Good Day :)

Yesterday was a good day. You know the days when you go to sleep and you're just happy about how everything went? My boss is in town and we had 3 meetings to go to - customer visits. Each of them told him what a train wreck Mark was and they are glad he's gone. One of them pulled Rick into his office when there was a big group of us in the conference room....Rick later told me in the car that he was telling him how impressed they were with my level of customer service and technical aptitude and they would have done a lot more business with us in the recent past had it not been for Mark. Yeah! Two more meetings today....I hope they go well too!

Plus I found out that a job I worked on with my engineer at Purdue was purchased! I get engineering credit - or at least I'm supposed to. The rep is trying to say that he did all of the work. Too bad I have the back up and buried his a$$ in a lie. Can't wait to see how this one pans out!

Then for the really good news......Papa is coming to visit! He called last night and said he wants to come paint our house! Work is slow and Allegiant had good ticket prices, so he's coming for 4 days next week! Justin is so excited (and so is mommy!) I made the mistake of telling Justin and he keeps saying "No...papa come today". Oops. We can't wait to see you Dad!!!!

Plus I have so many good shows on my Tivo just waiting for me - Lost, 90210, Greys, ER, 3 Views, etc... :) That's what happens when I have a productive work week!

Oh, and I'm going to Chicago on Sunday-Wednesday too. The Winter Conference for ASHRAE is at McCormick Place. It's basically a trade show and then in the evenings a bunch of vendor dinners/cocktail parties. And I get to stay at the Hyatt Lakefront which should be nice :) Oh, and the guy who I mentioned above who lied about the engineering credit will be at the dinner event for that particular manufacturer....can't wait to meet him!

Sorry - I will try to get some pictures this weekend to post!

The Hills 1-21-09

Hello! Not too much here to report...just work, daycare and housework! We did buy paint to paint our whole interior on the main floor and the upstairs hallway - now we just need the ambition to do it. And find somewhere for Justin to go for long periods of time so we can get it done without "help" :)

Here are a couple of pictures and a video. He loves the little grocery store right by our house becuase they have his size carts! The 1st one is him at dinner drinking the pineapple juice. He kept wanting me and Rob to eat more so he could drink the juice.... silly boy! The 2nd one is the little grocery store right by our house becuase they have his size carts!

The Frigid Hills 1-14-09

Hello from the frozen tundra :) We got about 6" of snow last night and now it's a high of -2 tomorrow with windchills in the -20 to -35 range....wish we were in Vegas this week! Mom and Dad said it's been in the upper 60's all week!

Not too much is new around here - just thought I would check in and say hi! Here is a video from the last Rivermen game of Justin doing the Cha-Cha Slide. He doesn't do it all, but the "cha cha real smooth" part is priceless :)







Tonight after work playing in our fresh snow!
















Sledding - I think it wore Daddy out, but Justin loved it!












He's not kneeling down here - our backyard had quite a bit of snow!





















Tucker LOVES the snow!













Watching Daddy shovel the driveway before work this morning....

Fun times!

This morning before I left for work I let Quincy & Tucker out one last time. I went upstairs to grab my belt and when I came down, I opened the door to let them in. Tucker was there waiting, but Quincy was out by our walnut tree on the back fence line. I yelled for him to come in and he hesitated (so not like him!). As he ran away I noticed a squirrel run about a foot up the tree where he just was and then fall down on his back. Ugh. So Quincy got to the door and had blood all over his snout. Great. I put him downstairs because I was so grossed out. I felt bad though because the squirrel was still moving. I went out there with a shovel, but I could not kill him. There was no blood at all on him which confused me and he was still breathing. Maybe he was just in shock? So I used a shovel and rake and put him on the other side of the fence....the whole time I was freaking out to Rob on the phone. He encourages the dogs to chase squirrels and they NEVER get one. It has to fricken happen when I'm home alone. The thing must have fallen out of the tree and hit Quincy in the head because he's not a smart dog :) So after I put the squirrel over the fence I went down to clean up Quincy. Turns out the blood was his....the squirrel got him in the face in a few spots. I am not sure if it's bites or scratches, but we called the vet and they are up to date on all shots, so he should be okay.

