
We've got to this the past two years and had a great time. This year it was AWFUL!! It looked like they raised the admission, there was only about half as much as there was last year, a lot of the places didn't have many samples, several of the vendors were quite rude, and there were a lot of non-chocolate booths, like soap and pit powder. Yes, someone at a Chocolate Festival was selling power to put on your armpits to make them smell better and not sweat. Um, what does THAT have to do with Chocolate???

Anyhow, it was really bad, we were majorly disappointed and probably won't go back next year. At least we had a great time at Red Robin's for dinner after. :)

Day Off

2009-01-19T13:56:00.000-08:00

Once again I forgot that everyone has Monday off and I should ask for the day off from work so I could have a nice 3-day weekend. Instead I got to work early and asked if I could leave around 10:30am. Everyone was cool with that and I actually ended up leaving around Noon. Now we're heading off to bowling. WOOHOO!!

Radio Controlled Car

2009-01-12T07:33:00.000-08:00

For Christmas Riley got a really cool radio controlled car from Uncle Peter. It took us this long to finally get it out and play with it. Riley had a blast and really did a great job driving it. I also had fun with it and showed Riley a few tricks. We went back in when the batteries died, recharged them and went back out in the afternoon where he showed Marci and Maddie all the cool things he could do with it.

I totally forgot to get any pictures or video because Saturday morning I came down with something and totally wasn't thinking straight. D'OH! The weather is supposed to be somewhat nice so we'll go out and play again, and this time I'll get some photos and video. :)

Christmas Snow

2009-01-08T07:15:00.000-08:00

Last year I was going to try to blog at least once a week. Failed big time there! LOL! Looking at old posts I realized this is kind of a diary of our family and fun to go back and read. I'm going to try to blog more often so years later it'll be fun reading and saying, "Oh ya, I remember that!"

This past Fall was very warm, much more so than normal. It was like global warming had decided to settle over us. Then in December temps went down to where they normally are and more! Around December 14th, it decided to snow.

Ok, no big deal, we often get a bit of snow that time of year. Except this time it didn't stop. And to make things worse, the temps stayed below 30 for several weeks! At home I saw our outside thermometer drop to 12! It was the most and longest snow I've seen since my family moved up here in 1976. You can't see it very well in this photo, but we got probably a total of a foot of snow. It was very dry. A few very windy days blew it around a lot and gave us spots that had very little snow and drifts up to three feet deep!

This is when I really love my job. What I do doesn't require me to be in the office. If I have questions, I can email users - or now that we have our new VOIP (Voice Over IP - internet phone) at work, I can run the software on my work laptop and when my phone at work rings, it rings on my laptop. Just like I'm in the office. Very cool! The only hard part about working from home is trying to get the kids to let me work. I have to work for a little bit, play with them for a little bit, work, play, etc. But fortunately things were slow and I could easily take time off to play with them.

We went out in the snow a lot. Every morning they'd get up and say, "Can we go out and play in the snow now?" For Christmas 2007 Riley got a little sledding board that he was able to use this year. They both loved sledding down the driveway, sometimes making it all the way across the street. Marci and I tried sledding a few times, it certainly was fun! I took a TON of photos that you can see by clicking on any of the photos.

We live within a mile of a little strip mall and grocery store. That was really great because we could walk there instead of needing to drive. When there was a break, Marci went out with the car and did a little shopping. She got another sledding board that was big enough for both of them. That came in handy when we walked up to the store. Both of us pulled the kids on these. It was a little tough at times, but much faster than trying to walk with them, especially Maddie who's little legs just doing go that fast yet.

I also took a bunch of video that I put together into one long 9 minute video. I'm glad my camera can take such good video. Our little camcorder can take better video but this way I don't have to carry both with me.

Thanks to the snow, this was the first time we didn't go anywhere for Christmas. Usually we go to Salem Christmas Eve to be with Marci's family, get up Christmas morning to do a quick Christmas with our family, then over to Rich's parents for Christmas with his family. We couldn't get anywhere so this year it was just us at our house. That was actually pretty nice. No rushing to get here or there, just a nice relaxed time at home.

Finally things cleared up enough by the weekend and we were able to go to Salem Saturday and Rich's parents Sunday. We had a fantastic time at both places. It looked like the snow was going to be gone, the roads were clear, everything was melting. Then it snowed some more, melted, snowed, melted, just kept doing that. The snow also caused a delay in getting together with Rich's Dad to celebrate his 70th birthday - Dec. 19th. We finally got together Sunday Jan 4th and had a nice dinner at Stanfords to celebrate.

But as we were leaving, Old Man Winter had to remind us he's still around by snowing on us one last time. It snowed hard and got bad to drive quick. I'm more of a wimp driving in this than Marci is, so after I got off the main roads, I switched with Marci and she drove the rest of the way home. We got about 1.5 inches, then by midnight it was 40 and everything was melting. By morning it was all gone, everyone was able to go to work and school.

It was a fun and wild way to end 2008! Now we're all back in the swing of things, back to normal sleeping schedules, being tired at work, etc. Lots of fun things coming up in 2009 that I'll be sharing here. On Jan. 31st, Riley has his Cub Scout Pinewood Derby car races! He's really excited to build his car. Also that weekend is the Chocolate Festival, so be ready for lots of photos of cars and messy faces!

We hope all of you had a great 2008 and 2009 is starting off great for you!

OUCH!

2009-01-07T08:29:00.001-08:00

Last night when I got home Riley was having fun hitting two rocks together trying to break the bigger one into smaller pieces. I'm putting away my stuff when he comes over crying because he got a piece of rock in his eye. I look and see it, almost right smack in the center of his eye. I tried to get it out but he had rubbed his eye enough that it was kinda stuck. By now he's crying hard.

Called Marci to come help and with both of us working on it, we were able to get it out. Whew! But while we were working on it, we were both in that mild parent panic because it looked like he had rubbed his eye hard enough to embed the piece of rock in it and we weren't able to get it out. I kept reminding myself - and Marci - to stay calm and don't freak him out. At one point I thought we would have to call 911 to get some help. But then Marci was able to get it with a moist q-tip.

Then Riley was fine, his eye didn't bother him at all the rest of the night. Sucks to learn a lesson the hard way, but now he knows to wear protective eye gear the next time he wants to do something like that. ;)

Riding the Cow Train at the Corn Maze

2008-10-09T08:55:00.001-07:00

The "Cow" train is a tractor pulling a bunch of plastic containers fitted with seats and painted to look like cows. We all rode it and had a GREAT time!

This looks even better in "high quality" mode. You have to go to YouTube to view that. Put your mouse over the little up arrow at the bottom right which will display a little menu option. Click the menu option which shows you an embed link and url link. Now click on the video. That will open it in YouTube's website. Under the lower right corner of the video is a link called "watch in higher quality". Click that and it will look much better. :)

The Pumpkin Patch

2008-10-05T22:03:00.000-07:00

Saturday we went to the Pumpkin Patch on Sauvies Island. It was a fantastic time! The main attraction was a giant corn maze. Last time we went we didn't get all the way through it, but this year we did! WOOHOO!!

There were several other things, like a hay ride, climbing a pyramid of hay bales, seeing a few farm animals, riding a "cow" train which was a bunch of plastic containers cut out and painted to look like cows, and of course buying pumpkin's. The weather held off for most of the day. It did decide to pour down really hard when we were in the middle of the maze. Fortunately we had umbrella's so we didn't get TOO wet. It was a lot of fun. A great way to spend a day. And the fun weather made for some cool clouds which I had to take pictures of.

We were there for about five hours and on the way home Maddie crashed. Surprisingly Riley wasn't tired at all. Marci and I certainly were! LOL!

A wild bird & poor Maddie

2008-09-24T07:12:00.000-07:00

We knew Roxy was a fast dog. Yesterday we found out just how fast. I didn't see it as I was busy playing Playstation 3 with Riley and Maddie was watching us, but I heard Marci's sudden scream at the dogs that told me something was wrong. When I got upstairs she was out of breath saying, "There's a bird in the room! There's a bird in the room!!" All of our birds were downstairs. The windows were all closed. But sure enough, there was a bird on the floor looking very terrified.

Turns out Roxy had caught the bird outside then brought it upstairs to play with. Poor bird! It's a very pretty blackbird and looks like Roxy may have damaged its wing but we couldn't tell just how bad. Marci called our vet and a few other places. Only one would try to help the wild bird back to health, the Audubon Society. However, they close at 5pm and we called at 4:55pm. So we got a spare bird cage and put the bird in it with some water and food, then covered the cage to help calm it. I checked on the bird this morning and it seemed to be fine, looked good, was moving around ok. Marci is going to take it to the Audubon Society today.

THEN, if that bird wasn't enough fun. Maddie burnt her hand on the stove!

Marci had just finished cooking, turned the stove off, and we've told Maddie TONS of times not to touch the burners. She's in her defiant stage now not doing what we ask and decided to see if it was hot. Instead of just touching it, she pressed here hand on it!

Screams, Marci trying to comfort her, putting her hand under the water, Riley freaking out, me trying to help hold Maddie, utter chaos for about five minutes. We got the neosporin and put it on her hand. That helped a lot - partly because it's the pain relieving formula. We also gave her some children's tylenol. Then we put more neosporin on her hand, found some good wrapping stuff and wrapped it up. I'm sure it'll be sore today and look worse than it is. Fortunately it wasn't THAT bad, no 3rd degree type stuff, and kids heal fast. Soon she was wanting to play and talking like her normal self. She went to sleep real easy too.

So quite the night for us! Oh, and Riley was really nice trying to help Maddie laugh and get her mind on something else. At first he didn't know what to say and I kinda got after him because I didn't want him to say the wrong things and make her cry more. But he figured out what to do and say and really helped her a lot. I also talked to him and explained why I was a little short and asked him to leave Maddie alone - and apologized because he was helping. Next time I'm going to give him a chance first, then if what he's trying to do isn't working I'll ask him to stop.

Never a dull moment at our house! haha

Riley's not-so fun day

2008-09-16T06:42:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we were getting new carpet - the last carpet showed the seams horribly. The new carpet is MUCH better. I was getting ready to go home when my cell phone rang. It was Riley's school.

They told me he had fallen and banged his head pretty good. He wasn't that responsive so they called 911 and the paramedics were there. They checked him out and he's sitting up, talking to them doing fine. They also had Marci on the phone. Interestingly, the person talking to her gave her a story that wasn't as nice sounding. That person told her Riley had an accident, the paramedics are there and he's ok at the moment.

At the moment?! What does that mean?? That person had Marci all freaked out. I wish she would have been talking to the person who called me.

Fortunately, they transferred my call to a paramedic who told me everything was. He then asked if I wanted to take Riley home, to his doctor, have them take him to his doctor, or just leave him in school. I figured if they are asking if I want to leave him in school then he must be ok. I asked if he had any recommendation based on what he saw and then I accidentally hung up on myself while trying to put on my car seat belt. D'OH!

I waited for them to call back, they didn't, so I finally called them. By now Marci was at school and everything was fine. Marci called my parents as she was driving up to school because she was freaking out because the school person didn't say anything and made it sound really bad. My Mom called me and I told her I had talked to the paramedic and everything was ok.

Got to the school, found Marci with Riley in the car ready to go home. Her heart was still racing which I can understand. I carried him in from the car and sat with him for a bit. I shared some of my silly things I did as a kid, knocking the wind out of myself and coming to with everyone looking down on me, skinning my arm trying to jump my bike over a way too big ramp, etc. He got a laugh out of that. We sat there for a bit then I had to move the remaining furniture for the new carpet.

He and I sat in the other room reading books, watching tv, playing games, etc. He was doing fine and I couldn't even see the bump on his head anymore. Oh, forgot to say. Sounds like he tried to jump over a basketball, stepped on it instead and did a face-plant. I'm surprised there wasn't any bleeding or anything worse. Just a scrap on his elbow. So the rest of the day he was his usual normal self. We wouldn't let him run too much because we didn't want him to fall again. But he was fine, didn't show any problems or anything.

At night he said he didn't want to go to school because he wasn't feeling good enough. I asked him if he really didn't want to go because he felt silly for what happened and didn't want the other kids to laugh at him. He hesitated, then said yes. Both Marci and I reassured him that wouldn't happen. Marci told him that his teacher called, said she sat the class down, asked what happened, and that everyone was hoping he was ok. Heck, we had the Principle and Vice Principle call too! After some talking, he agreed he really did want to go to school, he just felt silly for what happened.

So it was quite the day for him - and us, especially Marci! But he's fine, no problems. Whew!

One more thing. Maddie was soooooo cute! She tried to give Riley stuff to make him feel better, brought over a blanket in case he wanted it, turned on a light for us, etc. Then she because jealous. She walked into something on purpose, didn't really hurt herself, but grabbed her head and said, "Ow! I hurt my head. Can you please hold me?" LOL! It was funny! After a few hours when Riley was feeling fine, they were back to playing together as usual.

Kids eating dinner

2008-09-04T19:52:00.000-07:00

Me: Riley, Maddie, are you hungry?

Kids: YES!

Me: Maddie, what do you want to eat?

Maddie: What's Riley eating?

Riley: Fruit Loops!

Maddie: I want Fruit Loops too!

So the kids are having Fruit Loops for dinner. LOL!

Wow, real customer service!

2008-09-02T06:43:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we stopped into Starbucks to get the kids some hot chocolate. Two Jr. High aged girls were in front of us. They were $.85 short and Marci said, "Here's $.85." No big deal, it's just $.85. They of course were grateful and said "Thank You!"

Marci placed her order and when she tried to pay the guy behind the counter said, "No, your order is on me. That was very cool of you to help those girls out, you just don't see that anymore. Thank you!"

WOW! Amazing! She certainly didn't do that to get free hot chocolates. It's nice to see someone still understanding what customer service is about. Wow!

Good Roxy!

2008-08-27T05:53:00.000-07:00

For a little while now we've had a mouse living in our kitchen. We've seen it a few times, quite cute. We've tried to catch it humanely, no luck, the mouse was just smarter than us (or I should say me, which isn't too hard). It wasn't really causing a LOT of problems, not getting into our food or anything like that. Just not a good thing to have a mouse living in your kitchen.

The other morning Marci came into the kitchen to discover the mouse. On the floor. No longer mobile. No longer among the living. And there was Roxy looking up at her, smiling happily as she began playing again with her new toy.

No more mouse in the house. Good girl, Roxy!

Yes, it's a fire, call the Fire Department

2008-08-21T08:36:00.000-07:00

I'm out for my run this morning around 5am. It's a loop I found around my neighborhood that's exactly 1 mile which I run 4-5 times. I turned one corner and smelled smoke. It's been cool, raining, someone probably had a fire in their fireplace. Ran by the same place for mile #2 and the smell was stronger.

"I hope that's just a fireplace...".

Mile #3 and the smell was really strong. I looked around and saw a small fire burning close to the Jr. High.

"Well, that doesn't look right."

I walked over cautiously. It looked like a bonfire and I didn't want to bother people who were there and might suddenly come running at me or something. No one was there and what was burning looked like a garment bag hanging on the chain-link fence. There was some shrubbery ("Ni!" sorry, bad movie reference tangent) that was also starting to burn.

