Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes...

If you are among the 400 something hits to my blog in the past two months, you will notice that I've changed the color scheme lately! It is no longer garden themed. It is now more of a set of cooler colors. I think it is a little easier on the eye now. (Maybe the change from spring colors to winter colors will encourage Winter to chase away the Indian Summer here in Texas.)

Let me know what you think of the change.

Live From Under the Brooklyn Bridge / flickr test ...

Live Under the Brooklyn Bridge
Originally uploaded by jeff.perkins.

I'm testing out my new flickr account. It has a neat blogging feature that I'm also testing out.

But...

I'd also like to take the opportunity to recommend this great little U2 live EP: Live From Under the Brooklyn Bridge. It is available on iTunes.

January's visit to the doctor...

We went to the baby doctor again today. We heard Baby Perkins' heartbeat today! We are going back next month (2/22) for the big sonogram. We'll figure out the gender then. So, stay tuned.

Saddle Sore, part 2...

With the busy weekend in Kansas over, we got up this morning and drove home to Texas. Fortunately, it was an uneventful drive. Just long. As you can see in this first picture, the Interstate was closed for good reason last week. There were several different places along the Interstate that were blackened by wildfires. Some of these charred areas were miles wide and extended far into the west and the east.

This bottom picture is of the World's Largest Ball of Twine in Cawker City, KS. Apparently it was 40'3" in circumference and over 14,500 pounds in 1988, as the sign says. I just had to stop and take a picture.

Greetings from Smith Center...

These are some of the sights from Smith Center, Kansas. The Geographical Center of the Lower 48 States is located a few miles east of Smith Center, therefore Smith Center refers to the region as the Heart of the Nation.

Dum dum-da-dum, dum dum-da-dum...

Congratulations Hilary and Aaron.

Ephesians 5:21-33

Be do-ers, and not only hearers only.

Isn't she beautiful...

Isn't she beautiful? This is Baby Kellie Galena Perkins, formerly of Kemerovo (Siberia, Russia), now of Georgia with a loving dad and mom and two big protective brothers.

I'm sad that it will probably be a long time before I get to actually hold Kellie. I love her and I miss her and I have never even seen her.

Welcome Home Kellie and good night.

love,
Uncle Jeff (and Aunt Valerie)

Allright! Snow!...

It is still a magical feeling to me, to wake up and find everything covered in snow! We had about 2 inches this morning. It was all gone by the afternoon, but it was fun while it lasted.

A long hard day in the saddle...

Yesterday was a really long day at the beginning of a really long weekend.

Valerie's little sister, Hilary, is getting married on Saturday up in Smith Center, Kansas. As you can probably imagine, North Central Kansas/South Central Nebraska is quite a few stone throws from Fort Worth. It is a really long drive any way that you cut it. However, that 9 hour drive can become unbearable when you throw in construction, detours, and slow traffic.

Yesterday was no exception...

I seem to never have a good experience driving across Oklahoma. Over the years I've suffered through several hours of construction back-ups and hundreds of miles of detours. One spring break, we shot the gap between two tornadoes. At Thanksgiving, I had to deal with a hazy and smoky 40-60 mph wind. Yesterday, they closed the interstate due to wildfires.

So, we did not quite make it to Smith Center last night. We ended up pulling off in McPherson, KS at about midnight. We finally made it safely home this morning.

I'll blog later about the activities surrounding the wedding. Right now, I'm thinking about watching 24 and taking a nap.

The WAIT is Almost Over

The WAIT is Almost Over is a blog setup by my brother (Jim) and sister-in-law (Jeanette). This blog chronicles the past two months of their adventure in adopting my newest niece, Kellie Galina Perkins!

Kellie will be almost 1 year old by the time that she gets home.
I'll tell more of the story later, but you can find most of it (along with some interesting travel tips for traveling through Siberia) at the blog.

Would the real Pat Robertson please shut up...

with regrets to Eminem for parodying one of his song titles...

Pat Robertson really really should hire someone to screen what he wants to say and then advise him not to say such foolish things!

A couple of weeks ago, he declared the eminent possibility of divine destruction upon a small town in Pennsylvania because their school board rejected Intelligent Design as a legitimate scientific theory (which, by the way, ID is most certainly a legitimate scientific theory, which also happens to probably be a superior theory based on explanatory power over Darwinian evolution...but we can deal with that latter).

So anyway, now Pat commented that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's massive strokes are a divine judgment cause by his attempt to divide up "God's land." Read the story here.

New Pictures...

We went to the Doc again yesterday. We got new pictures of Baby Perkins! As you can see, there are clear pictures of Baby's head, face and umbilical cord. Baby is approximately 3 inches long and apparently is 13 weeks and 2 days old.

Special thanks goes to Chris and Robin for their friendship and the use of their scanner.