Not long after we started using their contest service they announced their own Launch Giveaway. I like free stuff as much as the next person so I thought I would let you all know about it. You can enter it right here by using the widget below. You never know you might win an iPad2 and if you win I would win a Kindle Fire. I think I actually want you to win more so I get the Kindle Fire.

The contest widget is on the full page of this post so you might have to click to the full page to see it.

Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

For our 2011 Halloween pumpkins Erica wanted a Barbie Kitty, and Matthew wanted an axe man. Thank goodness for those pumpkin stencil books that you can buy. Otherwise it would just be the plain old pumpkins.

Here is a short video I took of the finished product. Think they turned out alright. Lots of little lines on the Barbie Kitty. I was surprised it turned out as nice as it did.

If you want to see some of our past years pumpkins here are the links. Thought I had posted more than this but could only find the two.

• Halloween 2009 – Three headed dog and Sleeping Beauty.
• Halloween 2008 – Arial and Wall-E

Hope you have a Happy Halloween!

I have a huge website redevelopment project going on for a client. It has consumed a considerable amount of time and energy. I can’t say who it is right now but will talk about it once it is launched.

My daughter started Kindergarten! She now attends school for full days because she goes to Kindergarten and her communication class as well. It has made more time available for me to work. That has been great considering the project I am working on.

I have been hanging out at Google+ a lot more. I still use Twitter but find the Google+ is really convenient to use. I can see Google+ becoming more and more important in SEO, but that is another post.

I have been trying to post more at the LGR Internet Solutions blog, but that has been hit and miss as well.

I have decided to attend the Affiliate Summit conference in Las Vegas in January. This was a big step for me, since I don’t usually find conferences very enjoyable. I thought I would give this conference a try and see if it will help me improve my affiliate websites. More and more my affiliate work has been out performing my web development work and has been more consistent for income. Thought it was time I focused a little more attention on it.

Our car that had the huge spruce tree on it at our cabin is finally settled. Insurance has decided it is not a right off and will fix it. This is good news mostly because I had no desire to find a new vehicle. It is going to leave me carless for 10 or more days. Still not sure how we are going to handle that. Apparently the insurance company will not cover a rental because somehow it was my fault a huge f****** spruce tree fell on my car. Anyway I guess I will have to rent a car out of my own pocket for that time.

I have been trying to exercise more. Not something that has always been a priority but I have been doing my best to get some exercise in every week.  So far so good, hoping to get in better shape for another trip to Disney World!

Life overall has been good. It is nice to be busy and having some more time to work has been great. It is early to start wrapping up 2011 but so far it has been a bit of a rebuilding year. 2012 is starting to look like it will be better. I have some big ideas that I do hope to get off the ground in 2012, but talking about that will be another day.

I have to say they really put on a show. I have seen many clips on YouTube of them but it is much more enjoyable to see them live. You do not get a sense of the spectacle watching a little video on YouTube. If I ever go to Las Vegas I think I would want to try and get tickets to see them again.

All that being said here is one of the many Blue Man Group videos you can find on YouTube.

Enjoy!

On our recent trip to our cabin we had brutal storm. Took down lots of trees and did damage on several places around ours. The cabin four doors down lost 3/4 of their roof so I came out pretty good.

My car was unlucky enough to be in the path of a falling spruce tree. Here it is with most of its branches trimmed off already.

The rest of the trip was pretty relaxing. I am thankful we were all ok.

Seeing and hearing her slowly but surely master new sounds is a joy. Spending time together practicing sounds while playing a game and enjoying a good laugh together is a joy. Being totally surprised when she says a new word or sound like “quack” is a joy. There are joys, joys that need to be celebrated. I certainly would wish that my daughter would not have to go through this, but at least we can have some joy.

Apraxia does come with its share of frustrations as well. In the beginning many of the frustrations were from problems communicating with her, but as time has gone by those frustrations become less. It is unfortunate that the biggest frustrations become with the institutions and people that are suppose to help your daughter learn to talk.

Speech language therapists I am sure all mean well, but they are not all created equal. School speech therapists that refuse to use PROMPT even though you you know your daughter responds best to it is frustrating. Private speech therapists who quit out of no where and blame us for substituting private speech therapy for daily practice is extremely frustrating.  School systems that do not want teachers to attend apraxia conferences because it is not a priority for the school board makes you want to scream.

