Author: jfwerth

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Parenting

Jacobs’s New Tricks

Happy Boy

The second half of June has been an exciting time for young Jacob.  While his parents were gone to the east coast, he was able to hang out with his grandparents and aunts.  During that time he started being able to roll and has continued to work on it to this day.  He can now turn from his back to his stomach and continue to his back – turning to his left.  In the past two days, he has begun to roll to his right but hasn’t quite figured it out yet.

In addition to the rolling, Jacob (with the help of his mom) has discovered his toes.  Namely, that they are an additional object on which to slobber.  He is quite the flexible little guy:

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Activities

Vacation Photos!

Along with a couple shots of Jacob, here is the highlight reel from our vacation:

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Activities

Vacation Pictures

Here are some great panoramas from our trip.  More to come…

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Activities

Vacation: Day 3

Friday was the day for our tour of the West Point United States Military Academy. Our tour was scheduled for 11 so we took off at 10 for the 25 minute drive. After ending up on a detour route, the detour forgot to tell us where to go. We found our way back to our initial road and were cruising down a small scenic road only to hit a roadblock where a rock slide had occurred. At this point, it was 10:42 and we were still a ways off without knowing how to get there. (Keep in mind, our GPS isn’t being used due to the cigarette lighters not working.) After a quick call to the tour agency, we had our directions and were heavily speeding up, over, and down a mountain. We got there just in time and were off to the tour.

After going through Thayer gate we drove around the campus stopping at the parade fields, trophy point, cemetery, and the cadet chapel. The main campus was on a high bluff, filled with Gothic military buildings, and occupied 3,000 acres. Behind the campus was an additional 10,000 acres of mountainous terrain used for training. It was a very enjoyable tour and we found a small pizzeria for a late lunch. We hopped back in the car, and after some amazing roads through the mountains, the Hudson river, and Connecticut forest, we arrived in New Haven. We met Chris and Karen for a Thai dinner and some drinks. Tomorrow we are off to Gouveia Vineyard north of New Haven.

p.s. We are taking some amazing pictures, but forgot to bring the card reader. We will post the pictures after we return.

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Activities

Vacation: Day 2

After having a good nights rest in Hamburg, PA Elise and I drove north toward Pottsville to tour Yuengling brewery. On the way we took a couple scenic off-shoots – one up a gravel road on a mountain and another on a winding tar road next to water dams. Arriving in Pottsville, we found a nice bluff city with crazy roads (skinny, one-ways, and ridiculous hills). We saw a cool castle-looking building and upon almost entering discovered it was a prison. We were kind of confused since it had a historic landmark placard describing the hanging of the mollies. But after realizing it was a prison, we took off and went to the brewery.

Yuengling Brewery is in its 182nd year and has been family owned the entire time. Under the current ownership of Dick Yuengling, it has grown substantially and someday will be owned and operated by his four daughters. The tour was great as we saw the various stages from the kettles to the bottling/canning and the old storage caves carved into the mountain. The beer was good and we both really enjoyed the Yuengling Porter. After another beautiful drive, we stopped for dinner at Barley Creek Brewery and Grill. From there we drove on to our hotel in Newburgh, NY.

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Vacation: Day 1

Elise and I decided to take a trip to the east coast to visit a friend and see the countryside. After leaving Jacob in the welcoming arms of his grandparents, we departed MSP and flew to Newark, seeing Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty during the landing. Arriving without a hitch, we rented a car and drove west to Pennsylvania. We stopped in White House Station, NJ for a fantastic dinner at Reddington’s Diner where a number of folks were speaking Italian. From there we traveled on to Nazareth, PA for an impromptu trip to the Martin Guitar factory. There were no more tours for the day, but we took a peek at the shop, toured the museum, and tested out a few guitars. We were able to see the history of the guitars as well as the guitars of Johnny Cash, Paul Simon, and others. We drove onward and stopped for the night in Hamburg to prepare for our brewery tour tomorrow. Best wishes from PA!

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Activities

New Website!

Hi All,
Please check out the new and improved JonathanWerth.com.  During the past week, I’ve spent some time reinventing the look and feel of the site to better accommodate my future plans for the site.  Take a look around and let me know your thoughts, suggestions, or improvements (really!). Thanks!
-Jon

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Activities

Photo Booth

Saturday evening, Elise and I attended Andy & Rachel Perez’s wedding in Cedar Rapids.  The reception was held at Elm Crest in Cedar Rapids, home of famous golfer Zach Johnson. We particularly enjoyed the Tapas dinner, getting a variety of delicious foods such as lobster claws, prawn, and pork medallions wrapped in bacon. For their guest book, guests took pictures in the traveling photo booth (complete with fun costume items, if wanted) and pasted the photos into a guest book. It was definitely a fun-filled evening!

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Parenting

Solid Food

On Thursday, Elise and Jacob took a trip to the doctor’s office for Jacob’s four-month checkup.  He is doing very well, in the 40’s percentile for height and weight, and 94th percentile for his head size.  He now weighs 16.5 lbs, and received 3 immunizations. You can see the band-aids above.

This evening Jacob tried solid food for the first time.  The evening was rather uneventful since Jacob did quite well.  It was a little messy, but overall the rice cereal went down nicely.  Check out the images below for photos of the event.

 

 

 

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Activities

Going for a bike ride

Last Friday, Elise and I picked up a Burley Solo bike trailer that we found on Craigslist.  Today (Sunday), we were able to take the trailer out for an extended spin.  We biked around Kalona and checked out the town.  Here are some pics from the adventure:

In the photos, you can see our newly acquired bikes also found on Craigslist.  We both sold our mountain bikes in favor of Trek hybrid bikes.  Both of us highly enjoy the hybrids, as they are quite comfortable, light, and work smoothly.