Sunday, December 21, 2008

Meet Migo!

This is Maddie! Danny and I were wandering around  Walgreen's last night and discovered this guy. He's a stuffed dog, roughly Jack's size that we names Migo, short for "amigo". We bought it, thinking we'd use him for a little behavioral experiment. When we went to bed last ngiht, we put Migo on the bed where Jack could see him. We thought the most he'd do was jump up and chuck the intruder off his spot and ignore him. But Jack got defensive! He immediately stopped in his tracks, growling and barking at the usurper! He approached carefully, almost scared - it was funny! Once he figured out it wasn't real, he found himself 
a great new toy to play with.
As a bit of a sad epilogue, Jack took ten minutes earlier today to rip out one of Migo's eyes and all of the stuffing in his head. I did my best to patch him up, so now he has some new, oddly shaped shades! We don't have high hopes for his survival, but at least he won't have to see the horrors he has to feel.

Sunday, November 9, 2008

Back in Utah

So it's been a long time since we have posted.  We moved back to Utah from California at the end of June after things didn't work out as we had thought with Prestige.  I started working with Mike and Taylor Proudfit's company, Titan Alarm and have been in charge of the operations for Salt Lake, as well as offices we opened along the way in St. George, Denver (now closed) and Boise.  That has been a much better work experience and I have enjoyed working with those guys again.

We rented an apartment in Taylorsville and immediately started looking for a house.  In September we purchased our first home in Stansbury Park, which is about 20 minutes from downtown Salt Lake.  We love it out here.  It is far enough away from the city to not feel cramped and feel like we have space to spread out, but close enough to be very convenient for Maddie's work and to visit family.  We are right on the banks of the Great Salt Lake and it is very pretty out here.

Poor Jack has now lived in 4 homes in the first six months of his life!  He's quite the little trooper, but it has been a little difficult adapting in each new place.  We finally had him completely housebroken in our apartment in Taylorsville, but adjusting to the new house has been a few steps back for him.  I think he is starting to distrust that this will be out last move.

Shortly after moving back to Utah, Maddie got a job working as a receptionist at Electrical Wholesale Supply (EWS) in Salt Lake. She has enjoyed working there and they have treated her very well.

It was very interesting to see the hand of the Lord bless us when we came back.  The summer in California was the most difficult and stressful summer I have had working in the alarm industry and it just didn't ever feel at home.  Once we made the decision to move home, blessings poured out.  I was able to immediately start working for Titan, which provided much more stability in our lives.  Maddie quickly got her job at EWS, when she had struggled for 4 months to find a job when we were living in Pleasant Grove after we got married.  We found a good apartment without a deposit, which was good since money was getting a little tight after moving to and from California in 2 months.  Then we were able to find an absolutely gorgeous house and find it at a time when the price had been reduced by about $50,000.  Without so many things falling into place, we wouldn't be in the position we are at in life right now.  It has been a real testimony to me of the blessings that come from living the Gospel, particularly paying tithing.  

The one sad part of our lives in the last six months was our baby.  Shortly after coming home from California we went to the doctor for a checkup and the doctors discovered that the pregnancy, for whatever reason, had not been a valid pregnancy.  It was pretty hard on both of us for a few days, but the good thing we got out of it was knowing that we were capable of having children and having the feeling that we will be able to have children in the future.

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Happy Father's Day



Maddie got me this awesome Patriot's jersey for our baby for Father's Day.  Since I don't have a human baby to put it on yet, I put it on the puppy!



Wednesday, June 11, 2008

We have a Baby Holmgren ETA!

We went to the doctor today and he gave us a due date! Through the very scientific method of spinning a little cardboard wheel to the right dates, he figured our baby will be here sometime around the 8th of February!

Monday, May 19, 2008

Thursday, May 15, 2008

Jack's work week

Jack's doing great! He's teething right now so certain things like carboard boxes and office chairs will never be the same, but it's no great loss. Since I take him into the office everyday he's become something of the technician's mascot, though all the reps love him, too. He spends most of his days sleeping on his bed here and playing with whoever shows up! One of his favorite playmates is one of our rep managers, Neil. He loves him! As you can see, they often play themselves into a stupor. Yes, they're both fast asleep, though Jack's eyes don't ever really look it.
The current heat wave is presenting somewhat of a challenge to his little body. Because of their short noses and short coats, Boxers don't tolerate extreme temperatures very well (I know, bad thing for a Utah dog). It's almost 100 degrees outside today when last week I was wearing a jacket! Nobody around here has air conditioning because it rarely gets this hot. So we had to get a fan for the office and ice packs for Jack to sleep against. Dang, it's hot...
Anyway, all in all, he's getting bigger, and according to the vet, he's perfectly healthy! Yay Jack!

Sunday, May 11, 2008

Maddie got a baby for Mother's Day!

