Big Month of Summer Happenings!

The last month has flown by as we have had a lot going on. We are now a month closer to meeting baby boy Lesnet, Kai is essentially potty trained while he is awake, and football season is upon us.

One of the highlights of every summer is the annual Lesnet / Briner family reunion at Uncle Gary's farm up in Northwest Ohio. Our turnout was a little on the thin side this year, hopefully attendance will be a little stronger in 2011.

Here is Kai with Grandpa and Grandma Lesnet at the family reunion. I think that my folks look pretty good for chasing around a energetic young man around for a few hours.
The weekend after the family reunion, we made a trip up to Devil's Lake in Southern Michigan. I grew up at the lake but hadn't been there since my folks moved down to the farm about 5 years ago. I have been pretty homesick for the area for a while and was thrilled that we had some family renting a house on the lake for a week...I was even more thrilled that they invited us to come up and spend some time with them. There were 15 of us in a 5 bedroom place, very cozy...hope we can do it again next year!

Here is Kai with his cousin AJ playing with their cars.
Here is Kai preparing for his first boat ride. He was pretty brave and even went tubing with daddy. Cousin Jen took some photos of us on the tube, as you can see he didn't really want to go but he warmed up to it and a little bit once we started going a little faster. Of course, once we got done he couldn't stop talking about how much fun he had!
Here is Kai crying and begging not to go. Too late buddy, you said "yes" and so you're committed.
Once we picked up some speed he had a pretty good time!
On August 14th, I hosted the 2nd Annual Old Married Dudes Golf Outing at Pebble Brook Golf Course right here in Noblesville. We had 16 men come out and play 36 holes of golf. I think it went pretty well as everyone had a good time. As the organizer, I tend to focus on the fact that the formats and games didn't work out as I had drawn them up. Either way, a full day of golf, friends, and insanely hot / humid weather is awesome.

Kai helped me prepare for the outing by helping me mark my golf balls. He thought that coloring golf balls was a trip and spent nearly an hour marking most of my dozen balls.
August in Central Indiana is State Fair time! The Indiana State Fair is really awesome as it feels like a ginormous county fair. It is an event that we could have spent several days enjoying but we were limited to about 3 hours so we tried to see the big stuff (like the World's Largest Boar who weighed in at 1,277 pounds this year).

Here is Kai riding Henry the pony. They had elephant rides at the fair as well but he wasn't having any of that!

We haven't taken pictures of Stephanie's growing baby bump. I caught this one kind of inadvertently but here it is.
Another big hit at the fair is the Dairy Barn. Its just an ice cream joint ran by the Indiana Dairy Producers but its one of those places that you have to go to every time you hit the fair. Another good thing about the Dairy Barn is that it is right next to the trendy food item of the year. This year it was the Krispy Kreme Burger, Chocolate Covered Bacon, and Deep Fried Butter. We didn't try any of the signature entrees this year.

2010 has been a great year for my "Bucket List". I'm sure most folks are familiar with the concept of the bucket list which was made popular in the movie by the same name starring Jack Nickelson and Morgan Freeman. Basically they have a list of things that they want to make sure they do before they die and spend the movie crossing items off their list.

Earlier in the year I went to the Super Bowl and now I have broke 80 for 18 holes on a for real golf course. I knew that I was playing well and started to think that it could be a special round about half way through the back 9. As far as items related to golf, I still need to get a hole in one and live long enough to shoot my age.

Here is my scorecard from breaking 80. I shot even par on the back 9. Lots of greens in regulation and lots of tap in pars. "Never again will there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not live out his years; he who dies at a hundred will be thought a mere youth; he who fails to reach a hundred will be considered accursed. - Isaiah 65:20

Summertime and the Livin's Easy

I'm sure that each of you would agree that there are seasons in life where the days go by like a blur and then there are others where the days just drag on and it seems like tomorrow may never get here. Right now is a season where time is going by a little too quickly, see we only have 106 days until Baby Boy Lesnet is scheduled to arrive and so many things that we want to do before he gets here. Many of those things are fun adventures that we would like to do before the pace of life slows a bit with a newborn.

One of my favorite things about spring is that black raspberries are in season. Black Raspberries are the coolest because they are delicious and sometimes you can find them growing in the wild. Fortunately for us, there are a lot of black raspberry bushes that grow along the walking paths of our neighborhood. Kai and I took several walks on the paths to eat raspberries and when Grandpa Eridon came to visit, we took him with us.

