Occasionally it is nice to spend the day with no specific plan in mind. I retrieved Maya from a sleep over and she assisted Nicolai as they prepared chocolate chip pancakes from scratch. I posted several items for sale on Craig’s List and generally organized my study, workshop, and camera equipment storage areas. Another several hours went into tagging my photo collection (a process which will take several months to complete but will allow me to find specific photos very quickly). As the day came to a close I found myself in the garden looking for some nice photos for the day.

Kyle has completed his freshman year at Santa Clara University and returned to Concord this morning for the summer. We are extremely pleased with his academic performance and he appears to be very happy with his choice of schools. His studies have proved very useful as he continues to develop his business. Yard Dogs is now a LLC (Limited Liability Corporation), duly incorporated in the state of Massachusetts. Pictured here is the raised seal which bears witness to the legal status of his company. He slept for most of the day catching up on sleep lost while studying for finals. Late in the afternoon, he enjoyed catching up with his siblings and me while watching a very exciting UEFOA Euro 2012 soccer match between England and Sweden. We ended the day with a boy’s night out at Paparazzi while Maya spent the night at a sleepover. Kyle offered sage advice to his brother about the best approach to picking a college.

Hard to say which girl is cuter. The pair are certainly hard to match. Although I find Nala lacking in virtually all desirable canine attributes she still manages to elicit great adoration from the women in this family. Admittedly she does make for a nice photo prop and therefore I am willing to dismiss her otherwise annoying feline characteristics.

As a result of his contract with SideStix, Nico will be featured in the company’s marketing campaigns. We received an advanced copy of this advertisement which will begin appearing next month in selected magazines. In theory, I can now add commercial photographer to my resume as well. Nico is very excited about his new role with SideStix and is looking forward to getting through his finals so that we can start working on a new video to promote the company’s crutches.

I spent my second day on the campus of Babson College at their Executive Center attending a strategy planning session for iRobot’s Home Business Unit. After our session ended I drove around campus hoping I might bump into my nephew who is attending school here. No such luck but I did enjoy my tour despite having turned my ankle at a 6 am soccer practice this morning. Hopefully, it will heal in time for our playoff match this weekend.

This evening I attended a presentation of the Peabody Middle School Drama Class of which Maya is a member. This term’s assignment was to create a short video project. Students worked in small groups starting with a storyboard, followed by shooting, and finally editing their masterpieces. Maya’s group of three created a movie trailer for a horror film. It was the final project to be shown (a position reserved for what I will proudly assert was the standout project of the class). I am working to obtain a link to the video and hope to embed it on this page in the near future.

Meanwhile, Jeanine reported in from her vacation on Martha’s Vineyard where she is spending the week with her sisters and a few friends to celebrate Susan’s 60th birthday.

My soccer season also ended this weekend. We won decisively, 4-0 over Lexington to complete an undefeated season and promotion to Division 1 in the fall. I scored the final goal of the match on a break away, beating the sweeper with a nice cross-over move and slotted a strong left footed shot past the advancing keeper to the lower left hand corner of the goal. Our over fifty league has 5 divisions, each with a North and South section. The top two teams in each section will compete next weekend for the right to advance to the Division Finals the following weekend. I have fully recovered from my hamstring injury but my conditioning is not where it needs to be, something I hope to address over the coming weeks.

Maya’s last soccer game of the season ended in a 1-2 loss to Natick and a good bit of controversy over an obviously missed offside call (flagged by the linesman, ignored by the referee). She had a great game (and season) contributing on both the front line and the back line. Over time, I see her migrating to a midfielder position given the play-making ability she shares with her brothers and her endurance. When it came time for a team photo I had nothing but my telephoto zoom (300-800mm) and had to improvise with this unusual perspective.

Maya’s turns 13 on the 19th of this month. This evening she celebrated her birthday with close friends, many of whom will not be able to join her on the actual day. Pictured here is the masterpiece cake she created to share with her guests. It is called a Zauber Torte (Golden Cage), a recipe she selected from the Cake Bible. The cage which hovers above the lemon poppy seed pound cake is made of caramel and garnished with crystallized violets (from our neighbor’s garden) and is a challenge for even the most experienced cooks. Maya did all the work save for the frosting and it was impossible to say whether it was more beautiful or delicious. During the party the girls had a scavenger hunt, played a game they invented called Freedom (two girl’s seek to capture the rest who are hidden throughout the house, once captured they are confined to base unless they are rescued by a teammate), and watched a comedy about a female bounty hunter.

I spent the night at the Wiley Inn and was up at 5 AM hunting for ocean scapes. On the advice of a colleague, I made my way to Magnolia where I found plenty of opportunities to keep me busy until breakfast. Another long but productive day during which our management team focused on the theme of doing less better. In the end there was pretty strong consensus on our priorities and I feel very comfortable with the decisions. I was back in Concord by 6 PM but too tired to attend soccer practice.

iRobot’s executive management team began a two day strategic planning retreat today at the Wiley Inn at Endicott College in Beverly, MA. I left two hours early for the one hour trip with the idea of getting in some photography before the 8AM start. Skies were overcast with intermittent heavy rain. I found myself in Rockport with a 15 minute window of perfect shooting conditions.

Twelve hours later I had an opportunity to shoot the Inn and signature fountain by twilight.

It was appropriate that Nicolai was dressed in business attire this morning (he has a mock court appearance today in his constitutional law class). He is pictured here signing an endorsement agreement that we have negotiated with SideStix, the maker of his forearm crutches. Nicolai is now an Ambassador for the company seeking to promote sales, provide marketing collateral materials (video and still photos), represent the company at tradeshows, and generally evangelize the product. It is hoped that his accomplishments on the soccer field for the American Amputee Soccer Association’s US National team will make SideStix the crutch of choice for serious athletes. In exchange for his endorsement, he has received a modest equity stake in the company and will receive a royalty stream on all SideStix sales. He joins his brother in owning part of a business before the age of majority. Nicolai is excited about his new role and I am confident he will help SideStix grow significantly.

With all the rain we have had this spring everything has bloomed with greater than usual magnificence. I spent a few minutes after work exploring our gardens and settled on this pair of beauties for today’s photo. Jeanine spent part of the weekend in Schenectady with my sisters Mayela and Alissa and my mother and her sister Maruja. They completed what turned out to be a very successful estate sale as we continued to prepare the home of our youth for sale. It looks like the house should be ready to list in a few more weeks.

We enjoyed the first corn of the season as Jeanine prepared a wonderful dinner on the grill. We were joined by my nephew, John Quinn, who spent most of the weekend with us. I was in action on the soccer pitch this morning and played very well as my team kept our perfect season intact with a 2-1 win.