Scott's Blog

Hello all, this is Scott, Jenny has asked me to try my hand at writing captions for this weekends photos.

What a magical Saturday!

Our day began with a trip to Beaver Park Petting Zoo. Rachel's life long dreams and ambitions were fulfilled when she was given an opportunity to sit on a cement pig.



Rachel was eventually asked to leave the zoo after several of the chickens issued formal complaints against her for harassment.



Later in the day we made our way to Cherry Hill park where the girls were given a chance to blow off some steam!!!

Here is an action shot of Annabelle gazing longingly at a pair of random parents across the park, wishing they would adopt her.



At the park there were several uncovered power lines running along the ground. Flood damage has caused several safety cut backs in the city. Rachel's experience at the park was "electrifying" to say the least.



"Daddy, please make me puke."



After the park, we drove to Marion to Squaw Creek campgrounds, where Grandpa and Grandma Strang where camping this weekend. Unfortunately Jenny accidentally ran these deer over while trying to take a picture and drive at the same time.

Rachel is scheduled to start group therapy to deal with this traumatic event next Tuesday.

I've been trying to load videos of the girls but it takes forever just to load a 2 min clip. The first video is from Father's Day. Rachel is reading the card she made for Scott. Keep in mind this was just a few days after the flood.



This video is of Annie playing with Ruby. Her face lights up whenever she sees Ruby. It's obvious Ruby doesn't enjoy Annie very much but she'll let her do this for a few minutes.

Rachel PASSED her first swimming class last Friday. She did a great job listening to her teacher and paying attention during class. She put her entire head under water several times during the last week and she's certainly more comfortable in the water now. She started the next level yesterday and once she finishes that session that will be it for this summer.

The rest of the weekend was spent mostly at home. We had our little buddy Maclain's 1st Birthday on Sat night and the girls enjoyed swimming for a few hours. Sunday we bummed around and Scott took Rachel to playground at her new school. Rachel is so excited start kindergarten and I plan on taking her to do a little "school shopping" this weekend. I never thought the day would come when I would be taking MY kids to buy school supplies!!!!

Annie continues to work on her walking skills. I've caught her walking across the entire living room a couple times. I've tried getting her on video but it seems she does better when your not paying attention to her. I guess all that added pressure gets to her. She has her two top teeth coming in so sleeping has been interrupted the last few nights. Hopefully these teeth will come in quickly so we can all get some much needed sleep again!!

I took a few days off in August and we hope to take the girls to the Niabi Zoo before Rachel starts school. With gas prices so high we haven't ventured too far from CR this summer. The zoo is the perfect size for that age and we can easily see all the exhibits in one day.

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY MARK & KARA!!!!

Who-hooo...she passed!!!!

No comment


I don't even know where to start with this one.

Go Cubs!!!

Ok, so Scott and I are not huge fans of any sports team or sports in general but we are fans of drinking beer and eating hot dogs at a sporting event! Our neighbors, Roger & Diane, invited us to join them this weekend to watch the Cubs play San Francisco on Saturday. Great seats, great weather and a great game. Thanks to Scott's parents for watching the girls so we could go!!








Fans from Cedar Rapids across the stadium
"Cedar Rapids Flood Victims Love the Cubs!!"

Here is a video of Annie taking a few steps last night!

Weekend Recovery in Progress

We had a GREAT weekend but now it's time to recover and get ready ready for a full week of work again. We spent Thursday at Kara's parents pool. This was Annie's first time in a pool and she LOVED it. She was content to sit in her inner tube and just splash around. Rachel put on arm floaties for the first time and she did a great job kicking her feet and swimming around. We spent the 4th in Cascade. We took the girls to the parade that morning and spent the rest of day playing at the farm. Scott took Rachel in later that night to see the fireworks in town. We went to Lake Delhi on Saturday with a group of our friends and the weather was perfect. We stayed up a little too late last night so it was hard getting up and going this morning. We are finally back home and Annie is glad to be back in her crib and Rachel is patiently waiting for Sam to get home so they can play outside.






Nice




Rachel & Abe

More Flood Photos

My friend Kara forwarded these images to me today. Most of these were published in the Gazette during the flood. This will give you an idea of how much water was in the downtown area.




Cattle deck party


House boats piled up against the Quaker Oats bridge


Image of downtown.


View of 3rd Ave

Happy 4th

I don't have any new pictures to post this week which is a first for me. I pulled up a few pictures from the 4th of July last year to post. CR will only have fireworks this year, no parade or Freedom Festival events. Everything has been postponed until Labor Day weekend. We were really looking forward to the Balloon Glow at Brucemore which is our favorite event. We will have all the more reason to celebrate at the end of summer and hopefully CR will be a little bit more back to normal. I took Thursday off so I'm looking forward to a long weekend. Hopefully we can enjoy some nice weather & fireworks back home.


The Kids Parade 2007. I was super pregnant
and it was super hot.


Rachel as her own float


Rachel & Cael

Balloon Glow - Rachel, Quinn & Shay

I'll be back in our CR office tomorrow...hooray! We are still on generators and no water but who cares, I'm just thankful it will only take me 10 min to get to work in the morning.

Here a few pics of the girls from the weekend.



Must of been one heck of a nap


Huh??


First time on roller skates

TGIF...a day early.

