Monthly Archives: December 2014

Fall 2010

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Moving right along, here’s another set of pictures, this one from fall 2010. Though a bit smaller than the last batch, this set covers broad ground.

For Joe, it includes his first day of real school in Junior K and his first soccer team, which some might argue wasn’t actually a team, per se, because they didn’t play games against other teams, but the kids had tons of fun regardless.

It also covers Julia’s second season of soccer, which reunited her with Molly Gosling, whom she knew literally from infancy, since Julie and Molly’s mother were in the same Las Madres group; the first grade field trip to Pizza My Heart, which seems to have had dubious educational value, but would probably rank at the top of her list of favorite field trips to date; and her trip to a Sharks game with her teacher, Mrs. Peters, which she won in a drawing at the Booksin Walkathon. She still remembers that trip as well, and when it comes up, she rarely fails to remind me that the Sharks beat the Blackhawks that evening.

Note that the pictures in this set come from a variety of sources: some were taken with my old phone; some are scans of prints; and some were taken by other parents and sent out in compressed form via email. As a result, the quality is a bit uneven.

Gallery: Fall 2010.

These Aren’t the Pics You’re Looking For (Spring and Summer 2010)

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I realize that our readership (by which I mean: grandparents) is probably vastly more interested in photos and a blow–by–blow (in some cases, literally) description of what transpired over the holidays here in San José this year, but there’s an really good reason they’re not ready: they’re not over yet. In fact, I have the week between Christmas and New Year’s more or less off this year, so there should be plenty of opportunities to shoot more pictures and video and, if previous years’ patterns hold, get them posted sometime in August.

In the meantime, we’ve had a giant pile of pictures from spring and summer 2010 sitting around, un–sorted, un–reviewed, and un–published for the last four years. This is my attempt to rectify that oversight. Note that while this may seem like a ton of photos to drop on you all at once, rest assured that these constitute less than half of the original set: believe it or not, this is a carefully curated selection.

There was a lot going on that year, including Joe’s fourth birthday and his first ride on the Junior K bus, but in going through the pictures, one particular memory jumped out at me: the ceremonial walk around the field at at San José Giants game for the kids in the Fearless Baseball program at Primary Plus. The march itself was unremarkable—just a bunch of kids in baseball uniforms wandering around a minor league ballfield, albeit with some classic Mason–and–Joe horseplay—but, following on the heels of her legendary meltdown at PAL soccer night at the San José Earthquakes, it did feature Julia expressing what can only be described as unbridled terror at being confronted by a large crowd (and probably mascots), even with Julie there to hold her hand. As we face down various manifestations of her forceful personality going into adolescence, it’s helpful to remember that it wasn’t so long ago that she was just a scared little girl who wanted her mommy.

Gallery: Spring & Summer 2010.