Updates, Updates, and more updates

I had expected to blog sooner than this, but sometimes, life just seems to get in the way.

So, here are a few updates.

Around January 7th, our olive eggers finally started laying.  Well, at least 2 have.  About half of our eggs are now the olive eggs.  It's really cool to look into the egg carton, and see the multi-colored eggs.

January 9th, we had our first snow of the year.  We didn't get a lot, and it was real pretty while it lasted, which wasn't long.

On January 15th, my Boy turned 16!!!  Hard to believe!  He got his permit towards the end of December, so we've been driving.  He's not super thrilled about it., I keep wondering who's kid he really is! (Too bad he looks like me)  Birthday person gets to pick the restaurant.  And where did my boy pick?  Charlies Chicken cause he wanted some Corn dodgers!  He had 2 friends come over after school, and they hung out and played Magic until time to open presents and go get some food.

Over the weekend, I did some work on the chicken coop.  We've had our chicken feeder hanging under the chicken coop. And it works pretty well.  But when it's extremly muddy, wet, well, yucky, it's a real pain to get in there, and get it.  I saw some cool chicken feeders built with PVC pipe recently.  So we decided to make one.  We'll see how well it works.  

I have a 4" pipe that runs from inside the coop, right next to where we keep a 5 gallon bucket with food, down under the coop.  There we made a little stopper and cover so hopefully, we'll not have any problems with it falling out, or with a lot of rain getting in it.

We'll see, and I'll update later on how it's going. (and you can't tell in this picture, but no, it is not sitting on the ground)

Guess that's it really.  I've had one Boy Scout camp out over the weekend.  Saturday night, it got down to 11 degrees and it snowed a bit on both Saturday and Sunday, but overall, everyone had a great time.

Until next time!

Worn out!

Today has been a busy day for me.

After work, which I left early, I mowed my grandparents as usual and my yard.

After finishing my yard, I still had some daylight, so off to Auto Zone to get oil and filter to change my oil in my Caliber. This is it's second oil change since we've had the car. We've gone about 6000 miles in 3 months.

I'm excited that I got it all done.

Happy Adoption Day

6 years ago today, I adopted my little girl. Though I guess she isn't so little anymore.

I gave her a little present (SpongeBob light) and a birthday card. I think I have done that every year.

I've never regretted adopting her. In fact, I never really thought about not adopting her.

She is as much my girl as my son is my boy. And as I point out to her. I was stuck with whatever came out with my son. With her, I chose her. I got to choose to be her daddy.

NFL Commissioner

I was catchin up on the news on KOTV's web page, and I found this story about the new NFL commissioner.

Roger Goodell is the new NFL commissioner for those of you that care.

My grandfater is a Goodell. And unlike Smith and Jones and Brown and all. the Goodells are actually one BIG family.

So I'm related to him. Unfortunately, I have no clue who he is, and visa versa, but still sorta cool.

Tomato thief

I went over to my grandparents today, and I found something very funny.

Seems someone climbed their privacy fence and stole ALL of their tomatoes. Both red and green!

We figured that if it was an animal, there would have been something left. Half chewed tomato, broken branches, or something. Nope! None of that. Just tomato plants with not a tomato on them.

Beware of the tomato thief!

hehe

Car update

Let me start off by stating how stinking hot it is outside!

Ok. Well, after church, my wife dropped me off at my daughters work for me to get the truck so I could go work on the car instead of taking my boy to the birthday party he was going to at Incredible Pizza.

So, I go and look at the car. Nothing. I see nothing. No cracks in the hoses or radiator. No signs of a leak. So, I turn it on. Once I get the water moving, I should see the problem easy. Still nothing.

While it was running, it took it a bit to heat up, but once it did, it didn't take much to get over the 50% mark on the temp gauge. I'm leaning towards this being a thermostat problem at this point.

I decide to go into Big Lots and cool off while I'm waiting on the car to cool down. While I was in there, I called one of the men from our church who works on vehicles for a living (meaning he knows WAY more about this stuff than I do). He gave me a couple things to check. Make sure there isn't a bleeder for the coolant system (some have them, didn't know that). Also, make sure the fan was on.

So I got back out to the car, and read some more in the repair books that we have for her car. It talks about how the fan will come on with the AC, or if the AC is off, when the car reaches a certain temp. So, I check. The fan is off. I turn on the AC, and it is on. So, the fan works. I turn off the AC, and wait. The temp gauge got back to the 50% mark, and the fan still hadn't come on. Ding, ding, ding, ding! I think we have a winner.

