Growing Up Geeky

So I couldn’t wait until Sunday to put up this post…I got this chain of emails this morning and just thought “These are the things my brother do” ahh…what a great family to grow up with!!!

From Ben:
Fam,

When I take breaks from reading legal texts, I play TI Invaders on the computer. Maybe for 10 minutes a day.

Remember all the levels and aliens? Well, here is the lineup of aliens:

Red boxy guys
Blue roundy guys
Green pointy guys
Pogo stick guys
Light-blue wormy guys
Dark green/invisible octopus guys
Purple blobbies

Well, playing the actual TI at home, I never got past the purple blobbies.

Well, I got past the purple blobbies! The next aliens are green flappy bird guys. (see picture)

Anyways, so just in case you needed to know these things.

-BEN

From Ben:
. . . . Now I only wish I could hack into the program to get me a new tank every 2000 points instead of 10,000. . . .then I would live forever!! MWAHAHAHAHAAA!! . .. ..

From Dave:
Cool. And you got there in only 10 minutes of playing? Pretty amazing considering no one got that far when we were kids...

As for hacking the game, maybe you should consult the family software department (Dad). Now, get back to your readings!
--Dave

From Mike:
Nice!!! Maybe try google: “Hacking TI invaders”. I’ve tried to look around on the internet for information on what aliens are on TI invaders but I come up with nada.

Mike

From Nathan:
All you need to do to hack it is get a HEX editor and find where in the game ROM new tank points are defined and change the value. As long as you can do it so that the size of the ROM or it's lenght doesn't change, you can make it what you want.

Really boys?!?!?!? All if this about TI invaders?!?!? What’s next…were more levels to that Atari game where you had to beat that jumping jungle dude at the end to save the girl? You know…the game with the awesome music while you jumped and ducked under rocks and swung across the alligators?...it was my favorite…

One Down...11 To Go

So far so good!!! I've posted at least once a week for the whole year!!! I'm happy that one of my resolutions has lasted longer than the average 3-5 days like the averaged person's new years resolutions. So all my other resolutions have kind of slipped away and died lonely deaths.

But on to happy things. Lowe got his first hair cut today. We used Tyler's beard trimmer to get it all kind of a uniform length. We got a lot more hair off than we thought we would...but at least now it looks a lot better!!!

I've been working on painting Lowe's room this last week. I talked my friend Heather into coming over on Tuesday to help me with the stripes I'm doing around the edges of the rooms. Between me and her it took about 3 hours to get just the stupid taping done!!! Granted we were dealing with Lowe for more than half the time as well...he finally went down for a nap and we got some more done but it still took forever!!!

Than we got started with the painting only to find out it's going to take more than one coat. So I only did one coat of the yellow on the walls, it's that paint and primer in one and it covered really well with one coat. So I was more than annoyed that the painting was going to take a lot longer than I thought especially since I worked the next three days and than we were in Tempe yesterday!!! So needless to say...it's not going to get done until tomorrow...So little Lowe's got to sleep in the pack and play in the office for at least one more night.

Not that we've got anything against him sleeping in the pack and play especially since he's been sleeping through the nigtht since we've moved him in there...we're really really hoping he continues to sleep through the night once he's back in his own room and bed...if not that pack and play might get set up again...

Yesterday we went up to Tempe so Tyler and I could go to the Temple in Mesa. It was nice to go and have a few hours of baby free time. Thanks again mom and dad for watching him! Than afterwords, Tyler and Dad went on a bike ride while Mom, Lori, Lowe, Caleb and I went to the quilt show that was going on at the Fairgrounds. It was loads of fun!!! I got two quilt kits for the same quilt so that I would have enough fabric to make a twin size quilt for Lowe. I also got a coordinating fabric for the backing! I'm so excited to have it all be matching like that so when it's done it's really all supposed to go together...I think I like quilt kits now...it's going to be a little football quilt and I'm excited to make it. I'm just glad I've got at least a year to get it done though...he won't be going to a twin size bed until then I don't think!

Lori and I both got these panels that you cut in a certain way and sew together to make little fabric books!!! They're about the coolest things I've ever seen and I'm really excited for those too! Lowe really likes books but can't really get the pages turned in board books and he rips out the pages in normal books so these fabric books are going to be perfect I think! We both also ordered these play mats that have an entire city with streets on them for the boys to drive cars around on. So once those get shipped it'll be fun. I'm planning on making Lowe's and giving it to him for his birthday along with some cars.

Well, that was our week!!! On to February!!!

Work, work and more work

So another week has gone by and it seems like most of it was spent at work. Tyler and I both had extra hours we had to do this week...blah.

Lowe's such a cute little guy when he wakes up. And here's proof!!!