Grrr! Stopped my run, went home, got my cell phone and ran back to call 911. When I got there I noticed a dump truck there.

Me: "Hi! Did you call the Fire Department?"

Him: "I just called it into my boss. Looks like it's dying down, so we didn't think we needed to call."

Me: "Um, I think we should. I ran by hear earlier and it looks and smells like there's some plastic in there. That won't die down easily. And the shrubs are starting to burn. I think it would be best to call the Fire Department - better safe than sorry."

Him: "OK, I'll call my boss back and tell him to call the Fire Department."

Me: "Thanks. I'm not trying to be rude, but I can just see this thing getting out of hand and the little fire quickly growing to a giant fire, burning these big oaks and threatening the houses. Like I said, better safe than sorry. Thanks again!"

As I walked away I heard him telling his boss to call the Fire Department. I was worried they wouldn't do it. When I got home I fed the birds, did a few other things, then went upstairs and looked out a window. It had been about 15 minutes since I left him and by now I should see the Fire Department there.

Yep, there was the engine putting out the fire. Whew!

When I first saw the fire, I was upset because it ruined my run. Plus I didn't want to hang around until the Fire Department got there, and maybe even after because I had stuff I needed to do! But then I reminded myself that I need to do the right thing and that's to call it in. If I were late to work they would completely understand. I could see how easy it is for people to just ignore and not want to get involved. That was weird. It sounds like I debated it for a long time, but really it was only about 5 seconds.

When I was leaving for work there was more weirdness. I passed a police car. Eh, no big deal, they often roll with a fire. I pulled onto the main street and noticed another fire engine and police cars around a small housing development next to the school. Wow! Another small fire! I passed yet another police car after that. Looks like someone was messing around, might have a little arson going on.

From what I saw, nothing was damaged. The fire's were set away from buildings and everything. I'm not sure WHAT was burned, I'll have to check the local news websites.

Weird morning, but glad I was ready to do the right thing.

Marci 2, Rich 0 - and that's a good thing!

2008-07-21T11:38:00.000-07:00

This weekend we were working in the yard a lot. We bought a bunch of rocks (which is a strange concept - buying rocks...) to make a path and had lots left over. We placed some around one area of the house then decided we needed to get some border stuff. These are plastic brick looking rectangle things that have two stakes you hammer into the ground to keep them in place.

First Riley wanted to help hammer them in. I was tired, it had been a long day, and I was afraid he'd miss a lot and break a stake or something, so I said no. Marci told me to just let him have a try. I said no and told her why. She said that was silly and I should let him try. Again, I was tired, got mad, a few more dumb conversations went on and I threw down the hammer saying, "Fine! He can hammer one in!", which bounced over and hit Maddie's leg - fortunately for me, not badly, just a little tap. She was more surprised than hurt. Ya, that was pretty stupid of me to get so mad and do something so freakishly stupid. So I let Riley hammer a stake in.

He did a great job! I was now mad because I got so mad at something so dumb and I was quite wrong, he wasn't breaking them or causing any harm. That was really, REALLY stupid of me to not let him at least try it. So we finished all of them where I would pound in the first stake and he'd pound in the 2nd. And it was fun doing that together!

Marci 1, Rich 0.

Then Maddie wanted to try. I again said no because it would be too hard for her. Marci again said to let her have a try. I didn't want to, but saw how wrong I was about Riley, so let her have a try (while grumbling about it). In this case, it WAS too hard for her, she just couldn't swing the hammer hard enough. BUT, when she saw it was too hard, she was ok with not doing it! That shocked me. I thought she was going to throw a fit and want to keep doing it even though she couldn't. Nope, she was now fine with just watching.

Marci 2, Rich 0.

Moral of all this for me was that even if I'm tired, I should let the kids try things. Sometimes they will surprise me with how well they do and how well they act. Mostly, I shouldn't act like a 3 yr old and throw a hammer at the ground - I was lucky no one got hurt. At first I just wanted to finish it quickly, but I ended up having a lot of fun with Riley helping me.

Man, I hate it when I'm so stupid. Thankfully I have Marci to keep me in line. ;)

What did I get myself into?

2008-06-05T08:28:00.001-07:00

Last night was orientation for Cub Scouts. At first Riley didn't want to do it. Then he found out some of his friends are going to do it so he wanted to. The kids went off to do some fun things and the adults stayed listening to what Scouting is about, costs, etc. I remember having a lot of fun in Scouts and thought Riley would enjoy it too. I also remember many times not wanting to do things, but as a kid, I never wanted to spend more than 5 minutes on something, got bored quickly, and never liked to do anything that required work. LOL! Fortunately I'm older now and think I can help Riley have fun.

At the end they said while they will take all of our applications, they need to have someone run this group, this Den of kids. Until they could get someone, they wouldn't be able to do anything. Then they asked if anyone there wanted to do it. After no one raised their hands, I raised mine. My mind was screaming, "Are you crazy? You barely have enough time to do anything NOW! Stop it! Put your hand down!!" But it wouldn't go down and my mouth enthusiastically said, "I'd like to do it!"

So now I'm going to be the Den Leader. What did I get myself into?

Riley & Maddie at the Dentist - and a quick run to the vet

2008-06-04T07:30:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a very long day. Both Riley and Maddie had major cavities and had them fixed. I was talking with the dentist to try and understand what we have been doing wrong that would give them so many cavities and he said he'll go over all of this in the follow-up visit. But it isn't any one thing, rather a bunch of things together.

First was Maddie at 6am! I got up at 4:30am to get her there on time. Then took her home, got Riley and brought him back. For both of them, because of their age and the amount of cavities, they said it would be best to put them out. This involved a shot in the arm that put them out in about three minutes! I mean it was fast! They were hooked up to IV's while they did the work, then I held them while they woke up. You know everything is perfectly safe and fine, but dang it, they are YOUR kids and well, you just can't help but be worried something will go wrong. Fortunately I had my laptop with me and was able to get online to do some work to take my mind off of it. ;)

Maddie took the shot fine, though she did crumple up her face and start to cry a little. But I comforted her and soon she was out. On waking up she was fine, just wanted to sleep. They wanted to make sure she was able to respond to questions before we left. To help her feel better when she woke up they had me bring a blanket of hers, something familiar. I also turned the Backyardigans on my laptop so she could have some familiar sounds - I'd say something to look at but she wasn't interested in looking at anything. She woke up fine - she told me she wanted to go home - and slept on the way home. Once we got home she didn't want to lay down, she wanted to sit with Mommy and have a drink.

I took Riley and he was mad. Not because he was going to the dentist, but because he was hungry and not allowed to eat. They couldn't have anything past midnight. We felt bad for him but I explained if he had something then his tummy might get upset and he would throw-up all over himself and the dentist. He agreed he didn't want to do that.

His shot was much harder. He saw the needle and did NOT want it! Then as the drug took affect he was shaking his head trying to clear it. It was harder to sit with him, but I just rubbed his back and told him I was there and everything was ok. Waking up was really hard. They had me come back to help hold him so she could get the IV out of his hand. He was groggy, disorriented, and couldn't see well. They made a comment about how strong he was - I had troubles holding him too! ;) Sitting in the wakeup area was tough. At first his vision was blurry and he was dizzy. It was tough to comfort him but I did my best. I also had Backyardigans on again as he likes them too (hey, just because you're 6 now doesn't mean you can't like Backyardigans). His vision got better and he wasn't dizzy but he kept crying because his mouth felt funny and he wanted to go home. He also wanted to know what was going on and what happened and why they gave him a shot and why they put something in the back of his hand and a bunch of other things. It was tough to get him to be calm, but with lots of big deep breaths, he did. He had some water which helped because his mouth was really dry.

I could tell he was feeling better because he was getting mad at me. See, we told him the day before that after this was over he could get the new Lego Indiana Jones for Playstation 3. He also saw an X-Men game for Playstation 2 that he wanted and well, we're softies, wanted him to feel good and be distracted during his recovery, so we said we'd get that for him too. He was mad because I told him I was going to drop him off at home and then go back out to get those games - he wanted to come with me! LOL! So we both went and got the games. He was tired and slept a bit in the car, but once we got home and got the games in, he was fine.

Oh, and while they were cleaning his teeth, his bottom front tooth came out! They gave it to us so we could have him put it under his pillow for the Tooth Fairy. He's happy and excited about having a tooth gone.

Both recovered great at home. Maddie took about a four hour nap, Riley just played quietly. After Maddie woke up around 6:30pm, both were awake and wanting to play - run, jump, all the usual stuff. No pain for either of them, I hope that continues this morning. It was quite the experience for all of us. We did use this as a way to get Riley to brush better though. We told him, "Do you want to go through that again? No? Then you need to brush EXTRA EXTRA good." He agreed with that. He doesn't remember anything of what happened other than the shot and waking up, kinda.

Fortunately for both, all of the cavities are in baby teeth - heck, all the teeth in their mouth are baby teeth and will fall out. So all those fillings they have will be gone. We're going to really work to keep them from getting more.

As we were all getting ready to go upstairs, we heard a yelp in the other room from one of the dogs. We figured they were just doing their usual playing. Roxy and Tiffany came running out and as I turned around I saw Zoey with a sad face and her right front paw up in the air. I picked her up and it was sensitive to touch. She was also shaking. We had one pain pill left and decided to be safe. So at 9pm (remember, I woke up at 4:30am and had no nap), I took her to the emergency Vet in Tualatin, about a 30 minute drive. Dove Lewis is closer, but we've had some no-so-great service there and never had anything bad at the Emergency Vet Clinic in Tualatin.

A super fantastic vet came to look at her, he was awesome!! He couldn't find any problems with the foot itself, no broken bones, no punchure wounds from teeth. We put her down and watched here walk. From the way she was walking - putting her foot down solid then not being able to put any pressure on it - it looked like a shoulder sprain. He said sometimes dogs play rough and slam into each other, almost t-boning each other. I told him yep, that's our dogs. ;) No reason for x-rays he said, because x-rays work only for bones, they don't tell much of anything for soft tissue damage. More pain meds and I was told to watch her to see if she starts putting any pressure on it. If things don't get better in a few days we need to have our vet look at her.

Poor Zoey was hurt, not feeling good, and shaking like crazy, it was hard to calm her down. And her tail was between her legs a lot, I felt sooooo bad for her. We weren't there long which was good, and she slept in the car on the way home as I pet her. Took here up to our bed so she could sleep next to Mommy - everyone wants to sleep next to Mommy so Daddy never gets to. LOL!

Got to bed at midnight and am very tired today. A really long day with lots of emotions. I'm very mellow today which just might be a good thing, I'm feeling like if I put my headphones on I'll be able to focus very easily and get lots of work done. ;)

Starlight Parade 2008

2008-06-02T09:12:00.001-07:00

Another year, another fun Starlight Parade. A few drops fell as we were standing there waiting to get going, but thankfully that was all. It was actually a little humid and muggy when we were marching - at least to us it was. A fun time and my lips are still sore two days later. LOL!

Friday is the Concert in the Park (formerly the Festival of Bands), and Saturday the big Rose Parade. Right now it looks like we might get wet Friday but be dry Saturday with mild temps. That sounds like perfect marching weather.

I didn't take a LOT of photos from the Starlight Parade, but I'll take a lot more at the Rose Parade which I'll post this coming weekend.

Riley's Birthday

2008-06-02T08:53:00.000-07:00

Wow, Riley is now 6! Where does the time go? We had a family birthday, and one with his friends at Safari Sam's. He had a great time at both, and loved getting presents twice. LOL!

Click the photo for more pictures.

He's really had a great time in Kindergarten. Every day he looks forward to going and has a lot of new friends that he wants to have over this summer. That means we have to get busy and clean the backyard up.

6. Wow, just doesn't seem like it's been that long. And Maddie turns 3 in another few weeks! Need to take more photos and video so they can be embarrassed when they are in high school. haha

What a weekend.

2008-05-19T08:02:00.000-07:00

This last weekend was some fantastic weather, the kids loved playing outside in the new pool. We went with my Mom to the Leach Gardens. They had a dinosaur thing going on which the kids enjoyed. It's a beautiful area on SE Portland right next to Johnson Creek.

Got some work done around home, and sat in the hospital emergency area for four hours Saturday night. Marci sprained her right ankle and just to be safe, we went there to make sure it was just a sprain. We greatly appreciated my parents taking the kids until midnight! Marci's doing fine, her ankle just hurts and she's feeling frustrated that she can't do much around the house. Both of us were starving by the time we picked up the kids. We were about to BBQ when she hurt herself and hadn't eaten anything. Thank goodness Taco Bell is open late! ;)

Sunday she relaxed and watch the kids while I mowed the lawns, water the new plants, finished installing the new ceiling fan (see previous post), ran some errands (Maddie came with me and had a nice nap - she immediately fell asleep when we got in the car), helped get dinner for everyone, took Zoey for a walk, got the sprinklers working again (it's the time of the year to turn them back on), failed to fix the portable DVD player after Maddie decided it needed more salt and pepper, and a bunch of other things. I tried to get Maddie to sleep so Marci could get to bed early and she didn't get to sleep until 11:45pm! I tried everything, but she was just awake.

Even though I'm tired this morning I feel really good about getting so much accomplished, with the ceiling fan being the big one. And the Leach Gardens were a lot of fun - I had a chance to make a few more panoramic - or rather multi-image - photos. :)

I didn't burn down the house!

2008-05-19T07:39:00.000-07:00

We have two ceiling fans in our living room. They are nice, but the remotes never worked well and they don't provide a lot of light. A few weekends ago we finally got a new fan to replace one of them and just a light to replace the other. Really, there was no reason for two fans in the room. One of those things that sounded like a great idea when we were building the house and nine years later has us scratching our heads. haha

This last weekend *I* actually took out the old fan, installed the new one and it worked! Turned off the power, took down the old one, matched up the wire colors with the new one, put it all together, turned on the power, crossed my fingers and the fan started spinning around nicely. I gave out a little Tim Allen grunt of accomplishment. ;) I'm no electrician by any means, but being able to do that myself made me feel pretty good.

Next weekend, the new light will go up.

Happy Mother's Day!

2008-05-12T14:10:00.000-07:00

We cleaned around the house, did some shopping, and tried to give Marci a break to do whatever she wanted. Unfortunately she had a headache and didn't feel that great. :(

In the afternoon we went to my parents for homemade pizza (Riley enjoyed helping with that). Maddie fell asleep on the way there and slept through dinner, waking up just as we were done. Then ice cream and opening presents. We all had a lot of fun.

Since Maddie had a good late nap, we knew she'd be up late (11:30pm she finally fell asleep!). Again, it was Mother's Day, so I told Marci, "Nope, no discussion. You go to bed early and get plenty of sleep, I'll get Maddie to sleep." Fortunately she was quiet and let me sleep between Backyardigans' shows. LOL!

NEW CAR!!

2008-05-06T14:20:00.000-07:00

Sunday we traded in our Honda Pilot for a Honda CR-V. It's AWESOME!

We were planning on trading in our Pilot in a year or two for a CR-V, but decided now might be a better time with a trip to Reno coming up, a trip to the beach later this summer, and who knows what other trips, and gas prices going up. The Pilot is a wonderful vehicle but with the CR-V we'll get 5-10 more miles per gallon.

