In New England, the first days of spring often feel more like winter. This has been the mildest winter since we moved here almost nine years ago and the trees and bushes are already beginning to flower. This photo does not do justice to the bright yellows that can be found on the road leading to our house. Spring always feels like the shortest season in Massachusetts and this year I am determined to more fully enjoy its beauty before it is overwhelmed by summer.

Kyle is back from college for spring break. Unfortunately, he had to complete a final project which is due this evening leaving little time to catch up. Jeanine prepared a special dinner and it felt really good to have the whole family gathered together. His ankle remains swollen from a nasty turn he suffered while playing basketball but he says it doesn’t hurt. He has more ailments than his old decrepit father at this point. With my soccer season set to begin shortly, I may have to drag him out for a run or two to help with his rehab and my 5 pounds of stress-induced weight gain.

My mother is the most organized person I know. I recently came across an envelope containing all of my scholastic report cards including one from the third grade! I have begun the process of scanning old family records and photos that my parents collected over a life time. I estimate the effort will take three years to complete if I set aside 15 minutes a day for the effort. Several years ago I completed a multi-year scanning project for all of my old photos and documents. The motivation for this daunting task is to preserve precious memories and share them with all family members rather than having them wind up in a box in someone’s attic. Children please note that dad was not a half bad student and that good grades do pay off.

All I am going to say is that this was a very difficult photo to make. I don’t particularly care for spiders and the big white dot on this one’s back warns of its venomous bite. Jumping spiders have a total of 8 eyes and can jump many times their body length. They generally do not spin webs but rather stalk their prey, ambush them with a prolific leap, and use their fangs to inject them with their fast-acting poison. If you can look past all the creepy stuff I think this one, probably a juvenile is rather cute.

Spring is in the air and a more beautiful day you could not ask for. Arriving in the middle of March seems a bit early but who am I to complain. My league soccer season opens in two weeks. This morning we had a friendly match against Belmont’s division 1 team as a tune up. At the half we were down 0-2 and our team was looking just awful. During half time we made some strategic adjustments which proved highly effective. Five minutes into the second half I scored a really sweet goal. I received a nice pass into open space as I charged down the right side of the field. My first touch was the key to this goal which I used to improved my angle on the goalie. My second touch set up my right foot and forced the keeper to commit to the near post. I drilled it past him to find the side netting on the far post and to open my season with a strong finish. My team went on to score an additional four goals to their one resulting in a 5-3 win for Concord. Maya and Nico spent a large part of the afternoon indoors doing homework but I could not resist being outside where I made time for a little photography.

This evening Jeanine and I joined three other couples for dinner in downtown Boston at Sibling Rivalry. This restaurant featuring modern American cuisine is run by two brothers from a family of ten. The menu offers competing selections designed by each sibling. The result of this competition is inspired culinary innovation. I cannot remember when I last enjoyed a meal so thoroughly.

Like the two before it, this has been a very long work week. On average I have been spending 12 hours a day in the office and another couple of hours at home on e-mail. I expect this level of intensity to last another few weeks and then return to more normal levels. With my recent promotion came the responsibility for integrating two largely dissimilar divisions into a single cohesive team. I like managing complex transitions and despite the long hours, I am genuinely enjoying the opportunity to innovate at the organizational design level. My energy is buoyed by the strong support from my new leadership team and the positive feedback that I have received from all corners of the organization. Even as I left the office at 8 pm there were several other cars in the parking lot which speaks volumes about the work ethic present at iRobot.

I left for the office before sunup and returned after sundown. I am still working in my home office, so no picture for today.

Temperatures are steadily climbing and it will not be too long before our field is green again. Work is occupying all of my time right now but I really enjoy the process of organizational transformation making the time commitment worth every minute.

UPDATE: This photo is taken 5 years in the future. The one originally posted here was lost due to an archiving problem, which impacted many photos in the 2011-2012 time period.

Before visiting with us last weekend, my brother visited our childhood home in Schenectady where he gathered various items of sentimental value as we prepared the house for sale. The wood jewelry box pictured here is something I made for my mother many many years ago. Seeing it again brought back fond memories and it was as if I had reunited with an old friend. It has withstood the test of time well and I will pass it down to Maya when she is a little older.

I could not resist adding one more photo of Rose from this weekend. It is hard to decide whether she is cuter when she is happy or when she is not. Both of Mark’s girls are at that magical age when everything they do is adorable. I remember when Maya was this age and how much I enjoyed playing with her. By contrast, she now seems very mature. Even so, I still see through to the little girl inside of her and I am pretty sure I always will.

