That's right.  The title was not a mis-type.  Today, I gave my wife an ultrasound exam and have the pictures of baby "Jandon" to prove it.  Part of my job at my company is to evaluate various medical devices.  So, when I recently had the chance to try out a handheld device that can perform ultrasounds, I thought that I couldn't pass up an opportunity to take a peak in to see our growing baby.  Once I felt comfortable with the idea I decided to go for it.  The quality is not near what you will find in the 100K machines in hospitals but it's pretty good nonetheless.

So, with 10 and a half weeks to go, here's our beautiful girl's pictures taken from our living room!  Medical technology is really getting cool!

 

 

I'm guessing this site still works since I'm typing these words.  Hard to believe it has been around 4 months since I last posted anything here.  For the record, there have been at least TWO people who have approached me and asked me about this.  So, to those two people, thanks for caring.  Here's a blog post just for you!

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Between January and April, I worked with my father-in-law and rebuilt our privacy fence.  That's right.  It took over two months!  What I had originally thought would take a couple of weekends ended up taking 7 weekends!  Ouch!  Totally underestimated that, but so glad that it's done and it looks good, too.  It was good carpentry and construction eperience for a wannabe handy man such as myself.  I really enjoyed getting to spend quality time with Jan's dad as well as a few other friends that came over and pitched in from time to time.  Thanks to Gabrysch, Oliver, Kyle, Steve, and the lifeblood and architect, Tim!

Here are some pics showing some of the progress.  As you can tell, my backyard is pretty much shot now, which means an upcoming sod laying project.

I'm really pleased with the way it turned out and am proud of our work.  Looking back, I'm not exactly sure that I would do it again myself given that it turned out to be much harder than expected.  The hardest part turned out to be removing the existing posts.  They would usually snap off at the base or we would just run into some serious rock which the original concrete had settled into.  In the end though, we probably paid half of what the total would have been had I outsourced it. 

Here's to at least 10 years of having a sturdy dependable fence! 

 

The First Annual B-Dubs...

I've been wanting to host the first annual B-Dubs for a while.  After reading a friend's recent blog post that basically listed his various Top 5 lists for the year, I figured that now is the time.  So, without further adieu, here are the 2007 B-Dubs in order...no drum role needed...

Category:  Movies
1.  Bourne Ultimatum
2.  Blood Diamond
3.  God Grew Tired of Us
4.  Ratatouille
5.  Amazing Grace

Category:  TV Shows
1.  The Amazing Race
2.  Project Runway
3.  King of Queens
4.  The Office
5.  How I Met Your Mother

Category:  Beer
1.  Fireman's #4
2.  Pacifico
3.  Black and Tan (Guiness and Bass)
4.  Newcastle
5.  Modelo Espcial

Category:  Restaurant
1.  Moonshine (gourmet comfort food)
2.  Saccone's Pizza (the best Jersey style pizza not in Jersey)
3.  Magnolia
4.  Hula Hut
5.  Waterloo Ice House (25 cent wings and $2 draft Dos XX)

Category:  Music Artists
1.  Radiohead
2.  David Crowder Band
3.  Mute Math
4.  Neko Case
5.  (not enough data)

So, for next year, I am going to have to expand my musical interests so I can have more options when it comes to next year's musical category selections.  You can help by suggesting some new music for me to check out in the new year! 

Last night we went out to my parent's house in Wimberley to have dinner with some of my mom's family who was in town.  Ralph and Janet were there from Danville, Illinois where they run a very big family farm.  I had not seen them since I was a little kid, so it was a lot of fun to hear about life on the farm. 

A funny story involving Marley...

Ralph and Janet were telling us about their old dog Amos.  Amos was a big shaggy dog (think, "The Shaggy Dog") who looked and acted more like a human with a dog suit on.  Every day, he would join Ralph on the tractor, lean back in the passenger seat, and put his right paw up on the window sill as if he were just chillin'.  In the middle of the story, I heard something outside.  Since I had put Marley in the dog kennel with my parents' dog Cutter earlier that night, I got up to go and check on the noise.  I never went outside because I was too interested in Ralph's stories about their incredible dog Amos.  So, I sat down to listen to more of the stories.  A few minutes later we hear a noise inside the house and my mom says "the door opened!"  Before you knew it, in trots Marley greeting us as if he had not seen us in two weeks!  That dog had climbed over the chain link fence and somehow opened my parents' door to come and be reunited with us!  I should have been somewhat concerned and upset at him, but I was actually proud of him.  We've always known he had the talent to be a climber since the first week we had him and he would scale the doggy gate as a little tike.  Now, we have more evidence of this talent and more proof that he'd rather just be with people.  I'm thankful he didn't hurt himself and did not run away.  Hopefully he's not a bad influence on Cutter. 

Here's the Escape Artist himself

Tomorrow, November 6th, would have been my grandfather's 90th birthday if he had lived to be that old.  In a lot of ways it doesn't seem quite possible that it has been almost 4 years since he passed away.  I'm grateful that I have so many priceless memories of Papaw and hope that the Lord will allow me to hang on to them for many years to come. 

I will always miss Papaw, but will always be so thankful that I have so many good memories of him.  May his legacy continue to guide our family and bring us closer to one another through this bond.  May his faith in Christ continue to be passed from generation to generation in the Wilson family.  Happy Birthday, Papaw.

Genesis 17:7
"I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you."

The new sports journalisam TV show on ESPN, E:60, has done a great story on one of the Lost Boys of Sudan.  It is about a young man named Marachuria that made it to the US and discovered running as a sport.  Through running in college, he decided that he wanted to pursue qualifying for the US olympic team as a marathon runner.   To do this, he had to obtain his US citizenship.  Watch the video and enjoy another encouraging success story of one of the several thousand Lost Boys that were rescued and brought to the US.

Sunday night Jan and I travelled to San Antonio and met up with our good friends Dusty and Lori.  We went to see the David Crowder Band play at Floore's Country Store in Helotes.  I heard somewhere that the sold-out show was only the 2nd ever sell-out at Floore's, with the other one being Willie Nelson.  I'm not sure I believe this, but I do know that it was packed to the brim with 3500+ people there. 

The show was incredible as expected.  It was so nice to have them headlining instead of being the opening band.  We saw them open up for 3rd Day last year and was disappointed they only played for 45 minutes.  It was hard enduring two hours of 3rd Day after that too (no offense to the many 3rd Day fans out there.)  But, this show was a good hour and a half of Crowder goodies to feast on.  Every time I see them in concert, I am usually amazed at how much they had improved since that last time I'd seen them.  I think they've reached the level where I can't tell that they need to improve at all so that's credit to them. 

One of the highlights of the night has to be when they played "...neverending..." with Dave sporting a Guitar Hero guitar.  It wasn't just for looks though.  He actually played real chords with it that went right along with the song!  Incredible!  I think it was B Whack that took the time to program it and unlock it for live sound.  I'm not sure how he did it but my hat's off to him. 

The new cd Remedy is really good and I highly recommend it to everyone.  Check it out here! or buy it at iTunes, Best Buy, or wherever music is sold.  I already have a couple of Crowder favorites on this album - "For the Glory of It All" and "Never Let Go."  And, Ted Nugent (no lie) plays on one of the songs.  That's more random than Abra Moore playing on All I Can Say.