Thanksgiving 2008

It was so great to see everyone last week over Thanksgiving. We really enjoyed our week back in the Midwest--watching College Football with friends, visiting the little brother's new place, staying with my parents (including yet another tour of Kingwood Center and Glen's Surplus) and catching up with Jenn, Buttons, Grandma, Grandpa and all of my Aunts, Uncles, and Cousins.

We also started what might become a new Thanksgiving tradition... why sleep on the couch and watch football when you can go outside and play it? Cousin Drew beat me deep on several pass receptions (seemingly all for touchdowns), and while my Option Offense scored us a couple of touchdowns I couldn't help but throw just as many interceptions... proving exactly why I never was a football player.

My Uncle Mike was taking pictures with his camera, and he forwarded the pictures of our Thanksgiving celebration so that I might share them on the blog.

I think everyone can agree that after a much more subdued Thanksgiving celebration last year, the turkey and dressing never tasted so good!

GO-BAMA!

I hope that everyone enjoyed a historic election night on Tuesday. I am proud that someday I can tell my children that I helped put the first African American president in the White House. I want to give a shout-out to Ohio, who finally made up their mind in an election. As soon as Jason and I leave the state, they finally get it right! Hopefully, NC will come into the fold as well. I am looking forward to the change that we so deeply need. I am hopeful that Obama can lead us in the right direction.

Nightmare Scenario--Remember to Vote on Tuesday!

Click the picture (above this text) to play the video. (Make sure your speakers are turned on!)

REMEMBER: Don't let this be you!!!

(One Last Reminder)
Photo credit: Jarrod Craft

Congratulations Jason !!!

This morning, Jason passed his PMP exam to become a certified Project Management Professional. While most people take months to study, Jas decided to do it in only 3 weeks. While it's been a stressful 3 weeks (you thought that I was the uptight one!), it was definitely worth it. Congratulations Jason!!! We're so proud of you!

Deck Project "Complete"

After 8 long days (6:30AM - 9PM) as well as several evenings of hard work as well as the last few evenings after everyone has went back to work, the Deck Project is mostly complete. It was a beast of a project, but turned out exactly as we had planned.

Some stats on the project:
Deck size: 35 feet wide by 14 feet long (including steps)
Deck height: Approximately 9 feet above the concrete patio.
Number of steps: 14 (which took about 2 days all by themselves)
Unique Feature: Chalk Water Drainage System (patent pending) funnels all rainwater through a gutter system, allowing for a finished ceiling (along with lighting, ceiling fans, etc) to be installed at a later date.

Holly actually put the last screws into deck boards today, and the only things left to do is to install the downspout off the gutter and do a massive clean of the deck, patio, worksite, house, and garage. We worked our tails off, but the project turned out pretty good.

A **HUGE** Thank-You to my parents... Dad is a tremendous engineer and carpenter, and the deck is truly one of his masterpieces. Mom made many, many, many trips to and from Lowe's, Home Depot, and several other places as well as helping to craft and install the drainage system. Matt and Jenn also came out to visit, and while the visit involved mostly work (Thank you!), they did get a chance to stop in at Ravens Training Camp, Gettysburg, and have a nice Seafood dinner. As you can see in the pictures, Holly got her hands very dirty as well, and she wasn't afraid to grab a hammer, start cutting deck boards, or throw herself into a million other tasks as well.

I'll post more pictures of the completed project once everything is cleaned up, furniture is set up, and it is truly "done". There is still probably a solid day of cleanup left, but I hope to spread that over Saturday and Sunday among frequent dips into our new hot tub (that Jenn and Matt helped us break in!).

Without further ado, ChalkDeck 2.0 (ChalkDeck 1.0 can be found here):

Patio Project Complete -- Stay Tuned for Deck!

Fellow Chalboard readers,

We couldn't keep you in suspense any longer. The patio project is 99% complete, and we had to share pictures of the beautiful patio that we now have in our back yard...



We also have the last gallery of patio pictures. This should fill you in on what happened since the last step. They power-washed the concrete to bring it to the basic white-with-beige-texture color. They then finished and textured the sides. All of this happened yesterday, and today they came out to stain and seal the patio.

The staining process took about 5 hours, as two of Visual Concrete's best painstakingly stained each individual "brick" by hand. They also stained the sides and the steps as well. As you can see from the pictures, this brought the patio to life. Finally, they applied a sealer to lock in the color and to protect the concrete, stain and all so that we can enjoy this beautiful masterpiece for many years to come.

