4-28-12

Jacquelynn Rose jacqroses@q.com	11:18 AM (10 hours ago)
to me

Sharon stopped for a quick visit and it was great seeing her. She has to walk with a walking stick for balance. It is concerning that she has a 5 hour drive ahead of her from  Des Moines, but she manages the drive okay. I made a care package for her, grapes/cheese, water, and Dad bought Dutch Letters from Pella, so I sent 3 home with her.

I wanted to share a couple of shortcut ideas for cooking and you may already be doing this as well. But here it goes

I micro wave 3 baking potatoes for potato salad instead of boiling a pan of potatoes. 3 works us + 3 to 4 eggs, celery, sweet pickles and we still have a little left over.   Eric and Shelley uses pickle relish instead  and that makes it a faster process too. 

 If you make the 3 bean salad, you can now buy green and yellow beans together in a can. Add kidney beans, onion and the dressing and that is a quick  healthy salad.  

**** Grandma sent a box of recipes home with me to give to you.  I sorted through them and kept about 10. We must remember to thank her for them. 

It was enjoyable sorting through the recipes because the ones she kept were Grandma through and through. 

The majority were pie recipes, some salads.  The baking and canning kept her going for so long. 

OH, I use hosta leaves in flower arrangements. Do you have hostas?  

Dad bought me some get well flowers last week and they still gook great. The leaves were dying so I added the hostas leaves and  the arrangement looks very nice.  Sweet Dad!  He has really been a sweetheart. 

Okay enough babbling. I know that you are a busy lady so thanks for calling this morning. 

4-27-12

From April 24

Andrea & Eric,

   Here is a copy of the newspaper article about a bank robbery yesterday. When I looked out my kitchen window yesterday morning at about 10:30 I saw a police car in my backyard between my house and my neighbor’s to the east. As you know that is clearly not an area meant for driving so I wondered what was going on. I went outside and the car was still running but there was no one in it and I noticed a motor bike on the ground under the front wheels of the car. The car hit my pear tree and took that out so I looked down in the circle and saw about a half dozen police cars. The robbery suspect was on the front porch of one of my neighbors in the circle and the police finally took him down somewhere near the park on Teg Drive. The police car chased him down through neighbors’ yards across the street from me cutting between houses then across Hafor Drive and across my east neighbor’s front lawn then down into my backyard. I assume his motor bike hit a protruding root beside my house which caused it to flip because the police car then hit him after it hit my pear tree.

   So what’s new with you?

John

 

Man accused of robbing bank in I.C.

 

 

By Gregg Hennigan

 

The Gazette

 

IOWA CITY - A suspect in the armed robbery of an Iowa City bank Monday led officers on an hourlong chase by motorcycle and foot before being apprehended.

 

Eric Martin, 34, of 1656 W. 42nd St. in Davenport, faces charges of first-degree robbery, possession of a firearm as a felon, interference with official acts with a weapon, carrying weapons and eluding.

 

Law enforcement was called at 9:32 a.m. for a report of an armed robbery at Hills Bank and Trust Co., 1401 S. Gilbert St.

 

Police said a man wearing dark clothing entered the bank armed with a handgun and demanded cash from the tellers.

 

After an undisclosed amount of money was put in a backpack, he left on an off-road motorcycle.

 

Nearby Johnson County sheriff's deputies pursued the motorcycle into Benton Hill Park. Officers from several other agencies set up a perimeter, and a team entered the area and found Martin in a wooded area behind the 1100 block of Weeber Circle, which is northwest of the Lodge apartment complex off Highway 1.

 

Martin again fled on his motorcycle, then fled on foot when the motorcycle collided with a marked squad car, police said. He was apprehended a short time later in the 1900 block of Woodberry Court, near Willow Creek Park, after a brief struggle, police said.

 

Martin was treated and released from University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics for minor injuries. A news release said he was being held in the Johnson County Jail on a $38,000 bond, but the jail said he had not been booked as of 5:10 p.m.

 

Two Iowa City police officers suffered minor injuries while arresting Martin. No bank employees or other civilians were injured, police said.

