Problem Solved

As I said in the last post, we had some problems getting Bonzo to actually go swimming.  The one time before today that he actually got in the water he fell under and lost quite a bit of his confidence.  Since then he's gone close enoughto get his toes wet. 

This afternoon Emily and I went to Tuesday Morning to look around and you won't believe what we found.  As we predicted, Bonzo was not too thrilled as you can see below.

I think he spent the entire car ride to the dog park worrying that the other dogs were going to make fun of him as you can see below.

But hey! The thing actually worked.  We have a swimmer!

Summer Thus Far

Got a ladder

Cleaned the gutters

Played golf

Hung a ladder

Hung shovels and rakes

Walked Bonzo

Mowed the lawn

Let Bonzo out in the fresh mown lawn

Gave Bonzo a bath

Took Bonzo to the dog park

Threw a ball. He couldn't get it. Ball is lost.

Watched as Bonzo fell into the mud pit

Gave Bonzo a bath

Played tennis

Took Bonzo to another dog park

Wondered the whole time why I didn’t just take him for a walk

Watched as Bonzo didn’t get muddy

Breathed sigh of relief

Took him home

He’s out like a light

Bonzo

The danger of spending money on a raffle is not that you are spending your money with nothing to show for it. The danger of spending money on a raffle is that you are spending your money with a chance to have something to show for it.

It all started out as an agreement to temporarily watch an Australian Shepherd/Labrador puppy for a couple days.  The plan was that someone was suppossed to win the chance to take this puppy home.  I agreed to buy a raffle ticket and the outcome was that we were the someones to take him home.  I really didn't see that one coming.  I never would have guessed that I'd some day become a dog owner but I must admit that this pup is pretty cute and nice. 

That being said there is a new resident of our house.  Being an Australian Shepherd we looked to the internet for Australian slang words to name it.  After narrowing it down from a few possibilities we settled on naming him Bonzo.

That being said, enjoy a few pictures of Bonzo.

2010 Update

When we left off I believe Thanksgiving had just come and gone.  So if you wish, join me on a trip back through the months on December and January and find out what has kept me from this

DECEMBER:
December started with Emily and I completing our first month of marriage.  To celebrate we went to a restaurant called "Thomas" in KC MO.  This happened to be the night of a Packers/Ravens Monday night football game.  We haven't found many Packer fans in Kansas City yet, but when the owner introduced himself to us we learned that his family was from Beaver Dam and that he too was a big Packer fan.  As we ate, we watched the Packers and occasionally enjoyed a conversation about Wisconsin people and places.  It almost felt as though we were back in Wisconsin.

Emily started a new job waitressing at Cheddars, a nice restaurant with great food at a decent price.  The restaurant is brand new and just opened in mid-December, so there was a bit of an adjustment period, but she's working good hours which has helped a lot with the bills.

We had the opportunity go home to Wisconsin for Christmas, however it was a pretty short trip as we had to be back for Emily's waitressing schedule.  Nonetheless we were able to spend time with both sides of the family.

JANUARY:
I guess you could say that Emily and I started some "New Year's Resolutions" this year.  The firstof which includes joining one of Dave Ramsey's "Financial Peace University" classes.  Ramsey's big themes are living debt free and to simply control your money before it controls you.  Although we feel like we started with a pretty decent grasp on this we feel as though we learn a thing or two each of the weekly sessions.  We highly reccomend for anyone to go on his website and searching for an FPU class near you.  The younger the better but there is no age limit.

Another resolution has been for both of us to get in better shape.  I don't consider eitherof us to be out of shape but I can speak for myself when I say that I have definately felt myself getting older quicker in the last few years.  We both want to be proactive about not letting that happen too fast.

Several who may be reading this may know that a few years ago I decided I wanted to take on a triathlon.  While I started to train for that by riding my bike and especially running I learned that I wasn't going to be able to run a great distance until I took care of a bone spur and bone partical under my knee.  This sidelined the goal of competing in a triathlon and I have not done my part to pick it up again.

This is my avenue to announce to everyone that I am going to compete in the same Pewaukee Triathlon that I had wanted to compete in three years ago.  July of 2010 I will do this.  Keep me on task.

To finish the month off I have to admit that I broke my first bone ever.  While navigating through the dark I found a piece of furniture with my toe.  Sadly yet luckily at the same time my first broken was nothing cool sounding like the femur but instead was the distal phalanx (I think).  But it became very colorful.  I'll put a picture up here soon.

FEBRUARY:
The last few months have been greatly consumed with basketball. In the NBAless town of Kansas City there sure are passionate feelings about the KU Jayhawks, K-State Wildcats, and the Mizzou Tigers.  I can't say I care too much about any, but I do think it would be really cool to go to Lawrence to see a KU game. 

The truth of the matter is that I've been consumed with Bethany basketball.  I've really enjoyed the opportunities I've had to coach in the past and I appreciated every one of my St. Peter's teams that I was affiliated with.  This year I was still able to coach the Eagles.  With all the changes there have been in the past it meant a lot to be able to coach again as it has been something that I've enjoyed.  During the regular season my boys only two games.

The first week of February marked the last week of my 5/6th grade basketball season.  The Kansas City Lutheran Athletic League Tournament was held at KC Lutheran High School this weekend.  Ranked third going into the tournament I knew there was a good chance we'd face the two teams we prviously lost to.  I can't say I was anything but eager to see both of them.  I'll let the pictures do the rest of the talking for this post.

Until next time... God bless you.

