and into the fall we go

I'm very pleased to see the participation we've had on the blog so far. I trust you are all enjoying it as much as I am.

It's starting to get much cooler here. This makes the bike rides back and forth to school a little bit nippy. Nothing I can't handle of course, I'm just saying. Anyway, to combat the cold air, I'm posting this picture of warmer memories from the summer. As you may know, we stained the house this summer, and this picture was taken upon completion. A very happy time indeed.


Today's highlight was this: I was in the library, looking for a few sources, when I got a text from my roommate: "Free chili Alumni." This meant there was free food nearby on campus. Turns out there was a chili cook-off/contest. So I tried as many kinds as I could. What a perfect meal for a cool night. Free food usually tastes good no matter what.

Easier to See in the Dark

Ben was able to fix the settings on my night-time pumpkin picture- thought you might like to see this one-

Cheers!

Sigh...another railing

Our church building has numerous stair railings that are potentially unsafe because of the gaps between the bars below the railing. I've been doing some retro work with the welder. This is #3 of 5 stairways needing attn. It's a big project by the time I buy steel (180ft) , cut to size, weld, grind, prime & paint. This was harder because there's nice carpet. Welding and grinding create sparks flying everywhere.

Halloween

We had an awesome time carving pumpkins this weekend, so I thought I'd share some fun pictures! They looked great all lit up, but those pictures didn't turn out too well. These were all hand drawn- no stencils used here! Mine is the Mummy, Ben's is the scary tooth pumpkin, and his sister and brother in-law did the witch and pirate. What fun we had!

Poladroid

Ok, so I should be going to bed about now, but I got distracted by this freeware that turns your digital photos into polaroids. Complete with sound effects. www.poladroid.net

JC and the Man Cave

Well, it has been nice to hear from all the family members, now I guess it's my turn to inform everybody on what is going on at JC and the Man Cave. I'll be going on band tour to Winnipeg, Canada on Nov. 13-15, which is coming up pretty quick, so that should be pretty fun. I will blog about the tour later, and maybe I'll be able to take pictures or get a souvenir or something like that while I'm in Canada! HAIL TO THE LEAF!!

Anyway, since elections are near I thought I would post my own question, so here it is. Now I know all of you have seen my chin beard, and I know you'll probably laugh, but I was wondering if I could get a family vote on whether to leave it on my face or shave it cause I can't decide for myself. If you could post your answer, shave or no shave, that would be great! I just figured it is time for a change, since there is supposedly going to be CHANGE once the next president is ushered in, haha. I got my absentee ballot on Friday and it feels weird to be finally voting. Crazy huh!

Some of you probably want to know the Man Cave is, so here's some pictures of it:

From left to right - Entryway, my roommate Kenny and his cove, my roommate Devin's corner, my part of the cave (bunk shared with Anthony, my other roommate) and desk area (don't worry, my computer isn't gone, i just used it to take the picture, haha), the entertainment center (Devin is pictured at right) and our furniture.

Sorry about the 2 1 2 1 format, it woul've been 3 3, but the blog isn't wide enough to fit it that way. Hope you enjoy them despite the format!

I hope to get better pictures of the room and of my roommates and I in the future, but for now this is all I got. I can't believe October is almost gone, but for every week that passes, I get more excited about Thanksgiving and Christmas break! Hope all is well, from the suburbs to the windy city to the rocky mountains to the plains to the good ol' south!

Nothing but love,

Austin

I have an exciting life! (every once in a while)

Hey gang,

The story I am about to tell you has been about a month in the making. So, hopefully it makes for an interesting one. Last month, I found a contest online at alliancewakeskate.com. The contest was not just a simple "enter your e-mail" contest. So, I had better odds from the beginning. It was a "Look-alike" contest. We were supposed to send in a picture of ourselves, looking like either of these two liquid force staff members. The winner would recieve a prize package of Liquid Force apparel.

