Asa is growing and changing

I wanted to update the blog with new pictures of Asa.
He's about 9 1/4 pounds now and 22 inches long.
He's growing and becoming much more aware of the world around him.






He enjoys baths and likes to be outside. He likes riding
in the car, but it doesn't put him to sleep.
Asa will be 6 weeks old on Thursday, the 30th.

Nixon Investigation

Thought this would have something to do with Watergate? Fooled you! It is just our cat, Nixon, taking a closer look at the new addition to the family.

Asa's First Full Day at Home

This is a short clip of Asa ready to go out for his first time. We're taking him for a doctor's visit this afternoon.

Asa Paul is in the house!!

Asa Paul Speer was born @ 10:22 p.m. 09/18/08. He weighs 7 lbs. 14 oz. and is 19 in. long.

He's awesome!

The Pets

Thought I would post about the animals.

Sophie, Nixon, Condi and June are all doing good. Into trouble all of the time of course, but they do make my day from time to time.

Nixon is still as loving as ever. He loves attention and is such a good cat!

Sophie can definitely have an attitude at times when things don't go her way or when things are different than they usually are. I was very proud of her, though, because we had to go get yearly vaccinations and she didn't growl at the vet and didn't get upset when we got home. She's been sleeping at our feet every night now for about 2 months.

Condi is the everlasting kitten. She' s a year and a half old, but looks like she's about 4 months old. She's a mischievous little kitty, but she's so cute. She loves Nixon and June. Sophie doesn't care for her too much, even though Condi would love to play with her.

June is beginning to listen to us much better. She is a big 85 pound baby. She really likes attention and thinks that she is a lap dog. She loves it when I lay on the couch at night and let her lay with me. She really likes all of the cats, but Condi is the only one who lets her get close. She's a good dog and one day we will master the electric fence collar. I have confidence. :-)

Trip to Maryland on vacation

After we left the Outer Banks, we headed to Maryland for my maternal grandparents' 50th wedding anniversary party and also my two grandmothers
had gotten together and planned a baby shower for us since this would be the only time we would be up there before Asa was born.
Thursday night was the night they threw my shower in the Community Building at the park in Williamsport. It was a good shower and there were quite a few family members there.

On Friday night we had my grandparents' 50th anniversary dinner at Hickory Bridge Farm. It turned out really nice. It was a good time celebrating what is a rarity in this day: a couple who stuck together and worked things out for 50 years, regardless of what they went through.

Beach Vacation

We started planning a vacation to the Outer Banks of North Carolina with my family back in the fall of 07. We had wanted to go for sometime since we had lived there for a short period back in the mid 90s. We finally decided to go and incorporate the trip with the 50th wedding anniversary party of my mom's parents in Maryland since OBX is somewhat on the way to the Maryland.
We rented a beach house and set out on May 24th. We got to the house Saturday afternoon and it was a bit on the cool side. We had pizza that night and got everything settled in-we made several trips out to Wal-mart and Food Lion. No shocker there. We also watched National Treasure II with a projector that night.
Pretty much every morning we had a good breakfast and the guys would sit at the table waiting while we girls fixed up the food. (see above)
Obviously, we spent a lot of time on the beach. Joey and Jonathan rode the waves for hours on Monday and Tuesday. The water was probably in the 58-62 degree range. It was not enjoyable. Once you got used to it, it was kind of bearable. Uriah preferred staying out of the water (and the dangerous jelly fish, sting rays and other creatures that were out to get him) and searched for beached creatures. He found lots of crabs. I finally coaxed him (and me) into the water a bit.
One night we went out to Dairy Queen for ice cream and one night a girl who had been in Dad's youth group at the church we had been at when we lived in NC came down to the beach to see us with her family. So, that was nice.
We also go to take good family pictures on the beach. It was a really nice vacation. Sarah, Jonathan and I left for Maryland on Wednesday. Wednesday was the only day of our time at the beach that it stormed and rained and was cold. We need to do the beach again one day.

Picnic with Joseph and Elizabeth

Jonathan's younger brother Joseph is in the Air Force Reserves and is leaving for deployment to the Middle East in a week and a half. We wanted to do something with him and his wife before he leaves and they suggested a dessert picnic at Falls Park in downtown Greenville (they always come up with great ideas). It was fun. We had cheesecake and sparkling grape juice.
Elizabeth's baby boy is due November 9th, so almost exactly two months after Asa. It will be nice that he will have a cousin so close in age. Jonathan's oldest sister Becky is also expecting and is having a boy at the end of October. They'll either be the Three Stooges or the Three Musketeers. Either way, I'm sure there will be no end to the trouble and mischief that they will get in to.

