Barry’s Daily Web News

A Beautiful Spring Day

We had a really nice day today, and rather than write about it, I thought it would be best expressed in pictures. I spent part of the morning cleaning the pool. Here is a nice picture showing our flowering vine in full bloom, covered with white flowers: (click on picture to see the full-sized image)

I also mowed the lawn and checked the sprinkler fittings. The roses look the best that they ever have. This picture shows a row of different colored roses. The blue flowers in the lower right are verbena. We have a few more rose bushes around the corner, and the largest one is just covered with large pink blooms.

After lunch, Sean and I spent some time playing with the lego train set. This picture shows our setup. The yellow train station was built per the original lego kit. The two middle train cars are also per the lego set. I made the caboose design myself. I tried to combine what a caboose looked like from memory with the existing train desing. The locomotive is similar to the original one. The original one uses the motor and battery box, which no longer work. I replaced these with something that looked like a real engine, so that Sean could at least pust the train around the track.

After dinner we went to a park nearby that had just opned. Here is a picture of Sean and Ethan playing on the “spaceship”.

It was a fun day.

The Twins Birthday Party

We all went to the twin girl’s birthday party today. The girls live just up the streat from us, and are just a couple of months younger than Sean. The party was at a Build A Bear, at the local mall. Sean “built” a stuffed Lion. He named the lion Simba. I wonder where he got that name. I snuck Ethan off to the play area at the mall, so he could get some exercise and work off some restless energh.

Afterwards, we had cake and ice cream at a restaurant in the same mall. Sean nearly finished a large piece of cake, slowly eating one small bite at a time, being very neat about it. We stopped by a couple of stores afterwards, and Sean was fairly beat after that. After his work at in the play area, Ethan just quietly observed it all, and seemed happy to just be out and about.

Sean is Growing Up

I can definitely see signs of Sean maturing. Today, he walked over with me to get my hair cut, and sat patiently while I was in the barber chair. Of course, the lollipop he was given helped. He walked home with me, without any problems at all.

Sean and I spent a good part of the day playing with the lego train set that I had as a boy. Sean sat patiently while I put the pieces together. I was surprised that almost all of the parts were there. The only problem I had was that the motor is no longer working. I had to build a similar locomotive so that Sean could push the train around the track. Sean didn’t want to leave the lego train, even though it was time for bed.

Sean and Ethan at Burger King

Cortney deserved a break, so I took Sean and Ethan to Burger King myself. We had the play area to ourselves. Sean and Ethan were well behaved for the most part, and Sean was only overzealous with Ethan once or twice. I wanted to stay out longer to give Cortney more of a break, but it was obvious that the kids were getting tired. That’s not surprising for Ethan, since he is recovering from his ear infection, but I think Sean is either just run down, or getting sick himself. We will keep an eye on him this weekend.

Sean Uses the Computer

On the way home from class, Sean was commenting that it wasn’t time for bed, because it was still light out (even though it was after his bedtime). I played along, and asked Sean if he wanted to do a reading lesson, or use the computer. Sean opted for the computer. So when we came home, I let Sean at the computer. Since it was late, I wasn’t going to let Sean play his game unless he was able to click on his icon picture in order to log into his account. Sean was able to do this, so I loaded up Reader Rabbit for him. Sean was actually able to manipulate the mouse and use the program. This was the first time I had seen him do this. Good for him.

Ethan Has An Ear Infection

On a hunch that Ethan wasn’t his normal self, Cortney took Ethan to the doctor today. It turn’s out that she was right, that Ethan has an ear infection. Ethan was asleep when I came home from work, so I couldn’t tell how he was feeling right away. After waking him up and feeding him dinner, he seemed to be doing fine, but I noticed he wasn’t his normal self. Ethan is now on anti-biotic, which means we get to trade the ear infection for diarrhea.

Ethan, Wine Connoisseur

We have a small wine collection sitting on top of the bar, which is part of the kitchen island. Apparently, Ethan decided that one of the bottles of wine was too cheap and low quality compared to the other bottles. So, he climbed up one of the bar stools, and pushed the bottle of wine onto the tiled floor. What a mess. And it’s true that the broken bottle was the cheapest of the lot. That made the loss easier to deal with. I still had a tough time cleaning it up while keeping the kids away from the broken glass.

Shopping Trip With Sean

Since I spent last night with Ethan, I decided to spend time with Sean. I took Sean to two toy stores, and also to Circuit City. I needed a new pair of headphones for work, which is why we stopped at Circuit City. Sean had the most fun at the Thomas train table. I guess he is a little bored with the train table we have, so he still enjoys a train table that was setup up a bit differently. Sean told me he enjoyed the shopping trip.

Ethan Is 18 Months Old

I forgot to mention that Ethan is now 18 months old. He reached 18 months on Sunday. Since Sean was tired, I took just Ethan to the library. Ethan is now participating in all of the finger plays. He really has matured over the last few months. I now feel comfortable letting Ethan walk, holding his hand, rather than carrying him. His play style is noticeably more mature than all but the older kids playing at the train table. Ethan’s well visit to the doctor is this coming Monday.

