Ok, So This One Time. . .K Bye

LDS Account Setup - "About Me"

2010-11-05T21:36:00.007-06:00

So they have this new thing on the church's web site.
You can fill out basic information about yourself to use it as a tool for missionary work.
Their hope is that people around the world can find someone in the church they can relate to who understands their view of life. Then, if they are interested, we can share the gospel with them. I'm not very good at sharing the gospel with others sometimes. (I have wonderful grandparents that I have never dared say anything to because I'm too worried that I might offend them.). . . so hopefully this can help me get more in a missionary mood so I can share what is most near and dear to me rather than hoarding it for myself. :)

So this will take a few blogs to cover. So I can't do it all today.
Today I uploaded a picture of myself and wrote a short description about me.
Here's what I wrote. There are other sections that I'll work on in day's to come:

I grew up in Utah County.
I was involved with scouting a lot as a youth.
I traveled to Russia during a summer while in high school to attend the First International Russion Jamboree.
I served as the senior patrol leader for the group from Utah on that trip.
I enjoy travelling and hope to travel to more places around the world.

I served a mission for the church for two years in the Pennsylvania, Philadelphia mission. I served as a Spanish speaking missionary.
I still get to use my Spanish every now and then. . . but it is pretty rusty.
I would love to learn more languages, especially ancient Hebrew, Russian and Chineese.

I worked at a family business all growing up.
It is a skating rink, for the most part.
I enjoyed working there. . . and now that the economy is not going so great, my wife and I have picked up a shift on the weekend to earn a little extra cash and spend some time away from the kids.

My wife and I have been married for just over 10 years and we have three boys and a girl who keep us very busy.

Like a lot of architects, I work a lot. I do anything from programming to construction administration. The last project I worked on was three years long, starting with a study of the building, design, construction documents and finally the construction administration. There are many times that I work late after helping my wife put the kids to bed. I always manage to eat dinner with my family when I'm in town and we enjoy reading scriptures together as a family and singing songs from the hymn book and childrens' songbook before tucking them in bed.

My favorite places are:
1. Wherever my wife is.
2. Northern California in the foothills between Tahoe and Sacramento.
3. The Temple
4. The mountains of Utah
5. Lake Powell

Big cities are fun. I love to see the cool architecture that you can find there. But I always enjoy coming home to the slower pace where I can enjoy time with my growing family.

Stay tuned for the next post which will be entitled, "Why I am a Mormon."

Thursday, July 15th - New York City

2010-07-31T13:37:00.009-06:00

So this was like Philly's famous sign. . . and it was right around the corner from our hotel, so we took a picture. . . actually a couple of pictures and photoshopped ourselves together.

We were walking down toward the museum of Natural History when Norman Foster's building caught my eye. . . so we closed in for a closer look.

This is a project where they gutted a historic building and put the skyscraper inside the historic building, only saving the facade.

The building had its LEED certification by the door. . . I think it was Gold. So that is pretty good for a skyscraper.

The next building on the way to the museum of Natural History was the Time Warner Center by SOM. We didn't go inside yet.

Another fun building across the circle from the Time Warner Center. Part of it was a museum.

So the Natural History Museum was. . . not so interesting. . . but they had a really big canoe. . .

The Whale reminded me of Hello Dolly . . . I can see why Barneby wanted to see it.

Had to take a picture of the dinosaurs. . . they were probably the coolest part of the museum.

After that, we walked back through Central Park. We stopped at the Bethesda Fountain. It was pretty cool.

We took a ride of the carousel.

Then we went back and walked through the Time Warner Center (mostly to cool off).

The lobby was pretty cool.

And it had a great view.

Later we went to the Museum of Modern Art. . . It wasn't quite as disturbing and wierd as the Guggenheim. There were some fun things to see such as Van Gough's Starry Starry Night.

Mondrian . . . very cool.

The building itself was pretty impressive. (Our hotel was across the street to the north.) It wasn't much to look at from the street side on the north side, but inside was what I would call a fun Julio project (Julio, being one of our architecture instructors).

Marthe wanted me to take this picture because it is in one of our favorite Olivia books we read to the kids. . . "I could do that in about Five Minutes!"

In reality his paintings are pretty impressive. . . and he was the first to really do it.

If anything, you got to hand it to the guy for waisting so much paint. . . paint is not cheap, and you can see that some of the blobs of paint are pretty much an entire tube's worth of paint.

Soup cans anyone?

This was an interesting study of solid and void.

This exhibit reminded me of the 80s. . . why?. . . You'll see.

This is what I saw in my head.

This room was an exhibit. . the art was the dimensions painted on the wall. I told Marthe that is what I look at on my screen every day. Big dimensions on interior elevations of walls.

Ok. . . so this one was wierd enough to comment about. It was a series of flat speakers suspended across from each other. As you walked between them, there were different voices saying the days of the week back and forth from one speaker to the other and in mostly the right order, but enough of the wrong order that it was more odd than it would have been otherwise. Aparently that one was worth a whole room to somebody.

We ate dinner in time's square again. This was a pizza place. It used to be a church and had some great stained glass above where we sat.

We stopped in to St. Pattrick's Cathedral later to take a looksy. These buildings are always impressive.

Oh. . and this building reminded me of a cheese grater.

That was pretty much it for the day.

But we had a lot of fun. The next day we'd be getting ready to go home and going home. . .

Wednesday, July 14th - New York City

2010-07-26T20:42:00.011-06:00

So Wednesday was a museum day. But the day started off at the Dunkin Donuts in the subway beneath Rockefellar Center. It was an interesting experience. . . let's just say that if you don't know what you want, you better get out of the way. . . which makes it all the more fun to take your time. The Rockefellar Center is probably most impressive because it is such a simple space. It isn't really big and it isn't really fancy. No crazy building geometry. . . but in a city where everyone is about maximizing profits, this space is a gift to the city that people from the city and from around the world enjoy every day.

St. Patrick's Cathedral with the Seagram building in the background.

After we ate breakfast, we started walking up the street toward Central Park.
It started to rain and even though we had umbrellas, by the time we got to the Guggenheim museum. . . well. . . Marthe was wringing lots of water out of pretty much everything.
We enjoyed walking through the museum. . . especially because our shoes were going squish squish every step of the way. The big skylight was covered, so the interior was not as impresive as it should have been with natural light streaming in.
They had a great Kandinsky exhibit, but we couldn't take pictures, so you'll just have to take my word for it.
By the time we finished (which was pretty quick, because some of the exhibits were pretty psycho) it had stopped raining. So we started walking back down the street. I turned around to get the shot of the building.

Approaching the Metropolitan Museum of Art. . . the only think I could think of was "don't eat the pictures, no! no! no!. . . don't eat the pictures no! no! no!. . . . don't eat the pictures NO! when you go to museums"

The MET was interesting because the rooms themselves were decorated and themed to house the art that was inside them. We walked to the back of the museum and down to the cafeteria to eat some nice and bland food before enjoying the museum.

Some rooms had pieces of whole buildings in them.

Some rooms were basically replicas of other buildings, like the one below from one of Frank Lloyd Wright's residential designs. Imagine having this for your living room. Parade of Homes, eat your heart out.

The egyptian exhibit was cool. They transported and reconstructed a small temple complex from egypt to this room in the museum.

We made sure to take pictures of the mummies for the kids.

Below is the main lobby in the museum. . . it was one of the better spaces in the museum.

This is the sculpture court in the greek exhibit was pretty cool.

Here's a corner detail of the greek sculputre court.

This was the Roman sculpture court, patterned after the Roman courtyards.

Monet paintings are always fun to look at.

