Happy New Year!

I hope this post finds you and your family happy and healthy! We had a wonderful holiday that was both busy and full of fun. I even took off nearly two weeks from work and had a blast spending time with Keira, catching up with family and friends and getting projects done. The following are several photos highlighting just a few of our memorable moments.

Grace and Keira built an awesome snowman

Keira loved seeing her friends, William and Grace

We spent an afternoon at Chuck E Cheese's with Keira's good friend, Myaura

Keira really enjoys playing dress up and posing for the camera

Keira's friend, Noah, visited from Hawaii and we had a blast at Nick Universe

Opening gifts on Xmas Eve with our family

We spent NYE with our friends from Hawaii

Mark built a sledding hill on our deck stairs - it's awesome!

I'm enjoying my time back at Best Buy as a consultant. It's amazing how much less stressful it is when I can focus on a core project and not worry about the politics and extraneous work often involved as a direct employee. Sure I still get frustrated and stressed, but on the whole, it's not on the same level as when I was at Seagate, Best Buy or Select Comfort. So far, I'm really enjoying the life of a consultant. My contract technically ends at the end of Feb, but I'm hoping the business I'm on will fare well and my contract will be extended.

Mark is still at Seagate and continues to be a top-performer. Is that really surprising?! He also enjoys early morning basketball three days a week and usually leaves the house by 5:00am to do that. He's also much more disciplined than I am. I've considered getting up early and working out before work, but so far it's never happened...and likely will never happen.

Keira loves Kindergarten and has made many new friends. She's learning a ton and her reading and writing abilities have improved exponentially. It's amazing to watch her progression. She's even writing sentences. Even though the spelling isn't always correct, it's usually phonetically correct. I'm pretty sure the only thing I learned to write in Kindergarten was my name. My memory must be poor or education has improved that much - maybe both. Either way, we've been so happy with her school and her teachers.

2013 is off to a good start for our family and we hope it is for yours too!

Heartbreak and Sorrow

I would never claim the grief I'm experiencing  is anything compared to those who lost loved ones in the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting. However, I'm surprised by how greatly this horrific event has affected me. I try to avoid the media reports, yet I can't help but be drawn to the TV, the paper, the Internet - anything I can get my hands on to learn more. I want to know why this happened. I want to know how the families are coping. I want to know more, but I don't. I stare at the photos of the little children and I weep. I weep for them, for their mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers...I look at Keira and something grips my heart as I try to stop thinking about, "What if..." I see pictures of the teachers and admire and grieve their untimely deaths. It's all I can do to get up in the morning, go to work and pretend like anything I do actually matters. All I feel like doing is staying at home with Mark and Keira - I want to keep them in my sights. I want to hold Keira close to me all the time. There is just something about the innocent lives of children lost that takes hold of us and we will never forget.

"Death leaves a heartache no one can heal; Love leaves a memory no one can steal."

Back at the BBY

I started my first consulting gig a few weeks ago and am back at Best Buy working on a service called CinemaNow. It's been going really, really well and I'm very happy I made the job change. I have so much more flexibility and the work itself is much more interesting too. 

Beyond that we're all keeping busy and had a wonderful Thanksgiving. The Favres came from Ohio and Texas to Rochester and we enjoyed spending time with everyone. Keira especially loved having her cousins around to play with. As always we had our second Thanksgiving with the Huynh family at our home and that was fun too. I ate way too much...ate myself sick, actually, but it was great!

Keira had a ballet recital today. Here's a picture of our little ballerina.

The following is a link to a short video of her performance. We think she danced brilliantly...for a five-year old! Keira's ballet recital

Otherwise, our Christmas tree is up, Mark started putting lights up outside the house, and now we just need some snow!