It's a beautiful black car with beige interior. It's got pretty much every bell and whistle except navigation; navi was like $1500 more and we already have one we can mount in the window that works very well. Heated seats, dual climate controls, XM radio (free for 45 or 90 days, not sure if we'll keep it), a sun roof (WOOHOO!!!), and a bunch of other cool stuff. Unlike the Pilot, it doesn't have a DVD player in it. So we bought a set that hangs on the back of the headrests, one for each kid. You can play one DVD and watch it on both, both can play their own DVD's, and one can be playing a DVD while the other is playing a game. This means for our trip to Reno, Maddie can watch what she wants and Riley can be playing his Playstation 2.

The best part of this was the experience of purchasing the car. It was FANTASTIC!!! By FAR the best experience we've ever had getting a car!

Late last year when I learned what the 2009 Honda Fit would look like and decided I wanted one of those instead of the 2008 model, I contacted the internet sales person at Hillsboro Honda (formerly St. Johns Honda). I told her I was only interested in the 2009 and wanted to get my name on top of the list since I knew they'd be a hot item. Since then I've exchanged numerous emails with Pattie Brown and we went out to meet her once at some special event they were having.

This last Friday we started exchanging emails about the CR-V, figuring out what we wanted, how much we wanted our payments to be, etc. Sunday morning she said she had two cars like that and we were on our way. She was just the greatest. Very friendly, made us very comfortable, no pressure, definitely NOT your typical car sales person. I mean this person is someone you'd invite to a party, not someone you'd want to run away from as fast as you can and then take a shower to get rid of the slime.

There was one funny thing. The finance guys first estimate was $1.24 OVER what we wanted. Now $1.24 is not that much money and we certainly could have afforded that, but that's one of those things that makes you feel like someone is trying to make a point, that THEY are in control, not you. She saw that, turned around and told him, "Come on. Let's not be silly about this. $1.24 over is just crazy. Get rid of that." And he did. When she took the job she said if she couldn't be honest and no pressure she wouldn't do it. They all laughed at her and thought she'd be gone in a month. Last year she was the top sales person in the entire company. That's ALL Larry Miller dealerships across several states! Gee, what do you know, honesty and no pressure works. Go figure!

It took us a total of four hours, but it didn't seem that long because she made us so relaxed and comfortable. So if you're in the market for a Honda, click this link and you won't be sorry. You'll get the best deal you can and even if things don't work out, you'll love the experience and come back again.

Oh, and the kids were amazing! They played together nicely, the dealership had some things for them to do, and they really were wonderful. One of the cars in the showroom had a ton of balloons in it. Pattie let them toss all the balloons out of the car, then they put them all back in. Maddie was leaning out the window and Riley would hand them to her. The last 30 minutes was toughest and Maddie crashed in the car about two minutes after we left. But we couldn't have asked for them to be any better.

Ah, that new car smell....

It was Arbor Day at our house this last weekend

2008-04-28T07:50:00.000-07:00

This weekend was beautiful weather so we decided to work in the yard. Sunday we bought and planted three trees and two shrubs. The Sherwood Rotary was selling them for $10 each! $50 for all of them! We stopped by Home Depot to get some other stuff and saw a tree similar to one we just bought for $70.

Lots of digging, getting hands dirty, trying to watch kids at the same time. LOL ! Marci did a fantastic job weeding and planting some other flowers around the place. Riley also helped by planting several flowers, including some strawberries. And playing with the hose spraying it straight up in the air and letting it "rain" on him. haha

Hopefully I'll get the photos posted to Flickr soon.

Lots of stuff to post

2008-04-23T15:46:00.000-07:00

Man, I've been REALLY bad about posting. Lots of stuff to post since the last time. I'm going to try really hard to do it tomorrow morning. But a quick recap: We now have a Vizio 52" HDTV hanging on our wall, new carpet, Johnnie has left us, Zoey is loosing weight, we had an amazingly great weather day and bought an eight foot trampoline, having fun watching American Idol (David Cook is going to win!), Maddie & Riley are a lot of fun as always, and I have the BEST wife in the world! For my Birthday, she bought me a Playstation 3! Now we have a Blue-Ray DVD player AND a very cool game machine! Riley and I already finished our first PS3 game, Uncharted. It was a blast!

Anyhow, I'll post more later. Be sure to checkout our Flickr page for photo updates.

Guitar Hero & Riley

2008-03-09T21:27:00.000-07:00

Tonight a friend of ours came over so I could help her with her Unix homework. After, she joined us playing Guitar Hero on our Playstation 2. She plays it a lot and is better than all of us.

But for most of the time, Riley was playing the game with her and going extremely well! Sure, he failed several times, but he also completed the song many times and did great with the rhythms! We were really amazed watching him hit all the right notes. It's not only hitting the rhythm right but hitting the right colored key on the guitar.

Well done, Riley! WOOHOO!!!!

GPS fun

2008-03-09T11:03:00.000-07:00

I found a new use for our GPS. On our way to dinner last night Maddie fell asleep. Riley said he didn't want to go to the Burger King playland by himself and we decided to get some pizza. I called in the order and they said it'd be ready in 25 minutes.

Hmmm.... It wasn't going to take me that long to get there, more like 10 minutes, maybe 12. "DING!" An idea!

I looked up Pizza Caboose on our GPS and set that as our destination. It gave me a route and said we'd get there at 5:25pm. WAY too early, had to be 5:40pm. SO, I started taking side roads letting the GPS recalculate our route AND arrival time.

That was fun and cool! The GPS not only helps me find where I'm going but now I can use it to help me not get to a place too early - or too late!

New Bikes and Enjoying the Great Weather

2008-02-29T07:19:00.000-08:00

Last year we tried to take the training wheels off Riley's bike, but he had a really hard time and wanted his training wheels back on. Marci and I agreed the problem was the bike. It looks like a motorcycle, specifically a chopper with long front forks. It's really cool, but hard to balance on. We decided we needed to get him a new bike. Since the weather was so fantastic, we decided to see if we could find one. He picked it out because he liked the wheels. It's maybe just a tad big for him, but by summer he'll be taller and able to ride it without any problems.

Maddie also got her first bike. Like Riley, she picked it out. She wasn't too sure about it and didn't ride it that much, but she does like it and loves to sit on it in the house. She can ride the tricycle just fine (which surprised us because we didn't know she could do that!) so we're sure she'll be riding her bike soon.

We've also had some incredible weather for the last several weeks. It has been sunny or partly cloudy with the highs between 58 and 63! Talk about Spring fever! It was so nice one day that we decided to head to one of the kids favorite parks and play for awhile. They really had a lot of fun.

Oh, and as you can see they have new jackets. We were at Sears, the kids saw these and just HAD to have them. That's ok, the one's they had were getting to be too thick and heavy. They both loved them and were wearing them everywhere. In this photo I asked Maddie to smile. You can see she is definitely Riley's sister. LOL!

Riley's feeling better!

2008-02-16T21:20:00.000-08:00

He had 3/4's of a grilled cheese, a big bowl of vanilla ice cream, some cookies, lots of Squirt, and is feeling a LOT better. Earlier in the day he needed me to carry him to the bathroom, and just a little while ago he walked there. Now he's telling me he's bored and wants me to play with him. I think after a good nights sleep he'll be fine tomorrow. Whew!

Poor Riley

2008-02-16T13:58:00.000-08:00

We've had this cold thing going through the family. Last night on the way to dinner Riley said his tummy hurt. At dinner he just wanted to curl up and lay his head on my leg. Then he fell asleep. When we got home he went right to bed. He's got a fever and doesn't feel good, but he's resting nicely and drinking fluids.

Poor guy. Hopefully he'll feel better by Monday because he really loves going to school.

Flight home from Boston

2008-02-13T13:33:00.000-08:00

LONG flight back. A big head-wind made the trip 30 minutes longer, so 6 hours!

As they were pushing the plane back from the gate in Boston, we heard a "bang" and the plane jerked a little. Found out they broke the push-back bar. Had to push the plane back to the gate so a mechanic could make sure the plane was ok. We all sat there with our fingers crossed and after about 10 minutes, everything was ok. Whew!

When we were about an hour and a half into the flight, the pilot gave us the "Welcome and thanks for flying with us... blah blah blah" speech. At the end he said, "And right now in Boston it is snowing heavily and visibility is down to less than a mile." Oh man am I glad we got out before that hit!

It was a uneventful flight, which is always nice. One odd thing for this whole trip was I had the entire row to myself on each flight! That was soooooo awesome!

I rented one of the movie players Alaska Airlines offers for $10. It has a bunch of movies in it as well as tv shows, sports, music video's, and a bunch of other things. I watched "3:10 to Uma" and "The Seeker: The Dark is Rising". Both were really good and they certainly made the flight go faster. I started watching "The Darjeeling Limited" but ran out of time. It was a bit odd, but I was into it enough that I wanted to see how it ended. Oh well, maybe I'll rent it sometime.

Overall it was a really great trip, I got lots of great ideas for the users group and had fun chatting with friends. I just wish I would have gotten more sleep. My body is still not recovered and not fully functional.

Rich's Trip to Boston

2008-02-11T17:52:00.000-08:00

Oh man, what a wild trip. I'm in Boston (actually Bedford, a suburb of Boston) for a meeting with all of the Progress Software North American Users Group Presidents. I do this every year about this time. Had a great first day and a super steak dinner.

Normally we meet in mid-January, but this year we had to change it. I usually fly out on Alaska, there's only one flight out (Portland to Seattle to Boston) so I fly out the day before. I couldn't do that this time because Riley and I were going to the Monster Truck show Sunday (yesterday). I found a flight that took me from Portland to San Francisco to Boston (on the red eye) which allowed me to take him to the Monster Truck show and still get me here in time for the meeting that started at Noon.

Everything started fine, got to PDX on time, plane left on time, simple no problem flight to San Francisco. Then the problems started.

First, I had to leave the security area to go to another terminal and go back through security. A minor hassle, but it was made a little more of a problem because I had a Sprite in my backpack from Portland that I forgot to remove. TSA wasn't happy about that. They weren't rude or mean, just not nice. Sprite got thrown away and I was on my way. Found the gate only to see the plane was delayed an hour and a half - instead of leaving at 11:30pm I was leaving at 1am!

Great.

Downloaded the photos from the Monster Truck show, looked at some other photos, was going to get online but SF wanted $9.99/day and I wasn't about to pay that. Why can't everyone be like PDX and have free wireless?? Then I started watching Family Guy on my Playstation Portable. That was fun but I had a hard time staying awake.

Finally we boarded. Luck was with me, no one else was in my row so I had all three seats to myself. I stretched out and slept. Next thing I knew I heard the pilot saying we were getting ready to land. I remember some bumps, but mostly I slept really well. A bumpy landing, but nothing bad.

I made my way to the shuttle area and of course the transportation I arranged wasn't there. I figured it wouldn't be. Called them and was told I gave him the wrong flight number. I told him that's the number that was on my ticket. Whatever the case, he couldn't have someone there for another two hours. I couldn't wait. Found a taxi. Asked if he knew how to get to the hotel (showed him the address) and of course he said, "Sure, no problem!" After we get on the freeway he's calling his dispatch asking how to get there. ARGH!!! I ended up showing him the way when we finally got closer. He was nice, just clueless on driving. I swear I thought we were not going to make it, that we'd end up in an accident the way this guy was driving. I really was surprised I made it.

Got here and my room wasn't ready. ARGH #2!!!!! I told them I just wanted some place to shower before my meeting started. She was nice and found me another room that was perfectly fine. Got my shower and got to my meeting on time. From there on everything was great and I had a super day.

A major pain getting here, but I stayed calm and kept a cool head, and left plenty of time to get here, so everything was fine. I get to leave tomorrow, my flight gets in at 11:44pm. A long couple days, but worth it. Now I'm going to get a good nights sleep so I'm awake tomorrow. :)

Chocolate Festival

2008-02-04T12:33:00.000-08:00

Sunday we went to the Chocolate Festival. Last year was so much fun we had to go again this year. It didn't seem like there was as much chocolate as there was last year. But this year they added a 3rd building, so maybe there was and just wasn't in the main building.

One thing they DID have was the worlds largest truffle. After it was made and weighed, they took ice cream scoops to it and gave out samples. WOW! It was AWESOME!! We hit there first, had a bunch of other stuff, then hit it again before moving to the other buildings. And they gave us HUGE samples. We tried a few other chocolates in the other buildings, but nothing was really all that exciting. A lot of places had flavored chocolate, very few had just simply chocolate - milk, dark, etc.

We had a great time and left feeling like we had eaten our years worth of chocolate in one day! haha Pictures will follow sometime in the next day or so.

Snow this week

2008-01-31T13:40:00.000-08:00

We had two fun days with some snow. Monday it was more icy than snowy. The strange thing is my parents are at about 200 feet and had more snow than we did at 336 feet. But that changed on Wednesday when we had lots more than they did. Thankfully it still melted early so driving wasn't bad at all. It was pretty while it lasted though. And of course Riley was not happy that it was gone so quickly. haha Here are two photos.

Monday. I took several photos and stitched them together, then did a little processing in Photoshop to give it this neat look.

Wednesday. Again I took several photos from Maddie's room and stitched them together to make this panorama.

Portland Auto Show

2008-01-27T18:52:00.001-08:00

update: Photos are now on Flickr.

We went to the Auto Show today. Nothing terribly exciting or thrilling. Some neat/cool cars, some blah cars, and a lot that were nice. But the kids really had a great time. We let them get in as many cars as we could. They wanted to sit in every car and we were getting tired after only making it through about a quarter of the show. I got some good photos of cars and them in the cars that I'll post to Flickr sometime soon.

We did have fun going through the Motorcycle area. Riley and Maddie had a blast sitting on the ATV's. We went into the everyday motorcycle section and within 10 minutes had horrible headaches. They had a DJ playing rap-ish type music with HUGE bass that was way too loud and just didn't sound good. We couldn't talk normally, had to raise our voices and it was just not fun. I really wanted to find someone in charge to tell them how horrible that was, but decided it wouldn't do any good, that one person wouldn't matter and they'd just say, "Ya, they were some old farts who don't know music and motorcycles." Well, the kids had fun anyhow.

The exotic cars were fun, though you couldn't sit in them which sucked. I mean sure, I'm never going to own a $300,000 car, but it would be fun to at least sit in one. Oh well, it was a fun day. Now we're just waiting until Sept when the 2009 Honda Fit comes out so we can get one from Larry Miller Honda - dealing with Pattie Brown the internet sales person who's AWESOME!

Don't Watch Me...

2008-01-25T11:52:00.000-08:00

Maddie has really gotten into dancing. She used to just sit quietly and watch the Wiggles, Doodlebops, and other shows. But now she wants to dance to the music - and she's started singing some of the words.

The other day I was watching her dance. She saw me, stopped, and said, "Don't watch me, Daddy." I said ok, turned away, then turned back. She caught me and said it again. But with a smile. Recently she was at my parents and did the same thing.

So that's her new thing now. Dancing to the music, but you can't watch her do it. LOL!

Fun with Riley at Wunderland

2008-01-18T09:46:00.000-08:00

Last night Marci and Maddie went to go spend some time with her sister. This left Riley and I to find something to do. We started by playing in his room and having fun with cars, then left for Wunderland.

