2023 in Review: Happy New Year!

We enjoyed another "week 1" in Utah while the kids were on their college winter breaks, joined by Karen's Dad and Leo's Mom and Sister. Snowbird created a new system where you can pay a bit extra to skip all the lines, so we splurged on that for the biggest powder day. Karen felt a bit guilty skiing right past all the poor people waiting in the giant line, but she is also extremely impatient with lines and it was really wonderful to get in more beautiful powder runs. The other bright spot of the trip was Leo's amazing new 80s style ski suit. It's quite something! Utah album

Looking through all of photos from February, our month was apparently 99% hanging out with our cats and foster cats, but we did have one exciting outing when we finally won the Hamilton lottery and got front row seats! We stopped at a Chinatown bakery to pick up a dinner of savory and sweet pastries and it was a perfect evening.

In March, Karen and Leo took a lovely week-long cruise to the Caribbean. We enjoyed hiking, caving, tubing, dancing, swimming in a waterfall, several lovely island tours, and renting a private speedboat for the day (with some other ship guests we found online). Leo teased Karen about stealing a kitten right out of the hands of a child, but in her defense, she was in cat withdrawal. The only sad thing is that we came down with COVID shortly after our return but luckily we had pretty mild cases that just felt like colds (likely helped by our prior vaccines and our Paxlovid prescriptions). We greatly appreciate Leo's mom and sister who brought us medicine, vitamins, and treats to help us feel better. Cruise album

In May we were headed to Pittsburgh for Greg's graduation from Carnegie Mellon, so we decided to turn it into a fun road trip with Leo's Mom and Sister. On the way there, we stopped by Watkins Glen (unfortunately the lower trail wasn't quite open yet, but we took the rim trail and that was also very cool), the Corning Museum of Glass (this was the first museum Leo and family visited after coming to the US and they remembered it as being amazing but weren't sure if that was accurate and now we can attest that it is indeed incredible!), and by Lake Erie (hiking along the lake and visiting the Maritime Museum and USS Niagara).

Julia flew in to meet us for the actual graduation weekend. After a wonderful few days of graduation celebrations, on the way out of town we stopped by "the famous house" Fallingwater by "the famous architect" Frank Lloyd Wright. Gregory had never heard of either of these and claimed that Karen didn't understand the meaning of the word "famous". It lived up to the hype (that apparently only some of us had heard of)! Then we spent two nights with Karen's cousin Jimmy and his husband Thomas, who run the wonderful Country Hearth Bed and Breakfast in Lancaster, PA. Our final hurrah was to stop by Valley Forge on the drive home. It was not a completely authentic Valley Forge experience since we had beautiful weather and started the day with a three-course breakfast from the B&B, but was certainly very interesting (note: if you are currently confused about what breakfast has to do with Valley Forge, read this). We drove all Greg's stuff back and he moved back home (which some people and some cats were very excited about). Greg graduation week album

Graduation season wasn't over yet! Next on the agenda was Karen's niece Grace's high school graduation. It was extra fun because she was one of the graduation speakers, as the top ranked student from the Medford Vocational High School. She did a great job with her speech and we were very proud! Grace graduation album

June's next celebration was Leo and Karen's 25th anniversary party! We opted for an outdoor shindig at the pavilion at Rocky Woods Reservation which nicely matched our casual style. We had a tasty catered lunch and cupcakes, volleyball, croquet, Lego flowers to put together, and canoes. There was a brief downpour to make things interesting and then the sun came out again! Original wedding album and 25th anniversary party album

Karen was excited to have a mini reunion at our house with two of her college friends, Gigi and Katie, along with their families.

We took a long weekend out in Western Massachusetts, including hiking, swimming, visiting the Norman Rockwell Museum, and an especially fun tour of sculptor Daniel Chester French's studio and grounds. He created the statue of Abraham Lincoln in the Lincoln memorial in DC. Western Mass album

Karen's Dad had a trip to Greenland scheduled for 2020 which had been repeatedly pushed back due to COVID, but 2023 turned out to be the magic year when it actually happened! He had a week in Iceland planned after the Greenland expedition, so we decided to meet up with him. Iceland Air allows free layovers for trips to Europe that we decided to take advantage of, so technically we had a 3 day trip to London with a 7 day layover in Iceland. In London we crammed in as many museums as possible. Greg claimed it was museum overload and that he wouldn't be able to set foot in a museum for the next year.

