It’s been a busy day as we celebrate Jessica’s birthday. Although the day isn’t over, and we still have a nice seafood dinner at home to look forward to, we’ve already crammed a lot in. Before I get to everything we’ve had going on, I want to wish Jessica a very happy birthday. I love you, I love our family, and I couldn’t be happier. Thank you for everything you do, and know that we love and appreciate you so very much!
Before getting out and about for the day, we had a visit with a contractor this morning about replacing our front porch. This was a project we wanted to do last Summer, but it never quite worked out, so we decided to put it on hold for a bit. Anyway, there’s a guy named Jeff that we’ve seen around our neighborhood a lot over the past few years. He owns a house around the corner which he rents out, so he’s frequently over there, but he’s also frequently on our street because several of our neighbors have hired him for different house-related projects.
A few weeks ago we hired him to power wash our house, clean the gutters, clean the roof, and treat the roof to prevent moss from growing. He was a pleasure to work with and did a great job, so we decided to ask him about building a new front porch. He came back over this morning to take a look and measure everything. Hopefully it won’t be long before we get a bid, and depending on how that turns out, we could be starting this project sometime soon. Jessica said multiple times this morning that if it all works out, this would be the best birthday gift she could ask for.
After that we headed down to Nothing Bundt Cakes in Mill Creek Town Center to pick up Mom’s birthday cake. Last Sunday, on our way home from hockey, Ava and I stopped by there to order the cake. I let Ava pick everything out and she did a great job. It’s a chocolate-chocolate-chip cake with a beautiful purple flower, purple crown, and a flag saying “Happy Birthday Mom”. Ava did a great job picking everything out and we were really happy with how it turned out. Obviously we’re looking forward to enjoying it for dessert tonight. Chances are we’ll even have enough left over to enjoy a Grandpa Elmer Breakfast tomorrow morning.
After taking the cake home, we headed out for family brunch. We decided to try a new place, and I’ll admit the food was good, but it was so crazy busy that from the time we put our name on the list until the time we were actually eating, it had been just shy of 90 minutes. As you can imagine, we were all a little cranky (or should I say hangry) by the time our food arrived, but it was delicious and we all had a nice meal together.
Once our bellies were full we decided to swing by Costco on the way home so I could pickup groceries for tonight’s birthday dinner. The menu includes some beautiful King Crab legs, seared scallops, shrimp, corn on the cob, and of course, our double chocolate bundt cake. After dinner we’re all going to sit down for another edition of Family Movie Night. Tonight we’ll be showing a classic from our childhood that we think the kids will enjoy – ‘Honey I Shrunk the Kids’.
As usual, we’ve got plenty of other good stuff in the works. Earlier this month we purchased plane tickets to Las Vegas. We’ll be going down the final week of June for a week of warm weather, swimming, lots of quality time with family, arts and crafts with Nana, and plenty else. My mom is really excited to have us, and we’re particularly excited to have a warm weather family vacation. Every time we go somewhere as a family it’s during the winter, so we’re looking forward to this change of pace.
By the time we go to Vegas it will have been exactly 6 months since our last trip there, and I won’t have taken a single day off work during that timespan. Our fiscal year ends on June 30th, and the second half of the fiscal year is always busier than the first, so to go that whole time without a vacation day can be a bit exhausting. Due to this, I’m taking a few more days off when we return, which will be capped by the 4th of July. Between vacation days, weekends, and the holiday, I’ll have a total of 12 consecutive days off. Glory.
Related to work, the new menu I’ve been developing for azure.com went live this past Monday. It took me five full weeks of development time, and I’m still working on documentation for it. For comparison’s sake, the startups site that I built earlier this year took 6 weeks of development time, and that’s an entire website. Although it looks pretty simple on the outside, the new Azure menu is the most complicated front-end feature I’ve ever worked on. There are actually 3 menus in one (mobile, tablet, & desktop), it’s localized into 26 different cultures, it contains 2 different types of search functionality, it gathers analytics on all user interactions, and much, much more. My ultimate goal with everything I do at work is to create the most possible impact I can for my team, and considering this feature is included on every page of the website, it can’t really get much bigger, so I can’t help but be proud of it.
Finishing it last week and getting back to normal was nice, but I look forward to another big project, hopefully soon. In the meantime I’ve got a fun event to look forward to this week. Basically Google recently reached out to Microsoft in anticipation of them releasing their new mobile search algorithms in July. Basically they’re going to start ranking searches from mobile devices differently, and they wanted to give us a heads up so that we’ll have time to update our websites as necessary. They certainly didn’t have to do this, especially since we’re competitors, but we’ve formed a partnership on this, and this Thursday there’s going to be a hackathon on our campus amongst Google and Microsoft engineers to start making mobile-specific updates.
Owners of each major Microsoft website were contacted about this, and my manager chose a handful of people to represent our site, myself included. I’m excited to be part of the group, and am taking the work seriously. Search Engine Optimization is really important for us, so we can’t afford to get this wrong. It’s going to be a fun day of collaboration with Google, and a nice Happy Hour to follow. These are the kinds of perks and learning opportunities that make me love working at a company like Microsoft.
Okay, back to family stuff. Elise has been working so hard at dance and is very excited for her upcoming recital. In all honesty I think it’s her ballerina costume that she’s most excited about (such a fashionista this one is), but I know she’s also very excited to perform. It’s become obvious to me over the past 6-8 months that Elise is a natural performer. She loves telling jokes and making people laugh, she’s musical, loves dance, and seems to have some natural acting chops. Like Ava, she has recently started expressing interest in acting in a play. I certainly did my fair share of acting as a kid, so it appears the apple didn’t fall too far from the tree.
