Anya makes a beautiful watercolor painting of orca whales. The bright lightness of the work contrasts with the caption in the corner: “Watch out fishes, doom is near.”
Jan’s good thing for the day: the weekly Cozi lunchtime Texas Hold ‘Em poker game. Jan’s conservative game usually produces steady but modest gains. Today, however, a big bluff and a couple of steely-eyed bluff calls produce a huge payout. Jan’s coworker Dan, who appears in the photo, wants it to be known that none of the chips in Jan’s big pile are actually Dan’s.
Angela tells the girls they each need to eat “all the carrot sticks on your plate”. Liya quietly moves her carrots onto the table and then says, “Okay!”
Star Wars movie night. At Disneyland we noticed the girls were unfamiliar with some of the movies on which the park’s attractions are based. To address this gap in their knowledge, for family movie night (minus Bree—we put her to bed) we watch Star Wars Episode IV.
Summer camp preview. The Y camp where Anya and Liya will spend a few nights this summer offers a preview weekend in which first-time campers can spend a night at the camp with a parent. Jan goes along, and is rewarded with the chance to reminisce about his own camp experiences. Anya and Liya are especially happy to have some of their school friends there too, and the small pack of girls charges from one activity to the next.
For Mother’s Day, the girls have decided we should all take Mommy to high tea. The Fairmont Olympic does a fairly nice tea. The girls spend most of the time figuring out which things taste best after being doused in the chocolate fountain.
Jan heads back east for his high school reunion in Connecticut, and stops over for the night at Marlee’s home in Old Lyme. For Marlee’s birthday, Jan takes her computer shopping and then tinkers a bit to get the new PC all set up. Marlee’s thrilled to have a fast PC again!
Jan’s 25th Choate reunion. Jan stays in a B&B just around the corner from campus, which is convenient during the 2 1/2 days of events. Some friends he’s kept in touch with, like his first roommate, Tolomy. Others he hasn’t seen since 1986: Peter, Helen, Emily, and many more.
It’s also interesting to sit in on some classes: Marine Science, Entrepreneurism (the students pitch an alumni panel on various business ideas!), and AP Calculus. Another highlight is a tribute to former headmaster Charles Dey, who shares some interesting and candid anecdotes about the period of the school’s history when Jan and Chris were there.
Angela takes apart our old crib so we can give it away. It’s been acting as a holding pen for stuffed animals since Bree finished with it a year ago. Sniff! No more babies in the house.
Bike to School Day. On the same day as the national Bike to Work Day, the girls’ school encourages parents to bike to school with their children. Anya’s not interested, but Liya is, so Jan bikes with her to school.
To avoid the somewhat dangerous Arboretum drive that lies along our school commuting route, Jan drives the two of them to a spot just north of the Arboretum. From there, it’s about five miles along the beautiful Burke-Gilman Trail to the Fremont Bridge and the base of Queen Anne Hill. The hill’s far too steep for Liya to bike up, so we gamely push our bikes all the way up to the school.
Anya’s class launches model rockets, and Angela goes along for the show.
Game Day. The Frazers invite us over for brunch and a few hours of indoor and outdoor games. It’s actually sunny out, and they live on a quiet street, so a game of kickball turns out to be the highlight of the day.
Jan’s trying to finish “The Bead Tree”: the movie he and the girls started making last year with a friend of theirs. The video was all wrapped up last September, and has been sitting on a computer waiting for all the laborious editing. Jan’s decided to make a push and finish the movie in time for the girls to share it with their school classes before the school year ends on June 15th.
This has led to a frenzy of post-production over the past two weeks. Jan’s edited all the video (with a bit of help from Anya), and is now moving on to the sound. The background audio on the video is useless (filled with sounds of dogs barking, lawnmowers running, and Sabriya babbling), so he’s laying down separate audio tracks for voice, sound effects, and music.
Today is Voiceover Day. Jan brings a laptop and microphone over to the home of the girls’ friend Kaila, so she and her mom can rerecord their lines. It all goes pretty well, and by the evening the voice track is in place.
Only two more weeks to go…