Harvard Ballroom Competition - The Simmons Get Good News

Last Sunday, Susan, Hannah and I set out for Harvard for the Harvard Ballroom Competition. Leaving at 8:30 am, we drove for about 2 hours: just in time for the 11:00 am start. Hannah's friends Sarah and Danny drove with us.

Prior to that, a group of eager young ladies had descended on our home for coffee and last minute practicing at 7:oo am. Watching how much energy they had made me feel even older and grumpier than usual.

Harvard, Yale, Brown, Columbia, Dartmouth, and others we present. Simsbury High School was one of only three high schools that fielded teams.

Hannah danced Bronze Swing, Rumba and Foxtrot with Saira: the young lady in the video that I posted earlier. she switched to another partner for the Waltz. I'm sorry I can't remember her name, but she's featured in the picture here. Hannah received call backs for all of the dances except the Waltz, made most semifinals and placed in the Swing and Rumba. We're happy for her.

The next competition will be held at Yale on November 14th.

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Many of you know about Owen Simmons. For those that don't, here's the run down. Owen is my cousin Andrea's son. He was born with HLHS, hypoplastic left heart syndrome (1/2 a heart) and has made it through 2 open heart surgeries. He is currently in heart failure which is managed by medications until he receives the gift of a new heart.

Owen and Andrea have recently been to Stanford, for what they thought might be hospitlization leading up to a heart transplant. However, they weren't sure that Owen was strong enough to make it through surgery. Carson, Andreas husband, remained at home in Arizona to with their daughter Kamryn.

As it turns out, Owen's heart is stronger than they thought, and he was released from the hospital. Looks like Mommy and Owen will be at home for Halloween. For the complete story, check out the Simmons Family Blog here.

Take care Simmons family, you are in our prayers.

Sadie meets the water

Two weeks ago, Susan and I took Sadie for a walk down to the Farmington River. We wanted her to splash around and go for a swim. She's a Labrador after all.

Well she wasn't too sure about the water. She went to the edge, drank a little water, dipped her toe in and flopped around on the muddy bank. Didn't even chase the people in the canoe drifting by. Maybe she'll grow into it eventually.

The picture attached is of the old bridge over the Farmington River, that serves only foot traffic now. Volunteers from the community maintain the flowers and plants that you see. We needed to cross the bridge to get to a place where we could easily descend the bank.

More to come soon.

UCONN Ballroom Competition

Hannah competed in the UCONN Ballroom competition last weekend at the University of Connecticut. This was, I think, her first competition dancing at the Bronze level. It was also the first time that she didn't lead every dance.

Hannah and her partner, Saira, are jiving in the semifinals in the video below.

Allow me to explain a little about these competitions, for those of you who don't compete or don't have children competing in them. They are all day long events, typically starting at 08:00 am and wrapping up about 12 hours later with an awards ceremony. This means that Hannah gets up around 3 am, to shower, primp and power slam coffee before connecting with her team at the school around 5:45 am. When the day is over, they're just pooped. This time around Hannah danced in shoes that were slightly too small with resulting blisters roughly the size of Montana. I carried her inside around 8pm. Gritty performance.

September 27, 2009 Draft Blog Posting

It is almost the end of September, and I have not updated the blog since July. A slacker, perhaps. I had intended to post a new entry after returning from the cottage in late August. We had a nice time visiting with family in Michigan. Located in The Sleeping Bear Dunes National Seashore, the Jillson cottage is a nice retreat. While there, I played a few rounds of horrible golf and visited the Cherry Republic with Susan and the kids. Erick's good friend, Derrick Magnun came along and was a good sport. He even survived unscathed the nearly famous Peanut Butter war at Dearing's grocery.

On the way home, we were able to spend a few days with my folks in Cleveland before I needed to return to Connecticut with the boys; Susan and Hannah went to stay at her Mother's house before driving to Indiana pick to up our newest family member, Sadie. A sweet little black lab, who was born on July 1st, Sadie endeared herself to the family quickly. Here is a photo of the little girl on the 7 hour car ride from the breeder. She found the nape of Susan and Hannah's neck the ideal place to cuddle: never seen a dog do that before. Since her return to Connecticut, Sadie has gained about 5 pounds per week. Her paws keep getting bigger.

Hannah has started high school! She is earning good marks in the ninth grade at Simsbury High. This morning Hannah and her team had their first ballroom inter district of the year. The UCONN Ballroom competition is next weekend, as is homecoming. Hannah will be dancing the weekend away! The UCONN team asked Hannah to join them but she had already committed to the high school team. She will try to practice with the UCONN team on Sundays.

