A walk in the park

It was very hot, and hard work pushing two kiddos, but Jack, Xander and I braved the weather and enjoyed a shady walk along Coal Creek Trail with a stop to meet Jack's Mom, Elizabeth, for a picnic!  Although you wouldn't know it from the photo, both boys had a blast... but by the end, they were both ready for naps, and so was I!

Into the Looking Glass

Sometimes it is just darn cool that Jake works for Ball Aerospace.

From NASA:
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_1725.html

Recently, technicians at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., completed a series of cryogenic tests on six James Webb Space Telescope beryllium mirror segments at the center's X-ray & Cryogenic Facility. During testing, the mirrors were subjected to extreme temperatures dipping to -415 degrees Fahrenheit, permitting engineers to measure in extreme detail how the shape of the mirror changes as it cools.

The Webb telescope has 18 mirrors, each of which will be tested twice in the Center's X-ray & Cryogenic Facility to ensure that the mirror will maintain its shape in a space environment -- once with bare polished beryllium and then again after a thin coating of gold is applied.

The cryogenic test gauges how each mirror changes temperature and shape over a range of operational temperatures in space. This helps predict how well the telescope will image infrared sources.

The mirrors are designed to stay cold to allow scientists to observe the infrared light they reflect using a telescope and instruments optimized to detect this light. Warm objects give off infrared light, or heat. If the Webb telescope mirror is too warm, the faint infrared light from distant galaxies may be lost in the infrared glow of the mirror itself. Thus, the Webb telescope's mirrors need to operate in a deep cold or cryogenic state, at around -379 degree Fahrenheit.

He had to pick the pepper

Xander loves rearranging and emptying my pantry and spices.   It does no harm to anything other than my rather over developed sense of order, so I let him have his fun, then I stuff everything back in when he's gone on to his next "project". 

It was only a few days ago that Jake warned me that soon Xander was going to learn how to actually unscrew the top off the spices and wouldn't that be a mess? 

The answer?  Definitively, yes.

Xander picked the full Cheyenne pepper of all things to open, shake and dump all over himself and the carpet.  It cleaned up pretty well, and it didn't get into his face, thank goodness.  All the same, I'm rethinking my strategy on letting Xander have free reign in that cabinet.

There's a Reason its Called Adventure

We really like to go on adventures.  There is something really fun about heading off on your own, having to make your own decisions, being free to be spontaneous.  Erin and I have never been fond of tour guides who ensure you have the optimum experience, public camp sites that try to be wilderness but take away all the wild, or any of those things.  We'd rather have an adventure.  We have had lots of wonderful adventures, but the thing about adventure, sometimes it just doesn't turn out.

Our plan was to go camping this weekend.  We have been busy and hadn't had a lot of time to plan out a spot, but picked beautiful lake kind of last minute.  We headed out in the Jeep this afternoon and drove up to Fall River Road and from there left the beaten path and headed out the Rainbow Lakes 4x4 road to Chinn's Lake.  It was a nice drive up to the lake, a little bit of a rough road, but no challenge for the jeep.  We started to get nervous though as we saw lots of people camping along the side of the road.  This was supposed to be a wilderness experience, right?  Well, we arrived at the absolutely beautiful lake (it really was beautiful) to find probably a hundred people camping around the lake and some idiot shooting a fully  automatic (really) rifle at a rocky hillside (bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang)  At least his girlfriend had ear protection...  We took one look at the pretty lake and got the heck out of there.

Although somewhat thwarted, we figured we could handle this.  There were lots of other 4x4 roads in the area, with nice streams running along and crossing them, there had to be some great camping spots around.  So, we headed out of the madhouse back to Fall River road and took a different turnoff.  We were immediately relieved to find no one around.  We headed up a bit more challenging 4x4 road in search of the perfect camping spot.  We passed a few likely spots, but  had scoped out a few areas that looked good on the map so we forged ahead.  This is where the adventure part comes in.  We had a map, a good map, we had a compass, we even had my blackberry which gives GPS coordinates.  We had so many different roads going in different directions that weren't even on the map, we were lost.  The thing about our map, it didn't label any of the roads, and didn't show a lot of the roads that were there.  How could we get lost, as "prepared" as we were?  Well, when we got home I found this map from the forest service that shows some of what this area looked like.