 

The Iowa City Police Department and the FBI are continuing to investigate the robbery, 'including determination of Martin's involvement in three previous Iowa City bank robberies,' according to the news release. A police official did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.

 

The U.S. Bank at 2312 Mormon Trek Blvd.

 

was robbed in February and November, and the MidWestOne Bank at 2233 Rochester Ave. was robbed in December. All three of those incidents occurred after 5 p.m. on Fridays.

 

Monday's robbery led to lockdowns at eight Iowa City school district schools for about one hour, and parents were notified with a recorded phone call. The University of Iowa also sent out an alert on its system.

4-24-12

Potty Training: Day Who Knows

I picked up Zach from Kidz Kabana today around 11:15 after I got done at the gym.  Zach was in the bathroom washing his hands. Miss Stephanie said he did great with potty training today. She also shared that Zach has actually been sitting on the toilet to potty for some time . . . as it sounded good to him. That rascal. Tonight he would not potty before his bath, but he didn't hesitate to take a leak in the tub.  He is such an operator.  I wouldn't be surprised if he is running a gambling wring from his Little Tikes car bed.

Speaking of Little Tikes,  Zach and I drove to Belton today to buy a Little Tikes climber with slide. It was a fabulous deal!  It is in really good condition for half the price of some of the other ones for sale on Craig's List. On the way, I say, "Look Zach. We are in a town named Grandview."  He said, "Yuck."  and a few other choice words like icky and poopie, but I was laughing so he got away with it.  Then we drove past a trailer park and he said, "Look! Broken stuff!"  The neighborhood with the playset was nice. The gal, probably my age, operated a childcare from her house. Their cars had KU stuff on them, so I figured they were ok. They had 2 Labradoodles (my dream dog)! It was fun.

Mike got home from work before Zach awoke from his nap. So we set it up near his tree house for a surprise. I told him the Easter Bunny did it. He had a good time climbing and sliding on it. I want to find something to put on the ground under it to make it a little softer, like wood chips.

My manager is going to cross-train me to work in the ICU at St. Mary's. It will be great to be able to try it out.  I am excited to learn about the gizmos. Then I got a certificate for cookies for being the first person to notice that one lady that had a stroke, even though she'd been there a week and had the stroke years before. It is neat that they are so happy that we called the stroke team.  Also, this goes against my personal trainer's advice, but St. Mary's has the BEST chicken-fried steak with mashed potatoes and gravy.

4-22-12

Potty Training: Day one

Pottied like Daddy x 2. Pottied in pants x 3.  Wet pants are not a problem for Zach. Who needs dry pants when you are having fun? Mommie got pull-ups, which we are trying to pretend are underwear, but Zach is not fooled.  Diapers still at night. 

4-21-12

Zach knocked on his bedroom door and yelled “Come In!”  Then, “Daddy! Daaaday!” the other morning when he woke up. 

He walked along side of the cart for my entire Wal-Mart trip and was able to help pick things out.

He has been saying, “Oh my gosh!” in a surprised tone and holding his hands up to the sides of his mouth. 

Despite playing with Easter eggs all year long, he was very surprised when the Easter bunny delivered eggs to the ranch. The older boys were kind of acing him out and he got upset, but Dale, Warren and Steve told them to follow behind Zach. The boys did a really good job with that. 

Zach liked the ranch, but not for the livestock or the gun shooting. He liked the swing set and Little Tikes slides, exploring around the pond with Daddy and climbing the “mountains,” which were steep dirt hillsides. I have been looking for some used playground pieces ever since.  There is a lot of expensive new crap and a lot of expensive old crap.  I’m going to find some slightly less expensive, not-crap, used stuff. 

I have a bumper crop of Yukon Gold potatoes growing, and all I did was put the pieces in the ground and water once or twice. The onions and lettuce are ok too.  It is strange when you think about all the bacteria and manure in a garden, how we don’t worry that any of it seeps into the vegetable (well, I guess I do now).  Mike said he’d help me weed the damn thing today.