Van Gough paintings have such wonderful texture.

More Monet

And some Degas

More lobby. . .from the balcony

Suits of armor are always fun too.

Wednesday evening we went to the Broadway show Lion King. Of course I couldn't take pictures, but that is what the Google Image Search is for I guess. So here are some images from the show. We really enjoyed the show. It was really well done and it made me realize that I could be happy with seeing Broadway shows all the time. Musicals are in my blood. This one was a good one to see. I do wish we could have seen more shows, but they're pretty pricy.

Rafiki

Scar and Mufasa

The costumes were part of what made the show great. I couldn't help but wonder if the Disney imagineering crew came up with some of them.

Zazu was one of the great characters in the show. Excellent comic relief.

Pumba and Timon were great too. Timon had a great Brooklyn accent that was really fun.

We walked around some stores at Times Square after the show. . . because I don't think they ever close. . . then we went back to the hotel.

Tuesday, July 13th - New York City

2010-07-24T14:00:00.008-06:00

Tuesday we got moving early. We stopped by a nearby McDonalds for breakfast (That information is for Uncle Devin's enjoyment), then we walked by Grand Central Station to the subway station under the Chrysler Building.
We took the subway down to Battery Park, where we boarded a ferry and went to see the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. Marthe did ok on the ferry, even though she didn't have a life jacket. She said it wasn't rocking enough to be uncomfortable. The podium on which the statue sits is a museum. There are a lot of cool things related to the statue in the museum. Below are toe molds which were used to make the toes on the Statue of Liberty.
They had a model, cut away to show the structure of the statue. There are a lot of awkward truss configurations and how the forces are really transferred to the podium appears somewhat questionable. But they probably made up for it with really thick steel and lots of bolts.
The Statue itself looked its age. I was telling Marthe that it is too bad that it isn't a privately owned site because it would be taken care of a lot better. Obviously the taxes from the people don't go very far in taking care of the statue and the podium and the site.

Ellis Island was the next stop and we had fun walking around and learning about how people had to enter the country. We learned that around 2 percent of all the immigrants that came to the states got put on ships and sent back to where they came from, sometimes without their families. With the number of immigrants that came to the states during that time period, that ammounts to a lot of people. It definately was quite the system and required people to jump through all sorts of hoops to get into the states. . . . not quite as easy as jumping the border. :)

We walked from Battery Park back up to the financial district to see Ground Zero. By then it started raining and before long we were pretty soaked and bought some umbrellas. Not long after we bought the umbrellas, it stopped raining. Ground Zero is a big construction site right now as they are well underway with building the new Freedom Tower. . . or whatever it is called now. While we were there, we saw on the news that they found remains of an old ship while excavating. I bet the contractor loved that stop-work order so people could carefully decide what they want to do with the ship.
We then walked past City Hall and over to Center Street. We saw the Brooklyn Bridge from a distance.

Some of the city and courthouse buildings that were around that area were pretty cool.

It is kind of hard to see in the picture below, but in the distance is the Empire State Building.

There were some cool churches that we walked by.

Somehow we ended up back in Times Square after visiting the Paul Frank store and took the subway back up to our hotel's neighborhood.

After we ate dinner, we walked down and went to the Empire State Building. It was interesting to go here on the same day as we visited the Statue of Liberty. This was a high-class, organized and well-staffed site to visit (most likely because it is privately owned. . .I'll have to see if it really is or not). Anyway, the finishes in the building were well kept and the line to go up to the top was short and within a few minutes, we were up on the top of the building (86 floors up).

This is the view toward where the twin towers used to be in the financial district.

This is the cool wedge shape building. This building was used for the Daily Bugle in Spiderman.

The building below is the New York Times new building by architect Renzo Piano. He does some very cool work. It is one of the taller buildings.

On the left of the image below is the Bank of America tower and on the far right is the Chrysler Building.
This is us up on the top behind the sturdy web of fencing to keep you from getting too close to the edge.

That was pretty much it for Tuesday. . . stay tuned for the post for Wednesday, July 14th.

Monday, July 12th - New York City

2010-07-23T21:21:00.012-06:00

We got to New York on Monday afternoon. We spent the evening just walking around and seeing some things close to our hotel.

The Apple Store Entrance - Complete glass structure
The Seagram Building - Designed by Mies Van der Rohe
Grand Central Station was grand.
The Bank of America Tower at Times Square - Designed by Cook+Fox Architects.

Marthe spotted some local wild life, so I took a picture.
Times Square was kind of like Vegas. . only more people. . . and no slot machines.

We saw Radio City Music Hall on our way back to the hotel. It was only a couple blocks from our hotel.

Went to bed after that. Stay tuned for the next post for Tuesday, July 13th.

Salt Lake Temple Amazing Exhibit

2010-06-02T21:25:00.009-06:00

So, this is what I have always wanted. . . to be able to share with you some of what I've seen on the inside of the Salt Lake Temple. It is such an amazing building and now the South Visitor's Center at Temple Square has an exhibit just about the Salt Lake Temple. Below are some photos I took of the massive 6-foot or so tall sectional model. I have never seen a more detailed and well-constructed model in my life. It is truly a piece of art as well as an accurate depiction of the masterpiece which is the Salt Lake Temple.

When I was working for Heath Engineering, we did a mechanical study of the buidling which required me to crawl in all sorts of spaces in and around the rooms you're seeing below. It was a true joy to spend lots of time in this building (even though most of my time was in the sub-basement levels) and I would be happy if I could work on Temple projects for the rest of my career. I'll try and give a brief explaination of what you're seeing below.

This is a shot of the exterior corner of the model. You'll notice that they have accurately depicted the blemishes on each of the granite blocks based on photographs of the real building. The image below is the baptistry in the basement of the Temple where they perform baptisms for the dead. Below is one of the instruction rooms depicting the world in which we now live.
Below is the Priesthood Assembly room which is used less than it used to be, now that the church is so big. I think they mostly use it now for meetings of general authorities of the church.

There are two rostrums, one on the west and one on the east, patterned after the Kirtland and Nauvoo temples.The one on the west is for the Aaronic Priesthood and the one on the east for the Melchezidek Priesthood. There are two levels to the room. . . a balcony level and the main floor level where the two rostrums are located. . .

Below the priesthood assembly room you can see the room where the council of the twelve meet each week. Below you can see some of the detail work done on the doors of the model. . . very cool.

Here's a bigger shot of the model. You can see the room where the twelve apostles meet each week in the upper left of the photo with the instruction room and baptistry from the previous photos. On the right you can see the Celestial room representing being in Heavenly Father's presence. Below on the right is the garden room representing the garden of eden.

Here's another shot of the Celestial Room. The upper windows are natural light from the outside. The lower windows are artificial light because the annex which was added . . . I can't remember. . . possibly around the time of David O. McKay. . . The door on the far left used to be a window too, but they added a couple steps to get to the annex level.

The lighting was pretty realistic too. All the new Temples typically have one large chandelier in the middle. It is interesting that the lighting is fairly uniformly spaced. Most likely it allowed the room to be brighter when fixtures used to not be able to put off as much light as the new chandeliers now can. The new chandeliers are kind of like a big light bomb in the middle of the room and the rest of the lighting can be toned down. Back when this Temple was built, mainly natural light from the windows was used during the day. . . funny how we think we need the lights on all the time. . . "for the experience." In my opinion, natural light and the occasional shaddow are very powerful experiential features. But there is something to be said for a room full of light . . . that seems very appropriate.

The image below is a bad photo of the ceiling in the Priesthood assembly room.

Here's a detailed image of one of the rostrums.

Here's a close up of the garden room.

