The Lindenbergs

This past weekend actually started on Friday for me. I took the day off to help my bother-in-law, Billy, and his family move into their new house. Its a very nice new home and they're now closer to us on the Kansas side (their old home was in Missouri). Of course the weather was ungodly hot -I probably easily drank 10 bottles of water.

Saturday morning was Pierce's first t-ball game. The team itself has played in about 4 games, but we've been out of town for all of them so far. We had a clear and hot morning and Pierce's grandparents came out to watch too. Pierce isn't much of a fielder, he's too busy drawing in the dirt, but he seems to enjoy himself. On Pierce's first time at bat he hit a very solid ground ball. He then promptly ran to the pitchers mound (then veered off to first base). Fortunately I go the whole thing on video (boy am I accumulating a nice batch of material to embarrass him with when he gets older).

My Dad and his girlfriend, Mary, came in for a visit later on Saturday. Its been over a year since we've seen them and the kids were very excited by the visit. We spent most of Saturday afternoon out on the patio visiting and watching Pierce and Anna play in the sprinklers and the wading pool. We finished off the day with some "Eric homemade ribs" right of the grill and movie night (The Incredibles).

Sunday we had brunch at a nice restaurant before Dad and Mary got on the road to go home. Nora took Pierce to a birthday party at Deanna Rose petting zoo while I stayed home so Anna could get a nap (Anna went upstairs after we got home from brunch and declared she was tired and needed to go to sleep). Pierce had a great time at the party -he got to fish, pan for "gold", eat cake, and even got a goodie bag (with toys) to bring home. I think I lucked out, Nora told me it was extremely warm and she thought Anna and I would have both been miserable.

We finished up the weekend by going over to Nora's folks house for a "postponed" Father's Day dinner. Yummy. Whatever weight I may have burned off moving Billy's stuff on Friday I more than recovered on Sunday.

-Eric (Dad)

We went down to the Lake of the Ozarks this past weekend to spend some time with Nora's extended family. We had a short weekend there and unfortunately, most of Nora's extended family had already gone home, so it was just us, Billy's family, and her Uncle Rich and his wife. We spent literally the whole afternoon IN the lake on Saturday. Anna got a little bold and rode on the jet ski with me a little bit, as did Nora. We finished the day by playing a little poker while the kids watched TV. It was awesome. Sunday was short with a morning boat ride around the lake for about an hour. Very relaxing. If the lake was just a little closer I could see trying to get out there more frequently.

My Dad and Mary are coming in this weekend, so we're looking forward to that. Nothing big planned, just lots of grandparent time. After that we don't have much going on until my brother's wedding in October. Two notable Pierce quotes from this weekend:

1)

We went out for dinner Sunday night and decided to go to Dairy Queen for some ice cream afterwards (Pierce had been promised that if he was a good eater he could get a vanilla cone). On the way to DQ we passed a gas station with a car wash. Pierce announces that instead of ice cream we should get Nora's car washed. I wanted to verify that this is what he really meant: Eric: So, you don't want ice cream, you want to go throught the car wash instead? Pierce: No ice cream for me! So that's what we did (of course, after Pierce and Anna went to bed Nora went to DQ to get ice cream for the both of us.

2)

While we were at the lake Pierce got a bug bite on one of his testicles. Changing him into his pajamas last night I put some cortizone cream on the bite, then we went downstairs to read for a bit. Just as we got situated one of Pierce's friends rang the bell to see if he could play. I had to politely turn her down due to pending bedtime. From behind me Pierce announces, "Isabel, I have medicine on my penis!". I've never seen quite such a "deer in the headlights" look as the one I got from that little girl. I wonder what she told her family when she got back home...

-Eric (Dad)

Nora's last day an the NAIC was last Friday. Her co-workers took her to happy hour Thursday night so I got kid duty. Pierce, Anna and I went to Pierce's t-ball practice immediately after I got off work. We got some cooler weather (for a change) but after several days of hard rain the field and surrounding areas were pretty muddy. Pierce had no problems, but I spent most of the practice chasing Anna to make sure she didn't get into the mud. After practice Pierce suggested we go to Dairy Queen for dinner and ice cream (what a bright boy).

