Turkey Day

One of my favorite holidays has become Thanksgiving, nothing like creating an entire day around eating.  The massive amounts of food that is cooked and served at our house has become legendary.  I cooked three turkeys last year and did the same this year.  At 7:30am I started the first turkey on the smoker.  Last year I over smoked the turkey and wanted to redeem myself.  I thought if smoke was not coming out of the smoker I was not cooking it, so I kept shoving more and more wood chips into it.  Not the right way to smoke, the turkey was okay but a heavy smoke flavor.  The second turkey was baked the old fashion traditional way but this year I got a roaster on sale and put it in that to free up the oven.  The third turkey was deep fried.  I deep fried last year for the first time and it was great this year I had problems with the auto timer they put on the deep fryers and had to get a new one.  The auto timer shuts off the gas after 15 minutes unless you press a button to give another 15 minutes but, on a busy Thanksgiving day it's easy to forget about it and then your oil cools down.  I got a new one with a mechanical timer, still a pain.  It also had a stand to lower the turkey in the oil.  I tried the stand but like the bucket from my old frier and eventually put the turkey in that to finish the job.  Three turkeys done then we also had a ham, lasagna, broccoli, mac and cheese, mashed potato's, cranberries, fried squash, butternut squash soup and more that I'm surely forgetting.  We also had about 4 pies for dessert.  Yes and we still have leftovers.  I was happy about the leftovers since I usually would leave home at 4am the day after Thanksgiving to direct football but not this year and I have made up for all the turkey sandwich's I missed.
Little man seems a bit overwhelmed on Thanksgiving with all the activity in the house.  He did good but was tired by the time dinner hit the table and after eating some the trictafan kicked in and he passed out there in his chair.  Of course we did what every good parent would do and shoved a turkey leg in his hand and took a picture.  Now come my real dilemma, we took a great picture of little man just days before thanksgiving and then we took the turkey leg photo.  We are not sure which picture to use for the Jame Jack 2011 calender.  Help us pick one for the month of November, tell me which one is your favorite.  The 2011 Jame Jack calender is going to be great!

Stump

Turkey Leg

Bierstube

Finally a day off!  It seems as of late that all my shoots have been going long, this is good the checks will be nice when they arrive.  I called home the other day and asked Jynx if she was the strange woman sleeping in the bed next to me?  We had a laugh but unfortunately that was true we had not seen each other awake in several days.  Unfortunately for me it was the same with little man, I started to feel like the dad in the cats and the cradle song. 

We decided to head out for dinner and I had thoughts of trying out a polish place in Hammond that I had heard good things about.  After checking it out on line and where we needed to go that night we decided to head to a favorite restaurant of mine that I all to often forget about.  I can not tell you how much I love this restaurant the Bierstube in Peotone.  The food is great and lots of it, the atmosphere is fantastic with all the decorations and the waitresses dressing the part.  The best part is the man on the stage singing great polkas and having fun singing and entertaining. 

We arrived there and got a table right next to the stage and the music was going on but he has no problem interrupting a song to velcome you or to say alvederzane when you leave.  Little man noticed him right away with a quick point and his favorite word these days "Dat". 

We had arrived just in time the place quickly filled up and everyone was greeted from the accordion playing man on the stage.  He even took a bit of a break while we ordered and even told us what was good on the menu.  Of course the best thing on the menu is their Wiener Schnitzel with all different toppings.  Although I got a look at their goulash which looks great as well.

Little man got right into the music and started to rock back and forth with his eyes glued on the funny dressed man.  Then the cow bells came out for Edelweiss and even for me this is amazing how he manages the cowbells ringing them in order when they are spread out all over the table.  This time he even included the bartender by giving her a cue and she would ring her bell.

As the night went on and our massive amounts of food began to arrive Little Man was enjoying the music more and more.  He would cheer at the end of the songs, he also began to clap along with the

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pYxc_CxDKBA

music which everyone enjoyed and got a kick out of. 

Little Man came up by me and started to dance a bit but kept pointing to everything saying "Dat! Dat!"  We gave him some money to tip our German singer he put the money in the tip bucket and the let him ring the bells.  He wasn't too sure and was more interested in looking at them then ringing them but Dad helped him out with it. 

It was a great night filled with a lot of great food and fun.  I need to remember to head out there more, I'm sure little man won't mind at all. 

41

I tried to stay busy, I tried not to think about it but my birthday came anyway.  40 was hard for me 30 wasn't bad but 40 really freaked me.  I think a lot of it was that I keep thinking about little man and how old I will be when he reaches a certain age.  For example when he's 10 I'll be reaching 50.  Ouch it hurts just to type that. 
I grew up with younger parents my mom and dad were both barely in their 20's when I was born.  Jynx actually is younger than her mom was when she was born so I think she is handling it all a lot better.  When Jynx and I first got married we talked about having kids and Jynx said she wanted to have her first by the age of 30.  I remember thinking how old that was and wanted to have children sooner.  I was 39 when Jame was born but it did not bother me until my 40th birthday that I started to freak out about my age.  A lot of my friends have children in high school and that are 16 years old.
I've talked with several people who had kids later and they are handling it just fine and Jynx's mom and dad seemed to have handled it just fine as well.  I've also consoled myself by thinking that god won't give us anything we can't handle.  I usually follow up that saying by saying I just wish he didn't trust me as much.  I know there is a reason that god has chosen this path for us and although we may not understand it there is a reason.

