In the past, I would have just gone out and bought it, but since taking the Financial Peace class from Dave Ramsey, I’ve been trying to be more responsible.  After waiting for nearly a year, I decided to take the bull by the horns and put a bunch of stuff on eBay to make the money I needed.  Combined with some Christmas money, I was finally able to order it (thanks for selling it $25 cheaper, Amazon) on New Year’s Eve and I’ve been loving it ever since.

Not only is it a great device that works exactly as it should, sounds great, and holds all my music and even a bunch of episodic TV shows (Firefly, Arrested Development, and Futurama, right now), but it means even more that I wanted it for over a year–waited, saved and sold stuff to get it–and was finally able to order it.  I think that makes it an even more awesome device than it already is!

On a side note, I have been enjoying being an Amazon Prime subscriber.  For those that don’t know, Amazon Prime allows you to get free two-day shipping on anything fulfilled by Amazon.com and for $3.99 per item, you can get something overnight.  I got a 3-month trial when I ordered the iPod and I think I’m going to actually pay for the subscription ($79/year) when the trial runs out.  I’ve been ordering more “necessity” items which are not only cheaper than at stores, but also ship free thanks to Amazon Prime.

I love this show.  Not sure why exactly, but it’s one of the few TV shows we don’t miss an episode of.  Seeing the transformations of these people over approximately 16 weeks (and then a few more before the finale) is incredibly inspiring.  Some of them are almost unrecognizable by the finale.

So, who are your favorites this season?

I don’t mind however, putting a few things down that I hope to get accomplished this year.  Valerie wants me to do this 101 things in 1001 days, but I’m not sure I can come up with that many, so I’ve made this somewhat shorter list.  I guess they’re “goals” of a sort.  It breaks down into a few neat categories, so in no particular order, here it is:

Family

• Figure out Kayla’s school situation.  This is more of an early-in-the-year-necessity as Kayla will start Kindergarten in the fall.  Ideally, I’d like to have her in private school.  Financially, that may have to wait a year or two.
• Have semi-regular date nights.  With a special needs child, it becomes both harder and more important to escape every so often.  We need to find a reliable, adult (or almost adult) babysitter that we can “train” in order to feel comfortable leaving Rebekah.  Ideally, I would like to shoot for a night (or afternoon) out without the kids once a month.
• Begin doing semi-regular family devotions.  Kayla is at an age now where she should be able to sit and listen.  I need to find an age-appropriate book or method to help out.

Finances

• Build up to 10% giving to our church.  We were there at one point, but some unexpected things came along and we cut back a bit.  I’d like to build up to that again.  We’re not far off, so this should be doable.
• Halve our debt.  We don’t have a huge amount, but I’d like to cut it in half.  This will largely depend on what new medical expenses come our way for the next year, but I’m hopeful.
• Begin making a car payment to myself.  The time is coming when I will have to replace my car and I don’t want it to sneak up on me.  I want to 1) have enough to put down from making that payment to myself and 2) be able to just carry on with that payment to pay off a new(er) car in 4 years or less.

House

• Get rid of our storage unit.  When we put the house on the market, we needed to de-clutter.  Now, we are paying $85/month to store this stuff.  Some of it we use and regularly go change out (winter/summer clothes, for instance).  Some of it we don’t.  I would like to sell or get rid of anything we can live without and refine the rest of it down to an amount we can fit in our attic storage areas in the house.
• Tame the yard.  This is more of an ongoing, progress item.  It will never be fully tamed, but I’d like to reclaim a bit more from the trees/scrub.
• Insulate.  We really could use a few more inches up in the attic and it would be really nice if we could do something about the uninsulated finished basement (not my handiwork, the knucklehead who owned the house before us was responsible for that one).

Personal

• Bring my lunch.  Once or twice a week would be good.  Not only would it save money, but it would also give me time to complete some of the items below this one.  My problem is that lunch is a social event for me.  It’s hard for me to pass up that hour with friends to eat at my desk by myself.
• Complete some video games.  I have a bad habit of getting partway into a game and not finishing it.  Whether it’s boredom, simply not enough time to keep up, or the next shiny thing comes along, something pulls me away.  I need to complete Zelda: Spirit Tracks, Torchlight, and Defense Grid.  I’d like to make some progress on Elven Legacy, Sacred 2, and Civ IV as well.
• Read some more.  I used to read a lot.  I don’t have time to read a lot anymore, but I have a handful of books that I would like to prioritize to complete.

