Congrats to Milkbomb!

Whats a Milkbomb you ask? Well that depends on if you ever worked at Food4Less in McMinnville, OR (that's a story for another time). The Milkbomb I'm writing about today is the name of a band that's headed up by our great friends Peter and Kevin. They have both been in bands together since our early high school days but within the last couple of years they have really seemed to gel and find their sound and direction. They have been playing shows regularly throughout the Portland area and getting some play on the local rock station KUFO. They just recently wrapped up their first CD and release party over 4th of July weekend. Unfortunately Missy and I could not make it down and attend. We got our copy (from CD Baby) on Monday and it is awesome!! I think anyone that likes a grunge/old-school alternative sound should definitely check it out.

Anyhow, just a shout out to them and a big congrats on a killer album. Seeing them take it really serious and listing to the results is incredible.

Click through either of the links I've embedded and take a listen!

We Got Jayden a New Kitty!!!

Missy, Jayden and I went for a walk this afternoon. We were headed down to the local fruit and veggie stand about 1/2-3/4 mile down the road from us.

Jayden found a new buddy while we were out. On the way we saw a sign for a garage sale and we could not pass up checking out other peoples junk. They had this giant tiger that Jayden really wanted. He was a little dirty and needs some patching but he was only a dollar. So we figured that if a cycle through the wash ruined him or permanently maimed him it would not be a big loss.

I'm happy to say that he did survive the gentle cycle and is now a happy member of Jayden's SAP (Stuffed Animal Posse). Here are a few pic's of Jayden and mom playing around with the furball.

Time to get a new cell phone. What ever shall it be?!?!

My old cell phone finally kicked the bucket this week. I usually have it in my front shirt pocket and I some times forget to take it out when giving Jayden a bath. Lean over to far and *plop*, into the tub it goes. It has survived 3 baths so far but on the 4th it gave in and ceases to function. Jayden actually saw it and took it out of my pocket. I tried to grab it quick from him and knocked it into the air. Picture me in slow motion going "Noooooooo...." as the phone plops into the bath beneath the bubbles. Jayden thought it was some sort of game and sloshed and splashed about. By the time I found it under the bubbles it was too late.

I have really been longing to get an iPhone since they came out over a year ago. Many of my friends at work have them and they are very, very nice. But they where soooo expensive and the monthly plan was double what I was paying now (we have a really good deal with Sprint right now. 500min and unlimited everything else for $35 each). The new 3g iPhone just came out and cut the price down to $199 (from $599 originally and $399 at the time).

Long story short I convinced Missy to let me get one or Missy decided I could get one. Which ever way you wish see it ;)

I love, love, love, LOVE my new phone. I have used several and really liked them but now that I have gotten to use it for 48hrs I have a whole new level of appreciation. It is so sweet and multi functional. Here is a small list of the things that are just so great about it:

Replaces my iPod so I don't have to carry 2 devices every day.

The screen is 3 times the size of my iPod. Watching a movie or show on it is rather enjoyable now.

Google maps. Not just google maps but a super slick, super fast touch interface to google maps. This is pry my favorite thing. This will be so useful. Like having a computer with you at all times that you can map and look stuff up on. Very, very sweet.

Integrated GPS. I can literally open Google maps, it locates me via GPS. Type in "Pizza". Shows me all pizza places near me. Select one and click "directions" and BAM!- turn by turn GPS directions from my exact location to the pizza place i picked. That will be so so cool on vacations and new places, like Mexico.

Internet access. The real Internet. Not a mobile phone version. Can't really explain how cool it is, you would have to see it.

Email from my yahoo and gmail. This is nothing too new to you "Crack-berry" users but I have never had this, so very cool to me. Plus its my personal email, not a work leash ;)

Here is the only bad thing:

No video capture capabilities. It can only take photo's. It cannot take videos. So no more Jayden quick videos posted unless Missy takes them.

FYI - How to comment on this blog

A couple times people have told me that they would have loved to leave a comment on one of the posts but they did not want to "sign up" for anything or create an account to do so. I totally agree and hate it when/if I have to do that. This is just an FYI about that.

You do not have to sign up for anything or type in your email address or anything to leave a comment. You just have to make sure and pick the right option when you are leaving a comment and you will be good to go.

It should go something like this:

Read one of my hilarious and entertaining yarns about our bomb life.

Realize that you should tell us what you really think of us.

Click on the "comment" link at the bottom of the post.

