2010
Copyright © James W. Blilie, 2010: All rights reserved
Phyllis and Jim's family photos - Main Page
Phyllis and Jim's family photos 2010
2010 turned out to be one of the most eventful years we can remember. It felt like, from March through October, that there was never a weekend without plans. Please see the photos. The year began with lots of snowshoeing. We got out snowshoeing in the open space across our street almost every weekend. Nothing like good exercise in the open air and it really helps the dark cold time pass more quickly.
Last winter also brought a marked decline in Jim's Dad's health. In March, he caught pneumonia again and passed away on 26-March-2010. We said a sad goodbye to him. He had military honors at his funeral which was very moving and lent it a special dignity. Jim's Dad had a long and eventful life that included service in World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam-Era. He saw much of the world in the Air Force and when traveling for Sperry Univac in the 1970s and 1980s. He also took his family on a number of far-ranging vacations in the USA and Canada. He had many interests besides his family, including fishing, drawing and painting, photography, travel, reading, and writing. He was lucky to have at least 16 good years of retirement in which to enjoy them. We miss him very much.
In early June, we had a wonderful visit from Jim's cousins, the Narums from Bliligård in Norway (Bliligård is very close to Eina, Norway, which Google maps can find). John Arne and Ingrid visited for about week in June, right before we left for France. They stayed with Jim's Mom and had a great time visiting with the family. We had several family gatherings while they were here. This is the first time Jim had seen them since his visit to Bliligård on his bicycle in 1992. We plan to visit Norway and Sweden the summer of in 2012.
In June and July we took our long-awaited trip to France, which included Jim's Mom. (Please see the extensive photos of the trip on Jim's website.) We flew out of MSP direct to Paris-CDG on Wednesday afternoon and landed in Paris in the early morning of Thursday. We spent two days in Paris (the first one very jet-lagged) and then took the TGV high-speed train to Avignon in Provence. At Avignon, we picked up a rental mini-van and then drove around Provence for two wonderful weeks of perfect (if a bit hot) weather. We rented gîtes (the French system of fully-furnished vacation rentals in the rural parts of the country) in the towns of Sarrians, near Carpentras and Orange, right in the middle of the southern Côtes du Rhone wine region, and in the tiny hill village of Murs, between Mont Ventoux and the Luberon mountains. We saw the wonderful sights of Provence: Markets, vineyards, hill villages clinging to the sides of mountains, castles, wineries, mountains, and the Mediterranean. We drank lots of good local wines, ate the local cheese, breads, charcuterie, olives, and the best cherries any of us had ever tasted. The cherries were from a local farmer only about 1 km from our Murs gîtes. After two great weeks, we caught the TGV from Avignon back to Paris and spent another 3 full days (and half of Saturday) in Paris enjoying the sites, including Notre Dame, Saint Chapelle, Les Invalides, Versailles, and the street life of Paris. We all had a good time. Joe in particular enjoyed Paris and was already thinking of a return visit.
On our return from France, we held Joe's high school graduation party at our house. Joe's party was a good success and included his Dad, uncle Pat and Aunt Pam, and his cousin Alex. Then in the first week of August, we flew out to White Salmon for a short one week's visit to our place. We had a good gathering of friends to see us, including a visit from friends Marty and Elizabeth Grodin, now living in Oregon, who we hadn't seen in almost 30 years. We also got to see Jeanne, Steve, Anne, Ben, Gaye, Cara, Tim, Eric, and Allison. Out friends Nannette and Jeff were with us the whole week. Jim's Mom came with us on this vacation as well.
Returning to the Twin Cities, we drove to Shawano Wisconsin to celebrate another graduation party for Joe, this time surrounded by a great big group of Phyllis's family. It was almost like a family reunion and Joe enjoyed seeing all his grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins (we all enjoyed this big gathering very much: Please see the photos on Jims website). We then tried to catch up on all of our usual summer tasks, which this year included planting a new linden tree in out back yard to replace the maple we lost in a windstorm a few years ago. We also planted a number of perennials in the front planters to replace those eaten by the voles last winter.
Phyllis redecorated Jamie's bed room, including an under-sea mural of fish and dolphins that completely covers one wall. We rode our bicycles almost every night after Jim got home from work, with Jim pulling Jamie on the "After- burner" third-wheel bike. Phyllis and Jamie successfully raised a Monarch caterpillar to adulthood and released it in September.