Lowe decided he loves our computer keyboards...whenever hears one of us typing on it, he's got to come over and try to help us out with it. He'll get extreemly angry when we move him away from the keyboard. I guess we need to find him one of his own to bang on while we're using the good one we don't want ruined by him!


He's pulled the mouse off the desk and is smacking away at the keyboard.

The last few days have been full of actual winter weather!!! And to prove it; here's a picture of the mountains covered in snow!!! I know there are those out there saying um, that's not much but to us Arizonans...that's a huge amount of snow!!! It's been pretty chilly here, so not much outside activity for us. But it's a nice change to have it actually be wintery instead of 70 degree weather all the time when it's not summer weather.

Lowe and I had the first of his little gym classes this week. There were only 3 other kids in his class which was kind of disappointing...how we're supposed to get use to being around other kids when there aren't any to get use to being around!!! Oh well...hopefully more people will join later...And poor little Lowe is sick again!!! I guess he got the getting sick easy and often thing from me. I think this is the 3rd if not 4th time he's had a cold since he was born...and it's only been 9.5 months!!! Poor little guy. I wish there were a way to keep him from getting so sick so often. Oh well.

We got all the supplies finally to paint and decorate Lowe's room. I know it's about a year too late but at least it's going to get done while he's still a baby!!! Once I get it all done, pictures will be posted...so that's my project for the week: paint the baby's room!!! Wish me luck!!!

And as a sidenote...Tyler surprised me on Tuesday night with tickets to see Legally Blonde The Musical. He had this planned for a while. He asked me if I'd like to go on a date with him that night (a few weeks previous) and told me it was going to be a surprise. So we went out to dinner and than drove downtown. I'm trying to figure out what in the world we're doing. We go to the TCC and I'm still really confused until we get to the music hall and he says this is where we're going. And I'm all happy because I love the movie and the musical ended up not disappointing!!! Woo hoo to awesome surprises from a wonderful husband!!!

Blog Surfing

So...while being bored as Lowe napped, I decided to press the 'Next Blog' button at the top of my blog...and whala...I find myself continuing to press it over and over again and am really wondering how many blogs there are!!! Most of the ones I surfed through were family blogs. I found a few other interesting ones those...there was one with 3 contributers, all girls in their mid 20s and that's how they keep in touch with each other. Pretty cool I thought...maybe I could borrow that idea for some of my friends...

I thought the blogs would be in some sort of order (alphabetical or something) but it just seemed really random. Maybe I could just keep doing this blog surfing when I'm bored and I'll find some interesting ideas for other blogs for me to write or just interesting things...does that make me creepy?!?!?!

Extra Extra Hear All About It

So with the whole posting once a week thing I've really got to come up with some post titles...it'll get old fast if I can't think of funny things to name my weekly posts...

On to our week though...work on Monday, nothing new. My brother Ben was in town with his girlfriend Joanna. So on Tuesday, we all went to the Desert Museum. It's sort of a zoo/museum combo and I think Lowe had some fun. He got to see a few animals, shared our lunch with us (as usual) and fell asleep after lunch. It was so nice outside, no need for jackets, a little windy and really sunny. Ben showed us all this bush that smells like rain. Tyler, Ben and I all thought it smelled like the rain but Joanna didn't really smell it. Maybe you've got to be from around here to realize that scent is the desert rain smell...I decided if I ever get to pick plants for a desert landscape I would like to have one of those rain bushes...


Lowe is so mobile now...he saw me changing the toilet paper roll and of course was all sorts of interested in what that white thing was. So he crawled his little self over there and...

What a silly boy. So now we've got to keep him away from the toilet paper and the door stoppers...if he finds a door stopper he just sits there and plays with it making all sorts of racket. If he plays with it long enough it'll come off and he'll eat it...so a few of them around the house have been taken down and are up on dressers or countertops for the time being.

We had Lowe's 9 month appointment on Thursday. He weighs 20 pounds and is 29 inches long! So yesterday, Tyler and I went to Babies R Us and bought him a forward facing car seat. It was one of the less expensive ones but it works great and is really easy to get in and out of the cars...well, at least in Tyler's truck, we haven't tried it in my car but we'll put it in there later on this week. So Lowe really didn't seem to know what to do with himself now that he's sitting up straight and facing forward. But he was the least grumpy he's been in the car in a long time so Tyler and I were both very happy about it!

We also bought Lowe some shoes...so far in his life he's pretty much been shoeless. We got him some new Sunday clothes too and he was just so cute for church today we had to take a picture. And yes Dad...he's wearing a sweater vest with socks and sandals!!!

So that's pretty much been our week. Nothing too exciting. Just Lowe growing up too fast. He tried a few times this week to stop holding onto the furniture after he pulls himself up and he stays upright for a few seconds...so I don't think walking is too far off for our little guy! Lowe and I start his little gym class this week so we'll see if he likes it! He seemed to like the free class we took so I hope he still likes all the stuff!