I turn on the AC, and the temp drops some. So, I close up the truck, and the car, and take the car for a drive with the AC on. Never once did the car ever reach that 50% mark on her temp gauge. I took her back her car and asked if they were running the AC yesterday or not. She said no. So I explained that I think she has a sensor out, and until that can be replaced, the run the AC all the time.

The book actually talked that if the fan worked, then it not coming on automatically could be a combination of a few different things. This one may take a real mechanic to fix.

Now, I'll have to wait to hear how the car is doing with the AC running.

Family is home, back to normal

My family came home today.

I'm glad they are home, but I didn't get everything done I wanted to before they came home. I was hoping to finish the laundry and vacuum, but they got home an hour earlier than I expected. Also, finishing the upstairs took a bit longer too, so once I was done with that, they were almost home.

My daughter was home for maybe 30 minutes before she ran out the door. Normal.

My son didn't come home for a couple of hours. When the neighbor kid was picked up, my boy road home with them, and he stayed there and played. When I went to get him, he didn't want to come home. Normal

My wife got everything unpacked (well, not everything, my daughter and I helped), and then she took a nap. Normal. :)

I've really missed my wife, and I'm glad to have her home. She's my best friend!

As we went to my grandparents to see my cousin off to Guam for her mission trip this year, my daughter called and her car broke down. Guess I'll have to take a look at that tomorrow.

It's late, and I'm tired.
Good night all.

Alone time

Tomorrow morning, my wife and kids will be going to Falls Creek for the week.

Falls Creek for those that don't know is a great church camp for teenagers (and sponsors). You get away from all sorts of distractions and get time to focus on God. There is a lot of time spent in devotional's and Worship services, but each afternoon (from about noon till 5ish) is a free time (with other shorter free times in there). It sounds like a lot, but it is great!

My wife is going as a cook, and she is taking my boy (the only way non-teenagers can go). My daughter also was able to get off work (thank you God!) so she could go.

That leaves me here, alone for the week. I look forward to this week every year. I love my family, but I enjoy time to myself.

Missing Teeth

Today, my boy lost his 4th tooth.

So far, they have all been on the bottom.

The top two middle teeth are both a bit loose, but have been for a while.

At Christmas, he may get to sing:

"All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth..."

Family Lake Trip

My wife had the day off from work today, so we went out to the lake today for some fun. My daughter had to work, so she couldn't join us, but we had a lot of fun.

Swimming, tubing, and just the normal putting around on the water. It was a lot of fun.

On the way back, we ran across a guy paddling his boat. So, we took him into tow and got him close to the shore. We offered to take him to the dock, but he didn't want that.

I got a sun burn today too. Not bad, but since it was on top of yesterdays slight sun burn, I'm putting off a bit of heat.

I had a nice time getting to spend it with my wife and son. The only way the trip could have been better was if my daughter could have made it.

Fourth of July Weekend

This has been a good weekend.

Yesterday, my boy and I got around, and got some donuts. Then we went to help my cousin move, ate some really good pizza at "La Pizza" (at 5th and Sheridan in Tulsa). Then we went swimming.

It was a good time. Even the move wasn't bad.

We got home, and my wife had made plans for us to go to her friends houses for a party at her neighbors house. We got there, and her husband and kids were not home. So, she called her husband and promptly cussed him out. It wasn't pretty. It just went downhill from there. I had a lot of fun with my boy, and the kids there. We set off some fireworks. We also had a good dinner.

This morning, we loaded the grill up into the truck and took it to church. We grilled burgers, dogs, and chicken after the morning service. Our music minister was out of town this weekend, so I ended up leading the music. After the sermon, I left a bit early to get lunch started (the burgers and dogs, another man was cooking the chicken).

This afternoon and evening, I spent it playing PS2 games with my boy. We made 3 trips to Game Stop. We got Star Wars Bounty Hunter. We took it back and we got Charlie and the chocolate Factory. We took it back and got Lego Star Wars. This one is a keeper. The first was just too hard. The second was just not very good and too hard. Lego Star Wars has been real good.

No real plans for Monday or Tuesday.

Ahhh, sounds nice.

This is also the first 4th that I've had where someone I know has been over seas serving our Country! It's defiantly made me appreciate more what I have.

Happy Fourth everyone.

Fathers Day

Sunday, as you know, was Fathers Day.

Right before we went camping, I got a couple things that would be useful on the camping trip. I got some table cloth holders, a collapsible shovel and a rubber mallet. This was really cool.

