EveryTrail for my iPhone

I have been trying to get back into my running and it's been pretty sporadic. Every time I start I get really determined to keep doing it and something like uhh... Thanksgiving week comes along and blows my plans apart or I'm trying to do too much like work 40-hours a week while taking care of Dominic and of course dealing with the rest of life.

Sometimes it's nice to have new things to make working out more motivating too. You know, like when you get a new pair of shoes or shorts or headphones. Heck even a new pair of running socks will motivate me! So today I loaded EveryTrail onto my iPhone (oh yeah, I never posted that we got iPhones/3G on Sept. 2nd! rad huh?). You can watch your data as you run, take photos of things along the way then save and share online by uploading it to the website where you can network with other trail-minded people. EveryTrail is FREE and for ANY kind of movement tracking. So far I like it!


(edit: 2008-12-05. Sorry guys. I thought about this a bit and felt it was unsafe to post a trail leading to my house. I shouldn't go out of my way to make myself a possible victim eh? so here's a limited screenshot of the map. EveryTrail is pretty neato. you can take photos along your trail/trip/run/walk/whatever and it posts photo-markers on the map with a slideshow to the side.)

Jeans For Your Toes Too!

Shannon.... another one for you! :)



.... I know a lot of the GUYS are all like, "wow..." (OK really, close your jaw you're drooling LOL). And you girls might be judging her by her looks.... but I gotta give her props, she can do some pretty nifty tricks with all this toss-out stuff. makes me want to go thrift store shopping or dig up something to shred from the back of the closet.

Who's Laughing Now?

Peter Schiff. Laughed at for his views... uhh... like who's laughing now?
(originally I saw this from this site which you should also check out, liked their commentary)

Blog Attachment Baby Tracker

Not sure if anyone noticed, but I added an age tracker for Dominic to the side of the blog. It's just a snippet of code from Lilypie.com. It's really easy! And now that Blogger has added the ability to add a 3rd Party HTML-code-snippet as a sidebar layout thingy-bopper, you can add it yourself REALLY easily.

It's fun and cute. You can customize all the little details of the tracker. Try it out! :)

Raaaaarrrrr!!!

Mama's Little Piggy

Just sitt'n on a pile of tubs

Shannon, this one's for you...

This site helps people with interior decorating using refurbished/recycled materials.

GreenLandz.com

My Grammy & Me

Gramsi & Me

Dominic 6-Months Old

6 Month Stats

Height: 26 1/2in.
Weight: 16lbs. 13oz.
Head: 17in.
*50th % for all stats

Eating solids:
Dominic is so far, his fathers child for sure. John is a very "meat and potatos" kind of guy. When I first introduced solids we tried rice cereal, Dominic was 4mos. old then. He didn't really care about it, so I waited a couple more weeks. Rice cereal is real boring.... so I started baking sweet potato's and yams. I would mush them up all smooth with some BMilk and he was loving it. I've given him some banana here and there too. Otherwise we weren't very adventerous in this first month of eating (around the 5month mark). So at six months the doctor says to feed him twice a day... which I already started noticing a week before the appointment that maybe he was ready for this as he would be quite interested in me eating lunch.

So after his appointment I start making green beans and squash for something new. Probably a bad idea in the first place because he was a little affected by his shots more so than the other times. Anyway... I should video him eating green beans... IMPOSSIBLE. He gags and pukes and then clamps his mouth shut.

So we were back to the same old stuff which was giving him "play dough poo" as I referred to it. Gramsi made us some homemade canned peaches and pears so I wizzed those in the magic bullet and he was in love with those. Of course, they're sweet! I don't consider fuit alone a meal... so after trying and failing at Butternut Squash, I thought I would mix some pear in with the squash and what do you know, it worked. finally, something new.

Activities:
Dominic is always laughing or smiling at something. He's pretty happy 99% of the time. He is a really funny kid - very observant to EVERYTHING. I dont' think I've ever seen a kid pay attention to things like he does. Gramsi say's he is scary sometimes because he will just stare and stare studying your face and locking eye-contact. He's done this since he was a peanut.

He's rolling everywhere, also getting up on his hands and knees and rocking forward. We feel like he will start crawing tomorrow! Which will be another fun adventure (yes yes and trouble too!).

Dominic and I go jogging daily (try to). Adventures to the grocery store in the jogger are really fun. When John comes home from work, Dom get's to go hang out on the closet floor while Daddy gets changed.

We have him on a nightly routine for dinner, bath and bedtime which is working out really nice. He usually sleeps from 8pm - 4am. I am usually up late working so I feed him and put him back to bed, then go to bed myself by that time.

