Back at the home ranch…the kids are doing pretty well. Josie is working on getting some teeth now so Sunday night was a tiring night as she didn’t want to sleep much. It amazes me how growing teeth can be so painful. Josie’s also crawling all over the place including going up any and all stairs she can find. Of course she can’t come back down yet, so we have to run up and get her.

Jayden has been keeping his end of the deal up being an almost 3 year old; the almost daily melt down and his big brother attitude. He is as curious as ever and loves to “do things on his own”. In his words, “I will do it!”.

Kim was very busy taking care of the kids last week, as well as, organizing a garage sale (Jayden’s pile and Josie’s Pile). It went over pretty well and we got rid of quite a bit of stuff. It amazes me how much stuff one accumulates having kids.

It’s good to be back in the groove now, but the Florida trip was fun. See more pictures in the Informatica Set

I’ve also been doing a kind of social experiment at work. We use a multitude of chat clients and such and decided to try and live without the main one used by our “little” group, namely, IRC. I decided to do it in part because sometimes the conversations get a little heated. Communication in a chat program is entirely different than that of person-to-person. You don’t really get the true feeling of a conversation (missing body language and the vibe that you get from talking with someone in person). It’s understandable why parents are worried about their kids being bullied from online sources. So, without the IRC client going, it’s been rather quiet. It’s hard to believe how much a person can get tied to modern technology (although IRC has been around for quite a while). Yeah, I could just go 5 steps and talk to the rest of my co-workers, but seems like social experiences are different these days. People don’t talk one-on-one like they used to, or at least it seems that way. Without IRC, I can be working and not even talk to my co-workers all day. I may have to go back and join the IRC chat. I feel alienated from the rest of the gang.

Anyway, enjoy the new look and hopefully you won’t find too many things broken.

With this small fortune that we found at Wal-mart, we went to some garage sales with Kim’s parents this weekend. I managed to find a computer for a dollar. It’s not much of a computer but I thought I’d play around with it. Jayden was all excited he got to ride in Grandma’s Avalanche. We’d ask him if he wanted to ride in the car, but he’d shake his head and say in his little voice, “No.”

Baby number two is making Kim’s life miserable. It seems that it’s already started to drop some as Kim was feeling less then great over the weekend. Hopefully it stays in the oven at least another 2-4 weeks so it’s not born too early.

Oh yeah, and I still have a job and haven’t been “re-assigned”. Hopefully it’ll continue that way. We’ll all find out more after another meeting this morning.

Works been going good. I’ve been good and busy, but it’s been hard to concentrate and do the whole “work smarter, not harder” because of some events that might be happening next week. I had a whole bit written about it, but decided to not include it in fear of getting in trouble for it. So, you’ll have to wait till after next week to see what might or might not have happened.

This time of the year provides a lot of “admin” time at work to do all sorts of surveys and “training” at work before the end of the year.

1. Jayden getting croup – He’s getting better, but he still has a little problem breathing at night. He’s not as bad as he could have been though. The Doc said that he’s actually 2 weeks behind the peek Ankeny experienced 2 weeks ago.
2. Getting sick – because of a combination of changing of the weather and losing sleep while helping Jayden breath at night I have a slight cold.
3. Paper work – this includes, but is not limited to: flexbile spending account submital forms, performance plans, rebates (give me the price of the item from the start), timesheets.
4. When people ignore things or don’t read the signs – For example, today I went to get my usual glass of water from the refreshment center but no cups were to be found. So, I went over to a different refreshment center and brought some back. Two people during that time had told me that it was like that yesterday too. Hmm. On the wall there was contact information to re-supply missing items. I emailed them and bam…we have cups.
5. Occasional Driver Training – I’ve been driving for 17 years (actually more when you consider driving around the farm) and haven’t been in an accident yet…is it really necessary to take “Driver’s Ed” each year just to drive for work?
6. Ethical Awareness and Decision Making training – Actually, I’m glad I had to take this one. Case in point, Martha Stewart. I don’t want to be sent to prison for being unethical. Perhaps Bill Knapp and his buddy Dennis Elwell should be put through the same process as Martha. (Des Moines Register article)
7. The price of iPods – I really wish I could afford one.
8. Minimal Tinker Time – There needs to be 26 hours in a day so that I can tinker with new computer related technologies.

Well, that’s it. I could have made the top 10 list, but I can’t think of anything more to rant about and I think I feel pretty good now. haha.

On to other news…well…not a lot has happened, other than Jayden getting bigger and learining how to do things more. He’s now learned how to scoot on his butt to get around. He’s given up on crawling, as we too have done. He loves to grab our fingers and walk around. We went up north to vist the Farm and my side of the family last weekend. That was pretty fun. Jayden loves the baby calves and kittens. And likes to sit on the tractor with Dad and Grandpa. Jayden’s still as picky as ever on what he eats. He hates to eat “wet things” and seems to only eat certain kinds of food…bread with jelly, his dried fruit, cereal, chicken sticks, a couple of kinds of pudding and his most loved food, Milk.

Last night Jayden slept like a charm. Monday night he was “”master of the house”" and cried until 12:30 AM, Tuesday morning. He wasn’t eating very well and we had no clue what was going on in his world. We made it through it though. I am definitely glad when he does decide to sleep when it’s the right time to sleep (actually, he sleeps a lot as it is…what the life! ).”

1. Pioneer was purchased by DuPont.
2. I survived an apartment fire in the building I was living in.
3. I have purchased two different houses (a townhouse and then a regular house).
4. I got married a year and about 2 months ago.
5. Kim and I are expecting a baby in August.
6. I’ve gained about 5 lbs since graduating.
7. I don’t have as much hair on the top of my head.

Yesterday I went and picked up my birthday present from Kim. It’s early, but I couldn’t wait any longer. For her birthday I got her ISU license plates (KM4ISU). So she got me some for my b-day. Check them out.