Updates on our Life

I know it's been forever since we updated the blog. Ridiculous. Now that I'm not working (and before the baby is born), I'll try to post a few things. We've had a good summer. Not been too busy with a bunch of things, but it's been good. It's been very hot, but we've been spoiled for the past few years by cooler weather. I'll post a few pictures of things we've done and then we did take a vacation with my (Heather's) family in May so I'll definitely do a post of that.
We've had several baby showers this summer. Our church gave us one, my work gave us one, and our parents gave us one for family and friends.
I've also been getting the nursery ready. I'm not sure if I've posted this, but we are naming the baby Asa Paul Speer. He is due September 10th. I will post some more about our summer in a different post since this one is getting full of pictures.

We're Growing!

Well, first of all I have to say that one of my pet peeves is people not updating their websites/blogs...of course I am now one of those people. Technically this Jonathan's project, but I could do it if I just took the time.

We have kind of been waiting to put this on here until we had picture/video, but since that is slow in coming....we're adding to our family!!

We are having a baby-due September 10thish. !!!

Of course the 'family' already includes three cats and one dog. Unfortunately one of the cats needs to go (Sophie). I am very apprehensive about giving her away, but I think I would be okay with it if we found an exceptionally good home for her.
So...there will be more to come. Jonathan has a video of our first ultrasound, but hasn't been able to get it uploaded here yet...hopefully soon.

I went outside tonight and snapped a few pictures of the lunar eclipse. It was really pretty and the photos turned out better than I thought they would considering I was using a digital point and shoot Nikon L1. Of the pics I took, the one above turned out the best.

Trip to Lincoln, NE

I took a business trip out to Lincoln, NE in August. Our company uses SDS/2 steel connection design software and we all

4 went out for the User's Group Conference. It was a great trip for us since we got to get a good look at the newest version of the software and learned several tricks for getting even more out of it. We flew out to Omaha via Chicago and rented a car to drive to Lincoln. While we were there we attended a private evening at the Strategic Air Command Museum. Huge understatement: we had a great time. We flew back via Chicago, so we got to see the Windy City at night, which was really neat looking. The pictures are, from bottom to top, a view out the plane window on our way home toward Chicago; the Blackbird jet at the SAC Museum; the Cornhusker's stadium, taken from our parking garage downtown; and then another picture from the plane without the wing in it. I just thought the clouds looked really pretty that evening.

Washington D.C. Vacation

At the end of September, Heather and I took Amtrak to D.C. for a few days. It was our first train trip and we enjoyed it a lot. It was nice not to have to pay for parking or worry about our vehicle breaking down or getting wreck or having to pay for gas. We walked and rode the metro everywhere. We stayed out in Rosslyn within walking distance of the Iwo Jima Memorial. We also took over 600 pictures. Not only were our feet tired every day, so was our picture-taking finger. It was a really great trip for us and probably ranks up near the top of our all-time greatest vacations. The picture was taken in the Library of Congress.

Family Reunion 2007

This is our whole family in the hallway of a building in St. Augustine, FL around Labor Day weekend. We were out doing some site-seeing and a scavenger hunt while we were down at my brother's house for our family reunion when it started to POUR rain. We made it to an old shelter near an old well near the old section of downtown and huddled up and tried not to get wet. Unfortunately, we ended up standing there for over an hour and still got pretty wet, especially our legs, because the wind was blowing. It was quite and adventure and we did get this good group shot out of it, so I guess it was okay.

Joseph and Elizabeth

My brother Joseph and his wife, Elizabeth were married yesterday on January 19. I took the wide angle shot with the bridge in the background in the park downtown on the night they got engaged a while back. Obviously, I played with it a little bit in Picasa. The close up is

not altered. But then I couldn't resist doing something wierd with it, too. Anyway, congratulations to Joe and Elizabeth!!

Addition To Our Cat Family

Condi (short for Condileeza) joined us in June of 2007, just a couple of weeks before June (the dog). We got her from the same place we got June, Heather's parents. As you can see in the picture, she and June are good friends. That is June licking Condi's tail while she is posing for the picture. Condi is a good cat, but she has learned a lot of bad habits from our evil cat, Sophie, who I've posted about before. She really enjoys playing with June. Sometimes June will be resting and Condi will come get her up just so she can hide and let June try to dig her out of various boxes, drawers, and bags. She likes to get into a certain basket and let June pick it up and toss it around and carry it from room to room. It is quite funny to watch.

One New Thing From Last Year...

One thing during our hiatus from blogging in 2007 was a dog. Her name is June and she appears to be a bird dog and dalmation mix. That is what most of the people at the pet store and the vet think. We got her from Heather's parents who had taken her in as a stray, but since they already had a dog, they decided not to keep her. We got her in June, thus the name (I know, I know-- very original). She is very smart and was already pretty much house trained. She will sit and stay and come and respond to "NO!!!!" We have to say that to her a lot. She weighs around 75 pounds and she doesn't realize that she is as destructive as she is. Her best friend is Condi, about whom I will post next.

It's Officially Been a Year!! Wahoo!!!

It has been just over a year since we've posted anything on our blog. It went by very quickly.
One of our New Year's resolutions is to be more faithful to post something... anything... on our blog this year. I'll post a long entry to let everyone know what we did this year in the next few days.