Birthday Bash

Tonight was the birthday banquet for Pat's parents, Frank and Arlene, who turned 80 and 75 respectively. There was not much of a program, just 5 tables of friends and relatives eating a yummy Chinese banquet. It was fun because my folks came, along with Steve, Karel and the boys.

I worked up a "Fiddler on the Roof" medley with the kids playing flute, accompanied by me on guitar (Borrowed from Lisa). They did great and were the hit of the party.

Frank and Arlene felt very honored and we had a great time. Ready to have a nice relaxing day tomorrow - may go the Strawberry Festival.

That's all, folks!

California, Here We Come

School's out! We are officially finished with middle school. Eric went out with a flourish, collecting academic awards in four different subjects plus a leadership award. Before we know it, he'll be joining Katie in the fall at Timber Creek High School. He's champing at the bit to join the marching band, the mighty Timber Creek Regiment.

We got up at 4 this morning to catch our 7:40 flight to LA. We're here in Cerritos now at Sherry (Pat's big sis) and Dale's house, getting ready for Pat's folks' birthday party tomorrow. It'll be a Chinese banquet with about 50 attending, including Dan's folks, who happen to be down from SF this weekend, and brother Steve's family, who happen to live here in LA all the time. It'll be the first time the parents-in-law have been together since we got married 20 years ago! A bit overdue I guess.

Eric is interested in aeronautical engineering, and Uncle Dale's is a great place to visit for that. Dale has been training to fly helicopters, and also has taken up model copter flying. One of the coolest things is a computer simulator that you plug the actual copter controller into, and then fly a photorealistic copter just like your actual one. So it's a model of a model, with amazing realism. It's a great way to learn to fly without damaging the real model. Eric spent quite a bit of time with that tonight.

Might catch the Star Wars movie Monday or Tuesday.

Summer's Almost Here!

We end early here in Orlando - May 27 is the last day of school. The typical end-of-year restlessnesss prevails at the high school and middle school.

We'll be flying to LA on Saturday to help celebrate Pat's mom and dad's birthdays - 75 and 80 respectively.

Ever since seeing Les Miserables a couple of weeks ago, both kids have been playing the soundtrack constantly on the computer as they study (mostly Katie) or play games (Eric). Mom and dad tend to get tired of it, but it's okay--we know that many parents wish their teens had such good taste in music!

We're very proud of Eric, who was recognized at the 8th grade awards ceremony for maintaining a 4.0 grade point average through his entire career at Discovery Middle School. Congratulations Eric!

MORE Music: Katie found out today that she qualified to sing in the Madrigal Choir next year at Timber Creek. This is the small, elite choir that gets to perform a lot in public. That was pretty exciting news!

CHESS * MUSIC * HEALTH

CHESS CHAMP
Actually, this happened last week. Eric's been in Chess Club for a couple of years now. It's pretty low-key, but they do end the year with a tournament. Eric had to scramble in his last game, but won it with about 10 seconds left on his clock. So he's the 2005 Chess Champ of Discovery Middle School!

MUSIC OF THE NIGHT (AND DAY)
Eric's symphonic orchestra did their year-end concert. This group is mostly strings with some winds put in to fill it out. They played a "Phantom of the Opera" medley that had some beautiful, tear-inducing moments. We were very proud of Eric as he played a couple of flute solos flawlessly.

Eric is REALLY looking forward to playing with the Big Kids in high school next fall in the Timber Creek Regiment. He and other 8th graders have already been to two "icebreaker" events where they learn some marching basics and peek at the show music.

Eric has expressed interest in starting to learn guitar this summer. Of course, Dan is excited and will try to be a good teacher.

Katie had a season-ending choir concert and banquet. She won her choir's "Outstanding Dedication" award. She's planning to be in the choir program her senior year as well.

LES MISERABLES
Dan and the kids saw it on May 8th. It was fantastic as always. Eric enjoyed it a lot, as it was his first time.

HEALTH
Dan saw the orthopedic doctor this week for a mysterious hip pain. X-rays were negative. It's "wait and see" on the hip. He also is scheduled for an MRI next week on his chronically sore shoulder. He thinks surgery is probably in his future.

WINDING DOWN
Only 2 weeks of school left, but one of Katie's 2 AP tests (Euro) was pretty much the final exam. Mostly a lot of goofing around the last couple of weeks.

Katie is considering going into teaching, so spent a couple of days this week in classrooms at a nearby elementary school.

AP * LES MIZ * HEAVEN

AP TESTS
Katie took two this week: English Language on Monday and European History on Friday. The Euro class is infamous at Timber Creek for being THE killer class at school. Katie has put in incredible hours studying for this class.

The AP Test was hard, but we're fairly sure she did okay. We can get results starting July 1.

Her senior year, Katie plans to tackle 3 more AP's: English Lit, Environmental Science, and Music Theory.

LES MISERABLES
Part of the kids' reward for doing so well and working so hard in school is, we're taking them Sunday the 8th to see the last local performance of "Les Miserables," the show we humbly think is the best show ever done. Katie's been once, in 2001, and this'll be Eric's first time. He's been listening to the music and has a grasp of the story, which is good b/c it's a somewhat complex story.

In case you haven't seen "Les Miz," we highly recommend it.

HEAVEN
I attended church in April with friends in Arroyo Grande (south of San Luis Obispo) and found that all the area churches were teaching on the topic of Heaven, and had pooled their resources to publicize the series on TV. What a great idea!

My friend Bill Kimball showed me Randy Alcorn's recent book titled "Heaven." I finally got the book this week. I have read the first hundred pages (out of 500!) and can hardly put it down.

We, believers and unbelievers alike, have often fallen for the lie that Heaven will be boring. Read this book and find out otherwise. I'm prepared to have my life changed.