Category: Family

Posts about me and my family, things we do together, etc.

Having a yard

So, having a yard is both a blessing and a curse (as everyone who has a yard knows). We’ve spent a fair amount of time and money on ours recently, what with the usual fixing sprinklers (a new tradition in my life that makes me wonder about whether sprinklers or irrigation is better), fertilizing, planting flowers, etc.

One of the big projects we just finished was to take out a bunch of ivy in the back corner of our yard, and then to grind down the three or four stumps in the yard (as well as the 5 or 6 stumps we found in the ivy patch). Rosanne’s parents rented the grinder for their house, and then brought it up to ours and helped us grind ours down as well.

And, our fence is in really poor condition, so replacing one side of it is another project coming up really soon. I’m looking forward to that one.

On top of that, there is the weeding, the mowing, the weed-wipping, the trimming, the spraying, etc. etc. that takes tons of time and effort.

 

However…

 

Then you look out at your yard, and it actually looks really nice, and it is so neat! Earlier this year a couple decorative trees that we have were in full bloom–two of them had white blossoms, and two had purple (flowering plum trees, I think). They looked really pretty! (sorry, I didn’t think to take a picture). And then you see how much better your yard looks because of your efforts. For me I have to say that having a yard is worth the effort (so far–that could change).

The little things

I had a rather neat experience yesterday. We had a ton of yardwork that we wanted to accomplish, but Ada was being very clingy and wouldn’t let Rosanne put her down, so Rosanne kept Ada happy while I fixed the sprinklers and started working on the back corner of the yard (we are trying to get that cleaned out and all the vines removed–this upcoming Saturday we’ll be removing the stumps).

By dinner time, I saw that there was no way I was going to get it done before dark working alone, but I was sure if Rosanne were helping we could finish it. so I said a quick prayer that Ada would calm down enough so that Rosanne would be able to help. I was impressed that Ada would not calm down, but that Rosanne and I needed to learn how to deal with that.

Nuts.

Oh well, I thought, I’ll just get as much done as I can on my own and finish it up later. A couple minutes later Rosanne came down saying that Janelle had just called, and wanted to play with Ada, so she was on her way over. She showed up in a few minutes, Rosanne was able to come out, and between the two of us we were able to get the job completed.

Now, God didn’t have to do that. I don’t think it really mattered, but it was just a reminder to me that He is concerned about us and He is very involved in our lives. I love seeing the little insignificant things that He does for us, not because it is so important on a grand scale, but because we are His children and He loves us (which is not such a little thing after all).

Family Update

Here’s a quick update of what’s going on with my family:

Jeremy: I’m being kept pretty busy with work, but so far it has been (mostly) enjoyable. Our boss is wanting us to be able to work from home at least a couple days/week, so hopefully that will pan out.

 I’m also trying to work on my own website, jersdesk.com. I’ve got several ideas that I want to do with it, mostly a picture gallery for Rosanne and me.

I had a LAN party the other day (Every so often I have some friends over and we play computer games together). This one was fairly well atteneded, and I think everyone had fun. James and Becca came (Becca even played for a while!). Unfortunately, their computer seemed to break down–the ‘on’ button was stuck and so they couldn’t turn on their computer. I looked online to see how to take the front cover off, and stumbled across a forum where someone else had the same problem with the same computer. The solution? Hit the front of the computer (but no too hard). James tried it and it worked.

Also, John just showed me a site about API’s that have been released from familysearch.org, that allow other programs to saerch their ancestral data, add capabilities to PAF, etc. and I want to do something with that. John and I each have some genealogy programming ideas, and we haven’t decided yet if we’re going to try and work together on something or each do what we want to do. I would be interested to know what others would like to see as far as a genealogy program (besides “something that will do it for me”).

Rosanne: Rosanne is kept very busy with her work and taking care of Ada. She does a very good job with that, as well as taking care of the house. She is the office manager, shipping manager, and on-call support (tech and otherwise) for mightyauthors.com. Fortunately (for us), the business is still rather small. As it grows, other people are supposed to be hired to take care of most of these assignments, leaving Rosanne to be mostly a seceretary.

She’s also been crocheting a baby blanket–ever since Ada was given one and she enjoyed it so much. Rosanne figured we’d better have another one on hand for when the current one gets worn out.

 Ada: Ada is just getting over either a bad cold or a mild case of RSV (we hope the former, but suspect the latter). Either way, she seems to be getting better, which we are very grateful for. She’s stil teething, so life has been a little more interesting than usual for us. Rosanne has been amazing at taking care of her and being patient with Ada’s progressivly getting up earlier… and earlier…

Despite that Ada is still largely a fun happy baby. She obviously enjoys being with Mom and/or Dad the most, and will smile and giggle at our antics. But she is also OK with playing with her toys by herself, though one of us usually needs to at least be in the same roon–if we leave for a few minutes and she notices… we’ll just say that life is a little less happy for a while.

Hello World

<p>Hello World</p>
echo “Hello World\n”; 
System.out.println(“Hello World”);
alert(“Hello World”);

OK, so that was cheesy. Sorry. On the other, it is just as much your fault for reading as it is my fault for writing it.

 …anyway…

So I wanted to create a blog to put some of my thoughts and comments on… actually, anything.

 In case you hadn’t figured it out, I’m a programmer. I live in Utah. Yes, I’m Mormon, which (being a programmer), essentially means I have all the geekiness, but without the caffeine. I enjoy books (mostly young adult fantasy), movies, classical music (and movie soundtracks), chocolate, and my family.