Update on the Family

You know, Facebook sucked the life out of my regular blog postings. Anyway...

Annalise is now 4 years old. She had a zoo birthday party and a celebration at her school, which she will eagerly tell you about if asked. We also had cake at home on her birthday. She loves legos, barbies, little critters and other small playthings for creative imaginative play. She can be very talkative when her sister shuts-up and she is very whitty. She has a thousand different facial expressions and doesn't like to listen or follow directions when it's contrary to her personal goals. She loves helping Ryan cook. She is teeny tiny but with normal sized feet. It's only funny when you consider the fact that Madeline has the tiniest feet. She still wets her pants occassionally but seems to be getting better. She graduated up to having chores and is in charge of getting the dirty clothes washed, folded and put away. She also helps pack her own lunch.

Madeline is almost 8.5 years old. She had a sleepover party this year. There were a bunch of girls and they had a lot of fun. She is still extremely social and loves art and creative play. I am so happy that she is still a kid. She likes the pre-teen Disney shows like Wizards of Waverly Place but I can still find her watching princess movies and dressing up in princess dresses. She doesn't play Barbies as much as she used to, but will play with her sister, occassionally. She is very small and has tiny feet. She is a size 13. I think most of the kids in her class are a size 3-4. She wears slim 6/7 jeans and normal sized tops. She's just small, or maybe just normal and everyone else is big. Who knows. She takes hip hop class this year and is in no other organized activities. It's nice to be a little less busy. Madeline's chores include everything to do with the dishes. She sets and clears the table, loads and unloads the dishwasher and also vacuums.

I am still working for the County. I increased the size of my department by adding a professional planner to our group. We hope to add a civil engineer next year to be shared with the County Engineer's office. I travel a lot for fun both with the family and without. Because of travel I was not as good about keeping on top of my workouts but resolve to do better this year. I injured by knee and had surgery this year which prevented me from completing a marathon and triathlon but there's always next year.

Ryan is doing well with Leo A. Daly. He's been there over five years no and serves as operations director for about 60 people. He sits on their leadership council for the Omaha office, is the president of the Sarpy Area Arts Council, president of the College of Architecture Friends Association, was recognized in the Sarpy under 40, as well as the Midlands Business Journal 40 under 40, Father of the Year, Greatest Dad and so on and so forth...you get the idea. He's Mr. Perfect.

No plans for 2011, other than survival.

Wow, been a long time since I've posted a blog. I'm surprised I even remembered my login and password!

February

So this year's off to a running start. Marathon training is in full swing, I started triathlon training as well. I swim 4-5 time per week, am running about 35 miles per week. Madeline started the swim team, still takes dance and swimming lessons. Annie knows how to chill and doesn't do much of anything except tag along. Ryan got a new title at work: Senior Associate and became a member of the "Board of Director's", which is a super elite secret group. Ooops, let the cat out of the bag, didn't I? Anyway everything is going well!

My job is great. I have four new planning commissioners and all the fun of training a new board. I am very excited about the potential of this board. It is a very good cross section of the county and includes some very interesting and knowledgable people! I am honored to serve them. News on the County Board front is that our chairman will not run for a second term. Her opponent is a peer from the Chamber of Commerce. He may have a challenger which would make for an interesting race. It will be a very interesting year, to say the least! I love politics! At least, when they don't involve me.

January 2010

Since it's been a very, very long time since my last post...I will start my innaugural post of 2010 with new year's resolutions. I didn't actually make any, but I will think of some on the fly now.

2009 was a very interesting year. I hope that 2010 is also interesting, but perhaps in different ways. Such as the following:

1. Find better balance between my highest priorities; Ryan, Annalise/Madeline, exercise routine and career.
2. Spend more time building the evolving marriage relationship.
3. Strategize on how to impress the most important values onto the girls.
4. Finish critical home projects.

My personal goals include:

1. Run a marathon.
2. Finish a triathalon.

We hope to visit Europe soon, make a nostalgic trip out to Seattle and I would like to visit my best friend Mona in New York City for a solo (or with Ryan) vacation. So there you have it! 2010 in a nutshell.

I was able to close out 2009 by going through almost every item from my parents estate. I donated about 2000 cubic feet of items to the DAV and a vanload to the county department of community services. There is more to donate and that will hopefully be finished soon.

I started swimming class which meets weekly on Tuesday's. There I will learn all of the strokes and how to perfect my form so that I will be in top shape for the triathalon in June. :)

Demolition

I used to have a fireplace mantle and hearth. Now I have none. I still have a fireplace, though. I will post pictures soon.