Another photo of the priesthood assembly room. The big oval windows used to be operable so the lower windows would bring in cooloer air and the upper windows would exhaust the hot air.

This is a great building for no air-conditioning because of the climate. Massive exterior walls slow the heat build up on the interior and the temple is narrow enough to get good cross ventilation.

It is hard to see, but the chairs on the balcony level are tiny padded folding chairs. . .the model is truly amazing.

Here's another shot of the instruction room representing the world in which we now live.

The next bunch of photos are of a section through the east towers of the Temple. Here you can find rooms which served as apartments for various people like James E. Talmage or Lorenzo Snow.

This door leads to the exterior door on the east side of the building on the south side. I believe it was around this location that President Snow saw the Savior.

Another amazing part of the model. . . not to mention the real thing in the buildng. . . are the spiral staircases. I had a pioneer ancestor that worked on these stairs. They are beautiful.

So this is my favorite room in the Temple. . . the top room in the east tower. It has a door to the roof. But the best feature is the huge circular windows with splayed openings. I don't recall any light fixtures in the room. . . just the two massive windows high above the head. If I remember right, the room is basically a 30-foot cube of space with these two windows. . . It is incredibly minimal in it's experiential qualities. Peaceful, serene, powerful.

A better shot of the room. You can see the door to the roof in the back. I'm not sure the model has the scale quite right for this room. . . but you get the idea. . . and sometimes scale can be tricky when it is experienced versus drawn. . or modeled.

The middle two rooms in the east tower on this photo are sealing rooms where people like my parents got married. The rooms are small but beautiful and accessed directly off of the Celestial room. Part of why I'm excited that this exhibit is going on is that people like my grandparents, who aren't members of the church, can see inside the Temple. It must have been quite frustrating to not be able to go in and see your daughter's wedding. Maybe we can convince them to come out again to see this exhibit. . . part of the exhibit has videos of the interior which explain the experience much better than the model.

The room with the chest of drawers in this picture has a picture of James E. Talmage. This one of the spaces that he used while writing Jesus The Christ. There is a small staircase that leads to the room below which appears to have been a bedroom. It had a closet but no windows. I'm not sure if that was the case, but it looked probable.

The west tower (on the other side of the temple) was simlar to this side before they gutted it out to install the elevators.

So. . . there you go. . . even though the basement and sub basement are kind of cool too (even though it is just footings and mechanical equipment. . . the only thing I regret is that they didn't cut away the roof to expose the big steel trusses above the priesthood assembly room that look like old bridge trusses with a gazillion rivets. . . Because the structure took so long to build, you can see how the building technology changed as you go from the basement up to the roof. Steel construction in the west didn't really exist until the Temple was 80% or so complete.

Anyway. . . hope you all enjoy this.

Building Faith to Go To The Temple

2010-03-14T20:48:00.002-06:00

I spoke in church today so I thought I'd post the basic text of my talk. They gave me an option of several broad topics, including the Temple. . . . So. . since the Temple is such a big part of my life. . . I chose to speak on Temples. I thought the High Councilman speaking after me was going to talk on the same general topics. . . so I kind of geared my talk thinking it would build up to his talk. . . . He talked about a different subject. Oh well. Here's the text of my talk. I know there are some typos, but I'm too lazy to fix them at the moment. :)

BUILDING FAITH THAT MOTIVATES ME TO GO TO THE TEMPLE

The Temple is something that is on my mind often, for many reasons. I see the Temple all the time. I see Temples when I go to work. I see our Temple whenever I go anywhere and even when I close my daughter's curtains before we tuck her in bed. I hear about the Temple in the hymns and primary songs we sing at home. I feel the Temple through keeping the covenants I have made with God in the Temple and I feel the pull to the Temple when I learn of my ancestors and feel their need to go to the Temple as my need.

Yet as often as the Temple is on my mind and in my heart, I often need to build the faith to go to the Temple. I go to the Temple about once a month. . sometimes more. . sometimes less. Those months where I go more than once a month are typically good months for me. Those are months when the things I have chosen to think about and do build my faith. Faith, more than belief, is a motivating force to action. As we build our faith, it is as if our lives are woven into an intricate pattern, the center of which is Christ and His Temple. The Temple is the great symbol of our membership in the church.

So I'd like to share with you a few things I think about and do that build my faith to the point that I am not content until I go to the Temple. These things also help make my Temple experience more worthwhile.

1. Build faith that you will learn and feel something in the Temple.
2. Build faith that Temple work is essential service to those in need.
3. Build faith by experimenting on the words of our living prophets.
4. Build faith that the Temple is God's house and by being there you will be close to God.
5. Build faith that by going to the Temple, you can't help but bring a little of it home with you.

BUILD FAITH THAT YOU WILL LEARN AND FEEL SOMETHING IN THE TEMPLE

My Faith to go to the Temple grows out of my need for a deeper understanding of what I think I already know. Life-changing knowledge and sacred feelings do not come from some search for something mysterious and unrevealed. Searching for light and truth in the Temple is not like a scientific archeology dig. A Typical archeologist hopes to find something that no one knows about and with little purpose other than knowing more. . . being an "expert". When they find something, what do they think it will teach them to do? Or is their purpose merely academic? At best they might find a few of the simple truths that I can find every day in the study of my scriptures.

For example, one of the greatest discoveries in archeology is the Rosetta stone which basically taught the world how to translate Egyptian Hieroglyphics. Since that discovery much has been learned about the history of the world in and around Egypt and many portions of the Biblical record have been confirmed. Truly it is an amazing discovery.

Now compare all the historical facts, dates and cultural clarifications that the Rosetta stone brought with only a few verses in Alma (7:23-25). I have always felt that the deepest doctrines are the simple truths of the gospel and those are the seeds that grow best in the temple. Things like "What does it really mean to be humble?" The Temple is the greenhouse where we can take the seeds of our understanding, and the Lord will help those seeds grow into a tree of life.
In the Temple we can be focused wholly on that which is holy.

BUILD FAITH THAT TEMPLE WORK IS ESSENTIAL SERVICE TO THOSE IN NEED

I ask myself the question, or sing these words in my heart, "have I done any good in the world today?" When I have been to the temple on a day I ask that question, the answer is easily yes.
By serving others who need our help outside of the Temple, I understand more fully what it means to be what Obadiah calls "saviors on mt Zion". Service to others outside of the Temple is part of what prepares me to get the most out of the Temple. For, surely, inside the Temple I can serve people who cannot serve themselves. Saviors on Mt. Zion. My Mt. Zion is a short walk up the hill. Will I not serve those in need?

Outside the Temple, to serve others often means being at the right place at the right time. But inside the Temple I don't have to worry about what the right time is, or even what time it is. I don't have to worry where the right place to be is, or even what the right words are to say there is always someone there to assist me in my service to others. Everything is right. Everything is beautiful. Everything is holy.

BUILD FAITH BY EXPERIMENTING ON THE WORDS OF OUR LIVING PROPHETS

Our living prophets urge us to be a Temple-going people. They remind us of the blessings that come from the Temple as often as they can. Is what they say true? How can we know? We experiment. . we go. And we go again. I gain a testimony of prayer by praying. I gain a testimony of tithing and fast offerings by paying my tithes and paying a generous fast offering. I gain a testimony of home teaching by doing my home teaching. The same is true for gaining a testimony of Temple attendance. I go to the Temple to gain a testimony of what going to the Temple regularly will do to my life. . . my soul.

