New Pictures

Well, we've had a bevy of new pics downloaded, so I thought I would throw a few on the blog here:



Here's Jae playing. He's getting pretty big, even though he fell off the growth chart at his last check-up. He's finally started taking to solids, so hopefully we'll get him nice and plump for his next visit to the doctor.






Our little family at Temple Square for the lights.








Me and the boys in my hospital bed, post-appendectomy.








I know this one is blurry, but I love it. We had to leave our ward Christmas party early. I was sad that Boston wasn't going to be able to see Santa, but as we were leaving, we heard some jingle bells and then, there he was. It was so fun to see Boston have a one on one moment with Santa outside of a mall. The joy on his face when he showed up was priceless!





Boston and his cousin, Caleb.
AKA: Thing One and Thing Two
AKA: Trouble




Well, I'm sure there are a bunch more that I could post, but I don't want to overwhelm the blogspot server. We will definitely have a whole bunch after Christmas.

Appendicitis Sucks!

Well, the last 48 hours have been pretty exciting for me (Ben). Friday afternoon, I started to feel a little sick to my stomach and thought I was having some indigestion. I left work a little early and tried to get home, but traffic was bad and it took me an hour to get home from Draper. It was a long, uncomfortable ride. I didn't think too much of it and expected it would run its course through the evening. I had planned to meet with my good friend, Adam Spencer, who I haven't seen in a couple of years. We enjoyed a good evening of catching up and reminscing about where we've been and what we're doing. I wasn't getting any better, though. In fact, I was getting worse. Late that night, I got nauseous and developed chills that I couldn't get over. I thought maybe it was the Cafe Rio burrito I'd eaten for lunch and I could just sleep it off. I had a pretty nasty pain in my side, but attributed it to the indigestion.

In the morning, I felt a little better. My pain had subsided, but was still there and was sensitive to the touch. I was supposed to go skiing with my dad, and we had a busy day in general planned, but I ended up staying home all day, honing my Guitar Hero skills. Jenny got back from her parties and errands about 2:00 or so. We ran some errands and decided to swing by the instacare, but the wait was an hour, so we decided to bag it. I was convinced that things would resolve on their own and wasn't excited about seeing the doctor anyway. We went back home to wait things out, but with a little coaxing from my father in law and Jenny, I decided to take another shot at the instacare.

We hit the instacare about 6:00 and I got all signed in, but when the receptionist saw my symptoms, she recommended I just go to the ER. She said there wasn't much they could do there if it was appendicitis. They were kind enough to give me back the copay and send us on our way. We got to the ER and I went and checked in while Jenny took the kids to Target where Jami was meeting her to pick them up. My wait in the ER was fairly typical. There weren't too many people there, but a young couple on a date came in after getting in a car accident. The girl had her arm broken by the airbag and her poor date was trying to help her out. I got the impression that this was either a first date, or they hadn't been going out too long. It was a little awkward when he had to ask her if she was pregnant, had given birth recently and the date of her last menstrual cycle. At the end of the form, he had to put in their relationship and they weren't quite sure how to classify it.

I got triaged ahead of a girl with congestion and a headache who checked in the same time I did. I also got in just ahead of the broken arm couple. They took me in and got me settled. Jenny had gotten back and my dad showed up a little bit later. They came in to draw some blood and I had to give a urine sample. While I was having my blood drawn, I thought I was going to pass out and had to lay down. I got really woozy and light headed, so they gave me some oxygen. They started an IV as well at that point. The doctor came in eventually and was pretty confident almost immediately that I would have to get my appendix removed. They waited for the blood tests to come back. The next time I saw the doctor, he said his findings were confirmed and they were going to get a surgeon to come in. He started to explain the procedure when the surgeon came walking in, did a little evaluation, explained the procedure, and off we went that quick to the OR.

I was fortunate in a lot of ways. The surgeon had just wrapped up a case and decided to call down to the ER to see if they needed him, which they just did, for me. I got to the ER at just the right time, and although they said they had a full house, I didn't have to wait long. By the time I was being wheeled to the OR, though, they did have a full house and it was starting to get overcrowded.

I was extremely fortunate to have my dad there to give me a blessing. I was also fortunate that the anesthesiologist was a worthy priesthood holder who was willing to annoint. It was special to have that calming blessing from my father just minutes before I was under the anesthesia. The next think I knew, I was awake in the recovery room. I hung out there with the recovery room nurse for a few minutes before they wheeled me up to room 207. Within a matter of 3 hours, I had been through the ER, operated on and was resting comfortably (well, as comfortable as you can feel post-operatively) in a hospital room. I was no longer with an appendix and had two small incisions in my belly and a reopened belly button. Other than that, no worse for wear.