• The year began in glorious fashion with our heater going out on New Year’s Eve.  Thanks to Aaron and Steph, though, our family (including my visiting parents, sister, and their chihuahua) stayed warm until we could get it fixed.  Add to that the necessity of digging up and replacing our septic tank line from house to tank (technically in 2008) and it made for a whirlwind family visit for the holidays!
• Our youngest daughter, Rebekah, was diagnosed with several neurological issues (microcephaly and lissencephaly) that have a drastic effect on her development and require a lot of extra care.  These have led to CT scans, an MRI, eye surgery (for crossed eyes), lots of physical and occupational therapy, feeding issues, and our latest struggle, sleep disorders. We are still learning what it means to be parents of a special needs child (and, in fact, still coming to grips with that at times).
• We finally came to the realization that with everything else going on, we just couldn’t do the two-dog thing anymore and found a new home for our beagle, John T. Chance.  We miss him, but it’s a huge burden lifted off our shoulders as he could be high maintenance at times.  We replaced him with a beautiful Glo-fish named Ariel (can you tell who named her).
• We decided we’d had enough of keeping the house in tip-top shape and took it off the market.  It didn’t matter anymore as anyone who would want our house, would never be approved for a loan without putting at least 20-30% down (due to the ridiculous amount of short-sales and foreclosures in our area).
• We celebrated 10 years of marriage in July.  It’s so awesome to have my best friend with me every day, no matter what.
• I have mostly kicked a VERY long-lived habit of biting my nails.  Still working on not biting around them, but I now have to clip them regularly which is a big thing for me.  Thanks to my daughter, Kayla, for continuing to remind me not to bite my fingers.
• We found the church where God wants us to serve for this next phase of our life.  It’s amazing to look forward to the next Sunday as much as we do and genuinely miss it when we don’t get to be there.  Our small group is a huge support to us and we’ve made close friends with some great people.
• We successfully waged a battle against cuts to the state program that helps provide Rebekah’s therapy and she got to keep her aggressive therapy schedule.
• We have figured out that Kayla has a flair for the dramatic. She is quick at memorizing things, loves to sing (on key for the most part, though she does make up her own words), and is quite the little diva at times.  So, even though that ballet thing didn’t work out well, maybe she still has a career on stage to look forward to.
• We were able to spend Thanksgiving with my parents in NJ. My 17 year-old sister who is well on the way to a career in dance was home for a few days from her boarding school in CT and my grandpa (who is now legally blind and lives with my parents) was there as well for us to spend some time with.
• Soon after Bekah’s therapy schedule was straightened out, we found out that we were approved for enrollment in a program that will help pay most of Rebekah’s medical expenses that aren’t covered by insurance.  This is a huge blessing as her therapy alone was starting to add up to nearly $250/month.
• We closed out the year with some much-needed time off, a visit to grandma, aunts, uncle, and cousins in South Carolina, and some rest-time at home to get ready for 2010.

I am blessed to go to a job which, though it can be stressful at times, is challenging, rewarding, and stable.  I am blessed to have two beautiful little girls who have me wrapped around their fingers.  I am blessed to have family and friends who have been there for us when we needed them.  I am blessed to be a part of a community-focused, Christ-centered church.  Most of all, I am blessed to walk through life with my best friend, Valerie. I couldn’t do it without her.

Bring on 2010.

Welcome To Holland by Emily Perl Kingsley

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It’s like this……

When you’re going to have a baby, it’s like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It’s all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, “Welcome to Holland.”

“Holland?!?” you say. “What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I’m supposed to be in Italy. All my life I’ve dreamed of going to Italy.”

But there’s been a change in the flight plan. They’ve landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven’t taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It’s just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It’s just a different place. It’s slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you’ve been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around…. and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills….and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy… and they’re all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say “Yes, that’s where I was supposed to go. That’s what I had planned.”

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away… because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.

But… if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn’t get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things … about Holland.