BUILD FAITH THAT THE TEMPLE IS GOD'S HOUSE AND BY BEING THERE YOU WILL BE CLOSE TO GOD

What does it feel like to be in the presence of God? As a mortal who has not seen God in the flesh, I can't say I know what that is like. But my spirit and your spirit knows what it is like to be in our Heavenly Father's presence. Because as surely as we are here today, we were with him before. And our spirits know and long to be in His presence again. Where God is, is our home and the Temple is the house of God. I think of this and my faith surges and I go to the Temple. Will you go to the Temple?

BUILD FAITH BY BRINGING A LITTLE OF THE TEMPLE HOME WITH YOU

One of the best ways I find to get me to go to the Temple again is by bringing some of the Temple home with me. I do that by writing about my feelings in my journal, sharing those feelings with my children and my wife. I realize that I always come out of the Lord's house better than when I went in and I should share that better person with all those around me before it starts to wear off. When I do that, my friends and family will want to be around that better person and they'll be the first to start hinting at things that will get me to come back to the Lord's house and progress and not digress.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2009-11-26T10:15:00.005-07:00

Happy Thanksgiving!

We thought we'd help you enjoy the day by sharing some fun pictures.

Mark is now a tractor driving expert. . . or at least he can pose as such.

Mostly he likes to play video games and read.

Here's the dangerous Sadie-Fett.

Sadie watches what Marthe does. . . and then when Marthe is not looking. . . she tries to do the same things. In this case, Marthe was pounding sewing things with the hammer. . . Marthe was in the other room when all of a sudden she heard some pounding. . . this is what she found:

Sadie likes to go down the slides at the rink.

Anna didn't enjoy it so much.

The new Blast Zone is really cool. Everyone had a blast. . . get it. . . :)

Marthe got a good work out by taking kids down the slide over and over and over.

The boys think they can get lots of prizes with the tickets that they didn't pay anything to win.

Spencer made a turkey costume in preschool. He really has fun at preschool.

I got the christmas lights up on the house. . . I'm so excited.

Funny Old Home Video

2009-11-15T15:14:00.002-07:00

So we found this funny clip the other night and decided to do a bit of editing to make it even funnier. Perhaps it is funnier when it is your own kids and it is time for bed. . . but Marthe and I were laughing for quite a while. So we thought we'd share it with you.

Fun Times in California

2009-10-18T14:59:00.007-06:00

We enjoyed our vacation to California to see my grandparents.
Who knew that road construction in the middle of Nevada could be so fun. The following video shows how funny the little bumps on the side of the road are. . . you know. . . the ones that are supposed to keep you awake.

We stopped by the Reno Temple. It is the first small temple that I have seen up close. . . even though I have worked on several of them.

Tuesday was really stormy and rainy.

Wednesday before lunch we walked around downtown Sutter Creek and let the boys & Marthe peek in the windows. They always have good window displays.

Marthe caught a frog while we were wandering down there. No doubt it was out with all the wet weather the previous day.

Later on Wednesday, we drove in to Sacramento and went to the train museum. We all had a great time there. There are so many cool things to see.

They had lots of toy train displays along with the full-size trains. It is amazing how decked-out some of the train interiors are. Too bad the normal airplane cabins aren't as cool as old train cars. It kind of takes the fun out of traveling. Now they just try and distract you from how uncomfortable it is with a movie. Old trains would have been a really cool experience.

We helped Grandpa pick walnuts. Luckily no one came out with black hands. Apparently if you pick up walnuts without gloves, your hands will turn black and they will not go back to the regular color for about a month. Nothing will take the stain out. . . soap. . .turpentine. . . nothing. It was fun doing a chore that was a bit different than the usual ranch chores I have helped out with over the years. This is the first time I have been down there during walnut season.

We got home without too much trouble. Sadie barfed once. She is the only one of our kids who has ever gotten car sick. It wasn't a big deal. . .fairly tramatic for her. . . but she settled back down after we cleaned her up pretty quick.

First Lost Tooth

2009-10-05T22:13:00.002-06:00

Tommy lost his first tooth today.
He had to be bribed to let me pull it out.
I learned how to pull out teeth from the Berenstain bear's book about going to the dentist.
So I just got a napkin, got a good grip and quickly pulled up.

Tommy was quite shocked that it came right out and didn't really hurt.
Mark never let me pull any of his teeth out.
Tommy is a little more die hard. . . especially if there is a good bribe.
Uncle Swayne gave him $1.50 for his bravery.
Here's the proud Tommy.

The State Fair

2009-09-12T09:19:00.003-06:00

We made our anual trip to the State Fair. We saw lots of white trash, stinky animals, ghetto rides and got to tell our kids "no" a lot. But they were able to come home with a lot of free vendor junk that will probably get thrown away today. . .
We did go dow the big slide which is always fun. And we did the "Little Hands on the Farm" which the kids really enjoy. . . because they get a treat at the end.

Spencer Blowing Out Candles

2009-08-01T21:49:00.003-06:00

St. George Trip - July 2009

2009-08-01T21:11:00.005-06:00

We recently took a trip down to St. George.
My brother-in-law's family has a condo down there.
His family was going down and so we went with them.
We spent a lot of time in the indoor pool because outside was so hot.
Here's my niece McKenzie:

Here's another niece. . Michaela.

The other kid seems familiar. . . but he's too crazy to be mine. . . or maybe not. Here's another niece. . . Maddie
Michaela and Sadie spent a lot of time together. Sadie calls her kaka. . . somewhat amusing. . .

We took one day to drive down to Vegas and enjoy the aquarium at the Mandolay Bay casino.
We stopped by the M&M factory while we were down there so we could buy some M&Ms at twice the price that you can buy them at a regular store. Spencer had his birthday while we were down there. There were some candles there luckily. . . the funny part was that they were the re-lighting type.

We went to sacrament meeting down there before coming home. Before church the kids enjoyed playing with everything in the kitchen.
On the way home we tried to see a ghost town at Silver Reef, but it was pretty disappointing. However, we did stop at Cove Fort which was a much better historical stop. Cove Fort was the crossroads of a couple main routes for the telegraph, mail and travel in central Utah.

For more information on the fort go to : www.covefort.com

It was a nice break from the car.

There were missionaries there to give guided tours, so it took a bit longer than expected, but was more informative than just looking at the rooms and fort would have been.

Sadie enjoyed it.

Here's the big front doors. and a cute family.

(On a side note I noticed that the hinges to the doors leave the pins on the outside of the fort when the doors are closed. . . so when the doors were closed, someone could potentially pop the pins of the hinges and pull the doors off. . . so I guess it is good the never had any battles here. The fort was recently restored. . . so the hinges on the wrong side could have been a result of the restoration).

Anyway, it was a fun .

Rub a Dub Dub. . . A Bunch of Kids In a Kiddie Pool

2009-07-08T21:12:00.005-06:00

After a fun day playing on the big slide, it was time to relax with the cousins in the pool.

Sadie enjoys singing.

Fireworks on the 4th were fun.

I Love Synth Pop . . . Especially From The Experts

2009-06-30T20:57:00.004-06:00

So I forgot to post a review on this one back when I bought it a month or so ago. I get way too excited when my favorite artists come out with a new album. It is so satisfying when it is a really good album. Lately other of my favorite artists have put out albums that are ok, but "Yes", the new album from the Pet Shop Boys, is fun, happy and a beautiful example of lyrical and electronic architecture.

Every once and a while I dig around for some good new synth pop and find some artists that are really good at making their machines make some great ear candy, but pretty much all of them fail when it comes to lyrics and a good tune that you can enjoy even when the music turns off.

Hats off to the Pet Shop Boys, this may be my favorite album after Behaviour.

