"Nature has been for me, for as long as I remember, a source of solace, inspiration, adventure, and delight; a home, a teacher, a companion."
— Lorraine Anderson
Jim and Linda Travel Some More
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Jim and Linda at Thanksgiving
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Polar Bear Sticks out Her Tongue
Jim and Linda are traveling frequently as they age. We are planning two or three trips a year at least until 2016.
Despite having visited every continent on the planet, the intrepid birders kept up the pace, traveling to
Svalbard in the high Arctic, and Southern Ecuador.
We sent out trip reports on both trips, which are online, so we won't repeat those. We've collected photos from the trip:
In April, we traveled back to Austin and Houston for Lindsey Hargrove's wedding to Michael Raspino. We drove one more time, and spent some time driving back to California, birding along the way. We frittered away the rest of the year playing with grandchildren and celebrating various holidays.
Another Grandchild
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Family Pose with Newborn Nico
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Scarlet Is Not Sure
Nicholas James Hargrove Ricci arrived as planned on June 4, 2013. He weighed almost twice as much as Scarlet had at birth and continued growing apace.
He is blessed with a great set of lungs that he uses whenever he is hungry, which seems to be fairly often. One of his nicknames is “Bruiser”. Scarlet, after
a couple of days to think it over, wasn't sure we really needed a new baby.
Claire and Ron: Property Moguls
Claire and Ron's old condo wasn?t big enough for their expanded family, so they found another in the Potrero Hill area of San Francisco.
It is close to AT&T Park, where the SF Giants play baseball, as well as Ron?s office. Claire has a shorter commute to Children?s Hospital Oakland due to being closer to the Bay Bridge.
Their old condo, meanwhile, has been leased to someone from New York City, who thought the sky-high rent was quite reasonable.
In addition, they are remodeling Rancho Relaxo, their weekend place near Philo in Mendocino County, to have bedrooms and a bath on the second floor to accommodate more guests.
Charles and Amy
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Charles and Amy as Princess Leia and Darth Vader
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Charles with Kiera, Kai, and Scarlet
Charles and Amy continue to excel at as parents. Both worked part time in 2013, Charles by choice and Amy the result of the ?layoff rip off.? Alta Bates, where she had worked full time, laid her off, then hired her back as a part time independent contractor without benefits. She has spent several months searching for a better job.
Her search finally paid off on the last day of 2013, and she now looks forward to a better job with shorter hours for more pay.
Meanwhile, household chores and child rearing, are divided nicely, and the spice rack is still in alphabetical order, so something is working right. Amy continues to amaze us with her ability to create Halloween costumes, as shown in the photo
Charles has joined the “Maker Revolution. ” He started by making his own beer (pretty good) and moved on to mead.
That required honey, so he began raising bees. Alas, that experiment ended in tragedy as the hive all disappeared one day. He intends to try again in 2014.
He is also starting to work on 3D printing, which we all think will be the Next Big Thing. We'll let you know how that turns out.
Charles and Amy continued their Christmas tradition of an Iron Chef party. We failed to place again.
Kai and Kiera
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Kai shows one way to use chopsticks
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Kiera imitates her Auntie Claire
Our older two grandchildren are growing up. Both are in school at nearby Harding Elementary, a short walk from home.
The school has a lot of activities for parents as well as children. Charles works with the Dad's Club frequently.
The photos prove that Kai is a typical seven year old boy, and Kiera is a typical tomboy.
Comensals
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Chipper in one of his favorite spots
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Cash
We reduced the cat population at our home by one, returning Cary to Austin, where he now lives with our niece Panika. We still have Cary's sister, Cash, and The Min,
a street cat that adopted Linda in Austin. Chipper meanwhile actively protects us from dangerous animals in the yard. Unfortunately, the most dangerous one around is a
striped skunk. Despite four encounters, he has failed to learn to leave it alone. Aren‘t poodles supposed to smart?
On to 2014
Standard apology for the lateness of this report. Hope you have a wonderful 2014. We look forward to welcoming any visitors to our home in Oakland whenever we are there.
Drop us a line and let us know if you like this report. If you think we should simply use Twitter and Facebook instead, we'd like to know.
