Ready, set, go!

We're at the hospital, Amy's doing great. Real soon now!

Feeding kids...

(Yes, today is Amy's due date. For whatever that's supposed to mean. No little one yet.)

I don't think anyone likes feeding kids. Am I right? Peter has been a struggle, but he'll feed himself now. Kate, on the other hand, would actually prefer to feed herself, which is a mixed blessing. Why?

Just another day...

March 3rd, and all's well!

Just got back from working out (5th time in two weeks... *gasp*... trying to get rid of some of these "sympathy" pounds...) to find Amy asleep on the sofa. They may have debunked the "eating for two" thing, but she definitely needs to sleep for two!

Here's a photo from Monday, when Amy and the kids went with family to a fun kids' place to play:



The rest of Monday didn't go quite as smoothly as we'd hoped, but I did manage to get one photo when no one was pestering anyone else and everyone was sitting somewhat still (in front of the TV watching the video from five years ago). Enjoy...

No baby, no time

As some folks are really taking me at my word to post every day until the baby arrives, I'll post and say...

"No baby yet"

Today was busy, so that's about all I can say. Trust that you'll see it here when the little bambino arrives, and thanks for checking!

Celebrating Sydney's Gotcha day

Believe it or not, it was five years ago today that we adopted Sydney! It has been a blast, so far, and God has blessed us more richly than I would have thought possible.

We've celebrated the anniversary every year since then (more regularly than we've written about it here), with various friends and family joining us here and there. Sydney was well aware of it this time around, and came out of her room this morning carrying her photo albums and ready to share them with everyone!

Our traditions include watching the video of our trip to China and giving her a gift that we brought back with us from China on that trip (yes, Amy has that much forethought...). Tonight we'll be having dinner with family and sharing memories of the last five years. I'll post photos tomorrow, hopefully.

Maybe another project will do the trick...

So apparently we haven't been busy enough to make Amy go into labor yet. Hmm... we can fix that!

Yesterday, as part of everything else we did, we cleaned out a desk that is going to find another home for some undetermined period of time. We're not giving it away, because I designed it and my step-father built it for me (he did custom cabinetry and other carpentry), and it has too much sentimental value to let go permanently. But for the present, at least, we need the room for other things. Today, after church, we disassembled it (we being Amy's dad and me, not Amy...) and transported it to its new home.

Well, now that it's out of the way, why not start redoing the office where it used to be? So I broke out the paint and put some sizable patches on the wall to make sure we like the color, and tomorrow we'll judge it in the light and either pick a different color or move the rest of the furniture out and go to town. Again. And I'm sure Amy won't sit idly by and watch. So if you're listening, little man, now would be a good time to make something happen...

Work Day

Today was a full day! It started out with a little house work, followed by the kids' favorite, a project for kids at Lowe's. I've attached a few pictures below. After that, we worked in the yard, getting dead stuff trimmed back for Spring, killing weeds, and just generally spiffing up. And before you think I made my almost-40-week-pregnant wife work outside, know that it was her idea, and she was more than half-hoping it would make something (i.e.- labor) happen...

I took Peter and Sydney to the coin operated car wash here nearby and washed both cars, just because it was a beautiful day and it seemed like a good idea. Maybe not so much after letting Peter and Sydney take turns with the power-spray nozzle, but oh well...

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That little "Next Blog" link...

I'm feeling a little wierded out right now...

I had a few minutes to kill, and I started clicking on the "Next Blog" link at the top of this page...

I clicked 12-15 times, and every time, without a single exception, Blogger directed me to a blog either about adoption, adoption activism, or by an adoptive family.

So, apparently Google thinks they know me, and they want to send me to sites I'll resonate with, rather than just a random blog. Either that, or adoptive families have taken over Blogger and replaced all material not related to adoption with adoption stories.

Anyone else experience this kind of "targeted" selection for Next Blog?

Second test from a phone

Okay, this appears to be much better. Instead of sending in a post via SMS, I'm using the phone's browser to post through the normal web interface. A little more effort, but worth it for the extra features available.

And yes, this is just practice. No baby yet...

Blogging from my mobile

This seems like it might be a handy feature in about a week, so let's give it a try!

(Posted from a phone)

(and then edited from the web...)

One week and counting

We're down to 1 week until Amy's due date.

Not much else to report, but I said I'd post everyday, so...

there...

I posted.

I'll leave you with this shot of Sydney reading to Peter, which is a huge blessing!

SCIENCE!!!

Sydney loves science experiments. And her dad loves getting to do them with her!


That's salt making the glass on the left cloudy in case you were wondering. Oh, and it makes the egg float too. But contrary to popular opinion, it won't save you from having to salt the egg when we cook it.

