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Sunday, February 15, 2009

Sun, 15 Feb 2009 13:08:22 GMT

~Two More Weeks, is this the new pattern?	(7^o F)
Lots of sickness been going around my house the past couple weeks. Everyone but Lydia has had their turn. It started with Luna and her bout with pink-eye and the cold that just wouldn't quit. Then it moved to Wendy and her own version of the cold with an extremely version of a sore throat. Finally I jumped into the mix with a cold virus that knocked me down for the count for a couple of the days. Then just to round things out Wendy got a little Subway food poisoning (guess were we won't be eating again for a LONG time). Even though a few runny noses are still lingering, we are all finally feeling better... oh, well Lydia did get in on the fun a little bit, but it induced... she had her spacers put on for the braces she's getting next week! Whew, that was a lot of info in just the first paragraph and that was the big rundown from a health standpoint. We still were able to fit in some other significant events! Lydia attended yet another birthday party from one of her friends (pre-spacers). They spent the night @ a hotel, did some shopping and some other girl-stuff. Lydia also had swim meet where she topped a personal best time in every event she swam. It's really impressive since she pretty much tops her personal best times every time she swims. We also had what was called a Life Summit @ our church. Life because that's the name of the church and summit because it was an all church "meeting". It was pretty good as we took some time to just really gather ourselves and focus. It was a great time together. Another highlight was that Wendy and Lydia had a girls night out and went to see Coraline in 3D. They were telling me it was awesome and by the looks of the previews I'm sure it was impressive. This past Tuesday Wendy and I celebrated our 5th anniversary of marriage (US). We had a quiet dinner @ Timberlodge... the steak was pretty good ;) It still amazes me that we've been married for 5 years already, time sure flies when you're having fun! As part of our Anniversary/Valentines week, I had bought tickets for Tony & Tina's wedding. It was great fun and well worth the price of admission. It's an inter-active play experience with fantastically funny characters. We even got to be a part of the act, good times! The last note of the past two weeks is Lydia and her friend, Rachel going to the Acquire the Fire event @ the Minneapolis Convention Center this past Valentine's weekend. I haven't yet heard too many details, but overall I think they had a great time!
~SirPatrick	(today's weather)

Sunday, February 01, 2009

Sun, 01 Feb 2009 12:41:03 GMT

~Two Weeks Now!	(24^o F)
What's new? Let's see, working @ Citigroup and I still actually have a job in spite of all the layoffs and all the news reports of how back the state of things are @ Citi. Obviously very blessed to still have a job and a good one @ that. I am thankful, my wife is thankful, my whole family is thankful. Oh, random thought... I've really got to get my tax stuff together and get that done! Sure won't hurt to get some $$$ back this year. Superbowl! Ok, today's the day for the big game. It certainly looks like a huge mismatch, but I have a feeling the Cards are going to give the Steelers a run for the their money. I just hope it's not a blowout either way, that would just be boring. I think I'm just going to stay home and watch the game with some chicken wings and pizza, that should be just about right! A couple of highlights from the past two weeks: Luna's been sick and just doesn't seem to be shaking the cold she's had. It's so hard as a parent to see your little ones sick and feel like there's really not much you can do... or at least know that you've done all you can, but it's just time that's going to bring them healing. Anyway, she's not only had the cold recently, she also has a mild case of pink-eye. Mild?!?!? I'd hate to see severe. She's got gunk coming from each eye all the time and after naps she can't even open her eyes because they are sealed shut by this crap. It's really nasty and I expected the antibiotics to work faster than they have. She's better, but it's been 3 days, I thought it would be pretty much cleared up by now. If she's not better by tomorrow we'll have to make a stop @ the peds office. Lydia... holy crap is this kid busy. This past Thursday night pretty much summed things up where she had a dance rehearsal @ 4pm, ran home ate @ about 5:45pm only to leave again to be @ a swim meet before 6:30pm for which she swam in 4 events and didn't get home until after 9pm. It was a long night... I'm just thankful (and so is she) that there are not many nights like that. She's a trooper though and has really done a good job with everything she's involved in. Wendy and I have done our best to keep things moving in the house and not get sick. I've had a slight cold, but nothing that would slow me down and Wendy has been pretty much the same as me until yesterday. I think her body has finally said, "rest"! However, before all that we took in a few films over the past couple weeks. Some of those included: Benjamin Button (very impressive film), Wanted (new to my collection), and Pride & Glory (surprisingly good). Saw Button @ the theater and Pride & Glory we picked up from the RedBox. We also have Fireproof in hand from the RedBox and we plan to watch that before the SuperBowl today. If possible, we might even squeeze in The Dark Knight as well, but we'll see. That one we own, so it can be anytime. That's all I have to say about that...
~SirPatrick	(today's weather)