Playground Shrine

 "Hey Rog, my kids don't use our swing set anymore do you want it?"  I had no idea how much work was heading my way.  It was a great offer and very kind.  We headed out and took down the swing set, fort, slide and all the accessories packed them into a van and headed home.  I wanted to get the set up quickly before I forgot how to put it back together again.  It actually went back up faster than I thought so we decided to add a few things to it. 

$300.00  REALLY????

We decided to add another fort to match the first one so I took measurement and headed out to Menards to buy the lumber.  I got up early the next morning and started to assemble the floor of the fort it was after I got all the bracing ready that I realized my measurements were off and I would have to start all over again.  Jynx's sister came over to help and we took it apart re cut the boards and started over again.  I attached to fort to the old one and it looked good.  More ideas popped up one being adding a plastic rockwall but after pricing them out at 300 dollars I decided to build a wood climbing wall. 



My climbing wall

 I felt that the project was always just a few hours away from being done but I was mistaken.  I took advantage of the Indian summer we are having and would wake up with the sun head out to continue always hoping I would be done at the end of the day.  At night I would take Advil and rub Ben Gay all over my aching arms.
I was constantly adding things and making up for my mistakes.  I wanted to add an entrance on the second floor for a rope ladder.  I knocked out the panels and cut the 2x4 for the entrance.  I was cutting the last of the four 2x4 when I realized that I had cut the support for the swings.  D'OH!  one more run to Menards to get 4x4's for support.  I also decided to replace the floor on what I know call tower one since it was showing signs of age, yep one more trip to Menards.  Jynx suggested that since we did have nice weather that we should try painting.  Menard here I come again.  I asked at Menards how much paint I needed and it looks like we were one gallon short.  I was so close to finishing the project but the sun would not stay up long enough to get the last gallon of paint on it.

I'm upset that I could not finish but my body and my mind needed a break from the play set.  I spent every waking moment with the play set and I even told Jynx she could bury me in it one day.  I'm very proud of my monument and I think Little Man will have to play in it until he is 40 for me to feel good about the time I have spent building the playground shrine.

Production, Production and Production

I'm thankful for the work but I truly feel like I have been burning the candle at both ends.  I'm still working the Judge shows that are in full blown production and the elections have kept me busy.  I love my work on the Judge show and it's always interesting and the political always has my interest. 

Stedicam connected to the crane and the light balloon

Testing the Crane

The night before the election I was lighting for Willow Creek Church and their Christmas video.  They really do go all out and it was great fun.  The scene was an angel coming down to these kids and then taking off again.  They rented a light balloon to light up the night, they also had a crane and rigging to lift both the actors and camera guys for shots.  It made for a long but fun evening and I have another part of the shoot tomorrow as well.   I left the shoot about midnight and arrived home around two in the morning.

The next day was election day and I popped out of bed earlier than I wanted too but wanted to do my civic duty and vote.  I headed to the polls and had to wait a bit but I got the job done.  Later that day I had to head to the south side of Chicago for election coverage for aljazeera television.  It was for their international so it was in English.  They were talking with people in Obamas neighborhood about the election.  I spent the night shooting with one eye and the other watching the returns.  I also spent every free moment on my twitter account.  I would have not done this had I been home but watching twitter on election night proved very interesting.  I was dragging a bit after the long night before but it went well and I was done earlier than I had anticipated but once again I was heading home around midnight and had an 8 am call for the Judge in the morning.  I got home set my alarm and it told me that I would have 3 hours of sleep.  I really hate that feature on the phone, I know now how little sleep I actually get a night.  I did not go to sleep right away I laid awake watching more results and recaps of what I missed earlier.

With all this I truly have missed time with little man.  Most days he is asleep when I leave and by the time I get home I may see him for a hour before I fall asleep.  Last night he had a bit of crying and I got up with him for a while and then Jynx got up with him so I could try and sleep a bit.  Jynx told me that she has flash card that he like and they were spread all over the room so she decided that he could help pick up.  She asked him to bring her different cards.  he asked for the cow and he brought the cow card she asked for the firetruck and he brought the firetruck.  He truly does understand us we have told him to put certain decorations back and he knows to put it back where he got it from.  I'll pick him up when I get home and say hug and he'll place his head on my shoulder and throw his arm around me and squeeze.  I imagine it won't be long before he's talking and then it won't be long before he learns the dreaded word "NO".  

Trick or Treating is ALIVE!!!