That was my fun for the morning! I didn't go to the back fence after work to see if the squirrel is still there. In my head I'm going to pretend that he was just in shock and ran off with his friends. More likely he'll be a coyotes dinner tonight, but I can think happy thoughts :)

Off to BW's for a date with Katie!!!!

The Hills 1-7-09

Hello! Not too much new around here.....we're glad to be back into the swing of things and back on a somewhat normal routine! I think it's better for all of us! Here are a few random pictures - nothing too exciting, but I know that people check for blog updates on an hourly basis :)





Rob and Justin on New Years Eve at the Rivermen. Justin looks so old here!












Meet Dallas. Yes; that is our backyard but no - she is not our dog. I saw him almost get hit by 2 cars while running around our road so I went out with dog treats and lured him into our backyard. I went and played with him for a while and gave him food so I could get close enough to see if he had a collar - which he did...with no ID tags. Smart owner. Anyways, I called the local shelters but nobody had reported him missing. I didn't think he had been out for long because he was still soft and clean. I decided to take him on a walk to see if anyone stopped me and told me I stole their dog. No such luck, but we did walk the mile or so to the vet and he was microchipped! So I got the owners address (right down our street) and took him back. Nobody was there, but they came and got him about an hour later. He was a really nice dog. I am thinking about getting Q&T microchipped. I had always thought it was a waste of money, but it was so quick and easy to find his owner with the little scanner at the vet!




Every night before we go upstairs for bed, we clean up the toys that we played with. Lately, Justin wants to do it himself - and I'm not going to argue! After about 4 trips last night from the living room to the toy room he told us he was done and went upstairs. We tucked him in and turned on the Grinch (yes - he will probably still watch that in July). My parents got him one of the Fisher Price tough stuff DVD players....highly recommeded! He watches his 1/2 hour movie and then turns it off and goes to sleep! Anyways, we came back down stairs after putting him to bed and this is what we found at the entrance to the toy room :) I guess tonight we'll have to define "clean up" as getting it to his toy bucket :)

Happy New Year!

I've been slacking on the blog again, but it's been kind of nice to have a little bit of time off and be away from the computer. My cell phone died and I didn't plug it in for 2 days either which was kind of nice....just hanging out with my boys!

NYE was fun - we went to a Rivermen game (surprise!) with Katie & Josh and Rob's brother Kurt and his gf Ashley. After that we came home and grilled steaks and played Wii. Nothing wildly exciting, but a fun time! The next day we had a ton of stuff to get done...returns, grocery shopping, etc. We got most of it done! Friday morning Kurt & Ashley left and we went back to work. I wouldn't say I worked really hard, but I got a few things accomplished.

This weekend we just hung out at home. Saturday I had a sore throat/headache all day. This is exactly what I was trying to shake through the holidays. I was so good too....I got rest, didn't drink (much), etc. And I still got sick again. Ugh.

This morning Justin has mostly new friends at school. A lot of his classmates went up to the next room, but he is still too young. So now he's one of the older ones - and he gets to teach the new little kids the bad things :) J/K - not my little angel! At least Lauren is still in there with him...and Drew (his arch enemy) is not!

I will try to get some pics posted soon. I need to take some!

Christmas Week

Christmas 2008

We had such a fun week! I didn't want it to end...but we had to come back to reality. On Christmas Eve we drove to Holland to my Grandma & Grandpa Metzler's house. My brothers and sister in law met us there. We had dinner, hung out with cousins and then went to 11pm church. Justin stayed awake and was such a good boy during church! I don't know how much him and Uncle Mikey paid attention, but at least they were quiet :) We woke up on Christmas morning and Santa had been there! We all got spoiled. After hanging out for the morning, we got ready and drove to Kalamazoo where my other side of the family was...my mom's side of the family. We always have a great time and Justin loves playing with all of his cousins! It's nice for Rob and I because we have lots of babysitters and nothing to worry about! On Friday we went to the Rivermen game in Grand Rapids with Uncle Mikey, Uncle Ry and Aunt Manda. GG Brooks and Uncle Kurt and Ashley met us there too. The Rivermen won in overtime, so it was a great game to be at! After the game we went to BW's on the way back to Kalamazoo - Justin was in such a good mood and we had a lot of fun. It would have been better if Mom and Dad were there so our family would have been complete, but we'll all be able to go out together in March!!!

