One More Thing

A few posts ago I mentioned that we went to the OU / OSU baseball game last Saturday, to watch the Pokes beat the Sooners, but also to watch our friend from church (who also happens to be our pastor's wife) sing the national anthem.

I'm not sure who did the marvelous camera work, but here is the youtube video. She's extremely gifted!

Night #2

Night #2 with Shadow in the house went really well. So far we've only had one accident in the house (we weren't paying attention). All the rain hasn't helped the house training, as he doesn't much care to venture into the tall wet grass to take care of business. We picked up a crate last night, and he took about a 2 hour nap in it. I expect he'll crate train with little or no problem. He hasn't eaten much since joining our family, but I expect he's still adjusting. He's drinking lots of water, however so I don't think he'll blow away anytime soon.

I'm picking up the papers from the breeder tonight so we can get Shadow registered. I was doing some research today, and this little doggie has quite a pedigree. His mom and dad are both champion show dogs, as are most of his lineage.

Diplomat's Pedigree

This link is the pedigree for Shadow's father. I'm getting the pedigree of his mother tonight and may post that as well.

New Mouth to Feed

We picked up another mouth tonight...Shadow! He is a miniature schnauzer and HE IS CUTE! He's 13 weeks old, his mom and dad are both show champions, and we're all pretty excited.

The breeder is the nicest great-grandmother you'd ever meet, and lives alone. So Shadow is going from a nice quiet life to our crazy loud house. The breeder assured us he'll adjust in a few days. For now, he's laying low :)

Here are some pictures...

Week in Review

I don't know about you, but this week went REALLY FAST. Month end always means busy times at work, which makes the time fly. The monthly projections for May are pretty low right at the moment, but I'm sure the team will get it pulled out and hit the targets.

Ted and I managed to sneak out early yesterday. We went down to the Lexington WMA (wildlife management area) South of Noble, OK and tried to round up a turkey or two. I heard some hens, but no gobblers, and didn't see any. Oh well. Gonna have to get better at hunting them rascals. Which is tough given that I just don't have the time to get out every weekend and chase them. So far I'd much rather be sitting on a boat chasing smallies. No ticks. No camo. And you can talk and drink a beer if you want.

Plans for the weekend? Well, we're going to the OU / OSU baseball game at Bricktown tomorrow night. A friend from church is singing the national anthem.

Spring Has Sprung

Sorry about the delays in posting. With spring has come a new level of busy! Jonathan and Robert (he doesn't like Robby anymore) are both playing soccer. That is, when the field isn't soaked from all the rain we've had this spring. We've had a few fishing trips to Skiatook, and had a great time catching stringers full of crappie. Jonathan, Robert and I also made a trip to Murray last Saturday (see the pictures above).

A few weekends ago we made a quick trip to Lake Arcadia, which is about 2 miles from our house. We didn't catch any, but we had a good time exploring!





School lets out the end of May and the kids are ready. Frankly, I think their mom is ready too. More to come l8r!

Winter Wonderland

We're getting more winter weather in the great state of Oklahoma! We had some snow early yesterday (just a good dusting), then some freezing rain late yesterday. Lots of accidents yesterday. This morning we've had about 1/4" of snow. Roads weren't bad coming in to work. I'll take some pictures once the battery is charged.

In the meantime, here's a pic of my truck, done up like a Cars character. Give me your suggestions on a name!

Pinewood Derby!

Jonathan's pinewood derby was last weekend. He took 2nd place in his den, so I guess all the polishing and work paid off! He had a great time, though it was at 8:00 in the morning on a Saturday! May have to see about changing the time next year!

Robby's Birthday Party...Finally!

Well, we tried to have the party on Jan. 13th but cancelled due to the big ICE STORM. Then we setup for Jan. 20th but cancelled due to the big SNOW STORM (that never came, by the way). We had the party yesterday, a full 18 days after Robby's actuall birthday. But it was great!

Katrina is a master at these birthday party setups. She made the ship out of a refrigerator box, and made the mast and sail. The cake was a big ship, and very tasty! The kids played a game similar to musical chairs, but they had to sit on a treasure map. They then had a big scavenger hunt. Great fun was had by everyone!

Here are a few pix from the party...

Party!

Holidays are over, and the decorations are getting closer to the attic (tho we're a little slow to get it done this year). Now we're getting ready for Robby's 6th birthday party. His birthday is the 10th, but we'll be celebrating next Saturday. He said he wants a pirate party, so Katrina is in planning mode. We'll have some pix posted next week.

Christmas 2006

Christmas 2006 got here so quickly! I've just gotten used to writing 2006 on checks, and now I'm going to have to change to 2007 very soon. The older I get the faster the time goes by...

We had a wonderful Christmas break this year. We went to Skiatook on Friday, returning to Edmond on Monday, Christmas day. Here are a few pictures...

Clowning Around!


OSU beats Alabama!

Return of the slacker

So I've been slacking on my posts, but I'm back! The last few months have been very busy.

Professionally, I can't think of a more precarious time. Our company continues to struggle to make it to profitability, and we've lost some very key personnel. But we continue to plug away in hopes that one day we will be able to help even more people that are at risk of blindness from diabetes.

Personally, we've been very busy. Now that school is in session, so are football, soccer, and cub scouts. Joshua celebrated his 3rd birthday, my brother celebrated his (removed to protect the innocent) birthday, and we went camping and it was COLD.

I've also started hunting this fall. I've been dove hunting twice with one of my coworkers, and we got a few. I'm really looking forward to turkey and pheasant. I still like fishing better at this point (you can throw a fish back; it's hard to throw a bird back when it's twice it's weight in lead).

