Friday June 11, 2010

For today's installment I will discuss Brianna and her tee ball adventures. This is the second class she has taken, the first being soccer. The classes are set up with about 10 kids and one teacher/coach. They meet twice a week for a month. The classes consist of the teacher/coach giving the kids instruction and they have to follow the rules. Simple enough, right?

Well this tee ball is basically mass chaos. Some of the kids are younger than Bri and they have no concept of listening and following the rules. We are proud to report, that surprisingly, Brianna listens very well and follows the rules. Now if we can get her to do this at home. The kid who is teaching/coaching the kids does a great job, but I can sense the frustration. There is not enough money in the world for this guy. I am sure his minimum wage barely makes it to the bar after these classes.

The teacher/coach does a great job, but its too bad the parents lack in that category. When you see your kid playing Ring around in the Rosey in the outfield, its probably in your kids best interest if you tell them to stop and pay attention to the teacher/coach. When you show up to a baseball/softball class, its probably in your kids best interest to have a glove. When you see your kid take off to the other side of the gym, its in your kids best interest to stop and listen to what is going on. The list could go on, but I will stop for now because of this next intriguing story.

Just last week the teacher/coach was showing them how to throw a ball into a net with wiffle balls. Simple task. One of the mothers, who I am going to judge by calling her a "West O, Over Protective, Over Reactive, Mom". Her kid walks toward her and she put her finger in one of the holes of the wiffle ball. At this point, I thought this mom was going to call in the National Guard to deal with the catastrophe. The mom cant get the ball off her finger. Another mom is saying "you will have to get the hand soaked in ice cold water". Then the mom takes hand sanitizer and chap stick to use as lubricant to get the finger out. Meanwhile, the kid now freaks out and is crying hysterically. My dad happened to be with me since he was watching Bri that day, and I said to him, "just pull the wiffle ball off the finger!" I could not believe the drama of a wiffle ball stuck to a finger.

And now for a few pictures, Brianna and her tee ball class.

Tuesday June 7, 2010

A couple months ago Omaha became a stop for Iowa State's Cyclone Tailgate Tour. We had been talking about going to this since that first day. We told Bri that Cy would be there and she was very excited. She is terrified of mascots, but every event we go to a sporting event, she looks for them and waves at them, albeit 20 rows away. Just last week we met Tim and Brooke at a Royals game. The only entrance at the stadium was filled with mascots. It was the Royals' mascot Casey's birthday, so every mascot in the area was there. She freaked out, but once we sat in the last row, all she did was look for them and wave at them.

Now fast forward to tonight, Bri still had planned on giving Cy a high five and take a picture with him. She wanted to get the picture framed so it can go next to her bed. Well, once Cy made his appearance, she freaked out and wanted nothing to do with him. We rotated from one end of the function to the other, always away from Cy. When it was over I told her this was the last chance to see Cy. She agreed and decided to go get a picture. Well, she was too late, he was gone and probably headed toward the nearest bar. She said that was "OK because I can see him at a football game". Only time will tell on that one.

Here is a picture of Bri and the closest she was to Cy. Notice how Cy is in the far top right corner of the picture. The next two pictures are the only pictures Bri got with any of the coaches, Coaches Hoiberg and Rhoads. Every time we got close to another coach, Cy would be near and she would freak out.

Sunday June, 6, 2010

Since it has been a while, I figured now would be as good a time as any to get this started back up again. Just so you know, I am off for the next two weeks, so I should have plenty of time on my hands.......... Not really that much time, since we have been busy the past four days. On Thursday June 3, 2010 at 7:22 PM, our new addition finally arrived. Little, not really little, Emily Ann joins us. She was 9 pounds 13 ounces. Needless to say, shes a beast.

Here is a little run down on the events of last Thursday.

Kristy was finished working the second of three straight nights in a row. She had been talking for the past month that every night she worked was her last for twelve weeks. The only prediction that was correct was the due date the doctors came up with. Kristy thought for sure she would go early, but that did not happen.

So I was sitting at Bri's tee-ball, I will post about that later, when I got a text that said today was the day. I kind of shrugged it off, because when Bri was born, it was a 27 hour ordeal. Kristy said not to hurry, so we ate lunch and came home. Kristy said her water kind of broke, so we went in. Once she was admitted, I thought for sure families would show up in four hours and I would meet up with them at Paulie's for a few drinks before anything happened. To make a long story short, once the nurses' shift change was happening, little Emily was born. A grand total of eight hours plus of labor.

Here is one of our first pics of Emily with Bri and Kristy.

The whole time we never found out what we were having. We thought for sure it was a boy. Emily was the only girl name we came up with. It was definitely a shock to us. Bri was a little disappointed when we didn't name her Taylor Swift, but she will get over it. When I walked out into the waiting area I said we have a baby, but I did not tell any of our family what we had. I took Bri back first so she could make the announcement. I could hear the grumblings as I walked away. Here is the short video we took of Bri telling our family. She could not wait to get back out there to tell them.

Since then, Emily and Kristy are doing really well, minus getting good sleep, but the adjustment period begins. Even Reagan seems to be liking things, even though he knows he is now out numbered.

