Yesterday, the iPad 2 came out.  As with most Apple products, I dutifully kept up on the liveblog (as did most of my office).  The modifications to the iPad were expected in some ways (front/rear cameras) and unexpected in others (33% thinner?  Really?) but it all added up to making me want one.

This is an expected problem.  When Tasha and I both opted to get an iPad last year, we knew that it would only be a matter of time before the new version came out and we would want it.  That doesn’t necessarily make it any better… no, I don’t need another technology toy.  The upgrades are good, but not earth-shattering.  I should be able to hold off until iPad 3, but it’ll be hard once some of the guys at the office start bringing theirs around!

After a long, busy day at the office Tasha and I had another of our weekly doctor’s appointments.  Things are progressing perfectly, Tasha’s doing fine (aside from being uncomfortable) and there’s nothing bad to report.  Tomorrow I have a doctor’s appointment for a physical and a consult for my acid reflux medication.  That means in about 40 minutes, I will be on only water until after my appointment (which totally sucks).  Thankfully, I gorged myself on Quizno’s and Coldstone Creamery just a bit ago so I should survive until lunchtime tomorrow.

Not much to report aside from that, this week is flying by and it’ll be the weekend before we know it!

To celebrate the end of baby classes, Tasha and I went to Denny’s tonight for a relaxing dinner followed by a lazy evening at home.  The weather is unseasonably mild right now, so I took the dog for a walk after I got home from work tonight.  He really wanted to be in the weeds near the drainage creek by our house, but there’s no way I could get him out of there if I let him go in so I had to keep him on the leash.

I really don’t have a lot else to report right now, except for tomorrow is a doctor’s appointment for Tasha and the baby.  Fun!

Tasha and I completed the last class in our Baby University: First Aid.  We still have a few DVD classes to make up from our Active Childbirth (Bradley) class, but the part of the exercise where we have to be at the hospital three nights out of the week is behind us!  I am full of learning and ready for the baby to arrive, at what time I will realize that all of this learning was for naught and but at least we’ll have the information should we need it!

The weather here in Colorado is cooperating, and we have 60 degree weather most of the week.  This makes it exceedingly difficult to head back into the office after going out for lunch, but still we soldier on.  I had a fairly productive day despite this distraction, and I’m looking forward to a few more days of similar momentum before the weekend comes around again.  What am I going to do with all the free time with these classes out of the way?  Get the house ready for baby, get the carseat installed and the nursery appointed, and most of all RELAX (both Tasha and I).  We also need to continue practicing our relaxation and visualization for labor, which we’ll be focusing on during the next few weeks in anticipation of baby’s arrival.

More soon!

This weekend has been hectic but fun.  We spent most of yesterday shopping and then gaming for my buddy Ed’s birthday, followed quickly by a D&D session on Sunday.  The remainder of the weekend was spent doing our normal end of the month routine, which included some extra baby shopping and the creation of the monthly budget.

Set firmly in the “fun” category: my Dad is having me build him a Grizzly ukulele kit, but he’s allowing me to grow my lutherie skills by enhancing the kit with wood bindings, new tuners (similar to the ones on my ukulele), and a French Polish finish.  All of these skills are going to be directly applicable to my guitar-building later on this year, and it’s fun to get some practice on a small scale.  This also affords me a good jumping-off point to buy a few tools and supplies now, which cuts down on the gear I will have to buy later.  Who knows, if I get really lucky the weather will cooperate and I can get started on the build this weekend!

Suffice it to say the weekend went by quite quickly.  I wish it as another day longer, but I’m optimistic for a productive week at the office and a touch more sanity in our schedule.  Time well tell, I suppose!  More soon!

Today I finally made the time to go to Hobbytown USA.  My buddy Doug got me a gift card for my birthday, and it sat in a basket by the door for almost an entire year before I finally made up my mind that I was going over there and was determined to spend enough time in the store to actually pick one of the thousands of cool things they have for my very own.  I felt a little guilty for procrastinating so long to use my birthday gift card, but no matter!  It was shopping time!

I ended up with various items in support of my lutherie hobby:

* A razor saw/miter box set for cutting bridge blanks, nuts, and fretboards
* Some Titebond II wood glue for use on bindings
* A variety of small pipettes for french polishing

I priced things right, with the grand total coming up to $30.18… my $30 gift card was successfully spent.  Thanks goes to Doug and Shelly for introducing me to Hobbytown USA!

Tonight the Waltons are joining us to play some Rock Band and eat some pizza.  It has been a long week with a lot of baby classes, work, and very little time to relax so tonight is a welcome distraction.  This weekend is going to be pretty busy, with a party for one of our friends and D&D on Sunday.  We also have to get the carseat installed and do some shopping for baby.  Oh yeah, and we have to get more done in the nursery.

Good times!

I had a productive day of writing unit tests and reviewing code, which I found way more relaxing than I probably should.  The day was still pretty hectic despite this soothing work, with many meeetings and consultations punctuating my productivity.  After that, it was quickly off to Noodles & Company before birthing class, and now we only have one class left (plus a few DVDs to watch).  Tonight was a fun class, we got to tour the birthing center where we will actually have our baby.  This made all of the education seem very real, the few short weeks now seem even closer to reality.

That’s about all there is going on right now.  I’ve been watching a lot of the news coverage of the Christchurch earthquakes closely.  I have several friends/coworkers that live there, and the shots of the devastation, injuries and deaths are truly heartwrenching.  I believe all of my coworkers are accounted for, thankfully.  If you’ve got some extra prayers, point them toward New Zealand.  They need them.

The long litany of birthing classes continues tonight, with only two remaining.  Tonight’s class was on baby and infant care, so we got to diaper the plastic baby and then give it a plastic baby bath.  We also wrapped the baby in a receiving blanket, I did finally learn what those blankets are actually for.  Neat.

The instructor for our class was less than engaging and the room was darkened for the slideshow, so I was having a hard time focusing on the class and found it rather dull tonight.  Thankfully, we only have two classes left… a birthing class and tour tomorrow, and the second first aid class on Monday.  Then we get a short reprieve before the baby actually arrives and we have to put this knowledge in action.  Good times!

I’m going to recap tonight’s workout, since apparently I missed about three workouts since the end of Kangeiko.  Tonight we started out with some simple punch/kick combinations.  We cycled through stances, kibadachi, front stance, back stance, cat stance, and rooted stance, and performed two punches, a rear leg front kick, then two more punches.  Shortly thereafter, we moved on to partner training where we worked on intercepting our partner as they moved into distance.

One round around the room trading partners and it was kata time.  We did Wankan and Meikyo several times, and wrapped up the class with our own personal kata (Sochin for me).  It was a good, much needed workout!  More soon!