What a week!!!! I know I can't complain too much. I'm very lucky to have a house unlike the approx 25,000 people who live in CR who have lost almost everything. It really was a tough week I think many others would agree with me. My work building was evacuated last Thursday and as of today, it's still closed. We've been working temporarily at our office in Davenport. I stayed in Dav Mon & Tuesday night and drove up today and will make one more trip there tomorrow...hopefully my LAST trip. Our office may open by Monday and my co-workers and I agree that we'd rather stay in CR and use porta-potties and skip the commute. It was hard being away from Scott and the girls but I can't see i didn't enjoy a free hotel room, free meals and some much needed "me " time!

Last night we drove around downtown and I gotta say, seeing the damage after the water is gone is far worse than seeing the initial flooding. I can take picture after picture but you really have to see it in person to understand how devastating it is. Tonight I drove around our old neighborhood and up Ellis Dr and started to cry...again. House after house, block after block, destroyed by the water. Mountains of furniture, carpet and appliances sitting out front of each house, waiting for the dump. The scene that really got to me was the dozens of computers I saw sitting in a pile outside the local Boys & Girls Club. Organizations like that depend on donations from the community and I'm sure it took a lot of time and planning to raise the money to purchase them. But I did hear a positive statistic today. Out of the 25,000 displaced citizens of CR, less then 500 are staying in shelters. That means they are either staying with friends or family or have already found alternative housing. I pray this clean-up goes quickly so these families can go home again.

Rachel's Dance Party

I'll let the video speak for itself.

Happy Fathers Day!!

Happy Fathers Day to Daddy!!! Thank you for ALL you do! Especially for your patience and your smiles. You make every day fun!









We also found out this morning that we can start using our water again...HOORAY!! Everyone will get a bath today and we will slowly start up laundry and dishes. We drove over downtown last night and I was amazed as how quickly the water has receded but the mess left behind is going to take months to clean up.

Cedar Rapids Flood

Unbelievable. That is the only word I can find to explain what is going on in here. I hear myself saying that word several times a day as I watch TV and talk to friends and family. I've been watching the coverage on KCRG non-stop for the past couple days. They've shown the same pictures and video over and over again and it's still hard to watch.

I walked down to the river on Wednesday over my lunch and took some pictures of the river from the 2nd Ave bridge and a few of the streets downtown had just a few inches of water on them. That entire area is now flooded.

I passed over the river and downtown on my way to work on Thursday morning on I380 and I was in total shock. All I could do was cry. All of the downtown bridges were covered in water. It was so hard to focus at work. I kept checking news online and they were closing roads every hour. I finally left work at noon to pick up the girls from daycare and our building was evacuated just an hour later. I turned the news on when I got home and I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Downtown is like my home away from home. I've worked down there for almost 13 years so I'm very familiar with the area. I was watching aerial coverage and I could see all the restaurants I eat at, the benches I sit on and eat my lunch at and they are ALL covered in water.

The water is a block away from our old house. We talked to our old neighbors and they are doing fine but no one ever imagined the water would reach THAT far. Our neighbor owns a plumbing business just a few blocks from our old house and it's a total loss. As I laid in bed last night with Rachel and watched the news, I couldn't help but feel guilty. Guilty because I have dry house and warm bed to sleep in while there are hundreds of families who have lost everything and who knows how long it will be before they can go home again.

Scott helped fill sand bags last night and we are trying to figure out how we can help after the water recedes. I can't even imagine how long the clean-up process will take and how soon before life goes back to "normal".

On a lighter note, life does still go on around our house. Rachel and Sam have been playing non-stop for the past three days. Today they decided to get creative with Rachel's markers, thankfully WASHABLE markers!


The view of 1st Ave on Wed afternoon. The water
is now up to the Dairy Queen sign.


View of 2nd Ave from my office building taken
yesterday. The water is now all the way up
to the bottom of the picture.



No wonder they were playing SO quietly
in the basement!


Rachel & Sam


Miss Dimples

Going for a Cruise

Our neighbor, Roger, asked Rachel if she wanted to go with them to watch a Little League game at one of the area parks tonight. Roger also owns a Mustang GTO convertible so the girls got to ride in style to the game! This picture is of Sam and Rachel as they were getting ready to leave, sunglasses and all!!

It's Officially SUMMER!!!

Rachel has been waiting...and waiting for it to warm up so she could play in her Dora sprinkler. This weekend she was in her swimsuit by 10am and READY to play outside. This weekend was also Annie's first time swimming in her baby pool and she loved it. Amazing how one inch of water can entertain a baby for almost an hour! It finally felt like summer and despite the bugs, we enjoyed every minute it!!!


Rachel & Sam


Ahhh....this is the life!


Annie being attacked by bubbles


We knew those curls were still there, we just had
to wait for it to get hot so we could see them again!


Oh yeh, I'm using a sippy cup.

Happy Birthday Rachel...and Trey...and Grammy!

What a busy weekend!! We helped Scott's nephew and his mom celebrate their birthdays on Saturday and we had Rachel's 5th Birthday party on Sunday. Thankfully the severe weather held out until after the party. It didn't rain but it was VERY humid out. Rachel didn't care, she had so much fun with her friends. She got a lot of wonderful gifts and we had a great time with our friends and family. I took tomorrow off for her actual birthday and we plan on taking her out for breakfast and spend the rest of the day at the farm...weather permitting. Thanks to everyone who helped us celebrate on Sunday, Rachel had so much fun!!


Ready to eat


Rachel's Barbie Cake


Modeling their new visors


Rachel & Ellyse


Funny Faces