We were relieved to learn that Kyle’s ankle injury is not as severe as it initially appeared. The doctor feels he can make a full recovery in time with physical therapy. Kyle’s absence was somehow amplified with all of his cousins visiting and we are looking forward anxiously for his return during spring break.

Nicolai, Mario and Rory joined me this morning for my regular soccer practice/scrimmage. Four Calabria men all on the same team made for a powerful combination and one extremely proud father and uncle. The beauty of soccer is that even men of a certain age can give a bunch of young bucks a run for their money. Minuteman Park and the Old North Bridge were the afternoon destinations for the adults where we combined exercise with a walk through history. Later in the day, I secured a group photo using the promise of an ice cream outing as an incentive and upon our return, photographed my brother who requested an individual portrait.

Shortly after lunch my brother Mark and I set out for a little kayaking. We put in at the South boat house and paddled up to the Sudbury bridge. Mark used the kayak that Maya built and found it to be to his liking, both roomy and stable.

Maya looked elegant in a new dress, hand tailored by her Aunt Marie, as she readied herself to attend a bar mitzva for a school mate.

Rose may be the smallest of the cousins but she commands more than her fair share of attention. She can switch from being coy to pouting to unbridled exuberance in the course of a minute.

The morning meal was prepared by Nicolai who cooked eggs to order for our expanded household of eleven. For dinner, Mark expertly sauteed scallops to complement a magnificent salad prepared by Jeanine and Marie.

Bringing to five the number of visiting cousins, John William Quinn, my sister Alissa’s son, joined us for dinner and spent the night. We like the fact that he is attending Babson which is a relatively short distance from our home. Kyle was very much missed from our gathering which did not seem quite the same without him. A recent ankle injury does not appear to be healing very well making his life more difficult than need be and we are all wishing him a speedy recovery.

When I returned from work this evening I was treated to a great surprise. My brother Mark was able to join the rest of his family for a weekend visit from Minnesota. Pictured here are my niece Sophia and her sister Rose. When I finished our basement, I built a kids-sized room with a tiny door and window underneath the stairs. I was pleased to see it occupied again as my children have long since outgrown it.

Heavy winds today produced this unfortunate outcome which I came across on my work commute. Fortunately, the car was unoccupied when the limb fell according to the owner who was also photographing the scene for his insurance company.

This evening we celebrated the CCHS Wrestling team at a banquet in their honor. Naturally, Jeanine played a major role in providing food the event (pulled pork with barbecued ribs and chicken) and always seems happiest to me when dishing up a meal for a hungry crowd. Nicolai, decked out in tie and coat, delivered one of the captain’s speeches nicely summing up the challenges and rewards of being a wrestler and the importance of working hard to reach your full potential. I provided a slide show of 300 images from the season which played in the background all evening.

I took the red-eye from California to New York’s JFK and then flew on to Raleigh Durham, NC for meetings with iRobot’s maritime design facility. This team is responsible for our Seaglider, a deep-diving unmanned underwater vehicle capable of missions lasting several months and covering thousands of miles. It can be fitted with various sensor packages that collect data on temperature, salinity, ocean currents, contaminants, etc. When it surfaces, this data is transmitted via satellite to scientists on shore and they can send back new diving missions. I spent the day in meetings before flying back to Boston completing an exhausting 2-day, coast-to-coast-to-coast journey.

I arrived in San Luis Obispo, CA early this morning (3:30am body clock) after a flight delay resulted in a missed connection. I am here for 18 hours to visit with one of iRobot’s development teams which is now part of the organization I am managing. Arriving as late as I did the car rental agencies were closed so I took a taxi to my hotel. This morning I decided to walk to the office (2 miles) and passed the Madonna Inn along the way. This local landmark includes the inn, a restaurant and bakery and the property is adorned with a pseudo-Swiss-Alps exterior and lavish common rooms accented by pink roses, Western murals, and hammered copper. Each of the 109 guest rooms and suites is uniquely designed and themed, though some tourists (myself included) stop just to peek at the famous rock waterfall urinal located in the men’s washroom, a feature designed by Hollywood set designer Harvey Allen Warren.

I managed to coerce Maya into letting me measure her height this morning, something I have not done since last August. I have used a long 3/4 x 3/4 inch piece of wood to record the growth of all three children since we moved here nine years ago. With Kyle out of the house and Nico probably nearing his maximum height, Maya is the only one left to measure. She has grown 2 1/4 inches in the last 6 months. Quite pleased with her enhanced stature she requested that I tuck her in so she could sleep on the couch. Why do I get the feeling that a butterfly will soon emerge from this cocoon?

Later today I leave for San Luis Obispo, CA and then catch a red-eye to Raleigh Durham, NC where I will meet the remaining members of iRobot’s newly merged engineering team.