So, I ran down to my buddy's room and asked him if he could take a picture of me and do some photoshopping. He was willing and yet comparatively unexcited. So, I tried to straighten my hair as much as I could in attempts to look like the guy on the right. His name is James Balzer a.k.a "Jimmy Balz." We wanted to get the light just right so we went out at about 4:30 and took a few. I don't really look like that guy at all, but I when I'm squinting you can't really tell (or so we hoped!) Here was our result.


After reviewing the picture, it was clear that I definately wasn't Jimmy Balz but we pressed on. My friend and I (the spectator) spent about one hour on photoshop cutting me out of my picture and Jimmy out of his. Then after we had found a suitable background, he pasted both of us in, softening edges and adding some details. The end result was incredible! At least we hoped that they would think so. We sent them this:

After a week we had both kind of forgotten about it until one day I got an email titled "You've Won our Liquid Force Giveaway!" Usually I don't jump at the site of these because they are spam. But for this one I did. After a series of emails with my size and address they sent our stuff and it came on October the 23rd, 2008 the year of our Lord.

My friend and I split the winnings and posed for a photo. Aren't we such "Bros?"

The winnings consisted of 2 pair of boardshorts, 1 pair of walkshorts, 2 t-shirts and 2 mesh caps. Apparently all of that stuff retails for $231! Ridiculous. So, now we are feeling cooler than ever and have a cool story to go along with our heightened ego.

Hope you all are doing well. And if you aren't, let's hear about it.
Love,
Joel

50

Hi everyone! I wanted to share some words of wisdom now that I am a half century old. Actually, I don't feel any wiser than yesterday, just more stuffed! Tom and I just got back from a wonderful dinner at the Bistro, which was topped off with a complimentary dessert of chocolate torte, thanks to my student Kaitlin who works there. Yummy!

The celebration started off earlier in the day when I arrived at work to find my desk draped in black crepe paper and a cloud of black balloons floating overhead. You can see that my co-workers dressed in black in honor of the occasion. The young daughter of one of them came later, wearing a black dress, bringing more balloons because she wanted to get in on the party, too! Tom brought more balloons and flowers, we had dessert, and more treats and birthday cards.

After I got home Bella and I went for our usual walk, and then I worked for an hour cleaning up the garden. Just the perfect temperature for working and enjoying the last bit of sunshine on a fall afternoon. It has been a very nice day.

All in all, I would highly recommend turning fifty.

Ode to Mom

Mom,

Happy birthday. You are fantastic. I am so blessed to have a mother like you. May you have a splendid day.

Love,
Michael

keeping up with my family

Whew! Family blog off and running like crazy. P.S. I'm a swimmer and I never learned to run it's ugly.

I'm sitting at home on a Monday night with the world's slowest internet connection, trying really hard to be productive. I live with 8 girls and currently we are watching a movie, watching a youtube video online, having 2 side conversations and doing our homework. I'm actually surprised that the music isn't on as well. This has been an adjustment to my more introverted quiet lifestyle and I generally go to bed early because I can't cope with the chaos after 9pm, but everyone has left suddenly and it's quiet and I can think again.

Life is pretty good here, I'm enjoying my last year of school but I am getting really ready to be done. I'm really busy all of the time and should be making more art than I already am making, but such is the story of my life.

I spent my weekend/ my fall break up at Anders' house because his older sister got married. The weekend was full of wedding craziness but a lot of fun. I also celebrated my 22nd birthday by eating wedding cake.

Frost on the dock

You know it's going to be a quiet morning on the lake when you have to scrape frost on the car windows at home. The dock was pretty much covered with frost as well.

CAN U SKI? Text messages from Mastercraft-owning Chris are welcome anytime. And then he needed help pulling his pontoon lift out of the lake. Twist my arm. Air temp of 38* and water about 49-50* was fine.

952 Crew!

So hello family,

In case you want any autographs ahead of time, check out 952 Crew, the up and coming hip hop group featuring Jeff Prentice and Blake Johnson.

We're making T-Shirts for $10 if you want one too.