10 Days In...

One of my resolutions for the year was to try to blog more often...so we'll try the once a week thing and see how that turns out...we've finally got early church (thank goodness) so I've got the while afternoon free to do things like keep up with the Sunday School and Relief Society lessons. I'm the chorister in Primary if anyone was wondering why I wouldn't just be able to get those lessons during church on Sundays. I can also work on little projects I've started like quilts, file folders games and any other quiet things I can do like preparing ideas for Primary for the next week.



Lowe decided that his new favorite toy is our dust buster. He crawls across the room, squeezes himself in between the couch and side table and pulls himself back out with the thing and is oh so happy about it. He'll push it all over the place and it's really funny. He must take after his father...

We have Lowe's 9 month appointment this upcoming Thursday...yes I said 9 month!!!!!!! I can't believe that my little baby is already 9 months old!!! It's insane!!! The one thing that bothers me the most though is all the people who still say "You look great." I don't know why it annoys me so...I mean come on...it's been 9 months...most people are back to pre-pregnancy looking by then...Sorry if anyone find me annoying for finding that annoying but I can't stand it when people tell me that...

I got this idea from a friend of mine who mentioned that her son likes to sit in her sink and wear her apron while she's cooking. Since Lowe really likes to be doing whatever we're doing, I put him in our sink the other day when I was making some biscuits. He really liked playing with all the measuring cups and spoons when I was done with them. He tried a few times to get the flour over the sink divider...that would have been cute for him to be covered in flour but a lot of mess for me to clean up!!!

Well...that's about all that's changed between now and last week I think. Tyler managed to avoid any more car accidents, Lowe's just getting cuter each day and I'm still working and loving being a mom. We're excited to see Uncle Ben and his girlfriend Joanna on Monday and Tuesday. Lowe and I will need to think of some fun things to do on Tuesday.

Starting out the New Year Right

So to cap off 2009 before talking about the exciting things that have happened already in 2010...Christmas at my parenst house was loads of fun. There were 17 people there, 5 of which were under the age of 6!!! 3 of those 5 were under 10 months!!! Little Lowe had fun opening his presents...he was a little more interested in the discarded wrapping paper at first until he realized what some of his toys could do (like make noise, be taken apart, roll around, etc).

He is also all over the place now. Two days before Chirstmas he decided that it was ok to crawl and now he's all sorts of moblie. He's pulling himself up to stand on anything he can and is 'crusing' around the furniture. He also get very mad if I'm eating something and not shoveling the same food into his mouth constantly. For example: we're eating dinner, he's in his high chair with some of his own food on his tray, I take a bite of food, he's watching intently and starts yelling if he doesn't get a bite as well. This is how it goes with every bite I take! Whether he's got food in his mouth still or not!!! He'll crawl over to you and get all up in your personal space too if you've got any sort of food...grabby little hands and big begging eyes...the little bugger!!! But at least he's eaten every single kind of food we've ever given him...hopefully this will last past infancy...

On Saturday, Tyler went on a bike ride. He got home and I noticed his arm was kind of beat up. I thought maybe he had crashed his bike because it looked like some road rash so I asked him "What happened to your arm?". He looks up at me, kind of shrugs and says "I got hit by a car."

Um...not the response I was expecting...so I nicely demand he tell me what happened and he did...some guy turned right right infront of Tyler into a gas station just past an intersection shortly after the light had turned green. This was fortunate because neither party was going more than about 10 mph (but still). It didn't damage Tyler's bike at all (apparently that was the best part., no bike damage), totally distroyed the guys passenger side mirror and took off some siding on the car. The weird part it, it's the inside of Tyler's left arm that's all beat up...Tyler and I still haven't figured this one out seeing as how the outside of that arm should have been the body part taking any beating...

The cops, paramedics and firefighters all came. Apparently the dude who hit Tyler was a border patrol agent so he didn't get a ticket or even a citation!!!!!!!!!!!! How ridiculous is that?!?!?!?! Especially when he doesn't even use his blinker and takes out a cyclist who is clearly injured!!! So I told Tyler he should have called me and just had the ambulance take him to the hospital so we could have been for sure that nothing was damaged internally and everything would have been packaged nicely into one incident. This way we wouldn't have had to deal with any discrepencies between when the accident happened and hospital time. But oh well, Tyler likes to be manly about things like this (a word to the wise...just suck it up and do the smart thing not the testosterone fueled thing...). But he doesn't have anything broken that we can tell...his arm hasn't swollen up or turned odd colors and some ibuprofen has helped so I'm sure he'll be fine.

So that's the exciting way 2010 has started for the Goodrich Family. Hopefully that will be the only police, paramedic, firefighter story of the year for us. Happy New Year to everyone!!! This year I'm hoping to keep my new year's resolutions up for longer than January!!!