my little ashman hasn't had a highchair since we moved to seattle. we couldn't fit it in our moving truck so it was left a grandmas house in spokane. since we have been here asher has either been held or sat in his little rocking chair while he ate, it has been a huge pain. well, this weekend i finally got steven to put our kitchen table together and i got out our travel highchair. as you can see, ash was extremely happy.
on saturday we took the kids to the seattle children's museum. when we were getting ready to leave lily was given one of those amazingly large blowpops. she couldn't wait to eat it but we made her wait until she got home because i didn't want a sticky mess in her carseat. so, when we got home she sat at her little table for like an hour and a half one lick at a time. she was kind enough to share with jackson so here are the pics.
jana has been keeping her own blog for quite sometime now. the heller family.org has pretty much been run by me. when my life is hectic, nothing gets posted. well, i’ve finally figured a way to combine our two blogs. so now, when jana posts on her blog at http://www.janas-journal.blogspot.com/, the post will automatically be added to the heller family.org. there is harmony in the world. so you’ll probably be seeing a lot more content coming to the heller family.org now. jana’s insights tend to be more poignant and family related and mine, well, usually aren’t.  i hope you enjoy these two fresh perspectives on life through the heller’s eyes.
so, it’s 2am and i just finished watching the karate kid. i’ll admit, it’s one of my all-time favorite movies. i’ve got a lot of childhood memories wrapped up in that movie. it taught me a lot of things. it taught me to strike fast, strike hard with no mercy (sir). it taught me that fear does not exist in the dojo (nor does pain, defeat and one other thing that i can’t remember). but above all, it taught me that a little kid from jersey with a can-do attitude and a propensity for washing and waxing cars as well as some other basic home maintenance, can beat any member of the cobra kai with a little hard work, determination and help from an old asian man (whom identifies himself from the country of okinawa. there’s some trivia for you). so, yeah, i think it’s safe to say that the karate kid has influenced my life for the positive. though i’m sure the trail of broken bodies that i’ve left in my wake would disagree. it’s been many moons since i last watched karate kid and my skills have gotten quite rusty so when the chance came to watch it tonight, i knew i had to make the time. the movie was just as awesome as i remember. though i must have been watching some sort of alternate, unreleased version because the dialogue in this new version seemed a lot cheesier than the original. no matter, the movie still rocked my world.
it wasn’t until the last scene, the final match between johnny and daniel-san in the all-valley karate championship, came that a question was raised to which i still have no answer. now, i’ll admit to you right now that i participate more in the no-rules, winner take all, street karate seen in such movie as bloodsport and lionheart and as such, am unaware of the rules of many of the organized karate tournaments similar to the one seen in the karate kid. so if anyone out there is versed in the subject, i implore your help. as i’m sure you recall, the first to get to 3 points is the winner of the match. daniel laruso, or as the cobra kai call him, ‘our little friend danielle’ (you see, danielle is the female pronunciation of daniel. they were essentially trying to emasculate daniel. quite sharp.) gains the first two points right off the bat in the final match against “put-him-in-a-body-bag” johnny. right away we think that daniel is going to win the tournament. not so. “cream puff” johnny has a few tricks up his ghi and takes the next two points. in one of the finals rounds, he punches daniel in the side of the face/neck but is not awarded a point. fair enough. in my world there are no “points”, just the sweet sting of blood in your eye, but in the world of organized martial arts i can see why they wouldn’t award him a point for such reckless behavior. the score is now 2-2. the next point takes the match. daniel slowly raises both of his arms and lifts one leg off the ground. both the referee and johnny look slightly confused. what form of martial arts is this? that’s right, it’s the crane technique. we already know where this is headed. the referee starts the round. johnny rushes in only to meet daniel’s foot with his face in the center of the ring. johnny comes crashing to the ground, writhing in pain as we see ali (with an “i”) rush in to congratulate daniel along with the hundreds of other people in the  audience (who knew that karate was so popular in southern california?). daniel (with an “l”) is awarded the last point and is given the trophy by a congratulatory johnny lawrence. the end. or is it?
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i thought this was really funny. lily and jack were playing outside and asher wanted out with them in the worst way. he just sat at the slider and watched and begged to go out. it was really quite sweet to see him wanting to play with his brother and sister.
my little ash man has finally started sitting up. all three of my children have been late sitters and he has finally caught on. is he not the cutest baby you have seen?
so, i came across idiot pilot in some podcast somewhere. i’m always skeptical of new music that i just happen to run into. most of the good music on my life has come from any one of various trusted sources. i rarely come into good music on my own. idiot pilot are 2 guys that make music and perform it live. i always dig it when 2 people can make good music and manage to perform it live on their own.
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so, i’m sure you’ve all been waiting with bated breath for a post of some sort since the big move. it’s been so crazy around here that i’ve hardly had any time to do anything. i’m working at my companies’ bellevue office, typically putting in 60 hour weeks. i’m really glad i took the position but it’s really taking a lot of my time right now. jana is as busy as ever with the kids as they’re making the transition to a new home (it takes us at least a year to get fully unpacked and then it’s time for us to move again). as much as we miss spokane, it’s nice to be back in the emerald city. there’s a lot of really cool stuff to do here. why, just last weekend we… well, i guess we haven’t had much time to do that really cool stuff. but when we do get some free time… i don’t have a lot more to report right now. i think i might throw up a couple of songs that caught my ear recently, just for something to do.
i upgraded our wordpress installation and now something isn’t jiving with our tarsiki theme. so, i’ve had to use the standard wordpress theme while i figure out what the problem is. couple this with the fact that we’re packing to move in the next few days and that makes for a fun time. be patient while i sort this out.
lily, jack and ash are quite the team lately. they love to spend time playing and just hanging out with one another. now that ash is a little more sturdy, he tries to do everything that they do. he wants to be with them all of the time. when he wakes up from a nap both lily and jack can't wait to get him out of his bed or get in with him.
i thought that this picture of lily and jack in the bath was really funny. they could not be built more different.
this was a little ball tent that jack got for christmas and it was popped within 1 hour of blowing it up.
asher likes to hold hands and i think it is cute that in both pictures he is trying to hold lily's. she loves it of course because she just can't get enough of him. i will indulge her now because in about six months when he is getting into all of her stuff she will not be as amused.