Thankfully many of those frustrations are in the past. We have an excellent private speech therapist that our daughter works well with. The new school speech therapist will use PROMPT to help our daughter. In the meantime I celebrate that my daughter has somehow “found her quack” along with “yes” and a list of other new sounds.  She will talk and someday maybe, just maybe we can celebrate no more speech therapy.

For those that are wondering about the quack reference, at a recent kindergarten meeting the teacher read “The Duck that Lost It’s Quack”. My daughter surprised me by saying quack along with all the other kids. Ever since then she has been quacking, and trying out a number of other q words. Just in case you were wondering.

If that is not enough then watch this one. Harper even steals a speech from Emperor Palpatine!

For those that did not know, we went on a winter holiday to Disney World and an eastern Carribean Disney Cruise. We spent 4 days at Disney World exploring the various parks and then set sail for 7 days on the Disney Magic cruise ship.

Overall I have to say we had a FANTASTIC TIME! There is something magical about a Disney holiday. I am not sure how to describe it really. We have been on several family holidays, including a two week trip to Parksville on Vancouver island, summer holidays to Waskesui and Christopher Lake and I really enjoy those times with my family, but this Disney holiday was different. Perhaps it is the scale that Disney does things on. Everything is bigger than life and still full of magic.

While each of us have our highlights let me give you some of my favourite things from Disney World and the Disney Cruise. I will talk about them seperately because they are very different Disney experiences, even though they do share some similarities.

This was my first time going to Disney World, and I was looking forward to being there with my kids, who I think are great ages to take. Matthew is 7 and Erica is 5. My favourite memory of going to Disney World was not any one ride or attraction, but watching the joy and thrill on my kids faces as we explored the various parks. Of course there some things that stood out.

Cinderellas Royal Table – I heard about this just before we booked the Disney World part of our holiday. I did some reading on the Disney website and discovered I could book it online before we left, so that is exactly what I did and am I glad I did. We got a lunch sitting, and while it might have been the most expensive lunch we have ever had with the kids it was worth it. Like many little girls Erica loves the Disney Princesses so the chance to have them come to our table and spend a few moments chatting with the kids brought many huge smiles to my little girl. Matthew might not have thought to much of it but I think he enjoyed himself. I know he sure liked his dessert! 

The parades were great. Each park was different but the kids loved watching them. Everyone loves a parade I guess.

Mickey’s Fantasmic – This was incredible! I was very glad we went back to Holywood Studios to see this. The scale and awe of this show is really amazing.

Magic Kingdom Fireworks – It was the first time the kids have seen fireworks so it was special that it was at the Magic Kingdom.

Hollywood Studios Stunt Show – Nothing like watching a bunch of cars and motorcycles drive around really fast. Matthew loved this, what 7 year old boy wouldn’t. It was like watching Hot Wheels live.

Toy Story Mania – This was by far my son’s favourite ride. We got got fast passes to go on it when we first got to Hollywood Studios and went on it before lunch the day we were there. When the second performance of the stunt show was on we got in the regular line for the ride and only had a 15 minute wait. Not bad for a ride that is so popular. Matthew would have gone more times if he could have.

Laugh Floor – It really surprised me how interactive this show was. I was expecting it to be more a just sit and watch kind of show, but the texting in jokes and audience interaction was great. I even got to dance in front of everyone. Kids loved the joke that was texted in as well. “What is the difference between brocolli and boogers? Kids never eat their brocolli.”

Tomorrowland Speedway – Matthew had a great time driving around the course. He was not tall enough to press the gas and drive so I handled the gas peddle and he drove. That suited me just fine.

Tea Cup Spin – We went on this three times. Nothing like going round and round getting dizzy.

Mickey’s Philimagic – Leave it to Disney to turn a 3D film into an experience. The kids really liked the ending to this. I won’t say what it is, but they still bring it up.

Disney Princesses – We had lunch with the Princesses but Erica also saw the Princesses before lunch. It was impressive how the kids get a few special minutes to get autographs and photos.

Buzz and Woody – Seeing the Princesses was Erica’s thing, but Matthew had the chance to see Buzz and Woody which made his day. He also enjoyed seeing Mike and Sully from Monsters Inc.

