1/31/2005

Kim just celebrated her 35th Birthday on 1/27/2005.  Happy Birthday Honey!  We've been busy as heck.  Kyle is just completing BJHS Wrestling Season this week and he won a silver medal in his first major tournament.  Jacob has several weeks of basketball left and scores at least three baskets per game.  Here's the video we took of Jake's game and Kyle's tournament.  Jessica takes gymnastics but I haven't heard of any recitals yet. 

Last Friday night Jacob went to his first Pinewood Derby.  To give you a little history, Kyle and I built a Pinewood Derby car 4 years in a row while he was in Cub Scouts and each year we finished in the top 3 for the pack and received a trophy.  This year was Jacob's first, so we built a car using the same techniques as with Kyle, however this year we didn't even place.  Jacob was very disappointed.  While I was sitting close to several of the other parents Jacob walks up and says. "Gosh darnit Dad!  Why did you make me such a sucky car!  We all bust up laughing!

Anyhow, everyone is doing good.  We'll be in touch...

 

3/19/2005

As you probably already read on my website my buddy Mark, Ole, and I went to Daytona for Bike Week.  I can only explain it as 10 days of beer, motorcycles, and bad drivers.  I must admit I felt a little guilty leaving Kim and the kids in frozen Illinois while we were riding motorcycles up and down the East coast of Florida.  You can read all about the trip and see numerous photo's of the mayhem on my Bike Week 2K5 page. 

Anyhow I started back to work last Tuesday (3/15) and received some great news from my boss.  As it turns out I was promoted effective last Saturday (3/12)!  If that isn't the perfect ending to a pretty darn good vacation, I don't know what is. 

Kim and the kids are doing great.  Kim is busy as ever running the household and doing her transcription work.  Kyle just started track and will be Confirmed Catholic in April.  Jacob finished basketball and is getting ready for flag football and Pony Baseball.  Jessica is growing like a weed and is almost as tall as Jake.  If we could just get some warmer weather, I wouldn't have a single complaint.  

 

4/29/2005

It's been a busy month.  I spent another 10 days in Florida (4/5 - 4/14).  I had an Agency Conference in Orlando the first week and the Gartner Wireless & Mobility Conference the second.  Fortunately my Mom picked me up in Orlando and I was able to spend the weekend with her and Cliff in Ormond Beach.  We had perfect weather for the weekend and had a great time fish camp hoping along the Halifax river.

Kyle's been busy as well.  While maintaining honor roll grades, Kyle also finished a winning wrestling season and track season.  Kyle just spent the last week at Camp Ingersol for Outdoor Education.  The entire 7th Grade from BJHS spent 5 days camping near London Mills, IL.  Kyle also has several jobs now.  Kyle baby sits for friends and neighbors and dabbles in landscaping.  He also has a part-time job at Game Time Gym as a Flag Football Official.  He officiates his younger brothers games.  In addition Kyle celebrated his 13th birthday on 3/28 and was recently Confirmed Catholic..

Jacob's still in Cub Scouts and just earned his Tiger Cub badge.  Jacob finished basketball and started Flag Football and T-Ball.  Jake is one heck of a great athlete.  For a 7 year old he's very coordinated and aggressive.  He's excelled in every sport he's participated in.

Jessica's still taking gymnastics but her classes are during the day, so I've not seen one.  She'll be getting a hamster in a few days and she's very excited about it.

Kim's been the busiest of all of us.  I've been out of town like four of the last eight weeks and that leaves her taking care of everything without relief.

Everyone is healthy and doing well. 

 

6/6/2005

I don't even know where to begin...  Jacob finished football and started baseball.  Kyle is taking bass guitar lessons.  Jessica is in gymnastics and Kim is watching neighbor kids at home and dabbling in transcription.  I'm busy as ever and still loving my job.  I recently ordered cable broadband and may be hanging up DSL.  Insight will be out this Thursday (6/9) to drop off the modem and run a new cable drop.  Cable broadband is currently the fastest in town and I ordered the 6mbps/512kbps plan.  I've had DSL for more than 4 years and thought it was time to try cable.  I'll try both for a month to see which is consistently faster, better, etc... then drop the other.

 

6/12/2005

We finally made the switch from DSL to Cable Broadband.  I must admit Verizon's DSL service has served us very well for the past 3 or 4 years.  However, the fastest connection we could get was 1.6mbps/368kbps and with neighbors and friends closer to the POP getting 3mbps for the same price, I was frustrated...  In addition, I'm having a problem with my Netgear FVS318 router.  Every time my WAN IP lease expired my router would get a new IP address and Verizon changed their lease to expire every 900 seconds.  Yeah, I was having some serious connectivity issues... 