My night was pretty uneventful except for the hourly vital checks for the first few hours of the night. I was able to get some sleep and overall have felt pretty good. I was discharged about 11:45 after my last prescibed round of IV antibiotics. We then came to my parents home to rest and recuperate.

Overall, I think things went as well as they possibly could. The timing was impeccable as apparently the thing was just about ready to pop. I should be back to full health for Chrismas and won't have to worry about an emergency appendectomy on the cruise in January. I've already been there, done that.

Elf'd

Click here to see our family as elves!

Merry Christmas!

Black Friday and Beyond

So, back in time to over a week ago...

Black Friday has been a tradition for Jenny and I ever since we got married. We started the first day after Thanksgiving that we were married. We decided on a whim to go to Best Buy and get a door buster deal on an Aladdin DVD. We went to the Best Buy on Riverdale Road and ended up towards the end of the line about 1/2 mile away (maybe a bit of an exaggeration, but not much)in front of the Lowe's. People were amazed that we would get up that early for a $15 DVD. I was amazed that that many people would sacrifice sleep after a holiday to wait in the cold for these deals. We were in and out of the store in about 10 minutes with our DVD and a couple of other things. We decided that since it was so early, we would go to Kohls to see what was going on there. We ended up buying the rest of our Christmas and had all our shopping done within an hour. It took us two hours to pay, though. We decided two things on that day: 1) We were going to do this every year, and 2) we needed to recruit some people to tag team with.

Since then, our experience had evolved in sophistication. We recruited my brother Adam and his wife Jami the next year. We split time in line so our whole experience was only about 2 hours. We were careful to choose a few items from the Thanksgiving day ads and mapped out a path for the next morning. The last two years we've been accompanied by my sister and her husband and my other brother. We've seen some pretty crazy things and we always make sure to have fun or it could be a pretty miserable experience.

This year was somewhat different in that we didn't have any specific items we were shopping for, but there was no way that was going to stop us. We did start a little later than usual and made Target our one major stop. We got there shortly before the doors opened at 6:00. The line was already down the entire front of the store and around the corner to the back side. We ended up back there and counted down the minutes before the doors opened. My Jami, Sarah and Matt decided to hang out towards the front of the line to witness the inevitable commotion. There were a few skirmishes as people outside the lines tried to push there way in. I will say, to Target's credit, they had things pretty well under control this year. By the time we were getting into the store, the real die-hards were already making their way out with their doorbuster big-ticket items. We made sure to let the guys who sacrificed
sleep and the possibility of frost bite for a $575 flat screen TV that we respected their efforts.

We make it a priority to get the cheap DVDs. They had a great selection and we stocked up. We got a few toy items for the kids, some great deals, and just took in the sights and sounds of a Target packed with enough humanity and shopping carts to fill, well, a SuperTarget. One piece of advice...don't bother with a cart unless you have someone who can stay with the cart outside of the main congestion. Have runners to make specific grabs in high-concentration areas, specifically the toy section. Another tip: bring all of your patience with you. I can't believe how many grumpy people show up at these early morning sales, cursing and complaining about the crowded ailes and lack of personal help. What did you expect coming into this? A little common sense, please.

At any rate, after Target, we split up a bit and headed off to other destinations. There is an Old Navy and a Toys R Us within walking distance of Target so we made a trip over there and got some good, unexpected deals. We waited in line for a little while at Toys R Us, but overall it was a good experience for our first time in that store on Black Friday.

We wrapped up our morning at a little after 8:00. I think it's worth the time and effort to get all of our shopping done in about 2 hours. You also can't beat the deals you can find, even when you're not planning on finding any.

After that, we enjoyed the rest of the long weekend with family and friends. It never seems to last long enough and then you're back at work. It's busier than usual because you're playing catch up for the short week the week before. It also seemed like everyone was sick with something. I had one day where there was one MA in my clinic with 3 doctors because everyone else was late or sick. Must have been sleeping off the tryptophan. It's weird to think that Christmas is only 24 days away.

Thanksgiving 2008

Holidays always seem to take on a life of their own when you are married with two kids. Thanksgiving day reared it's big head, took us by the leash and dragged us around for the next three days. I don't think I've been so tired when I've supposedly been off of work and enjoying a long weekend. Don't get me wrong, I love the holidays. I love Thanksgiving enough to willfully put off celebrating Christmas, which I love, so that's saying something. It just seems that they are busier than you plan on, especially with big families that live closeby.