That was a pretty good find of black raspberries, dad. I think that there are more though.

Grandpa, I will pause for a moment to take a picture with you because you picked black raspberries for me. Now, get back to picking berries!

Black raspberries are delicious but they are very messy.
This summer has been pretty hot but it has also been very rainy. It has been a nice combo as it has made the neighborhood swimming pool a little cooler than it normally would be with all of the heat. Kai is getting a lot more daring this year regarding the water and loves jumping from the deck of the pool in to daddy's arms.
On the weekend of June 26th, I headed down to Arizona for the annual "Golf Endurathon" to play with some of my friends who live down there. I had a great time down there and while I was away Stephanie and Kai went up to Bowling Green, Ohio to visit her family.

I don't know all that went on up there but I do know that Kai had a great time because he refused to take a nap or go to sleep at night. Although Kai had a blast, Stephanie was worn out so she left a day earlier than she had planned. That was okay with me as I flew back on Saturday night from Arizona and was so glad that I got to spend Sunday hanging out with Stephanie and Kai that I didn't mind not painting the baby's room like I had planned.

Here is Kai with his Grandpa Eridon, I love the way that Kai looks at his grandpa.
July 4th fell on a Sunday this year which meant that many folks were able to enjoy a 3 day weekend. Unfortunately, I had to work on Saturday and Monday in order to close the books at good old Republic Airways so Stephanie held down the fort at home. Since it was a 3 day weekend, Stephanie thought it would be a good time to do "potty training boot-camp" with our 2 1/2 year old boy. Although he did a pretty good job, I'm glad that she chose a weekend where I was gone.

One thing that is funny about Kai and going potty is that he likes to do it outside. Maybe to be like Kiki the beagle?!?! Anyway, here is Kai making stinkies on the front porch. I'm sure glad that I was home to experience this!
On Sunday the 4th of July, we went up to Noblesville to go to the parade. We went along with Master P, Special K, and their folks. Kai loved the tractors and the fire truck. He also hauled in a pretty impressive amount of candy. It was pretty warm but everyone had a great time.

Here is Master P hugging Kai. I know that this looks cute and innocent but really he is just buttering up Kai hoping that he will share his bubbles.
On Monday (July 5th), the law firm that Stephanie uses at work invited us to go to an Indianapolis Indians baseball game. It is no secret that Stephanie and I really enjoy going to baseball games and we were excited to go and see how our young son would behave at such an event. We got to the park a little early to slather sun screen on Kai and get some good ballpark fare (Monday's are dollar food days at Victory Field)...but to our joy, we learned that our tickets were to an air conditioned and catered suite!

Here is Kai "watching" the baseball game...
Here is Kai after he ran down about 10 boxes and through a different suite to the lobby area. It was hot and the A/C felt great (especially after chasing him through the stands and under the railings that separate the boxes).
Here's Kai getting some exercise. Fortunately, the home team was getting whooped so we weren't missing much on the field.
Stephanie got the idea from somewhere that it would be neat to make some cookies with the boys and take some of them to the local fire station. Master P's mom agreed that it was a great idea so on Saturday (7/10) cookies were made and cookies were delivered to Noblesville Station 6 (the station that would come to our house if something would happen...momma didn't raise no fool). The firemen were glad to see the boys and thankful for the cookies. The firemen took the boys to see their new truck and gave them some fire hats and badges. The boys were excited to see the truck up close but were terrified of it once they got inside.

The firemen (both of whom are dads) pulled out all of the stops to try and comfort the boys. They even offered to let them sit in the drivers seat and work the lights. Even that didn't work (although us parents wanted to sit behind the wheel and run the lights...but we were all too big of wimps to do it).

Those aren't tears of joy...

Although I usually try to keep the blog in chronological order, I am going to back track for a day to talk about a round of golf that I played on Friday (July 9). Eugene and I were able to skip out of work a little early on Friday to get in some golf. Eugene invited his friend Scott so I invited our mutual friend Trevor to join us as well. We played 18 holes together and had a good time. Although it was fun, our friends are not golfers so we were not able to keep our focus on the golf. When we were done with 18, Scott and Trevor had to leave but Eugene and I wanted to play a couple of extra holes so that it could be more about the golf and less about social hour. I am so glad we did as both of us put together the best stretch of 9 holes that either of us had ever played. I have scanned the scorecard for all of you to see.All the birds of the air nested in its boughs, all the beasts of the field gave birth under its branches; all the great nations lived in its shade. - Ezekiel 31:6

It's a ?????????????????????????

