company fun

Pics from Auntie Deborah Poppins' trip: presents, a trip up Camels' Back (with a thunderstorm lurking above and the remnants of a park fair below), and a trip on the Boise Train. So much fun that we can't hardly believe how lucky we were; Deborah and I even snuck out for a morning of shopping in downtown Boise! The kids loved every minute and so did we.

First day of preschool...

They're getting big, of course. Buddy wouldn't keep his eyes open for anything. Girly is holding "Tarissa Parissa," her favorite kitty. We have no idea where the name came from, of course.

Both are loving being back in school and say goodbye with just a wave--it's fun to see!

catching up--a few pics for the fam

Some pictures from the past month or so...

...Lining up their 'babies' on the couch (a favorite past time, this lining up activity. Takes lots of time and energy!)

An early am Tin-Tin reading session by two superkids...

The Swiss arrives!

Kids' Room

The bedroom pics are in the house renovation blog, which isn't listed here yet,
Extrem4 House Projects:
http://extrem4-houseprojects.blogspot.com/

August kid fun

Yes--that's ketchup, mustard, and pasta sandwiches. Yum!

So this is what happens when I'm at school in the summer and Extrem is with the kids....

...and yes, the nickel came out

...nothing like a little suspense for a few months!

So: Con's added me to the family blog. Remy passed the nickel 3.5 days later--some fun poop-digging, that.

May/June: cousin time, much fun was had with lots of time with K/A and kids. We're still talking about it! This is a Lakeport pic:

June/July: I traveled a little, Con worked a *ton*--so I took the kids and we did our first solo car trip all the way to mom and dad's place. We were there over the 4th and had a ball--a day at the Oregon coast (where it was actually warm enough to go in the water. In a swimsuit. Amazing!), a small-town 4th parade, dinner with Hamiltoes, and an afternoon of...kid-free shopping. Ahhh....

I brought mom back with us and she was here for 10 days or so. In that time I had a 2-day trip, so it was great she was here. Unfortunately it was the hottest part of the summer and she melted! :( The kids loved the extended gramma/grampa, and then gramma, time.

Con started the porch project then. It's almost done now--just needs a few finishing touches--and we like it. It's a nice outdoor space--nicer than our indoor spaces :) I wish I had another month and I'd paint the whole house inside--ah well.

August: we went boating with Spam and Banana and co., which was tons of fun. This last weekend we cleaned and cleaned on Saturday and then had Vogts over for swimming and dinner. That afternoon, Remy *finally* ventured off the second step (we've been going every day for the whole summer. Good night.) He went from clutching the step to asking me to "throw him to the sky!"....so that was major progress! Yesterday afternoon at Karl and Sonja's, after union mtg., Siena decided to ride a bike on her own. Another big breakthrough! Wow!

More coming...

(by Heidi)

Hey it has only been 2 months since the last post...

Ok 2 months and 1 day but who is counting. Many things have happened over the summer and I will try to do the readers digest version mostly by photo if I can get it together. We have a week before ourextended company returns from Switzerland to start school at BSU. We have been working on the house and have nearly got our porch project done and have a new project to start on the front porch. The kids are learing to swim slowly but surely. We took a trip to SLC to see cousins and go to IKEA. There have been blogable experiences but blogging has not been a priority for some reason. I will try to better in the future. I w do will probably start a new blog to chronicle the house updating and link it here.

No change........yet

Well, the other night I was getting our little 2.5 yr old ready for bed. He decided it would be interesting to swallow a nickel. I heard him make a funny gulping noise and what had been a nickel in his hand became a nickel in his belly. So far no nickels have reappeared but no problems either. We called and the recommendation was to watch and wait if there were no obvious problems. So we watch and wait. What fun to search for hidden treasures.

Holiday Over

Well the inlaws and outlaws have come and gone. We had a great trip to CA and to the ranch for a couple days. We then drove back to Boise and brought the whole family with us. It was a quick couple of weeks but very enjoyable. Boise has been hot and we came to really enjoy the pool and our big girl is really taking off. She went from a timid swimmer needing both noodles and water wings to swimming with wings only. It has cooled off with snow anticipated in the mountains. I will work on getting some pictures up on my next day off.

You don't see this everyday

We heard something out back the other night thinking it might be raccoons we found this instead:

Cousin Pictures

Trader Joe's Boise

I am of the belief that Boise could support 2-3 Trader Joe's and it seems they will eventually get here but for now we are not on the suply line. So it is a little annoying to Boise that Bend, OR has broken gound on a Trader Joe's to open next year. The news it seems is that Trader Joe's plans to put a store in Boise after it puts a store in Spokane. Here are the news clippings that I could find.

