Vivi and I are part of a local group sponsored by the YMCA called Adventure Guides. It's a great way for dads and daughters to spend some quality time together each month, doing different activities like bowling, ice skating, sledding, and even a pine car derby.

The final event of the year is a weekend campout on Orcas Island at a beautiful camp called Orkila. We had a great time combing the beach, rock climbing, boating, making pottery and ... riding the giant swing. We had a great time, but I can't stop talking about the giant swing. They basically put a harness on you, attach the harness to a couple of ropes between trees, pull you up in the air 65 feet, and let you go. It's exhilarating and terrifying at the same time. Luckily, there were some cameras to catch this action:

I was so proud of Vivi for going on the thing, not to mention that she wanted to go to the TOP. Fantastic.

Here are some other videos from the day:

Marc and Emma (Good angle on this one, you can get a feel for how tall it is)

Dan and Hailey

Vivi and her friend Emma (just kids... yikes!)

Hailey and Grayson (note the "encouragement" to go higher.)

We spent a Sunday afternoon recently at the beach, Northwest Style. There's no sand, just rocks and pebbles and stones and more rocks. And the water, it's ice cold. It sounds unpleasant, and it is if you are looking for a typical beach. But this trip consisted of searching for sand crabs, sea urchins, starfish, sea anemones, etc. We spent a couple of hours just wandering the coast -- the kids actually seem to know more about the local sea life than us, and that is very cool.

Vivi played soccer this spring. Her team -- the Orange Crushers -- was great, the girls all played some excellent soccer and had a great time.

Here's Vivi in action during one of the games:

She's really getting good at soccer, we are very proud of the way she plays. She got some time in goal as well... nothing gets by her! (well, almost nothing)

Vivi and Maddie both had their respective spring concerts at school recently.

Here's Vivi, in the middle, ooohing along with the class:

And she got a chance to play a little xylophone as well...

Apparenty in 4th grade you learn to play recorder, as 80% of the concert consisted of recorder songs. Zamfir would be proud. It's actually amazing how many different songs you can play with the same 3 or 4 notes. Maddie shows off her skills here:

They both did a great job in their concerts!

Maddie asked for her room to be redecorated for her birthday. And given the fact that it was previously decorated 7 years ago with clowns, we agreed it was time. Vivi and Maddie pose here in the finished product.

Maddie turned 10 this year and had a swimming party at a local pool. They all had a great time. The game in this picture was fun -- they would all line up on the side of the pool, count to three and then all jump in together. They must have done this at least 20 times.

Sherrie bought an inflatable ring for each girl at the party which was a nice touch. I've almost recovered from blowing them up that morning. I don't know what is going on in this picture, but it looks like Madison (top left) is about to flip Maddie over.

Maddie enjoys some time with the "Mimos" (Malia and Maya) at the party.

Our annual Easter picture, the girls showing off their baskets. I need to compile a set of pictures like this, we take the same one every year.

We made our annual weekend getaway with friends this year -- this time to a cabin in a resort community called Suncadia, about 60 miles outside of Seattle. 6 families made it: 12 adults, 14 kids (and one in the oven). It's getting tough to get everyone there as people move away, but this year we got everyone including families from Southern California and Connecticut.

Continue reading "Suncadia 2008" »

We had a great Christmas this year as our house was filled with family - Buzz and Betty from Florida and Rob and Annette with their four kids from Dallas (at least they were at the time... they've since moved to Atlanta.) All in all, we had 12 people in the house at once which was a little crazy at times, but worth it. This is the first Christmas that Sherrie has spent with her brother in many years, and the kids all had a great time together.

Of course we had to see the Seattle sights, so we took a break from the seemingly nonstop Wii Sports play to check out Pike Place Market. (in the picture: Annette, Claire, Buzz, Vivi, Julia, Anna, Maddie, Betty, Mia, Rob and Sherrie. Brent operated the camera.)

While we were there, Anna, Vivi and Julia had their picture taken on one of the pig statues in the market.

Another outing was to see a matinee performance of the Nutcracker in Seattle. Once everyone was dressed, we managed to get this rare picture of Buzz and Betty with all of their grandchildren (6 girls, 0 boys!) The performance was great, Buzz even made it through without a single complaint!

Christmas morning was a whirlwind of gifts and wrapping paper unlike anything I've ever seen. It took a surprisingly short amount of time to unwrap all of those gifts, probably because (as you can see in the picture) all of the girls were unwrapping theirs at the same time.

Vivi got some roller blades from Nana and Papa in NY and had to get out there and try them out that afternoon.

After almost three weeks of waiting impatiently, Maddie got her new glasses. They look so cute on her! I think she's as excited to wear them as she is to finally be able to see the board again at school.

Times have changed. When I got glasses (in 4th grade, like Maddie), I didn't want to wear them because back then people made fun of people for wearing glasses. It's not even on kid's minds these days, they want to wear glasses. Weird.