Anyway, here are some photos. I hope to be better about posting more frequently (yeah right).

Cheers...


Josh at his 3rd birthday party

The guys at home, messing around as usual

Back To School

Summer is over. The pools are empty. The kids can't stay up late now. But it's still hot out. Jonathan started 2nd grade on Monday and Robby started kindegarten this morning. They are both enjoying it so far. Jonathan had a note in his backpack Monday asking our permission to have Jonathan tested for gifted and talented classes. The letter said that he demonstrates characteristics that permit him to be tested. So we're pretty excited, and we'll see how he does. Needless to say our expectations of his financial ability to take care of us in old age just went up!

All in all we had a great summer. I was able to take some good time off, playing in the sun. Only regret is that I still haven't been on the golf course yet this year.

Having a Heat Wave

It's HOT! Oklahoma City was up to 107 today, and I think the lawn will probably give up very shortly. The kids were on the slip-n-slide all day today...staying cool.

I just read the Business Week article from last week about Kevin Rose. The article was okay, but it eluded to the fact that he made 60 million in 18 months. In fact, his company is not yet profitable, and has not given in to the pressures of selling the company until they are done building their vision. If you haven't seen Kevin's website, www.digg.com you should check it out. The site is a news aggregator where users (called the diggnation) submit interesting stories, and other digg members either give the stories positive or negative diggs. Stories with more diggs go to the top. And you can add users to your 'friends' and view their history of diggs. So you can associate with like-minded people, and see what they dugg. Pretty great concept.

I continue to struggle getting Wytek IT Services off the ground. I need more word of mouth and networking, which is difficult while continuing to work fulltime. I also need to spend more time developing the service line that I offer.

The kids were at Grandma and Grandpa Wyckoff's house from Saturday night until Tuesday night of this week. They had a great time on the lake; swimming, tubing, and playing. It gave Katrina and me a nice break for a few days.

COOL!!!

Well, we have AC again! You can tell by the smiling kids! As of last Saturday. One of my co-workers put me in touch with his AC guy (if you live in OKC or Edmond and have problems w/ plumming, AC, etc this is the guy!) We replaced the system (furnace, air handler and condensor) and went to a larger system. It's really working great.

You'll notice Jonathan is missing a few teeth! His top two front teeth finally got loose enough to come out. The new teeth were actually pushing the baby teeth forward in his mouth instead of out. We thought we'd have to take him to the dentist or something to get them removed. But last weekend he wiggled them enough, and we got out the floss and gave 'em a good yank! He lost one of them, and I'm sure I'll step on it at 3:00 in the morning or something.

Jonathan and Robby are finishing up their baseball and t-ball this weekend. And summer is quickly coming to an end. We've had a great summer, lots of days off playing in the sun, fishing, boating, and swimming. I'm not ready for the summer to be over so soon, but Jonathan is all fired up about second grade and Robby is ready for kindegarten (mainly because he'll get to go to school with his big brother).

HOT!!!!!

Okay, so it's been over 100F for the past 5 days. One of our AC units in the house (the big one) died last week, and it's still not fixed. We've got a new system that will be installed Friday, but the forecast is 106 today, 107 tomorrow, and 109 Friday. The temp in the house is around 85, which feels really hot when you're in there for awhile. To cool off, we go outside for 5 minutes and when we come back in it feels great!

Jonathan's 7th Birthday

Jonathan's 7th birthday was last Saturday. And man, it gets CRAZY with eight 7 year olds running around a house! Next year, Incredible Pizza gets my vote!

Anyway, here are some pix.

Wisdom from the Rainman

So tonight I had a chance to watch some television. There was a program that I caught at the tail end about the 'real' rainman, the man about whom the movie was made. He was a very interesting fellow, full of facts and figures. But occassionally he blurted out with grunts, laughs, and out of context words and comments.

This man has no capability to dress himself, shave, shower, etc. His 80 year old father continues to care for his son 24 hours a day. It was toward the end of the show that this man who could barely carry on a conversation or care for himself said something very profound...

"My dad and I share the same shadow"

What a great testament to this father's dedication and love for his son. And what a great example for the rest of us fathers!

Everyone have a great and safe Memorial Day weekend...

Apple Switch - Real Life!

I was at the Apple store on Friday, and the girl in front of me had a Dell badge on. The clerk asked if she worked at Dell and she said. That she works in the OKC Dell Service Center. The girl quickly became flush and responded: "Yeah, I do. Sorry about that..." and quickly removed her tag and put it in her purse. She was buying a new Macbook and iPod!!

I fairly certain she would receive some type of employee discount on a new Dell? So I think it speaks volumes that she was willing to lay down a few G's on an Apple!

Living for the Weekend

we had a great mother's day weekend! saturday was busy as ever, with two soccer games and two birthday parties. then we had to get the house ready for family on sunday. tim came over saturday night and cleaned the carpets in the main rooms (thanks tim!).

sunday mark & katrina's parents came over, as well as uncle marcus aunt anne and aunt carol. we cooked the ham a little too long and ended up with grilled chicken (which turned out great). had a great visit with everyone and the kids got to play with nathan, ashlynn, and lauren.

so i've been making some dvds lately for church. using imovie hd and idisk hd on my powerbook. its amazing that it takes about 3 hrs. to render and only about 20 minutes to do the actual composing and editing. apple sure has made it easy to get professional results. we're doing some video shoots at work as well to start posting video podcasts. should be interesting...

well, that's all my thoughts for now. can't wait to see mike and carrisa this weekend when they come for jonathans birthday!