Family Pictures

We had our first baby appointment today. Click on the first picture to see our little one inch baby. I highlighted the features in the second picture so you could see it better. Kinda looks like a monkey (doctor says it looks like its dad, lol). We listened to the heart beat and Alana had some blood drawn for testing. Baby and Mom are healthy.

Updates from Idaho

Vicki and Daniel came out to visit this weekend. They will be flying back to Colorado in just a few hours from now. Vicki and I had our house search narrowed down to several houses (out of several dozen) and we were bound and determined to find out future house on her visit up here. It is much cheaper to buy a house on developed property than it would be to build on our ten acres.

Well, we did it. We found the perfect house. It is only a few miles from our property here in Athol, and actually still in the Athol city limits. It is an immaculate four bedroom, 2 bath house on ten forested park-like acres. We have a huge 30X50 insulated shop, and quite a bit of our acreage is already partitioned off into fenced horse pasture. We don't know anything about horses ourselves, but might look into boarding horses for others to make some money. We will be having a house inspection tomorrow afternoon to ensure there is nothing serious going on with the house that we can't see.

We offered 215,000 for the property and they accepted the offer. Closing date is on October 19. Vicki will be having the Navy pack up our stuff in Colorado on October 28, 29 and 30th. Her final day in Colorado is just before Thanksgiving: I believe 11/24.

Daniel had a good time out here. We spent a few hours at "Triple Play" yesterday, where he and I had a laser gun battle, climbed some rock mountains, and he got to waste several dollars on video games. He got to shoot a BB gun for the first time, and Papa even broke out the .22 rifle and his .45 revolver. Daniel shot both of those, and the revolver scared the living crap out of him. Hopefully he won't be so enamored of handguns anymore.

So now its back to work for Billy. Supposedly Sears is completely revamping the way they will be routing us, and I won't be working quite so many 12-13 hour days. Supposedly I will be working mostly 8-10 hour days. That will indeed be a very welcome change.

Bobby and Nikki, you should look at this link http://www.wacanid.org It is a 300 mile bike ride through Washington, Canada and Idaho. You can start anywhere you like on the loop, and ride as far as you like each day. It would be an awesome way for you to experience the Northwest. It's in October each year, and we have an RV (hint hint) so you wouldn't have to stay in hotels each night and you'd have ready access to rest and bathrooms and a family to follow you around. It looks quite awesome and seems like it would be right up your alley.

For everbody else, it's gorgeous up here. Tom and Cheryl, there is a huge amusement park up here called Silverwood, and lots of riding trails, lakes, hiking and such. There are at least three or four lakes just within half a mile of us here. You would all love it up here and it's a good getaway during the summer months of Phoenix.

Well, that's the latest news from the chilly North. Lots of love to all.
Billy and Vicki

Back to the Drawing Board

While I truly appreciate Eric's hard work and participation with the look of the blog, it just seems that in the end, the original look was best. I've added everything I had before and look forward to Eric and Michael adding any other fancy little buttons and gadgets that will make this blog better. You'll notice that I've added two picture gadgets at the top. I figure instead of wasting time uploading photos onto a URL site and then linking to them (like photobucket, etc.), I can just replace these on a regular basis from my cpu or Keene. I also went into every post and added a suitable category. They are listed as well for easy searching....

As you are all aware, posting is a rather difficult task for all of us. Cheryl and I have our hands full, as do all of you. I'll do my utmost to post something on a weekly basis. Perhaps if all of you can do so, we can get at least four to five posts every month.

Perhaps Billy can update us on his adventures in Idaho (strike the banjos, Bobby Joe!), or Mary and Mark can offer us tales from the Wild West (blow on that bottle, Dilbert!). Joe can tell us how life is in the deep South (Suuuuuuuueeeeeyyyyyyyyyyy, Jeb!!!). Bobby can write how the family is doing in sunny San Fran (Uhhh....groovy man, that's righteous). Finally Tom and Cheryl and  Mom and Dad can carry on about our droll lives in the big city (which is too normal for a song people).

And finally, lest we forget or if we have forgotten, Happy 21st Birthday to Eric Jones and a belated congratulations to both Eric and his lovely wife on their upcoming addition to the family (suckas, your lives are over).