Happy Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to two wonderful dads! (an all the other dad's out there) We're so lucky to have had these two great guys in our lives and continue to enjoy all that they've taught us. Wishing we could be in Spain to celebrate Father's day with Primitivo and missing Dad a lot...

An Evening with Friends

The Guys playing pool at Bar Nine

Yesterday we went out to dinner with some friends to celebrate Virginia's 30th birthday (Yay! Happy Birthday Virginia!) and had a really nice dinner at Becco. The food there is delicious and super reasonably priced - no wonder Josh and Virginia love it so much!

After Becco we went to a bar up Ninth avenue a ways, where Mike was waiting for us. The guys had a nice time playing pool (see the above photo with Josh, Mike and Felipe) while the rest of us relaxed and chatted on the huge couches they have in the back. It was a very enjoyable evening.


Felipe, Virginia and Josh


Josh showing off his fancy behind-the-back moves (he did make the shot!)


Mike taking a shot


Josh on another shot. Felipe was more a spectator/fan - didn't play but encouraged/heckled Mike and Josh.

Grace's Graduation - Videos

This is a video of all of the Soldiers exiting the auditorium together, you can hear Grace's Drill Sergeant Gonzales calling cadence.


Grace and her friend showing off.

Grace's Graduation - Fort Sill, Oklahoma

Grace is super hugged by Mom after the Family Day presentation.

I left Wednesday to go to Fort Sill Oklahoma to see my younger sister Grace Graduate from basic training. Mom and Mariam and I met at the airport in Dallas and flew in to Oklahoma City together. Thursday morning there was a brief program for the families, with skits of what the soldiers in training had been doing each week.


Here they are demonstrating how they prepared to go into the gas chamber.

After all of the skits the soldiers were released for the day to spend with their families. This mostly involved eating and picture taking. Grace's "Battle Buddy" Savard joined us for the two family days since his family was unable to make it to Oklahoma from Rhode Island. We had a lot of fun with the two of them.


Grace and Savard (first name is Frank) in the car on our way off the base.

As I said before, the day involved going out for a nice lunch, driving around the beautiful city of Lawton, OK and getting more food and coffee (this is missed on base) and red bull (I've never seen people drink so much red bull, but apparently the soldiers in training are very sleep deprived!). We had to have the two of them back at the base by 8:00pm.

The next day there was the Graduation ceremony at the McMahon Auditorium in Lawton. We arrived and all of the soldiers were already seated in the auditorium. They had strict instructions not to acknowledge the presence of anyone, looking only straight ahead. Something Grace later said was very strange and zoo-like because so many people were taking pictures.


Grace with her fellow C Battery graduates.


Captain David Leibovich, Battery Commander


Grace's Drill Sergeants - Gonzalez (left) and Alaniz (right)

After the ceremony we took the mandatory gajillion photos. Here you can see Grace next to her Drill Sergeant Gonzalez.



A nice photo of Private Frank Savard











Later Grace took us back to her base and showed us around a bit. We got to see her bay (where they sleep) and some of the grounds where they do physical training. Including below, the Treadwell Tower.




Finally saying goodbye to mom and the rest of us....it had to end sometime.


She then fell in to formation with her battery.


One more shot of her Drill Sergeant - I swear this guy is right out of a movie!


And that concludes Private First Class Grace Sergenian's graduation from basic training. She's now off to Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas for 16 weeks of Advanced training. Congratulations Grace!

One, two, three...GO!

Felipe with Ana Luisa and Bruno at Virgil's

I swear it, I am back to posting! It's been a while since I have kept up this blog regularly, but jeez, time really goes fast! It's June already?! We had a nice day today visiting again with Ana Luisa and Bruno (friends of Felipe's parents from Brazil). We met them for lunch at Virgil's Barbeque near Times Square. It was nice to have another chance to meet up with them before they leave. Bruno was here doing a visiting scholar program at Fordham and they've been in New York City for a month. We had a lovely time with them over Memorial Day weekend when we met them for a show at Dizzy's Club (jazz).

This week promises to be jam packed - tomorrow my dad's friend Steve will be visiting with one of his friends, and they will be staying with us through Wednesday. Then Wednesday night I leave to go to Oklahoma for Grace's graduation from Basic Training at Fort Sill. I'll be meeting mom and Mariam for the visit (coincidentally we will all be meeting at the Dallas airport as we got the same flight in to Oklahoma city).

I'll come back to New York City on Saturday and we'll get to spend some time with Laurence who is visiting from Paris again (she's in town for a conference). Busy busy! And, if I might say so without jinxing myself, I think we are seriously close to finishing the medical textbook that we've been working on at work - this would be MAJOR! This book has been my main project at work for the last two years and this past several months has really been a mind marathon.

So wish me luck with my busy week, and look forward to more posts coming up!!!