Wednesday May 19, 2010

It has been way too long since my last entry, but I thought I should post on something Kristy showed me today. The video below:

After watching this video, there is living proof that the new wave of "parents" in our society is ridiculous, like I mentioned in an earlier post about the parents at preschool. What message are the parents sending to their 8 year old girls? "It's OK to wear as little clothing as possible and to dance around in a whorish manner." (Maybe not the best word to use, but I couldn't come up with anything else) I understand the things that are being shown of TV are getting worse each year, but to subject your 8 year old daughter to this type of behavior is unbelievable. I fully understand how bad it will be in ten years or so when the monster gets to be in high school, but to know that there are parents out there like the ones in this video drives me crazy. Hence the phrase I mentioned a while ago in a previous post that Bri said "burring her boyfriend in the backyard". I am going to need a boatload of shovels. We can control our kids, but there will be sometimes when we cant control what the other parents are letting their kids to that will affect our own.

Now for some points on this video.

The father mentions how the video is designed for a dance competition and the video that is floating around the internet is taken out of context. What context is the competition designed for? I thought dance activities are to get kids active and doing something besides watching TV. The father should be the one appalled by this. I cant believe he supports this type of activity for his daughter. Then again, this is California and their daughter is being open minded with a free spirit. I bet they cant wait for the new pay-as-you-wish Panera opens there. (See my cousins Terry's blog, The Evans Politik)

Now the mother is something else as well. She said, and I paraphrase, that this Beyounce song is pop culture and one of the most popular songs of the decade. Are you serious? Its 2010, the beginning of a new decade!! She also said the costumes are designed for movement. No kidding they are designed for movement, the 8 year old girls are wearing nothing. When you wear nothing, therefore nothing restricts movement. I have a hard enough time putting the monster in her princess clothes because they are too small and her belly sticks out.

End of rant, just saw this video and it irritated me. Its a Brave New World out there, and if we don't stop to smell the roses and see what is going on it will only get worse.

Thursday March 18, 2010

For this installment I will do my best to describe what the issues are with the future of our youth. These kids aren't dumb or stupid, its their parents. The problems our society will endure is because of bad parenting.

My case in point is Brianna's pre-school. Below is a diagram using MS Paint. It's not very good, but its the best I could come up with. Back in August, we had to attend a parents meeting about the school. There are simple rules that they ask us parents to follow.This one simple rule that I am about to explain bugs me to death that its not followed by parents every single day.

Here is the diagram:

The diagram did not turn out like planned, but I will explain. The gray area is the parking lot. The main entrance is on the left and once inside the doors there is a waiting area. Once classes are done, they open the door and the parents line up to pick the kids up and leave. The rule that they asked us in the beginning is to walk in the door on the left, wait in line, and once you pick up your child, you continue walking in the same direction, illustrated by my red arrows, and exit on the other end. Once you exit on the other end of the building you turn around a corner and are back in the parking lot. Its a small room/hallway, so this is intended to keep one way traffic flowing to ease the congestion in the hallway.

Every single day, there are the same parents who never follow this rule. Yesterday it ticked me off even more because Bri's classroom in the first room, right by the entrance. So we all wait in line and the line goes out the door into the waiting area. We are in the doorway blocking it and the same mother that does this every week, goes to the end of the hallway to pick her kid up and then walks back toward our line. She he has to squeeze through all of us in line. There are even times when she tells her kid "we are going the wrong way", but she continues to do this. I usually just stare at her and wonder why she does not have to follow the rules of others.

When we see kids causing problems or not listening, its not 100% their fault, its their idiot parents. If the parents cant follow a simple rule, how in the hell are their kids suppose to be held accountable for the rules they are breaking? Its frustrating to see, but what can I do.

Today begins one of the best weekends in sports, the first and second rounds of the NCAA men's basketball tournament. UNI got hosed as being a 9 seed with 4 loses, but if they win today, they have a shot at shocking the county and beating Kansas. Go Panthers!!

Finally, I completed a few brackets this year. I submitted 2 to the local sports talk radio shows. One I completed on my own and the second one was Bri's first bracket. I am having issues loading it on here at this time, but we completed the bracket on what mascots were playing. Bri's Final Four is Ohio State vs. Butler and Clemson vs. Notre Dame. She has has Clemson beating Butler for the National Championship. In a few short weeks, we will see how well her bracket does. I could probably see that bracket beating the real ones I completed.

Wednesday March 3, 2010

OK, its been way too long. Kristy keeps asking me update this thing even though we live TOGETHER and she knows what happens everyday. So here we go.

As we were minding our own business getting ready to pick up some groceries some 17 year old girl backed into our car. I was in the process of dropping Kristy off in the crosswalk of a Hy-Vee and this girl backed into the rear passenger side door, right next to Bri. No injuries but Bri did say later that "when that girl hit us at Hy-Vee I hit my head". A few days later, she shows no signs of brain damage, just the same old talking all the time, not listening to us, unrolling a whole roll of toilet paper on the bathroom floor (see below), not going to bed on time, being grumpy in the morning, this list could go on for hours.