Thanksgiving day started out innocuous enough. Jenny and I got up and tidied the house. We even managed a workout in preparation of binging. We got the kids up and ready and I went off to play a little football in the Shadowbrook Ward Turkey Bowl. We played for about an hour and a half (I was on the losing end of a lopsided game, but I did manage to throw two interceptions!) when we decided to call it before any major injuries beyond the few muscle pulls and bruises.

Jenny came and met me and I got ready for the day. We headed off to her family's house to meet up with her brother who came into town from Portland. We hung out up there until I got hungry and decided that I wanted to eat. Since my family was eating at 2:00, and Jenny's wasn't eating until 6:00, it worked out that we got a little Thanksgiving lunch. After heading to my family's house to partake of our first feast, we went back to Jenny's fam's to digest and wait for dinner to start. We enjoyed our second meal of the day with them, then chewed the fat for a while before heading back to my fam's house where we were spending the night in preparation for our "Black Friday" tradition of early morning Christmas shopping.

More on that later...

A "The Office"-worthy Gaffe

This just happened about 10 minutes ago, by the way...

I have been having this miserable morning. I got a call at about 7:00 that one of the MA's at Murray had been sick all night and couldn't come to work. In addition, we had one of our physician's working who usually doesn't work Tuesdays, so his MA was not coming in. This left us with two MAs for four physicians.

I scrambled around and ended up pulling an MA from another office to work for us at Murray. When she arrived, I was introducing her to the staff. I started up front with our receptionists, Dee and Donna. Immediately, without thinking, I added: "The Double D's." As soon as I realized what I said, I could feel my cheeks flushing with embarrassment. I guess that's where Michael Scott and I deviate. I might say those things occassionally without thinking, but he's proud of it when he does it.

That's what she said!

Boston's Primary Program Debut

Boston made his Primary Program debut today, even though he's not in Primary. The primary chorister asked Boston and me to sing "I Hope They Call Me On A Mission" as part of the program with 3 other fathers and sons. Grandma and Grandpa came with Uncle Erik to see him. We sang toward the end so we enjoyed the program until it was our time to sing. Boston jumped right up on the podium and stood on the booster. He sang so well. He's been singing the song for months now and did a great job. Everyone complimented on how cute he was and gave him high fives and handshakes. It was pretty emotional to stand up there with him and sing that song. I hope that the joy he feels about serving a mission now will endure for the next 17 years.

As for the last couple of weeks, things have been extremely busy for me. Work has been insane with 2 new providers starting at Hidden Valley, searching for new office space for Dr. Murday and the usual busy nature of Murray Peds. Jenny has been working extended hours, opening at 6:15 and staying until 2:00 or later. Boston has been his usual busy-body self. Jae has another tooth. Other than all that, business as usual in the Gunn household.

We are buying a townhouse in North Salt Lake that will be ready next spring. We are pretty excited about it, although I am pretty nerve-wracked with the prospect of paying that much for a home. I keep hacing to remind myself that it's a good investment. Then I think about how nice it will be to have 3 bedrooms, 2 and 1/2 baths, a little backyard, two car garage... yeah, I'm pretty excited. We've been in our small, cramped, two-bedroom apartment for 2 and 1/2 years. We'll be sad to leave our ward, but we really need the space. It'll be nice to have a place that will be ours.

Thanksgiving is this week and Christmas officially starts for me on Friday. We are planning our usual early Friday A.M. shopping spree. It's hard to believe it's almost 2008.

HI-
I thought that I would write a quick blog. Let you know whats been going on in our house lately. Boston is growing big, and has makes us laugh all the time. Today I told him he was getting so big, and he said " No I'm little, I cant reach anything". We were rolling. He has also starting telling us the he hates us. Thanks to Finding Nemo, we wont be watching that one for a while.( Nemo tells his dad he hates him) He really is a good boy. He still hates going to bed, and has has started to ask us every night if there are monsters. We have tried everything we can think of to make bed time a enjoyable experience , but we still all dread it every night. Especially on Wednesday nights, when I have to do it alone because Ben is at Young Men's. So if anyone has any suggestions on putting a 2 year old to bed , I would appreciate it.
Jaegan is getting chunky. He got his first tooth, and has a second one coming right behind it. He has been grumpy but if you talk to him he gets so smiley. He has been sleeping so well also. He only wakes up once and Ben and I take turns getting up, so some nights I actually get a whole night of sleep. I have to be to work super early in the morning, and so I love those nights I get a full night sleep.
Ben has been busy at work trying to make his Dr's happy. They are kind of high maintenance. He helps me a lot though, he brings the boys over to school in the morning, and he is such a good dad. We have decided to buy a town home in North Salt Lake. It wont be built until the end of April or so, so we will stay in our apartment until then. We are so excited to move and get some more room for Boston to run and play. We are really excited to stay in North Salt Lake to.
I love and hate my job at the same time. We have had a CRAZY week, we had to fire two teachers and have had a lot out sick, so I have been working lots of hours and I have decided that I am a cranky person when things don't go the way I plan them to. I am so glad that tomorrow is Friday. I will have to make the most of the week-end. If anyone has any fun ideas let me know. Well I will go for now. This is fun to blog, so I will have to do it again later. Love you all.