We got (and some of these were rumored or pretty much announced beforehand):

• A new iPhone
• More details on Snow Leopard (stupid name, but $29!!)
• A much-needed consolidation of the MacBook line (WANT)
• Some new (7-hour batteries, SD slot that is bootable, backlit keyboards all across) and some returning features (Firewire) in the new MacBook Pro line.

The thing about WWDC is it’s a “Developer’s Conference.”  Of course, with all Apple’s secretiveness, everyone expects huge product announcements at any public event for Apple, but I’m glad they’ve returned WWDC back to the developers.

I’ll just leave you with this awesomeness.  Apparently, they set up a 20-screen wall of cinema displays displaying tiny iPhone icons for the top-selling 20,000 apps in the App Store.  These icons pulsed every time that app was purchased offering quite a cool effect.  Hit the link for some cool pictures and videos.  I wonder if Safe Eyes Mobile made it on the wall…

McAfee Family Protection

For the last 7-ish months, the team at InternetSafety.com has been quietly working away at the largest project we’ve ever tackled (and considering we conquered the entire continent of Australia, that’s saying something).  We couldn’t talk about it for a long time, but this past Tuesday night at around 10:30pm all our hard work came to fruition when McAfee released the McAfee Family Protection to the public.  Try a 30-day trial if you’re not sure it’s for you, but this is just another way that InternetSafety.com is helping to make the web safe for families.

I will say this about the project.  We have a great team.  Despite the fact that we spent more time every day with each other than our families over the past few months (and even a few nights), I can say that we still like each other afterward and can still stand each other enough to want to get together outside work (like lunches almost every day and a gaming party tonight).  You don’t get that with every job.  Go team!

Rebekah Anne

I can honestly say that this has been the most challenging 8 months of our lives yet.  Since my last update, Rebekah has begun Physical Therapy and Occupational Therapy (yes, she has an occupation–it’s “baby”).  While she still has a long way to go (she still can’t sit up, roll from tummy to back, or crawl), her progress has been amazing (she now rolls from back to front, reaches for and fumbles around with toys, plays while strapped into her high chair, can sit up assisted, and has two teeth–not therapy-related).  Her neurologist checkup yesterday went well and Dr. Janas was pleased with her progress.  She’ll have another MRI in 3 or so months when she turns 1 and a followup/checkup after.

We know God has His hand on her.  Pray for her continued progress with the therapy.  It has been an amazing blessing that Valerie has been able to stay home with the girls since January.

Work is still busy and exciting, but not quite as crazy as the past few months and we’ve been learning a bit of a routine with Rebekah (although, she still sometimes just decides to get up at 3am and not go back to sleep until 7), so I will try to be more faithful with updating the blog (even if it’s just using a few spare minutes to post a stupid link or picture).  Thanks for being patient over these last few months.

Praise God her sutures are normal!  Of all the things we have to worry about, major head surgery was not one of the things I wanted to add to the list.  So, we’ll keep pressing on with testing to learn more about what we might have to expect and we’ll keep thanking God for providing this answer to prayer!  It has amazed us the number of people across the country that have been praying for little Rebekah.

Oh, and next week, we start all the paperwork to get enrolled in “Babies Can’t Wait”–the Georgia program for early intervention physical therapy.  As a little aside, last night, she grabbed hold of her paci and put it in/pulled it out of her mouth a few times.  She is also kicking her legs over, but hasn’t figured out she can keep going and roll over–just yet.

I’m not going to say the book was easy to get through.  The material was amazingly detailed, fantastic, and engrossing, but some of it was so very challenging to read.  I have to admit I dozed off a few times while reading it.  Don’t let that detract from the book, though–that was more a failing of me and the fact that Rebekah still doesn’t sleep very well.

I can’t even do justice to what Mr. DiLorenzo presents in the book.  From the fabrication of “implied powers” to the General Welfare Clause to how Lincoln was one of the worst Presidents our nation has seen, the author presents Hamilton’s America from the early days where he battled daily against Jefferson (his arch political rival) to long after his death as his ideas were implemented by the power elite in Washington.  It is a fascinating journey of how we came from an affiliation of self-governing states to the bloated, bureaucratic, overbearing central government we have today.

If you have any interest in liberty in America, American history, and politics, you owe it to yourself to read this book with an open mind.  You might just come out of it with a different opinion of Alexander Hamilton than our country’s public (and private) schools have conditioned you to believe.