We went to Stephanie's 2nd trimester ultrasound yesterday (Friday June 18) to find out the gender of Baby Lesnet. Of course the 2nd trimester ultrasound is also about making sure that the baby is progressing as they should and to check for any potential issues.

When we had Kai's ultrasound, we were able to learn if he was a boy or girl very early in the ultrasound. Baby Lesnet was much more bashful. This one definitely had a different feel to it as were hoping everything was okay and that he or she would warm up to us and flash us the money shot before we were done.

So, first the update on the health of Baby Lesnet. Baby Lesnet is able-bodied, active, all right, athletic, blooming, bright-eyed, bushy-tailed, chipper, firm, fit, flourishing, fresh, full of life, hale, hardy, healthful, hearty, husky, in fine feather, in fine fettle, in good shape, in the pink, lively, lusty, muscular, normal, physically fit, potent, robust, rosy-cheeked, safe and sound, sound, stout, strong, sturdy, tough, trim, unimpaired, vigorous, virile, well, and whole. Here are some photos...enjoy!!

Here is Baby Lesnet looking at you while you look at Baby Lesent


Just in case you couldn't tell that that was a face and belly, the ultrasound tech labeled them.
Here is bashful Baby Lesnet's legs and knees. Still hiding the identity!
So after all of the measurements were complete the tech mixed up Stephanie's belly a couple of times and finally got the shot that we were waiting for...

Without further delay, Baby Lesnet is a BOY!!Baby Boy Lesnet is also mooning you in this shot. Not sure if you noticed, but either way, you've been mooned!!

the Angel who has delivered me from all harm —may he bless these boys. May they be called by my name and the names of my fathers Abraham and Isaac, and may they increase greatly upon the earth." - Genesis 48:16

Is Blogging "Lame"?

As life gets busier and busier and free time becomes shorter and shorter, the way that I spend what time I have is analyzed more and more. As you who follow this blog have undoubtedly noticed, it clearly is not as as much of a priority to get online and make posts as it was in the recent past.

On an episode of CBS's "How I Met Your Mother", which is one of Stephanie and my favorite TV shows, they made a lot of jokes about a lame blog. With the blur of busyness that most days are right now, I may have missed out that blogging is now considered "lame" and I never would have known it if I didn't faithfully follow at least 1 TV show.

Alas, I have come to the conclusion that; yes, blogging IS lame but I'm going to continue to try and make it a priority to get on and archive our lives out here in blogosphere for now. I have also come to the conclusion that I am lame also. Fortunately, my wife and son (and baby on the way) are most definitely NOT lame. And I have also dubbed our beagle, Kiki as VERY LAME.

Last weekend we went to the Indy zoo for the first time since they opened the new Cheetah exhibit. Kai loves going to the zoo and I love to go too (that's probably lame).

Here is Kai and I checking out some animals.

Here's Kai looking at some silly looking birds near the Cheetah exhibit.
We made it through the zoo without incident but Kai bit it on the sidewalk after lunch and bumped his head pretty good.
Kid is tough, you can hardly notice the goose egg next to that awesome smile!
This past weekend was action packed as we took Kai to gymnastics, the farmer's market, and the neighborhood pool on Saturday. Today (Sunday) was church, lunch at Chipotle, 3 hour nap, then hang time with Master P and Special K complete with burgers on the grill.

A baby Lesnet update:

Stephanie will be 21 weeks tomorrow and the 2nd trimester ultrasound will be on Friday. At that time, we will hopefully find out how to decorate the baby's room. Kai is no longer saying that he would like a "baby cow" but is now on board with a baby brother. Each night when we say our prayers Kai suggests that we pray for baby brother along with his friends, grandpa, grandma, Master P, God, and Jesus. Stephanie went on record saying that she thinks that this one is a girl and I think its another boy. For those of you keeping score, the official Indiana Lesnet baby gender vote as of June 13: boy = 2 (Kai and dad) and girl = 1 (Steph).