Well, Saturday night I was surprised when we were all standing around talking, and I was given another present. I got really excited, because it was in a Victoria Secret bag (ok, not really, but that was how I played it, I recognized the bag from the perfume I had bought my wife). But I got 3 wonderful cards and the Narnia movie.

Here is a rare picture of me and the kids.

Anniversary Gifts

A couple weeks ago, I posted that my wife got me a great mp3 player for our anniversary! (And she told me that I didn't even tell that she got it for a HUGE bargain (about 1/2 off).

Anyway, someone asked what I got her.

I got her a bottle of Dream Angles Heavenly perfume by Victoria Secret.

She loves that perfume.

Mystery Snake

Tonight, when my daughter got home from work, she came running in all excited about a snake in the road.

We grabbed flash lights and went out to look at it.

Here is what we saw.


We both really like snakes. And neither of us could identify this snake. Since we didn't know what kind it was, I wouldn't let her catch it. (which she really wanted to do).

I've come in and looked for some time trying to find this snake on Google, but no luck. Maybe someone knows what kind of snake this is. (clicking on the pictures make them larger).

I know it is probably not poisonous, but I didn't really want to take that chance.

Update

I know, it's been a while. 8 days in fact since I've last updated. I think this is the longest I have gone without updating.

Where to start...

Soccer
Well, I didn't get to see any soccer games from Wednesday till yesterday (Monday). The USA is still in the mix, but they will have to win their game Thursday and Italy has to win theirs. If Italy doesn't win their game, then the US will need a lot of points to make it to the next round.

VBS
Vacation Bible School started last night. I do believe this is the smallest VBS start I've ever seen. We only had 9 kids last night. The point isn't really the number of kids that come, but what they get out of it, but more kids would have been nice.

Camping Trip
Last week, we went on a camping trip. We camped at Twin Points at Skiatook Lake from Wednesday through Saturday. It was a very nice trip. It was hot, but we had a good strong south wind the whole time. That was good for the heat, but it made getting out on the lake impossible. We tried Friday night, but I was afraid I was going to capsize the boat, so we headed back to the dock.

On Thursday night, my boy was riding his bike that he got for Christmas. He hasn't ridden it much. So this was a good time for him to practice. He was doing pretty good. I took him up a hill to have him come down so I could take some pictures. Well, it started off real good, but he got going too fast, and had problems stopping. Needless to say, he crashed. And he crashed good! Scratched up his bike and his knees. One was bleeding pretty good, but once we got the mud cleaned off his knee, it wasn't bad. I was proud that he handled it as well as he did, or he might have really gotten hurt. It also made me happy when he got back on the bike Friday morning. I was a bit afraid he wouldn't get back on it.

There was a chance of rain Friday night and into Saturday. We knew this, and almost came home. But this is Oklahoma, and so until it actually rains, who knows if it really will. I asked my boy if he wanted to go home or stay one more night even though it might rain. He said he wanted to stay. So we put the rain tarps on the tents. The neighbors Friday night sat up late into Saturday morning partying. I really wouldn't have cared, except they were noisy as could be. So, I didn't really get any sleep till they went to bed which was around 2. Then their dogs started barking at a raccoon after all had gotten quite and I finally got to sleep. Well, the 'coon finally moved on and the dog was quite and I got more sleep. Then the rain moved in. Lots of lighting and thunder. And the tent started leaking. So did the rain flap. It was dripping on my wife. We talked for a bit about going in or staying through the night. We decided that we would go home if our boy woke up. If not, we would stick it out.

Well, the next morning (around 7ish or so), we got up (the rainflap finally quite leaking sometime during the night. I had put a towel where it was dripping on the bed so we could try to sleep). We started packing up camp to go home. Got most everything put up, and woke up my boy. He asked why everything was wet. He had slept all through the storms in his own tent. My wife and I just laughed about that.

We finished packing up and went into town for breakfast (between the raccoons and the rain, or planned breakfast was wet). After that, we headed home to unpack, reset up the tents and wash and dry them out.

Misc
Saturday morning as we were headed home, my daughters ex-boyfriend decided to try to choke her and then hit her (at her work), so he was arrested for assault. My wife went up to check on her, and I stayed home with our boy and unpacked. Yesterday, my wife and daughter filed a protective order against him.

Through all of this, I missed going to a birthday party of a guy I work with. He turned the big 30! (sucka). Anyway, gratz again.

Well, I guess this novel is long enough.

later

Anniversary Present

My wife can pick out such cool presents!

Yesterday, for our anniversary, she got me the Philips PSA612/17 mp3 player.

It's a 4 gig player with FM tuner, Recharable battery, and a stop watch.

It's really cool.