Our city whirlwind was followed by a week driving the famous Ring Road to see the beautiful natural sites in Iceland. Highlights included hot springs, waterfalls, glaciers, hikes, and a lava show. One crazy moment was an insane swarm of black midges near Lake Myvatn at which point Greg threatened to just stay in the car that entire day. Luckily Bepa found a bug net that could cover his entire head and then he was willing to venture out. Greg was also shocked by the prices everywhere we went in Iceland. He would gasp anew at each menu we opened and as a protest he refused to order any drinks or desserts. London/Iceland album

A bunch of us attended the Tufts family day in October, where we all trailed Julia around campus like ducklings.

For Thanksgiving, the four of us drove to Lancaster for a wonderful 3 days of food and games with Karen's cousin Jimmy, his husband Thomas, and Aunt Marilyn and Uncle Jim.

And finally our last hurrah for the year was a big family trip to Virginia Beach, where we rented an Airbnb together. It was quite a long drive there and back, but on the way there we stopped by this really cool Hindu temple in New Jersey. We enjoyed lots of sights in Virginia (sometimes splitting the party), including Colonial Williamsburg, Cape Henry Lighthouse, Virginia Aquarium, Virginia Beach Boardwalk, Pleasure House Point, Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge, the Military Aviation Museum, Disc Golf at Munden Point Park, and Chrysler Museum of Art. We also played lots of bridge and games, soaked in the hot tub, challenged each other to foosball and skeeball (in the game room at our house), went kayaking in the canal, and gobbled up all the delicious food prepared by Leo's mom. One quite amazing time was when Julia and Grace decided to go swimming in the ocean, despite the water temperature being only 50 degrees! Random passersby saw them in their swimsuits and expressed their amazement. Meanwhile Katya also intended to go in but said it became too painful after going up only to her calves! We also were able to have lunch, a walk, and dinner with family friend Jean Ruffin who lives in Virginia Beach. It was really lovely to see her again! Virginia Beach album

Leo continues to enjoy his work with WB Games Boston. He and Greg share their love for the online games Rocket League and Marvel Snap. In addition to his usual interests of bridge and disc golf, a new interest this year is building Legos and other brick sets with Karen. In the Summer, he got to play in the Chicago NABC (North American Bridge Championship) GNT (Grand National Teams) representing District 25. He also enjoys our semi-regular Friday dinners with work friends, weekly online bridge and board games, and the new Pathfinder campaign Karen and Leo joined (with our friend Dan as game master!)

Karen is still liking her work as a solo Salesforce consultant for nonprofits, and her side hobby fostering cats and kittens. This year we had 23 fosters for the Medfield Animal Shelter, which brings us to 126 fosters total! We had our shyest foster ever, Brie, where after a month she was still hiding all the time, but the big success was that she would occasionally thrust up her hips for more pets. We also had several more intense medical issues, one mama kitty named Margarita who had a fever of 106.6 and needed an IV port overnight and one little spitfire kitten named Peri Peri who we had (along with her siblings) for multiple months while we tried to figure out why she had stunted growth and elevated liver values. Both got better and were happily adopted. Karen is very grateful to her friend Beth for cat-sitting for our resident cats and fosters several times this year. One fun thing from this year is Karen and Leo are trying to complete 25 dates before their next anniversary. Some highlights so far include Ed Sheeran and Aqua concerts, a leaf peeping hike, indoor mini golf, glass blowing, an arial adventure park, and more.

Some of our fun dates

Gregory is back at home (for now) and enjoying working as a software engineer for WB Games Boston. He and Leo share their love for the online games Rocket League and Marvel Snap. In order to play at the same level as Leo in Rocket League, Greg only drives backwards, which regularly amazes their opponents. He also still enjoys playing online games with his four best friends from high school and occasionally hanging out with them in person.

Greg and Bliss and Greg with high school friends

Julia has continued to love her time at Tufts! She is currently in her junior year, is studying Computer Science, and has continued to be actively involved with JumboCode and Tufts Engineers without Borders. She is still TAing for the CS department and this Fall, she started TAing for Machine Structure and Assembly Language Programming (CS40). Over the summer, she worked as a Robotics Intern at Tatum Robotics and has continued her work part time this Fall. She also traveled to Malawi with Engineers without Borders in late August. A couple more highlights from this year include a Montreal trip with friends for Spring Break, camping in NH, lots of hiking, sunsets, game nights, picnics, and more! She is so excited for next year! :)

Julia in Montreal and Malawi

Our resident cats (Bliss, Rosie, and Momo) are cute and happy. They had a few accidental encounters with foster kittens this year which were very surprising for them, and also multiple encounters with some mice who made the mistake of trying to move in (these encounters sadly did not end well for the mice but were very exciting for the cats). We got them a fancy litter robot that they are still trying to decide whether they will actually use.

Cats!

Wishing all our friends and family a happy and healthy 2024!

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