I've had a lot of people tell me that they hope that I have a girl. I will be absolutely thrilled to be the father of a girl but I really have no idea why so many people feel as strongly as they do about baby Lesnet's gender. I am not a very macho man, I work a desk job, drive a Toyota Corolla and spent this past weekend doing laundry, washing dishes, and making about 200 pancakes for the freezer. I guess even with all of that I must simply ooze machismo. Maybe I'm not lame...

Yeah, I'm lame.

No man who has any defect may come near: no man who is blind or lame, disfigured or deformed; - Leviticus 21:18

May Today, June Tomorrow!

Today is the last of May and we are nearing the midway point for the arrival of the newest Lesnet. Today Stephanie is 19 weeks pregnant but you would never know it as she is still looking good! We ask Kai from time to time if he would like to have a baby brother or a baby sister and he replies that he wants a baby cow. In the short term we think he'll be a little bummed but over time I'm sure he will warm up to the little human baby.

May has been an action packed month as evidenced by my lack of blogging. During the month, Stephanie and I went down to Lexington Kentucky and left Kai at home with Aunt Jessica then Grandpa and Grandma Lesnet. Kai had a great time while mommy and daddy were gone!

Stephanie went to Dallas for a week to learn some stuff at training and to go to a conference and left us boys to fend for ourselves. We did great without her, but are glad to have her back!

The remainder of this blog post will be mostly pictures and commentary:


Sometimes it is just hard to be 2.

Kai is such a great helper. He loves to help mommy and daddy cook and clean up. As you can tell, he also likes hitting the weights; look at those guns!

Mommy and Kai washing dishes.

Here is Kai teeing off. He's already got a better swing than his old man.

Kai was trying to take his shirt off but hasn't quite figured out how to do so yet. I asked him to put his hands in the air so the he would look like The Great Cornholio. Cracks me up!!

While mommy was in Texas, Kai and I were ambitious and had 5 yards of mulch delivered and picked up a flat of flowers. Kai was a big help!

On Memorial Day weekend Grandpa and Grandma Eridon came down to visit. Here is grandpa and Kai playing some No Limit Texas Hold-Em. Kai bet his dozer and grandpa bet all of the cash in his wallet. I'm not sure who won this hand but I do know that Kai still has his dozer and Kai's piggy bank is a lot heavier.

On Monday, Kai's buddy Master P came over to paint some pictures.

Kai paints with his left hand and Master P paints with his right. Kai still hasn't figured out which hand he prefers but P does everything with the right.

One of the best ways to unwind after some strenuous painting is to blow some bubbles.

I am so proud of my family and I am so humbled to have such an amazing wife and son. Every day Kai learns something new and every day is one day closer to meeting our new little one. Most of the time I feel like I'm living a dream and I keep hoping the the alarm clock doesn't go off and make it all come to an end. Thank you God for these blessings.

The fear of the LORD is pure, enduring forever. The ordinances of the LORD are sure and altogether righteous. They are more precious than gold, than much pure gold; they are sweeter than honey, than honey from the comb. By them is your servant warned; in keeping them there is great reward. - Psalm 19:9-11

The Uber Conference?

Disclaimer: The views expressed on this particular posting may not be shared by the entire Indiana Lesnet family.
I am up late suffering from allergy induced insomnia. Before bed tonight I spent a little time researching the potential expansion of the Big Ten Conference and read a pretty interesting article written by a student at the University of Texas regarding the addition of Texas to the Big Ten. You can read the article yourself here.

Anyway, since I am a proud member of the Purdue Varsity P Club and a Purdue football season ticket holder I feel that I can let the blogosphere know my thoughts on the expansion of the Big Ten conference. Mr. Jim Delany, if you read this and it helps to sway your thought process, you do not need to give me any credit.

I think that the most important thing is to make sure that any school that is added is an "it" school like the current schools in the Big Ten. All of the current schools in the conference are kind of like that guy in school who is the all-state athlete who carries that perfect 4.0 while dating the prom queen. By that I mean, the current members of the Big Ten are all ranked in the top 75 academic schools in the country and of course they all have big time athletic programs.