Vinegar and Baking Soda. Stinky, but fun. And yes, the wine had been safely ingested with friends several days earlier, don't fret! Sydney was very interested to know when the balloon would deflate. Turns out the answer is "pretty soon", as the air (and freshly generated carbon dioxide, naturally) seeped out around the neck of the balloon before bedtime.

Kate's version of a science experiment is rolling her head around on a sofa and enjoying having her family laugh at her hair. If you can't see her hair, click to see a larger version. She looks like she just grabbed hold of a Van de Graaff generator...

Shiny new door

If you had said the words "door maintenance" to me three years ago, I would have thought you were talking about oiling the hinges and the lock to stop squeaks. Little did I know how spoiled I was with a painted metal door that faced north under a covered front porch.

Now we have a south-facing wood door that is stained and finished, and much to my surprise, it requires regular maintenance. Well, "requires" is a funny word, isn't it? It's not like the previous owner did any. When we moved in, you could tell the door needed some spiffing up, but it wasn't that bad. Two years later, however, it was that bad.

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Peter's favorite stories

For a while now, Peter has been in the mode of loving to hear stories told before bed. Actually, he loves stories all day long, but we have set the standard that right before bed (nap and at night) is the time for Mommy and Daddy to make up a story. It's not as hard as it sounds, as pretty much any story that involves a little boy named Peter gets two thumbs up. Past storylines have involved Peter riding a train, flying on a rocket, helping to put out fires, and all kinds of other activities that little boys love to dream about. His favorite, however, is to ask for a story about a boy who doesn't have a hammer and nails.

I can see you re-reading that last sentence to make sure you didn't miss something.

That's right, he asks for a story about a little boy (named Peter, of course) who does not have a hammer and some nails. How exactly we arrived at that is not completely clear to me, but it involves the construction of our swing set last Spring, Peter's assistance in said project, and the inevitable stories that went with it about building all kinds of fun things with a hammer and nails. Invariably, the little boy in the stories starts out by getting a hammer and some nails and various other tools, and proceeding to build whatever Mommy or Daddy can come up with off the tops of their heads, but it is very important that the story start out sans tools, which is fascinating to me. I'm not sure if it's because Peter recognizes that he does not own such tools, or if he thinks the story will be longer if the boy does not start out with what he needs, or if there is some other basis for the story that is not understood even by Peter. I do know, however, that anyone who offers to tell Peter a story about a boy who doesn't have a hammer and nails will find themselves with a captive audience.

Playing with Google Voice

So Google is basically out to rule the world, right?

I mean, honestly. Google Mail, Google Apps, Google Maps, Picasa, Blogger, Google Wave, Google Voice, and something just popped up about "Buzz" when I checked my mail earlier. Don't know what that's about yet, but those are just the things I have been tinkering with! (Editor's note: I somehow failed to mention Google Calendar, Google Docs, Orkut, Google Reader, Google Code, and YouTube... what was I thinking?)

So, Google Voice...

So far, I like it. One number that can ring to whatever other numbers you want, and you can set up schedules for weekdays, weekends, etc, for each number. Voicemail gets transcribed and emailed and/or sent via SMS to a mobile phone, in addition to be available through the Google Voice website. You can make outgoing calls in what seems very similar to a Skype or Vonage setup. It's slick, and I'm sure it will just get better.

Oh, and no baby yet... just for those who are checking...

Ding-dong, the server's down

It's official.

My Linux server that at one time or another faithfully hosted a number of domains, including this one, 02victor.com, carolynjoe.com, pecks.org and hewletts.org, is now powered down. Now that all the domains I have a hand in have been moved to other hosting solutions, I'm able to free myself of running a server at home.

It was a good run!

I've had that machine for just shy of 11 years, and the last 7 it had been on 24/7, except for maintenance, hardware issues, and the occasional power outage! The processor, power supply, video card, sound card, memory, and hard drives had all been either replaced or upgraded over the years, but everything else (let's see... that would be the motherboard, NIC, optical drives, and chassis...) were the same!

I'm going to give it a few days of rest to verify that I don't need anything else off the hard drives than what has already been backed up, and then the hard drives will come out, and the server will be no more. *sniff*

A moment of silence please...

Ok, enough of that. Time to go outside and play with the kids!

Daily Post Challenge

I've just decided I'm going to post something on this site every day until our little one arrives. Why? As Peter would say, "I-unno..."

Maybe THAT will cause Amy to go into labor...

And if nothing else, maybe it will get people to visit each day and see if he has arrived. I'm sneaky that way.