Taylor Swift Concert

I will blog more about this tomorrow since it's late. Madeline and I were lucky to be able to purchase a couple of tickets to the concert tonight and attend with our friend John. He provided the opportunity to buy seats in a great location. We had a lot of fun. I have some pictures and videos to post.

Garden Update

I realized that it has been awhile since I updated on the garden. As many of you know we have a fairly extensive garden in an effort to reduce our carbon footprint.

Many of the crops did not get planted. I think I mentioned in a much earlier spring post that some things had not yet been done. They never got completed. Peas, beans, raddishes, lettuce, carrots or onions were never planted. A few things did get planted. Things that are doing well are fruits that are perennial. We had approximately well over 100 peaches. We had a variety of peach issues this year. There was some peach curl, a bug crawled over the peaches and gave them sticky spots and caused some malformation, worms got about 60% of the peaches and several were eaten or partially eaten by birds. We harvested all but one of the peaches. Several were eaten and I all found was a peach pit at the base of the tree. I'd say maybe 20 peaches were lost in that way. Even still we were able to harvest and keep a significant amount of peaches. We had about 40 that did not have any worms. Those were eaten whole. The rest are going to be canned. At least they are supposed to be canned, if Ryan does it.

The blackberries, grapes, tomatoes and peppers are ready. Raspberries are almost ripe (and there are many, which need to be covered to avoid loss from birds). The brussel sprouts are doing well and look to provide a decent crop. I almost forgot about the squash and cucumbers. Those are being picked now too. Pumpkin and butternut squash are growing now. I can't tell how many there are of each because of the way that Ryan planted them this year. They're in a cluster right now. When the growing season is over, we'll harvest them.

There are several pears on the pear trees. this is the first year fruiting. I don't know if they will ripen enough to eat. Only time will tell.

Madeline's top toof

Ryan pulled the last top tooth today. She is enjoying her new smile and excited the tooth fairy is coming tonight. I will post video and pics soon.

Surgery

Tomorrow I will have surgery. The surgery is at 9am and will last about an hour. I return to work on Tuesday. I should have a speedy recovery and be able to run again in about six weeks. Surgery is outpatient and I will be home in the afternoon. It will take about six months to have a full recovery but all should be well after about a week.

The girls will spend the day with Grandma, Grandpa and their Seattle cousins. We'll be having dinner with them tomorrow night. I am not sure if I will be up to going so I may stay home and rest. Then this weekend we're going to South Dakota to celebrate Ryan's grandma's 80th birthday. The Jackson's from Colorado will be meeting us there on Friday. It should be fun. I just hope I don't sleep through all of it! LOL

Ryan's new car

Ryan got a new car on Madeline's birthday. He got a Ford Fusion Hybrid. It's black with black interior. He really likes it. I think he has a picture to post and I will ask him to post it. We traded in the trusty Explorer that we had purchased new in 1998. He used the cash for clunkers program. I think all new car purchases get to deduct the sales tax this year too. Good year to buy a new car. The new car gets over 40 mpg in town and over 30 on the highway.

Seven

Madeline is seven today! We woke her up at 7am to wish her a happy 7th birthday! She is having a CoCo Key's birthday party starting at 1pm and ending at 5pm. It should be lots of fun!

Tonight we'll open birthday presents and have cake (which I have not yet purchased). :) No time like the present!

Mammories

I know this has less to do with my daughters and more to do with my "girls" but it's noteworthy! I had my first ever momogram! WOOHOO! THAT was really fun, minus the squishing, tugging and pulling. They read it right away and it showed everything normal. :) Now this was interesting, they put little stickers on your....nips.

Just a few more days

In just a few days we will see some relatives after a long delay. Rhonda's family will be here a week from this Thursday! We are so excited! We cannot wait to see them and their family. It will be a fantastic long weekend with lots of in-law brothers/sisters/cousins/nieces and nephews. The Colorado relatives should be here too, but we don't know the date yet. I wonder if the Colorado relatives would like to stay at our place on the way in or out. We can have the place stocked and ready to go, if that's what happens :)

Pierced Ears

For Madeline's seventh birthday Mary took her to get her ears pierced. We all went to Claires and Madeline was brave, although she did cry. The video is too large to post, but I videoed the whole event. She's very proud of them now :)

Holiday Weekend

It was a relaxed weekend. Davie came over from Peoria. He and Ryan went out Friday to a pool hall, ate dinner, played pool and drank a little beer while my friends Carrie, Beth and their kiddos hung out at our place. Carrie mixed up some tasty drinks for us. Everyone had a good time (I think!).