The insurance companies went to work really fast. Two days later we were notified to go get an estimate and set up a time to get it fixed. Who would have thought a one foot by one foot dent in our door would be over $2,200 in damage. Good thing we weren't at fault. Too bad it will take a month for us to get it in to get worked on and once its there, it will take five days to fix. We better get a Corvette or something fancy for a rental. Somehow, I see them giving us a mini-van.

On a related note to brain damage, Bri had a tough time this morning. I was taking her to pre-school and as I got her out of the car, I reached in a grabbed her back and hat. Bri is standing there looking at me with the bright sun shining in her eyes as I begin to shut the door. For some reason, she sways into the path of the door and I hammered her right above the eye and the impact knocked her on her butt. As I picked her up she had a mark on her face and had a few tears already. She said she wanted to go back home and go to bed. At this point, I thought maybe she is hurt. I walked her inside and dropped her off at her door and informed the teacher that she ran into the path of the closing door, so that mark was not caused by child abuse. I was anxiously awaiting protective services when I picked her up. I guess its time to go find a nice helmet (or helm-hat and Bri would say). Again, no signs of injury.

Here is the picture of Bri and the roll of toilet paper. This potty training is nice, but now she likes to screw around and make us angry at her. This is just one of those moments. Disregard her sitting on the toilet. An finally, back to Reagan. I have said this a million times before, but he has every right to bite, scratch, and fight with her on a daily basis. Below is a picture of her playing veterinarian with him. She bandaged up his paws. We only allowed her to bandage up the front, she wanted to do all four legs. He just sat there and let her do it. Speaking of Reagan, I found a video of him an Bri "playing". He is starting to realize that she is older and can put up with a good fight. He plays rough with me and I have some scratches to prove it. In the video, she is slapping him and he is jumping back at her. But we taught Reagan a good safe word whenever he and I are fighting with each other, "Kisses". In the video, you can hear Bri slap at him then say "kisses" and he stops and starts licking her.

OK, one more video. This was a Saturday when we watched Evan and Drew. They were maniacs. The video was taken around 10 pm, well after they were suppose to be in bed. They just ran and ran in circles. It made me tired just watching it.

And to polish this off this lengthy post, I will plug my cousin Terry's new blog. "The Evans Politick".

http://www.theevanspolitick.blogspot.com/

If any of you want a good view on politics, jump right in. He likes people to respond and post, so if anyone wants to join in, his email is at the top and fire away. If you don't agree with us, we will judge you to the fullest extent possible. (Just kidding, kind of)

Tuesday January 18, 2010

It has been about a month since my last visit and its been busy. Christmas was good. We pushed up the arrival of Santa Claus for Brianna this year due to weather. When she got up, she was excited to see what Santa brought her. She had been asking for a pretend puppy, and that's what she got. We have been having issues with Bri wanting to take pictures with our camera. She will throw a fit if we don't let her, so we bought her a kids digital camera. She loves it. A majority of her pictures are action shots, her running around and snapping pictures, but she has taken a few good ones.

Brianna and her standard action shot.

A grumpy self shot.
And finally one of her better pictures. At least she let Shawn and Morgan pose for this one.

The weather did hit the Omaha area like they predicted. We were able to leave Omaha a day early to beat the weather. We made it to my parents in Harlan without hitting any problems. Just a decent amount of rain. In Harlan the rain was starting to freeze on the city streets, but the interstate was just wet. Once we got to Baxter, the weather was not bad at all. Just foggy and some little freezing rain. When we woke up Christmas morning, it still did not snow like it was in Omaha. I believe it was around 37 degrees when we woke up but it dropped in a hurry.

We needed to make it back to Omaha for Kristy to work the Saturday after Christmas. The roads around Baxter were fine, but the closer we got to Omaha, the interstates were closing. We ended up staying another night in Baxter. We definately did not want to take our chances getting stuck in that maess.

We had no problem driving back, the interstates were good. The problem we ran into was, our driveway. I figured it would be bad, but not this bad. I had been in contact with a co-worker who had offered to bring his snow blower over to clear our driveway. Since we were gone I was not able to at least do some damage control during the storm.

There was around 4 feet of snow throughout the whole driveway, including the mess the County road crews made at the base of the driveway. This prompted us to retire the shovel and purchase a snow blower. I don't care if it doesn't snow again, the snow blower is worth its weight in gold.

Now our back yard, is even worse. 95% of the yard is full of snow, up over the fence in most parts. Poor Reagan had this large back yard that has been reduced to a small strip along the house. He has yet to even try to walk on the snow. This has also caused him to avoid going outside for his bathroom breaks. That lazy, 85 pound house dog, will be making messes at the Humane Society if he keeps this up.

All in all, 2009 has been a good year, minus this snow. Bri is enjoying her first year of preschool. Her teachers seem to enjoy her in class, the obviously do not know the real Brianna. We have a little one on the way. Only time will tell, if he or she will be just like Bri. We cant possibly get another screaming, non-stop talking kid??

I cant forget to add, its great living in Nebraska we have a year to tout an Iowa State win in Lincoln in football and a recent UNI basketball win against Creighton here in Omaha. The more those teams lose, the better it is to be a Nebraskan!!!