Finally some pictures...

Our Halloween Family











We found Optimus Prime in Utah County!



Boston at Cornbelly's











Bobbing for Apples. I got one!

Jaegan's First Tooth

We found out the other day the reason that Jaegan has been so fussy the last little while is he had a tooth breaking through. Jenny noticed it the other day. It is on the bottom and barely poking through, but he is much happier since it started to show.

Also, happy Halloween. I've been meaning to post pics, but haven't downloaded any yet. I'll get them up this weekend.

Ideas for future blog entries

I just want to chronicle a few ideas for future blog entries. I don't have time now to really give these justice, but my head is chock full of ideas on these topics. I just need to flesh them out before I post them in their entirety. Maybe via comments, my frequent visitors (all two of them) can give some feedback or ideas.

1. The dumbification of America via reality TV.
2. The relationship between celestial/terrestrial and the sun/moon
2. I already forgot the next one. It was a real winner. It'll come to me. Wait for it...well, I'll have to keep thinking about it.

In the meantime, I will keep this entry open for further addition.

Meanwhile, two times in the last week Boston has requested us to drive by the temple so he can see "Angel Rome-eye." It's really funny to hear him say it. In fact, we had the Elders over for dinner a couple weeks ago and he had them rolling with it. He really loves the temple and talks all the time about going inside. He is also already excited about being a missionary. It's reassuring to know that maybe we're doing something right by him. If we could only get him to hold still and be quiet during prayers.

Jaegan seems to have gotten over his flu, although he's traded his puking for being exceptionally fussy. He's eating incessantly, too, which I guess is good seeing as how he didn't really eat much of anything the week he was sick. Everyone says he's starting to put on weight. Boston has developed an appetite, too. He's starting to get chubby cheeks again like when he was a baby.

Our exciting week was all it was billed to be. I'll post more about our specific activities once we get pictures downloaded.

Busy Week Ahead

Well, as we begin to close out the month of October, this little Gunn family has a busy week ahead. I have young men's tomorrow night, then Thursday we are planning on going to look at some houses with Matt. Friday we have a ward "Chili Cook Off" for which I am planning on making Karen's (my mother in law) white chicken chili. I am hoping it will wow the ward as it does me. I look forward to this time of year almost exclusively for the fact that I will be able to consume this divine culinary concoction. If I make it half decently, I will make it sometime for everyone. It is SOOOO good. Saturday we have a big day lined up, spending the morning in Lehi with Lincoln and Carina to take in the sights and sounds of Thanksgiving Point's Halloween festivities. Then we have two Halloween parties to attend in the afternoon, one hosted by Karen and the other by Sarah. I really do love this time of year!

Hopefully the weather and everyone's health will hold up. The weather is actually supposed to be decent all week. So far, so good. A bit mild, but no storms which have been the norm for about the last month. We are supposed to have a storm-free weekend for the first time in about a month, so we'll cross our fingers with that.

Jaegan seems to be getting over his stomach flu, but threw up his whole bottle again yesterday. Boston woke up with a fever this morning and Jenny is under the weather with a cold as well. I'm knocking on wood as I type in hopes that I don't end up sick as well. I usually have this uncanny ability to avoid major illness, but with so much going on around me it might be inevitable. I am going to get my flu shot today, so hopefully that will help!

October Already?

I can't believe that it is already October, and the weather the last two weekends has proved it. The transitional seasons of spring and fall in Utah have been pretty non-existent the last couple of years. We'll go directly from a scorching hot summer into a bitter winter without any mild temperatures, and then right back into summer without much of a spring. It's kind of depressing in some ways, as spring and fall are my favorite seasons. We were able to see the beginning of the trees turning on our camping trip, but I'm afraid that the winter-like weather of the last two weekends will knock all the colors off the trees. I can only hope that this transition-less season change will lead to an early snow-packed ski season.

Because of the weather, we have not been able to do much over the last couple of weeks. I've been trying to keep up with my workout and diet routine to get in shape for our cruise in January, but didn't do so well this last week. I was able to get out and run on Monday and Jenny, Boston and Jaegan accompanied me to the park Thursday afternoon to get in a run before our shows (My Name Is Earl and The Office) started. By the way, the season premier of 30 Rock was REALLY funny. I'm looking forward to the rest of the season.

