Mr. Polehn writes

As I mentioned a little bit ago , my wife and I are expecting another baby in December.  Yesterday my wife had an ultrasound, the one where you can find out the sex of the baby, and there it was.  The first this thing we see is the interspecies sign of malehood.  There is a very tiny man rolling around inside if my wife. He was pretty photogenic and they didn't find anything concerning in the ultrasound.  We are definitely a bit surprised, I mean after two girls in a row you start to see a pattern I guess. We're excited to have a boy.  It'll be interesting to see how different he will be from his sisters.  When we would ask Lucy if she wanted a brother or a sister she has been telling us she wants a brother and has been insisting that there is a brother in mommy's tummy.  I guess we should have been listening to her this whole time. We have no idea on a name yet.  Amanda just won't agree to Hezekiah, I have no idea why. ;) 

t's been about six months since I've posted anything here or G+ or any other social network for that matter.  So what I have been up to for the part six months?  Well I'll tell you. Vegas   Vegas, I've never had much of a desire to go here no matter how much its been romanticized in our culture.  Its the place to be if you want to make a lot of bad decisions but it is also the place to be if you want to see Celine Dion in concert, which I do obviously. We saw a lot of slot machines, ads for prostitutes and re-creations of cool statues and buildings.  Only the later of which I really liked but hey you can't see any of those things just any old place.  We also ate some pretty great food including some at restaurants of celebrity chefs like Gordon Ramsay and Wolfgang Puck and I am a sucker for celebrity chefs. Celine was awesome.  I mean, it was worth it to fly all the way down there just to see the greatest diva of all time belt out love s...

  I don't normally do new years resolutions.  I typically keep a long list goals in my head; I'm sure some of them fall out every once in a while.  But I figure it is not bad to write  some of these goals down and put a 12 month deadline on them.  Writing down, publicly stating and setting deadlines for goals is like some kind of weird magic sauce that makes you actually want to get shit done. Pay mortgage down to $110k   Having a 30 year mortgage with a 0% down payment we essentially started out behind and only making slightly more than the minimum monthly payment has not given us much progress.  Even with adding on to our house we are still under water. As it sits now the mortgage is at about $129,700.  I'd like to get that number down to $110,000 by the end of the year.  That will set us up nicely to be able to refinance and start saving for another house.  According to my lender if we keep making the normal payment I will b...

We'll it's done, Ol' Bettsy is no longer parked on the street in front of my house.  I'm sure the neighbours are glad to have one less eye sore to wag their heads at as they drive by. I tried a few different methods to sell my car .  First I tried the social networks.  Selling your crap on Facebook seems very popular these days, plus I liked the idea of selling my car to somebody I actually know.  However, between Google+ and Facebook I had only three inquiries and only one of those I would consider "serious" Finally after giving up on the social route I posted my car on Craigslist.  Good ol' Craigslist brought me 15 email's almost immediately from people wanting to see my car or buy it out right (my favourite was "$400 today no questions!").  I did eventually end up selling it to somebody that found me through Craigslist, a nice couple from Boring who definitely needed the old reliable beast of a car more than I did. All and all this ...

  While replacing the tire on my front wheel last week my quick release just completely fell apart.  Being a bicycle maintenance noob I said to myself "No!  Now I need to go buy a whole new wheel!" (and quick because this is my  commuter bike ) I quickly hopped in the car and drove down town to the local bike shop downtown, which was closed.  Apparently the owner is "biking and eating in Italy." I have only ever known of this one bike shop in The Dalles.  In desperation I did a search for bike shops near The Dalles and low and behold a location popped up just blocks from my house.   T & Nae's Cycles is a little appointment only bike shop a couple operates out of their house.  I didn't know it was appointment only at the time so I just hoofed it up there to see if they could help me fix my bike.  Luckily somebody was home and willing to help me out.  Once I explained to him my problem he  got me the part I needed (for free! ...

As I mentioned earlier I've been thinking about selling my car.  Well, after talking it over, my wife and I decided we should just take the plunge into single-car-family-dom.   ( warning following statements may be in jest) This beautiful 1994 Toyota Camry features: Low miles Beautiful interior  and a sleek body. I'll be asking $550 as that is well below the kbb value for this type of vehicle in "fair" condition but there is some work needing to be done. And did I mention I'll throw in this car jack and copy of  The Hunger Games  FOR FREE!!!!!!!??? Update:  CAR SOLD!!!

Its a little late but here are a collection of photos from when  +Amanda Polehn , our girls and I went to Wallowa Lake for a few days.  All and all it was one of my favourite vacations we have had as a family. This deer was a little infatuate with Amanda followed us around until a dog finally chased it away. Giant chair for the "Resort" we stayed at. We did eventually get out on the lake in a boat.  Lucy conquered her fears and claims it was her favourite part :) This is apparently what you do when you get a hole in one. It's kind of funny to me how you can live in a state for your whole life and still find great new places to go.  I didn't even realize that there were mountains this big this far east in Oregon. I'd definitely like to do this again.  Spending time on the lake and just hanging out in our cabin was nice and relaxing.  Not only that but the town of Joseph was a pretty neat little pla...