Anyhow, I now have a new D-Link Router and as of last Thursday I'm flying high with Insight Broadband with a blazing 6mbps/512kbps connection (for a low $75/month, yikes...).  The only thing faster would have to be FIOS, I'm waiting for you Verizon...

With our new and improved upload speed, I'll be posting more video content on 5nolans.com in the near future.  Keep in touch...

 

8/3/2005

This Summer has flown by and we've been too busy to keep up the site.  Here's a quick rundown on the Nolan's this Summer.

6/25 - Celebrated Jessica and Jacob's birthday's by renting the Holiday Pool (with 6 life guards) and inviting 20 friends for a pool party.

6/27 - Jessica's 5th Birthday.  We celebrated with dinner at Chucky Cheese's.

7/1 - Kim and I celebrated our 17th Wedding Anniversary.  Dinner and drinks at Creole Cafe and additional drinks at Fat Jack's.

7/11 - My 37th Birthday.  Kim and I had dinner and drinks at Fiesta Ranchero.

7/22 - Jacob's 7th Birthday.  We celebrated with dinner at the Rain Forest Cafe in Downtown Disney, Orlando.

7/7 - 7/11 - Kim and Theresa's cruise to the Caribbean.

7/6 - 7/28 - Kyle, Jacob, and Jessica fly solo to Jacksonville and spend time with their Nana in Ormond Beach

7/15 - 7/28 - Kim and I drive down to Florida and sped time in Ormond Beach, Orlando, and Jacksonville.  We spent time on the beach, on the boat, and at Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure.  It was an incredible time...

7/28 - Kim, Jacob, Jessica, Rusty and I drive back to Bloomington.

8/4 - Kyle and Ryan attended the Warp Tour in Jacksonville.

8/5 - Kyle flew back to Bloomington by himself.

8/12 - Marlene (aka Grammies) will be flying to Bloomington and will be staying with us for a week or so.

 

9/12/2005

Hello everyone, sorry I haven't updated the site in a while.  Hurricane Katrina hit on Monday, August 29th and I was deployed to Birmingham, AL on Friday, September 2nd.  I spent 10 days on catastrophe duty in Alabama, Mississippi, and Texas.  I drove nearly 2000 miles, flew 2400 miles, and worked approximately 112 hours.  All I can say is I was very tired and very sad for the people whose lives have been turned upside down by this disaster.  Here's a look at my schedule while in the South.

9/2 - Fly to Birmingham, AL

9/3 - Drove from Birmingham to Gulf Port (work 4 hours), drove to Biloxi (wait 1.5 hours for gas), and drove back to Birmingham (through Pascagoula , I-10 East was closed).

9/4 - Fly to Houston, TX and drove to office at the Space Center  (work a couple hours) and fly back to Birmingham.

9/5 - Drove from Birmingham to Meridian, MS (work for an hour), drove to Hattiesburg, MS (work for 4 hours), then drove back to Birmingham, AL.

9/6 - Worked 14 hours in Birmingham office.

9/7 - Drove from Birmingham to Mobile, AL (work 4 hours) and drove back to Birmingham.

9/8 - Worked 14 hours in Birmingham office.

9/9 - Worked 14 hours in Birmingham office.

9/10 - Fly to Bloomington, IL

 

9/22/2005

Its been another busy week but I have to take time to tell everyone about Kyle's last football game.  We went to the RCA Dome last Sunday (9/18) in Indy to watch the Jacksonville Jaguars vs. Indianapolis Colts game.  Immediately following the NFL game, Kyle's team played 2 games on the pro field in the dome!  I must say it was very COOL and Kyle looked great out there under the lights.  All the boys are very motivated now.  It was a very long but satisfying day even though the Jags lost :-(...

 

12/31/2005

I failed to make a single update from September through December.  We were all very busy with kid’s activities and work.  Here are a few bullets I can remember from last year.

o       Kyle finished his last season with the McCLean County Cougars (JFL – Travel League).  They finished the season 10 – 2 -1.  Kyle will play for the Bloomington High School Raiders - 9th Grade Football team next season.  Kyle also had a successful track season and wrestling season at BJHS.  Kyle went pretty much undefeated most the season, however he lost two matches in Regionals which knocked him out of Sectionals and the State Championship.

o       Jacob wrestled, played baseball, flag football, and basketball in 2005 and is now a Wolf Scout in Cub Scouts.

o       Jessica was in ballet, gymnastics, and a Daisy – Girl Scout.

o       Kim managed the household affairs and took great care of the kids and myself, as always.  Kim managed to pay off the van and nearly paid off my bike through her financial management skills.

o       I had another successful year at work.  I was promoted back in March, which tops me out in my current role.  I’d have to change jobs to go any higher but money wise there’s not much incentive to leave my current team…  

We’re all doing great and busy all the time now.  However, we’re all healthy, happy, and doing very well.  I’ll try to at least update this site once a month…