Monday (Heroes) and Thursday are really the only days that we watch TV. Otherwise, we're watching movies with Boston. His new favorite is The Jungle Book. He refers to himself as "Man Cub" and gets confused when we tell him the man cub's name is Mowgli.

Jae has just been getting bigger. He's smiling a lot, but is also a lot more grumpy. I think he's starting to realize that crying and fussing is a good way to get what he wants. Eventually, after trying the bottle, then the binkie, then the blankie, then the cuddling, then the whatever-else, mom and dad will usually get to what he needs.

That really does about sum up the last couple of weeks. It will be a sneeze and a sniffle and then it will be December. At least we have the cruise to keep us interested as the weather turns to gray.

Camping Trip

Jenny, Boston and I went camping over this last weekend. We arranged to have Jaegan stay with Jami so we didn't have to subject him to the elevation and cold as he was fighting off an ear infection (his first of many to be sure).

We got off early on Friday to head up to Christmas Meadows on the back side of the Uintahs. As we headed off, we had to make a number of stops that impeded our progress. We had to stop in Evanston to buy a car charger for Ben's phone as he tried to wrap up his day at work despite leaving early. Even with all the headaches, we got up to the campsite around 5:00 and pitched our tent. Jenny's family had been there since Thursday night and had things pretty well set up. Dinner was already cooking. We enjoyed a dutch oven dinner of spare ribs, pork and beans and a divine peach cobbler for dessert. That alone made the drive worth it!

Boston spent the night with us in the tent. It was cold, so we had plenty of blankets, which don't go well with Boston as he usually sleeps without one. He kept Jenny and I up as he tried to wrestle his way out of the sleeping bags and out from under the pile of blankets. He managed okay, though, and was a trooper despite the cold.


We awoke to a beautiful, but cold, morning in the Uintahs. We started a fire and made a breakfast of pancakes, eggs and bacon. After breakfast, we all took a walk down in the meadows by the river. This was quite an adventure. Boston liked throwing rocks into the stream and hiking along with his cousins.

We went back to camp to rest for a little while, then we took an excursion to Lily Lake. The ride up was interesting with Grandpa's truck chuck full of people. The road was rough and rocky, so it was a pretty fun and wild ride. Up at the lake, we did a little fishing and explored the shore of the lake. I caught a little fish and Grandpa showed Boston how to fish.











After our time up at the lake, we went back to camp and had some lunch. We decided that with the impending bad weather, we should pack it in and get ready to leave a little early. We packed up camp and hung out chewing the fat around camp until the rain started to fall. We left to head home and were glad we did as it rained the whole way.

We really had a good time and were sad that we were only able to make it up into the beautiful mountains one time this year. We vowed that we would get out in to the wilderness more often next summer.

Jenny's Look-Alikes

Look Alikes

Saw this on Anissa's blog and it looked like fun.



John Edwards, huh? Well, Harry Potter and James Cagney are there too, so we'll stick with them. I think the forehead was throwing things off a little. I'll try again with another pic. There has to be a little Brad Pitt in there somewhere.

Let's try again...



Not bad. Chad Michael Murray, Leo...what's with all the chicks, though?

And if there was any doubt...



he looks more like me!

Lagoon Bounceback

Jenny and I had our first time sans 2 boys last night as we bounced back to Lagoon. It was somewhat nostalgic as our second date was to Lagoon. It was really nice to have some time to ourselves. As much as we love Boston and Jaegan, I think every couple needs to have time alone together, even if its in the midst of hundreds of people while riding on roller coasters. We owe Syd big time for watching the boys on short notice. It's also reassuring to know that they can behave when we're not around.

Since it was only $7.50 to get back in, we didn't feel like we needed to take a whole day to get our money's worth. Monday was again a pretty slow day with school starting this week. We were able to get in as much riding as we did a couple of weeks ago. We hit up Wicked first thing and didn't have to wait too long. We rode all the rides on the south end and hit Wicked one more time before moving on. I dragged Jenny on Re-Entry (she REALLY hates that ride!) but she made it through. We went on Rattlesnake rapids and got a little wet and then went on Cliffhanger and got REALLY wet. We decided to call it a day but stopped for a ride on the Tidal Wave before we left. I totally wasted my voice in the screaming contest as the boat rocked back and forth.

We went and got the boys at about 8:30. Syd managed to get Boston to sleep (no small task, trust me). It was a fun night and I learned that we need to do it more often.