Queue disaster music. Walking into the Dairy Queen, Pierce led our little group and I held Anna's hand as she slightly trailed behind me. Somehow, and all parents know how fast this happens, Anna put her thumb in the opening where the store's door hinges. Yup, you guessed it, the door started to close on her thumb. I got the door open quickly but her thumb looked pretty "squished". Nothing looked to be broken but I grabbed a hand full of ice and got it on her hand FAST. The Dairy Queen folks were very nice and quite helpful, even bringing Pierce and Anna some ice cream while I tried to get Anna calmed down. Pierce tore through an ice cream cone while I spoon fed Anna ice cream and kept her thumb iced. She liked the ice cream, and ate it with enthusiasm through her tears, but she was obviously in pain.

We cut our DQ visit short and Nora's Mom met us at our house to watch Pierce while I got the address of the nearest Children's Mercy Urgent Care center and took Anna to have her thumb looked at. Turns out the thumb was fine. By the time we got there the swelling had gone down and Anna was busy entertaining the staff and playing with some toys I'd brought. The doctor gave her a clean bill of health.

The only long-term affect from the whole episode is that I think it shaved about a year off my life. Of course, when Nora got home her comment, after hearing the evening's events, was "I'm out one night and my daughter ends up at the emergency room..."

-Eric (Dad)

I just finished downloading our vacation pictures off the camera and cleaning them up. Want a look? Click on, or go to:

http://www.editedmemories.com/Videos/Corolla2005.wmv

You'll need windows media player and make sure you have the sound on (there's music).

It already seems like our vacation was a million years ago.

-Eric

We're going through a nasty heat wave with lots of intermittent thunderstorms and tornado warnings. Looks like our springtime is behind us.

The whole family sat in Anna's room last night and watched a thunderstorm roll in (Anna kept asking for more lightning).

-Eric (Dad)

Our neighbors from across the street, Jean and her son Alex, came over for a pizza dinner last night. Very fun. Jean is about the nicest person you'd ever want to meet. Her son Alex watched our house for us while we were on vacation. Nora took the dinner opportunity to give Alex a souvenir shirt, a thank you card, and his "paycheck".

Alex recently got a new bike and brought his old bike over to give to Pierce. I cannot overstate how excited Pierce was. Of course, Anna got Pierce's old bike, and she was just as excited. The two spent most of the evening driving their new bikes around the kitchen with Anna getting significant help from Alex.

-Eric (Dad)

As usual, we spent Memorial Week in Corolla, N.C. (the Outer Banks). This year Scott's fiance's parents, Jim and Sherry, joined us. I think they had a great time and they fit right in with the usual crowed: Nora and me (and the kids), my Mom, Carrie (Nora's best friend), Doug and Erin (and Kevin), and Scott, Chance and Stacy.

We had tolerable weather this year. A little on the cool side with rain in the middle of the week. But we got some quality beach, pool and surfing time in, so no real complaints. Our house this year was Leisure Thyme. It was a brand new, beautiful house with us being the first renters. Unfortunately, the house had more than its fair share of bugs and I spent the first part of the week on the phone constantly to have workorders fixed (sigh). Ultimately the realty company and the owners were not only gracious and apologetic, but made an effort to compensate us for the inconvenience. They also sent us a delicious blueberry cheesecake (yum!).

This was the first year Anna could really appreciate the beach and she took to the experience like a fish to water. We got some great pictures of her playing in the waves. Pierce was more of a sand guy this year, with lots of back and forth to the ocean to fill a bucket and dump it in the sand.

Pierce and Chance jointly came up with the idea of having me make a new Star Wars movie featuring everyone in the house. After dinner one evening we collected every broom, mop, beach toy, and pool toy that conceivably could be treated like a light saber and had the entire crew go out into the front yard and have a battle to the death. It was a blast. I don't even want to think about the level of effort necessary to add in the special effects to make this thing look good. Hopefully I'll have it done before next year's trip.

We got back to Kansas last Sunday and picked up Josie (the dog) after work on Monday. She doesn't seem to be any worse for wear and of course we all missed her. The whole week went by entirely too quickly, but we're all glad to be back home.

-Eric (Dad)