Other things that were useful in Disney World
T-Mobile sim cards – Having unlocked cell phones paid off during the trip. I picked up a couple of T-Mobile prepaid SIM cards for our cell phones and they worked great. Roaming fees with Rogers would have cost us a ton, but with the T-Mobile SIM cards we were able to call / text each other and get web access for much less than roaming fees would have been. 

Touringplans.com – Since we only had 4 days at Disney World before our cruise we wanted to make the best of our time there. Touringplans.com came in handy planning our days. Plus the web app on our phones was great to check wait times for certain rides. Although, I think we picked the best time possible to go since none of the wait times every seemed very long.

Disney Transportation System – Several people suggested we rent a car for when we were there, but I am so glad we did not. Staying at a Disney resort and hopping on the Disney bus was just easy. The longest we every had was 15 minutes for a bus. Not to mention it meant I got to relax and did not have to worry about driving around.

Disney Dining Plan – We had booked our trip with the Disney Dining Plan, but something went wrong somewhere. All the information we got and our travel agent got said we had booked the dining plan. The Disney resort said we did not book with the dining plan. It was frustrating at the time, but when all was said and done we were refunded the value of the dining plan that we paid roughly $700.00 for the four of us. We ended up using the Disney quick service mostly when we were there and it cost us roughly $550.00. When we go back we might not worry about the Disney Dining Plan.

Disney Cruise
We had a great time at Disney World for 4 days but I think we were all ready for the Disney Cruise.  

Disney Magic – This ship is incredible! I know that the Disney Cruise line now has the Disney Dream, which is roughly twice the size of the Magic, but I still think the Magic was great. Nothing like having lots to do on the ship. Loved deck 9 for the pools and the food.

Character Appearances – Disney character appearances happen regularly and you can always find the schedule to make sure you meet the characters you want to see. Erica wanted to see the Princesses again so she was able to see several of them, plus the kids club had an event to Dozy Doo with Snow White which made her day.

Mickey and Pals Character Breakfast – Nothing like having Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Pluto, Chip and Dale coming around to your table for autographs and photos! This was a lot of fun and I don’t know who enjoyed this more, Lynn and I or the kids.

Shows – The live shows were very enjoyable. Glad they had matinea performances so we could see them.

Castaway Cay – We had a great day at the beach at Castaway Cay. It was great to just be at the beach and play in the water. This was my favourite part of the cruise I think. Not to mention the you get a great BBQ lunch. Nothing like spending the day at the beach and not having to worry about cooking. I would have loved to have stayed their longer.

Overall it was a great trip. We are all hoping we can go again in a few years. I think we picked a great time to go, the weather was great and the crowds were not that bad. Next time we would probably plan for an extra day or two at Disney World so can explore Epcot more plus there were parts of all the parks that we were not able to see.

Cell Carriers – Pretty much all of them. Of course I have a particular hatred of Rogers and Sasktel, but they all pretty much suck.

Apple – All the Apple fanboys will probably jump on me for this one, but I hate Apple. Mostly because people think their products are so great when in reality they are nothing special, except being over priced. As a side note I also hate them because Steve Jobs needs a new wardrobe. The black turtle neck and jeans is getting old. This from a guy that does not have a great wardrobe. Not to mention I am sick of Apple being constantly talked about on Techcrunch.

Microsoft – Come on it is Microsoft.

Hulu – This hatred is probably more a general hate of old media in general, but Hulu gets mentioned because they are such a good representation of old media trying to control and maintain the same old same old. Tip: If you want to try and watch Hulu from outside of the good old USA try the Hide My Ass! Pro VPN Service.

Banks – I hate dealing with my bank. It seems like everytime I talk with them they are telling me about some new service charge for this or that. Less service and more service charges are their motto. If I could I would stuff my money in my mattress!

PayPal – This is similar to my hatred of banks, but PayPal gets a special mention because they keep saying they are not a bank. They are right, banks cannot sieze all of your money for no reason and not give it back.

Google – I have a love / hate relationship with Google. I love Gmail, Reader, Docs and my Android devices. Adsense and Adwords not so much. They are an impossible company to contact and they really do have some double standards. At least they do not all wear the same stupid black turtle neck and jeans.

Facebook – I do not even spend much time on Facebook compared to some people. If it was not useful for marketing my websites I would delete my acount.

That is all I can think of so far. I am sure I have missed a few but there has to be some that are not to bad right.

What are the companies you love to hate?