The other joy of my week was that I got to find him a Cardinals outfit for the Super Bowl on Sunday. It should be super exciting to watch the Cardinals and the Steelers play on Sunday. Go Cardinals!!! I hope you enjoy the videos, Colby is just getting more and more grown up everyday and before we know it he will be walking all on his own.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Getting Bigger
So Colby is finally growing out of his 6-9 month clothes, which meant it was time to pull out the tubs of 9-12 month clothes. To my surprise, and let me tell you it was a big surprise with all the clothes he was given, that he had maybe 3 or 4 outfits in the next size. So lucky mom and dad, we have been able to buy Colby clothes, clothes and more clothes. This also means that I get to pack up the smaller clothes and put them in storage for another day.
Saturday, January 24, 2009
Rob's Web Adventures January 19-24
Well, life has been pretty busy lately. I have been working to try and grow our 11:30 a.m. Sunday morning service, The Journey, by stepping out of the 9:30 so I could put in more time and resources. It's been good so far, but preparing and preaching two sermons a week is exhausting. Luckily I will only be preaching on Wednesday nights for the next two weeks. Don't get me wrong though, I really like to preach at The Journey and its qucikly turing into one of my favorite worship services ever.
Wesley is very busy these days as we continue to grow steadily, develop leadership, and are in the midst of a logo/website/promotional materials overhaul. I am really excited about it though and I hope things will be in place by the end of next month, at least with the logo and the website.
Strangest conversation of the week was with the Wesley student leadership council. Apparently college students want to be contacted through Facebook, except when they want to be contacted through e-mail when something is important. Interesting thing happening here. Is Facebook reaching its peak? Or do college students just want to use it as a networking tool and not necessarily as a primary means of contact? It used to be no one ever checked regular e-mail, I had to contact through Facebook or Myspace messaging. Anyway, all further "important" messages to college students shall be sent through standard e-mail. What are your thoughts?
The upcoming week brings hopefully settling in to the routine of the semester and of course lots of anticipation for the Super Bowl. Let's go Cardinals!!!
Don't forget, if you want full access to family pictures and videos to create flickr and youtube accounts and connect with user name "robrynders" or robrynders (at) gmail.com
Places I went to around the web this week...
Speak Out Against Massive Budget Cuts to Education In AZ
http://www.speakupnowaz.org/action/index.php
With a new administration in the state and a huge budget deficit, Republicans have proposed massive education cuts to make up most of the budget shortfall. This will have a huge impact on everything from kindergarten to our public universities. Go to this now and contact our legislators. I wrote the following letter:
Dear Arizona Legislator,
I am the United Methodist Campus Minister at Arizona State University. I work with dozens of ASU students, all who are excellent students who have bright futures, not just in the United Methodist Church, but in their communities and in the great state of Arizona. Many of these students, who are Arizona residents, are only able to attend ASU because it is affordable. Many of them are already living on the financial edge and the proposed budget cuts to the education system would force them to drop out of school or borrow large amounts of student loan money.
Accessible and affordable education is one of the things that make this a great state to live in. By accepting these proposed tax cuts we will send a message, not only to our own residents, but to the entire world that Arizona devalues education. We will also effectively put our state into an economic tailspin as our workforce becomes less and less educated forcing companies to look elsewhere for quality employees.
This is also a moral issue. Affordable access to higher education provides students with a good moral grounding, provides opportunities for some students to break the cycle of poverty in their families, and shapes leaders for the future of our state and our nation.
These budget cuts will provide a crushing blow to an untold number of Arizona college students and I implore you to work with each other and the citizens of Arizona to find another way.
I will be meeting with many of the other religious leaders at ASU next week to discuss how we can be part of the movement to keep these cuts from happening. Unfortunately, we will also have to discuss how we are going to provide spiritual support to many of our students who will have to withdraw from school if these cuts occur. My hope and my prayer is that our latter discussion will never leave the planning stages.
Please do your part to make sure these unconscionable and immoral budget cuts do not occur. I hope to continue to tell others that Arizona is place where all of it's residents can get a quality and affordable eduction.
Sincerely,
Rev. Robert G. Rynders
United Methodist Campus Minister
Arizona State University
Slacker Radio
http://www.slacker.com
My favorite Internet radio site. I also have the iPhone app. Put in the name of an artist or band and Slacker will create a custom radio station for you. It's like Pandora and its free too!
AZGreenday
http://www.azcentral.com/members/Blog/azgreenday/
This environmental blog is managed by a member at First Tempe UMC who is a reporter for the East Valley Tribune .
Virtual Box
http://www.virtualbox.org
A great virtualization program that will allow you to run Windows in OS X. The best part is that it is free!
