Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Daddy Baby Trip to Phoenix & GreenBuild


This last week Boston and I (Jason) spent 5 days in Phoenix. My primary reason for going was to attend GreenBuild, which is hosted by the U.S. Green Building Council. As many of you know, in June I took the LEED A.P. test and I am now LEED accreditted. This is a designation that denotes that I have at least basic understanding of green or sustainable building construction, practices, design and operations. Certainly I am anxious to gain more hands on experience, but at least I have accomplished the initial "book smarts" of sustainable design. Feel free to ask me about it, and I can tell you as much as you want to know. Anyways... this conference was a perfect place for me to network and connect with potential employers and learn about sustainable products available in the market place. I attended a job fair on Tuesday, then a full day of conference on Wednesday and Thursday. Friday I took the day off to play with my favorite little baby! Boston came with me to Phoenix because Kathy (my mother-in-law) wanted to take care of Boston and play with him. This gave Emy the opportunity to get ahead on some school work and relax some! We sure did miss her, and she claims to have missed us more!
On Friday Boston and I started off the morning playing at home, getting in the hot tub, taking a nap, and then going out for lunch! We had so much fun. Look at us at our "lunch date" at Pita Jungle which is really tasty if you ever get the chance!
At the conference I got to go to the Keynote opening plenary where Al Gore spoke, among others, and Sheryl Crow put on a really good concert! ( A full hour of her singing!) I wasn't to sure about what Al was going to say, but turns out he was very funny and a great presenter.

I was in the FRONT ROW, so I was like 10-15 feet from Sheryl!
Boston and I rode bikes around some on our free time. The weather was GREAT. One evening we rode a few miles to Ice Tango which has great frozen yogurt! We ended up going there 2x other times with Will and Kathy, they love it even more than us!


The first morning we were there, we went on a nice ride as well! Boston loves riding in this seat, we need to get one so we can go on rides at home (when its not snowing...)

The last morning we were there, I was determined to run a 5k with Boston. I was planning on running the 5 k that was hosted by the GreenBuild Conference, but it got cancelled last minute, so I found another race on google that was out in Mesa! We showed up 15 minutes before the race started, signed up and took off! I don't know what motivated me to run the race, because EmyLee will tell you, and I agree, that I'm not too anxious to go running here at home. I just wanted to do it, and thought it would be a cool memory with Boston. We did alright, finishing around 29 minutes. I thought that was descent given I never run, and I ran with Boston in the jogging stroller! All in all we had a great time in Phoenix! Thanks Will and Kathy for letting us stay with you!