Saturday Mary came over to enjoy watching fireworks from our garage/driveway. For the most part it was a good time. Unfortunately our immature forty-something neighbors had to cast a cloud on things because they were too proud to admit that allowing their kids to shoot fireworks into our garage three times was inappropriate. It always surprises me when peoples immediate reaction is to turn things back on you and blame you for their mistakes. It's probably the most immature behavior I've seen. They made some comment about taking care of our yard, which interestingly has nothing to do with fireworks flaming past our heads but was somehow important to them at the time. Maybe if our yard was 1/4 inch shorter the kids would not have been misusing fireworks or lighting them off right in front of our driveway. Or maybe the yard had something to do with distraction during the lighting of fireworks. I'm having a hard time making the connection. Anyway, I digressed.

Davie left for Peoria this afternoon. Twenty five bucks in the back since I paid him 25$ to mow the lawn at 9pm last night right in front of my neighbors. :) My rationale was the yard was important enough to mention (and they know we have a yard boy who mows and would have been here today) then we might as well take care of it right then. I hope they felt like jerks because they certainly acted like jerks. Anyway, they did end up moving their firework lighting down a bit and OH MY GOSH, the fireworks quit flying into our garage. See how things can be easily fixed. Too bad it included a bunch of stupidity along with it. Of course then the fireworks started flying in the other neighbors yard but I think they had already gone in for the night. But I am supposed to be telling you about today... It's really sunny and hot today. Annie is resting and Maddie is cleaning the playroom. Ryan is reading and I'm about ready to go out for a second tanning session.

Hostas from Gina

New smile

New picture

All I want for Christmas is my two front teef

A few updates to give you.

Madeline lost her first big front tooth yesterday. She looks quite different. I am surprised because after her recent dentist visit I did not expect she would lose the tooth for quite some time. Madeline had been wiggling it a lot lately, which helped move the booger right out! The tooth next to it is pretty wiggly so I think she will be toof-less in a week or so.

Ryan and Madeline will be riding in a parade this morning for Ryan's art council. I think Ryan may walk and Madeline will ride in a convertible with a couple of other kids. It should be a lot of fun for her. I think Ryan is in two or three parades this summer.

Mary and David watched the girls last night and it sounds like they all had a good time. It was nice to go out with Ryan to have dinner and drinks.

What's New...

Well I have been a bit disengaged from the family for the past six weeks. This is for two reasons. First work has been very busy. My responsibilities have increased, there are pressures from budget related issues and a variety of other special projects. This requires several additional night meetings and socializing with consultants. Second, I believe I am suffering from burnout. Probably related to work, but also related to having two type-a intense personality children - one of which is in the throws of the terrible twos. That being said I still play the leading role of "Mommy" in the hit new musical "This is my life". All of this is important to note because it explaints why it's difficult to give a family update. I don't really have my finger on the pulse at the moment and there's not really an end in site. In fact things are on the verge of getting much more complicated at work which will mean additional time restraints, meetings and stress. I am riding this wave as it comes so I have no idea what will happen. Now I can give you a peripheral update about what I know of the family living in the house I share with them.

Madeline started VBS this week. What you don't know is that I just took a thirty minute hiatus from this post because at the moment I typed the first sentence of this paragraph I realized that I only had about 20 minutes to pick Maddie up from kids club and get her heiny to VBS. See how districted I am! Anyway, VBS is going well. This year we had to arrange someone to take Maddie back to kids club after VBS ended. I don't have the latitutde with my schedule like I used to. Madeline seems to be enjoying VBS. This morning when I dropped her off I leaned over to give her a goodbye kiss and she actually cough/sneezed right in my mouth. Probably the most disgusting thing that happened to me this month. Maybe the last year.

Annalise is back to school, after a one-week break, and having a good time. She is starting to whine, hits when she's ticked off, and still loves to destroy things, especially smashing food when she's bored with eating. She really enjoys the outisde and will take off without looking back, although that is nothing new.

Ryan is busy with work, arts council and college of architecture alumni association. He's planning a big arts bash in September and will be busy all summer with arts activities and participating in the variety of city festivals in order to promote the new council. His new-ish job at work appears to be going well.

Like I mentioned before I am swamped, in a good way, but busy nonetheless. I continue to run and am training for a full marathon. I've tentatively marked my calendar for a marathon in NY, one hour north of the city. I plan to spend a week with Mona in NY and run the marathon. All subject to change based on whichever way the wind blows. I will visit Mona this year however, now that Annie is weaned. (She has not asked to nurse for several days) woohoo!