Sunday, January 18, 2009

Sun, 18 Jan 2009 12:28:51 GMT

~Another Week	(14^o F)
This week was a little more low key, well at least in the sense that we didn't have a 13 year-old's birthday party. One of the bigger accomplishments was getting Wendy's car fixed. Starting @ the end of last year's winter, we were noticing a smell of gas when we first started the car. This would only happen on the colder days and would go away not long after the car had been running. We brought it to a guy we trust and in that day he found that pretty much ALL the hose clamps on the fuel line were loose. He wasn't sure which one(s) the leak was coming from, so he just clamped them all down. Haven't had a problem since. I guess I didn't realize what I was saying when I stated there wasn't a 13 year-old's birthday party this week.. in fact Lydia did have another 13 year-old party to go to, but at least this time it was not our responsibility to host it. One of her good friends was having her party this past Friday, very similar format as Lydia's, but they went to the Nick Universe^(link) @ the MOA.^(link) I have not yet heard how it was as she's with her mom this weekend. However, I'm sure it was great fun! Oh another bug accomplishment for our house was defrosting the freezer... seeing as it was -20 nearly all week, we didn't have a problem keeping things frozen while the freezer was thawing out. Now that it's done I think we have nearly twice as much space in there! Glad to have that done too! We also rented our share of movies this week... some of which included The Duchess, Babylon AD and The Mirrors... we might not be done yet, let's see what today brings.
~SirPatrick	(today's weather)

Sunday, January 11, 2009

Sun, 11 Jan 2009 13:00:15 GMT

~Week In Review	(13^o F)
It's been a good week. My first back @ work from our Mexican vacation and I think everything is pretty much back in order. Though I do miss Mexico, it sure is nice to be home... even if the weather is brutally cold at times. We had a big week @ the Frank's house this week. The biggest highlight of the week was Lydia's now 13! Yep, an official teenager in the house now. She had 6 of her friends over for a sleepover on Friday night and it was a bit crazy. However, it did go very well and it was a lot of fun for her. As part of the party Wendy took them all to the EP Mall to do some shopping and then to see Bride Wars in the theater. From what I hear they had a great time. Of course when they got home they were pretty squirrelly, but that's expected, right? They did actually go to sleep @ some point that night... no idea when as I was fast asleep. The following morning I made them all French Toast, I think they liked it :) Other highlights of the week were getting to the theater twice to catch up on some movies! Wendy and I were able to take in The Reader^(link) on Monday evening. Last night we caught two: Doubt^(link) and Seven Pounds.^(link) All of these were good films, very interesting stories... and best of all fantastic acting, especially in Doubt. PSH and Streep were incredible. I highly recommend it.
~SirPatrick	(today's weather)

Sunday, January 04, 2009

Sun, 04 Jan 2009 12:30:55 GMT

~Mexico Trip 2008/09	(0^o F)
The last time I wrote one of these up was about this time last year for our annual trip to Mexico visiting family. I had laid out every day in detail and highlighted what happened even if it was just what we ate that day. Kind of silly I know, which is why I'm not going to both with all that effort this time. Instead I'm just going to type and see what comes out... It may not be in the correct chronological order or anything like that, but you will know that it happened sometime during the 17 day vacation. Let's start with the biggest highlight of the vacation, the Christmas Eve Fiesta! Like many years before this one, the family gets together for great food and some gift exchange on the Eve of Christmas. This year was only slightly different than years I have had experience with, it was @ a different house. It was still fun and we still had great food headlined by turkey, ham & roasted pork leg... all VERY good. It was excellent to see everyone again and see how some people have changed and others not much at all. We only exchanged gifts with the kids this time (another slight modification) and that was fun. After things started dying down around 2am a bunch of us went across the street and played @ the playground :) Luna was up and was able to slide down the slide a couple of times and she and I swung on a swing too. Good times. The following morning ended up being the BIG gift opening back @ my mother-in-law's house. It was there that we exchanged most of the gifts we brought since they were for more immediate family. It was a great time and LOTS of gifts were tossed around. I think we started @ around 9:30am and were not done until 1 or so, it was great. Lots of laughs, smiles, hugs and just all around joy in the place. New Year's Eve was another highlight of the trip. We spent the evening with family and kicked off the new year with fireworks. However, before the fireworks we had a good meal of sushi! It was very good and we even had pizza for those who didn't care for the Japanese quizeen. New Year's Day contained yet another trip highlight (all food related of course). We grilled juicy Chihuahuan steaks for a grand meal and even took some time to have a little birthday party for Lydia (Jan 3rd). The cake we had for the party was really good... nice butter cream frosting. Before Christmas we took an evening trip downtown Chihuahua and saw the light show. It was only about 10 minutes long, but it was pretty incredible. It showed the history of the city in a light show displayed on the largest cathedral in the city center, very cool. It was something I had never seen done before. That even we also stopped at a bunch of little shops setup down there and even grabbed some churros! A few more bits worth noting was the annual party with Wendy's theater friends (good times)... Visiting her best friend and new baby (born early December)... driving to Wendy's Dad's mom's house outside of the city and spending some time in a REALLY small town... Lots and LOTS of really good food: doggos, tacos, burritos, queso fondue, tortas, huge burgers... it was all great. Overall it was a very nice relaxing vacation. It was great to see family and watch/listen to Luna learn so many new Spanish words. She is a smart one. That's all for now.
~SirPatrick	(today's weather)

