People

Easter Sunrise Service

I realize that I’m more than a week behind in posting this. It’s been a busy time and I’ll try to get caught up shortly. Easter sunrise services are one of my favorite events. It’s partly a function of how much I appreciate Easter. To me it’s much more important than Christmas. I realize you cannot have Easter without having had Christmas but without Easter, Christmas would be meaningless. Easter also has some wonderful music associated with it and we aren’t overwhelmed with non-Easter, seasonal music as we are for Christmas.

Kaien

Pictures of smiling, happy babies are great, of course, but there’s something about a baby making a less peaceful expression that I really love. I’m not saying I want babies to cry and of course I try to make them happy when they do. But crying happens. It’s a fact of life.

The family we here for dinner this evening and I took a bunch of pictures and a few short videos. Kaien was in a good mood most of the evening and he’s a pretty easy going little boy. Later on he was getting tired or hungry or something and was a little less happy and that’s when I took this one. I wish I had been a bit farther away or had a shorter lens on the camera so I could have gotten his whole head in the frame. He was wiggling about and my tracking was a little behind. I caught the expression, though, and I think that’s the main thing. You get what you can when you can. I certainly didn’t have time to go rummaging through my camera bag. I love this look.

Becky, Steven, and Titus

I took another boatload of pictures at the play this evening. Most of those won’t mean much unless you where there and if you were there, then you already saw it. Also, unless I posted the entire cast again, I’d have to pick a picture of one or two people and leave out all the rest. Well, I guess that’s what I’ve done but instead of going with a picture of students, I decided to post this one of Becky, the fearless director of the WCA play. If you’ve ever been involved in high school drama (as if you had to put on a play to get drama in high school!) then you know how much work it is. Imagine doing that with a toddler in tow. But she pulled it off, with the help of a wonderful assistant director, student assistant director, and a host of others. Well done.

Lexi and Maria

This evening We met up with our good friend Jean and her two beautiful daughters, Lexi and Maria. We only live across the river from each other but getting together seems to get harder rather than easier. The evening rush hour is not the best time to cross the Potomac but we did and had a wonderful time chatting and laughing. Talk ranged from the serious to the silly, as it does when you’re with good friends. It’s hard to believe these two girls are so grown up, but it’s true. Sadly, Dorothy wasn’t able to be with us, but we’ll get together again when she’s home this summer.

Steve, Kai, Ralph, and Dot

We got together for a family dinner this evening at Iris and Seth’s apartment. George and Carmela had talked about being there but in the end they couldn’t because they had important matters of a canine variety to take care of. Specifically, they were picking up their new, one-year-old dachshund, Chester. But it was a fun time visiting with family, enjoying a wonderfully prepared meal, and of course, passing the baby around. I don’t think everyone had a chance to hold him but most did. We also took a few pictures (really?) and I’m particularly glad we got this one of four generations, from oldest to youngest Dot, Ralph, Stephen, and Kaien.

Lacey and Daniel

Taking pictures of newborn babies is a bit tricky. Typically they are lying down or being held that way. If they are being held, the person holding them is often moving, meaning the good angle for a picture changes from moment to moment, assuming there is a good angle at all. Newborns don’t generally make interesting expressions and asking them to smile doesn’t help very much. When they do make a good expression, the chances of them being turned away from you are fairly high, or the person holding them is talking or has his or her eyes closed or something. That isn’t going to stop me from trying, of course.

I’m pretty pleased with this picture of Lacey and her three week old son, Daniel. It isn’t the greatest picture of Lacey, who is laughing at something someone said, but perhaps she’ll forgive me that, since it’s a pretty nice picture of Daniel, who seems quite happy and content. We can’t ask for a lot more than that. Congratulations to Lacey, Gil, and big brother Tim. What a beautiful addition to the family. Thanks for letting us intrude on your domestic life for a little while.

Old Family Photographs

Cathy’s been working her way through a box of old family photographs and making some interesting connections. In the bin in this picture, the picture on the left is Cathy’s grandfather, Albert, from high school. We were hoping that we might find a picture of Ernest Hemingway, who attended the same school, Oak Park and River Forest High School, from 1913 until 1917, a few years ahead of Albert. Unfortunately, we didn’t. But you never know what might show up further down in the box.

Kai

As I mentioned in the post from Friday, pictures of this little fellow are likely to be fairly common here for a while. For one thing, he’s the cutest little thing. For another, he’s the first of the next generation, as far as my immediate family is concerned, and is my first grand nephew. We’re fortunate to have him (and his parents) living so close by. After visiting him on Friday, we had dinner at mom’s this evening because Brady was in town on business and we took the opportunity to get together. It was good to see her and everyone, including Iris, Ralph, and Tsai-Hong who were there via video conferencing on Seth’s phone.