That should open a page that looks like this:

Click the pic for a more detailed view if you like

Select the radio button that says "Name/URL". This will let you just type in your name (you do not have to give a URL) and submit your comment.

This is not a plea for comments but I hope this helps for those of you that wish to leave a comment. Any and all suggestions are welcome. Want to see more of something? Less? Let us know!

Weekend BBQ with Good Friends

Last weekend we finally made it over to our friends house, the Schulte's, on Bainbridge Island for a BBQ. It's always so difficult to get our schedules to match up but all the stars aligned and we made a go of it.

It was Jaydens first ride on the boat and he loved it.

Another friend, Jim and his wife Danielle and their son Ayden made it over as well. We all use to work at Escend together and had been quite some time since we all hung out. In fact the last time we were all together the Schulte's only had 3 kids, Jim and Danielle had none and neither did we. So we had lots to talk about :)

There was tons of food and beverages. Jayden had a great time playing in the sandbox with Aaron's littlest - Tessa. Then got pushed around the yard by Ayden and Tessa.

Lots of fun on the island

After dinner the men decided we need to test out some of the toys at the Schulte homestead. One of which was the Jason Giambi Batting Cage! This thing rocked! Very cool setup. We got in and took some hacks at 60-70mph and I actually did rather well for not swinging a bat in 10 years.

My cat like reflexes and quickness too fast for our camera to fully catch!

Then we started messing with the kind of pitches it could throw. We had it throwing some wicked curve balls which I hit really well but then we decided to crank the sucker up to full speed. I tell you what, that thing can hum it in there upwards of 95-100mph. I could not even see the BALL!! I think the wives thought we were going to get killed. Nothing at that speed hit anyone or anything, including the bat ;)

We even got the wives to jump in and take a few hacks. Missy did the best out of the girls!!! She had several solid hits.

Good form!

A great time was had by all and I really hope it does not take us another year to all get together.

Happy 4th of July Everyone

I hope you all had a relaxing weekend and were able to enjoy a BBQ and possibly a cold beverage.

We headed over to a friends house for the traditional BBQ, etc our selves. There where several other couples joining us, all with younger kids. We had a really good time and Jayden got to play a lot and eat a lot of yummy food.

Darn E-Mail never stops...

After the little ones went to bed we played some games in the backyard. Horse shoes and croquet where the games of choice. It was fun watching us all try and throw the horse shoes like we knew what we were doing.

Our friends Angela and Scott were great hosts. They just moved into this new house and they have tons of room and a big back yard. We did not really do any fireworks. Mostly due to the fact that one of the houses in their neighborhood just recently caught on fire and did tons of damage so no one was really in the "lite stuff on fire" mood. Plus the boyz are a bit young to really enjoy it just yet.

We finished the night off watching the fireworks on TV.

One funny before hand story was what I will refer to as "The Mellon-ball Incident". Missy had decided to bring a nice fruit tray to the BBQ. It was to be filled with all sorts of tropical delights. One of which was going to be watermelon. She worked hard at making these nice ping pong ball sized "melon balls" out of it using, of course, a melon baller. They where perfect little guys. After she was done she came into the living room and sat down. About this time Jayden walked into the kitchen as he always does and Missy and I started talking about the day or something like that. Jayden is a big fan of the watermelon and about a minute later we both kind of had this "He's really been quite in there" moment of "oh crap!" Missy walks in and sees melon balls all over the kitchen floor and carpet! Jayden quickly deduced that mom was not to pleased with him and left a smoke trail to the living room. I came in and saw the mess all over the floor and tried my best not to start laughing out loud (Missy understandably not really ready to "look back and laugh" just yet). What he had managed to do was take his riding dump truck toy and prop it up against the cabinets. Stood on top of it (pry on his tip-toes), opened the plastic bowl with the melon balls and scoop out arm loads, all while being supper quite. That boy has got mad skillz. Luckily he did not get that many and there were plenty left for the tray.

I think he learned a valuable lesson - When sneaking food never take more melon balls than you can eat or carry.

Trip to Spokane with Jayden is well overdue

Over the weekend of June 27th the Misses and I loaded up the wee-one and headed east. Much fun was had.

Background:
Before stopping in Oregon, Missy and her family moved out to Spokane from Hopkins (MN) some time during her days in middle school (mid 80's maybe?). Shortly thereafter her grandma, aunt and a cousin moved out to Spokane as well as the the Shervey's began to stake their claim to a piece of the great northwest.

