Celebrating the 24th

It may not have been how we imagined it.  We tried to get away for the weekend, but work ran late on Friday and we couldn't hand off our responsibilities on Sunday.  Brett's toe was giving him trouble too.  We made the best of it and did some new and familiar things.

Having an early lunch at the Crepe place in Turlock.

Mimosas and sharing one delicious and one sweet crepe.

Followed by a round of golf, nine holes was all that was needed.

It helped that we warmed up at the driving range before our round.

Then a Lincoln Brewster concert, the former lead guitarist for Steve Perry.

Couldn't get over the awesome high backed chairs.

 

Baseball Season Begins

We had the opportunity to get the gang back together and all play ball together in the perpetually age extended league to accommodate Garrett and his group.  This year, Bryce has stayed healthy, but we lost a different son to a toe injury that hasn't improved since January despite multiple treatment courses.  Brett is assistant coaching when he can make it.

Bryce mans second base and has played in the outfield too.

Garrett playing first base, he has also pitched and played the outfield.

Garrett pitching.

Garrett pitching with Bryce at second.

Griffin has missed most of the season with a toe problem that led to surgery.

 

Western Area ICC Tournament

Being a part of hosting the Western Area tournament means responsibilities for everyone in the family for the whole day and even part of the day beforehand.  Brett was given more responsibility in Tab, including putting the ballot packs together and finding which things weren't printed as per the print order.  Then he was joined by Mark for the third straight year to keep everything entered properly as they came in.  Wisely recruiting some help at the end to get all the final ballots into the student's envelopes for distribution after the celebration.  Joy was in charge of the evaluator orientation and coaching the evaluators through the process of filling out their ballots, answering questions aplenty.  Garrett, who graduated from competing, evaluated and ran the sound/tech booth for the celebration as well as speaking at the alumni event and sharing part of this journey.  Bryce and Griffin competed in the event.   Bryce was celebrated as being a part of the ICC intern team for 2025.  Griffin carried additional responsibilities of being one of the MCs for the showcase event.

Family picture after Showcase, Brett said he didn't need to dress up since he was hidden away in Tab all day...

Griffin and Jake finished the day ranked as the top two competitors.

Griffin, Caleb, Chloe, and Jake were the MCs for the showcase.

Garrett shares as an alumni on the student panel.

Leadership at chapter:  Jonathan, Griffin, Caleb*, Chloe, Isabella, Sasha, Bryce.

Grammy and Poppy take a moment to smile with Griffin.

The students are ready and waiting to hit round one.

Bryce leads his round table team.

Caleb C, Jake, Griffin, and Luke gather.

Garrett helped test pilot the on-line evaluator group.

 

Intern Announcement

After the long weekend of the film competition, we were given the news to share with Bryce that he had been accepted on the 2025 ICC Ambassador team as an intern.  Garrett helped make a video of Bryce and we had collected numerous interviews of people reflecting on his journey over the week in preparation for the announcement on Sunday night.  Joy made a pizookie honoring the event.  We watched their movie at our house after the deadline to turn it in at the State.  Then there was the additional video to celebrate Bryce afterward, which he enjoyed and appreciated.

Bryce holds his pizookie.

Gathering with the Garcias and Heatwoles.

Getting to see Breakout film project completed.

 

Ovechkin Watch

While the film competition went on, Brett took Joy and Garrett to the Shark Tank for a perfect day of midday hockey.  We ate lunch and walked to the game.  It was the Sharks vs the Washington Capitals for the Caps only visit to San Jose on the year.  Alex Ovechkin (8) was chasing Wayne Gretzky's goals scored record in the NHL and he did not disappoint, recording goal #887 of his career.  In the meantime, the Sharks boast two of the best rookies in Macklin Celebrini (71) and Will Smith (2) with Celebrini pocketing the Sharks loan goal of the day.  Those were Brett's two goals for the game and he got both of them acknowledging that the Sharks (worst record in the NHL) were not going to beat the team with the best record in the NHL.

The crew for the game.

Ovechkin and Celebrini in the same picture!

Ovechkin celebrating with his team after goal #887.

Seeing the retired numbers of Thornton (19) and Marleau (12) in the rafters.

Ovechkin sends a pass to one of his teammates.

Celebrini scores!

 

Breakout

Bryce and Griffin joined up with Chloe, Jake, and Caleb (in Saipan) to compete in a 48 hour film marathon.  They spun a wheel for a genre of film, landing on thriller and had to include a canned food item and the line "I'm glad someone finally noticed."  They planned on Friday night and then got up early on Saturday to start filming with the plan to hand the editing over to Caleb who could work during the "night" which was his day.  Well not everything went according to plan as the filming lasted until about 5am on Sunday morning.  The product, a five minute film, was edited and paired down from what was originally about 10 minutes, which included cutting some of their favorite scenes that they spent hours getting the right angles on.  They were invited to the State Theatre to watch the premieres of each film and then the winners were announced at the end with Breakout taking the winning film for youth.

Garrett took his brothers to the State Theatre for the  premiere.

Celebrated on stage and asked to give a speech which each of them did.

Their film being shown at the State.

Debriefing the night's events.

Early morning start, waiting with Chloe for Jake.

 

Golf Adventure for Three

Joy, Brett, and Garrett took a late afternoon venture to the golf course to see how many holes they could get in before sunset starting at 3pm.  Well the answer was about 15 holes, their first time on the back nine with some amazing things, like sinking a shot from 75 yards away that rolled onto the green and then disappeared...into the hole!  Another hole where all of us were on the green after one shot, albeit was a hole that was under 100 yards in length, but we are improving our accuracy.

Sun is going down, how much we got left?