Boise Trader Joe's 1
Boise Trader Joe's 2
Bend Trader Joe's

I suppose that Bend is closer then any other Trader Joe's (maybe SLC) and it is on our route to OR and only 4-5 hrs away. On a regular basis we lament the fact we don't have a Trader Joe's and every time we go out of town we make a trip to stock up. I have a feeling that once they do open here they will be overwhelmed by the hordes of shoppers on their grand opening.

Did I win the 5K race? Did I cure Breast Cancer?

The answers are no and maybe. I did not win but did post a personal best. As I have never run a 5k before it must be a personal best, right?
Well, after my extensive training which amounted to 2 short bike rides and wearing my new running shoes for a week to break them in..........I can say we finished. Unfortunately, I can't tell you what place or what my time was. In fact it was not the most organized event and there were 13000 people in the race that just kind of did their own thing. The kids and I hung around for a while waiting for a chance to start the race as people with strollers were supposed to go last but I saw plenty of others with strollers going so I figured I better hop in. The bad part is that a good many of the horde in front of us were walkers and it was next to impossible to pass with a bike trialer turned to stroller. I probably only got to run half of the race because of the traffic.
The winning time was something like 16.06 mins. The course doubled back on itself so we saw the leader coming back toward the finish line. He was screaming at the pace car "GO! GO! GO! for them to hurry up as he was about to run over the top of it. One of my coworkers from the hospital finished in about 10th place at 19 mins and we saw him almost wipeout as a little girl wandered in front of him and he had to essentially hurdle her to keep from colliding with her.

My legs are a little sore but not too bad. That night we also took a 6 mile bike ride that evening with some friends so I guess I am on a fitness kick.........I just need to keep it up.

If you watch all of the video clips you might see us but I didn't bother. Next year we will try it again but with a new strategy. Get out in front of the walkers. The nice thing is that it is just out our backdoor and the race route is the road off our backyard.

You are still wondering about my curing cancer. It is possible that my meager donation will pay for the reasearch for a cure. So, if there is a cure in the next year you can bet it was my 20$ that made the difference.

New Leaf? - We shall see

So here is the deal. Although I have lost a fair amount of weight in the last year the one thing that has not changed is my general couch potato attitude toward exercise (hey we live in ID we have to support potatoes right?). I work in an office where everyone else either plays tennis, mountain bikes or runs. Two are training for a half marathon and I can only get tired when they talk about 10 mile plus runs over the weekend. Now on occasion I do take a little 2-5 mile bike ride but that is about the extent. So at work the other day my coworkers sign me up to run a 5K in the Race for the Cure sponsered by the hospital. That may not sound like much to you but I have not run 5K consequtively ever and not collectively over the past 10 years. I am not really a runner. I tried a couple times in MI but never quite made it. I think I need someone to run with me to keep me going or something. In NV Jim got me to go a few times and I almost got to the point where I felt like I wanted to go but then I remembered that I probably didn't.

So here I am 6 days before my big run. My training has amounted to this:

1. Buy running shoes.

So maybe this is one of my problems. I have lots of shoes (at last count 25 pair or so) but no running shoes. Now that this is taken care of I think I am set. I don't think it makes sense to go out a try to do a bunch of running to get ready as it ain't gonna happen in 6 days.

One of our favorite family stories is about a Swiss brother in law (to remain nameless) that decided to see how many situps he could do in a minute the night before his military duty physical. He did great with 50 some situps that night but the next day struggled to make 10.

I have a feeling that walk or run as long as it is a start in the fitness direction that is a victory. We have no excuse as we are right off a great trial for running and biking. BTW my wife go some shoes as well so no more excuses for her either. I am not so sure that I will ever become a runner and do any marathons or anything like that but I would be happy in being in decent shape and not get so winded just listening to the women in the office talk about there weekend runs.

Blah blah blah

Well it was a very nice weekend and it has been great weather in Boise. The Spring is great except for the assorted allergies that seem to come and go for me but it is beautiful and we had a great bike ride tonight out on the river down to the park.
So I finished my 21 days in a row of work and now have only 8 days on and 1 day off in the middle. The life of a prn SLP. Feast or famine. I am trying to make up for the famine and getput back some of the savings that was sacrificed during the lean season. No home fixing going on until the finances are a little more secure and until we figure out what in the world we are going to do or at least where to start.
The sister, niece, nephew and grandparents were here for a week too bad I work most of the time. I tied to post some pictures but so some reason it is not working i will try later I guess.

What a Croc!

I have finally bought some new shoes for work. The others almost had holes in the bottom and I really needed some new ones but being cheap I didn't want to spend too much money. I just happened to get a dividend check from REI so I decided to buy my shoes there as I had 15$ in store credit to spend. So for 20$ I got a pair of these Crocs. They look a little funky and some would say downright ugly but I like them well eough and they are quite comfortable. They are very light and have little knobbies on the sole that kind of give you a little foot massage as you walk around. You can also throw them in the diskwasher to clean them up. So with 2 days of wearng them I reccomend them.