Track Listing:

01 Love Etc. - Some good synth sounds, a fun bouncy beat, creative lyrics

02 All Over the World - A good fusion of classical motifs and modern electronic sounds. It has a unique rhythm that is very catchy.

03 Beautiful People - Reminds me of some of their B-side songs, apparently made for a TV show called Beautiful People in Europe somewhere. . . with that background, it sounds very much like a TV opening/closing song.

04 Did you See Me Coming? - By far my favorite song on the album. All the classic dancy beat of old pet shop boys with great new electronic ear candy and great melody & lyrics.

05 Vunerable - It is interesting lyrically, the synth is fairly basic, but the bridges give the whole piece the feel of one of those screen savers that you keep watching even though there isn't much to it.

06 More Than A Dream - Good ear candy. Would be cool to disco skate to. Very dynamic and well orchestrated.

07 Building A Wall - Good blending of lower notes & electrical sounds during chorus.

08 The King of Rome - Ok. . .so maybe I have two favorite songs on this one. This one is just so full of feeling. It reminds me of something far away that I can't reach. It takes me back to the days of listening to "Jealousy" in the underground hut Jared built and takes me far ahead to speculate what the future has in store. . . . listening to it right now. . . I'll enjoy this one for the long term much more than track 04.

09 Pandemonium - This one would be good to skate to . . too. This one is just fun, upbeat and very Pet Shop Boys as only Pet Shop Boys can do.

10 The Way It Used To Be - Really good new synth sounds/blends. Would be good for driving across the desert of Nevada, through Canyonlands or Arch's. .

11 Legacy - This one is probably trying a bit to hard to be interesting. Some complex key

changes with a political march feel to the beat. The least interesting of all the tracks.

12 Love Etc. (Pet Shop Boys Dub) - This one was a fun extra track for the album because it gave me one of those fun extra mixes that I used to get only by buying the related single. Might make a good launch ramp song or a speed skate song. . . . maybe a blackout skate with a really good light show with some programmed track light patterns and occasional bursts of strobes. . . and really loud bass.

13 (Yes Track by Track Commentary by Neil and Chris) - It is nice to hear artists talking about their own music. It is nice to hear how normal their personalities are and the little things they find funny about the whole album-making process.

Good Album.

If you like the Pet Shop Boys, this is one to add.

Cool Clouds & Fun Dinosaurs

2009-06-09T20:40:00.004-06:00

I got off the bus today and this is basically what I saw. To the right was clear skies, to the left was completely gray. This was in the middle. . . . so I took a picture. . . only my camera was on low res. so you don't get all the cool detail in the could. Oh well.
We went to the Ogden dinosaur park the other day. It was fun. Sadie likes dinosaurs a lot. She says rarrrr whenever she sees a dinosaur toy, on tv, and so at the park. . . that is pretty much all we heard from her.

Introducing The Sisty Uglers

2009-05-30T21:34:00.006-06:00

So she finally did it. Marthe is online with her sewing talent at Etsy. Her sister has been prodding her to do it for a long time now. Lately, however, Marthe has delved into sewing clothes and that turned into making a few outfits for Sadie, a couple purses and even some of her own patterns. She's actually pretty excited about it which is fun.

So she is building her inventory and learning what it is like to have a small web business. Anywho. . . . I've posted a permanent link on my page to the right, so you can visit her site and see what she's up to anytime.

Enjoy!

www.thesistyuglers.etsy.com

Day 6 - Sadie Drives Us Home

2009-04-26T16:10:00.002-06:00

Sadie wanted to drive home.

Day 5 - One Last Day at Disneyland.

2009-04-26T15:44:00.008-06:00

Excited about the Dumbo ride.

Weee!

We almost had a new king. . . or queen. :)

We also tried for an executive committee king.

Larger than life eyelashes.

Jedi Training

Tommy got picked for Jedi training and was able to defeat Darth Vader.

We stopped at the Lego store. . . of course.

They were actually upset at this point. . . but sometimes dad is able to make them laugh anyway.Some of them just get slap-happy the later it gets.

When Tommy runs out of energy. . . you know it is time to go home.

Day 4 - California Adventure & Disneyland Again!

2009-04-26T15:05:00.009-06:00

She's ready for another day of Disney. You have to get the picture in the front of the park.

Are you ready for a Jungle Adventure?

Some people were too busy taking pictures to enjoy the ride. :)

This was Sadie's all time favorite ride.

Silly Monkeys.

She saw danger. . . it was written on a sign.

Baby elephants that take baths are pretty funny. She thought the back side of water looked pretty cool.

The canibals were debatable.

Hippos were interesting.

She did hide from the pirannas.

It almost looks real.

Mark and Marthe enjoyed the Tower of Terror. . . so did the Asian guy in the background. . . he was a bit worried at first.

Wall.E Was Fun.

Most of them were happy to be there most of the time.

The new Toy Story ride is my new favorite ride.

Once the boys put on the 3d glasses, they looked around and said, "wow Mark, you're in 3d" etc.

I realized shortly after Marthe took this picture that Tommy was actually standing up in the ride. . . You'll have to see the video sometime when I tell him to sit back down.

One of Spencer's occasional demonstrations of having to deal with it.

If you work for Disney, you get to fight kids with light sabers. . . and you get paid for it. It is great, because by the time fireworks come around, mom & dad are pretty tired.

Marthe did a great job with the new camera.

The fireworks were very cool.

This is one of Mickey Mouse:

Ooooh

Ahhhh

That was totally wicked!

Day 3 - Disneyland!

2009-04-26T14:41:00.005-06:00

Here are pictures from day 1 at Disneyland.
When we first got there, we went to Space Mountain.
While we were gone, Buzz Lightyear tried to say hello to Sadie. . . this was about as close as he got before Sadie freaked out.
She liked the haunted mansion. . . Tommy cried and cried begging me not to take him on the haunted mansion. . . but after he went once he declared it as one of his favorite rides.

There are always cool things to use as backdrops for photos.

Sadie and Spencer had to do a lot of waiting while other people went on rides. . . but they didn't seem to mind much.

This ride revealed the children as they really are. . . martians from outer space.

They tried to lock us up. . . but we were too busy having fun.

I forgot to turn on my flash. . .but you can still see the face of Sadie. . .who wasn't too interested in Mickey. . unlike Spencer at the same age who was very excited.

We all enjoyed It's A Small World. . . they added some new Disney characters from some of the more recent films. . . and got new plastic boats.

Half the fun was before they even got into the ride.

Aunt Julie was nice and took the boys on the teapots. . . Mom and Dad don't do the teapots.

You can see why:

But they had lots of fun.

Day 2 - Legoland

2009-04-12T09:57:00.005-06:00

Here's some pictures from day 2 of our trip.
We went to Legoland in Carlsbad, Ca.
It was kind of in between Lagoon and Disneyland.
It wasn't too busy, but we did stand in plenty of lines.
The whole lego theme was really fun and there were lots of cool things to see. . . just as fun as the rides.

Day 1 - San Diego

2009-03-29T20:02:00.005-06:00

It is not every day that you see a time machine.

So we enjoyed our first day in San Diego.
We got to see a lot of cool things and went to some nice parks.
Mark informed us that the parks were boring.
I guess he'll get his fill of not-so-boring parks starting tomorrow.
But today we just wanted to take it easy.

However, the pictures do provide some evidence that everything wasn't too boring. :)

Here's the monument/memorial building for the Mormon Batallion. . . .

These are pictures from Old Town. . . Very fun victorian and antique stuff. . . Grandma would have had a ball!

Then off to Balboa park which was very beautiful. The colors came out real good on the photos because it was overcast for most of the day.