Erick is enrolled at Tunxis Community College. He and his longtime girlfriend, Evangeline have classes two nights a week. Erick also got his driver's license earlier this month. He took his written test in June but had to wait until September to take the driving part. He passed on the first try. As we were walking out to the car with the new license in hand, Erick tells me that we need to go back in an stand in line again. Why?, I ask. The DMV had marked “female” rather than male on his license. Just about no one wants to go back and stand in line again at the DMV, but our other options weren't very attractive.

Gavin is not enrolled in Tunxis yet as he simply waited too long to get the ball rolling on his transfer from Northwestern prior to registration deadline. I'm fairly certain that he plans to start up there in the spring. He is working lots of hours at Andy's Grocery Store.

Susan is still loving her job and it is going very well. Once a week her co-teacher Denise, “Nise”, comes over for lesson planning. They put out a monthly newsletter about what they are covering in the classroom so the parents are kept up to date through the school year.

Leaves are starting to change color and fall. The temperature is also falling. I am hoping to have plenty of cool New England small town photos for the next posting.

Gavin Turns Twenty

Two simultaneous posts: I know, it's weird. However it didn't seem right to put the photo from Gavin's birthday into Hannah's post. A separate post seemed more appropriate. Check out the huge candle in the cake. Dinner was my responsibility that evening; I forgot the birthday candles.

It's weird that G's no longer a teenager. While sitting down and thinking about how old we're getting (yes, that's a bald spot in the last post), I thought about how much the world has changed since Gavin came into the world. Here's a short list of things that come to mind:

• We've fought in two wars in Irag and one in Afghanistan. Except for the first gulf war, the outcomes and long term impact are still uncertain.


• There was no internet in 1989. Ok, there was a an internet, but virtually no one was using it. Personal computers ran MS/Dos or an early Mac OS. No one surfed the web. I got my first windows computer with AOL in 1995. We all sat down in the family room and cruised the web at 28.8 speed.


• Cell phones were the size of small boom boxes with huge antennas. Today, kids don't even talk on them. At least my kids don't.


• VHS was just beating out Betamax to become the standard. No one was watching movies on DVD.


• Music was purchased on cassettes, but CD's were becoming more common. Today, CD's and record stores are becoming a thing of the past. iTunes and iPods have fundamentally changed the industry. I saw an interview with Richard Branson of Virgin Atlantic recently; he was announcing the closure of the last Virgin Megastore in the US.


• The Berlin wall fell, Germany was reunited and Russia became a democratic country, or did it?


• Many South Africans lived under Apartheid. Mandella was an opposition leader yet to lead the country through the truth and reconciliation process.


• Gavin has lived in Cleveland Heights, Rocky River, North Royalton, Gurnee, Grayslake, Shaker Heights, and Simsbury. He's gone to elementary, middle, high school and is now in college. Happy birthday, Gav!

I'm sure I've missed a ton: if you're motivated, add them to the bottom of the post.

Jeff

Hannah Rides, Play Basketball with Dad

Hannah has worked this summer at a stable in Granby, Connecticut. Each summer the stable holds a day camp for little children. They ride, learn about horses and generally have a good time. Hannah helps with the horses and looks after the kids.

In return, her riding time is complimentary. Saturday mornings have become the default riding time. Driven to the stables by Mom, Hannah will spend several hours riding. Here's a photo of Hannah jumping. A rumor exists that Susan also did some riding, but there are no photos that exist of this. An inside source tells me that she also jumped. Next week's mission: get photos of Susan jumping.

I'm throwing in this photo of the daddy daughter basketball game. Hannah is celebrating a basket that she made from the top of the key. I've just gotten the rebound.

Hannah & Christina

In March of this year, Hannah's good friend Christina moved back to her home near Manchester Center, Vermont. While she had only lived in Simsbury for about nine months, Hannah and she became fast friends.

Early in June Hannah made the trip to Vermont (about a 3 hour drive) to see Christina's graduation and spend some quality time with her BFF. Dropping her off, and being a complete geek, I realized that there was a historical landmark on their property. Situated right next to her house was an 18th century blast furnace used in the revolutionary war era. It's worth mentioning that her home is right near the Bennington battlefield site, where Hessian soldiers were defeated soundly during the war.

I digress. After the graduation ceremony, Hannah and Christina returned to Simsbury for two full weeks of fun. The two of them palled around and generally had a good old time seeing old friends and attending end-of-the-year parties.

All photo credits go to Susan, who made multiple trips to Vermont.