We're a week into our 2 week road trip. Helen's last day of teaching was Friday, May 22 and we hit the road as soon as she got home. We spent a whirlwind week at the Wilderness Lodge in Disney World and we'll spend the next week traveling around Florida. We're currently in St Augustine and plan on making our way around the coast line; down to the Keys and the Everglades; and back around the west coast.
Last year we visited my sister, Katie, in Louisiana; continued on to Texas; and even crossed over into Mexico. We had such a great time! We thought about a lot of possible trips this year, but settled on Disney World and Florida. We spent a week in Disney World a couple years ago and loved it. We were anxious to get back, especially while the kids are still young enough to see the magic in it all.
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Spring Break 2009: Seagrove Beach (Day 2 of 8)
Derek and Adam
Sister Katie and Mom
Derek and sister in law Laine
Adam and Helen
Laine and sister Kelley
Sunday April 5, 2009
The boys woke up eager to try out the new skim boards Aunt Laine bought them. Aunt Laine bought a new board for herself so she was eager to try it out as well. The weather was overcast and a little cool, but it didn't stop them from having a good time.
My mom was still recovering from a broken leg so she had limited mobility. We ended up swapping bedrooms so that she could be on the 2nd floor with the kitchen and more easily satisfy her middle of the night cravings.
Scrabble was the board game of choice and everyone helped out with Laine's "doodling" project for her art class. There was plenty of good food, drink, and relaxation.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Update
I hope everyone had a nice Mother's Day weekend. On Saturday we were at the boy's baseball games all morning and afternoon before heading to my Mom's for a pre-Mother's Day dinner. We visited with Jason and Laine before they head out of town tomorrow. They showed us the new blog they set up so we can track their travels. Derek is already harassing them with instant messaging.
Unfortunately both boys won their games on Saturday so they will continue on in the end of the season tournament. They were fun games to watch and we want them to do well, but this season has dragged on long enough.
Yesterday we did Mother's Day for Helen's side of the family. We had a good time visiting with everyone.
Swim team practice starts this week. This is the first season the boys are doing swim team. They weren't too happy about it, but we told them to give it a try. We figured they might like it and it should definitely help them be better swimmers.
The school year is winding down as well. Helen is very stressed right now. It seems like some semesters she's reasonably on top of things, but this semester is not one of them. She was grading labs all weekend and was not happy about it. Whenever she complains that she doesn't have enough time to get her school work done, I offer to take care of everything so she can have unlimited time to work, but that makes her even more cranky because the point is that she doesn't want to be working on her personal time in the first place.
We're irritated that Helen's not going to get paid for the Tuesday following Memorial Day. The last day of school was supposed to be the Friday before Memorial Day, but the school system is forcing the teachers to make up a snow day on the following Tuesday. We will be long gone out of town by then so she's taking the day off without pay. At least she has the option to take it off without pay, but shouldn't grading labs all Mother's Day weekend count?
I've also been bogged down with some computer issues. I like to stay on top of things so it really deflates me to come home feeling like I've got everything under control only to have Helen inform me that something has broken. I have to fix it even though I wasn't the one to break it. In fact, I wasn't even home when it happened. It's bad when you walk in the door and are informed that something needs fixing, but it's worse to go and use something and find out that it's broken and either no one informed you or no one knows anything about how it might have been broken.
The other night it was the printer. I tried some things to fix the problem and then finally decided to uninstall the printer software and reinstall it. Unfortunately, the install would not run. I was obsessed with fixing the problem for a few days. I stayed up late several nights and went back and forth with HP technical support only to figure out (on my own using some tracing tools) that the install would not run because I had disabled auto run a couple months back when the conficker worm took control of our computer.
The night we were attacked by the conficker worm we had returned late from Derek's basketball game and we were trying to shut everything down, but Derek got on the computer (when he was supposed to getting ready for bed) and all the sudden things started going haywire. I'm not sure if Derek caused the problem, but it was certainly suspicious that things started going wrong while he was on the computer. It took me several days of obsessively trying all sorts of things before I finally had to restore the main hard drive from backup. Luckily, I run daily backups of the main hard drive to an external drive each night so we didn't lose anything. I really don't know how non-technical people have any hope of keeping their computers up and running. There's always something.
Unfortunately both boys won their games on Saturday so they will continue on in the end of the season tournament. They were fun games to watch and we want them to do well, but this season has dragged on long enough.
Yesterday we did Mother's Day for Helen's side of the family. We had a good time visiting with everyone.
Swim team practice starts this week. This is the first season the boys are doing swim team. They weren't too happy about it, but we told them to give it a try. We figured they might like it and it should definitely help them be better swimmers.
The school year is winding down as well. Helen is very stressed right now. It seems like some semesters she's reasonably on top of things, but this semester is not one of them. She was grading labs all weekend and was not happy about it. Whenever she complains that she doesn't have enough time to get her school work done, I offer to take care of everything so she can have unlimited time to work, but that makes her even more cranky because the point is that she doesn't want to be working on her personal time in the first place.
We're irritated that Helen's not going to get paid for the Tuesday following Memorial Day. The last day of school was supposed to be the Friday before Memorial Day, but the school system is forcing the teachers to make up a snow day on the following Tuesday. We will be long gone out of town by then so she's taking the day off without pay. At least she has the option to take it off without pay, but shouldn't grading labs all Mother's Day weekend count?