There's more to the story, but we'll have to share the rest of it when we get back. We need to get to bed for the busy park week that starts tomorrow.

Love you all!

Captain EO on You Tube

2009-03-14T09:18:00.003-06:00

So Marthe and I got talking about Captain EO the other day and I did a google search to see if anyone has posted the movie somewhere. . . they have.

You can now watch the short movie on you tube.

So if you are dying to delve into a bit of nostalgia. . . .do a search for captain eo on you tube and enjoy. Now all our spouses can get more insight into why we are so wierd.

U2 - New Album Commentary

2009-03-14T08:57:00.002-06:00

U2 Has a new album. I downloaded the album the other day. . . I had to convince myself that I didn't need the actual CD. Usually I buy the CD, rip the songs to MP3 and then store the CD in my closet. I'm running out of storage space now. . . so I realize now that downloading songs is probably the way to go. I can always burn the MP3s to a CD if I want. But most of the time I will just listen to them on my iPod.
Anyway, the new U2 album reminds me of Zooropa. When U2 came out with their landmark album Actung Baby and went on tour, they wrote the songs for Zooropa while they were on tour for Actung Baby. The result was an album that sounded a bit like Actung Baby with some other experimental numbers.
I think No Line On The Horizon will be more successful than Zooropa, but it sounds kind of like the previous album and it has several songs that are more experimental.
The main single, "Get On Your Boots" reminds me a mix between "Vertigo" and "Wild Wild West by the Escape Club". It is probably my least favorite song on the CD. There are a few songs that are more raw and were done in a similar vein as songs from the Unforgettable Fire album. . . most likely because of using the same bunch of producers. The result is a pretty unique, yet very U2-sounding album. It will take longer for it to grow on my than How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb, but I am liking it.

2009-02-21T09:09:00.002-07:00

I forgot to post this earlier, but it is official. I am now a licensed architect in the state of Utah. It is a good feeling to finally get the actual license. Thanks to all of you who helped me get to this point.

A Few More Pictures and Some Comments

2009-02-07T16:03:00.006-07:00

Spencer got stitches a while back. He was goofing around while getting out of the car and met a part of the car that was a bit sharp.

Sadie does all sorts of funny things. This particular day she decided to walk around and show off her legs. She walked around like this for about a half hour.

Tommy always has more energy than the rest of our family combined. . . can't you tell.

Mark is a very happy kid. He is doing great in school and is a good helper for Marthe. The other day he vacuumed the front room for a quarter. He had never vacuumed before, and was a bit hesitant. But he ended up enjoying it.

Sometimes they get tired. . . It is rare enough that we took this photo for evidence.

We're lucky to still have them around with all the sharks around.

Kids to Funny Things

2009-01-28T20:14:00.003-07:00

So this was too funny not to share quickly.
Marthe got Sadie out of bed the other day and she came downstairs and had breakfast etc.
Sadie was walking around funny. . . but that was nothing new, sometimes she just likes to walk funny. . . especially in the morning after breakfast when she's in a good mood.
Anyway, eventually it was time to get dressed so Marthe took her upstairs to get her dressed.
She started taking off Sadie's pajamas when she felt something in each foot of her footy pajamas.
She took off the pajamas and . . . surprise. . . a binky in each foot. Somehow she had stuffed both binkies down her jammies before Marthe got her out of her crib. Her pajamas were not unzipped at all, so she must have just stretched the neck out and shoved them down and eventually they worked their way down. . . one in each foot.
We got a pretty good kick out of that. I have to wonder if she didn't want us to take the binky away, so she was hiding them. Usually when we get her up in the morning we take the binky from her. So I wonder if she thought she'd get away with it. . . . .or she just found a hole where she could stick something small and there were only two things small enough to fit in the hole. :)

Yummy

2009-01-22T13:24:00.003-07:00

I made this for an activity days leader meeting I had. I've always wanted to try making one and look how yummy it turned out! I was so excited. Maybe one day I'll make one for you too.

Here's a link to the recipe I used. I did use different fruit. Well you can see what I did different from the recpie. Try it sometime. It's YUMMY!

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/fresh-fruit-tart-recipe/index.html

Marthe

Updated Pictures

2009-01-05T08:15:00.006-07:00

Here's some updated pictures for you guys of the family.
Enjoy!

ALL DONE!

2008-12-26T22:29:00.000-07:00

Just got my last letter from NCARB (National Council of Architectural Registration Boards).
I have passed my last test.
Now I just have to do some houskeeping things at the state level and pay my fee to become an official registered (licensed) Architect!
Merry Christmas To Me!

I am very blessed.
Heavenly Father helped me a lot through these tests.
There were many tests where I came out thinking I had not done well enough to pass.
It is not typical to pass all 9 the first time.
HKS has been great at providing resources and an environment that helps with studying for the tests.
There have been a few people at my work who have passed all 9 without having to retake any.
I am grateful to work for such a great company.

Thanks to all of you who supported me and put up with my odd study hours to meet this goal for this year.

A Crafty Halloween

2008-11-02T20:40:00.004-07:00

This is my first major craft project since I got out of school over 3 years ago.

And to complete the project, you have to have corresponding outfits for the rest of the family! :)

Pumpkins galore! and HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

2008-10-28T14:17:00.003-06:00

The kids get a huge kick out of picking out pumpkins each year.... we have yet to carve them, but that will happen soon. Unfortunatley we will have to replace two of them that have gotten a bit on the soggy side.

Happy Birthday to Sadie!

Sometimes I wish I could be one again. Wouldn't it be nice if someone did just about everything for you? Okay so it would drive me absolutely batty... but sometimes I do wish someone would do something for me.... Like maybe the laundry or the dishes or the toilets.... hint hint!

I Love Being In Kindergarten Again!

2008-09-27T21:29:00.003-06:00

A couple of short clips for you today.

Being a kindergartener is soooo fun.

The Future's So Bright, I gotta Wear Shades

2008-09-13T16:18:00.001-06:00

Ok, so these were pictures that were too fun not to share.

Enjoy!

School and outside fun!

2008-08-13T22:11:00.002-06:00

The First Day of school!
They were both excited, but Tommy was dissappointed when he found out kindergarten didn't start til the next week.... but they both are enjoying it now.

Teeter toter....
bread and water....
Not sure where Mark went in this picture... Maybe he got bounced off... that is the favorite thing to do on the teeter toter.
Even Sadie loves the teeter toter! Well she really loves anything that happens to be outside.

SPENCER AND THE LEGO

2008-07-13T15:28:00.002-06:00

These Legos are not very large.

They are among the smallest lego pieces available.

They fit into very small parts of any model to add a little extra detail.

. . . apparently Spencer decided his nose needed some more detail.

Yes, I was at the church and got a frantic call from Marthe telling me to please quickly come home because Spencer stuck a Lego up his nose and it was bleeding.

Of course, it is not hard to make Spencer's nose bleed.

You could look at it the wrong way and it would start to bleed.

Needless to say, I came home right away and by the time I got home, Marthe had pinned him down and made the extraction.

Spencer is just fine (So don't ask me how his nose is, or if he is ok Mom).

It will be a good one to laugh about for a long time.

Oh. . . this picture was taken before I left to go back over to the church after we brought them home. . . . Our little nose-picker. . . .and apparently nose-stuffer. . .. .I think he understands that we shouldn't put things up our nose anymore. :)

Moroni Added to Temple

2008-07-13T15:21:00.002-06:00

On the way home from work on Friday, we noticed that Moroni had been placed on the Temple. I had heard that Moroni had been placed on the top of the Draper Temple on Tuesday. I think that he must have been added to our Temple on either Thursday or Friday sometime. The church doesn't publicize these things very much. There were people in our ward who caught wind of it and went to see it put on the temple. They said it was pretty fun to watch.

