June 13, 2004
Well it has been more than a long time since I've last updated our web site. So much has happened!
Most importantly, John just finished his second season here at Yale with much better results. His first recruited class, this year's freshman -- were third at the IRAs (National Championships) and narrowly lost to Harvard (by 4 seconds) at the two mile Yale-Harvard race this weekend.
John's Varsity 8 was 7th at the Nationals (up from 15th last year) and lost to Harvard by 25 seconds (down from 50 seconds last year). Vast improvement!
Today the season ended and we are getting John back for the summer. He's off to Ireland with friends to ride his bike for 6 days beginning June 23rd, but other than that, we should be seeing a lot of him.
On the family home front: all is well. The boys have had a terrific year here in New Haven. They have made wonderful friends through their new school and love their lives here. Thomas is on the fourth Harry Potter book (yes, the 800 pager). He is very advanced for his grade level in reading and math. He's read all four of the Harry Potter since May 1! He reads as fast as I do. He has also made great progress in Book 2 of Suzuki violin and is (sometimes) enjoying that activity too. Most importantly, he has made a couple of good friends and seems to be more secure than we've seen him for a couple of years. His best friend, Griffin, lives in Branford -- on the way to Madison -- so we should see a lot of him this summer.
Jake has had a great year as well. He has made enormous progress on all the academic fronts and is starting to read with more ease. He is very much "grade level" in all his subjects, but continues to excel at making friends and at artwork. His artwork was amazing this year, clearly he continues to be imaginative, perceptive and can concentrate for long periods on creative tasks. He's playing piano now and is progressing well. His recitals have been terrific. He seems to know just how to step it up a level when he's playing to a group. A born performer. Jake has lots of friends at school -- seems to know all the kids at every grade level. He's always saying hi to kids and teachers .
Both kids are playing soccer and baseball this spring. I'm coaching their soccer team and they have a great baseball coach as well. They've learned a lot about field position and strategy. Tommy has gotten 10 hits this season and a couple of weeks ago, Jake got his first hit of the season. There was just a little bit of excitement over that!!! John plays assistant coach to the baseball team whenever he has time from coaching.