It was great because it was almost empty. we didn't have to wait for a game to become available. We played a few games where you get the tickets you can exchange for stuff, but spent most of our time (and money) playing driving and shooting games. The driving games were ok, but the shooting games were a blast!

They were two player games where we worked together to fight the bad guys. When I'd die, I'd quickly feed four more nickels into the machine so I could keep playing. When Riley would die, I'd hand him my guy and feed more nickels in so he could keep playing. We spent most of our $10 in nickels on those games. It was a great time!

We got a few tickets, but not enough to get anything. Riley said next time we need to get THREE bags of nickels - one for the games where you move the giant claw and hope to grab something, one for the shooting games, and one for the games that give you tickets. LOL! Talk about a really fantastic time.

Marci said she and Maddie had a lot of fun too. They went to Ikea, but only had about 30 minutes to look around and they might go back Saturday. That's fine with Riley and I, more time for us at Wunderland! :)

Another icy morning

2008-01-16T13:15:00.000-08:00

More ice this morning on the drive in, though not as bad as yesterday. Well, not as bad weather-wise. This morning we couldn't see the ice - black ice - so people figured, "I can't see it so it must not be there," and decided to drive fast again. Yesterday people were respectful and kept a safe distance behind me. Today I had people right on my tail all the way to work. Watching the news before I left I noticed more accidents today.

Yo, moron's, just because you can't SEE the ice doesn't mean it's not there! geez...

Icy drive in

2008-01-15T14:29:00.000-08:00

This morning there was some ice on the roads. It wasn't that bad, but after listening to the news and walking on our street, I decided to wait an hour before leaving. Instead of leaving at 6:15am, I left at 7:15am.

Our street was pretty icy, but I managed to get out. Several times my brain would say, "This is stupid! Turn around! Go home and wait until it warms up!" I would have to remind my brain that the side roads are always the worst and I was reserving the decision to drive in until I was on a main road. My brain wasn't happy about this until I got to the main road. It was MUCH better. When I finally got to a very busy road, it was pretty much all gone, just a few patches here and there.

Whew!

The most surprising thing to me was people behind me were actually at a safe distance! Normally I've got at least one person on my butt really close, but this time everyone stayed back. Very weird. Could Oregonians actually be learning how to drive in bad weather? Nawwww, I must have just had some freaks behind me. haha

I have Play-Doh in my diaper!

2008-01-06T20:50:00.000-08:00

Maddie was running around this morning saying, "I have Play-Doh in my diaper". I thought she meant she had a poopie diaper, calling the poop Play-Doh. Nope, she had taken a full jar of Play-Doh and put it in her diaper alright. Why? Why not! hahaha

p.s. A Christmas recap post will come soon, photos are on Flickr.

Poor Roxy

2007-12-12T10:23:00.000-08:00

This last Saturday Roxy was coughing and hacking a lot. We took her into the vet and turns out she has kennel cough. She WAS vaccinated against it, but the vet said dogs can still get it. The good news is the vaccination helps to make it less severe and not last as long. She's on antibiotics and doing better. Sunday night she had a really rough time, coughed a lot, even so much she made herself throwup a little. Poor girl! But as of this morning she's doing a LOT better. And thankfully it looks like none of our other dogs picked up the cough. Whew!

Sunsets

2007-12-08T19:55:00.001-08:00

Three versions of the same sunset. The top is the original which was made up of 8 photos (I used Photoshop CS3 to create the panorama). The middle is after I played with it in Photoshop. In this case I bumped up the blue too much but thought it looked cool. The bottom has better color and I added the moon. This was fun. :)

Frankie and our Vet

2007-12-07T12:07:00.000-08:00

I hadn't mentioned it to a lot of people because it was hard to write. A week ago Frankie passed away, he was 12. He'd been battling cancer for several months and actually lived about 3 months longer than anyone thought he would. We had him on some medication and other than laying around a lot he seemed to be doing pretty good.

The morning he passed he seemed fine - well, fine for how he'd been doing. He came down the stairs, went outside, ran to the fence and barked at people going by, ate, took his pills, he was fine. We went shopping and did a few things, came back around 7pm. When we called him to come in he just sat there next to the deck. I thought he was just having troubles so I went out and helped him in. He walked in very strange, like he was really tired. I called Marci to look at him. We tried to give him his medication but he didn't want to take it, and that's rare. We'd always give it to him with peanut butter which he loved. We took him upstairs to lay in front of the fan as he liked. He tried to get up to go get a drink of water and collapsed. Marci yelled for me and when I got there I could tell he wasn't doing good. We'd been trying to get ahold of our vet for about 30 minutes and finally did. He said to bring Frankie in asap. I got dressed, Marci asked me what she could do and it hurt terribly to say, "Say good-bye...". I hopped into the car with Frankie who wasn't doing well. He didn't seem to be in pain, just like he was having a hard time breathing. I could tell he was going. While I was driving there (which is about a 2 minute drive), I pet him, told him we love him, and calmly told him it was ok, he could let go. Shortly after I got to the vet's office he was gone. The vet showed up a few minutes later, took him and took care of everything.

I don't think he suffered or was in pain at all, he just didn't seem like it. It was like he was just closing his eyes and letting things go. I also feel that he waited until we got home so we could all say good-bye together. Why? Because it was a matter of minutes after we got home and got him inside that he started going.

He was our first dog. A very good dog, one who was always there for us, would protect us against anything and anyone no matter how big the other was. He was very loving and excellent with our kids. One time when he was younger in our other house, we heard him barking strangely. It sounded funny, but we were busy in the garage. A short time later he came walking into us with one of our birds in his mouth. The bird was completely un-hurt and we realize he was trying to let us know earlier that one of the birds had fallen off the cage and couldn't get back (we clip their wings so they can't fly but then can flutter down gently). He did that one other time, didn't hurt the bird at all, just gently carried her in his mouth to us. He sure was fun and fantastic and we will miss him.

Yesterday we got a card in the mail from OSU's Veterinary school. Our Vet had made a generous donation in Frankie's name to them! Wow. That was sooooo cool of them! Both Marci and I cried a little. This guy knew Frankie could go at anytime and gave us his personal - his PERSONAL! - cell phone so we could call him anytime. When we did call they were closed and he was at home doing a crossword puzzle. How many Vet's would do that and not be mad when you called?

If you live around the Bethany area and want the best Vet in the world, look up Dr. Norman at the Bethany Family Pet Clinic, you won't be sorry.

So now we are left with Johnnie who still has trouble walking but actually seems to be doing better, Tiffany who's doing better except with food (she takes ours all the time), and our two great puppies, Zoey (who's working hard to be the top dog) and Roxy. Having puppies in the house certainly makes coping with our loss easier. It's strange to not see Frankie laying in his usual spots and to not call his name when we call the dogs. We do miss him but he's in a better place now, where he can run and play with other dogs - and Rio and Lola.

Ashmead 2007 Christmas Party

2007-12-02T10:08:00.000-08:00

What a great party! It was at McMenamin's Grand Lodge in Forest Grove. The food was a buffett and really good. Then we went to another room where they had a live band who were awesome! This was our first Ashmead Christmas party and we're already looking forward to next year!

This morning it was strange. I got up before everyone else (as usual), came downstairs and the house was clean! Man, what a nice feeling to wake to a clean house. Then another 45 minutes before Marci woke up. It was really quiet and really cool.

Busy Saturday

2007-12-01T16:39:00.001-08:00

Marci and I spent all day cleaning the house, finally got done around 4pm. Now we are getting ready for her Ashmead Christmas Party at McMenamins Grand Lodge in Forest Grove. Marci's sister Wendy is coming over to watch the kids so it's going to be a very rare night out for just the two of us!

It's going to be so weird not having the kids with us.... haha

Christmas and getting back on track with blogging

2007-11-30T07:50:00.000-08:00

First off, sorry it has been so long since my last post. I was trying to do this at least once a week, got busy, and soon a whole month had gone by. D'OH! Today I'm renewing my vow to post once a week.

Every year over the Thanksgiving weekend we get our Christmas tree. These last two years we have gone to Sleigh Bells in Sherwood. What a great place! Lots of trees to choose from. This year, a really nice young high school guy asked us if we needed help cutting down our tree. Well, we didn't but heck, I wasn't going to turn down the chance for someone else to get muddy. He cut it down, his brother came by to help him haul it to the road for us. Coolness! Then we went to their very cool store that has TONS of ornaments, picked out a few, got some fudge (they have AWESOME fudge!!) and went to pick up our tree. They bring it down, put it in a machine that shakes out all the loose needles, then bale it and put it on our car for us. Man, that was great! Got it home, set it up and it looks fantastic! Click the photo for more Christmas 2007 photos. I will be adding more to that Flickr set as the days go by.

Riley is LOVING kindergarten! He really looks forward to going every day. That's so cool! I was really worried he'd hate it, not want to go and fight going. But the few times I've walked him to school, as we get closer he starts almost running to get there. It's one of the very few times he's walking faster than me! He's also made some new friends and even went home on the bus with one of them so they could play. Our little boy is growing up.

Maddie is LOVING preschool! She also looks forward to going each day she goes. The kids there treat her well and she's got a few that really look out for her. We can see a big difference in her since she's been going. She talks more, does more things, basically just growing up all of a sudden. Right now she is being more of a pill, definitely trying to experience her terrible-two's. haha She's not REALLY bad, just learning she can do some things and wanting to see everything she CAN do. Like putting ornaments on the tree. She really wanted to help, but didn't understand about the glass and fragile ones. We kept having to take them from her because she wanted to squeeze them. Fortunately she didn't hurt herself or break any. Then we'd put some on and she'd take them off. LOL! She's still wonderful and a fun to play with. Her and Riley for the most part play really well together, which is nice.

Marci just had her birthday and I surprised her with an iPod nano. She's been wanting one and now they have video. So I preloaded it with videos of our dogs and the kids. I even got the kids to say, "Happy Birthday Mommy!" and had that one ready to play when she turned it on. I think I was more excited about giving it to her than she was about getting it. haha

Well, that kinda catches you up on where we are now. I'm going to set a calendar reminder to blog each week, and hopefully do it! ;)

Riley jumping in Leaves

2007-11-04T18:45:00.001-08:00

Today was a BEAUTIFUL day!! I mean shorts and t-shirts kind of weather. Well, it wasn't THAT hot, I think it got to the high 50's. But if you were in the sun it was really warm and nice - for November!

Riley went next door to help his friend Cameron rake up leaves. Then they made a big pile and had fun jumping into it! It was a riot to watch them. I took a bunch of photos. Click on the photo to see more.

Roxy & Zoey at the Dog Park

2007-10-28T16:32:00.000-07:00

[ more video's ] We took Roxy & Zoey to the Hondo Dog Park in Hillsboro the other day. They LOVED it! This park is really awesome. They have a small dog area, a big dog area, and a winter area - which is all sand no mud - though you don't have to take your dog to any specific area. We took them to the small dog area once, the winter area once when it had been raining a lot so the other area's were muddy, and this time decided to try the big dog area.

THEY LOVED IT!!!

Roxy really went wild, running all over the place. She's normally really shy and stays with us, but this time she decided to go crazy and was all over the place. It was great to see her having fun.

Zoey also had a good time, though she just hung around us and took it all in. Marci did a little run later and they both ran with her. We were there for probably an hour and a half. A beautiful fall day and a lot of fun for the dogs.

Riley & Maddie also had fun with all the dogs. And there's a hill that they had fun rolling down. It was a riot to watch them.

I'm not touching you...

2007-10-24T08:31:00.000-07:00

Last night we were in the car coming back from the dog park. I had a headache. Riley was being Riley, which sometimes doesn't mix well with a headache.

Riley: no no no no no no no no no no no (in a singing style to some made up song).

Rich: Riley, can you not do that right now? I've got a headache and that's making it hurt more.

Riley: no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no...

Rich: Riley, I asked you to please stop that.

Riley: no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no...

Rich: Riley! Stop that!

Marci: You have to be specific and tell him WHAT you want him to stop doing.

Rich: Riley, could you please stop saying "no"?

Riley: doh doh doh doh doh doh doh doh doh doh doh doh...

Rich: Riley! I asked you to stop that!

Riley: I'm not saying "no". doh doh doh doh doh doh doh...

Marci: Well, he IS doing what you asked. You know, if you asked your parents they'd say you would have done the same thing.

Rich: Ah, yes, it's the fun variation of "I'm not touching you!" And yes, I would have done the same thing. I'm sure Mom and Dad would be enjoying this payback.

Four shots for Maddie :(

2007-09-21T12:13:00.000-07:00

Today we went to the doctors because she needed her checkup - and to get some shots so she could continue to go to preschool. She needed four! FOUR!! And these went in her arms not her legs, two in each side. The first one she was looking at me and then suddenly made a face like, "Hey! What in the heck was that? It hurt!!" Then a 2nd one in the same spot.

Big frown on the face, some tears starting, her face got really red and we were waiting for her to start screaming. Then we switched arms for the other two. She still wasn't sure what was going on and why she was being hurt when she got the 3rd shot. Again a big "What are you DOING?" face when the 4th came. Then she wanted Mommy, not Daddy since Daddy was the one who let that lady poke her. haha

Still, she never screamed or anything major, just a few little tears and a big unhappy face - which quickly went away when we left to go get some toys for being such a good little girl. She really was amazing how she didn't cry or anything, that was sooooo cool of her!

Doctor said she's doing great, no problems, nice and healthy. WOOHOO!! ...and that Riley is due for his one year checkup. :)

Sunset

2007-09-19T14:51:00.000-07:00

The other day I looked out our window upstairs and saw a really nice sunset. I quickly grabbed my camera and took these photos (click the photo to see the full set at Flickr).

Finished Deck (well, almost)

2007-09-09T02:19:00.001-07:00

Today we FINALLY finished staining the deck. We needed to get between the boards on about half of it - we did the top completely earlier this year - and decided it would be a good idea to redo the entire deck.

Ya, right, good idea. We're still wondering which one of us came up with that idea and why the other agreed to it.

Took us about 4 hours. Riley and Maddie wanted to help but it just wasn't working out. So they started playing and just Marci and I did it. Then they wanted stuff and finally wanted Marci. So I finished it by myself.

Sore, tired, long day, but it looks great! Now we're ready for winter with it. Next up, the fence. :(

1st Days and Oregon State Fair

2007-09-06T12:09:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a day of firsts; both Riley and Maddie had their first day of school!

For Riley it was his first day at Kindergarten (click on the photo for more pictures). He's going to the afternoon sessions, so 12:30pm - 3:05pm. I took off early from work so both of us could walk him up there. He was nervous and a little scared, but he went without any problems. His teacher had everyone draw a first day picture and put their name on it. We waited for a bit then told him we had to go. He said he was ok, though looked almost like he was a little sad. Outside we watched through the window for a bit to make sure he was ok. He pretty much was his usual quite self, taking it all in, figuring things out. Then got up, got a book and sat down on a pillow to read it. He really didn't seem to have any problems.

For both of us it was quite emotional. Marci let's it show more than I do, she had tears in her eyes. For me, I kept wanting to say, "Our little boy is growing up," but each time I tried I could feel the emotion welling up in me, choking off the words.