Thanksgiving

Well it's a little later than Thanksgiving but I wanted to wait until I had some pictures to show you.  So how did Thanksgiving go?

I was blessed enough to have Wednesday of last week off of school.  This meant that Emily and I were able to leave Kansas after Tuesday afternoon's basketball practice.  We were on the road by 6:04 with plans to stop once we became too tired.  Emily drove the first stretch with me taking over at 9:00.  Not knowing where we'd finish the night yet knowing of the existence of a hotel in the area, I was hoping to make it to Dixon, IL where we stayed on the way down after the wedding.  Once we made it there, however, I started to realize how close we were.  I had said at the beginning I wasn't going to push anything if I felt the least bit tired and I don't feel we did once.  Instead of Dixon, we pulled into her parents driveway at about 2:30 am. 

Wednesday was spent baking pies and ended up going to Thanksgiving church that evening at Immanuel.  BBQ Burgers from Pistol Pete's are recommended by me by the way.

Thanksgiving Day was spent at the Theine house with Emily's siblings and parents.  It was a fun time had by all which included a Packer victory (of which I missed an impressive amount of the second half while trying to smile for the many takes before the 'perfect' picture was captured), good food, good dessert, and no one can forget Band Hero.

The day after Thanksgiving gave us another Thanksgiving celebration to be thankful for.  It was very nice to be able to spend a whole day at both places.  Thanks mom!  We missed out on seeing all of our nieces but were pleased to see half of the Racine Lorenz's.  We missed you guys Sarah and Emma!  The food was again amazing.  It was great to see as much of the Lorenz side as we could.  Thanks for hanging out everyone!

Believe it or not my Saturday, the last Saturday in November in fact, was spent on the golf course.  My dad and brother were able to take advantage of some amazing November weather and hit the links for what I'm sure will be my last round of the year.

We got a late start on Sunday but nonetheless we were able to leave after 9:30 church at Immanuel.  It was a long drive of course but for the most part it was rather uneventful.

Here's a (short) list of things I am thankful for (in no particular order):
1) My faith God has given me.
2) Emily
3) My family that is full of parents, siblings, nugens, etc... on multiple sides now.
4) Safe travels
5) Good eating
6) Brewers baseball
7) Wisconsin
8) Kansas
9) Brats
10) Math
11) Cars
12) Sothwest Airlines which now services Milwaukee
13) Friends
14) Dr. Pepper
15) Guitars
16) The chance to teach
17) Rock Band
18) Snooze button
19) Vacations
20) The Red Box
21) Our house
22) Sports
23) Trivial Pursuit
24) Books
25) Music

Again I know that it has been a while since my last post.  Please accept my apologies as it has been a rather busy few weeks.

Nonetheless the wedding day has come! It came and it went and it brought us back to Kansas.  It's so nice to finally have someone else from home in Kansas.

For those that were unable to be there I'll tell you a little bit about the weekend:

For myself it started after school on Thursday when I flew home.  Emily picked me up from the airport and we drove to my sister's house where we had the pleasure of meeting Grandpa and his lovely bride Peggy for the first time.  We also got the opportunity to see my parents, Matt, Elise, Madeline and Carly. 

Friday was busier than I had thought it was going to be.  It began with several errands to prepare the groomsmen/ushers gifts.  I also spent some time at the reception hall trying to help to be sure everything was ready.  From there we went to the church for the rehearsal.  Many thanks to Dean and Cathy for hosting the rehearsal dinner.  Everyone enjoyed a wonderful meal and time to relax.  This still made for a long night before the big day. 

As I went to bed that night, forecast: High of 59, Partly Cloudy

Though there were some kinks in the plan right off the bat nothing major happened to cause any problems.  Right from the get-go I woke up and relaxed a bit in the morning.  The TV was on and I was waiting for the weather.  Today's forecast: High of 68, Sunny.  Looks like everything is going to work out after all. Rumor has it that the temperature actually got up to the mid 70s.  I don't have any confirmation of this. 

Emily was stunning.  The service was beautiful.  I could not have asked for anything better than what we got.  The reception hall was gorgeous.  Emily did a great job of paying attention to the details.  From the cake to the tables to the favors to the dance floor.  It was all amazing.  We were very pleased with our photographer, our hall, the church, the DJ.  It was all amazing. 

The other amazing piece was all the guests that made it to town for the wedding.  We both want to thank our guests for making the long journeys from Kansas, Oregon, Washingtin, Georgia, Costa Rica, Brazil, or the many other places you came from.  It was flattering that you chose to devote your time to be a part of our special day.

Here are just some pictures for those that maybe interested:

Day One Again

Today marks the first Brewer-less day for the next 6 months.  Exactly 6 months today the Brewers play the Rockies at Miller Park to open the 2010 season.  That's 182 days. 4,368 hours. 262,080 minutes. 15,724,800 seconds.  What is there to do during that time? Just makes you wonder why they don't make it a year round sport.

On the brighter side of things, I am excited that the Crew was able to finish off the year strong with a sweep of the playoff bound Cardinals.  Also I'm excited to hear the ringing in my ears that Trevor Time will be returning for 2010.

I apologize for my lack of pictures again this week, but I assure you of plenty next week.  I'll be traveling home this weekend for the final time before the wedding to take care of things.  I have no plans set in stone and I know that Emily will be busy all day on Saturday.  If you are in town next weekend feel free to give me a call to let me know what's going on. 

As for tonight, I'm watching as the Packers are playing the Vikings and hope that they are able to get back into it.  Only the fourth quarter will tell.