We had high expectations for the patio, but I honestly believe that Visual Concrete managed to exceed those expectations. This sets a high standard for our deck project next week! Stay tuned for pictures from the deck, as well as final pictures (hopefully!) of the entire project!

Concrete Poured and Stamped

Today was a big day in the Patio/Deck saga that is our summer. Bright and early at 6:30 this morning, the cement truck pulled up (the first of 2...). It was time to pour concrete!

Everything was a blur, but here were the key steps (once everything was prepared):
1. Concrete was poured and smoothed to a glossy finish (16 yards of concrete--which is about 1.6 loads of a heavy-duty concrete truck!).

2. Color Hardener (which is "Ash White" in color) was then thrown on the entirety of the concrete. The concrete is re-smoothed to a glossy finish so that the Ash White color is completely in the top layer of concrete.

3. Stamping time! Release color (which is "Smoke Beige" in color) was then thrown onto the top of the concrete just ahead of where several guys were starting to stamp. They used about 8 different stamps (all of them were numbered for a specific pattern). The workers would throw Release, put a stamp down, stamp it with a big, handled, weight, and then repeat. They worked one end of the patio to the other on the top, then the same on the bottom.

4. They finished the tops of the steps with a texture stamp, but not with a pattern (since the steps are too small with a pattern).

They were all done and cleaned up by noon, and the results are amazing. (Pictures below). The pictures show more the beige color in the release, but once they pressure wash it, the hardener "white" color will come back through.

Next up, they will come back and finish the sides and the risers in the steps, cut relief lines, and then power wash it.

On Wednesday, they will be back out for the staining process, where the actual "stones" will come to life as individually colored pieces. At that point, the Patio will be complete!

ALL Pictures (of the process too) below:

Patio Project -- Getting Ready for Concrete

All,

The Patio Project is moving on schedule. Concrete is being poured on Monday, and the whole patio will be finished on Wednesday... just in time for deck construction to begin.

Here are some pictures I've taken after the two main days worth of excavating and framing. You can really see the patio starting to take shape.

Enjoy!

Patio Project Under Way!

Dad and I are at it again.

Digging, digging, digging, and then more digging. We dug post holes, we dug trenches, we dug around boulders... we dug in 95 degree weather.

We also determined that approximately 50% of the land we own consists of rock. One boulder in particular caused us to grow our deck an extra foot, because the 4+ foot long rock was exactly where we wanted to put a deck posts.

However, with steady work from sunrise to sunset and careful planning, the end of the weekend yielded all objectives complete and a job well done. Our deck posts are set, our drainage tiles are ran, the hot tub wiring is complete, and we even ran electricity to the corner of our property for a future outbuilding.

Everything is set for the concrete crew to come next week. We'll keep you posted as we continue on the project.

Thank you so much, Mom and Dad, for driving all the way out here and helping us build our backyard masterpiece!

I told you! He will change the world!

That's right! Almost 4 years ago, I told many of you that Barack Obama is going to change the world. I forced his books upon many of you, assuring you that you would need to know about this guy. Most of you didn't believe me (admittedly, because I sometimes make crazy predictions), but now we're half-way there! If you don't know much about Barack Obama (or if you think he is a "secret Muslim" - you know who you are), please visit his website at http://www.barackobama.com/ to learn more about him.

"Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek. " -Barack Obama

Sunny Gone but not Forgotten

Chalkboard readers,

I'm sure that almost all of you already know, but I wanted to share with those that didn't that Sunny lost his fight with E. Cunniculi this past week.

Holly and I made the tough decision to put Sunny to sleep on Tuesday evening. While his head tilt had improved (and was largely cured), he had lost a lot of weight in the process. He was starting to put some of the weight back on, but then started having trouble eating and digesting. Over the Memorial Day weekend, he lost all of the weight that he gained back and then some. After completely losing his appetite, we took him to the vet on Tuesday where they ran some blood tests. His kidneys had completely shut down (the readings were off the charts), and outside of bunny dialysis, there would be no stopping the inevitable from happening. The E. Cunniculi that Sunny had attacks the brain and the kidneys, among other organs, and while he was able to fight the parasite in his brain, the kidneys did him in.

He was a fighter to the end, but the odds were stacked too
much against him.