Don sent us another email to say that he didn’t know how much notice he could give us about when they would cut us off from the driveway.  We have decided to just not reply. We’ve been over this stuff a million times with him.  He is the only one worrying about the 1-inch difference in the property line and the imaginary lawsuits in his head.  Our neighbor George Dunning said, “I bet he got beat up a lot when he was a kid.”  Rumor also has it that Don brought some of their eggs to George and George told him to, ”Get out of here. I don’t want you coming around here.” George is known for embellishment, and he told me a slightly nicer version, but I like the first one.

We have 2 blue jay pairs and 2 cardinal pairs that fight over the bird food. A blue bird family moved into the blue bird house, but the other day I found Speedy had climbed up to look in the hole. Hopefully she didn’t hurt one.

I guess I like St. Mary’s. I am getting better at knowing the patient population and physicians. I can’t imagine the drive to KUMed now that I am not doing it.  It was really neat to be around all the smart people doing cutting edge research at KU, but that was sort of remote anyway.  

Mike is getting over his sinus infection. He had trained up to running 3-4 miles every other day, prior to getting sick.  He is anxious to get back to it.  He has $44,000 in orders to process at the office this weekend.  All of his compost is gone, so he is using fertilizer to help process the existing leaf pile.  We are sort of lost without it.

Tonight is parents’ night out at Kidz Kabana. Zach’s friend Hudson is going. So we are going to do something. We decided not to plan what though, because these nights are sort like New Years eve, in that you feel forced to feel like you are having a good time for the time you have.  Hopefully spontaneity will be fun. 

4-18-12

The view from my lunch table at St. Mary's.

4-15-12

Eric's Facebook post today:  RIP Seaweed, Stanley, Boulder, Sparkles, Bubbles the gold fish. It seems like just two weeks ago you came to join us and now you are gone.... Sushi anyone?


March 3 he wrote:  Retained the services of a fishing guide this AM. He dumped his coffee on me, gave me a defective beach chair and didn't find any fish for us. He is lucky he is family or i would mention his name on here........Dickie Durant.

4-14-12

I guess the reason I couldn't locate my camera, and Easter pictures, is because I left it at the ranch. Warren and Cole rescued it. Steve posted this one of me on Facebook with the caption, "While the rest of us were fishing, Andrea unwittingly became a Jeep commercial."  He's a pretty good brother-in-law.

4-13-12

Grass for Grandpa.

4-13-12

A smile for Grandma.

4-1-12

Last night we went for ice cream. Zach got a choc-o-late cone.  On the way home, he said look I'm a lion. He had chocolate ice cream all around his mouth and face, like a lion mane.  He did that a bunch of times, and through in a look I'm a ghost, oooOOOOoooo. Mike said it is because ghosts have those big circular mouths.

Last night, I taught Zach how to find frogs in the pond and make them jump in.  It was fun, but now I sort of think I opened the door to pond fun. It would be nice if it wasn't green.

I have mowed now for the second time. I'm not mowing the neighbors portion of the yard anymore, and it does go a bit faster. I am actually excited to get our new drive. Shane has a really nice slightly curvy plan for it. We'll disconnect from that guy next door, who is a loose canon. And, I will be able to buy a cute new mailbox. Someday I wouldn't mind dividing the pond. It would be fun to have a little land bridge and maybe making it slightly smaller would make it easier to maintain. Mike says the problems are all on their side, and I believe it with all the cattails and weird septic work.

Speaking of the neighbors, they have hired a woman to to their spring yard work. She shows up in an old minivan and works her tail off all day. Yesterday she was shoveling gravel into a wheelbarrow and unloading it somewhere all day.  That is hard work.  Probably got a deal on some lady from their church.

Mike found a great shelter at Jacomo that has a nice playground and overlooks the lake. We wen there this morning. After 30 minutes, it felt like we were getting a little over-exposed even with sunblock. So we ran to Ace Hardware. Mike got some fertilizer to put in the compost heap. We came home and turned on the air. Record highs forecasted today in the upper 80's.