The Lagoon Experience

Yesterday we decided to go to Lagoon for the first time in a couple of years. They have a new rollercoaster that I couldn't pass up experiencing in it's first year of existence. I didn't want to be the one guy in Utah who hasn't experienced "Wicked." We decided to go on a Monday to avoid the large crowds that seem to show up on every other day of the week. This wasn't overly convenient with my work schedule. I had a meeting scheduled at 12:00 that was pushed back to 1:00. By the time I got out of there, it was a little after 3:00. Meanwhile, Jenny had taken the boys with her and the rest of my family to swim in the morning at Lagoon-A-Beach. They had a good time, but Jenny got sunburned pretty bad. They came home to eat and I met up with them shortly after they returned to the park.

We spent the first little while getting the kids on the kiddy rides. Boston was a pretty big wuss. I don't know if it was the Disneyworld experience (which he didn't like too much), or the fact that the first ride Jenny took him on was the Terror Ride. Either way, we pretty much couldn't get him to go on any other rides and even had to force him on the train. He was fine by the end of the ride after seeing all the animals. I got to go on Wicked a couple of times before the lines got too long. I must admit that it's a pretty solid ride. Although it's not the caliber of a "Hulk" or "Mr. Freeze", it has it's unique qualities that make it fun. Going up at 90 degrees and coming back down at 90 degrees is pretty intense. The fact that the harnesses do not go over your shoulders also made for a fun experience, especially during the barrel roll.

We had a good time, but I am definitely not as young as I once was. While I used to be able to go all-out all day, the 6 hours I was there just about did me in. It was hot and hectic trying to keep track of all the kids. Boston was exhausted by the time I got there, so he was pretty restless and grumpy the rest of the evening. Jenny was tired and sore from her sunburn. I didn't get anything to eat and wasn't about to appease the price gougers in the park, so I subsisted on water, a few fries and a salty nut roll. By the time the park closed and we headed home, my feet were sore, my head was aching and I was so tired I pretty much just crashed when we got home.

All in all, though, I still like Lagoon. It has its character and a lot of fond memories of my youth. I still live by the adage: "Lagoon is as fun as you make it!"

Jami challenged me to do this little quizzy deal, so here I go:
Jenny's Responses:

4 jobs I have held:
Cavaughans girl
DayCare Provider
Recepinist
Book Keeper

4 movies I can watch over and over:
Sence and Sensability
Brother Bear
Sweet Home Alabama
Italian Job

4 places I have lived:
South Weber, UT
Eatonville, WA
Clinton,UT
Shoreline, WA

4 TV shows I enjoy:
The Office
My Name is Earl
Heroes
Dateline

4 places I have been on vacation:
Seattle
Burmuda
Florida
Wyoming

4 of my favorite dishes/restaurants:
Chick-fa-la
Costa vida
Lemonberry Slushy
Costco Hotdog

4 websites I visit daily:
Not daily, but often
Hotmail
Target
Old Navy
Parenting.com

4 places I would rather be right now:
Hawaii
On a roller coaster
Asleep
Bermuda

4 people I would challenge to do this:
Erik
Keri
Adam
Jami

Jenny and I have started a new full time job in addition to our regular job. It is potty training Boston, and it is a full time job. We try to be diligent in asking him regularly if he needs to go, keeping up with him so he doesn't have accidents, try to get him excited about going on his own (treats, toy cars, heaps of praise). I will say that he has made progress in the past week. We have stopped buying diapers and purchased a small inventory of briefs to keep things fresh. He has an accident or two per day, but if we stay on top of things, he does pretty good. We are hopeful that he will catch on and that we don't give him a complex that would scare him off the toilet until he's five.

Yesterday, we were able to attend the baptism of our neice, Chloee. Jenny and Chloee have a special bond and it was fun to be a part of things. Boston was excited, too. He wanted to get in the water with Chloee and his grandpa. We were lucky that he didn't jump in like he does at the pool. It was satisfying in a way to have him be so excited about being baptized. Jenny has also been working on teaching him about missions. I came home from an early meeting before church and they had been singing "I Hope They Call Me On A Mission." He told me he was going on a mission and then Jenny and him sang the song for me. These are the moments that make being a parent worth it.

As for the past week, it was business as usual at our house. We are pretty low key during the week as work and two kids keep us busy. At least this entry isn't overlong like the last few have been.

Challenge Accepted...

