Katie is officially an Aunt.  Brad and Heather (Katies’ brother and sister-in-law) had their first baby on December 23rd at 6:29pm.  Her name is Madeline.  We spent the holiday in Tucson with them and I was able to get one picture at least.  I’ll post more once we have them.  You can view more photos here.

Well, we’ve had him for a couple months and I’m just now getting around to posting this, but we have a new addition.  His name is Cody.  He’s a sheperd/border collie mix that we rescued.

Other than being very timid and attempting to chew on everything he can - he’s been really good.  Cody is now 9 months old and doing good.  Here are some photos.

Well, Katie and I are back from our “on a whim” weekend trip to Massachusetts.  We managed to find airfare for just $50 each way and decided to take the opportunity to visit Katies’ friends Laura and Ed in Cape Cod.  It was a quick trip, but we had a lot of fun.  Laura let us stay with her at her parents house on the Cape.  It was an amazingly beautiful home with equally as beatuful views.  Unfortunately, I didn’t take any pictures while we were at the house.  There was a lot of socializing, a horse pinata, a spanish lobster named “Mr. Pinchy”, and a haunted bed and breakfast involved.  Need I say more?  The weather turned cold and rainy/snowy as soon as we arrived, but that’s ok.

On the way back to the airport, we stopped in Fall River to tour the Lizzie Borden Bed and Breakfast/Museum.  I first read about this place back in college and have wanted to check it out ever since.  We got a guided tour of the house along with some trivia.  It was very cool.  They’ve done their best to decorate the place exactly how it looked back in the 1890’s when the murders happened.  Further reading:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lizzie_Borden.

I’ve got a few pictures from the trip, which you can check out here.

The birthday getaway trip to Colorado Springs had a suprise double purpose.  During a nice morning of hiking at Seven Falls Saturday, I suprised Katie with a ring and a marriage proposal at the most fitting place I could think of - Inspiration Point.  We’re very excited, and a bit overwhelmed already.  Trying to figure out dates, a venue, etc.  We’ll let everyone know when we have more definitive plans.

The entire weekend was amazing.  We had champagne and chocolates in our room at The Hilton Antlers Inn.  The hike on Saturday was beautiful.  The Aspens were starting to change color, so the mountainsides were ablaze with yellows.  We drove to the top of Pikes Peak to take in the view, and we had an amazing dinner Saturday night at the Craftwood Inn restaurant im Manitou Springs.  The couple sitting next to us overheard the news about our engagement and bought us dessert.  How nice of them.

Sunday we took it a little slower.  We headed over to Garden of the Gods in the morning, had lunch at the Phantom Canyon Brewing Company, then finally it was time to send Katie back to Arizona.  I had to stay in town and work with the Air Force Acadamy Monday and Tuesday.

I’ve posted some pictures from the trip.  You can check them out here.

Title: Colorado Springs B-day Trip
Location: Colorado Springs, CO
Description: We’re headed up to Colorado Springs this weekend to celebrate Katie’s brithday. Looks like the weather is going to be perfect (70’s and sunny). She’s never been before, so I’m excited to show her around. We’ll have pictures shortly.
Start Date: 2008-10-17
Start Time: 19:00
End Date: 2008-10-19
End Time: 20:00

We had a crazy storm last night.  It started lightening around 7pm here in Fountain Hills and just got worse from there.  I’ve never seen anything like it before.  The flashes of lightening were so constant that the thunder never stopped.  It was just a constant rumble for a couple hours.  We had quite the torrential downpour too. 

I didn’t realize quite how bad it was though, until this morning. CNN even put a link on their website to one of the local news stations reports: http://www.kpho.com/news/17331217/detail.html#.

Driving around town today, it is quite impressive to see the aftermath left behind from the force of the storm. There are reports of wind up to 100 mph, trees are down everywhere, and apparently roofs were ripped off houses.  I took a couple minutes of video.  You can hear the rain, but there’s also a constant rumble in the background that sounds like wind.  It’s not though.  That’s actually thunder.

Well, we’re back from our trip to Monterey, CA.  I was especially excited about this trip.  One, to spend a nice weekend with Katie away from Phoenix and in a place I’ve never been before.  Two, to see where Ansel Adams lived and died.

It was a wonderful trip.  I have to say that I really like Monterey.  The temperature was cool (70’s) in August.  The scenery was beautiful, and there’s plenty to do there.  We spent our time either walking around Cannery Row - which used to be a sardine cannery until they overfished the area; now it’s been convered into shops, restaurants, and a really cool aquarium.

On the last day, we took a whale watching excursion into the bay.  We had been out for about an hour when I started feeling a little queezy due to how rough the waters were and I was starting to doubt whether we would see anything.  Then, all of a sudden, the boat was surrounded by what the captain believed were thousands of dolphins.  They were everywhere.  We saw more dorsel fins than I could count and there were several types of dolphins all hanging out together, jumping, swimming, and running on the bow of the boat.  That was very cool… but it wasn’t a whale.  We went a little further and I was starting to have my doubts of seeing a whale on this trip.  Then, the guide on the boat screamed WHALE! and we all ran outside to see what she was talking about.  That’s when we saw the familiar scene of a huge humpback whale tail sticking out of the water, and it was headed straight for us.  To our amazement, we spent the next hour with the whale actually playing with the boat.  It would swim back and forth underneath and even stop to rub it’s head and back against the bottom of the boat.

It was quite awe-inspiring.  People kept running from one side of the boat to the other to see what it was doing.  Katie got some great pictures, and I took video footage.  It was well worth the $50 ticket.

You can view photos from the trip here.  I will be uploading a video shortly, so check back soon.

Well, it’s a little late, but I finally got the photos from our Hawaii trip uploaded.

We had a great week there.  The Hilton gave us a suite.  We did quite a few things while we were there.  We attempted to hike Diamondhead, which is an extinct vlocano, but we were turned away at the gate because the parking lot was full.  Oh well, at least we got to see the inside of the crater from the car.  It was like that everywhere though.  Wall to wall people…or cars.  The traffic in  Honolulu was horrible.  It would definitely pay to own a bike there.  We did get up to North Shore and spent a day snorkeling in an underwater lava bed.  That was the highlight of the trip.  There were just thousands of fish there that you could reach out in touch..if only they didn’t swim away every time you tried.  Most of the time was spent shopping.  We bought a lot of clothes.  We also toured the Dole pineapple plant.

Anyway, that was the third time I’ve been there and I can’t wait to go back again.  You can check out the photos here.  I’ll also be posting video from our trip shortly.

Title: Nice weekend in Monterey
Location: Monterey, CA
Description: I have to work in San Francisco all week, so Katie and I are flying up early to spend the weekend in Monterey.
Start Date: 2008-08-08
Start Time: 18:00
End Date: 2008-08-10
End Time: 23:30

Title: Hawaii
Location: Honolulu, HI
Description: Well, I have to do some work in Hawaii in July, so Katie and I are flying down there and staying a few extra days to enjoy it.  We’ll be sure to take some pictures and post them upon our return.
Start Date: 2008-07-19
Start Time: 08:00
End Date: 2008-07-26
End Time: 23:00