Thanksgiving 2011

Time for a quick recap of the events surrounding Thanksgiving 2011.

We stayed in Spokane for the week of Thanksgiving. Uncle George, who was the only out-of-Spokane Skidmore who came to town for the holiday, flew in on Tuesday night so we spent the vast majority of Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday at Papa and DeeDee's house (Papa and DeeDee are the somewhat self-chosen grandparent names for my father and mother).

Someone let a bug into the house

We should have known something was up when Sam fell asleep at the foot of DeeDee's couch on Wednesday in the early evening. Up to that point I could have counted on one hand how many times Sam has fallen asleep while in the middle of something. To keep things simple and since we were coming back early the next day, we transferred the sleeping Sam to my parent's guest bedroom and took the rest of the kids home. At around 11pm, Isaac woke up crying, which in of itself, isn't strange; but this time the poor guy was covered in his own vomit. Between Amanda and me, we were up with him the rest of the night. The poor guy kept yaking even when there wasn't anything in him to yak. Sure enough, when we called the parents in the morning to see how Sam's night was, we were greeted with a similar report: violent, frequent vomiting. It was a tough way to start the holiday, but we were not alone. By the end of the weekend, the bug had gotten to a handful of other family members, usually knocking them out for a day or so.

The Uncle George Factor

Uncle George's presence, my older brother, adds a unique flavor to any family gathering. George has a rare combination of a truly gifted mind and a sincere desire to learn as much as he can. This probably isn't the time for a George Dee Skidmore bio, but a little background would help with illustrating what I mean. George has a PhD in physics. His focus coming out of school was nanotechnology, so I often describe him as a "nano-physicist", it sounds cooler than just "physicist". He received the inventor-of-the-year award in the state of Texas a few years back. He owns or contributed to the issuance of several patents. He is a very capable chef and he makes his own wine and cheese. And he is a skilled pianist. So George prepared a significant portion of the Thanksgiving meal, including the appetiser, which has become both somewhat of a tradition at holiday family meals and an experiment of form and presentation. This year's appetiser was titled "Cabbage Wreaths" (see picture) and consisted of several types of cabbage, prepared in different ways (boiled, cured, fried) and some other garnishments, including a beet shaped into a bow. Consistent with George's love of creating things from scratch, on Friday we pressed fresh apple cider from the apples picked from my father's trees. This is the second year that we have pressed cider at my parents house. After all was said and done, we generated 12.5 gallons of cider. The kids love to help in whatever way they can. The little kids like to throw the apple pieces into the device that shreds the apples and help to collect the juice from the press (however, they drink quite a bit of it as well in the process).

On Saturday night, George put on a 60-75 minute holiday piano concert which this year was hosted in my brother Allen's home on their newly acquired Steinway piano. This is the second year that George has put on such a concert on in Spokane; however, he has been doing this for several years at his home in Dallas.

Lastly, casual conversations with George around are vastly more interesting than your run of the mill type. First of all, they are much more factual as George will fact check, using his smart phone, as the conversation goes. There were several example of these throughout the week, one of which ended with my sister-in-law Shannan declaring "you are all a bunch of nerds" as she left the room after jolting awake after having dosed off during George's fairly technical explanation of three-way transistors and integrated circuits. I may not have adequately articulated it above, but George is never condescending or demeaning. I never feel dumb while I am around him. I am usually left feeling a new desire to know stuff and to better understand the world around me.

The Meal Itself

We (Amanda and I) provided a relish platter, pre-meal appetizer and Amanda's cheesecake, which has become a staple at Skidmore family holiday meals. As usual, we all went around the table telling what we were thankful for. Charlie was prompted by DeeDee to say that he was thankful for Papa and DeeDee's house and Sam volunteered on his own that he was thankful for starfish.

All in all a pleasant and memorable Thanksgiving. Happy to have spent it with family.

The Great Getaway of 2011

I just returned from a two-week long business trip to the east coast. It was the last of the most recent string of out-of-town business trips and I am very happy to be home. There will be more out-of-town work in the future, but for now I get to enjoy a few weeks at home, including Thanksgiving week.