Even this map doesn't show all the roads, fortunately there is also this handy table...

Somewhere in there we took a wrong turn.  After 5 hours of driving, we still hadn't gotten where we wanted to be and found ourselves back on a major road, unsure of how we had gotten there, but finally not lost.  Erin looked at me and said, "Let's go home."  I thought it was a great idea.

So, dinner was had at our neighborhood playground, and Xander ran and played and slid down the slides and laughed.  It was a great evening.

We will go camping next weekend.  Maybe somewhere we have been before, maybe somewhere new.  Regardless, it is sure to be an adventure.

-Jake

Xander's 15 month Stats

Xander had his 15 month check-up on July 13, and here are his latest stats:

Weight: 26 lbs even (75th %ile)
Height: 32.5 inches (90th %ile - I think they may have been just a little generous on this one, but it's hard to hold  'em still)
Head: 48.5 cm- 75-90th %ile

Conclusions?  He's back on track to be taller than Mom by time he's 11.

Doc was very impressed with his verbal and sign language skills, and his motor skills as well.  She gave him, and us parents, an A+.  Unfortunately, we also agreed that Xander will probably need to have a second surgery, this time to fix his umbilical hernia, which doesn't appear likely to close completely on its own.  Luckily, there is no hurry for that- we'll wait one more year before making any final decisions.

Seth and Sarah tie the knot!

July 18, our good friends, Seth and Sarah, tied the knot up at Estes Park in a beautiful ceremony.  They threw an excellent party, and it was wonderful to see them so happy.  Mazel tov!

Don't my boys look stinking cute?

Art, and the Artist

Out the door

David came over this afternoon to say hi and we had a really nice visit.  Just after he left, I saw that the front door was open and Xander was making his way down the steps.  I figured the door hadn't latched and thought nothing of it.  Erin and I loaded Xander up in the chariot and went out for a nice evening bike ride.  Afterward we got home, I noticed that all the bathroom doors were closed.  As Erin was explaining to me that we need to keep the bathroom doors closed because Xander has figured out how to lift the toilet seats and play in the toilet water, I watched Xander walk up to the bathroom door, reach up and open it.  Erin turned to me and said, "My life is over..."

I think it will work out, but you can bet that we are locking the deadbolts now, not to keep other people out, but to keep our son in.  I give it only a couple days before he realizes that he can go through the dog door...

-Jake

In my spare time

July 19, 2010:

In my spare time, in the last few months when we *haven't* been updating our blog, I have been diligently spending all my spare minutes and moments working instead to do everything necessary to start my MBA this fall.  I decided to explore the MBA for a lot of reasons, but most especially because it will give me access to jobs and industries that I'm having a hard time breaking into now, and because I need the extra stimulation and challenge of adult conversation and academics.  Unfortunately, I decided about school only a few weeks before most of my applications would be due!  I took the GMAT within a few days (most people do spend a little more time in preparation for the exam) and did well enough, although not as well as I'd done on the practice exams.  I applied to several globally focused programs meant for executives with at least 10 years of work experience.  I like the idea of a little extra travel, and learning more about how business is conducted in other regions of the world.  I knew that at least half of what I would learn during an MBA would be from my peers, so I wanted experienced classmates, and I knew that the EMBA format would allow me to maintain balance with family and work. 

In the end I was accepted into 3 of the 5 programs (which is good, since I only had 24 hours to finish my first application, and so my rejection from that school was no surprise).  For each of the schools I not only had to complete a fairly rigorous application, but fly out to the school for  interview.  I surprised myself by picking University of Michigan's Ross School of Business.  It was the least global of all the programs, but just felt "right" immediately during the interview, and on paper.

I'll start August 24, and it'll take 20 months to complete.  I'll fly to Ann Arbor once a month for a weekend of classes, and will spend the time between working on group projects, individual learning assignments, reading, and exams.  Wish me luck!

-Erin

Spending time in NORTH Carolina

After spending all that time with my crazy Irish Catholic family, it was time for a little relaxation and fun visiting Jake's Father.  Grandma Barb and Grandpa Jack were happy to see how much Xander had grown, and we were happy to enjoy some fun times at the park and the aquarium!