St. Patrick’s Day 2010

On St. Patrick’s Day it was such a pretty day we rode down to Kemah and walked around on the boardwalk.  Then we went down to Galveston to see the spring-breakers.  It was a nice little road trip.

Crawfish Boil

Our friends Melanie and Chad had a crawfish boil at their house on Saturday.  I offered to cook and they came out pretty good. We had 60 lbs of crawfish, corn, potatoes, and sausage.  The weather was perfect for beer and bugs.  Afterward we played beer pong and then went out and sang karaoke.  We had a great time.

Valentine’s Day

Garrett and I made Kelly a Valentine’s Day card out of construction paper, glue, and ink.

 

For the last few years we’ve been going to The Melting Pot on Valentine’s Day for a special dinner. We went again this year on a double-date with our friends Angel and Jonathan.

The Spazmatics at Scout Bar

We went with a group of friends to see The Spazmatics at Scout Bar in Clear Lake.  I had never seen them before but Kelly had seen them a couple of times.  They are an 80’s cover band and they dress like… well… spazmatics.  They put on a really good show.  The place was packed and every song they played had me dancing and singing at the top of my lungs.  They play there every month so we are definitely seeing them again.

This is a video I shot from that show.

Jimmy’s 36th Birthday

We had a bunch of friends over for my 36th birthday. It was a blast. Lots of good food and drink with great friends.

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Holidays 2009

Wow, it’s been a long time since I posted.  We’ve been really busy. 

On Halloween day we went to Mary Jo Peckham Park where we had a photographer friend of Kelly’s take some pictures to use as gifts for Christmas.  They came out pretty good.

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We had a wonderful Thanksgiving at my cousins’ house with lots of our family.  The food was really good and we got a good 4-generation photo of Garrett’s great-grandfather Erlin, his grandfather Ken, and me & him.

… and lots of other good photos too.

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We made another Thanksgiving stop at Peggy’s house for dinner.  The food there was awesome as well.

I got off work on December 18th and I don’t go back until January 4th.  Since it was Garrett’s first Christmas we put up the tree this year.  This 9’ tree is really hard to put up but it is worth it.

 

Christmas was pretty hectic.  We had a couple of parties the weekend before Christmas.  Then on Christmas Eve we went to my mom’s and had lunch and exchanged gifts, then that night we had Kelly’s family over and dinner and exchanged gifts with them.  Then Christmas morning we went to my dad and step-mom’s house and had lunch and exchanged gifts with them and her family.  Then it was back to Kelly’s mom’s house for dinner and gift exchange with her brother & sister and kids.  Then back over to dad and step-mom’s house to play some games with her family.  It was a great time, but we’ve got to find a way to make fewer stops.  We did all of our shopping on December 23rd, which helped.

Garrett is growing up fast.  We took him to his 6 month checkup on December 11th.  He weighed 16lbs. 10oz. and was 28.5” tall.  This puts him in the 40th percentile for weight and the 90th percentile for height.  That means that he is taller than 90"% of children his age but only heavier than 40%.  Basically he is tall and lean.  But you wouldn’t think it by looking at his chubby cheeks.  My dad is 6’1” and Kelly’s dad was 6’ and her grandpa was 6’4” so Garrett might turn out to be a really tall guy.  I’ll have to go back to learning more Hapkido if he stay’s on that track.

He’s scooting around pretty good and he seems anxious to stand up.  He’s also started eating solid food.  Last week was rice cereal, this week is oatmeal cereal and next week we start on yellow and orange vegetables.

Halloween 2009

Kelly and I love Halloween because it gives us an excuse to dress up and act even more foolish than usual.  This year we went with the ‘70’s disco theme.  Kelly’s friend Hollie went as Amy Winehouse and my friend Eric went as Burger King Arthur.

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We stopped off at some friends’ house that were having a toga party and then went to Mo’s where we met up with some other friends.  This year was cool because Halloween fell on a Saturday and the clocks were set back because of Daylight Savings Time.  We drank and danced the night away.

3 Months Old

For the first week after we put Garrett in the nursery he slept pretty good.  Since then he’s had a hard time staying asleep.  His being in the nursery has been harder on us than it has been on him.  The baby monitor we got is pretty cool. It has a night vision camera on it so after we put him to bed Kelly and I lay in our bed and watch him sleep on the monitor.  It's our new favorite TV show.

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This past week Kelly got sick. She went to the doctor and they told her that she had a double ear infection and a throat infection. She had the exact same thing last year around this time. They prescribed some antibiotics.  I worked from home for a couple of days so I could take care of Garrett.   Then I started to get sick too, but I took some of Kelly's antibiotics to nip it in the bud.

Grandma & Grandpa rescued him from us on Friday and kept him through the weekend so he wouldn't get sick. We missed him so much while he was gone. It was nice to rest for a couple of days but we were really glad to have him back home.

 

We had tickets to the Nickleback concert for Saturday but we were too sick to go. We tried to sell the tickets but couldn't find anyone to buy them. At the last minute we were able to give them away so they wouldn't go to waste. It rained and it was muddy, but we heard it was an awesome show. Bummer.

Depeche Mode Concert

A couple of weeks ago Kelly and I went to the Depeche Mode concert at the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion. We missed them last time they came to town and really regretted it so we vowed not to miss them again.

