December « 2010 « Santina’s Squibbles

Pitcher Year in Review

December 21, 2010

In lieu of a ‘traditional’ Christmas letter, I’ve decided to update the Pitcher happenings of 2010 right here in my trusty blog. I can’t believe how long it’s been since I’ve put an update here. December is just about upon us. Dylan has many more ‘super powers’, Jonah is in 1st grade, Wayne was awarded tenure, I have been laid-off, re-hired, and then quit and found a new job. Yep, we just keep plugging away!

Jonah is an amazing 1st grader. He finished off kindergarten with a bang – and a luau. He was blessed with such an AMAZING kindergarten teacher – he really flourished well, and was very well prepared for first grade. He loves to read, excels at math, and of course if you ask him, he’ll tell you his favorite part of school is recess and P.E. (yep, typical 1st grader!). He continues to excel at sports, and loves tennis, golf, basketball and baseball. We signed him up with a basketball academy over the summer, where he got to spend the week with some amazing players, honing in on his skills with kids his age. We also signed him up for little league starting in the Spring – should be fun!

I can’t believe Dylan will be 2 in March! What an amazing year we’ve had. As previous posts indicate, he had such a good time discovering new super powers. He was walking by age 1 – and there is definitely no stopping him now! We now understand so much better when our friends and family talk about how very different each child was. Dylan looks so very much like Jonah did at this age, that we just couldn’t imagine his personality would be different – oh how very wrong we were!! Dylan is such a very special, energetic, and entertaining little guy! His laugh is infectious, and his tantrums infuriating – all at the same time While Jonah was what we called a ‘burrow-er’ Dylan is a climber. He will climb (or try) anything and everything in front of him. I have had to give up my parking space in the garage to make room for furniture. We have had to remove tables and chairs, including our dining room chairs! He has so much energy, Jonah sometimes has a hard time keeping up with him. He loves going to day care, and we love that there are such wonderful people who care and love for him while we are at work. His vocabulary is growing, which is always very exciting. Just like his brother, he loves playing with balls, blocks, and loves to dance.

Wayne continues his work at Chabot College, instilling a love for chemistry on every student he teaches! And, the best part is that all his hard work has paid off! He officially received tenure at the end of the last academic year. Woo hoo! Teaching chemistry isn’t the only thing he likes to do – he continues to dabble in his wood work. A Christmas gift from me last year sent him back to Woodcraft, where he took at stab at wood turning! He made an incredible peppermill - a pretty big accomplishment for someone who never touched a lathe before that class! To top it off, for his birthday this year, his parents were generous in buying him a lathe of his own! He’ll be off to another class at Woodcraft, to take a stab at making a staved vase (looking forward to filling it with lots of flowers!). I’m sure he’ll be updating his own blog with pictures and stories, so be sure to check it out.

I continue to dabble in the career counseling field, and as of October, am ‘back’ at Berkeley. For those who don’t know, I received a layoff notice from Cal State East Bay on February 16th – effective June 30th. I quickly began my own networking, hoping to find something similar at one of the handful of universities in our area. On April 21st, I received a “just kidding, you’re not fired” letter, which slowed down the pressure to find a new job. However, wouldn’t you know that my networking paid off. I was alerted to some job opportunities, all around the same time. Submitted resumes, went for interviews, and was offered a career counseling position at UC Berkeley. While this may be considered a lateral move, I truly do believe it will be a great way to improve my career counseling skills, as well as allow me to gain some experience in a larger center, hopefully positioning me to move up quicker. The job truly was the focus of my last year, although the kids and Wayne will continue and always will truly be the center of my world

As a family, we enjoyed our vacation to Nantucket and the New England area in July, and are looking forward to visiting with family over the holidays. Enjoy the pictures below, and be sure to keep in touch!

Happy holidays!