A Visit

We were visited by a family this evening, a family of ducks. When I arrived home from work, there was a mother duck and eight ducklings, all in the pool area. The ducklings looked like they were stuck in the pool, so I built a little ramp with a flat container cover, with one side resting on the side of the pool, and the other side resting on the floating chlorine container. At least one of the ducklings was able to use the ramp. Sean was fascinated with the ducks. He was even late to the dinner table because he wanted to watch the ducks.

Later on the evening, I also saw the father duck, as well as the mother duck and ducklings. Three ducklings were still in the pool, so I used the skimmer net to remove them from the pool. I hope the ducklings all find away to get over the wall surrounding our back yard.

Ethan Is Talking More

Ethan is definitely talking more lately. Some of it is still babble, but he uses the words mommy, daddy, cat, and ball frequently. Ethan is talking enough that I don’t think he will have the speech delay that Sean did. With Sean, I suspected that part of the problem is that Cortney and I understood what Sean wanted, so there wasn’t as much of a need to speak. I saw some of that happen with Ethan, but it appears that Ethan just enjoys talking.

Happy Easter

Sean and Ethan woke up to find Easter baskets this morning. And, the carrot we left out last night for the Easter bunny had been chewed on! After breakfast, we had an Easter egg hunt. Ethan found one egg, and Sean found the rest, although we had to give him some hints to find the last two.

Later in the morning, I went out to do some yardwork. I needed to repair the sprinkler lines for some of the newly planted flowers by the pool. While walking around trying to figure out where to put the lines, I fell in the pool! It wasn’t as cold as I thought it would be. Sean and Ethan were inside at the time, so they missed their father being clumsy. I didn’t mind the wet clothes too much, but it was hard to finish the job with wet hands.

Allergy Season

It is definitely spring here in Arizona, and everything is blooming. Unfortunately, that means lots of pollen in the air, and allergy season is upon us. I’m suffering from it with a runny nose, itchy eyes, and sneezing. Both Sean and Ethan are suffering as well. Visibly, they both have runny noses, and you can tell they don’t feel as well as they normally do.

This morning, I took Sean and Ethan to the park. Cortney was out at a yard sale, and I was watching them by myself. Sean had a good time at the park, but Ethan was just cranky. He spent more time trying to climb in to the stroller than he did playing. When we came home, Ethan was happy, but then Sean was beat. Sean did not want lunch, and it took him an extra half hour to decide to eat. After lunch, Sean looked noticeably tired, and he took a brief nap (on the floor!) after lunch. That’s not like him.

Later in the afternoon, both kids were hungry, so I decided to give them a snack. Ethan was still hungry after the snack, and he was very fussy. Sean initially refused the snack, then changed his mind. He was upset as well. Cortney wanted to go out to dinner, so I didn’t see now we were going to make it. I ended up putting the kids in the car, turning on the a/c, and playing a music cd. That at least kept Ethan happy, and Sean didn’t mind too much. That kept them occupied for the short while before it was time for dinner. That worked, and we had a good time at dinner. We went shopping after dinner until it was close to bedtime for the kids. I hope they sleep well. I not sure Cortney and I can take another day of fussy kids.

A Day with Sean and Ethan

Cortney had to run a number of errands today, so I spent the day with Sean and Ethan. This morning, we brought out the duplo blocks. These blocks are large enough that they are not choking hazards, like the regular legos are. I was trying to get Sean to learn how to construct with the larger blocks. He didn’t grasp the concept of overlapping the parts. Instead, Sean just prefers to stack them like blocks. I guess that’s still a good start. I tried to get Ethan just to put two blocks together. He didn’t care much for putting blocks together. He sure does like taking them apart though. In fact, I think Ethan had the best time when we put the blocks away. He just loved picking up the pieces and putting them in the bucket.

When Ethan took a nap, I pulled out the regular legos to play with Sean. Or, just to put together one of the model kits myself. Sean did enjoy watching. And, he likes to play with the models afterwards. Unfortunately, the lego models don’t stand up to his rough play. The kept me fully occupied by putting the model back together whenever the pieces fell off. I didn’t mind.

I wished I had accomplished more for the day. But, I guess just spending quality time with Sean and Ethan is enough of an accomplishment.

Arizona, State of Small Government

Arizona, state of Barry Goldwater, is known for libertarian conseratives. Or, so I thought. I thought libertarian conservatives were for small government. That’s why I was surprised that I had to pay for a permit when the hot water heater was installed. Part of that fee was to pay for an inspection. So, I called the city office and scheduled the inspection for today. The inspector arrived, looked at the hot water heater, and basically said, yes, you have a new hot water heater. It took longer to open the garage door than to conduct the inspection. I don’t understand why the city would want to get involved in such a simple transaction. If their were a problem with the installation, I could take the case up as a civil matter.