Maddie has been wanting a puppy since shortly after we got married (ok, I wanted one too!) When I was on my mission, I had a good friend who had two beautiful boxers and I have just loved them ever since.  They are strong and confident and once I showed some pictures to Maddie, she agreed we should have one. We couldn't have one in our last apartment, but I told her we would get one once we moved to California.  Maddie looked all over for good breeders of boxers and found one close to where we live.  Today we went and picked up little Jack.









Poor sleepy Jack.




















































Thursday, May 8, 2008

We're here!! And we have internet!!

We’re finally fully installed in our new apartment in Alameda, California! It’s beautiful here and we’re excited to explore and get to know the area.
The drive was long, tiring, and mildly terrifying at times. Danny drove the whole thing due to the complications we encountered and the fact that I’ve never driven anything more challenging than the Yukon and a large truck with a car dragging behind I is a whole different thing. The wind coming across the desert almost blew us off the road, construction in the mountains had us squeezed between larger trucks and concrete barriers, and coming down the mountains had us fighting traffic and gravity! But it was all expertly navigated by Danny and I didn’t spend too much time biting my nails. It was all worth it once we got about an hour from the end and we saw all of the strawberry fields and green, rolling hills in Northern California. I can see why those cows on the commercials are happy!
We spent the night on the floor on our air mattress again. I had a hard time for a while, I was homesick for Utah and our first home, but we eventually got to sleep and crashed pretty hard. This morning we got up and had to figure out how to unpack our huge truck. There’s two ways into our apartment from parking lots: a long way and a short way. The short way, unfortunately, is blocked by construction work on the building next door (the complex is still being renovated). So Danny went down and negotiated with the site manager to let him pull the truck through it all and pull it right up to the door! After that it was a matter of 20 feet from the truck to the elevator and another 20 from the elevator to the apartment. Danny’s friend, Tim Chen, from last summer is here and he stuck around and helped us move everything! Between the three of us and occasional help from Neil Papa (Danny’s partner’s younger brother), we got the truck unloaded in less than two hours. We’ve started to unpack now (I’m realizing how frustrating it is to do all that work over the last few days and only have to undo it all again) and we’re about there! There isn’t as much storage as our place in Pleasant Grove, but we’ll make it work. There’s a lot more room, though, so our furniture isn’t smashed together anymore. We also have a lovely, large deck, which makes us sad we didn’t bring the grill, but they’ve got some here anyway. We’re excited to be here and make it our home for the next few months!

Friday, April 11, 2008

Getting things rolling...

Things are going well around here. Danny's helping Prestige Alarm get ready for the summer. We're anxious to get going, but it'll come soon enough. In the meantime, we've got enough to keep us busy. Danny's classes are almost over, which means he's in the midst of finals and big papers and presentations. I've started a very temporary job at Robert's Craft as a morning cashier. We've already had two major thefts and I've only been there for two weeks! Who steals crafts?! Anyway, it's good to finally have something useful to do, and I get to meet a lot of fun people. All in all, things are busy and wonderful!

Saturday, March 29, 2008

The lovely and WARM Phoenix, AZ

We got back yesterday from our two-day trip down to Arizona. We went down to Siren Alarm, for whom we'll be a dealer this coming summer, to get trained on their systems. We got there early Thursday morning and spent the better part of the day learning all about how they run things.
We spent the night at Taylor and Becky Proudfit's. We had a wonderful time seeing our friends again and playing with Weston and Jameson. It's so fun playing with kids who love you! We were sad to leave them all and come back to chilly, windy Utah. I'm so sick of being cold...

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Trip to California


We had a fun trip this weekend to Orange County with Maddie's family in celebration of her sister, Micah, getting married.  The whole family was there except for one couple who were violently ill and couldn't make it to the wedding or California.  
I spotted Matt Hasselbeck (QB for the Seattle Seahawks) at the baggage claim.
Later spotted John Beck (former BYU and current Miami Dolphins QB) at Disneyland

Getty Center in LA

The Fam at Disneyland

Maddie and I at Getty Center

Friday, February 29, 2008

American Fork Canyon on a Nice Springlike Day

Maddie and I got a little Spring Fever today with the nice weather so we decided to go for a drive up American Fork Canyon and take some pictures.  

Cool Reflection
85mm f/14.0 ISO 400


85 mm f/11.0 ISO 600




17mm f/10.0 ISO400




Slatted Bridge
85mm f/11.0 ISO400



Tibbles Reservoir
78mm f/14.0 ISO400



Panorama of Tibbles Reservoir
6 images shot freehand stitched with PhotoStitch



Lots of bridges today.  I like rusted steel bridges.
85 mm, f/8.0, ISO 400



 85mm f/8.0 ISO400



85mm f/5.6 ISO 800

Work is a Headache

My work has become quite a source of aggravation these past few months. Firstline's bankruptcy has definitely removed some security from our lives. Joined forces with Pinnacle for a couple of weeks, but left after some promises weren't fulfilled. Now I have joined up with an old friend from Firstline, Lee Papa, who is running Axis Alarm. I will help run the tech program at Axis. We will be moving to New York for the summer, which will definitely be a fun adventure for us.