I've also been bogged down with some computer issues. I like to stay on top of things so it really deflates me to come home feeling like I've got everything under control only to have Helen inform me that something has broken. I have to fix it even though I wasn't the one to break it. In fact, I wasn't even home when it happened. It's bad when you walk in the door and are informed that something needs fixing, but it's worse to go and use something and find out that it's broken and either no one informed you or no one knows anything about how it might have been broken.
The other night it was the printer. I tried some things to fix the problem and then finally decided to uninstall the printer software and reinstall it. Unfortunately, the install would not run. I was obsessed with fixing the problem for a few days. I stayed up late several nights and went back and forth with HP technical support only to figure out (on my own using some tracing tools) that the install would not run because I had disabled auto run a couple months back when the conficker worm took control of our computer.
The night we were attacked by the conficker worm we had returned late from Derek's basketball game and we were trying to shut everything down, but Derek got on the computer (when he was supposed to getting ready for bed) and all the sudden things started going haywire. I'm not sure if Derek caused the problem, but it was certainly suspicious that things started going wrong while he was on the computer. It took me several days of obsessively trying all sorts of things before I finally had to restore the main hard drive from backup. Luckily, I run daily backups of the main hard drive to an external drive each night so we didn't lose anything. I really don't know how non-technical people have any hope of keeping their computers up and running. There's always something.
Friday, May 1, 2009
Jason and Laine's Excellent Adventure
My brother, Jason, and his wife, Laine, have officially entered the next chapter in their lives. Yesterday was Jason's last day at IBM. Jason left his perfectly good well paying job to join his wife Laine, who left her perfectly good well paying job at the end of last year, in early\semi retirement. They have been planning this exit for the past year and we've all been excited for them and vicariously living through them as they shake the shackels of the corporate world.The plan is to travel, visit friends and family, decompress, evaluate whether or not they're happy living a slower simpler lifestyle, and then decide what they want to do after that.
Follow their travels here: http://thingswithham.wordpress.com/.
Good luck and have a great time!
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Derek's Big Hit
After many rain outs and an extended off period for Spring Break, Derek is finally starting to get the hang of this baseball thing. He moved up this year to an older league and has struggled. He was demoralized and said that he wasn't going to play again next year. But a few games ago he coaxed a walk in his team's last at bat which allowed the top of the batting order to have a shot at a comeback. Last game he hit a ball hard, but was caught by the right fielder. Then last night he lined a ball up the middle for a clean hit. He had a big grin on his face as he ran to first base. We were so excited and it was really great to see how his team and coaches were so happy for him. To top off the evening he got the game ball and an ice-cream sandwich for the after game snack. Monday, April 20, 2009
Spring Break 2009: Seagrove Beach (Day 1 of 8)
Packed and ready to hit the road
Derek checks out his new skim board birthday present from Aunt Laine
Adam likes the bunk roomSaturday April 4, 2009
This year we went back to Seagrove Beach, FL for Spring Break. We've been going to the same development in Seagrove for 3 of the past 4 years (we went to Pensacola a couple years ago). We love the area. You can ride bikes up and down 30-A to neighboring towns like Seaside, the houses have a nice balance of elegance with a beachy feel - not too stuffy and no high rises\busy strips, the neighborhood has a heated pool, and the beach has a saltwater lake that connects to the Gulf where the kids love to play and skim board.
Here are the houses we've stayed at in Seagrove:
Here's a good website and interactive map of the area.
We followed the usual plan where I play my ALTA match in the morning before heading out of town. I hate to miss 2 weeks in a row. The baseball league takes off for Spring Break, thankfully, so the boys didn't have games. Helen did her best to get everything ready, but we were still a couple hours later than our 12 pm goal time for leaving town. The traffic south of Atlanta on I-85 was backed up, of course. How many more years before they finish that construction...and why is nobody ever working on it?
We arrived about 9 pm. Everyone else was already there: my brother, Jason, and his wife, Laine, along with my sisters, Kelley and Katie, and my Mom. Kelley flew to Pensacola from Anchorage and Katie picker her up on her drive over from Baton Rouge.
We unloaded the van, which is not too bad with everything packed nicely into plastic storage bins. When the boys went to check out their bunk room they found new skim boards that Aunt Laine and Uncle Jason got them for their birthday. They were so excited and came running downstairs holding the new boards. We didn't even have to tell them to give hugs and kisses.
Adam Is 7
Fighting with weapons as a warm up
Pizza and burp contest
Cake and presents (Bakugan's and Lego's)
A lot of spontaneous wrestling
Adam, Ryan, Max, Evan, and Wyatt striking a pose before the movieAdam turned 7 on April 11, which was the Saturday we drove home from the beach. Driving most of the day wasn't the best way to spend a birthday, but he did get to pick where we ate lunch (KFC) and dinner (Panda Express). We also picked up a cake and he got to open presents from us (an MP3 player, Carnival Games for his Nintendo DS, Playmobil Knights, and Tech Deck mini-skateboards).
Derek's birthday is March 30 and Adam's is April 11. They're close together and right around Spring Break (teacher timing) and Easter, which makes this time a whirlwind for us each year.
Derek and Adam are lucky to have multiple birthday parties each year. They usually get a friend party, a party at the beach with my family, a party at Easter with Helen's family, and a low-key party with the immediate family.
Adam's friend party was this past Friday evening. This year Adam picked a pizza party and movie (like big brother Derek), but thank goodness there was no sleepover. Those kids were wild. Adam invited his friends Ryan, Evan, Wyatt, and Max to see "Monsters vs Aliens" In 3-D.
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