Work, work, CEU'S and more work

Well, I have gone from being nearly unemployeed to working everyday for what looks like it will be a 14 day strech. When it rains it pours. The sad part is that my sister will be here to visit in the middle of my 14 days. I will get evenings and 1 weekend with her but the weekend I am home my wife will be in TX so it is a bummer. This is all good for the bank acct or I should say the Visa people.
I am quite enjoying work actually as I have fun colleagues and people are generally happy to have you try to help them to get better. I was in a 2 day training course in Seattle this weekend and am now a certified E-Stim provider for dysphagia therapy. It was rather a long trip to Seattle on Fri about 8 hours and an even longer trip home on Sunday (arriving home at 1AM) with work starting at 8AM the next day. They kept us busy on Sat from 7:30 AM to 6:00PM for the course but it was interesting and the time went by quickly. For those interested in Estim I will place a link so you can read more about it. VitalStim

Unfortunately, Bryan of Moments of Adequacy fame was out of town and I did not get to see him. There is not so much to report except to say the weather has been stinky and no roof down driving has been occuring except with heater and heated seats on which is a little silly.

Warning: Ranting and Raving Ahead

Today you are the beneficiaries of a rant. I have cell phone service through Sprint. I can't complain too much but I may or may not stick with them after my 2 yr contract is up. I like them much better then my former carrier AT&T but that is another rant.
Here is the situation. About 2 months ago I started receiving text messages all of the sudden that were your basic spam messages. Not ever using texting I just thought they were annoying because they drained my battery due to the ringer and phone light come on when they are received. I didn't really think that I was paying for the privilege of receiving junk spam text messages. But lucky me I spent between 15-20 dollars last month for this scam.

So I call Sprint and I say, "Turn off the texting which I didn't sign up for." Randy told me I have to call, email, or use website to opt out of the service I hadn't opted into. So I took the 800 number. I call the 800 number. Hmmmmm what a surprise. No such number. So I call back wading through the computer lady asking me to "Para Espanol presione por favor el número dos" and tell me my little problems before I can get to the real person, then I have to give the name number and SS# for the acct holder and explain the situation again. The second time around I get, Ebony, she says yeah, 'Those companies change their numbers alot". Hmmm doesn't sound like a scam to me. This time I get the text number to text and ask them to cease and desist. I get off the phone and try to text them only to realize I have blocked the texting so back through the hoops to talk to Mark. I go through the scenario again (Take 3). Mark agrees it seems like a scam (as if they are not dealing with this daily from disgruntled customers) and he agrees to refund me 5$. Whatever. I am not going to refuse. I get off the phone send my text message (which I don't think I had ever done before) and then hope that Mark remembers to block my text messages in 30 min as we agreed. I plan to call in an hour just to make sure.

In the end I think that Sprint and probably all of the other phone people out there are in cahoots with these companies to make extra money off me. The original scamsters get advertising money for sending spam text messages, sprint cashes in on the charges and tries to look good refunding some minimal charges and bad mouthing these companies but I don't think they try to hard too keep the spam from happening.

I guess I will wait for the next class action suit in which I will receive my 32 cents and feel only slightly vindicated. The moral of the sorry respond to any junk email with the reply "STOP/CANCEL/UNSUBSCRIBE". You will be out 30 cents for the 1 incoming and one outgoing message unless it is a premium message which is 9.99. Then you can wait 2-3 years for your class action suit check of 32 cents and make about 2 cents on the deal. This is just my 2 cents.

IKEATOWN - Bloklok

I came across this at another blog. IKEA sells prefab homes (apts). I guess it is not really new in Scandinavia(1997 first one built)but they are expanding to the UK. No talk of coming to the US. You can put them up in about a day. Ships in flat boxes with one allen wrench. Just kidding. (I guess the IKEA prefab house division is pretty sick of that joke). The concept is interesting with the idea behind it being inexpensive and compact. My wife and I have been interested in the concept of living big in a small place. I am not saying that is what IKEA does but if you look at books by Susan Susanka. Her ideas are interesting although we have no plans to build any "Not so big houses". For now we are sticking with our 80's home with the goal of doing some upgrading some day as finances allow.

Talk about insulting!

I am approaching one of those monumental birthdays. It is in the distant future not until December. So at this point it is not too much of a sore point but you really don't want to think about it and you certainly don't want people pointing out your advancing age.
So today I got this letter that I find highly offensive:

I am not sending any of my money away but I think I will carry this card around and see if it will afford me any senior benefits.