Here are some pics from the weekend. I will post a link to our picassa site tomorrow, so check back to this post and I'll put it right at the top!



Justin and Great Grandpa Metzler














Justin and Great Grandma Metzler












Justin opening his cool new DVD player from Gramma Airplane and Papa














Justin opening presents - this present was 2 fatheads from his uncles and aunt manda...pics to follow tomorrow of them hanging up in his room!


















Playing air hockey with Uncle Ry













He's happy to have his white tiger back from Las Vegas - we forgot it there when we went in November.













Justin loves his Great Grandparents!














Such concentration....













I really like this picture :)












When we got to Kzoo, Uncle Mikey decided to get one more use out of his Halloween costume :)



















Justin would not go anywhere near him!!!!












Cool present from his Godmother....I can't wait until we get enough snow to use it!













Opening the first present with the help of his cousins.













Justin and Grandma Mickey Mouse














Uncle David and Aunt Connie.....we really miss living close to them :(













Grandpa Rosebush opening his presents!













Probably talking fantasy football.....












Uncle Tom cutting the prime rib....it was so yummy! I wish this picture could be a scratch and sniff :)











Helping Grandma with breakfast













Playing air hockey with Morgan.... He LOVES Morgan and she is so good with him. She has so much patience and plays with him non-stop. I asked her to drop out of school and be our nanny, but her mom didn't like that idea :)









Justin with Grandpa and Grandma Brooks at the hockey game....he ate the whole dish of ice cream!














I like this pic - the puck not quite hitting the ice.














Silly Uncle Mikey and Justin. Uncle Mikey taught him how to give wet willies....nice :)

He also taught him to say "what's on your cheek"....and then Justin gives you a kiss on the cheek. So cute :) When he does it (all the time) he says "Uncle Mikey told me that"..... We wish Uncle Mikey lived closer - you need to look for jobs down here!

Ice Skating 101

Hello! We had such a fun weekend :) After seeing Santa on Friday, we came home, ate dinner and were off to the Rivermen game. Justin is getting braver and now likes to yell at the players, scream "Go Rivermen" and bang on the glass. Saturday morning he slept in until 9am - what a treat! We went to the store and got all of the stuff to make cookies all day. We made cut-outs (they turned out grandma!), chocolate with peanut butter chips and peanut butter blossoms...yummy! Justin was such a big help, too! Saturday evening we took Justin ice skating and then went to dinner with Katie & Josh. Sunday we stayed inside as much as possible until it was time to go to the Rivermen game. The temperature is around zero and the wind chills are so cold!!!

After the Rivermen game they had a post-skate with the team. This was Justin's 4th time (two time in Big Rapids with G&G Brooks, once on Saturday and then tonight). He did SO GOOD! Rob and I were so proud of him! There is a video below that is almost 2 minutes long because he just kept going....he didn't fall! In the video, you hear the buzzer going off to signal that open skate was over, then you hear Josh (COO of the Rivermen) say "he's doing well" - I think he was the youngest one out there - and then at the end the Zamboni fires up, so we really had to leave :)

We are really excited for our short work week and then a fun Christmas!

Visit with Santa....

Hello! This is going to be really quick - we have to head out the door to the Rivermen game. Last night we got an ice storm...see the tree to the left in the first picture? That one we can usually mow under on the rider. There are so many broken trees and downed power lines around and 40,000 people don't have power. We were pretty lucky!

The other pics are from this afternoon - we met the REAL Santa! Seriously. He and Mrs. Claus were amazing. It was at the outdoor mall in an empty store and the best part - it was free! You just had to bring your own camera. Justin saw him in the window first and he waved; then hid behind the Christmas tree and peeked around at us. When we went in Justin's eyes were so huge! Of course, he would not go sit on his lap, so Santa told me to hold him and we could read a book...Thomas the Train! After reading the whole book, Justin was warmed up and sat on his lap. Of course he told him he wanted hockey stuff... We had a good 10 minutes all to ourselves with Santa and Mrs. Claus. It put me more into the Christmas Spirit because I really think he was the real thing :)

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas....

.....in Las Vegas!

This is Papa and Gramma Airplane's house. I thought that mom might have been exagerating a little when she told me how much it was snowing! I hate to think of what traffic is like there. Just think - cab drivers who have never before seen snow...AAAHH!