A blog of stuff from Carl Benton
Christy had her 19 week scan last Friday, which was really great, because Kim came down for it as well. We got to see all parts of the babies body, from the brain to kidneys, to heart and blood flow! It was really amazing, and we even got a DVD of the scan to take away with us. So now, we are officially half way, and we are both getting rather excited…
To check out our baby pics so far, see the gallery here.
Oh yeaaahhhh!!!!!
Well, that says it all. The steps are in, the pavers are in, the gardens are in, the lawn is in… and it’s looking rather @*#$% awsome if you ask me! We did a lot of ground work for the patio base, so the 530 pavers went down with relative ease. The two-tier side garden below the lawn has been tidied with a small slate/concrete wall, and the grass in on the lawn is growing nicely. The next phase is to do the bottom steps, and the deck.
Today Christy and I went for the 13 week genetic screening scan. Well, when I say Christy and I, I mean Christy had the scan, and I watched. They wouldnt scan me for some reason…
It was pretty neat to see it in action. The technology they have today is awsome. The machine even keeps the gel warm!!! The lady looked at a small film of fluid underneath the skin on the back of the babies neck. The size of it gives an indication of the chances of the baby being born with a genetic abnormality. It was quite small, which is good. 😀 Christy also had some blood taken, so we will know the results in the next week or two.
To check out our very very first baby pics, see the gallery here.
Christy wanted me to make a box for her wedding bouquet…
Top View
Bottom Corner View
Christy is one talented Marine Biologist, and lately she has made an amazing discovery. Behold, the one and only SEA RASCAL:
The Sea Rascal
Well, the pattio project has been going for about 3 months now, and we have achieved quite a lot. With the pattio area now flat, bottom and boundary walls installed, and steps over half way, we should have most of it finished in the next 2 months. Three lights have been installed and the wiring is in place. The strip light for the steps arrived last week, which I got manufactured especially for the pattio with half the normal brightness. This is because there is a total of 40m of strip light, and the normal brightness would be way too much. Once the steps are in, which should be about 3 weeks away, the strip lighting will be installed. I can’t wait!
Well, the Super 14 is finished for another year. It was an exciting season, up until all the NZ teams crapped out, which was much earlier for some…
Anyway, I finished ranked 6791 (447 pts), while Dad finished at 16021 (434 pts) and Luke at 35191 (416 pts). So, the winner is ME! Congratulations Carl, you deserve it…
See my Jimungo profile here, or my picks here (you have to login to Jimungo).
See the RSS14 points table here.
Round |
Score |
Rank |
Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 50 | 598 | I got off to a great start, picking 5 winning margins and the other three were winning team but wrong margin. |
| 2 | 34 | ? | – I picked the Blues to beat the Highlanders by 1-12, which admittadly was a last minute gut feeling as I was hoping for the Highlanders to win. It turned out to be a good call, and the Highlanders failed to pull through in the end as usual. 8 pts for me!
– I picked the Crusaders to smash the Reds, but boy was I wrong (as well as just about everyone else)! The reds won 42-20, which only 0.14% of people picked as a result. |
| 3 | 37 | 1165 | Ohhh boy what an exciting week. Two nail biting games had Luke and I on the edge of our seat, with the Chiefs pulling a 13+ win giving me 8 pts, and the Highlanders only just winning under the 13+ margin giving me another 8 pts. |
| 4 | 20 | 2908 | Oh dear. At least everyone did pooly… |
| 5 | 45 | 574 | Another great week. I picked all the winning margins except for the Stormes smashing of the Hurricanes. Poor father. 😛 |
| 6 | 34 | 897 | Well don’t the Highlanders suck… |
| 7 | 21 | 3375 | Ohhh the Highlanders get a win! All luck really. |
| 8 | 21 | 4544 | As Luke put it: “What a shit weekend!”. That sums it up really, but at least everyone did shit! LOL |
| 9 | 23 | 5754 | Hmm, both luke and dad beat me this week, but lucky I have a good lead. 😛 |
| 10 | 21 | 10797 | … |
| 11 | 32 | 8753 | WTF? Dad forgot to pick, and the system automatically picked 13+ for the home team for all the games, and he got 29 points! I beat him, but he beat Luke… who is fuming! |
| 12 | 21 | 11232 | Well, the gap is seriously closing between the old man and I, so I better pull out some good pics this week! |
| 13 | 37 | 5931 | A great week for me, increasing my lead over dad and luke! 😀 |
| 14 | 38 | 6143 | Dad gained 4 points on me in the final round, but it is not enough to take the lead. Things would have to go horribly wrong in the semi’s and final for me to loose now! 😀 |
| 15 | 5 | 5237 | Semi Finals this week. I only got 5 points as I backed the Crusaders, and did not think the stormers would not win by that much. |
| 16 | 8 | 6791 | The Bulls took home the win, and I get 8 points! A final ranking of 6791 out of 100,000+. |
| 447 |
I thought I would just add some information on our progress on the patio project. So far we have been digging, and digging, and digging… The skip we hired was picked up today which had about 3 cubic meters of concrete and clay! Luckily it didn’t put holes in our driveway hehe. To help explain how everything will be constructed, see the image below:
Patio Layout
This image was taken from Solidworks where I have built up a 3D model of the whole area, showing all the dimensions and how it will all be constructed. That way I can see how many posts I need for walls, the length everything and how it will fit together.
The original land surface was sloping from the front of the upper lawn down to the front of the patio and down through the deck. Therefore most of the patio needs to be dug out, as well as an area below the patio for the wall and part of the deck. To build the upper steps, the patio garden wall needs to go in, and to do that we at least need to put in the front corner post which is also one of the posts for the retaining wall below the patio. Therefore we have started with that.
As far as lighting goes, there will be spots in the patio garden wall, and upper garden wall, strip light along the front of each of the upper steps and maybe spots on the lower steps, and maybe a few spots in the patio-deck wall.
You can see the pictures of the construction of the patio here.
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