bonnie & jason

Harding park pictures

We tried to do some pictures with the kids at the park near Harding Park golf course. It was not particularly successful. Getting three little kids to do what you want at the same time is a challenge with so many distractions about. But here are a few for your viewing pleasure anyway.

Easter was how long ago?

It’s been pretty busy with the backyard projects and other life things recently so here’s a bunch of random pictures from the last several weeks:

Mommy and her girls (sometimes I forget how outnumbered I am):

Uncle Alan teasing Ashley with a coconut cupcake (Ashley will pretty much walk up to you were her mouth wide open if she sees you eating something she wants):

Off to the playground:

Not sure what the deal was with the facial expression but it reminds me of Calvin from the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip.

Here she is mid-trip on the way to skinning her knee:

Babies were in PJ’s so they couldn’t come out and play:

The next few pictures are Alissa’s. She’s getting better at using the point and shoot.

Somehow, they seem to get cuter and cuter. Amanda in particular is becoming more and more of ham:

Milk, snacks, and TV. It’s good to be a baby:

Mani-pedi time:

We got a tunnel from IKEA:

Alissa likes ribs:

Amanda likes balloons:

Playhouse progress

The playhouse is nearly done… here are some in process pics:

Me and my helper finishing the framework:

Alissa with Uncles Alan and Calvin enjoying the half finished playhouse. The wall sheating is up and the roof is mostly shingled:

Fully shingled and mostly painted:

Now I just have to finish the doors and windows along with the trim. Alissa wants green windows and a purple door.

Backyard projects – cleaning, bench, and playhouse

It’s proving to be a very busy weekend for projects. On Friday, we had the yard cleaned up by a couple guys called, “Manscaping.” I pretty much hired them for the name alone. No, actually, two good guys with decent rates. They’re going to come back in a couple weeks and plant a bunch of stuff as well as lay down weed blocker so hopefully we can manage the yard ourselves ongoing.

Here are some before and after pics:

Today, I got started on a playhouse for the kids. It’s kinda like a mini-shed. But it will have windows, a porch, and a more reasonably graded roof. Here’s some pics of Alissa inspecting my work. Everyone’s a critic.

I did make Alissa work for it a little. Here she is vacuuming up some sawdust:

In the background, you can see the other project that I finished up today. It’s just a bench
I had been working on here and there. It’s a design from “Wood” magazine. My friend Bryan gifted me a year when they offered him a free friend subscription. Yes, I get “Wood” magazine. Mostly, it just makes me feel inadequate… for not having bigger tools. I mean power tools.

Easter and other random pics

Ashley in her Easter dress and hat:

Amanda too:

Alissa’s Easter fur:

Stroller to the park:

Helping Deeann and Calvin with their gremlins in their attic:

Alissa helping me down:

Grapefruit head:

The plant we’ve had for the last 7 years or so started sprouting this flower last week:

Running babies:

Ridem’ cowgirl:

What’s in your eye?

Boxes are fun:

Another thing to climb in:

Ashley sprawled in her crib

Refreshed IKEA furniture

I added some doors and a side panel to our IKEA coffee station. Here’s Alissa showing it off:

It’s just some 3/4″ birch plywood left over from my speaker build with some hinges and knobs. Now, the babies can’t climb in and use it as their fort.

Zaph Audio ZDT 3.5 speaker build

After building a set of small 2 way speakers, I decided that I couldn’t trust the kiddies from knocking them over on themselves. So, they are currently on loan to Alan while I build a set of floorstanding speakers that will be stable enough so as to not be safety hazards to the troublemakers.

I chose the ZDT 3.5 design, from the same guy who came up with the other pair I built. Since Bonnie wasn’t a huge fan of the all wood look, this design will use a combination of painted MDF and plywood.

Here’s a pic in progress:

And here’s a pic in the later stages of assembly:

3/30/2010 – They’re done! Sort of…

Got everything glued up and wired. I still have to fix the paint that I screwed up while gluing the front and rear baffles. And since taking the pictures, I’ve already made some little outriggers.

They sound pretty darn good. I’ll reserve my thoughts for a more thorough review after they break in a bit and I get a chance to listen to a bunch of stuff. But initial impressions are that the imaging is very good even at close listening distances. The crossovers seem to be doing a very good job as I can’t discern any distortion or other bad behavior. And I think there’s enough bass response for my needs. I have yet to try any home theater stuff, but for music, I think I’ll be happy.

As for build notes, I did make that one mistake with the mid recess but it’s not too bad. Otherwise, I was very happy with the textured paint although I might polyurethane on top of it next time. It tends to hold on to dust and everything else pretty tenaciously.

More to come. In the meantime, here are some pics.

The crossovers are velcro’d to the bottom empty space of the cabinets:

Amanda gettin’ jiggy with it

Amanda and Ashley love their new musical grocery cart. They don’t really push it around, they prefer to stand in it. I guess the view is better from up there. And Amanda likes to dance in it. She bounces up and down and sometimes puts her hand up in the air like she’s raising the roof. Anyway, watch it for yourself.

Alissa visits the fire station

The school went on a field trip today to the Fire Station. Alissa got to try out the hose and check out the fire engines and learn about fire safety.

She also got a nice hat that she wore to the grocery store to pickup something for dinner.