Wesley is very busy these days as we continue to grow steadily, develop leadership, and are in the midst of a logo/website/promotional materials overhaul. I am really excited about it though and I hope things will be in place by the end of next month, at least with the logo and the website.
Strangest conversation of the week was with the Wesley student leadership council. Apparently college students want to be contacted through Facebook, except when they want to be contacted through e-mail when something is important. Interesting thing happening here. Is Facebook reaching its peak? Or do college students just want to use it as a networking tool and not necessarily as a primary means of contact? It used to be no one ever checked regular e-mail, I had to contact through Facebook or Myspace messaging. Anyway, all further "important" messages to college students shall be sent through standard e-mail. What are your thoughts?
The upcoming week brings hopefully settling in to the routine of the semester and of course lots of anticipation for the Super Bowl. Let's go Cardinals!!!
Don't forget, if you want full access to family pictures and videos to create flickr and youtube accounts and connect with user name "robrynders" or robrynders (at) gmail.com
Places I went to around the web this week...
Speak Out Against Massive Budget Cuts to Education In AZ
http://www.speakupnowaz.org/action/index.php
With a new administration in the state and a huge budget deficit, Republicans have proposed massive education cuts to make up most of the budget shortfall. This will have a huge impact on everything from kindergarten to our public universities. Go to this now and contact our legislators. I wrote the following letter:
Dear Arizona Legislator,
I am the United Methodist Campus Minister at Arizona State University. I work with dozens of ASU students, all who are excellent students who have bright futures, not just in the United Methodist Church, but in their communities and in the great state of Arizona. Many of these students, who are Arizona residents, are only able to attend ASU because it is affordable. Many of them are already living on the financial edge and the proposed budget cuts to the education system would force them to drop out of school or borrow large amounts of student loan money.
Accessible and affordable education is one of the things that make this a great state to live in. By accepting these proposed tax cuts we will send a message, not only to our own residents, but to the entire world that Arizona devalues education. We will also effectively put our state into an economic tailspin as our workforce becomes less and less educated forcing companies to look elsewhere for quality employees.
This is also a moral issue. Affordable access to higher education provides students with a good moral grounding, provides opportunities for some students to break the cycle of poverty in their families, and shapes leaders for the future of our state and our nation.
These budget cuts will provide a crushing blow to an untold number of Arizona college students and I implore you to work with each other and the citizens of Arizona to find another way.
I will be meeting with many of the other religious leaders at ASU next week to discuss how we can be part of the movement to keep these cuts from happening. Unfortunately, we will also have to discuss how we are going to provide spiritual support to many of our students who will have to withdraw from school if these cuts occur. My hope and my prayer is that our latter discussion will never leave the planning stages.
Please do your part to make sure these unconscionable and immoral budget cuts do not occur. I hope to continue to tell others that Arizona is place where all of it's residents can get a quality and affordable eduction.
Sincerely,
Rev. Robert G. Rynders
United Methodist Campus Minister
Arizona State University
Slacker Radio
http://www.slacker.com
My favorite Internet radio site. I also have the iPhone app. Put in the name of an artist or band and Slacker will create a custom radio station for you. It's like Pandora and its free too!
AZGreenday
http://www.azcentral.com/members/Blog/azgreenday/
This environmental blog is managed by a member at First Tempe UMC who is a reporter for the East Valley Tribune .
Virtual Box
http://www.virtualbox.org
A great virtualization program that will allow you to run Windows in OS X. The best part is that it is free!
Friday, January 23, 2009
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Rob's Web Adventures January 11-17
I really don't have much time to blog in length about much and I will have a new blog dealing with religious/theological issues on the new www.valleywesley.com. What I thought I could do though was blog about some of the more interesting sites on the web I have been each week. I have interest in religion, politics, electronics, and sports. Nice mix eh? Well, here is the first batch, so check out the sites for yourselves and comment below!
Inaugural Events Schedule
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/01/16/inauguration.schedule/index.html
A good resource to keep track of the events surrounding the inauguration of the 44th President. Jan 20 will be one of the most historic days of our lives. It's really cool that it is happening after MLK day. Who would have thought that the work he did would eventually lead to an African American president 40 some years later.
My senior year of High School I was able to go on a class trip to DC to see Clinton's second Inauguration. I don't remember much from the actual ceremony other than freezing on the Capital Mall. Perhaps one day I will make it back to witness another one!
Get Afghanistan Right
http://getafghanistanright.com/
A movement of bloggers committed to pushing the discussion on Afghanistan beyond military/violent solutions.
"How to Be a Disciple"
http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=336
Great article by Dallas Willard, of which I quoted from, in my sermon today.
Phoenix Light Rail
http://www.raillife.com/blog/
We have taken a ride on the Light Rail a couple of times now to downtown Phoenix. It's not the quickest form of transportation but it beats parking downtown and I think will open downtown to so many more people. Should be interesting to see how life develops along the route in the next few years.
