Happy New Year

Happy New Year

Happy New Year

Anniversaire de Mamie

Tonight we celebrated Mamili's birthday at home, so Nathan and Sidney discovered the rest of their French family: Tata, Jordan, Ruben, Grand-mamie, and Tonton. Nathan spent his evening playing with Ruben and hugging him: he loves "bigger kids". Dinner was delicious and desert was outstanding with Lenotre's new Devotion cake. However, Ruben had a Feuilles d'Automne and Jordan a Schuss...

Au revoir Papie...

Luis Miguel...

Beloved husband of Sylvia, loving father of Linda and Diana, adoring grandfather of Alexandra, Jordan, and Ruben and great-grandfather of Nathan.

b. December 22, 1914
d. August 4th, 2008


You are in our hearts.

Mommy Shower

On Saturday, Monica and Ana had organized a "Mommy Shower" at the Secret Garden Tea House to celebrate the arrival of bebe Fell #2. The theme was around pampering... of Mommy, of course!

It was a real pampering event indeed: wonderful afternoon with friends around tea and sandwiches, lots of gifts... Just heavenly!

From left to right: Sierra, Ana, Deborah, Monica, Alex, Belinda, Janice, Nicole, Michelle, Natasha, Lauren

Leadership Discussion: Night Out

Tonight I got together with a bunch of industry peers (currently working at places such as RedHat/jBoss, WS02, MySpace, and BrightIdeas) to discuss leadership, and how the lack of leadership in a company can turn a great idea, excellent technology, and a solid group of passionate people into... well... nothing.

That being said, the company we were focusing on in particular has recently helped renew my faith in the Venture Capital system, as the CEO was demoted to CMO (chief marginalized officer) to make way for someone with hopefully a shred of leadership potential.

I hope that this company can turn itself around and that this fixes its leadership vacuum.

Giants vs. Cubs (*Cubs win!)

Steve (a season-ticket holder) invited me to come with him to a night game at AT&T park yesterday. The weather couldn't have been better, and we both had a great time talking, watching, eating, and drinking.

The whole time we were there, Steve was worried that he would get horrific heartburn from all the garbage we were consuming, while I wasn't concerned at all.

Last night at 3A I woke up with said horrific heartburn and Steve, by all accounts, had none.

Picnic at Paradise Beach

Belinda (and Steve, and Eva) organized a picnic for our whole crew at Paradise Beach park this weekend. The friends, food, and location was fantastic! And the kids, who last year were much easier to handle, had a lot of fun running around and playing in the dirt!

Charlie and Sam at Web 2.0

At the web 2.0 show

Jury duty

So I was called in for jury duty on Thursday, and luckily I avoided being placed on a 2-month trial. However, out of one frying pan and into the fire I went... I was part of the pool for a 2-week criminal trial involving (er... I can't tell you that) which required I come back in today for a second round of selection.

Now, I don't mind doing my part for our judicial system, showing up and basically wasting two days of "productive work time." However, I do think it's a little obnoxious that in order to have the priveledge of wasting my time inside the jury selection room I must also waste my time in an enormous line to get through security.

Luckily, I wasn't selected for the trial and life will go back to normal, tomorrow.

Valentine's Day Potluck

Ya Vote!

When I went to my polling place (which was listed as "Garage, 1027 Lincoln Avenue") to participate in the super Tuesday primary election today, I was very surprised that I never had to show any identification in order to cast my vote. All that was required was my stating my name and confirming my address.

Nathan's 1st Birthday party

Nathan had his first birthday party today at the South Beach Harbor community center.

We were planning to go there to set up right after Nathan's nap (10 or 10:30A) but Nathan amazed us by sleeping until 11:30A. It made setting up a little bit of a rush but luckily Lois and the Sorkins showed up first and helped out by babysitting Nathan and blowing up balloons.

The other casualty of our late arrival was the forgotten packet of plastic utensils we left at home (doh!) -- Thanks to Tea, Ana, Nena and Mirko who brought some utensils with them and saved us from having to eat birthday cake with our fingers!

We had SO MUCH FUN and are so blessed to have had so many friends and family come out to help us celebrate (and clean up after...) Nathan's big day!

Nathan the Birthday Boy!


...pushing Kati around in the Radio Flyer

...calling the store for an emergency milk delivery ("does that come in a pony keg size?')

...getting ready to (watch Deborah) blow out the candle

...asking Eric to take this nice "family portrait" so he can reminisce about "the good old days" when he's older (2?)

...and finally, taking a picture of the "King for a day" after Bill found the "Feve"in his piece of Galette des Rois

1 an déjà

Thanksgiving with Debbie and Betsy

The Halloween Party

Monica, Bill, and Sophia invited us all over to their home for a halloween potluck. The kids and the parents all had a great time, and Maggie (the dog) managed to get out alive!

Nathan and Sam are published!

My photographer friend, Aurélie, had an article published about her work in the French quarterly magazine Paroles de Mamans in the september-october-november 2007 edition featuring Dads. There are two photos of Nathan and Sam taken by her last May on page 3 (photos 3 and 7, left to right and top to bottom).

Sam the Frenchie

After a generous amount of paperwork, a letter of motivation, an interview in French, and a one-year waiting period... I received my French Citizenship!

We were all really shocked at how easy, relatively speaking, it was to get citizenship. As Robert said, "there is not a long line of clients."

The whole troupe went along with me to pick up my paperwork. There was no champaign or baloons (quelle tristesse!), only a print-out of the declaration des droits de l'homme and the Marseillaise (which I don't think I'll learn... it's a little scary). Robert and Linda invited us to lunch at our favorite international airport restaurant, "FireWood," before Robert boarded his plane to return to my "other mother country."

Vive la France, vive la republique!