September brought the start of school: First grade for Jamie and second grade, with her first graders of last year, for Phyllis. Joe began college in August. September also brought plans for Jim's Mom to move back to Shoreview to be closer to us and Charlie and also to bring her to an area that feels more like home to her and that she knows very well. We helped her with buying her new place and moving into it in October. She's now just a couple of minutes away and we can see her much more often and we are thrilled.
Joe graduated from Mounds View High School on 7-Jun-2010. He had a graduation party here in the Twin Cities in July and another one in Shawano, Wisconsin with Phyllis's family in July. Joe started his college career at Century College in White Bear Lake Minnesota, majoring in Computer Science, and is showing great aptitude in his physics and computer programming classes. He seems to be enjoying his classes and the college life. He is living at home in order to economize. In his last semester at Mounds View, Joe took advanced-placement exam in mathematics and he scored well enough to receive a semester's college credit in calculus, of which he is rightly proud. Joe is a math wizard! He is driving Jim's old Honda Civic and so Jim taught him how to drive a stick shift this summer. It's like second nature to him now. Joe continues to enjoy computers very much and this shows in his ability to code fast and well. Joe hit a deer on his way to school in late September and got some adult experiences of talking with the police, dealing with a tow, and driving his first rental car. Luckily, he wasn't hurt and the car was repairable (though the insurance company deemed it a total loss.)
Jamie learned to ride his bike this summer. He rode the bike just fine on his first try; but stopping was more of a challenge. Jamie started first grade in September and is doing just great. Jamie enjoyed our basketball hoop very much this summer: He shot a cumulative score of well over 1000 baskets. Some evenings, while we sipped wine on front porch, Jamie would shoot 100 or 200 baskets and we had the applaud every one (we didn't count up the missed shots.) Jamie also enjoyed driving Jim's RC boat on the pond, which he could handle with no help from Dad this year. Jamie raised a sunflower from seed to a monster 8-foot flower with the flower itself the size of a dinner plate. Jamie was thrilled to learn how to ride his bike and rode it almost every night (no serious crashes!).
Phyllis continues teaching at EXPO Elementary in St. Paul Schools; she is teaching second grade (her first graders from last year). Looping the same kids makes the second year much easier for her. She has made a big effort this year to make her classroom and office more organized and it is paying off in time saved. (Teaching is a very demanding job, especial of time.) She enjoyed working on our front gardens again this year, and organizing and redecorating Jamie's room. She's participating in two book clubs and continues to enjoy playing piano and taking her piano lessons from Cindy. Phyllis also used online "social media" to find and reconnect with several old friends including a best friend she hadn't seen since 4th grade (!), Marty Voight. Phyllis enjoyed our nightly bike rides and got to the point where Jim had to work hard to keep up with her. Phyllis was also officially diagnosed with ADD (which she had known herself for years - her whole life). Now, with medication, her ability to focus is dramatically improved (night and day) and she was able to tackle tasks she had avoided for many years (such as organizing her office, files, and classroom.) She is much happier and more productive now.
Jim survived another layoff (March) at Boston Scientific and continues to enjoy his job there in hardware engineering. Jim enjoyed showing France to his family and relaxing in Provence for two weeks. He worked very long hours all summer, preparing for the submission and approval of the product he'd been working on for the last two years or so. Fortunately, he got off "critical path" in early October and was able to enjoy the amazing fall weather we had this October. This year brought a major resurgence in Jim's interest in photography, fueled by his scanning of more or less all his old "analog" photos into digital and the purchase of more and better lenses and digital SLR bodies (the sale of a couple of guitars helped there!) Please have a look at the pages for the 1980s and 1990s and the webpage devoted to Jim's Dad on Jim's photo website to see the results of the most recent scanning. Jim is enjoying making photos again and also getting into the "virtual darkroom" that the photo software provides. It's amazing how powerful the SW is and how easy it now is to produce fine results for web or printing. It's like being in the darkroom, only better. Jim continues to enjoy making and playing guitars and taking his guitar lessons from Rick at Northern Pine (Phyllis takes piano lessons there too). He continues to enjoy hiking and biking with the family.
Phyllis and Jim's family photos - Main Page
Phyllis and Jim's family photos 2010
Last updated: 2-Jan-2011