In addition to her recital in June, Elise is also very excited for her birthday party with Webbly, the frog mascot for the Everett Aquasox, on July 14. She definitely understands that she’s getting an extra special birthday party this year, and the excitement she continues to show is super cute. She’s nearly finished with pre-school and can’t wait to join Penny Creek as a kindergartner in the fall.
Enzo is doing great and growing fast. His vocabulary continues to exceed his age, and he’s about as hot and cold of a kid as I’ve seen. Luckily the hot outweighs the cold, but it’s not uncommon for him to get mad at you, say something like “you’re being rude at me” for no apparent reason, and demand a warm bottle of milk. The thing is, the bad mood never lasts long with him, and without notice he’s liable to start laughing, hugging you, and saying things like “I love you with all my heart.” He really is a sweet kid.
Between school, hockey, and swimming lessons, Ava is as busy as ever. She’s been struggling with swimming, but had a breakthrough lesson this week where she willingly put her entire head underwater. This was a big deal for her so Jessica and I were really happy. We just want her to be comfortable and safe in the water, and we’re committed to continuing with swimming lessons until we reach that point. She also has perfect attendance at school this year, which we’re very proud of. As it turns out, due to her being such a natural social butterfly, the best way to punish Ava is to threaten to keep her home from school. Just the mention of it will straighten her out quickly.
Last Sunday Ava started the new Spring hockey session with Washington Wild. This is now her 3rd consecutive session in the Hockey 2 program with them, and the progress has been really noticeable. I’ve been there for every class and it’s been so cool to see her go from the beginners group to the advanced group. She has also qualified to play in their 3 on 3 league this summer, but her ultimate goal is to join a team, which she will be doing this fall. Regardless of how far she goes with hockey, the lessons she’s already learning about teamwork, listening to coaches, and self-improvement, will stick with her for life. Although I will never force her (or any of our kids) into an activity, I really hope she sticks with it. Her natural talent is obvious, and seeing her having so much fun on this ice is always a pleasure from my perspective.
Working on Sunday nights has been working out well for Jessica. Although going to work isn’t something most people think of as ‘me time’, when you compare it to full-time care of 3 small kids, it kinda puts things in perspective. Considering that it’s only one night a week, Sundays are a laid back night, and she gets to see people we’ve both known for many years, you can see how it’s the perfect gig for her.
Over the past couple years Jessica has become really involved in the local rock-painting community. Despite her modesty, she definitely has artistic talent, but beyond that, it’s her generosity with her work that impresses me most. It seems like every week she’s working on a rock for a sick kid, or someone who has recently suffered some type of misfortune. It gives her great pleasure to do nice things for complete strangers, which I think speaks a lot about her character. The funny thing is I asked her for 2 rocks about a year ago (one with the Vancouver Canucks logo and one with the Alice In Chains sun logo), and am still waiting for them. She’s always busy with other projects, but assures me I will receive them when least expected. I’ve had to remind her that Seattle is getting an NHL team in 2020, so the Canucks won’t be my favorite team forever.
One more thing about painted rocks; last weekend the weather was nice, so we went for a little rock hunt at a nearby park. There’s a big forest behind the park, and through her social media connections, Jessica knew about a special hidden rock collection in this forest called ‘The Dragon’s Nest’. The location was a secret, but you could get clues on social media. By the time we were going as a family, Jessica had already been there once before, but it was my first time, and I believe Ava’s too. We actually ran into other people in the woods who were also looking for it, which was a little awkward because it’s supposed to be a secret, but they were cool and weren’t there to steal all the rocks. Finding it was cool – it’s hidden really well, and there’s quite a few rocks there, each of which is painted with some type of dragon artwork. The idea is to only take as many dragon rocks as you leave, which we did. Unfortunately some people are jerks and take all of them, which is why they have to be careful about hiding them.
On our way walking through the woods I could hear the faint sound of clanging metal. I didn’t think much of it, but it all made sense a few minutes later as we walked around a corner, and suddenly, about 20 yards away, I see a man wearing a full suit of armor, like total Knights of the Roundtable style. Then I saw a few more in similar garb not far behind him. I have to admit for a second I was a little worried for my family’s safety – after all several of these guys were carrying broad swords, but I’ve seen enough episodes of Game Of Thrones to know how The Hound would deal with this situation.
The funny thing was the kids weren’t even slightly fazed by it. The just walked on by as if we weren’t in close proximity to a bunch of nerds LARKing in the forest. I, on the other hand, couldn’t divert my attention. They had a BBQ going, a few of them were choreographing a sword fight, and seemed to have been there for quite a while. I got a particular kick out of their shrink wrapped case of bottled water, like the kind you buy at the grocery store, which didn’t feel very authentic to me. Shouldn’t they have goblets, or mead, or something? I’ve never seen anything quite like it, but to each their own I guess. After all, we were out there on a rock hunt searching for a ‘Dragon’s Nest’, so who are we to judge?
Guess that’s all for now. I always feel like I’m forgetting something when I wrap a post up, most likely because I am, but I digress. In short, all is quite well, but it’s all happening a little faster than we ever expected. Happy birthday to my love, my best friend, and the best Mom our kids could ask for. I love you. Here’s a few recent pics.
A birthday pic with Mom and the totem pole
We had fun a couple weeks ago at Madi’s party. The girls were more than happy to ‘help’ her open presents.
Our family-style anniversary dinner
They love coming to guitar stores with me
A visit with Wild Bird at one of Ava’s hockey practices
The start of the Spring session has arrived!
Our neighbors had some concrete work done. Enzo was just a little excited to have a cement mixer on our street.
Elise enjoying the nice weather in her favorite sundress
Enzo had a fun beach day with Mom and friends. I can’t believe his sunglasses aren’t upside down.
Happy Birthday Mom! Not sure why Elise is holding a baby photo of herself, but I love it.