When it was time to go get him, we walked up really fast, anxious to see him and make sure he was ok. I don't know why we worried, he was GREAT! He said he really likes his teacher and had a great time. He already knew the names of some of his classmates and said they were nice. He didn't cry, wasn't worried or upset, nothing, just did AWESOME!

Today for his 2nd day I called him before he left. I told him I was sorry, but I wouldn't be able to walk him to school or pick him up, that yesterday was special but now I have to work. I asked if he was looking forward to school and he said he was adding, "I want to go EVERY DAY!" That's so cool! Man, I still can't believe he's already starting school.

Maddie also started Preschool today with Mrs. T. Both of us were a little worried that she'd have troubles when Grammie left, but not too much, Grammie was more worried. She had been to Mrs. T's many times to pick up Riley so it wasn't a totally new place. Grammie said at first she held on really tight and didn't want to do anything. All of the other kids said they'd look after her and make sure she was ok. Mrs. T has a big jump-jump in her backyard and Maddie just loves it. So Grammie took her over to it, let her get in, and while she was distracted with the jump-jump and the other kids, Grammie left. She was there from about 9am to 11am.

When Grammie picked her up Mrs. T said there were no problems at all, that Maddie didn't cry or fuss or anything. She said when the other kids were sitting down to color, Maddie wanted to just play in the other room by herself, which was ok. Maddie had a great time! Last night when I asked her if she wanted to go again today, she said YES!

So both kids had their first big days without any troubles. WHEW! It was a long emotional day and by the end we were all drained, everyone slept well.

The Oregon State Fair
On Monday Sept. 3rd we went to the state fair with some friends. It was a great time! The day started out on the hot side. We couldn't believe how hot it was and were all worried about getting sunburned. Saw lots of animals including a horse that was HUGE! Goats, Llama's, and baby pigs, Maddie loved them all. Marci and Maddie enjoyed the petting zoo while Riley and I enjoyed the lizards, giant turtles, crocodiles, and various other exotic animals.

Then we went to play some games and ride some rides. The kids won a TON of stuffed animals, they really enjoyed doing that. Then Maddie and Marci went on the Merry-Go-Round while Riley climbed in some big thing. Maddie sat on a horse all by herself and loved it. Riley climbed all the way to the top and came down a huge slide. He loved it too. Maddie and Marci also went on a little swing that spun around in a circle. When it stopped Maddie said, "More!"

It was a long day, we were all hot and tired. The biggest surprise was Maddie didn't fall asleep on the way home! When it was bedtime, we all crashed really quickly. A good fun day at the fair. :)

Neskowin Beach Trip

2007-08-28T12:42:00.000-07:00

This last weekend we went to Neskowin. My Mom's family owns a little condo-ish place there and we can stay for free! We left on Friday afternoon and came back Sunday afternoon. It was a fantastic time with almost perfect weather! Above is a panorama I made from stitching several photos together. Photoshop is wonderful and this turned out great!

Maddie wasn't sure about the beach at first. But soon enough she was loving everything. Her favorite thing was to go and watch the waves. We'd go there for awhile, then leave and she'd say, "Waves?" because she wanted to go back there. Each time we walked to the restaurant we had to pass the entrance to the beach and she'd almost get mad because we didn't turn there. She was soooo cute! And she didn't mind at all the water rushing in over her feet. She really does like the water a lot.

Riley and I had a great time digging all over the place. At the little store we found some really nice shovels for $5 each. Those really made digging more fun. He would want me to dig a big hole so I would, then we'd move to another hole or trench or something. We also built a few dam's in the stream to keep the water out of an area. It was a lot of fun.

My parents went with us and that was nice too. Five years ago I was laid off when the economy wasn't doing well. For awhile it looked like the only job I'd be able to find was in Iowa. We didn't want to move but we have to eat and have a place to live. Thankfully we didn't have to move. This weekend reminded us why we didn't want to move - our kids got to spend a lot of quality time with their grandparents (well, they do that now, but even more this time) and we all got to have fun as a big family. It was a very relaxing and fun weekend.

I've got 232 photos on Flickr, go check them out. Some I was trying to take professional looking photos, others were just of the moment. And I made a few panorama's too. This time both Marci and I were smart, we took Monday off so we would have one day at home to relax.

All in all, a great four days, and now back to work. Though this is going to be a great week. Because of the holiday weekend coming up, we are closing at 3pm. Since I come in at 7am, I get to leave at 2pm. I think I could get used to a work-week like this - Monday's off, leave at 2pm on Friday. hahaha

Maddie calling Daddy at work

2007-08-14T15:23:00.000-07:00

For the last week or so Maddie has wanted to call me at work. It's so cute, I answer the phone and there's this little voice saying, "Hi!" We have our little conversation (she doesn't have a big vocabulary yet), then I say, "Bye" and she says "Bye" back. It's sooooooooooooo cute, I love it!

Another new puppy!

2007-08-02T10:11:00.000-07:00

Yes, we are crazy. Actually, we got word the other day that the vet found a small cancerous growth in Johnnie's mouth. Thankfully it hadn't spread to his lungs, he just needs a small operation to get it all in his mouth. But of course this means his days are now numbered too. Honestly, with all of the problems he has we're surprised he's made it this long! He's not as bad off as Frankie, and has probably another year or two in him.

We also got to talking about getting another puppy so Zoey would have someone to grow up and play with. Marci went on a hunt, found some breeders, contacted a few, and yesterday we drove out to meet one. All of her puppies were of course very cute! We took Zoey with us and let her pick the puppy. She seemed to be favoring this one as well as this one taking an interest in her. Right now we have named her Roxy, her mothers name is Roxanne. We'll see if that still fits in a few days.

Zoey and Roxy have been having a lot of fun playing together. Roxy is only 6 weeks and Zoey is 12 weeks, but Zoey is gentle. Tiffany has been having fun playing too, and again is very gentle. Johnnie is kinda like, "Oh man, not ANOTHER one!" Frankie on the other hand has REALLY taken to Roxy, much more than Zoey. That's great! We're quite happy about that.

And of course the kids love her, especially Riley. He just wants to hold her all the time and has trouble understanding sometimes she doesn't want to be held, especially when she's sleeping. AND that she doesn't always want to sleep ON Riley. haha

So we now have our hands VERY full! But we're enjoying it too.

New Puppy & the Oregon BrewFest

2007-07-30T15:02:00.000-07:00

On July 19th we brought home a new Cardigan Welsh Corgi puppy! I'm a little late blogging about it because we had a hard time picking a name. First she was going to be Savannah, but after watching her play that didn't fit. Riley liked Daphne (from Scooby Doo). That seemed to fit her, but after awhile both of us didn't like it anymore. Then Marci said, "What about 'Zoey'?" Perfect! After living with it for awhile we all agree she is definitely a Zoey - even Riley agrees. So welcome Zoey!

Now many people are probably saying, "What? ANOTHER dog? Three wasn't enough?" Well, there was a reason for getting Zoey. Frankie and Johnnie are both 12 and we had planned on getting another dog in another year or two. However, life dealt Frankie a bad hand; we found out early in July he has cancer.

This got us to wonder what we are doing wrong? How can two of our dogs get cancer? After letting our vet know Frankie and Rio were brothers, he said it's very likely every dog in that litter has cancer. He did reassure us that he can't think of ANYTHING someone could do to give a dog cancer. That made us feel better, because we do love our animals and take the best care of them that we can.

Now we had a dilemma; do we put Frankie through treatments or let it run its course? Untreated he has 1-3 months, treated a year maybe a little more. We remember putting Rio through this and how it affected him. After lots of soul searching and talking, we have decided not to do anything. Rio was 7, Frankie is 12. He's had a good life and is actually doing really good right now, you wouldn't be able to tell he has cancer, he's still running and playing and all that. Thanks to this we decided to get a puppy now. The vet even said this is a great thing for everyone - us and the dogs for making the transition easier, and for Frankie because the puppy can make him perk up a bit and feel better. Plus some of Frankie's personality will quite possibly rub off on Zoey. It'll be tough when the vet says it's time. He's been a great dog and we're just enjoying our remaining days with him. Sad, but also lots of fun and smiles too. :)

And we're remembering all the fun stuff about having a puppy, like having everything and anything within puppy reach chewed up. haha We have also found out she's a good little herding Corgi. Ever since we got her she's been nipping at our heals a lot. We finally figured it out. We're all together, one of us leaves and she starts nipping at our heals. Once we get back together she stops. That's how Corgi's herd! It's now funny and gives us a good laugh. This last Sunday we took her to her first Puppy playtime. Our vet told us about this place that is ONLY for puppies, no dogs over 2 years allowed. She LOVED it! Was shy at first, but then got it into it a lot and had a great time. AND then slept the rest of the day. LOL!

Also, this last Saturday we partook of the annual Oregon Brewers Festival. The day started with a light drizzle and cloudy. We weren't sure it was going to warm up, but it did and we had a blast! First we had to stop at Saturday market because Riley has outgrown his last tie-dye shirt. Of course Maddie wanted one and Marci got one two. I should have gotten one as mine is fading a lot. We had fun being the tie-dye family.

Every Friday we go to Old Chicago for dinner, have gotten to know the staff there quite well. There's also this great gal, Tamara, who does balloon animals. Maddie LOVES getting balloons, so does Riley, though not quite as much. Tamara joined us at the waterfront and although she doesn't drink beer, she still came. It was fun hanging out with her and getting to know her better.

This year Riley finally outgrew the backpack - or rather got too heavy for Daddy back; ya, I'm a wimp. He rode in the stroller and Maddie was on my back. She did great! After being there a few hours she fell asleep. Slept for about an hour, then woke up as we were getting ready to leave. She REALLY wanted Mommy and we were somehow able to get her to stay in the backpack until we got to the car. The one sucky thing was riding MAX. Someone did a really bad planning job. They decided THIS weekend they were going to work on the tracks. This meant MAX could only go to 10th street where you had to get off and walk to the waterfront. Not really THAT big a deal, but they could have waited a weekend when there wouldn't be anything going on at the waterfront.

That's about all for now. Oh, Maddie calls Riley "Bleh" instead of "brother". We find ourselves saying, "Is that bleh's?" instead of "Is that brothers?" hahahaha

My 3D Photos on a NASA website - Coolness!

2007-07-16T12:17:00.000-07:00

NASA has a website that explains how to create 3D photos, the glasses, and shows off photos other people have done. They have two of mine right now. I sent them links to my other ones on Flickr because I think I have much better photos than the two they picked.

Coolness to be on a NASA website!

4th of July! New carpet!

2007-07-05T13:06:00.000-07:00

Happy 4th of July!

We had a great time. In the morning our neighborhood does a little parade. This year Riley rode his bike instead of in the wagon. Maddie still enjoyed being chauffeured around. Grammie and Grandpa enjoyed the fun with us. Later as it started to get dark, Grammie & Grandpa came back over to light fireworks with us. We started around 9pm and finished around 11pm! As usual we bought a LOT. But it was fun and worth it. Riley had fun picking which one I would light off next. And surprisingly, both Riley & Maddie stayed awake the whole time. Click the photo for more pictures. Riley is already wanting to know how long before we can do this again. haha!

We also put in some more new carpet. In the master bath we replaced the carpet with wood flooring (looks great!) and then replaced ALL of the upstairs carpet with a lovely subtle green carpet. It looks sooooo much better than what we had. Feels better too! 2007 will be remembered as the year of remodeling/decorating. It's funny how once you decide to stay somewhere the things you do to change it from a house to a home.

New Deck, Swingset, Carpet, Piano, busy busy busy.....

2007-05-29T12:38:00.000-07:00

We've been very busy lately. First Mom and Dad were very generous! They sold their Yamaha baby grand piano (a very beautiful sounding piano too, I loved playing on it) and bought Mom an awesome digital piano (a Yamaha Clavinova top of the line). She had been wanting a digital piano mainly because she likes to play sometimes when Dad is asleep or taking a nap. Now she can because it has headphones - and a bazillion other features! They also did some good wheeling and dealing and were able to get us a VERY nice Yamaha upright!!
WOW!! It really is nice sounding and I'd forgotten how much I enjoy playing piano. Way too cool, can't thank them enough for this! Though I do think Mom had some ulterior motives - now she can give the kids piano lessons and they have a place to practice. haha

Before the piano showed up, we decided we'd better finally buy new carpet for where we are going to put it - we've had the money saved up for quite some time, but same as always, it gets put off and put off and put off. So we now have some nice new carpet in that room. It's a little darker, more brown, but it looks FANTASTIC!

For many years now we've been talking about building a deck out back. Once again, we've had the money saved up, just too many other things going on and next thing we know it's too late in the year (cold, raining, etc) and we say we'll do it next year. This year we got a little more motivated and sent the dimensions of the area to my Uncle Paul who has been building houses in Florence (Oregon) for 30+ years. He sent back directions, plans, and a parts list. He also said if we build it before mid-June, they would come up and help us. Well, I looked at the plans and was positive I could do it myself, but no WAY we're gonna pass up help from a professional! The arrived Friday morning, we got it framed by the end of the day, then finished it Saturday. It's AWESOME! We love it!! HUGE Thanks to Aunt jean and Uncle Paul! If it weren't for them, 1) we probably still would have lumber sitting in our driveway, 2) no WAY we would have gotten it done in two days, more like two weeks! (and you think I'm kidding...)

I also created a slideshow of the progression of the deck. It's best if you change the speed to fast in the lower left corner.

Lastly, we decided this year we would get the kids a nice swingset. We LOVE those Rainbow gym/fort/swingset things. They are very rugged and fun. But they also START at like $4500! The one we would have wanted to get was about $7500!! Just a tad out of our price range. So we got a really nice one from Toys R Us for a fraction of that price. Took me about two weeks to build it just because of other things going on. It's almost done, I just need to put the slide on. As I was finishing it yesterday, Riley & Maddie were having lots of fun climbing and swinging on it.

This last weekend Riley turned 5! 5!!! Man, how did that happen so fast? He wanted it at Safari Sam's, a great place with a HUGE indoor jungle gym thing they can climb on, in, around, etc. It was a great time, we all had a blast. And Maddie turns 2 in a month! How time flies...

So it's been a busy year so far, especially these last few months. And I'm sure it's going to be a busy summer, but busy in a good, fun way. :)

Mother's Day

2007-05-14T09:00:00.000-07:00

It was a nice Mother's day. We went to my parents for a BBQ, had some fun chatting, looking at Mom's new Yamaha Clavinova digital piano (drool is more appropriate), and opening gifts. Riley LOVED helping to open everything, and was VERY proud of the gift he bought Mommy.

A funny story is my brother was talking with his friends about what they got their mothers for Mothers Day. Lots of traditional things, flowers, chocolates, typical mothers stuff. When they asked him, he said, "The Photoshop CS3 upgrade." They were all like, "You're kidding, right?" "No I'm not, and she will really love this." And she did. Guess our family is a little different than most. hahaha

Gamefly is WAY COOL!!!

2007-05-10T08:01:00.001-07:00

Netflix is a cool way to rent movies as long as you don't want it RIGHT THIS SECOND. We used to use it all the time, but then we had kids and rarely have time to watch anything, let alone a two hour movie.

