birthday weekend and fair parade

this weekend was my birthday so mom and dad bosch came down from grand haven with my nephew reese. we bummed around the yard - pretty much just playing with the boys. swimming, riding bikes, playing in the park next door, laying in the hammock and cooking beer can chicken on the grill. jack thinks reese is the coolest thing because he is bigger and can do lots of stuff, so its fun to watch them play together. after mom and dad went home lynne, jackson and i went up to monroe to watch the fair parade on sunday. a great weekend. now its time to mow the lawn and trim some bushes - then maybe a nap on the hammock before softball tonight.

ahh....summer

we bought a hammock on sale and i got around to hooking it up (from the pool deck to the middle hook of the clothesline pole near the house) i did have to by 10 feet of chain from the hardware store otherwise the hammock would have been four feet off the ground - too scary. i played around with a slow shutter so you, the viewer, could experience the lazy sway of the hammock, but looking at this photo makes me dizzy - yikes. so i've been enjoying reading my summer book "slaughter house five" which i either borrowed from kohl or tim, i can't remember - but thanks i'm really into it.

brusha brusha brusha ...

so, yes, most of this blog is going to be about jackson. lynne and i have been encouraging him to brush his teeth, he's resisted in the past ... we let up and then kinda let it go. so we're back to encouraging again - two nights ago the three of us brushed our teeth together and he thought that was pretty cool. mom, dad and jack all sitting on the floor in the bathroom brushing our teeth. and i think that helped him realize this is something everyone does, not just him ... so now its cool. tonight i put out the stool and he stepped right up there and put his brush under the water - who taught him that? to anyone who doesn't have kids you're rolling your eyes right now saying, sarcastically "wow, jack really brushed his teeth huh - hmm," but to me its the best thing that's happened all week.

recent wedding

started editing a wedding i shot recently
and this is what i like so far

running

stopped to take this shot of a group of distance runners as they met atop a hill at a nearby park for a run together. i was on my way to a soccer camp assignment. i liked it, wanted to share it.

pressure tank

on the 4th of July lynne noticed a slow leak under our water pressure tank. a plumber told us the tank had rusted out and he'd fix it for $850. my buddy aaron found a tank for $99 at anderson's and i wasn't about to pay that much for labor - so i talked him into helping me do it ourselves. it went pretty good, except for discovering a rotted-out floor underneath the old tank - replacing the floor put us back about three-hours. we started a 3 in the afternoon and finished around 11. jackson thought all the commotion was cool, he grabbed a wrench and got right in there with us. everything is working fine - no leaks...but i'll need to make some adjustments with the tanks pressure to make sure its filling up all the way. thanks a TON aaron, you saved us a lot of money and it was fun too.

vacation notes

well it was a great vacation weekend. there we many firsts ... jacks first trip to the beach, first ride on the tractor, first ride on the quad and first fricanos pizza. he liked it all, especially the quad. in fact he cried when we made him get off. he's a video of the first ride on the farmall ...