I don't have a digital version of any of the pictures I have seen from this "Shervey Spokane Era". I have hand drawn one for you though:

Shervey Clan - Left to right: Middle-School Missy, No-Grey Jon (or one of the Cosby kids. I'm not certin), Less-Grey Wayne, Merry and Mittens

The Fun:
We took off from Everett on Thursday afternoon. Normally we would leave with Jayden later in the evening so he could sleep most of the way but Everett to Spokane is about 5 hours and we did not want to get in at midnight so we left early and prayed that he would do OK. He ended up doing rather well the whole way. Missy did a great job entertaining him by reading books and shoveling snacks back to him. Also a saving grace was a CD of songs from one of his favorite cartoons - The Backyardigans. He loved this and panicked whenever a song finished and there was a slight pause, thinking it had stopped. It saved much need sanity for mom and dad. (Thank you Jon and Heather!).

Snacks and songs got us to Ellensburg where I had looked up a state park we could stop at, have dinner and let the boy stretch his legs. Since he was a good boy McDonald's fries were on the menu for dinner and he enjoyed them with much happiness. It was a cool park/farm. I guess it is a working farm as well and they do school field trips with hay rides and the whole bit. Neat-O!

Dinner at park.

*Side note* - Washington rest areas and state parks have got to be the nicest I have ever seen (and I've seen my share, not a lot of airline miles racked up on family vacations when I was young). They are always very well kept and the bathrooms are always very clean, no matter where you are. GO WASHINGTON!

Back on the road we went. Jayden did really good the second half of the trip. He gets all loopy and giggly when he gets tired some times. He'll just laugh for no reason or you could turn around and look at him and say something silly like "Waffle House" and he'll just bust up. So funny. Jayden entertained Missy with this for about an hour or so at one point.

I had never been to Spokane so of course I had never driven there either. It was a really pretty drive. The first half in the mountains and trees and the second half in the high desert with windmills and farm land. It was really cool and reminded me of a lot of the trips we took as a kid through California, New Mexico and Arizona.

Sunset on the way to Spokane.

We got into the hotel around 9:30pm or so. Wayne had been in Spokane for a few days doing some roofing over at his mom and sisters place so he had already gotten our rooms. We had two adjoining rooms with the double door thingy in between. That worked out really well because Jayden could run back and forth. It was kind of lucky that we got the two rooms this way. That weekend was also something called "Hoop Fest". There where like 18,000 basketball players in town for 3 vs 3 tourneys so hotels were hard to come by.

Jayden stayed awake the whole way so he was really tired. Dad was too.

The hotel we stayed at had a very nice breakfast in the morning. Waffles, danishes, fruit, breakfast burritos, biscuits and gravy, etc. All for free. Jayden likes the Honeynut Cheerio's. Mom swore they had more "honey coating" than normal. Either way they were a hit.

The hotel also had a pool as well. We went out one day and it was nice. Jayden loved swimming around and splashing all of us. Sorry, no pics, we were all in the pool!!

One of the days we went to Coeurdalene, Idaho. Its only like 15 miles from Spokane. It was really cool. Lots of nice waterfront areas with huge parks and playgrounds. We kind of made the mistake of letting Jayden get in the water a little bit. He LOVED it. But we were not really prepared for the water so we could not let him get in very far and could not get in with him, so he was a little upset when we took him out. But he had lots of fun anyway and played a bit more before going back to the hotel for a nap.

Jayden loved the water and was looking very cool.

We went over a couple of times to see Wayne's mom (Jayden's great-grandma) and his sister Wanda and her son Paul. One of the evenings was for a BBQ. It was so nice out. Hot in the sun but really nice in the shade. We hung out in the yard and ate burgers and dogs. Jayden loved playing in the yard. Merry had got him a few other things for his birthday that she brought along to give to him. He loved them all of course.

Lots of fun at great-grandma's and aunt Wanda's

We had a great time visiting with family and friends. It was so great that Jayden got to meet his great-grandma and he really warmed up to her. He just loves grandma's. Hopefully we will make it back out to see them all again soon.

I enjoyed my first trip to Spokane and I'm sure it will not be my last. Jayden did great. We'll have to see if this gives us the courage to try other "road trips" this summer.

Ending Note: On the way home I think this started out as a "No you can have a drink, you can not hold it. No hold. Just take a drink, here take a drink, just............."

Guess who won that one....