Dot and Kai

If you think we’re going to visit Kai without my taking pictures of him, or if you don’t want to see baby pictures, then I’m afraid you’re going to be disappointed. We paid him a visit this evening (we saw his parents, too, but whatever) and mom (Dot) was there as well, visiting her great grand son. We each took a turn holding him and I took pictures of both Cathy and mom holding him. He seems to be growing well and is certainly a sweet little thing.

Cathy, Jeannine, and Lizzy

It was a fairly busy day today. We spent the morning at Cathy’s mom’s house, going through boxes of papers. We made some progress, although there’s still a bit left to do. From there we went to College Park for a graduation party for a friend. It was nice to spend time with Josh and his family, as well as his girlfriend, Lizzy, pictured here with Cathy and her mom, Jeannine. Then we went to Baltimore to visit Ralph and Tsai-Hong. After that visit we drove through parts of Baltimore we hadn’t been to before. I tried to get a picture of the Domino Sugar sign over the harbor through the fog but it was too thick and you can’t make out what the vague pink light is.

Steve and Kai

Cathy and I went to visit our grand-nephew Kai this evening. We also visited his parents, but really, we all know why we were there. But seriously, it was a nice chance to visit and of course to hold the baby, who is growing like the proverbial weed. Cathy took a bunch of pictures of me holding him, but of course I post pictures here that I’ve taken, so you are spared that. This is Steve giving him his dinner. Actually, I don’t know how you name meals when they come every two hours, but it was 7:30 PM, so we’ll call it dinner.

Masked Lunch

We had lunch with some of the rest of our family today but it was a little unusual because we all wore masks to reduce the risk of passing infection to Ralph, whose immune system is “somewhat compromised” at the moment. It was really nice to get together and have a visit. We were sorry that Steve, Maya, Kaien, and Danna were not able to join us but having a baby throws your schedule off and it can make what would formerly have been an easy outing into a complicated journey. Of course they’ll get into the swing of things soon but we all missed seeing them (especially Kai).

Glenn

We have known Erin and David since Dorothy was in first grade. In fact, Erin was Dorothy’s first grade teacher, back in the day. She and David were married the following summer and we stayed in her family’s house while they all went off for the wedding. Over the next few years we got to know them better, even though she stopped teaching to begin raising the family they have now become.

This afternoon we were blessed to spend a little time with all but their oldest, who is now 12. This picture is of number five, Glenn, who was born last June. I won’t say he’s any cuter than his older siblings were, because they all have been quite attractive (some kids have all the luck in the genetic lottery). But this is one adorable little fellow. Look at those cheeks, to say nothing of his eyes. Thanks, Erin, for letting me hold him and thanks, also, for holding him so I could take his picture.

Cathy and Dorothy Doing the Cleopatra Move

We had originally held off celebrating Christmas with Cathy’s mom because Cathy’s niece (Dorothy’s cousin) was going to be coming and we thought we’d do it while she was here. Maggie’s travel plans have changed so we decided to go ahead with Second Christmas without her. That’s why there are all those presents under the tree.

Lately Cathy and Dorothy have been watching various exercise videos and working along with them. Yesterday they were talking about the belly dancer that we saw in a restaurant in Rockville and they looked up instructional videos. Who said the internet isn’t good for anything? Anyway, they worked their way through it and this is one of the many moves they practiced.

Amy and Jon

It’s funny how some things become tradition. Thirteen years ago, Amy and Kevin invited us to their house on New Year’s Day for what Amy described as a “low-key celebration.” When they repeated the invitation the following year it was on its way to becoming a tradition. The guest list has changed with the only constant being Amy and one or both of her boys and Cathy, Dorothy, and me. Since Keven passed away, we have hosted the party and this is our fourth at our house. The aim is the same, though, a low-key celebration of the new year. As we approached the date, Amy asked if she could invite a family that she’s known for many years and of course we agreed. When they arrived, we introduced ourselves to Karen, Kyle, and Grace and to our surprise, Karen recognized Cathy. Their families knew each other back in the day. And by that I mean the 1960s! Small world.

Hannah, Rachel, and Lyla

Well, it’s the end of another year. For what started out as Project 365, with one picture a day for a year, posted on Facebook, I’ve now finished six years, 2,192 consecutive days of at least one photo a day. I just looked back at the posts from December 31, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, and 2015. Of those five posts, three of them were taken in the family room of our good friend, Stuart and Donna. They were also all taken right before the stroke of midnight. This year’s photo was taken in their kitchen about 40 minutes before the end of the year. It features Hannah, Rachel, and Lyla.

In all I took only 18,270 photographs this year, the first year under 20,000 with this camera, but that brings the total for the camera to 134,953. I had one day this year when I only took one photograph but I’ve managed to take at least one every day. The most I took in a day was only 792, which is a pretty low maximum. We didn’t take any extended sightseeing vacations this year and I had no weddings to photograph, which played a part if the lower numbers. But I’m still at it. Anyway, see you next year.