In the last few years Riley has really been enjoying playing our Playstation 2. We joined the game clubs at Blockbuster and Hollywood Video, but they didn't have much of a selection. Then I found out about Gamefly. It's exactly like Netflix only it's for video games instead of movies. And they have a HUGE selection! Riley's really into Monster Trucks. I found two games awhile back and wanted to buy them both. Only one I could find to buy, the other was not available. However, Gamefly has them both! The other game is now in our queue waiting to be sent to us. Cool! AND it's not that expensive at all. Really it's an excellent service.

If you want to check them out and join, please use this link: Gamefly.com They have a rewards program where if you use this link and sign up, we get points that we can redeem for game rentals and other stuff. Give it a try, I think you'll like it a lot. The other big cool thing for us is we can try these games before buying them - some have looked cool and actually sucked and we were glad we didn't buy them.

Reno trip day 5 photos

2007-04-26T22:23:00.000-07:00

I've just uploaded the photos from Day 5, our trip home. Again, lots of road photos of nothing inparticular, just stuff I thought was interesting. There are also some cute ones of the kids. Click the photo to go to the beginning of the Day 5 photos. Enjoy!

Reno - Day 5, the trip home

2007-04-25T06:26:00.000-07:00

Sorry, photos will be posted sometime tonight. :(

We sure had a lot of fun in Reno, but it's always nice to come home. The day started with a nice buffet breakfast, gassed up the cars, then hit the road a few minutes before Noon. What a beautiful drive home! Only a few clouds and according to our car, the outside temp ranged from 58 to 72. Sunglasses all the way home. This time we knew how far we could drive before needing to fill up, so we only had to stop once for gas, in Grants Pass, which is about 6 hours out of Reno and 4 hours from home. We also drove it in one day instead of two. Made for a very long day, but that worked out better.

Once again the kids were amazingly great! No fussing, no crying, no real problems at all. The only things that came up were the usual ones that come up when they are tired and ready for a nap. They had fun watching dvd's, and Riley again played Playstation for close to two hours. Maddie took about a two hour nap from 1:30 - 3:30pm, and Riley crashed for about an hour and a half right after gassing up and getting some quick dinner in Grants Pass. The whole trip home took us a little over 10 hours getting in at 10:15pm. When we got gas in Grants Pass I did a quick calculation of our gas mileage - we were getting 26.64 miles/gallon! Not bad for a SUV. We really like our Honda Pilot a lot. :)

Coming back on hwy 44 is the Bogard Rest Area. On Saturday night it snowed there - snowed a lot!! I was watching the web cams all the time to see how the roads were and 44 was covered. But just as the weather had predicted, it was all gone by the time we went through. Whew! We did notice that rest stop is at 5600 feet. I'm sure we went even higher and was a little surprised there wasn't any kind of marker for the highest point - I think it was probably close to 6000 feet. There was a tiny bit of snow at the rest stop and I got some pictures of Riley & Maddie playing with it.

One worry about this route is it's only two lanes and it takes about 3.5 - 4 hours to get through - if you don't get stuck behind a truck or some idiot going really slow. We did get stuck behind a truck for awhile, but he was empty and going at least 60 usually 65, so that was ok (he must have been empty). At one point there's a big uphill where we did slow down to about 40 because of the truck, but at soon a he could pull over onto the shoulder he did and let us go by. Nice guy, we waved thanks as we drove by. Only one other time did we get behind someone really slow and they turned off to let us go by. We made it to I-5 in 3 hours 45 minutes.

Once on I-5 we really didn't have any problems. For most of the way in California the speed was 70 so we were doing 75 until we hit the border. And there were lots of places where we had to slow down because the corners were just a tad too sharp for that speed. One fun thing though. We started up a big hill to the Oregon border. It was probably a 6% grade. I had it in cruise control. When we hit that hill the cruise control kicked it up a gear or two and kept the car right at 70 without any problems! That was cool! I'm sure some people are saying, "Huh? What's so cool about that?" Well, I'm old enough to remember the early cruise controls and going up hills like this they couldn't handle and you'd either have to turn it off or press on the gas yourself. And maybe I just impress easily. ;)

When we got home, Marci took sleeping Maddie upstairs to put her to bed, though she did wake up when she took her out of the car, but she got her back to sleep quickly. We had a FANTASTIC guy watching our animals while we were gone. Three times he called us, twice with questions and once on the way home to make sure our plans hadn't changed and to see if we needed him to visit the animals one more time. A really great guy!! We put the birds in their cages and told him he could leave the dogs outside during the day and inside at night, we setup an area for them. When we got home they dogs were inside and VERY happy to see us. Riley was also happy to see them and spent about 30 minutes playing with them. The birds were at the cage door ready to get out - they are usually only in their cages during the work day, so this was a long time for them. I brought everything in, got everything settled, took bags upstairs (unpacking will be done tonight), got the kids to bed, then crashed around midnight, only to get up at 5am for work. Note to self: Next time take the NEXT day off too! haha

All in all, it was a great trip, we had a fantastic time, won lots of stuffed animals, got Riley some other fun things, Marci had a great visit with her Mom, and now we know what it's like so next time we'll be ready and have even more fun! But it is nice to be back home in our own beds. :)

Reno Day 4 - Last day of fun

2007-04-23T23:49:00.000-07:00

Our last day here in Reno, and it didn't start off all that well. Around 3am Riley woke up throwing up. We got him cleaned up and everything, he got back to sleep, then did it again at 5am, back to sleep, then again at 8am. Poor guy! After that he was finally done, slept another couple hours and was feeling better. Our best guess is he had a lot of snack-type food to eat last night, a big chocolate milkshake, lots of excitement, was up late, really wired, and it all just caught up with him.

Marci, Maddie and everyone else took off for a Zoo they found and a little amusement park that also had a mini-putt golf course. (Marci's Mom stayed and gambled, and did very well, as usual.) Riley and I stayed here because while he was feeling better, we weren't sure if he'd do well in the car ride and with everything. He probably would have, but we wanted to make sure he was ok for the long trip home tomorrow. Marci said they had a great time and she took a lot of photos with her new camera phone. Now I just have to figure out how to get them off. haha When I do I'll post them.

Riley finally felt up to walking around so we went back to Circus Circus to have some fun, get some more tickets and a few more stuffed animals. Then on the way back we both wanted hot dogs. Got those, something to drink, and came back to the room. He was still a little tired, but ate all of his hot dog (and it was a BIG one!) and kept it down. So we still had fun.

When everyone got back, we all went out to dinner (click the photo above to see the beginning of the Day 4 photos), then back up to our room to get the tickets we had accumulated, to Circus Circus one last time, got some more stuffed animals, more tickets, then traded them in for fun stuff. Back to the room, playing with the new stuff, then a fun bath in the cool tub, and everyone was ready to crash.

Tomorrow we are going to drive straight home, not stopping to spend the night. It'll be 9-11 hours in the car (including stops for meals and rest stops), but based on the trip down the kids won't have a problem - knock on wood. :) Time for me to head to bed too, some packing to do in the morning, breakfast buffet, then on the road. More road photos tomorrow too, though probably not as many. Night!

Trip to Reno Day 3

2007-04-22T23:54:00.000-07:00

Today was another fun day - Click on the photo to go to the beginning of the Day 3 photos on Flickr. Marci got in just as Maddie woke up and wanted her. She had fun with her Mom and Wendy, then we were able to sleep in. Got up for a good breakfast (at 11:30am haha), then walked around looking at all the stuff in the casino - well, stuff where the kids could go. Then we went back to Circus Circus so the kids could play, but after about 30 minutes Maddie was ready for a nap, so I took her back and put her to sleep.

Riley came back, was very good and quiet, we put in a DVD on my laptop for him to watch and he fell asleep, about 2 hours after Maddie went to sleep. Sure enough, 15 minutes after he went to sleep she woke up. D'OH! He slept for 2 hours, Marci came back about 1 hour into his nap, helped with Maddie then left to go have dinner with her Mom and Wendy. Riley woke up then all of us and Brandon went for Pizza dinner. Then we played at Circus Circus again winning more stuff. Came back to the room, played some, Marci came back, and now we're all going to bed.

It was a fun day, though not as many photos as I wanted. I'll try to get more tomorrow.

Trip to Reno

2007-04-21T23:47:00.000-07:00

On 4/20/07 we took a trip to Reno. Marci's Mom is a high roller (well, medium roller) at the Silver Legacy hotel. She gets her rooms comped, her meals comped, gets treated REALLY well! She invited us to come spend a few days with her pretty close to all expenses paid (just cost us gas and some food and whatever else we wanted to spend our money on). We couldn't wait!

We left on Friday the 20th. It is roughly a 9 hour drive to Reno. We weren't sure how well the kids would do so we stayed the night in Weed, CA then took off again the next morning.

The kids couldn't have been any better!!!! We were shocked! We probably could have driven all the way through, but it was nice to stop. On the way back we'll do it all in one day. We figure with stops it could take us 10-12 hours.

On the way down it was BEAUTIFUL!! Just a few clouds in the sky and around 60 outside. We couldn't have asked for better driving weather. And everything was amazingly green! I've never been past Corvallis this time of year and once we got past Eugene into the farming country, it was just amazing. The photos we took don't do it justice (click the photo above to see all the ones we've taken so far).

We really only had to gas up once in Grants Pass, but we did again in Susanville just because we've never driven this and didn't know what we had coming up - we had just under half a tank but could have made it into Reno without any problems. Spent the night at a really nice Motel 6. I know, I know, "What? Are you crazy? A Motel 6 is NICE?" Yes, it really was nice and for a place to crash for a night, it was perfect - great price, clean and a very nice shower. No complaints.

Saturday the 21st we got going again. Drove back down I-5 to 89 to 44 to 395 and into Reno. That took us through several National Forests and up as high as 5100 feet, most of the trip was around 4000-4500 feet. NO SNOW!! We saw some on the sides of the road, but the roads were fine. At first it was raining semi-lightly and had some snow/slush mixed in. But soon that stopped and the roads were dry the rest of the way. Only one "official" rest stop between Weed and Susanville, and it was a very nice one (see the photos). But there were plenty of other places you could have made a stop if you had, stores, parks, etc.

Going into Susanville was a very steep downhill. Then from there on out it was pretty flat and lots of nothing to see. From 89/44 to 395 there was very little traffic. We got stuck behind some people now and then, but they were still doing at least 55 so it wasn't bad. And there were plenty of places to pass people. After Susanville it was a 2-lane road with a lot more traffic, but again traffic was moving and we had places to pass if needed. Then about 30 minutes out of Reno the highway divided (lots of land between north & southbound lanes) and we now had two lanes, so passing was easy.

It took about 5 hours to get to Weed, then another 4 to get to Reno. Again, the kids were EXCELLENT!! Fortunately our Honda Pilot has a DVD player in it AND you can hook up our Playstation. They watched a lot of stuff and Riley played some games. That really helped a lot. And it helped us too - we couldn't watch the shows, but we could listen to them. Kinda like listening to a book-on-tape/disc. The car did a great job, and it was a very enjoyable trip.

Now we're here in our hotel room (which is AMAZING and has an incredible bathroom). It's midnight, Marci is having fun with her Mom, the kids are crashed hard, and I'm about to crash myself. Two more fun-filled days here then we leave on Tuesday. I'll try to write more and will definitely be uploading more photos. Gotta love Flickr!!!

Later!

Easter 2007

2007-04-09T08:24:00.000-07:00

We certainly had a lot of fun this past Easter weekend. Saturday morning we went to SleighBells in Sherwood for an Easter Egg hunt. It was raining really good so they did it inside. The kids had a lot of fun finding eggs, Riley was REALLY good at it and once Maddie figured out what she was supposed to do, she was finding them like crazy. They were all plastic eggs with candy in them. When they were done, they could sell back their plastic eggs for $.05 each, so both of them got a quarter (the limit for every kid was 5 eggs). Then they could go pick a toy from a table. The Easter Bunny was there, but neither of them wanted anything to do with him. Maddie REALLY wanted to pet the REAL bunnies they had. As we left, there was a turkey outside who was putting on a show for everyone; feathers out, showing off, lots of gobbling, both kids loved it.

Then home to color our eggs. Riley really had fun with that while Maddie was sleeping. One of the boxes came with one of those wax crayons where you write on the egg, color it, and where you wrote isn't colored. Once we showed Riley how that worked, he thought it was pretty cool and went wild with drawing on the eggs. Marci wrote their names on two eggs and as you can see above, Riley enjoyed showing Maddie her egg (be sure to click the photo for a LOT more photos). The hardest part for Riley was waiting for the eggs to boil. About every 5 minutes he'd ask, "Are they done yet?" Or he'd say, "I'm going upstairs to get something out of my room and they'll be done when I get back down, right?"

Sunday morning they both had fun finding the eggs, though once Maddie saw her basket, she wanted to play with the stuff it had, not find eggs. Riley found most, then he took Maddie around asking her, "Do you see any? You're getting warmer... Look over there, Maddie!" It was sooooooo cute!

Sunday afternoon we went to Aunt Joan's (my Mom's sister for those who don't know who she is) for a fantastic dinner and another Easter Egg hunt. It's a really fun family get-together, and the food is always awesome. Even Riley enjoyed it! haha After the meal we went looking for eggs and plastic bags with their names on them. This time Maddie got into it almost as much as Riley, they both found a lot of eggs and had a great time.

It was a fun weekend and a great time!

I'm doing MUCH better!

2007-03-30T10:25:00.000-07:00

I went to the doctors yesterday for a follow-up visit. I knew my appendix had burst and it was a mess in there, but he said there was also an abscess and that he had to do a LOT of cleaning of my insides. After examining me, he was really surprised at how well I was doing and told me I was "a very good healer!" That made me feel really good! I guess all that beer drinking has finally paid off. hehe (kidding).

He also said I could lift more than 15 pounds now (he said I have very good abdominal muscles and there's no worry of a hernia), which made Maddie VERY happy. When I got home I picked her up and she did NOT want down, probably making up for lost time. She wanted to sit with me and even wanted me to walk her to sleep, which she usually hates. While my back got sore (and is still a little sore today) from holding her, I did miss that and enjoyed it.

I've got one more visit with him the end of April when he said everything should be fully healed. WooHoo! Man, it was quite the experience but I'm glad I'm in good enough shape to heal quick.

One bummer still. He said not to play my trumpet or workout on the eliptical machine until he sees me again at the end of the month. :( Oh well, better to rest and be 100% ok than push it and have problems. I'll have to really watch what I'm eating so I don't gain 50 pounds. haha

Playing at the Park

2007-03-26T11:18:00.000-07:00

On Sunday (3/25) we went to a favorite park of ours and let the kids play for awhile. As usual, Maddie wanted to swing for most of the time, she really loves to swing! Riley had a blast climbing on everything, just like little boys do. Last time we were here there were a bunch of bigger kids playing a little too wild and Riley didn't have fun. This time there weren't too many people so he was able to play a lot and enjoy himself.

As for myself, I'm at work today, it's 11:30am, I've been here since 6:45am, and I'm feeling pretty darn good! A little tired because I didn't sleep well last night, but that was probably just the anxiousness of returning to work. I'm actually being productive, which I thought I wouldn't be, so I'm quite happy! I think I'll sleep well tonight though. :)

Wiggles Concert & Who Needs an Appendix?

