I was in my bosses office today (that would be Kem Meyer) for an impromptu meeting when I came to the stunning realization that the planets were in alignment and everything felt right in the universe.

I've come to the sad realization that life is short and opportunities will NOT always be there for you.

It's a Tuesday morning and I'm cranking through 200 emails and checking things off my to do list. But when I came across this I just had to share...

Well...it's crunch time around here.

After a SCUBA vacation, conference in Texas and some free time thrown in it's time to buckle up. The ride is going to get bumpy...

But then again, that's the way we roll around here. Our Senior Pastor explains it as "sprinting" and "resting." You sprint for a while and then you rest. Then you do it all over again.

For the Web Team at Granger (Communications Department) it typically hits in the spring and early summer. And this year is no different. Right now I'm working with teams on 4 high level projects being fine tuned for roll out. I can't exactly say what they are - but let me just say a couple of them will be very cool and will help us take the next step in our evolution. The others are annual projects that just need to get done but will also add value to those experiencing them.

On the side things are also running full speed ahead. Freelance projects are suddenly plentiful (with no advertising mind you). I may have to start turning some down.

I'm working on one commercial site and one non-profit site currently with a few waiting in the wings. I've loved testing out my design skills and learning new shortcuts in the development process.

My current blind spots: eCommerce and branding.

On the home front the family keeps growing (not in number...just in height). We're into the summer routine with soccer, swimming, weekends at the lake, lawn care, and the whole nine yards...

Like I said, it's a "sprint" season and I'm loving every minute of it!

Things have been pretty quiet around here. Some friends and I went to Key Largo, FL for some open water SCUBA diving. Our first time in the ocean and hopefully not our last.

Day one was a wake up call. Mr. Ocean said, "Welcome newbies - feel my power." And most of us did by puking our guts out and feeding the fish.

But by day 2 we learned about motion sickness medicine so we were good. In our four days of diving we saw numerous fish, lobster, moray eels, a stingray, giant grouper, etc. No sharks unfortunately, but we'll save that for another day :)

Welcome Home
After being home for a few days my wife packed up and is in Florida for a girls trip of their own. I hope they have as much fun as we did.

I'm back into the swing of things with two big projects at work and two large freelance sites to fill my time. The kids are all in soccer and doing well.

And we haven't even hit summer yet. Can't wait to see what happens...life is good!

This makes all the sense in the world - just didn't see it coming is all.

Apparently employees at LEGO are handing out small LEGO people as business cards. Now I'm sure it's difficult to get them into the little slots and thin plastic covers made for traditional business cards but I wouldn't turn one down.

What a clever idea. Made me thing about all the things specialty companies could use as business cards.

How about you? Do you work somewhere that might have a more unique calling card?

I have to come up with something. I want to be unique too...

Recently got to spend an entire week in South Carolina. North Myrtle Beach is a great place to hang out with friends and family. We stayed in a condo with a couple other families and spent most of our time either poolside or at the beach.

My wife is spending the week in Cabo with a couple of her friends. I picked this picture since it seemed to come up on every keyword search for Cabo. Must be one of the main attractions there...

So I'm home with the three munchkins for spring break. This means I've 'almost' unplugged for the week...alright...not really. But I've been a lot less accessible. I try to keep up with the Inbox so it isn't a mile high when I get back, but this time it's been hard to even keep up with that. There's just something exhausting about three kids and a big house.

I can hear my wife laughing as I write this. Pretty sure she'd agree seeing how that's one of the main reason's she is in Cabo - to 'get away' from the chaos.

Aside from the basics of feeding, clothing and bathing kids, laundry, cleaning, re-organizing and a small home improvement project, we did the following:

• Two days at Splash Universe in Shipshewana, IN: Small park, no 'real' swimming pool and lifeguards that took their jobs way too seriously...
• Boys Night Out: Last night Jami came over to watch seven kids so the boys could go out. We ate at Outback and then since there was absolutely no movies worth seeing, returned to the house to get killed playing Halo 3 for a few hours (mainly because I play so poorly).

Summary: Fun week with the kids, but I'm very, very tired.

If you still have that quizzical look on your face: sbux (Starbucks) IV (IntraVenous) 99 (the year I was married and yes - Wayne Gretzky)

I'm currently on once and a while for Halo 3 and possibly for Call of Duty 4 in the future.