Changes

Tue, 23 Dec 2008 18:19:31 GMT

It's been too long again since I've updated here, just have not taken the time. Most recently I've spent most of my online-time working on a new look for my personal website, SirPatrick.com. I have finished and I'm pretty happy with it so far. It's much cleaner this time, check it out :)

Thursday, November 06, 2008

Thu, 06 Nov 2008 11:22:32 GMT

~May the force be with you...	(50^o F)
Last week for Halloween, we took the liberty of getting the perfect costume for Luna... she was the ultimate Jedi master, Yoda! I mean, just look @ here, it's that perfect :) She moved with grace, even without the cane. I'm sure she could have conquered any dark lord of the sith on that day!
~SirPatrick	(today's weather)

Thursday, October 30, 2008

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 09:33:40 GMT

~Pride	(46^o F)
Did you see that movie? Not the best movie ever or anything like that, but it is a very good 2007 film about Jim Ellis, a man who starts a swim team for troubled teens at the Philadelphia Department of Recreation. It's worth renting if you have not seen it yet. Anyway, this blog is not about that movie, it's about my eldest daughter, who has become quite the little swimmer... well, not so little any more. Lydia swims for the Barracuda Aquatics Club here in Bloomington and this past weekend she had a meet. The photo you see is her swimming in her 50 breast heat. This has been one of her most difficult strokes, but I think it's soon becoming one of her best. In this heat she ended up in second place out of 8 swimmers and shaved 6 seconds off her best time... 48 and change down to 42 and some change. It's amazing to see her grow leaps and bounds with swimming. You can see @ the top of photo that she is behind one other swimmer, she went on to win the heat easily. THe excitement was with Lydia and the swimmer in the lane just below her. In this race in particular she showed her competitive side. With half of the last leg left in the race she did something she was not supposed to do, she peeked over to see the competition. In this case it was that extra incentive and in the next two strokes she left that girl in her bubbles and took command of second place. It was a very proud moment for me and a very fulfilling one for her. It was really fun to watch!
~SirPatrick	(today's weather)

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 11:12:00 GMT

~You're Kidding, Right?	(29^o F)
This is such a perfect picture. Luna loves to play with her "momma", which actually isn't a momma at all... in fact, it's the little babydoll which repeats "momma" over and over and over again. The little momma gets rides in the toy stroller all day and on this particular day... Luna somehow figured out how to fall backward and land with the stroller wrapped around her head. Just the thought of all this is funny enough, but the look on her face captured by the digicam is priceless.
~SirPatrick	(today's weather)

Friday, October 17, 2008

Fri, 17 Oct 2008 12:58:32 GMT

~Minnesota Fall	(44^o F)
The fall is a beautiful time in Minnesota; the trees are changing, the air is cool... I really like this time of year. Over the past 16+ months a little tike has really caught my attention. Her name is Luna and she just happens to be the cutest baby to ever grace the earth... ok, I might be slightly bias on that one. However, my opinion doesn't change because of the knowledge of my bias. Luna is as energetic as they come... it seems she goes non-stop until her head finally hits her ba ba ba (pillow) for the night. The photo you see the right is one of the most recent shots of her. Wendy took her to one of the local orchards here near the Twin Cities. Simply because of Luna's love for fruit in general, it was a blast for her. I'm sure it was heaven to her with nana's (mansana/apple) everywhere to be seen. Best of all she could just pick one and start eating. It is easily one of those times I wish I were wealthy enough to not have to work and just spend time with my family... but that's not reality... yet, so I carry on working to support my family so they can enjoy times like these and always have a safe place to come home and rest. It's worth it. If I were to try and catch up on everything in one blog, it would just not work... so I'm not even going to try. For now, this will have to do ;)
~SirPatrick	(today's weather)