2007-03-24T09:41:00.000-07:00

March 15th was The Wiggles concert. Maddie really loved it, I was told she was dancing in the isle all the time. And I was told Riley didn't enjoy it as much and was in a little bit of a mood. I think his friends at preschool have him thinking The Wiggles is for little babies and if he likes it he's a little baby. Deep down I think he had fun though. My Mom got a lot of great photos.

I'm sure you're wondering why I didn't get any photos and why I said, "I was told...". Well, that's because on Tuesday the 13th, I woke up Marci at 6am and told her I needed her to take me to the hospital. All night I couldn't sleep, couldn't get comfortable, my stomach hurt as did a little lower and to the right. Sure enough, when I got there the doctors confirmed what I thought - my appendix needed to come out!

It started Saturday the 10th when I spent six hours with seriously liquid diarrhea - ya, I know, EWWWW! I mention this because one thought as to why appendix's need to come out is they get infected by some poop getting into it. After I told the doctors about my Saturday, they were pretty sure that is what caused the problem. Sunday my stomach hurt, then it moved to my appendix area. Then it felt better, so I didn't worry. But Monday morning it hurt again. I was going to make a doctor appointment but then it felt better. Then around 11am it started hurting again and this time didn't stop. It hurt A LOT and just got worse. The doctors are pretty sure sometime Monday afternoon it burst. I knew I should have gone to the doctor then, but I kept thinking it was just a cold or something. Very stupid. I didn't sleep much at all that night and should have woken Marci up sooner, but I didn't want her to panic or worry about what to do with the kids. Again, very stupid.

The doctors were also pretty sure it had burst, which it had. The surgeon said if I'd waited another day I probably wouldn't have made it. Ya, that's scary! He also said it was a really big mess and took a lot to clean everything out and I had a little drain bulb on my side to drain all the stuff they used to clean me out. Fortunately, he was able to do it with three little incisions instead of needed to make a bigger cut.

When I got into the room it was very hard to move. I had a bar over my head to pull myself up with, but couldn't because it hurt too much. Each day I got better and was able to move better. They had me taking a walk four times a day. That first one was really tough and took me forever to get out of the bed, and I was walking quit hunched over. By the last day I had no problems walking and was standing up almost straight. The doctors were very happy with how well I was healing.

I did have troubles peeing so I had to have a catheter - ICK!!! On the last day they took it out and said if I didn't pee they have to put it back in and leave it in for a week! Man, I never tried to pee so much in my life and was never so happy when I finally did! hahaha

What really hurt was when they took that drain thing out. The doctor told me it would hurt a lot, I braced myself, then he pulled it out. At first I thought something in me was just cramping up, then I realized it wasn't a cramp but serious pain. It took me a minute to be able to say something other than some major cuss words. I apologized a lot and the doctor said, "Heck, if someone just pulled two feet of tubing out of me I'd cuss like a sailor too!" Oh man that hurt a lot! Took me about three minutes before I could breath relaxed again.

Came home Friday the 16th. At first I was moving really slow, but each day got a lot better. This last Thursday I finally put real clothes on because I had to go get my drivers license renewed. Then last night we went to our usual Friday dinner. That was a little tough, but the burger tasted very good and it felt so nice to get out of the house.

I'm feeling almost normal. The pants are still a little tight and I don't have a lot of energy, but I feel ready to go back to work on Monday. It was quite the experience. I should have said something sooner and next time I'm feeling pain or odd, I will. The hardest part right now is I can't play my trumpet for another two weeks, and worse, I can't pick up the kids. Hopefully I'll be able to do that next week, we'll find out after my follow-up appointment this week.

Anyhow, it's been quite an interesting couple of weeks and things are almost back to normal, which is good cause there's a lot of stuff to do around here, like mowing the lawn. haha

We Have Fish!

2007-03-04T21:49:00.000-08:00

We now have added four Betta fish to our zoo! Friday Marci informed me she told Riley he could get a fish. At first I was upset because she didn't run it by me at all. But then she told me she talked with others are read how fish can help kids learn responsibility - they learn to care for the fish, feed them, clean their tank, etc. So I thought sure, sounds good.

We went to Petco to get some goldfish and ran into a very nice and knowledgeable employee named Morgan. After listening to him for a bit, I could tell he was nerdy enough about fish that I could trust what he said. LOL! Seriously, he did know his fish and his stuff and was extremely helpful. He talked us out of goldfish and into female Betta's. He said they are more hearty, live longer - 3-5 years - and more enjoyable. Worked for us, so we ended up getting three Betta's. The next day we got a fourth just in case two decided to be friends and keep the third out - probably really over thinking it.

Riley LOVES the fish and is doing a good job taking care of them. Maddie also enjoys the fish a lot. So we have dogs, birds, and fish. Now all we need is a cat to complete the circle of life. hahahaha

Riley's in charge of Maddie - LOL!

2007-03-01T10:52:00.000-08:00

I got this in an email from my Mom, I found it very funny!

On the way back to your house today (it was just me, Richard, as Dad was home with the Direct TV guys), I reminded Riley that we needed to be quiet so Maddie could take a nap. He said he didn't want her to take a nap. I said that since you were going to Safari Sams tonight I was sure Mommy and Daddy would appreciate it if she had a nap. He said "no they don't care and I don't want her to take a nap. She's my sister and I'm in charge of her and I don't want her to take a nap!" I finally thought, oh well...... As we were at the stop light after Sunset, I thought it looked like she was asleep. I asked Riley if she was and very loudly he said, "Maddie are you asleep? MADDIE!!" But luckily she was completely asleep. I thought that was cute -- she is his sister and he's in charge of her!

Snow!

2007-02-28T08:28:00.000-08:00

I woke up this morning to snow on the ground. My first reaction was, "AHHH! I don't want to drive in this!" Then I calmed down and turned on the news to see what they were saying on the weather. "Snow this morning with trace to 1" accumulation below 500 feet, turning to rain this afternoon, high of 43." I again looked at the road and saw someone had driven by, it looked fine to drive on and really was more of a light dusting, maybe 1/4 inch. Plus it is supposed to warm up so I decided to go for it.

Now remember, I HATE driving in snow. Not that I can't, rather all the other idiots on the road freak me out, like the moron in the last snow we had that decided to tailgate me because I wasn't going fast enough for him and he was in a big truck so of COURSE it was like there was nothing on the road for him and he could EASILY stop as if the roads were dry.

Got in my car at 5:40am, I decided not to wait but to get out before the idiots got out. The roads were FINE! Mostly slushy and if I wanted, in some places, I'm sure I could have slid but I would have had to really slam on the brakes. Mostly it was just wet slush. Even our parking lot was just wet slush and easy for me to drive on. Whew!

So I figure if *I* can drive in this, it MUST be ok. Now I'm hoping the weathermen are right and it all pretty much melts so I can get home. haha

Feeding Ducks, Swinging, and a Nutria

2007-02-19T08:32:00.000-08:00

Saturday was a beautiful day, I think the high was around 62! We took the opportunity to go feed the ducks and play on the swings. Riley really likes feeding the ducks, almost as much as Marci. haha I held Maddie because she keeps wanting to touch the ducks, and they don't want to be touched. She had a great time just watching all of them come close to eat.

There were also a lot of people walking their dogs and Maddie really enjoyed looking at all of them. She'd be looking at the ducks, see a dog and quickly point and squeal with excitement. Fortunately, most of the people were nice, so Maddie got to pet several of the dogs. There was even a cat that lives around there and came out to see us.

After feeding the ducks, we walked to the other end of the park/pond to play on the swings. Both Riley and Maddie love to swing. At home, Maddie will look at us, point outside and swing her hips back and forth to let us know she wants to go outside and swing. It's sooooo cute! haha Riley is funny on the swings. He wants me to push him higher and higher, then suddenly - almost in a panic - he wants me to stop because he's going too high. But then after he slows down some and isn't going as high, he'll tell me to push him harder and harder, until he hits that too high mark again. After the swings, they both played on the playset, going down the slides, climbing all over it, and really having a lot of fun. Then we walked back to the car to finish our shopping. On the way back home, both crashed, Marci and I had a rare hour or so to ourselves, it was nice! LOL

While we were at the swings, we saw a Nutria feeding in the grass. He wasn't too afraid of people, though some kids decided to run over to him which of course scared him back into the blackberries. But he came back out and I got some good photos.

It really was a fun day, we're looking forward to the weather getting better so we can do this more often.

Monster Truck videos

2007-02-12T08:37:00.000-08:00

I don't know why they say you can take cameras but not camcorders. Most digital cameras these days can take video too. ;) I'm sure they are mainly wanting people to not make videos then make money off them. I have no desire to do that, just share the fun even we went to. :) So, I uploaded the videos I took to our YouTube account.

Chocolate Festival

2007-02-11T19:00:00.000-08:00

Saturday we went to the Chocolate Festival at the Western Forestry Center. It was AWESOME! We all had a LOT of chocolate that was incredible wonderful. Lots of big, free samples that we all indulged in. Mmmmm..... Chocolate....

Grave Digger

2007-02-10T09:47:00.001-08:00

On 2/9/07, Riley and I went to the Monster Truck show, his 3rd time. As always, it was a lot of fun and he really enjoyed it. I'm soooo glad we both were wearing Bose noise canceling headphones! We could still hear everything just fine, and the trucks were still loud, just not the ear-splitting, blood dripping loud.

This year they added dirt bikes doing a big jump in the air. That was pretty cool. And we saw one truck roll over while doing cookies, that's always a crowd favorite.

None of the trucks really went for it though, except the one that rolled over and Grave Digger. I think it's because this was the first of three days and they didn't want to hurt their trucks. We also didn't get to go down and see them up close because I didn't realize that is on Saturday and we went on Friday. :( Next year I'm going to get tickets for Saturday

Still, we both had a lot of fun, got there early, had some overpriced pizza, a soda, bought some stuff, and had great seats. Enjoy the photos!

Ben 10 and Riley is now happy

2007-02-07T07:48:00.000-08:00

Yesterday Ben 10 Season 1 came out on DVD and Riley just HAD to have it. Got home and all he wanted to do was sit in front of the tv watching it. Made it nice for us, we just had to watch Maddie and could relax some. haha

I'm trying to keep up with posting once a week and realized it's now Wednesday and I hadn't posted yet. D'OH!

This last weekend it was really nice out, so Sunday we went to a little park and fed cracked corn to the ducks. Riley and Maddie loved it! It was so funny to watch Maddie laugh at the ducks coming up for food. Definitely a fun time and something we will be doing again and again. ...and next time I will be sure to take my camera. :)

Super Bowl Prediction - 3:55pm PST

2007-02-04T15:47:00.000-08:00

Ok, so we are about half-way into the first quarter. It's Bears 7, Colts 6. So far, it looks like the Bears want it more. However, the Colts always start slow and come on fast in the 4th quarter, they never give up where other teams run out of steam in the 4th. So, who do I think is going to win? After the Colts just recovered a fumble on the kickoff?

The Bears.

I think they just want it more. I think the Colts have more talent, but that doesn't matter in games like this, it's who wants it more that counts the most. I say the Bears want it more. We'll see in a couple hours. The thing the Bears have to remember is to not let up until the game is over. If they can do that, then they will win. If in the 4th quarter they start to relax with a lead, they will not win.

Edit - 6:38pm, 7:49 left in the game. After the interception touchdown, I change my prediction - the Colts will win. Ya, ya, I know, easy to make a prediction this late in the game. But as I said earlier, the Colts seem to play their best in the 4th quarter when the other team is out of steam. If the Bears wanted to win it, they had to play 5 quarters, not just 4. They have run out of steam, they can't win, the Colts are just playing too strong. Game over, the Colts win.

Oh well, the Colts fooled me again like they have all season. The other team comes on strong at the beginning and it looks like the Colts don't want it bad enough and won't win. Then when the other team has run out of steam, the Colts seem to kick in their 2nd wind and take over the game, winning in the 4th quarter.

Well done, Colts, you earned the Super Bowl!

Portland Auto Show

2007-01-28T20:51:00.000-08:00

Today we went to the Auto show. It was a great time! Riley was so funny. On our way there and even right up until I sat in the first car, Riley kept saying, "I don't WANT to sit in a car! I don't want to go to the Auto show!!!" Then I sat in the first car and he wanted to sit in it too. After that, he kept saying, "Can I sit in another car?" LOL! It was a riot!

We had a great time, about 3 hours worth. We're not looking to buy anything right now because we just paid off our cars and it's nice to not have any payments. But we do have a few that we're interested in, so we checked them out. First, the new Mustang convertible. I REALLY want a fun car to replace mine, I miss my Honda S2000 a ton and a convertible family car would be awesome. The last time we looked at the new Mustangs, it looked like they had plenty of backseat room. I got it, adjusted the drivers seat, then looked in the back. DANG! Once again, as long as the person had no legs, everything was fine. :( Oh well, that's one reason I like going to the Autoshow, it can cure me from wanting a car because I don't fit, or other reasons. So I no longer want a Mustang - well I DO, but it's not a practical family car. Sure, the kids could fit, for another 5 years max. Not what we're looking for. We MIGHT get a new car now, and then another in 5 years, but I don't want to HAVE to get a new car.

Next we looked at the Honda's. We LOVE Honda cars, they have always been great for us. They had an Element SC, which is the new Element meant to compete with the Scion's, cool, trendy, extra stuff that 20-somethings are interested in, but us 40-somethings aren't. Loved sitting in the front seat, lots of room, nice. My head hit the roof in the back seat and not a lot of room. Well, I had to sit up REALLY straight to hit the roof, but I wasn't happy with how little headroom there was. Of all the cars I was interested in replacing mine with was the Element. After today, while I'd enjoy it, I don't think it's something I would enjoy for more than a couple years. Again, a great thing about the Autoshow, I no longer MUST HAVE an Element.

Honda has also just introduced the Civic Si Sedan, a 4-door version of their Si. It's REALLY nice! The seat went back far enough for me AND the steering wheel not only tilted BUT telescoped too! AWESOME!! I could get the seat back far enough AND the steering wheel right. It felt great and I really would enjoy driving it. Of course no one could sit behind me. I sat in the back and there was good headroom, my head didn't hit the roof at all. Overall, I liked the car a lot, and the fact that I fit and the whole family could fit was great. BUT, I must admit, I found it a tad on the cramped side and found another I fit in better. Though I must say, it was a tough choice because this would be a GREAT car to drive!!!!

The other that I really liked was the new Honda Fit, it's been sold in Europe for a long time as the Jazz. This is their little car that gets great gas mileage, 31 & 37. I sat in the front, TONS of room. But that's normal, I usually find lots of room in the drivers seat then sit in the back and hate it. After I was sure the front was enjoyable and I adjusted the seat for me, I sat in the back behind the driver. WOW!!! I couldn't believe how much room there was!! Amazing!! TONS of headroom AND legroom!!! What an amazing car!! Of course almost NO room behind the backseat for anything but some groceries, but WOW!!! This was a very cool car!! I have read and seen some reviews of this car and compared to others in its class, all the reviews have said others get better gas mileage, have better get-up-and-go (0-60 in 11 seconds for the Honda), but this is my far the most fun to drive and the most well equipped. I could certainly see that. It was a very cool car.

