They keep growing

No matter what I keep trying to do for some reason these great kids just keep growing. Savannah turned 3 last Sunday. She loved being the center of attention for the day and we did everything that we could to make it her special day. Over all I think it was a success.I can't believe how quickly she is growing up. She has these Disney princess dresses that she wears all the time, however when I call her my little princess she quickly corrects me. "No dad, I'm not a princess I'm Meena" (Meena is her nickname she got from Hunter back from when she was first born and he couldn't pronounce Savannah, it has stuck ever since) She is very concerned that we'll forget that she is our little Meena and not Cinderella or Snow White. She is just wearing the dress she says. I try to explain it to her that she can be my little princess and still be Meena but she hasn't grasped it yet. :)

Colton turns 1 in four days. For the last three weeks or so he has been walking everywhere. He is our climber too which means we have to watch him close.

On another note my grade posted today for my most recent class. 97.5%. So my straight A streak continues, granted this is only my second class in the doctorate program but I'll take it. :)

Pictures of Pamona College

So here are some of the pictures I took while I was off at school. They're not the best quality but for coming from a 1.3 megapixle camera on my phone I think they came out pretty darn good.

Busy Summer

So I haven't posted for a while. It has been a very busy month. I was lucky enough to be selected by my work to attend management school through Cuna. It is a three year program and only one person was picked to go this year from my work so I was very, very lucky and have been very excited about it. Western Cuna Management School is held at beautiful Pamona College in Claremont California. It is beautiful here, I've taken a ton of picture with my phone that I think are turning out ok. The architecture is amazing and I've tried to capture it. When I get back to work I will download them and post them up. So the begining of the month I was working crazy hours trying to get ready to go. At work there was month end as well as quarterly stuff to get ready and on top of that the state auditors were coming while I was going to be gone so there was a tone of stuff with that. Put on top of that my Phd program that I am in the middle of I barely had time to sleep. Since I've been here things haven't slowed down much but it has been awesome to say the least. I have learned a ton of stuff, the schedule is hectice with classes all day and social events every night. On top of it I have stil had to complete my other calss work online. It has been intense but well worth it. And the best part of it all is I will be going home soon. Kira and the kids came down last weekend, I have been missing them so much and being able to see them for a couple of days was wonderful. We got a room down in Carlsbad not far from the beach and just spent the days playing, nothing fancy but it was wonderful. The hardest part was when they dropped me back off at school and I watched them drive off while I had to stay.

So I am very excited to finally be heading home and I don't have to go back to work till Monday so that will be nice.

Summer Fun! (on a budget)

So we have been trying to get out of the house more. It is so tempting with the heat to just sit inside and enjoy the air conditioner. One of the coolest things has been the co-pilot we found on Craigs List, new in box for $45, retails between $89 to $120 depending on the brand. Hunter is having so much fun with it. He gives me nonstop commentary the whole way, letting me know how hard he is peddling and what direction we should turn. He is a great co-pilot.Savannah and Colton get to ride in the trailer and we have had some fun family outings with the bikes.We picked up my bike for $10 at a garage sale. It has been working great and it even managed to make it through a 25 mile bike ride. Now I'll admit that the ride was mostly all downhill. We rode from Kolob Reservoir in Utah all the way down through Zion and to the little town at the bottom of the mountain. It only took us a little over an hour with pretty frequent stops. The scenery was fantastic and worth every minute of wishing my seat had more padding.

And finally, Kira found this pirate ship swimming pool at Goodwill for $9.95. The kids love it and have been having a great time. Hope everybody's summer is shaping up to be as fun as ours is. Stay Cool!

The oven effect

So it is the time of year for a phenomenon I call "The Oven Effect", the first time I experienced it the thought came to mind of when you open up the oven to take out the food and that blast of hot air comes out and stings your face and the name has just stuck. As soon as it hits you you realize you should have stood farther back but it is already too late. That is what happened today as I walked out of Target with Savannah at about 11:30 am. As soon as I stepped out the door it hit me in the face, only there's no pulling back, no waiting for a second for the hot air to go away, all you can do is march forward, walking as fast as possible to the car and the A/C. How people lived here before A/C I'll never know. My feelings toward A/C are probably the equivalent of the comfortable and contended feelings that the image of a warm fireplace and a nice hot cup of chocolate invokes in people in colder climates. To me comfort and contentment are sitting under my ceiling fan with a cup filled with a cold beverage and ice with the thermostat set at 78. So anyways the heat is officially here.

My work has done something wonderful, for a trial period they are allowing middle management (that's me) to work a four day, ten hours a day schedule. IF it goes well then it will become permanent. I am excited, this weekend was my second three day weekend and since I was usually working 9 sometimes ten hours a day anyway I'm used to the hours. It is bliss. So last night I looked at Kira and told her that today I wanted one on one time with the kids. She heartily agreed and this morning I took Savannah shoe shopping, we had a great time going through Target and she was so cute picking out the shoes and walking up and down the isle showing them off. Hunter and I went to the book store, I may have mentioned this previously but my amazing boy has learned how to read through a combination of PBS kids, a reading website Kira found, a little bit of help from us, and basically practicing and practicing he has pretty much taught himself. I marvel at how smart he is, he will be starting kindergarten in September. Anyways, he loved picking out books and reading them and after about ten books I let him pick one. Then we went to Lowes and picked up some paint for my next project and headed home.

The kids had a great time and I just really enjoyed it. My next class starts tomorrow so my time is going to be scarce again for the next few weeks which was part of the reason for the extra time today. It will be interesting managing my time over the next couple of years while I go through this program.

Just a couple of pictures of hunter I snapped with my phone during our recent trip up to Utah. It was great seeing Brandon and his new wife Rachel and being able to spend time with Kyle and Kim and their kids. Thanks for taking the time out to see us you guys. It was great!

What a fun trip!

Kira made me this super-awesome, amazing slide show, best darn thing on the entire planet that you could ever see (her words, not mine) and I thought you might enjoy it ...

99.75%

Now 99.75% could mean a lot of things. It could be the percentage of people who gamble in Las Vegas and lose, it could be the percentage of people who are upset about gas prices, it could be my most recent raise, or it could even be our success rate for potty training Savannah.

However, 99.75% is not any of those things although I definately wouldn't mind the raise or the success with the potty training.

99.75% is my final grade for COM/705, the first class in my doctoral program. :)


So there's one down, way too many more to go. I couldn't ask for a better start, I hope I can keep it up. I ended up with a 3.8 grade point average with my MBA so I'm hoping for at least that or better. We'll see.