Anniversary

Today is my 8th Wedding anniversary!!! We were married 6/6 at 6:00 (in 1998).


We joked that if it was a horrible marriage, then the date/time was a sign. If it was a great marriage then it was a joke. It's been a joke. (The date/time thing, not the marriage.)

It's been a wonderful marriage!
We've had good times and bad times since we've been married. But that's to be expected I guess.

The good times have defiantly out-weighed the bad times.
We've only had a couple fights, and not many more arguments.

It's so wonderful being able to say that my wife is my best friend.
Course when you get married, you not only marry the other person, you get the family with them. hehe We both got family we probably would never have expected.

Anyway, I guess that is enough rambling, since that appears to be what I'm doing.

Happy Anniversary my love!

Up, Up and Away

For my father-in-laws 70th Birthday, all the kids and spouses got together and bought him a hot air balloon ride for 2.


Today was the big day.

They were to meet behind the Chili’s in Owasso at 6:45. As I was pulling up (to take photo’s), my in-laws (Linda and Vaughn) had just parked. Shortly after that, the man from Airgasmic Balloon Adventures pulled up. We had to wait for some more people to show up before we could get started. Plus, they had to figure out where they were starting from but that start was based on wind direction and speed and where they would put down later.

While waiting, they filled a black balloon up and let to float off and watched it to figure out the air currents. The balloon basically went straight up. (I thought that was smart, course that’s their job to know what they were doing). Anyway, once the last group of people got there, we headed to the 8th Grade center for launch.

We got to the 8th grade center, and they let off another balloon. This time, is slowly drifted to the south west. So, they decided to go to Freedom Baptist Church which was at 177th E Ave & 96th St N.

Off we went again.



We get there, and they started unloading and setting up the balloons.






There were 2 groups of people going (and 2 balloons). 3 people is all those baskets could hold!
At approximately 7:30, they lifted off.

They looked excited, but also a bit nervous (in my opinion anyway).







I called my wife several times cause she was extremely interested. After I told her they were up, it wasn’t long till she left work and started chasing them herself. She said the honked and waved, but when I asked Linda, she said she didn’t see her.

I enjoyed chasing them around in the car. The sun roof made it nice to be able to stop and take pictures without even getting out of the car.






During this, I had gone to QT for breakfast and a Dr. Pepper. When I got out, I started chasing them again. I almost missed the landing, but luckily I knew the area enough that I could get to where they were at without much hassle.


As they were coming down, from where I was out, it looked like they were going to land in the trees. But once I got to a better location, I could tell that their pilot knew what he was doing and was aiming for a small (very small from my point of view) clearing. At approximately 8:15 they had a very soft landed.






The ride wasn’t quite an hour. It would have been a bit longer, and they would have traveled father, but because of light winds, and locations to land they were only up for about 45 minutes, and traveled about 1.5 miles or so.

When they landed, the whole neighborhood came out and watched. Everyone grabbed cameras and took pictures and watched. It was even one couples 50th wedding anniversary. The woman said that they made their day! (Man below in green shirt and his wife is in the blue pants and white blouse).


I gave Linda a hard time cause the took a disposable camera with her instead of her digital camera. Hopefully I'll get some pictures from her camera scanned in and add them later. I'm sure they were beautiful, if the pictures come out.

Linda and Vaughn both had a really good time.

(Click on the images for larger versions.)

If you build it they will come

I'm not talking about baseball either.

Sunday, we bought a wooden playset for our boy. We've wanted one for him for a long time, and finally got around to getting one.

That in itself was an event. Went to 1 Walmart, they called 2 others before we found one. Then had to drive to go get it, then get people to get it for us, and check out, load it, get it home. whew.

Then we opened the 2 box set. Wow, what a mess. It is a good thing my wife and I work well together. Something like this could send people to divorce court, or at least a bar.

We opened the box, and the instructions stated that depending on your experience, it would take 6 to 12 hours to put this thing together. (It took us close to the 6 hours).

Anyway, He loves it. He finally got to get on it tonight.

When we finished with it, we had him get out of the pool, and he was really impressed he could get on it while he was wet. hehe




And as I said in the title. If you build it, they will come. And all the neighborhood kids were at our house just having a ball. (ok, maybe not all, but the ones he plays with regularly)

Schools over

8/18, my youngest child started his first day of kindergarten.
Today was his kindergarten graduation, and tomorrow is the last day of kindergarten.

How the year has flown by. It seems like yesterday he just started, and it wont be long till those next 12 years fly by, and I'll be going to his High school graduation.

He's grown so much this year.