So we talked about trading my 2001 VW Passat (bottom of the line) in for a Fit. Honestly, I would hate the sucky performance, I want something that goes 0-60 in 3 seconds. BUT, I drive about 6 miles, 12 minutes to work every day and that's almost all of the driving I do. My car is RARELY driven compared to our Honda Pilot. So why would I need a Porsche? I miss my S2000 more than I can say, I'd KILL to have it back! But would I really enjoy it? I'd never get it over 50, and rarely would be able to drive it like it should be which would really make me thrilled to enjoy it. SO, the Fit would be a a great "fit" for me. I - sorry, I'm watching "The Family Guy" and they just did a skit with Stewy doing a dance with Gene Kelly, the one he did with Jerry Mouse, and I had a HUGE smile on my face, I LOVE Gene Kelly!!!! - anyhow, after lots of thinking, I decided to email some Honda dealers about the Fit. Turns out it is still REALLY popular and NO ONE has it in stock and even one dealership isn't taking any orders for at least 6 months (Wilsonville Honda)! So looks like if I want to get one, it'll take me 4-9 months to get the one I want. :( Oh well, that's probably a good thing, give us time to really think about it instead of buying on impulse.

Oh, and Maddie LOVED sitting in the cars too! I mean if she didn't get to sit in the drivers seat, she got mad! It was really funny. We had a lot of fun and as we were waiting for the elevator, she fell asleep on Marci. A fun and enjoyable day!

Back from Boston

2007-01-24T14:12:00.000-08:00

It was a freaking long flight, 5 hours. But I didn't sleep much the night before I left, so I was REALLY tired on the way out there and slept nicely on the plane. I was quite surprised when I got there, no snow to be found, and it wasn't that cold!

It was a good trip, but I'm glad to get home. Oh, the flight back was awesome because I upgraded to FIRST CLASS! Had some Bailey's on the rocks, then a good salad, a very tasty hot beef teriyaki dinner (tasted like I was at a good restaurant), some warm mixed nuts, AND a fantastic ice cream sunday with hot fudge and whip cream! Oh ya, that's definitely the way to fly on a freaking long flight! Alaska also has the Digeplayer things. They are little portable video devices that hold like 8 movies, about 6 tv shows (each 30 minutes long), about 25 music videos, and a bunch of different kinds of music. In first class they are free, coach they are $10. It's money well spent and really makes the time pass much better. If you're on a long flight on Alaska and they offer these, get one, you won't be sorry!

The weather warmed up enough the other day that Riley was able to ride his bike around the block, he enjoyed that a lot. He and I are also having fun playing a PS2 game, Marvel: Ultimate Alliance. It's a two player game and he's actually quite good at it!

We were talking about things coming this year and realized Riley will be heading to kindergarten this fall. Kindergarten. wow. Riley will be five in May and Maddie two in June. How time files...

Snow Today!

2007-01-16T18:27:00.000-08:00

Well, I decided to work from home today, too many idiots on the road for me. We got 3-4 inches and Riley had a great time playing outside. Maddie had fun too, it was her first time seeing snow.

Tomorrow I leave for Boston. I'm a little worried about getting to the airport, but I've booked a shuttle so I should be fine. Just have to leave at 3:30am, YUCK! I just uploaded a short 35 second video I took with my new digital camera (Sony H2). Click on the photo above to view the rest.

Feeling better & Snow...

2007-01-16T08:44:00.000-08:00

So last week I slammed myself into the concrete. Here it is a week later and I'm feeling pretty good! Pretty much everything is much better, my knee is a tiny bit sore, my right elbow is almost completely better, my face never got any bruising (which surprised me since I hit really hard), but my back is still quite sore. Obviously that's where I did the most damage, I'm pretty sure I pulled a muscle or something. I just need to take it easy, which isn't easy with two little kids around. haha

Today we have a snow storm here in Portland. I know many other parts of the country laugh at us for getting 1-2 inches and having problems driving. We just don't get a lot of snow here so people don't know how to drive in it. And we have a LOT of hills here, you can easily go from 300 feet to 1000 feet in a matter of a few miles. So what looks good where you are is really bad trying to go over the hills. These are days I'm glad to be working in IT where I can work from home!

Riley went outside once in just his sweats (no shoes or socks), ran back in because it's freezing cold, then quickly put his boots and jacket on and announced, "I'm ready!" He really wants to go out and make a snow angel, it'll be a fun day for him. I'll get some photos posted to our Flickr later today.

Which is harder, concrete or my body?

2007-01-09T07:21:00.000-08:00

First, I have to say I thought this blog thing would be a cool way to keep people up with what's going on with us. I still that, however for it to work, I kinda need to actually write stuff here. D'OH! Last year from Sept on got crazy busy in every way possible. I took a week off from work between Christmas and New Years and that really re-energized me. I feel refreshed and ready to go! So this year one of my New Years resolutions is to blog at least once a week. SO, to start it off, here's hopefully a good laugh for everyone from this last weekend. I know I'm laughing about it. :)

We get our Christmas tree right after Thanksgiving and take it down the weekend after New Years. This year we had a fantastic tree, it was still taking water even the day before we took it down!

So this last weekend my wife was at the beach with her mom and I was home with the kids, they were actually very good and we had a great time. Sunday morning at 8:45am I remembered the Christmas tree had to be at the curb by 9am for the boy scouts to pick it up. I quickly took all of the ornaments off the tree, the lights, and shoved it out the door top first (I know that was the wrong way to push it out, I can only say I'd been up for about 15 minutes so wasn't thinking clearly, which probably explains the rest of this story, that or I'm just stupid which is always a possibility). Of course it got stuck, I took off the tree stand and pushed it out the rest of the way.

It went out fine, but then started to fall to the right. I didn't want it to fall on a plant so I was trying to guide it. As it was falling faster than I could guide, I went to move my right foot to catch myself, but I caught it on my pajama pant leg and proceeded to fall over off a two foot step onto the hard concrete in front of our house (and ours has those little rocks coming out, not the smooth kind).

Hit my left shoulder, left side of my head (my cheekbone and head), my right knee a little on the inside, my right hand to catch myself, and after I was down my feet finally came down too. I laid there thinking, "Oh great, my wife is at the beach and I've done something stupid and probably broken something." Took a quick inventory and nothing felt broke so I started to get up. My left side hurt (upper back and upper front on my chest) and my right knee, I couldn't put pressure on it to stand up or use my left hand, which is of course how I always get up so had to change position to stand up.

Got up, checked everything again, all felt ok, nothing broken or out of place, so I finished taking the tree to the curb.

When I got back in the house, I looked at my knee and it had a HUGE welt on it! My left should only has a few little marks and they look normal, and very little bruising. My right hand has three cuts which are healing fine. I went into the bathroom to checkout my head and was shocked to find NOTHING! I mean there wasn't any sign I'd tried to shove my head through the concrete! Very weird, but I've always known I'm thick headed. hehe

When my wife got home, I asked her to check my back as it was still sore and hard to lift my left arm. (Did I tell you she's a licensed massage therapist?) She said it felt like I pulled a muscle or really strained it. By the end of the day my knee was feeling better, my back was ok, but now my right elbow was acting up, really sore. I think when my right hand came down I kinda jammed it or something. This morning my knee feels great, just some cuts and it's still tender where I hit it, my hand is fine, my back is sore but better, my head still feels fine with no signs of anything, and my elbow was feeling better, though today I've been leaning on it too much and it's hurting again. I did think I might have gotten a concussion from that, so I looked it up online and had none of the symptoms.

I'm quite shocked that I came out of it feeling pretty much just fine, just a few scratches and bruises. So now I can laugh about it cause I'm sure I looked really stupid, I certainly felt stupid.

But I did get the tree out in time and they did take it! WOOHOO!! And that's what really matters as I didn't want to have to deal with it. hahaha

Stomach Flu - MAJOR YUCK!!

2006-09-21T16:47:00.000-07:00

So first Thursday night Riley gets sick with this, is out of it Friday but better Saturday. Sunday night late Marci gets it, is out Monday, better Tuesday. Which is good because Tuesday Rich got it and was out Wednesday, better Thursday. Oh, and in there Maddie caught it a little, but not as bad as we had it. Whew!

Man, this thing was nasty! Rich normally doesn't throw up unless his body makes him, he will actually lay on the floor in various positions waiting for hours until he doesn't have the throw up where Marci will throw up much more quickly and feel better more quickly too. This time within two hours, Rich HAD to throw up, he didn't have a choice!

It appears to have been a 24-hour thing, though it took another two days to feel back to normal. We sure hope no one else has gotten this!

Washing moss off a roof

2006-09-16T20:44:00.000-07:00

Today we went over to Rich's parents. They have a really big oak tree right next to their house that has caused a lot of moss to grow on the roof as well as drop a lot of little twigs, leaves, and other stuff on the roof.

Rich got up there with the hose and sprayed off all the moss and stuff. Well, most of the moss, there was still a tiny bit left, couldn't get it all with just the hose. That took about an hour. Rich was a little worried about getting up on the roof, one of those age things where it was no big deal when he was 18 but feeling a little more mortal at 43. He used to do it all the time and in high school, he and some friends re-roofed the house. Once he got up there he remembered how easy it was to climb around on the roof and had no problems. Whew!

Marci was inside with the kids and Rich's Mom playing, getting lunch/dinner ready, and doing other stuff. It was a nice break in the day and everyone had fun, especially the kids.

We also went shopping today for some pants for Marci. While at Kohls, we found a king size bed set - comforter, sheets, pillow cases, etc - that was on sale; 80% off!! It was originally $159, and we bought it for $29!!! Couldn't pass that up. One of the downsides of having a nice big king sized bed (actually California king size) is bedding costs a lot. This was a very nice find! Kohls is our new fav store. :)

It's 8:46pm, Maddie is asleep and Riley is getting there. Rich has some work to do at 9:30pm and Marci is watching tv while eating popcorn. It was a good day all-around!

Fun Labor Day Weekend

2006-09-05T08:48:00.000-07:00

We had a great 3 days! Saturday we went to the state fair. Spent about 4-5 hours walking around, letting Riley play some games (he beat Mommy at one and won a prize). It was hot, but lots of fun. Sunday and Monday were nice days at home, doing some work in and around the house. All in all, it was very nice and we wish it could have continued several more days. :)

Last night when we got home from shopping, we let the dogs in. Marci then put a bunch of dog cookies out so Maddie could give them to the dogs. We'd tell her, "Give one to Frankie," and she'd go get one then give it to Frankie - she DOES know which dog is which. It's soooo cute to watch!

Riley got TWO Halloween costumes, The Thing from the Fantastic 4 and a Mutant Ninja Turtle - they were both closeouts so cost us less than one new one. He's not sure which one he wants to be, but had fun wearing them both.

Now back to work for both of us, back to Pre-school for Riley, and for Maddie, well, just another day as usual. haha

2006-08-27T20:42:00.000-07:00

This last weekend, 8/26 - 8/27, we went to the beach - Neskowin to be exact. My Mom's sister owns a condo there that anyone in the family can use. So we went with my parents.

It was in the 90's Sat and Sun here in Portland, but around the 80's and partly foggy at the beach. We had a GREAT time! It was Maddie's first time to the beach and she loved it! Riley also had a blast. Both Riley and I had fun digging in the sand.

For those who don't know the area, there's a river that runs right by the condo to the ocean, and it is VERY shallow, you can easily walk across it. That's where Riley and I built a little sand fortress. First we built a sand barrier out into the river, then bailed the water out of the area we dammed off, then dug a big hole in the middle. It was silly yet fun. As soon as we left a couple other kids who were watching us jumped on it and started to play. LOL!

Riley slept really well, but Maddie was restless and woke up with a cold. :( Poor girl! Sunday it was very foggy and you couldn't see the ocean from our condo. It took us a little over 2 hours to get home and Maddie slept the whole way, which was good, she needed it. Riley crashed the last 30-40 minutes.

A great weekend for everyone, I think Mom and Dad had fun too! We're all sore and looking forward to a good night of sleep - if I can get Riley to sleep that is. LOL!!!

Here are the photos I took:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/richtpt/sets/72157594254236392/

Riley & Maddie update

2006-08-20T19:09:00.000-07:00

It's been awhile so thought I'd tell a few things that happened today.

We took the training wheels off Riley's bike and Rich worked with him. He was a little scared, but tried it and did pretty good, though Rich hung on to him 99.9% of the time (he let go for a second or less now and then). Riley agreed he wants to practice this every night so he can learn to ride by himself. He has really good balance so it shouldn't take too long.

Maddie can't talk yet, but she knows what we are saying. We've noticed this a lot and here's a great example. Rich picked her up this evening and sat down with her. She was screaming and squirming like crazy, didn't want to sit with him. He said, "Maddie, I just want to take your shoes and socks off." She stopped struggling, layed back and put her feet up! It was so cute!

It's been a busy summer, lots going on, not much time to think, but fun. We've been to the Zoo several times, that membership has easily paid for itself! We can't believe it's almost September - ARGH! Where did the summer go? Good thing Oregon has a nice summer through Sept and part of Oct.

Hope everyone is having a great summer!

Old Billy's Brass Band Videos on YouTube.com

2006-07-25T13:50:00.000-07:00

I found and uploaded some video from my old band, Billy's Brass Band, to
YouTube.com:

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=richtpt

The quality isn't great because the software I used many years ago wasn't that good. If I ever

get time I'll recapture them again and repost better versions. But for now this
is fun. :)

Rich

HOT!!

2006-07-21T23:46:00.000-07:00

It got up to 104 today! Our house was only 85, which was nice compared to outside, but still hot. Fortunately we have a window AC unit in our bedroom, so that room is nice and cool. Marci went out with some friends and I took the kids over to my parents, they have AC in their house. We had a good two hours, then came home. Both of them fell asleep on the way - whew! I was able to get them from the car to bed without them waking up, so now I'm just waiting for either Marci to come home or me to fall asleep.

Tomorrow they are saying if the clouds stay then it'll be 97, but if they break up, it'll be another 104. 97 is still plenty hot. That's a bummer because we wanted to go to a Sausage Festival at Raccoon Lodge - but no way we'll be sitting outside in that kind of heat. Hopefully it'll cool down by Saturday next week for the brewfest.

Maddie's 1st Birthday

2006-07-14T13:33:00.000-07:00

I FINALLY got around to posting the photos from her first birthday! There are some good ones of her with her cake all over her face. It was a great day, lots of fun, and she enjoyed the cake a lot. Enjoy the photos!

Jealous Brother and Sister

2006-07-10T12:02:00.000-07:00

It's so funny how to watch Riley & Maddie get jealous of each other. Riley has gotten jealous of her for awhile now. He'll be ok when it's just him and me or him and Marci, or all three of us, but toss in Maddie and he suddenly wants to be with whatever parent is giving Maddie attention. Doesn't matter what she's doing, he wants to be there.

Maddie now is getting jealous too. I was holding her and she was fine. Marci came downstairs and she was still fine. Riley came downstairs and went to play with Marci, and that's when Maddie started howling, wanting down, went over and had to be part of what Riley & Mommy were doing.

We're trying to give each of them plenty of one-on-one attention from each of us, but it's funny to see them get so jealous. It will DEFINITELY be interesting in another 5+ years.