Nice laid back weekend at Annie and Pops with the Johnson's and their girls. Swimming, Fishing, and Baseball. It was basically a beer commercial.
Greenway Shenanigans
It boggles my mind remembering how people fought the building of the Greenway. Articles used to be about the cost per square mile and now they all talk about the revenue generated per square mile. Without it day's like this wouldn't have been possible.
Pretend to be adults
We don't get the opportunity to dress up very often but when we do...it always seems like its July. :)
Spring Break 2017
Months ago Jenna had the idea to stay in a yurt at Petite Jean. We booked it so far in advance we really weren't counting down the days until it got here. There's something about camping that brings you together. I don't know if its the outdoors, being unplugged from our plugged in lives, or that you are just trapped together. I doubt it will be the same when they are teenagers but I pray it will be. Gallery below.
Goatsgiving 2016
Oh Goatsgiving, you little made up holiday that makes the next day so difficult.
Bike ride shenanigans
Shenanigans I tell you.
Buffalo River September 2014
I'm enjoying the new Memories section of Photos in iOS 10. This popped up as 2 years ago today and it made a video. I tweaked it for 2 minutes and BAM.
I thought I'd share it here since it was so easy but if you are interested here is the link to the original trip.
Summer 2016 Montage
The next iOS has a collections tab that pre-populates with pictures in a certain range. This one popped up today as the "The Past 3 Months." I took a look and other than the random opening picture of kayaks I think it did a pretty solid job of capturing our summer so I decided to throw it on here. No telling how good it could be with a little effort but then it goes back to that whole time thing :)
Hello Spring-2016
Still not officially here but try telling that to my allergies. Everything is blooming like crazy. I think our roses will have flowers before April at this rate. This coming weekend the kids and I are planning our garden. Mom wants tomatoes. Cam and I want cucumbers. We all want squash. Noah wants...carrots. Not sure about that one. This past weekend was a dream. Sunshine but enough rain earlier in the week knocked most of the allergens out of the air to make outside bearable. On Sunday we went for a family bike ride to downtown Springdale and let the kids play at the park and then we ate tacos at Black Apple Crossing cidery. It was a great afternoon.
I resolve to go back to the Gorge
When I started this site over 10 years ago there wasn't Facebook, texting, Twitter, and really cheap communications. It wasn't quite as bad as my childhood with long distance fees and postage but there still wasn't a cheap way to keep people informed.
Since 2012, I’ve gotten behind on galleries and general posting because it is so simple to text friends and family and post to Facebook to communicate more broadly with all your social circles. So the site has evolved for the biggest things. It’s also became an obligation that annoys me at times. Anyone who frequents this site knows we went to 30A for Thanksgiving. Between myself, Jenna, and Melissa everyone interested has seen the sights and sounds in posts, photos, and videos. So why post here?
As social life evolved so has this site. I have a record of the entire history of my little adventure in one place. A place I control. Text messages have to be purged to make space on your phone. Want to leave Facebook-hope you have a whole day to download important memories. I don’t even acknowledge Twitter anymore for personal use. It has become so vitriol I hate myself for even checking it.
The Sullivan Adventure has evolved to a place for Jenna and I rather than a place for our family to “catch up.” I used to get in trouble with my the grandparents if they missed a birthday party and I didn’t immediately post it here. Today they’ve Facetimed the kid’s within minutes of the conclusion. Then it was to inform, now it’s to enjoy. Jenna and I sit at the computer sometimes and will just look at the posts from a year and shake our heads how fast our little train is speeding out of the station.
Control has starting to become something more important to me as well. I’ve been happy with the control Squarespace gives me. It costs more than Wordpress or Blogger but I’ve never had a DOS attack or any intrusion at all. I’ve never had a minute of downtime. The pages can load slow if I have too many fancy posts (slideshow galleries particularly kill the speed) on the front page but generally it’s solid. Most importantly they give me tools to export out if I so choose.
So this year’s resolution is to catch up on the galleries and the vacations and the excursions and the birthdays and the everything. I also resolve to post big memories here first and link them to other social sites rather than defaulting to group think. I’m starting with a gallery from September of this year. A small little trip Jenna and I took to the Pacific Northwest. Enjoy.
Happy Thanksgiving 2015
Hope your day is great...and warm.
Pretty Solid Weekend
A 3-day weekend is nice but we don't always take advantage of it. This weekend we nailed it.
If It's Not Written Down It Didn't Happen OR 10 Years of Blogging
It’s hard to remember the world ten years ago. It was way back when you paid for long distance and you paid by the minute for your mobile phone. It was before apps. It was before texting was easy. Facebook may have been invented but it was far from a thing.
When Jenna became pregnant with Noah, we had zero family living close by. Every time something new happened, we’d have to share it multiple times with each family member. Whoever we spoke to last got the short end of the stick. So I had a brilliant idea. Let’s start a website. A blog. It’s this new cool thing people are doing. We can post news and everyone can go to their computer and see what happened! As always Jenna was skeptical about anything I’m excited about, but she went ahead and gave me her blessings.