Jami challenged me to do this little quizzy deal, so here I go:

Ben’s Responses:

4 jobs I have held:

Clinic Administrator
Medical Biller
Cell Phone Jockey
Amateur Landscaper

4 movies I can watch over and over:

Batman Begins
Any of the Bourne Movies
Star Wars (Old Trilogy especially)
Memphis Belle (Most underrated WWII movie of all time)

4 places I have lived:

Chandler, Arizona
Boise, Idaho
Kaysville, Utah
Issaquah, Washington
(Thanks Adam! And I'll add for effect: Sariaya, Philippines)

4 TV shows I enjoy:

The Office
My Name is Earl
Heroes
The Office
And The Office
Oh, and I've become a fan of 30 Rock as well
(Sorry, went a little overboard)

4 places I have been on vacation:

Seattle
Maui
Bermuda
Orlando: Disney World

4 of my favorite dishes/restaurants:

Chicken Fried Steak @ Chili's (I'm serious; try it!)
BBQ Beef @ L&L's Drive In (had some last night, sooo goooood)
Tiny Spicy Shrip @ Mandarin Palace
Chicken Sandwich @ Chic-Fil-A

4 websites I visit daily:

www.comcast.net (to check my email)
www.cougarblue.com (to check up on the Cougs!)
www.espn.com (they aren't the wide world of sports for nuthin')
benjengunn.blogspot.com (to see if anyone is commenting on my sparce posts)

4 places I would rather be right now:

In Bed
On the golf course
On the beach
At Sonic getting a lemon-berry slushie (should have put that as a favorite dish)

4 people I would challenge to do this:

Jenny
Erik
Adam
Jami
(2 down, 2 to go!)

Where has July gone?

Well, here we are again, more than two weeks since the last entry. I'm trying to keep up with things, but we don't have internet access at home and I've been crazy busy at work the last few weeks. We've had a quiet weekend for the first time in a while and are spending some time at Grandma and Grandpa's house, so I'll take this time to try and recall the last couple of weeks. Again, I'll go in reverse chronology:

This last week has been pretty uneventful. We've mostly stayed home. We made an excursion to IKEA on the 24th after watching the parade from the comfort of our living room. Jenny went back to work on the 16th, so we've been pretty low key during the week since then. Jenny has been dutifully working out and is motivated to get in shape for the cruise in January. I am struggling a bit more, but have set some goals for next week that I hope will get me going. We did go swimming on Monday as part of Duncan's Summer of Fun! The whole family came out and we had a blast. I even tried and (almost) successfully pulled off a flip on the diving board!

Last weekend, my dad took all the boys on a golf excursion for his birthday. Adam, Erik, Matt, Craig and I all took Friday off and headed north. Our first 9 holes were played at Sherwood Hills, a little course in Sardine Canyon that was a good warm up for the fun ahead. We played Logan River that afternoon, a challenging and narrow course that plays through the river bottom. We were all so wasted from the 27 holes that we just went to our motel and crashed in anticipation of another 27 holes for Saturday. Meanwhile, all the girls left at home went and saw Hairspray and loved it! Jenny wants to see it again. The boys awoke in Logan early Saturday and drove to Smithfield to start the day with 18 holes at Birch Creek. This is a more established and mature course with big trees and open fairways. It was my favorite course of the trip. That afternoon, we headed up to the Bear Lake valley to play the 9 holes at Sweetwater to wrap up our weekend. 54 holes was quite the challenge, but we all had a lot of fun. I finished Harry Potter on Sunday also. I wanted to get through it quickly so no one spoiled it for me. It was a good read!

The evening of the 16th, we went JetSkiing with the family. It was a pretty rigamarole trip. We didn't get out until almost 7:00, so we didn't have a lot of time, but the lake wasn't crowded and we enjoyed swimming out to the buoy for our exercise. We were able to catch up with Nick and Katie Oliver as well. They are some friends from Issaquah that we hadn't seen in a while and were spending the evening with Adam and Jami.

We did spend last night with our friends Lincoln and Carina Bischoff at their home in Lehi. It was fun to hang out with them since we havn't really done anything with them since Jaegan was born. We played some solid games of Sequence and took a stroll down memory lane, thanks to Bon Jovi. It was a fun evening we hope we can repeat soon!

Well, that's about it for now. I hope to spare everyone the marathon posts, but want to make sure it's all here. Afterall, the blog experience is as much for me as for all of you!

Busy Times for All

The last two weeks have been insane, and the sad part is I can't remember most of them. I guess I'll start with yesterday and work my way back since it is the freshest...