Consumer Electronics Show
http://www.engadget.com/category/ces/
http://www.macrumors.com
Each year the tech community gathers at CES in Las Vegas to show off all the cool new gear. Nothing too exciting for me this year. No major TIVO announcement, but Sling is almost ready to release an iPhone client, LED TV's are almost here and home media serves are getting cooler and more affordable. Oh yeah, will Windows 7 eventually make everyone forget about Vista?
Macworld was also occuring at the same time, however, nothing too exciting from there either. I am interested in the new photo tagging options in iPhoto, reverse "Rockband" in Garageband, and the web based features for iWork. Still waiting on something cool to happen with Apple TV, Blu-Ray drives, and larger SSD drives before I upgrade again.
Inaugural Events Schedule
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/01/16/inauguration.schedule/index.html
A good resource to keep track of the events surrounding the inauguration of the 44th President. Jan 20 will be one of the most historic days of our lives. It's really cool that it is happening after MLK day. Who would have thought that the work he did would eventually lead to an African American president 40 some years later.
My senior year of High School I was able to go on a class trip to DC to see Clinton's second Inauguration. I don't remember much from the actual ceremony other than freezing on the Capital Mall. Perhaps one day I will make it back to witness another one!
Get Afghanistan Right
http://getafghanistanright.com/
A movement of bloggers committed to pushing the discussion on Afghanistan beyond military/violent solutions.
"How to Be a Disciple"
http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=336
Great article by Dallas Willard, of which I quoted from, in my sermon today.
Phoenix Light Rail
http://www.raillife.com/blog/
We have taken a ride on the Light Rail a couple of times now to downtown Phoenix. It's not the quickest form of transportation but it beats parking downtown and I think will open downtown to so many more people. Should be interesting to see how life develops along the route in the next few years.
Consumer Electronics Show
http://www.engadget.com/category/ces/
http://www.macrumors.com
Each year the tech community gathers at CES in Las Vegas to show off all the cool new gear. Nothing too exciting for me this year. No major TIVO announcement, but Sling is almost ready to release an iPhone client, LED TV's are almost here and home media serves are getting cooler and more affordable. Oh yeah, will Windows 7 eventually make everyone forget about Vista?
Macworld was also occuring at the same time, however, nothing too exciting from there either. I am interested in the new photo tagging options in iPhoto, reverse "Rockband" in Garageband, and the web based features for iWork. Still waiting on something cool to happen with Apple TV, Blu-Ray drives, and larger SSD drives before I upgrade again.
Saturday, January 17, 2009
9 Months
So are little Colby is getting bigger and bigger. We went to his 9 month check up on Monday and he weighs 18 lbs. 1.5 oz. He was 26 in. long and has a big head:0 That means his brain must be big. He wants to walk more than anything, but he can't figure out how to balance all on his own. Someday it will all come together.
We are getting our second tooth, which means mom and dad get sleep every now and then. Colby has also entered the stranger danger mode, which means that he can have trouble sleeping if he has been around too many strangers during the day. We are just figuring out what to do day by day.
On a fun note, Colby had a play date yesterday with his friend Jacob who is just a few days older than him. It was lots of fun, and hopefully we will get pictures from their time at the park together soon. That's it for now.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
How to Access Pictures and Video
On the previous version of the site most were able to access pictures and video straight from the site. This, however, caused two issues. First, those with slower connections had a heck of a time loading all those photos and most were unable to watch the videos. Second, it probably is not a good idea to have uncontrolled access to hundreds of the family photos on the internet.
So here is how it works on the new site for pictures:
1. Go to www.flickr.com and create a free account then search for member "robrynders" and add me as a friend or family member.
2. If you are lucky and I approve you then you can see the family photo albums.
For video:
1. Repeat above process, but do so at www.youtube.com
2. I will again grant you access, however, no videos have been uploaded yet, but hopefully soon.
If you have any issues just call or e-mail me!
Saturday, January 10, 2009
New Website
Welcome to the New Site!
Since the inception of ryndersblog.com I had been using Apple's iWeb program. I am a HUGE Apple fan, however, iWeb was only software based and could only be updated on our iMac at home. The advantages were that we could have a "full" website with multiple pages and content directly on them.
Now I am using Blogger/Google, which means the blog can be updated from anywhere and there are a lot of tutorials for adding features that I could not figure out how to do in iWeb. There is not going to be a lot of content available directly on the blog, however, pictures and videos will easily be linked to on Flickr and YouTube.
Other features include a Twitter feed, ability to "Digg" posts, and I incorporated the new Facebook Connect tool so you can use your Facebook account to leave comments if you wish.
Anyhoo, let me know what you think. Leave your comments and suggestions below!
-Rob
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