Gramsi watches Dominic two times per week. Tuesdays and Fridays. I drop him off at 9am and pick him up around 5 or 6pm. He has a lot of fun hanging out with Gramsi, Uncle Bean and Auntie Robyn and cousin Alex usually come by. Gramsi takes him on long walks and bounces him to sleep on her yoga ball and gets to help cook.

Pumpkin Patch Buddies

Pumpkin Time!

My First Blog Post for Less

My bosses, Allan & Steve ("The Guys")

Check out my first post on the Less Blog

Daddy and Me

5 Months Old!

Our sweet little munchkin is now 5-months old! (i know i know... a little overdo in announcing). He does so much now! Rolling over (of course!), eating real food, taking a bottle like a champ (when the time calls) and maybe crawling coming up soon? Lots to look forward to!

I'm pretty impressed with myself here... I like to do my own stuff so researched what photographers use for backdrops and went out and got some black velvet. Now we have our very own home studio! We are going to get some great halloween shots of the boys. I wish I'd had this black backdrop when Dom was just new. I think this one turned out so good. I will upload the rest to Picasa soon.

Apologies for my lack of blogging lately. I am determined to return to it consistently soon.

One of my new jobs

The company Ben, Robyn and myself have worked for over the past 2-3 years just recently went bankrupt. Robyn and myself had been doing contract work after the babies were born so we were not technically employees at the time so we totally missed out on unemployment benefits. I have enough work as it is to not need it though.... on that note...


Amazingly within days, Less Everything, a company that produces some great online applications/products contacted me to start working with them. We had discussed possibly doing this earlier in the spring, but I was 8+ months pregos and we all decided to wait a bit. So that's the short of it.

I have been using their online product, Less Accounting for my freelance invoicing, expenses, etc...since last spring (2007) as a beta user and continue to use it today. I was a very active beta user and tried to provide tons of feedback on the product because I just fell in love. I had been struggling to use ugly huge QuickBooks for my tiny little side business (at the time, now I'm full time). I also started using their time-tracking product, Get More Honey.

Anyhow, I will be doing some fun things for them and it will be a nice change of scenery for me. See my "bio" on their website. Yup, I'm feeling pretty hip.

So far I have been testing their products for cross browser compatibility, sending out tweets (Twitter.com) and will start posting to the blog soon.

The life we live

Ben shared this video with me today. Maybe some of you can relate, but maybe most of you will just think it's just a cute video.



Ben.... you nailed the feeling... ha-ha! I just can't get over this video.

(sourced: http://www.develop-one.net/blog/2008/08/27/HugADeveloper.aspx)

4 Months Old

Dominic turned 4-months old on August 26th

Height: 26 inches
Weight: 16 lbs. 3 oz.
Head: 16 1/2 inches
Tempermant: Lots of Fun!

Asleep on the Job

My Bumbo Mumbo

My new big boy chair! Momma thinks this is just the best invention ever.
It's like Crocks! but in a seat (the material).

Rocks Rock

John has been doing quite a bit of rock climbing at the Rogue Rock Gym. He was quite inspired after we got back from Yosemite to get back into it. Dominic and I watch his skills on the wall after we go for a run on the Evergreen Trail (a paved trail from Ashland to Grants Pass).

John usually meets with his friend Chad...
...who is the head chef at Elements - Tapas Bar & Lounge
(I did their website, logo, business cards, etc.)

whew! sometimes climbing can be tiring! ;)

William Joeseph - Pianist Icon

I normally don't watch daytime TV, but sometimes I take a break from nursing Dominic at the computer (while working)... to see what kind of boring talk show or court TV drama I can entertain myself with for 30-minutes.

Yesterday I watched the end half of a Dr. Phil show and caught this amazing musical artist, William Joseph. Can you say WOW!??!! It's almost like listening to an amazing soundtrack score... Watch how he plays, it's just sooo intense. I am jealous!

The song he's playing on the show is called, "Ausperius"


...I wonder how many calories he burns by playing one song? haha.

more.

Carol of the Bells


....and of course, he plays UPSIDE DOWN! (the "Upside Down Song")

Elvis Lives in Joseph Hall

For anyone who isn't keeping up on America's Got Talent, I must update you on one of my latest favorites - Elvis Presley in the body of Joseph Hall. This kid is 23 yrs old, never had voice lessons and totally has that 50's Elvis look down. Not like the cheesy Las Vegas acts. I personally would pay to see him in concert!

We haven't watched the show much, but we start too later in the game when it's more interesting and there are not as many kooks to sit through.

Here (below) in his first performance he nailed it!




This next performance is a little off. I think he got a lot of flack for NOT sounding like Elvis here. If you got to hear the commentary afterward, Joseph Hall admitted it was difficult not having the screaming crowd to pump up his performance. I think also as a viewer, it was weird not having a screaming crowd to accompany the Elvis performance as we all have that image of Elvis and his screaming lady-fans. haha. I still think he's one of the #1 performers, even with his bad night and I hope his confidence stays up for his next performance.