(Insert Wayne and Garth "doodily doo" here)

Yesterday was one crazy day for me personally. My work situation was nuts with all the goings on, a staff meeting, a disgruntled employee, a computer system on the edge of functionality, but I still managed to squeak away early to catch a free screening of " Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" hosted by Mountain States Networking. Thanks, Dad! I won't tell. I must say that it was by far my favorite of all the movies so far, probably influenced by the fact that this was my favorite book so far. After the movie, I realized that there was so much of "Half Blood Prince" that I had forgotten, I decided I needed to read it again before the final book comes out next week.

Jenny and I started our new look endeavor this past Monday as well and are 2 for 2 on workouts. We've set some lofty goals and written them down so we'll actually do them. We're planning on weekly weigh-ins and goal reviews. We are hoping to be in a shape other than round by the time we go on our cruise in January. To Jenny's credit, she already weighs less now that she did before she got pregnant with Jaegan. Wish I could say the same!

Jenny's family was down the entire week of the 4th of July in addition to most of my family being in town for Tyler and Cliff's wedding, so it was pretty hectic. We went waverunning with Jenny's brothers on Thursday, the 5th. Boston got locked in his uncle's car by accident. Fortunately, it was as we were packing up to leave so the temperature had decreased and we had time to call the cops, who got us an extremely nice locksmith who slim-jimmed the door. It really could have been much worse only an hour or so earlier, but no broken glass.

The 4th was a lot of fun as we reveled in the usual, uh, revelry. We attended the Kaysville parade, which, if you have not experienced, is something you should check out. Not so much for the lackluster parade, but how the entire population of Kaysville and Fruit Heights in addition to much of Layton, Farmington, and the central Davis county metroplex, lays out their blankets as much as a week in advance to reserve their spot for the best place to sit and be pelted by more salt water taffy than any human should ever consume! Quite the spectacle. The Kaysville fireworks were well done this year, as well. In between, we spent some time with Jenny's side of the family at the Roy Aquatic Center. There wasn't much swimming occurring, though, as the pool was so packed you could barely see any wet.

We took the opportunity, with the majority of our extended family in town, to bless Jaegan on the 1st. It was a packed house as my parents graciously allowed us to use their home for our little party. The circle around Jaegan was so big, someone commented that we needed a bigger baby. I was sweating through my suit from the heat generated by the mass of humanity, but it was a great experience to bless Jaegan in the intimate setting as well. We were even more grateful that circumstances allowed so many of our loved ones to participate.

One more anecdote, and then I'll let you get back to your lives...

Tyler and Cliff were married on June 29th. The ceremony was lovely and the reception that night was very nice. I hadn't really spent any time in Tooele prior to the week of the wedding. The reception was held there in addition to a great family wedding dinner on the Tuesday before the wedding. It's a nice little town, but don't bother with fast food. We decided to stop at the Sonic in Tooele on our way to the reception to get a bite. I ordered two value meals and kids meal and should have known something was wrong when the total was, like, $8.00. I didn't make a fuss, just thought I was getting a good deal. During the 10 minute wait for our "fast" food, an employee comes out and tells us their out of corn dogs for the kids meal. How an establishment runs out of any kind of food is beyond me, and I should have taken that as a sign of what was to come, but I didn't. Okay, substitute the chicken fingers. Finally the food arrives. One kids meal, check. Three drinks, check. One chicken sandwich, check. Fries, none. Other sandwich, non-existent. Rather than wait another 10 minutes for them to fix Jenny's sandwich, we cut our losses and head to Wendy's. Certainly we can get what we order there. Jenny orders a chicken club sandwich. We pull up to the window, pay, pull away. Jenny opens the wrapper to find a bun, a piece of chicken and a solitary piece of unnaturally flat lettuce. Never mind "Where's the beef?" Where's the bacon? Where's the tomato? Where's the freaking cheese!? Moral: skip the fast food in Tooele.

We really had a great time with our family the last couple of weeks. It left us exhausted, but wanting more! We love all of you guys and hope to see you all sooner than later. In the meantime, I'll try and update this blog thing more often than once every two weeks. That should save everyone the marathon read. If my next post starts out: "It was the best of times; it was the worst of times...", skip it!

Yes, we have no blog!

I realized I was really behind the times when, as I was reading through my brother's blog, I noticed a question posed in the comments for one of his posts. He had mentioned that Jenny and I had our second baby the week prior, and the commenter asked: "Does Ben have a blog?" Yes, we have no blog. Although I had made a few entries on our extended family blog site, theoakstree.com, I did not have a blog of my very own.

I wondered, had we reached this point in our progression as a civilization that having a blog was a common enough thing that one would pose the question: Does he/she have a blog? Was it as common as, say, having a cell phone? An Ipod? Opposable thumbs? For the record, I still don't have an Ipod.

Well, now I can proudly answer the question "No, we do have a blog!"