Kid update

 Annelise finished out her Freshman year of field hockey and had a nice season with some good contributions to the team and the fun of being part of a high school level team.  We went to the banquet and it sounds like this team has a bright future ahead of them.   Annelise and her coaches are pictured below as well as her defending on our new turf field stadium.  Her other strong interests are music where One Direction is a big hit for her and her sister.  

Isabelle also played field hockey this fall and it seems her year round love is equestrian.  She is riding for Park Place Equestrian Interscholastic Equestrian Association team as well as continuing with Chagrin Valley Farms.  In IEA they blind draw horses they have never been on and then ride against riders in their class to be judged.  She is quite good at it and great with the horses.  It makes the sport more affordable as you don't have to own a prize horse to win in competition.

Heidi and our friends Dave and Cordula Faiman at the Alumni meet held Friday of Thanksgiving weekend each year.  HS swim meets take about two hours and you know most of the kids so it is actually quite fun to be there.

Connor is a sophomore now in high school and swimming 18 hours a week and on varsity.  He is lifting and conditioning and working hard on school work to make it all happen.  Amazing what kind of fitness levels you can achieve with that much effort.  We have seen big time drops in his second year swimming at this level.  He does a 50 meter swim in about half the time it takes his dad.  He also has his drivers permit and has mastered stick shift driving on his Subaru Forester.

Too long since last post

I guess it has been a busy summer because we are now in fall. I have a new video of Isabelle to share from her first Interscholastic Equestrian Association team competition today.

Isabelle Horse Show

Paris Trip

We got the chance to go to Paris as a family a couple weeks ago.  We borrowed an apartment from a friend with a view of the Eiffel Tower.  It is amazing how you can just stair out the 7th floor window of this apartment and look at the tower.  Maybe it was time spent catching your breath from the walk up the 7 flights of stairs.  No matter, those stairs were in Paris!  We tried to do as much as possible in the 6 days we had their.  Louvre, Versailles, Pompidou Center, Cluny Museum, Arc de Triumph, Montmartre, Notre Dame, Latin quarter.   The kids were the right age to appreciate it all.  15, 14, and 12.  Annelise celebrated her birthday there.  Working on the photo and video for youtube, look for a link here when it is done.  I credit Heidi with making this happen.  We celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary over there and it was very special.  She is an excellent planner.

Isabelle wins series Grand Champion at Chagrin Valley Farms 18" jump divisionClick here to see the 2:30 film

Frederik Back to Normal

I just saw what a gruesome picture I left as the last post and I think that Frederik deserves better. He has healed up great and is really back to his old self. The other eye works fine and you could say you can't tell the difference. Except for people who meet him. There is something about an eye that seems special. If he lost half his ear there would be much less reaction. Particularly because routinely 2/3s of the ears of Great Danes are chopped off anyway. Now if only he would bear weight on his left rear leg. Not much we can do about that. He was 5 last December 16th.

Frederik loses an eye

Our Great Dane had a progressive cataract in his left eye for the last year. In the last few months the eye had become irritated and his vision reduced to shadows at best. Then he started rubbing his eye and sleeping a lot. He seemed like he was not comfortable. So Wednesday we had his eye removed and he is feeling much better and just looks to be winking. Hard to see him getting older.

Swim Chronicles

Meet Connor. Freshman in highschool. For years he played baseball and soccer. But when highschool came along, it was clear that the local experience in those two sports would not be enough to get him on the HS team. So we made a deal. If he did swim team, he could buy himself an Xbox and all the first person shooter games he wanted. Little did he or I know thatit would result in him having a shot at earning a varsity letter as a freshman after swimming 16 hours a week since September 6th. Now on the eve of JV champs, Connor is in the shape ofhis life and shaved and ready to go fast in Canton tomorrow. So proud of his efforts and zero complaints. Thanks to Dan McGovern for pushing him in summer swim team to go for it and Matt Davis and staff for getting him through his first season.

Cancer Never Wins

I have a childhood friend, Fritz, whos sister Jane has been battling rectal cancer for years now. She writes an amazing carepages update which is often filled with very powerful, insightful thoughts on living with cancer. I want to post a quote from Jane I read today which I think is important and makes a strong point. Here it is:

"So I battle. Not with cancer - I have a problem with that word, "battle," when it comes to the cancer experience. It is an obvious and useful metaphor - battle, war, warrior, soldier - I get it. But then what happens when one passes? We say they "lost the battle" or "after a long battle with cancer" or words similar. Believe me, anyone who has had cancer doesn't need to be saddled with being named a "loser" in any sense of the word. What does that make cancer? The victor? Yuck. Cancer is never victorious."

I liked to say battle cancer. But I just might change that thinking based on Janes comments. I will still say survivor, because to me that denotes winning. Heidi gets her 1 year scan results back tomorrow and I am happy to say I can attend the appointment with her to support whatever we hear. It is one thing to be along with the cancer survivor to hear the results, it is completely different to be the cancer survivor getting the results. I will try to remember that.

Reserve Grand Champion for Isabelle

You have to love a sport where second place is called "Reserve Grand Champion". It seems only dog shows where you can win "Reserve Winners Bitch" for second place rivals this. So that is what Isabelle did a week ago on Kitty. As you can see from the photo she competed in 5 classes 3 Walk, Trot, Canter over crossrails and then two flat classes. She got two firsts, a second, third and fourth. The sum total of points made her second best on the day. This was done on her new saddle which she is so proud of and now has displayed in her room. So the slippery slope of the equestrian world is luring us in. We are now looking into her riding on an IEA team in the coming months. That is the equivalent of the school riding team.