I'm by no means good, so feel free to teach me a lesson :)

By the way - how funny is this picture? I would typically make something like this from scratch for the blog, but I did a Google image search just for the fun of it and this came up on the first screen...

For those of you who care to know the outcome: I went with the Xbox 360 over the PS3. I read a lot of reviews, talked with friends and then flipped a coin...

It took a while to acquire it since there was a Xbox drought in our area for a good week over Christmas. But after numerous phone calls and a short drive south of town - I finally found one.

Current Games: Forza2/Marvel: Ultimate Alliance (came with the system), Halo3 and Star Wars: The Complete Saga.

Next in line: Call of Duty 4 (for sure), NHL08, Tiger Woods PGA 08 and hopefully a cool RPG someday, like Uncharted: Drake's Fortune (currently only for PS3).

Love so far: The media server functionality is nice. I have the Zune software on my desktop and it acts as the interface for getting pictures, music and video to the Xbox. Streams fast with minimal lag time.

Worries me a bit: Connecting my gamertag to my Windows Live ID has proven a bit stressing. It says my current Live ID is already connected to an Xbox. Had to create a new one - which just isn't the best way to do it. Probably a quick fix - just can't find the answer.

Not much to say other than that. Looking forward to learning to play better and having fun watching my 5 year old daughter show me how to operate the Jedi in the Star Wars game...

I was looking through the hundreds of pictures we took this Christmas - looking for ones that were "blogworthy" - when I came across these two. They aren't funny. They aren't exciting in and of themselves, but they are perfect summaries of what took place.

This picture gives you a good shot of the chaos that ensued Christmas morning. This was after one good cleaning - preparing for Papa and Uncle Ryan to come over for round two. The floor was covered in paper and presents for the majority of the morning. Little kids love lots of presents, and I keep telling myself to enjoy it. After all, when the get older they'll each open two or three presents - each costing an arm or a leg :)

The other thing that "happened to us" this Christmas involved music. It started with Allison wanting a Hannah Montana guitar, and ended with Rachel asking for drums at the last minute. Throw in a tambourine for Tyler and our house has been filled with beautiful music.

Here is Rachel on the drums, Allison on the guitar and Tyler (off camera) with the tambourine...

Gotta love it.

Before I sat down to get some work done this evening I pulled some ice cream out of the freezer for a quick energy boost and quickly realized the product I was indulging in failed to advertise an important product fact: The probability that one will become addicted to the product after trying it for the first time...

I have always loved Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream (typically the chocolate type with mint) but I forgot just how good it really is.

I ate a centimeter off the top and put it away...before losing control and eating the entire thing.

Now I'm ready to work...

Do you use the "Out of Office Reply" feature in Outlook (or other email clients)? My wife always does but I am not totally sold - possibly because I get so many of them in my Inbox and have to heat up my delete key to get rid of them...

I guess my current stance is this:

• If I'm gone for less than a week and will be checking email then no...
• If I'm gone for a family vacation where I won't be checking email then yes...

But that isn't really the point of this post. What I really wanted you to see is this:

Have fun!

We all need to get away and rest. It can be date night with your spouse, a long weekend away or the traditional family vacation. But it needs to happen on a regular basis to keep the engine charged.

For the past two years we have also joined with friends for a group vacation to the Wisconsin Dells. Last year it was the Kalahari Resort and this year it was the Wilderness Resort.

Four days of waterpark fun. The kids (ages 5 months to 7 years) had every size slide/pool to play in/on and the adults were even challenged to do some slides that push the envelope of sanity.

It was a great time to strengthen relationships, watch kids laugh and push themselves and prepare for the next run of ministry.

When we get back to work we'll attend the 2007 Leadership Summit and then get back to the task lists on Monday.

Life is good...

One of my friends posted on M&Ms latest marketing ploy. It's a simple interface that allows you to create your own personal M&M character. Of course you try and make it look like you so that's what I did.

My guy is me for the following reasons:

• He's green (not sure what that says about me...)
• He has robot arms (yes...I have been working out - thanks for noticing)
• He has gray in his black hair (sign of maturity right?)
• He has scrawny legs (it has been a while since I exercised the lower body...)
• He is wearing hiking boots (i would love to be in Colorado right now...)
• He has squinty eyes (yes, it fits...)
• He's holding a coffee mug (enough said...)

I know this isn't real work related, but we'll just label it under Real Life and Fun!

Try it - you'll like it - and it won't melt in your hands...