Our friend Ryan was visiting over the weekend, and Sunny had a particularly good day on Saturday before things got bad. We took this opportunity to get Sunny out of his pen and let him run around the living room--one of his favorite things to do. He ran around for a bit to stretch his legs, then as always, gravitated back to us for head-pats and attention. Ryan captured these pictures of Sunny's last "good" day. I post them to show how much of a fighter Sunny was--how he was largely improved from his earlier pictures (in terms of head tilt), and to put some closure to the 4 and a half years Sunny was a happy member of our little family.

Jenn and Buttons--Homeowners

Congratulations to Jenn and Buttons who just closed on their beautiful new home. From the pictures below, it looks gorgeous! Holly and I are jealous at the size of your kitchen!!!

Enjoy the fun owning a home can bring... as well as the true enjoyment of knowing you don't have to move out when the lease is up! (Year, after year, after year...)

Sunny: "Don't count me out yet!"

Sunny has been showing slow, but steady, improvement consistently over the last 5 days or so. Every morning after we feed him, we've been placing him on a towel on the floor (outside the protective confines of his box) just to see how he would do without something to rest against. At first, he could sit for about a minute before falling over... then he started sitting comfortably, but not daring to move. On Friday, he started balancing on 3 feet and licking and cleaning his paw.

This morning, I sat Sunny on his towel, and as soon as his feet were on the ground, he was taking a couple of short steps. Surprising both of us, he stopped, looked at me, and then took off across the living room! Granted, he was weaving and moving slow and unbalanced, but he managed to thump the floor once he made it across the room.

He thumped three times, and looked at us, almost as if to say "stop feeding me that food and get me out of that box!". Well... he is no longer in the box, but he'll be getting fed twice a day for the next week or so until he starts eating on his own a little better, and he will be taking his medicine for probably the rest of his life.

We wanted to put a few pictures up now that he is a little bit better, so you can see how he is doing. He has a long way to go (he is still pretty tilted), but he has clearly turned the tide.

Thanks for all of your well wishes--Sunny is firmly in recovery!

A Sick Bunny

Sunny the Funny Bunny is not having such a good time of things... last Monday (the 14th) we noticed his head tilted slightly to the left. We got him out of his pen to see how he hopped around, and his coordination was clearly starting to go.

E. Cunniculi had struck again... but we were prepared.

First thing the next morning, we called the vet in Columbus and had Sunny's records faxed to a vet here in Westminster. That afternoon, the vet saw Sunny and verified our suspicions--the parasite was back. Armed with a handful of medication--antibiotics and his favorite Benzadole medicine--Holly headed home with our sick rabbit.

Things went downhill fast. By the end of the evening, Sunny could no longer control himself, and when he wasn't flipping, he was laying flat on his back. We cleared out his pen, got him into a box lined with towels, and settled in for the long hall. The box keeps him from hurting himself, gives him four easy walls to lean against, and also gives him absolutely nothing to do but lay around and sleep.

Besides laying in his box, Sunny has been routinely getting 3 feedings a day of "Critical Care"--an "add water" food/paste that he absolutely hates. We've been keeping up on this and monitoring his weight closely (we inadvertently were underfeeding him last time). Unfortunately, his condition continued to get worse.

Last time it took Sunny a full month to recover, but with us reacting quickly, it seemed that his decline started to slow down over the weekend. This was good, because he couldn't get much worse.

Around Tuesday, I was thinking that perhaps Sunny wouldn't make it this time... then the amazing started to happen. He started getting a little more active, started to stand up a little straighter, and started to perk up a little bit. He's starting to eat again a little bit too (if we hand-feed him so he doesn't have t search for it). He's also standing unassisted in his box... although if we take him out of it he is unsure of himself and rolls into a ball.

The poor guy has been through a lot again, and he is nowhere out of the woods yet, but he is showing that he wants to fight, and is even playing around in his box a little bit to pass the time. I think between us catching it early and knowing exactly how to take care of him, we just might be able to save our little rabbit one more time!

Thanks to everyone for the well wishes... especially the cards from Mom and Jenn! We show them to Sunny, and he actually is looking at them now (probably wondering how they would taste).

We don't like posting pictures of Sunny when he is sick, but with a little bit of luck, we hope to post pictures of a happy and recovering rabbit in a couple more weeks!

Jason has a "new job" at T. Rowe Price!

While I had been working for T. Rowe Price since last October, I was doing the work via a contracting company called Vision Technology Services. While Vision is a great company, my time at T. Rowe was limited to just the 2 year period on my contract.