It was during this two-week east coast trip that Amanda and I took advantage of a Moss Adams company perk - for anybody that travels more than 75 nights a year, the company will pay for one round trip airfare for a spouse or significant other. We decided, months ago, that this past weekend would be the best opportunity to take advantage. We booked tickets for Amanda to fly out to Pittsburgh and made arrangements to have my parents watch Sam, Charlie and Isaac for three days (and three nights). Due to a medical issue, we had to make some last minute rearrangements and the three boys ended up staying with my brother's family - three days with their cousins, whom they absolutely adore. That was probably a better result. I don't think they missed us for even one minute, not even Isaac.

The weekend was great, exceeded my expectations. Other than a seating issue with a hostess at P.F. Changs, the weekend couldn't have been better. I had been over 2 years since we had spent a night away from our kids and the first since Isaac's arrival. Amanda needed a break; consequently, we did very little. The good thing about having a weekend away in Pittsburgh, as opposed to Paris, France or New York City, is that there really isn't a ton of stuff to do, comparatively. The Steelers were out of town, so the downtown area was quiet and uncrowded. We got a great hotel, right downtown, directly across from the two stadiums (Heinz field and PNC park) and within walking distance to almost everything downtown that was worth seeing. Although it was early November, the sun was out and the temperature hovered around 60 degrees. We slept in, took walks, did some shopping, overate at some great restaurants and had several, much needed, uninterrupted conversations. I was great to reconnect. We both became a bit sad as the departure time of Amanda's Monday morning flight neared, but reality could not be escaped.

We are very grateful for all those who made it possible for the getaway to happen: parents, sister-in-law, my employer, Delta, Marriott Hotels, the TSA. We are very blessed to be surrounded by family and friends. For the next getaway, I am not sure that Pittsburgh will be the first city on our list, but for the 2011 getaway, it was perfect.

It's been a while

I'm feeling somewhat inspired by a fact that I recently learned about my mother. Apparently, for a period of time beginning shortly after parents were married (summer of '68, a year before Bryan Adams picked up his first real 6-string) my mother would write a weekly letter to her parents and in-laws. The key subject matter of the emails was the goings on of her family, with a significant focus on her children - my brothers and me. These letters were retained by my grandmother and are now being organized and bound in a book/binder by my mother. What a cool thing to have. The only thing that I have that is remotely similar to this are the letters that I sent to family during the two years that I spent as a missionary. Those missionary letters, coupled with a journal that I kept fairly well during that time, are priceless and I am happy that I have, at least, some of that period of time documented for future prosperity to enjoy. The thought that someone in the future (most likely a child or grandchild of mine) will want to spend their time reading about my life leaves me feeling kind of arrogant - often times even I find the details of my daily life quite unenlightening. However, I am very grateful that a life sketch, or mini autobiography was put together on my grandfather's (dad's dad) life. It has allowed me to learn about him in a way that I was not able to before. By the time I came of age, my grandparents had either already pass away or were well into their twilight years. The pictures are almost as fun as the text.

The thing is we don't communicate in even remotely the same way that our parents did (my parents are 70+). Letters were much more common. Long-distance calling was very costly and communication via computers didn't exist, in fact, during the time frame during which my mother was writing her letters, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs hadn't even begun to conceptualize the personal computer. Letters leave a great trail, are easy to document and retain. What is a good equivalent to that now? Personal emails? Text messages? Twitter postings? Facebook postings? I really don't think that I want my Facebook history to be used as my personal life history. Cell phones, VoIP, Skype and other facetime gadgets eliminate historical costs of long-distance calling, so we do that a bunch more, leaving less reason to write letters or email that would contain family history type communication that is retainable.

Long story short, I think that regular postings to a blog, like this one, could be a good way to communicate the goings on in the Skidmore family and, if retained, could serve as a make-shift family history. Consequently, I am going to make it a goal to post something weekly and I will encourage my wife to do the same (her excuse for not posting is that she is not a good writer, well neither am I, as evidenced above, but I am not going to let that be a deterrent). I suspect that I will look back at these years of my life with a great deal of fondness. Our boys are Sam, Charlie and Isaac are 5, 3 and 1, respectively. They are so much fun and are still so innocent and sweet, eager to learn, fascinated by new things and want to spend time with their dad. I hope that never changes, but I am sure that it will; but when the day comes when they begin to ask what they were like as kids, I hope to have some good answers for them and some documentation to back it up.