Here it was Saturday at five a.m. and my alarm went off for me to get up and ready for the judge show.  It was an unusual Saturday tape day but it was going to be special.  The show was having a trick or treat day for the kids and I had to take Little Man but it meant getting him up early.  Just after I got dressed Little Man heard me get up and stirred a bit and I used the opportunity to wake him up, he got up with no problem but it was mom who had trouble sleeping that night that had a bit of a problem waking.


Little Man sitting in Daddy's chair at work.



We were both a bit nervous about him spending the day at the NBC Studio where we shoot the show but we wanted to give it a try and thought he might enjoy it.  He was his normal shy little guy at first but then quickly opened up to people and became quite the charmer.  My roommate at the Judge show John brought his 11 year old daughter Kaylee and she had a great time watching and playing with him.  Even Judge Mathis got into the spirit and as he walked down the hallway he would hand out suckers to the kids along the way and talk with them for a moment.  The kids actually started listening to the intercom and would head into the hallway when they heard the Judge is on his way. 



Kaylee and Little Man

Little man had a great time at the studio and made his dad very proud.  I feel very blessed to have such a great little guy.
We took time at the end of the taping day to go into the studio and take some pictures on both the Judge Mathis set and the Judge Pirro set.

Little Man handing out justice "Judge Pirro style"

Little Man Doyle and Kaylee



Judge Jame Jack

The Man of Steel "e"

As if that wasn't enough for the day we still had more planned for Little Man.  We headed to his girlfriends house Bayle for a trick or treat party.  There were a lot of kids at the trick or treat party and Little Man who got a bit of a nap in the car was ready to go and loved seeing all the kids and toys to play with.  The real fun started for dad when we got him into his Superman costume and we headed out to trick or treat.  It was great to see a subdivision keeping this great tradition alive.  I remember as a kid we would dress up for school on Halloween and when school was out we would trick or treat all the way home, drop off our school bags and head out for non stop trick or treating.  Tick or treating has gotten such a bad rap the last few years I though it was gone but I'm a big fan of the tradition.  It is the only holiday where you are encouraged to get out spend some time with your kids and meet your neighbors. 

Little Man at his first door

The neighborhood quickly filled with children in costumes all up and down the streets it was a great sight and brought back such memories.  The neighborhood had some great rules for trick or treating first they had hours, not a bad idea since I remember our doorbell ringing late into the evening as a kid.  The second and I wish they had this when I was a kid if you were handing out candy you left your porch light on.  A great way to skip the houses that did not have candy.  I did have to laugh that the kids went up to a house with a democrat sign in the yard and the lights on but no one was handing out candy.  Sorry, but I just thought it was funny. 

Superman-mobile

Little Man was not to sure of what was going on but he got to ride in his wagon and Bayle quickly jumped into his Superman-Mobile for the ride.  We took turns taking him up to the door and getting the candy and then back to the superman mobile to check out the candy.  After a few blocks the kids got a bit cold and were done with the whole thing so we took them back.  Little Man went right back to playing with the other kids well into the evening.  At the end of the night we placed him in his car seat where he did not even make the end of the block before he was asleep.
It was a great day capped off by a great evening and it does my heart good to know that trick or treating is alive and well.

Pumpkins

After a asking everyone on Facebook about a pumpkin patch we found a nice one in Hobart, IN that was fantastic.  We called Wendy and her daughter and Jame's girlfriend Baley to join us at the pumpkin patch.  Jynx's family went with as well so we took their new motor home or should I say bus.  The pumpkin patch had it all and we tried to fit it all in.  We started out riding in a wagon towed behind a tractor to the corn maze.  I was not to sure how the kids would enjoy this but they had a great time running threw the maze and playing with the corn.

Then it was on to the pumpkin patch where the kids had a great time running from pumpkin to pumpkin playing with them all.  Little man had to try and pick up a lot of them.  I'm not really sure what he was planning on doing with them.  We played in the pumpkin patch and I took about a hundred photos before we had to hurry up pick out pumpkins and jump back on the wagon.

We then headed into the petting zoo that was filled with animals and tractors and things for them to play on.  Little Man got a big kick out of the chickens and as always he loved the cows.  Mom even took time to try and teach him how to feed the goats.

They even had a pumpkin easting monster but it only chomps on the weekends, so we did not get to see him in action.  Little Man and his friend had a great time at the pumpkin patch and we may be heading there every fall to spend a day.

Last night we took some time from our hectic fall schedule and carved a pumpkin with Little Man.  I was not sure how he was going to react to the whole carving but he seemed to enjoy it.  We had gotten some tools at the store that would carve the pumpkin but he could not cut himself although it still freaked me out at times.  He helped mom sort threw the guts and get the pumpkin seeds out.  As we were carving I showed him how to talk into the pumpkin for the echo and he enjoyed trying it as well.  When it was all finished we put one of the new battery flicker flames in it and he loved the little light.  We placed his first carved pumpkin on the back porch.  It was a lot more fun then I had ever thought it would be.  Happy Halloween.