We had lawn seats and the show was sold out. There was a sea of people. It was propably one of the best concerts I've ever been to. They played a good mix from their entire discography. The setlist was:

In Chains

Wrong

Hole To Feed

Walking In My Shoes

It's No Good

A Question Of Time

Precious

Fly On The Windscreen

Little Soul

Home

Miles Away / The Truth Is

Policy Of Truth

In Your Room

I Feel You

Enjoy The Silence

Never Let Me Down Again

Encore #1

A Question Of Lust

Stripped

Behind The Wheel

Encore #2

Personal Jesus

Waiting For The Night (Bare Version)

For few old guys, they can still put on a really good show. I wore my concert shirt from when they were here in 1994.

Two Year Anniversary

Yesterday was our two year anniversary.  I got Kelly some flowers and a manicure and pedicure, and she got me an Xbox game.  We left Garrett with grandma and grandpa and we went to Benihana and had the all you can eat dinner.  Afterwards we went by the new Sharky’s Machine and had a beer.  It was a nice night.

Nickleback

We just bought tickets to see Nickleback with Hinder, Papa Roach & Saving Abel at the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion On September 12th.  Should be a pretty good show.

Dinner and Rock Band

We had some friends over last night.  We grilled some steaks, chicken, sausage, and veggies.  Afterwards we played some Rock Band and had a good time.

Astros Game

My friend Eric was able to get some discount tickets to the Astros Game against St. Louis on Wednesday.  Grandma and Grandpa watched Garrett for a few hours while we went with Josh, Andrew, & Eric. 

We had good seats and we had nachos, chili dogs, cotton candy and a couple of beers. 

It was a good game and the Astros won.  When we left it was pouring down raining so we got soaking wet in the rickshaw on the way back to the car.

Good times.

Backyard Birthday Bash

Friday night, grandma and grandpa kept Garrett over night and Kelly and I went to a friend’s birthday party.  It was also his neighbor’s birthday so they combined the two into one big backyard party.  They had a DJ, a keg, loads of Jell-O shots, a vodka watermelon, a huge spread of awesome food and lot of fun people.

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It was nice to get away for the night and sleep in the next day even though we were hung-over.

4th of July

Garrett had his first sleep-over at Grandma Peggy’s on Saturday night while Kelly & I went to eat and watch fireworks.  We got in late and slept for about 11 hours straight.  What an excellent way to celebrate freedom and liberty.

Kelly’s 32nd Birthday

Tuesday was Kelly's 32nd birthday.  After being pregnant, Kelly wasn’t feeling too pretty.  Even though I think she’s beautiful, I got her a facial, manicure and pedicure. 

One of her favorite places she’s been wanted to for a while is Benihana.  They have an all you can eat special for $25. You can eat as much as you want from their entire menu.  The grandparents came over to our house to babysit Garrett and Roman & Jennifer, Robyn, Airen, & Stephanie went with out with us.   We had salad, onion soup, chicken fried rice, edamame, crunchy rolls (or as the waitress calls them cwonchy wolls), dragon rolls, denny’s roll, vegetable tempura, teriyaki beef & chicken, ebi (shrimp) , ikura (salmon), maguro (tuna), anago (eel), more cwonchy rolls, more soup, more salad, and for desert we had strawberry ice cream.  We had a really good time and Kelly had her first beer and sake in over 9 months. I’d say we got our moneys worth.

Baby Shower

We had our baby shower May 2nd.  I don’t think our house has ever had so many people in it.  We probably had over 40 people show up.  Several of our good friends worked very hard to make this a nice event.  We had a bunch of “It’s a Boy!” balloons, beautiful blue and white flower arrangements, a lots and lots of great food and deserts.

 

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I can’t express how thankful we are to have such generous friends and family.  Garrett is set for the first few years of his life.

Stephen Lynch

Kelly and I went to see Stephen Lynch Saturday night at the Verizon Theater.  You may have seen him on Comedy Central.  He’s a comedian that plays funny songs on his guitar.   We had pretty good seats on the 3rd row because we bought tickets as soon as they went on sale.  We were about 15 feet from him.  He played about 4 songs from his old material and the rest of the show was stuff from his new album.  This guy is absolutely hilarious and he’s actually a really good musician and could probably have a non-comedy album.  One of my favorite old ones of his is “Lullaby.”  A couple of my favorite newer ones are “Fishin’ Hole” and “Waiting”

Baby Shower

As my friend Nathan said, “You get the hose, I’ll get the soap and rags.”

We’re getting ready for our baby shower which will be May 2nd.  Its a couples shower so not going to be  your typical baby shower.  It’s basically just a big party for Garrett before he gets here.  We’re sending out invitations this week.  If you don’t get one, don’t feel bad… consider this your invitation.

Contact us for more information.

We’re registered at Target & Babies ‘R’ Us.

Beer & Crawfish

Ah yes… two of my favorite things.

The weather was finally nice on a weekend so Chad & Melanie and Kelly & I went to the Saint Arnold’s brewery on Saturday.  Kelly was a trooper.  She can’t drink and was really sick but hung in there with us as we sipped down some sweet crazy goodness.

Afterwards we went to the Tequila Lopez 8th Annual Crawfish Cookoff.  We’ve been to this the last 3 years and its always a good time.  It’s all you can eat crawfish from several different cooking teams and live music.  I ate about 8lbs of crawfish, went home and took a nap.  I’d say that’s a pretty good day.