We're excited to have a Temple so close to us. The Draper Temple is nice and all, but our Temple here is architecturally superior. :) It has a very pleasant look to it and you can now see Moroni poking up along many of the major view corridors that have been created here at Daybreak.

It is a nice reminder of how the work of the Lord continues to move forward.

ROAR!!!!!!

2008-06-07T12:08:00.003-06:00

We went to a distant land yesterday... so distant infact we happened to find dinosaurs still in existance! Boy, Ogden sure is behind the times!

It sure was fun though. The kids thought it was great and Dave and I had fun too. Mark is doing a project for school and he picked dinosaurs as his topic, specifically the T-rex. We thought the dinosaur park would be a good source of info. It turned out to be just the right amount.

Watch out she's DANGEROUS!!!

But she sure is cute!

Oh I'm being eaten by a dinosaur, a dinosaur, a dinosaur. Oh I'm being eaten by a dinosaur and I don't like it one bit!

Cute huh?

Tommy's 5-Year Old Pictures

2008-05-25T21:12:00.004-06:00

We were a little slow at getting Tommy's pictures after he turned 5.
But he's still as cute as he was in March when he had his birthday.

Our Cute Little Girl

2008-05-14T20:17:00.006-06:00

I haven't updated the blog for a while.
Here are some pictures for you to look at in the meantime.

Oquirrh Mountain Temple Progress

2008-03-25T21:05:00.005-06:00

Just an update on how the Temple is coming along in the neighborhood. The original estimate for completion was/is January of next year. However, they apparently are importing the exterior stone from China and that may push things back to March. . . . (coming from someone who deals with contractors a lot makes it sound like the contractor is trying to buy more time). I guess we'll see. Buildings usually take a little longer than estimates predict.

Easter Egg Hunts 2, 3, 4 & 5

2008-03-25T20:55:00.005-06:00

So, as you might imagine, I did not take pictures of all the easter egg hunts the kids had this year. Easter egg hunt #2 happened Saturday morning at our house. Hunt #3 was at Marthe's parents church with the Winterton portion of the family. Hunt #4 was inside at grandma Lael's house and #5 was outside at grandma Lael's house. They had lots of fun.

The First Easter Egg Hunt

2008-03-21T21:38:00.004-06:00

Well, you can't let Easter pass by without several easter egg hunts.Our neighborhood had a flashlight easter egg hunt last night.It was pretty fun. We found a bunch of easter eggs and lost one of Sadie's socks and one of the flashlights. . . but it was fun.

Our Future Sunbeep

2008-03-21T21:27:00.004-06:00

What is better than a kid singing primary songs enthusiastically?
Take a look. . .

More fun Photos

2008-02-21T21:22:00.003-07:00

Not much to say today. I just wanted to share some more photos.

Yes, Sadie is the oldest. . . and the smallest. . . go figure.

Patton (center) is 1 week younger and Max (left) is 2 1/2 months younger.

New Link Added

2008-02-03T22:56:00.001-07:00

FYI,
I added a link to my work's web site on the links bar for your enjoyment.

Snow Ordinary Sunday

2008-02-03T22:28:00.001-07:00

Well, we had quite a bit of snow today.
They only did sacrament meeting for church.
We let the boys go out and play in the snow since 24" of snow is not a typical occurance. It also allowed me to help some of my neighbors get out of their houses.
I spent most of the day shoveling walks, driveways, alley entrances/exits etc so people could get out when they needed to. We're supposed to get hit with another bit of snow this evening.
Some of the neighbor dads shoveled snow and made a snow mound/cave tunnel.
The kids had fun on it for a while.

Sadie is about 24" tall, so you can see how much snow there was.

The pile behind her is the fresh snow on the ground and not the stuff shoveled off of the sidewalk. It was windy, so some of the drifts got up to 4' high against some people's houses.

Below is a typical pile of snow from a very small driveway.

We had to get creative with where we put the snow.

We only have about 2 feet on each side of our driveway before you hit a vinyl fence.

I did not want to pack a lot of snow against the fence, so I opened the gate to our back yard and now there is a similar pile in our back yard.

I'm going to be very sore tomorrow.

In Memory of A Spiritual Hero

2008-01-28T07:50:00.001-07:00

Well, my heart is full today.

President Hinckley died last night at +\- 7:00 pm at his apartment with friends and family. He truly was a prophet of God and his legacy will continue to influence us all through the millennium. He was one of my greatest heroes whose constant encouragement to keep the commandments fortified my soul. What a great example. He was busy doing the Lord’s work until he died. Just a few weeks before, he dedicated the capitol building after its extensive renovation and seismic upgrade. Just as engineers could lift up and strengthen the building against the elements, so President Hinckley has strengthened the Church against the tempests and tremors of the world if we will but heed his teachings. And now we move forward, I believe he would be frustrated to see us morn his physical death, for he is now more alive than he has ever been. What a great reception he must have had into the spirit world and the arms of the Father and The Son.

Yes, Marthe Made It.

2008-01-20T15:09:00.000-07:00

Luckily it took less than 3 years to crank this sweater out.

Marthe learned knitting by making a pair of socks for herself. . . It took 3 years. . . and they are almost done.

But in the meantime, she tested he knit whit skills by making this nice . . uh. . sweater for Sadie.

You can have one too for the small price of . . . a long wait.

"These are My Eyes!" - Spencer

2008-01-20T14:57:00.000-07:00

It is amazing how much fun you can have with a pair of cheap googly eyes.

A New Year. . . How About A New Post

2008-01-03T21:48:00.000-07:00

It's fun to have in-laws, even if they are a bit crazy.

We had a fun time together during the holidays.

May and JJ are visiting from Malaysia for a few more days.

I think they had a lot of fun here.

They've been here since October and will be going back next week.

Yes. . . He has a lot of energy.

But they're all so cute.

Dallas 2007 - Day 3 & 4

2007-12-10T21:50:00.000-07:00

We had breakfast with some reindeer at the plaza of the Americas.

Of course, you need an ice rink inside your hotel/mall.

It must be fun to be so beautiful.

Come take a ride on the trolley. . . It's free.

Yep, that's an HKS project.

Nope, not an HKS project. Philip Johnson, famous architect.

HOK ripped off the idea and used it for the RLDS Temple in Missouri.

Still a cool idea.

We had a blast at the Saturday evening party. . . as you can see, Sadie was into it.

This was the result of the party.
(Or maybe she was just excited to get back to the room)

Dallas 2007 - Day 2

2007-12-07T21:35:00.001-07:00

Day 2 in Dallas was fun. It is hard not to miss the kids. Marthe got a bit bored in the morning, but we had lunch together and then they had a shuttle to the Dallas Galleria Mall for the afternoon. She and Sadie walked around and had fun there. Below are some pictures of the 4-story christmas tree and the ice rink at its base.

I had meetings in the morning and in the afternoon. The last meeting of the day held quite the surprise. A lot of awards were given out. Two awards were given out for excellence in sustainable design. I was surprised when they called my name. I'm not designing much, but I'm doing a lot of nagging about how we can design green in the firm. I have been working on a tracking/navigation system for projects that may help in the way HKS decides to direct its future. It is fun to be involved even if none of my ideas are used. Anyway, they appreciate the help. I guess I was surprised to see how much they appreciated it. Another guy I've been working will from Dallas won the second of two awards for excellence in sustainable design. Hopefully in the future it will be very hard to pick winners for this award because everyone is excelling at sustainable design. That would be the real achievement.

