May has been an exciting month for us on multiple levels. Earlier this month, Elise graduated from elementary school, and like her sister a year before, she had the pleasure of giving a speech during the ceremony about her 5th-grade teacher. She worked hard on this speech, and although she later said she was nervous while delivering it, you couldn’t tell while listening. Elise has been attending acting classes for the past few months and they seem to have paid off. We’re so proud of her, not only for having the courage to get up there and deliver this speech but also for all the work that went into it. She is now officially done with elementary school and will be joining Ava in middle school next year.
In addition to wrapping up her first year of middle school, this has been an exciting month for Ava due to the fact that her softball team, the Henderson Hawks, won their second consecutive championship in the 12U age group. After starting the season 1-1 during a double-header, they never lost another game all season long, including the playoffs. Ava’s improvement this season has been such a joy to witness and I felt lucky to be a part of the team as an assistant coach. We’re already looking forward to our next season in the Fall and Ava is determined to improve this offseason just like she did during the last one.
Another thing the girls have been working on that I’m very proud of is that they have both done more than 60 consecutive days of foreign language lessons on Duolingo! Ava is doing Japanese lessons while Elise is studying Italian, and they’re both obsessed with making sure they always do their daily lesson. I can relate, as it was only a few years ago that I finished all of the Italian lessons on Duolingo. I never missed a day in over 3 years, so it makes me proud to see them both doing the same thing on their own accord.
Enzo is now finished with 3rd grade and is excited to be on Summer break. It’s hard to believe that he is our only child who still attends elementary school. Although he hasn’t been as busy as his sisters with activities, he still loves to shoot hoops at home, go swimming, ride bikes, and play catch. He did very well in school this year and is excited for 4th grade, just not too soon.
Jessica recently made a big decision that we’re all very proud of. During the next school year, she will continue working as an assistant in her school’s special education classroom, but she will also be taking classes to get her teaching certificate. She plans on taking over a class of her own the following year! This transition has been on her mind for a while but she recently decided that the time is right. This summer she will be preparing for the entrance exam and looks forward to starting her classes in the fall.
Monday was also an exciting day for Jessica because we went out shopping together as a family and got her a nice new bicycle at REI. Ava has outgrown her old mountain bike and has recently started riding Jessica’s bike, then Enzo moved up from his old racing BMX bike to Ava’s old mountain bike. This left Jessica without a bike so we decided to check out REI’s Memorial Day sale. We ended up finding the perfect bike for her and are excited to do more family bike rides this summer.
Earlier this month we celebrated Mom by getting out for a Mother’s Day hike at Red Rocks. It was Jessica’s idea, which was a big deal for her because she hadn’t been hiking since her accident last fall. We started early to avoid the heat and enjoyed all the beautiful scenery. Elise and Enzo got to sit in a bright green Lamborghini at one of the rest stops, and we even got to see some ancient petroglyphs painted on one of the rock walls.
On my end of things, I’m now in my 3rd week working at Unabated Sports and I love it. I still can’t believe I’m working in the sports betting industry and I have to chuckle when I think about my Dad working as a bookie for my entire childhood. I like to joke that he was the original “work from home” and now here I am working from home in the same industry. At least I don’t have to worry about getting arrested though.
After one day of onboarding, they threw me into the deep end with a complicated task on my second day which took a couple weeks to complete. Our CEO later told me that it was the most complicated first task anyone had ever received at Unabated, which made me feel good because it wasn’t easy. More importantly, it’s an awesome company to work at and I’m excited to start work each day.
At my last job, I had a daily meeting at 7:00 am Pacific time, so I’d wake up by 6:40 and hop online just in time. Now, I wake up at 5:30 am to work out, do some Cappers work, clean up, and then still be online for my day job by 7:00. I love having those early mornings to myself and feel like I have already accomplished something before my actual workday even begins. I’m learning a lot about sports betting and also becoming a strong engineer from this role, so I have already started applying some of these new things to Cappers. It’s an exciting time for me.
This weekend we will be driving up to Colorado to hang out with Grandma and Grandpa Martin. We were originally going to leave on Saturday but Ava’s softball team is holding their end-of-season party that day so we decided to push our travel plans out by one day. The weather should be pretty good so I’m looking forward to taking one of their Harley’s out for a spin. Camping in the Rocky Mountain National Forest should be a lot of fun, so I expect next month’s update to be a bit longer than this one.
We’ve got a lot of good stuff to look forward to this summer, and I’m so proud of Jessica for the commitment she has made. See you next month with an update about our latest trip to Colorado!