Here is my list of "it" schools that are currently NOT in the Big Ten (in no particular order):
1. Stanford
2. Notre Dame
3. Duke
4. Vanderbilt
5. Cal-Berkeley
6. UCLA
7. Virginia
8. USC
9. North Carolina
10. Wake Forest
11. Boston College
12. Georgia Tech
13. University of Washington
14. Florida
15. Miami (FL)
16. Maryland
17. Pittsburgh
18. Syracuse
19. Georgia
20. Clemson
21. Texas A&M
22. University of Texas
23. Rutgers
24. UCONN
25. Brigham Young

In order to be included on my list, the University had to have a respectable athletic program and be rated in the top 75 on US News & World Reports list of National Universities. There are some others in the 76 - 105 range that could be good candidates if the Big Ten cannot fill their expansion efforts with the 25 schools listed above (Va Tech, Colorado, Baylor, Auburn, Iowa State, Alabama, Kansas, Nebraska, Florida State, Mizzou, and Arizona).

Although any of the above 25 schools would be decent fits in the new Uber Conference, I believe that some schools should stay put. I think that the SEC and the ACC should stay as they are and the PAC 10 should grow and add a couple of schools from the WAC. With that said, any school currently in those 3 conferences should stay put.

I think that the Big East and the Big Twelve schools would be open to moving to the Uber Conference. The reason that I feel that the Big East is open is because it is quite frankly a conference without an identity as not all of the schools compete in football. The Big Twelve is a relatively new conference that tried to blend the Big Eight with the Southwestern Conference to create a decent regional athletic conference. The main problem with the Big Twelve in my opinion is that the academic prestige just isn't there as only 2 schools in the conference rank in the top 75 national colleges (with another 6 that rank below the lowest rated Big Ten school but still rank in the top 105, leaving 4 schools in the "Tier 3" or "unranked" category). I feel that the opportunity to align with other prestigious universities would be a better situation for the following schools:
1. PITT
2. Syracuse
3. Texas
4. Texas A&M
5. UCONN
6. BYU
7. Rutgers
8. Notre DameClearly the school that makes the most sense and has been invited before is Notre Dame. I believe that Notre Dame is a great fit for the conference and would easily keep its identity as a national program if they joined the right conference. Do I think that they'll jump? Well, I think if the schools from the Big Twelve in my list would defect, then Notre Dame would be forced to join.

Which brings me to the other 2 schools that would complete the new 14 team Uber Conference:

Clearly Texas is the crown jewel of the Big Twelve and getting them alone would make an extremely strong 12 school conference. Bringing along the Aggies of Texas A&M would make the move more politically palatable and would make at least one of Texas's biggest rivaly games a conference match up.

Here is my Uber Conference
East Division:
Indiana University
Michigan
Michigan State
Notre Dame
Ohio State
Penn State
Purdue

West Division:
Illinois
Iowa
Minnesota
Northwestern
Texas
Texas A&M
Wisconsin

These divisions would keep most of the protected rivalries and may make it possible to have protected rivalries in basketball. This is definitely an amazing affiliation of fantastic universities. The only negative that I see here is the Indiana's football team may never win another conference football game again.

And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God. Philippians 1:9-11

Big News - New Lesnet Coming "Soon"!

The Indiana Lesnets are due to grow by one on or around October 25th! Stephanie is in her 14th week of pregnancy and everything seems to be going well. This pregnancy is eerily similar to Stephanie's time with Kai as she has had the same severe nausea and fatigue. The big difference this time is that we have the Energizer Bunny of 2 year olds running around so it is difficult to find time to rest (or make it to the bath room for throwing up).We have also fenced in the back yard. Kiki is trying to figure out how to escape from it and Kai enjoys throwing stuff over the top and making daddy go and get it.


I took Kai up to Purdue for the Dave Rankin Track Invitational. There is a reunion each year at the meet so Kai and I headed up there while mommy went to work. Kai loved running on the track and although I don't want to admit it, I really enjoyed chasing him.

While we were at Purdue we went over to Ross-Ade Stadium to check out some of the football team's spring game festivities. They had a giant Drew Brees bobblehead doll. Pretty neat!

Mommy works a lot in April and so Kai was forced to live with a lot of daddy duty. This evening Kai really wanted his mommy. Such a sad little boy!Who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has strife? Who has complaints? Who has needless bruises? Who has bloodshot eyes? - Proverbs 23:29