I'm a totally oldies music buff so I hope this kid makes it through. If anything, he could get kicked off tomorrow and still make something for himself. What do you guys think?

Dan Dunn - Interviewed

Dan Dunn - my new art hero

Baby Buns

Poor Poor Pinata

Kung Foo John!

...only John would artfully destruct a pinata by removing all his limbs before busting its gut...



(I hate being the camera person. Hearing yourself being the loudest laugher is not quite that nice.)

Another Year, A Week to Celebrate!

Monday was John's birthday (Happy 37 honey!!). We have been celebrating for over a week now.

I threw a surprise party that wasn't a surprise at all, on July 27th because my family would be out of town for his real day. You can get a great overview of that party from my mom's post "Happy Birthday You Old Poop!". If you haven't seen it, you should. She has all the photos from that day because our new camera was still on it's way. Aside from the radically disgusting poop themed cake....I especially loved the shot of John clobbering Daniel with a cooler full of water (remains from the water balloon fight).... and don't forget all the unicyclists. What a family circus!

Anyway... I threw another party this past Sunday (3rd) for John's family. His Mom (Linda), brother (Ken), our sister-in-law (Jen) and our niece (Taylor) came over for a pasta lunch, cake and fun of course!
After lunch we played with a cool water toy that Taylor had gotten for her birthday and had been dying to use.

Then we busted a pinata (from Ken, Jen & Tay-Tay). John's FIRST pinata ever in his 37 years! His dad's side is Mexican so I find that pretty funny.After all the outside fun we finished it off with a little Trackmania (looks like such a serious game!)...


...and more laughs and giggles with Grammy.It's sooo tiring playing all day... whew! Happy Birthday Daddy!

Monday, John's REAL birthday... FINALLY! John and I got to go out to dinner and a movie thanks to my mom (gramsy) for watching Dominic. We got to so see The Dark Knight and went out to Si Casa Flores. It was a nice relaxing afternoon/evening.

The week of celebration came to a close. :) But what a fun one it was!

Simon Says,"Do what Grammy Does!"

Crack a Smile!

Be Serious!

Say Aaahhhh!

Make a Funny Face!

....You're funny grammy! I love you!

A Not So Lucky Month of July

We are celebrating July being over with. It started out great... a family reunion camping trip and all that... but the weekend following the campout the poo hit the fan at our house. Ha-Ha!

Things broke and had to be replaced:

1.) All four tires on my subaru. The day after I got back from the campout I was heading out to replenish the refrigerator and what do you know, I had a flat tire. WAY FLAT. There is still a mark from the wheel rubbing through the rubber out the garage and down the driveway. Fortunately I noticed a few blocks down the road from the house. I guess it was so bad it was irrepairable which means you have to replace ALL the tires. yuck! Not to mention or rub this in but we had just sold our other little impreza wagon and threw in the extra tires we had laying around. duh. I guess we learned that if we ever have an extra set of tires to just keep them around. lol.

2.) The living room ceiling light/fan. The light went "pop!" and would not work anymore. I know this seems like a small deal, but that fan costs $160 new. Luckily we gave our old one to my parents and my dad was able to salvage it. The dimmer feature broke which we use a lot so would have replaced it anyway. Other than that the "broken" one works just fine. So maybe it was more of a vain replacement.

3.) Camera. Hence the new wide angle pics of Dominic that I just posted. We just got another Kodak EasyShare (but the new Z1012 IS). I'm really liking the upgraded features, but would have liked to not have had to replace the camera in the first place. ohwell...

4.) Monitor. Newly added. John reminded me that one of my monitors of my dual monitor setup died too (yes, for those of you who don't know... you can have the use of multiple monitors at once on one computer - it's quite efficient!). This really put a cramp in my day. It was a Dell flat panel.... funny thing though is that John's old Samsung, our very first flat panel back when they were uber-expensive (I think he paid like $350 for it) is still alive. Luckily we have no shortage of computers or monitors at our house. John doesn't use his desktop PC often so... I just stole his Dell widescreen. Now I've got this nice new (bright - nice contrast) wide monitor dualed with a frumpy-dump (dull and dim) square Samsung. But whatever works. Better than just one single monitor. I won't be replacing any monitors anytime soon.... I'm not quite THAT vain. haha.

I feel like there is more... haha...well there is, it's just doctor stuff though and that's just how life goes. So I just felt like venting about our money sucking month of July.

We are really looking forward to September 2nd! One month from today we will both officially be owners of iPhones! Yes, we are joining the ever-growing army of iPhone addicts! WE CAN'T WAIT! (we get a $200/discount each phone if we wait until Sept.).

Hang'n Out

A good solution when you can't have mommy....
...have daddy hang you over the couch!