952 Crew found at

http://amiestreet.com/artist/952-crew/

Some of my personal tracks can be found at

http://amiestreet.com/artist/jpfresh/

Nebraska RX8

Well, the RX8 has landed and it's an awesome car. We had a great trip aside from the "The midnight train to Omaha" It may be more spacious than flying, but doesn't lend itself to sleeping. 8:30pm - 5:00am. Amtrak seemed like a reasonable option at $67 per person, until we saw the price of gas in Omaha. See Photo ($2.57)

Rotary power and super handling, a few pieces of trim in common with my Mazda3, but not much. Maybe the same steering wheel? What a blast to drive. Too bad there weren't any corners to make between Omaha and Denver!

We had a fun trip jammin out on the Bose sound system to the Doobies: Rockin' Down the Highway: Highway patrol got his eyes on me--I know what he's thinkin and it aint good--I'm movin so fast he can barely see me--Gonna lose that man, I know I should--Gotta kick in my pedal--Make my ford move a little bit faster--Can't stop, and I can't stop--Got to keep on movin or Ill lose my mind--Oh, rockin down the highway

Hi.

Hi.

Ummm... well. I'm in my dorm room by myself (my roomate went somewhere over the break.) I've done a lot of thinking this semester due to the fact that my roomate has a girlfriend and other factors as well.

{the following is unorganized thoughts.}

I've mostly been thinking about the college life my parents experienced. I think about the movies that we are making and what my kids (scary, I just shivered) will think of them. I don't really have any footage of Mom and Dad when they were in college. I always felt like my parents were older than I am now when they were in college, but I guess they weren't. So, if I have their genes, then I will probably meet my wife in 2 years or less (another shiver!) I wish I could see you, Dad, playing basketball. I imagine it a lot and I can see you doing a two-handed-reverse-underthehoop-rim-shakin-blastastic-jam. I think of the silly pictures of the facial hair and crazy hairdos of those times... and then I LOOK IN THE MIRROR! Ha ha haa...

now I'm homesick. great. well. I should probably sleep.

I really like this blog idea. I hope that all of our family feels the same way and feels the need to contribute. I already feel closer to Dave now that I can "see how he do" on a regular basis. The blog's power spans the miles. I have a feeling that doing this will make me homesick. That's okay with me. I can deal with the Family Illness.

I love you all. But in order for me to communicate my love, you must read :)
good night moon,
Joely

Fall Break

I've been taking it easy for fall break. I've practiced some, and probably should be practicing more, but sitting around feels good. The main focus of this weekend has been helping my roommate Rocco with his new film projects. Joel and I are involved in both, and Rocco is doing some fine work already. Anticipate the results. The photos are from the German cyclist documentary.


Today we went to the local Apple Festival. Cool name, huh? It sounded totally awesome. We thought we were going to experience all things apple. When we found out you had to pay to get in, we were reluctant, but it turned out we got free passes. Since it cost money to get in, we figured there would be free stuff everywhere. Wrong. It turned out to be lame. Think Folkfest divided by 5.

I went for a bike ride tonight on the new seat Dad sent. My bike needs a tune-up, but I'm reluctant to spend $55 on a tune-up when I only paid $75 for the bike. The ride was good though. There are some great country roads with minimal traffic (see photos). Some interesting sights too. Tonight's highlight: seeing llamas grazing in a fenced area littered with trash next to a trailer home. It's the south!

I hope you all start blogging more. Otherwise I will be reluctant to post.

What's everyone doing this weekend?

We need some participation on this family blog!
I'm taking the train to Omaha tonight...my friend bought a car on ebay and asked if I'd help him drive it back. It's a boring drive across Nebraska, but the cool part is he bought a '06 Mazda RX8. Should be a good road trip. (544 mi – about 7 hours 38 mins) I'll post a pic from Nebraska next week.
What's everyone else up to this weekend? -Dave

Keegan's Drum Solo

Keegan (20 mos.) might be the next legenary drummer, Dave Weckl? Obviously enjoying his craft, although what he's saying is anyone's guess... no doubt pure bliss.

Welcome

It's a family blog! It was Dave's idea, so I thought we could start one up and then see who was interested. The idea is that it would be a good way to keep up with each other.

Basically, we're trying to catch up with Laura.