On September 1, 2005, I made the first post. Today, I make my 863rd post. I had to manually add them up because I didn’t think the statistics page was correct. 863! It has grown just like our little family over the past ten years. It went from a way to keep grandparents up to date on doctors appointments to a true history of our family.
It has become a historical document to us in a way I can’t explain. It has been there for two births, hundreds of small victories, a couple of huge victories, and a few moments that threatened to crush us. It has also seen it’s fair share of deaths and chronicled the pain that goes along with life. Without knowing it or even trying, I created a written account of our adventure.
I am thankful for everyone who has ever visited. I am thankful for a life where I get to wake up the two greatest children in the world each morning, watch them stretch, and hear “Good morning Dad.” Mostly I am thankful for my beautiful wife. She is and always will be the star of my story.
Heaven's Amphitheater
The Columbia River Gorge in Washington. Pictures do it no justice at all.
The kids' first concert
My first concert was the Gap Band with Midnight Star opening for them. I don't remember the year but I've never forgotten the concert. My big sister let me tag along with her and her friends. No one ever forgets their first concert. Noah and Cam got to go to really cool laid back one. Amos Lee and David Gray had an outside concert that was perfect. It was all lawn seating. The view was great. The music was perfect. We love Amos Lee. The kid's have grown up listening to his music and Noah could sing along to about a third of the songs. David Gray was a mystery to me. I haven't really listened to him since his first album but his show was awesome. He was a great performer. Hopefully it made an impression with the kids. I'm glad Amanda and Sue got to share it with them. Come to think of it, I'm glad their parents got to share it with them too.
The Swoosh
Last time we were in Portland, I got a tour of Nike's campus from Amanda. This time the kids were bigger so we all decided to take a peek. Coming from 2 people who work in school districts, it seemed like a foreign country. We were there during lunch time and the amount of people working out was astonishing. The culture of health was unlike anything we experience. If you workout you get an additional 30 minutes of lunch. I don't know logistically how every company can emulate that but what a service for your employees. Everything from the tennis courts, to the gyms, to the pool, to the soccer field was being used. Jenna loved seeing the soccer field where one of her Nike Training Club app's trainer's had a bullhorn and was putting about 200 employees through a crazy workout.
The kids enjoyed it in different ways. Campbell just thought it was a town with cool art. Noah just looked at the banners of all the athletes. They got to run a lap on the track and see museum worthy things they won't appreciate until they are older. This trip to Portland really opened Noah's eyes to a lot of sports. Lacrosse seems to be his new "favorite" sport. My personal favorite moment was seeing a group of engineers (or whatever they are) putting a group through workouts as they tested Sparx gear.
Thanks to Sue for taking us there on her day off, even though people kept trying to stop her and engage her in work :)
Oregon 2015
What an amazing trip. We crammed in as much of the Pacific Northwest as we could but still left feeling like we missed a lot. I'll document the different adventures we had one by one. The trip started on a high note with Campbell flying for the first time that she can remember. The look on her face as we took off was awesome. Then we landed at Amanda and Sue's resort. It needs a name like Shangri La or something. Then we hit the coast, we hit the woods, we hit Nike, we hit the waterfalls, we went to the kid's first concert, we brewed beer with an airshow flying overhead, and mostly we recharged our batteries. Our hosts were amazing and for the second time in as many trips, Jenna was checking job openings in case we decided to stay :)
Happy Father's Day OR Channeling my inner Ice Cube
Can't really quote any of the lyrics here, but "It Was A Good Day" comes to mind thinking of this year's Fathers Day. The kids are at that perfect age where:
1. They can do things for me.
2. I'm still a big deal to them.
The day started pretty early and went so late it felt like 3 days in one. My card was sweet like only homemade cards can be. Then my gift was a rose bush picked out from each kid. My favorite thing about our first house was the rose garden. We tried transplanting the one I planted when Noah was born but some things just don't move well. I have one failed attempt at roses at our new house but it failed. After 8 years though I'm ready for another go.
We sat outside under the willow until we were hungry then went to breakfast. The kids helped me fix my Jeep hoist and we took the top off. Topless Jeep ride to go visit Ann and Pops. Back home to FaceTime Dad, who had the good grace to say my tomatoes looked good before showing me his drool worthy plants. Early evening Magga and Jana showed up for a visit this week. The day ended with my new favorite thing. The U.S. Open in the Pacific Northwest. I mean, watching golf while the kids get themselves ready for bed? Yes please.
Highlight of the day was the kids playing baseball in the backyard. Jenna and I watched through the window for awhile before I had to capture some on video.
I really will have to up my Mothers Day game next year for Jenna.
Summer of DMB
We are going to see Dave Matthews Band over Labor Day at the Gorge. It'll be a huge check off of the bucket list. We'll get to share it with family so it'll even be more special. Then right after we committed, their summer tour was announced and the AMP was listed. So in September we'll travel to 1500 miles to see them. But last night we got to drive 3!
A Little Non-holiday Surprise
It's always nice to have visitors. Last week we were lucky to have Amanda visit from Oregon. We see her every Christmas generally but we were able to score a visit in April. Noah had a fundraiser for Odysey of the Kind and south Arkansas came through in a big way. For delivery Magga and Amanda came up for one quick night.