Dallas-2007 Day 1

2007-12-06T20:43:00.000-07:00

Traveled to Dallas today. Sadie came with us. The boys stayed with Grandma Lael. . . they're having too much fun to miss us.

Anyway, Sadie slept through the plane ride and we're now staying at the Fairmont hotel in downtown Dallas.

We had some time to do whatever we wanted to today. Tomorrow will be my company training stuff and an evening party. Saturday will also be a free day with a party in the evening. We'll be coming home on Sunday.

The Dallas Museum of Art is right by our hotel. We enjoyed looking at pictures you read about in textbooks. This one is by Jackson Pollock. It is similar to one in an Olivia book that Tommy likes to read before bed every once and a while. Olivia says she just doesn't get it and that she can do that in about 5 seconds and when she gets home she tries.

I enjoyed seeing some of Piere Mondrian's (spelling probably wrong) work.

Very simple, yet interesting.

There was some work by Kandinsky and others of a simlar time period too.

Kristen wasn't here to see some great paintings by Monet. We enjoyed them for her. The are quite wonderful. The photo of the painting tends to make it look more like the scene than just looking at it in real life.

The one below is a Van Gough. It was also very good. There were lots of interesting things including a mummy coffin that they took out a peice of the coffin so you could see the mummified feed of whoever was in the coffin.

Anyway, we're having fun. We had dinner with some of the people from the office. We ate at a mexican restaurant. We ordered things that we would typically order in Utah, but they were way to hot here. . . so Marthe had some oatmeal when we got back to our room. Good thing we're prepared.

Stay tuned for tomorrow's post.

Funny Elves

2007-12-01T13:05:00.000-07:00

My friend Maasa at work showed me this web site.

It is great fun. Hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1125235315

Thanksgiving Activities

2007-11-24T15:28:00.000-07:00

We had the family over for thanksgiving dinner.

Everyone "slept" over and so we all were pretty tired for Thanksgiving.

But everyone had a fun time anyway.
We took the kids over to the park while the womenfolk made the dinner.

Oh, and here's one more picture of Saide. :)

Need We Say More?

2007-11-24T15:26:00.001-07:00

Need we say more?

Still Good Friends

2007-11-08T20:36:00.000-07:00

We had a fun get together with some old friends the other day.

Jared's kids are getting big. Mike and Sarah's kids are big too.

It was fun to see Mr. Niemann and Andy as well. The next get-together

will be at the ward christmas party in December.

That will be fun.

Baby Feet

2007-11-08T20:33:00.000-07:00

Here's something for you folks who like baby feet.
She's pretty cute isn't she?

Happy Halloween People

2007-11-03T15:03:00.000-06:00

So Halloween was fun. The boys. . I mean Spiderman, Dash and Lion had a lot of fun. And the pea-pod couldn't tell the difference, so she had fun too.

People at my work dressed up, so I decided to be a Lion Contractor. Some people got it, others did not. But it was fun.

Anyway. Here's the photos.

Happy Halloween!!

2007-10-30T21:57:00.001-06:00

We had fun making pumpkins for Halloween today. Marthe was the most ambitious.
Have a great Halloween tomorrow!

2007-10-24T22:09:00.000-06:00

It's always fun to update a few pictures, even if I don't have a lot to say. Marthe and I are getting a bit of sleep here and there. I have decided that I'm just in a constant state of almost-awake which probably equals a full nights sleep. . . eventually.
She's worth it though.

A few more fun things before going back to work

2007-10-17T20:39:00.000-06:00

We took the kids to the local pumpkin patch on Monday to get some pumpkins. They have tractors there that the kids like to sit on. We got a bunch of pumkins for 6.00. It's a great deal and only a couple minutes from the house (behind the movie theater). It was a nice warm day so Sadie even came along.

Yesterday (Tuesday) I was still off work so I could take Tommy with his preschool class to HEE HAW. It was a fun trip. Tommy and Spencer enjoyed walking through part of a corn maze, going down slides, seeing a 1000lb pig, going on a hay ride and picking out some more pumpkins to take home.

She's Here!!!

2007-10-10T19:59:00.000-06:00

Sadie Ann Henderson was born at 12:37 am.

She weighed 6lbs 12oz.

She was 19.5" long.

She has strawberry-blonde, slightly curly hair.

She has Tommy's eyelashes (now we won't have to hear about the lashes being "wasted" on a boy. :)

Mom and baby are healthy and doing fine.

The boys are hanging out with Grandma Lael and are excited for the new addition to the family.

Mission Reunion

2007-10-07T21:36:00.001-06:00

I enjoyed going to my mission reunion the other day. To the right of me is Raymond Waldon and to the right of him is Carson Howell and to the right of him is Moroniah Walden. All three of these lovely folks were serving at the same time I was serving. It was really fun to see them. The Waldens have two beautiful children and the Howells had two cute ones as well. Carson's little girl was very cute and was very social. My boys enjoyed running around with the Walden kids and Carson's son.
Elders Beene and Hall got stuck in traffic and were not able to make it up. That's ok, it just made it easier to tell jokes about them. :)

Canstruction - The iCan

2007-10-03T21:05:00.001-06:00

Ok so I am trying to upload more pictures but the site is giving me a hard time.

I was able to upload one image at least.

I worked with others at my work to participate in this year's canstruction event for the Utah Food Bank (http://www.csc-ut.org/).

We raised money for the cans and the idea for the design just kind of landed on me as I was driving home one day. It was a fun project and although we did not receive any awards, it was very worthwhile.

It took more time than I expected, but no one wanted to head it up. So it was either Dave's in charge, or we just won't do it this time.

I have a hard time passing up opportunities to help the homeless and hungry people of Utah.

So there it is. The iCan. I designed the board to look like an advertisement for an iPod.

The sculptures will be on display for a couple weeks.

Ok, I'll try and upload another picture.

Oh good. It worked. Now you have 2 pictures to look at.

Enjoy!

It was bigger in real life

2007-10-03T20:42:00.000-06:00

This was my view as I arrived at work the other morning.

The moon was huge, however the photo does not make it look as big as it seemed.

Anyway, I thought it was cool enough to take a picture.

Ok, I enabled the commenting. . . I think

2007-09-30T22:11:00.000-06:00

So after 99% of the small group of people who view my blog have complained about not being able to comment, I have enabled the comment feature.

The picture to the right was taken a few weeks ago. We took the canoe out on the lake by our house. The boys had a lot of fun. . . Marthe was grateful to be back on dry land. :)

We enjoyed the snow yesterday.

Tommy was yelling to me that it was snowing and I kind of said, whatever.

Then I went and looked, and sure enough, it was snowing.

We'll not much else to say for this week.

Stay tuned for the Canstruction event pictures next week.

I'll explain in the next posting.

Fun Stuff in the Yard

2007-09-23T21:01:00.000-06:00

Here's a little something we have in our yard. I tried to find out if it was poisonous or not, but it doesn't seem to be so. It is in the orb weaver family. Anyway, it was in our window well when I took this picture. It since progressed to a main level window screen and then . . . . it could be anywhere.

Tommy is having fun with preschool and Spencer says he likes preschool too.. . . he, of course, doesn't have preschool. Mark says he can spell ham because. . . duh!! it only has like three letters. 1st graders are so smart.

It has been raining here. It has cooled off a lot. Its kind of nice.

We enjoyed international talk like a pirate day. ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!! See.

She forced me into doing it!

2007-09-19T20:48:00.000-06:00

So little sister convinced me that I do blogging. You can click on post title to follow link to her expert blog spot. We'll give it a shot for a while and see what we come up with.