Read all about it

Leah's August News is here. Can you believe she's going to be nine on Tuesday?

Summer Concert in the Park

Mercer Island sponsors public concerts each Thursday and Sunday evening at the Mercerdale park downtown, so we went there last night to watch.

Leah hung out with her friends, Nathan ran with his, while Martha just ran around near the stage.

Boating on Lake Washington

Our friends Mark and Elaine own a 9-person speed boat. They took us for a spin last night on Lake Washington, leaving from the south end of the island. We had dinner in Kirland, on the other side of the lake, and then came back again at sunset.

Fishing Lesson

Nathan and Daddy went to a two-hour fishing lesson sponsored by the Parks & Rec department. We learned how to tie a fisherman's knot and a few other things.

The instructor says there are plenty of perch in Lake Washington and that it's easy to catch them from the dock, especially if you go from 4-7pm. 

Five pints of jam

An hour of raspberry picking left us with way too much to eat. So Stowe took some jars, pectin, lots of sugar, then boiled some water and made this. 

Our first baseball game

We live a short and convenient 20-minute bus ride from SafeCo field, home of the Seattle Mariners, so you might expect us to make the trip regularly during baseball season. Apparently not. Through a remarkable oversight on the part of their sports-oriented father, we have not been to a single professional sports game! In fact, other than a couple of pro games I saw in Japan, I have never been to a real game either!

So when my office decided to hold a group “morale event” with families at the Mariners-Tigers game, we just had to go. Mom and Martha stayed home, but Nathan and Leah were surprisingly eager to see what it was like, and even more surprisingly we all had a great time.

On the way to the game, we happened to chat with another Mercer Island couple who were obvious, big Mariners. When they asked who we hoped would win, Leah immediately said Seattle, but then I pointed out that Grandma & Grandpa are from Detroit. To which Nathan, our precious conflict-avoiding middle child said “I hope it’s a tie”. As it turned out, the Mariners lost badly. We left at the end of the 8th inning, thereby missing the only Mariners hit of the day.

The kids had a great time, so will we ever go again? Tickets are $45 each (even for kids) and the food prices are outrageous ($4 for a bottle of water?!?) Still, I suppose I owe it to Martha to take her. So who knows, maybe we'll make that bus ride again someday. 

Stars of Neillsville High

I missed my 25th year high school reunion last weekend because my parents were in town for a long-planned trip out here. Fortunately Jimbo kept me in the loop, even filling out my class directory entry. Now Mark Foster sent everyone an email to a linked video from 1981. [click on the photo to watch]

You might notice that some people are featured very often in this video, at the expense of others who only have a cameo appearance or two. Back in high school, such grumbling about the "ritzy people" who get all the attention forced Mark, who made the film, to stand in front of the class and deny that there is any such bias. "Who are the ritzy people?" he asked, "I'd sure like to meet them."

So those of you from the Class of '81 who have wondered all these years, I'm pleased to announce that I was one of the Ritzy People. Yes, along with Jerry Poppe, we ran the school social scene. Notice how Mark had to redo the soundtrack for the Internet version? He did that because well frankly, too much of the dialog is about me. Do a frame-by-frame inspection and you'll see that Mark carefully edited out that scene of me with the cheerleaders--no doubt to spare embarrassment from my wife, to whom I am now happily married. So thanks, Mark, for your discretion.

That said, I admit to a little disappointment that, along with the missing scene of me driving Laurie and Cheryl around in my Corvette, it appears he also eliminated the famous shot of me catching the winning touchtown pass that at our senior Homecoming game. Anyway, the video was getting long so I suppose something had to go. But if you just want to see the scenes of me that are left after the editing, you can skip ahead to the following parts:

4:30: banging a book on my desk
5:25: with Jim, I'm at the back of the class reading a computer printout
6:14: reading a book
7:42: Jimbo by himself in the back of the class
9:39: I was editor of the Warrior Post (our school newspaper)
10:00: getting makeup for the class play
10:25: I’m at the far right, barely visible in front of Jeff Thoma
14:32: Jerry Poppe

To watch the whole video click here [Windows Media Player required] 

Nathan at Fort Worden

Daddy and Nathan spent the weekend at Fort Worden, not far from Port Angeles in Western Washington.

Watch the video:



Or click here for a higher-quality version if you have a high-speed Internet connection

Martha's Concert

Click here to see Martha sing "Go Tell it on the Mountain" with her buddies at preschool.

Leah's Dance Recital

Leah has been taking dance lessons for over a year, and last weekend she was able to show off in a performance before a large audience at the annual Definitive Dance recital.

(click on each photo to see a video clip of her performance).
Here she is doing hip-hop dancing. 

Chess is Cool

Chess instructor Elliott Neff, second from right, checks out the board as Nathan Sprague, right, decides his next move in a tournament game against Christopher Dierkes on the last day of Chess4Life camp April 13.

[From a longer article in the Bellevue Reporter, Apr 26-May 9, 2006] 

Back from Disneyland

We're back from three days in Disneyland.

Richard's sister Connie joined us. A good idea, since it ensured that the adults were not outnumbered by kids. 

Manhattan Beach

These kids really love the ocean.

 

Happy Birthday Martha

Watch Martha blow out birthday candles in this 2-minute video clip of the festivities on fourth birthday. 

Lucky Leah

Look who found a four-leaf clover! And not just one, but two!

 

Happy Easter

The weather cooperated long enough to let the kids go searching for Easter eggs in our back yard.

Watch this 4-min video to see all the fun.

(this video is about 65MB in size, so if your computer has under 500MB of RAM, you may want to right-click and save-as to your hard drive before playing)
 

Easter

Blood donations

Chess camp

Biking through the tulip fields

We spent the weekend in Skagit County, where the tulips are just starting to bloom. The trip highlight was Saturday morning when we participated in the annual "Tulip Pedal" bicycle ride, a 20-mile course through fields of flowers.

[watch the video]