Throughout my time with Accenture, I had the opportunity to do work for a wide range of companies across the financial services industry. While I had good and bad experiences at all companies, I immediately felt "at home" with T. Rowe. The working atmosphere is tremendous, and I finally felt that I have found a company that I could see myself with for a long time.

When that opportunity came up a few weeks ago, I couldn't turn it down. I'm very excited about the opportunity to stay for a long time and leave a positive impact on a company that I really believe in.

My "new job" starts April 14th!

Old and New

It has been awhile since I blogged, but as the weather starts to get warmer outside, I wanted to share what has been keeping Holly and I entertained over the past few cold months.

My Grandpa Mort had a record player that fascinated me as a kid. It sat atop of Grandma's piano in this beautiful but worn hardwood case and was crank operated. Even more impressively, it didn't play the familiar records that I was used to--flat LP discs that everyone thinks of when they talk about a "record player". Instead, it played these little blue cylinders. I loved hearing it play, growing up, knowing that the music and words spoken were from a time long forgotten.

I don't know the history of how my Grandpa came to own what I now know is an Edison Amberola Phonograph (which was manufactured in the 1910s, but gave way to the records we know today in the 1920s), but I've heard both Grandpa and other recount stories of how this record player was the only entertainment he could afford during the Great Depression.

Listening to the Amberola, you realize how much entertainment and technology has changed over the last 100 years. While the music and the technology certainly has changed, some things haven't. Some songs--mostly patriotic and folk songs--are still played today, while others have faded into history. Also, while the technology has advanced a thousand-fold, the Amberola has the distinction of participating in the first "media format war". When conflicting media formats are discussed, many people think VHS versus Beta video tapes, or the more recent HD-DVD vs. Blu-Ray DVDs. However Edison and the Victor Talking Machine Company had different ideas of how audio should be captured and played (mostly to avoid paying Edison any royalties on his cylindrical recording patents). Edison had the cylinder, and Victor (of Victorola fame) had the records that we know of today.

Knowing of my fascination for this wonderful antique, my Grandpa and Grandma left me the record player. My Dad held onto it for a couple of years as we moved out to Maryland, and while he had it he restored it to the beautiful condition it's in today. He also built a gorgeous stand for it, where I can keep all of the records that my Grandpa played over 70 years ago. The stand, made of Oak, contains wood that my Dad harvested from my Grandpa's forest, and is a gorgeous piece of furniture itself. They compliment each other perfectly, and I hope that the pair stay in our family for many more generations.

You can see the pictures of the Amberola in its new home below. Also in the set of pictures is the other piece of equipment that has entertained us this year, our new Samsung 1080P 47" LCD HDTV. While the LCD TV in our family room is truly beautiful to watch television on, the Amberola still draws us to the living room almost as often... something that I don't think our Grandchildren be able to say of any LCD TV in 100 years.

Some Competition?

It appears that we have a little bit of competition out there, for some of the dear readers of the ChalkBoard...

My cousin, Kelsey (pictured above), recently put together a Blog of her very own, and I have to say it's pretty impressive, especially considering that Kelsey is now just starting to master multiplication and division in school!

I put a link to her Blog on the right column of my page, where it will be for as long as her site is up! Of course I am doing this because her Blog is really pretty good and is fun to read... however it also looks like Kelsey has VIDEO on her Blog... this is something even I have never done before. It's clear that Kelsey now knows more about computers than I do, so now you can go over to her Blog and ask her when your computer starts malfunctioning! (Just kidding, Kelsey!)

Nice job, and welcome to the Blog-o-sphere!

Pictures from Spain

I've got a selection of pictures from Spain posted online (and also to Grandma's picture frame).

This was a tremendous vacation, and hopefully you can see how busy we were, and how much we were able to do in just 4 short days! We took 492 pictures, but we chose the top 100 to share with ChalkBoard Nation. Spain is truly a beautiful place, and the places that we visited (in order--Madrid, Toledo, Escorial, then back in Madrid) were all tremendous. Further, the people there were all very friendly and accommodating of our less-than-fluent Spanish... let's just say that Holly can't make fun of me anymore for not being able to communicate in France.

Below, the pictures should automatically scroll, but if you want the "full size" pictures, click on them and it will bring up the Picasa web site, where you can see them at "full" size.

Home Safe and Sound

All,

Just wanted to let everyone know that we have made it home safely from our trip to Madrid, Spain. It was a crazy weekend, but a lot of fun. We got in late last night, but both made it into work this morning!

Pictures will be coming probably this weekend when we have time to catch our breath!