Jeanine helps Maya with her hair as she readies herself for a Model United Nations Conference being held at Bentley College today. I assisted by knotting one of my ties for her very business-like outfit. I would have never predicted that Maya would put my tie collection to better use than I. As I mature, I find myself almost religiously opposed to wearing a suit. I’ll take a pair of comfortable hiking boots and soft cotton clothes any day.

Nala, the master of relaxation, set the tone for my day. Having completed a week of back to back 12-16 hour days in the office I needed to just kick back and relax. I expect another week or two of intense work before my schedule returns to a more normal pace.

This has been the strangest winter I can recall as far as snowfall goes. We had a massive storm very early in the season. Then nothing at all. And now, with spring around the corner, we get our first substantial snowfall of the season. Had I been less busy yesterday I would have taken a few hours in the early morning to capture some nice snowscapes of the fresh snowfall. Instead, I spent 16 hours working and had to settle for this day-old shot of the rapidly vanishing snow from my office window.

Jeanine has been plant sitting this cactus (among many others) for two months while its owners were touring in Thailand. When it arrived it was looking rather anemic. Under her care it has thrived and she urged me to photograph it when it started to bloom. I am beginning to think that I should add a few cacti to my collection of bonsai trees in my office at work.

Having had a few weeks to prepare for the iRobot restructuring described yesterday, I was able to announce and introduce my new engineering leadership team, which includes the Directors of Program Management, Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Software Engineering, Systems Engineering and Architecture. I spent three hours presenting my thoughts and plans for the future to key managers of the combined organization during the morning and then another 2 hours presenting to the entire engineering team at the end of the day. I could not have hoped for a more optimistic reception which has energized me to help unleash the passion for innovation that I see everywhere.

iRobot held its annual all employee meeting today in the Grand Ballroom of the nearby Doubletree Hotel. We celebrated fantastic 2011 financial performance, honored 7 stellar employees with Chairman’s Awards, and recognized our inventors who have pushed iRobot granted patents over the 100 mark. This gathering was also used to announce a major restructuring of the company from two independent divisions (Home Robots and Military Robots) to a single organization with multiple business units. As a consequence, the divisional engineering organizations have been merged into one and I have been asked to lead the team. The combined engineering team is three times larger than my current organization and includes employees located in Raleigh Durham, NC and San Luis Obispo, CA. I am looking forward to the new challenge and honored that I was selected for the role.

This photo was taken by Jeanine in the Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park located in the Santa Cruz Mountains just outside of Felton. When Kyle was 2 years old we used to take him to the Roaring Camp Big Trees Railroad located immediately adjacent to the park. Maya seemed to enjoy it just as much as her older brother did 17 years ago. I hope that one day all of our children will return here with their children to admire these magnificent trees.

Temperatures during my weekly soccer scrimmage hovered around freezing this morning. Steady strong gusts drove the wind chill considerably lower demanding more than a hat to keep my head and face warm. Once the game starts my legs, torso, and arms are usually quite warm. My head and hands, however, always remain cold. There is no bad weather for soccer, just inappropriate clothing choices. I had a great run and was thankful for the exercise given the spring season starts in just five weeks.

Jeanine and Maya spent the day walking the hills of San Francisco. As I think about it, this is one of their first mother-daughter travel adventures and a good prelude to Maya’s coming of age trip (tentatively to India).

My Canon 5D Mark II is the best camera I have ever owned. For the last 3 years it has been my go to camera for ultimate image quality capturing just over 50,000 images for me. The time has come, however, to upgrade to a newer body with the latest technology. I have no misconceptions that a new camera will do anything to improve the quality of my photos. I simply enjoy using state of the art tools and by caring for them I can recover much of my initial investment on resale. I am also selling my flash unit, a zoom lens and my exposure meter all of which I photographed for the sales listings which I posted today.

The University of Southern California asked Santa Clara University if they would change their name from the University of Santa Clara to Santa Clara University so they could be known as USC. In exchange for doing so, USC presented SCU with over 100 mature palm trees to plant on their campus. Jeanine and Maya learned this and other trivia from Kyle who proudly toured them about the campus before enjoying dinner together in San Jose. Kyle was very sweet with his little sister showing her off to all his friends. Maya was no doubt feeling all grown up and enjoyed all the attention.

Nico and a friend left this morning in Jeanine’s car on a two day college tour to include Dartmouth, UVM and an overnight stay with his Aunt Susan in Burlington. With only four more months until he turns 18 I did not want Nicolai to wind up with a speeding ticket like his brother did and risk losing his license. Kyle, you may recall, dodged a bullet when the issuing police officer failed to appear at his traffic court hearing and the ticket was nullified. To his great consternation, I insisted that Nico bring my GPS tracker with him for the duration of the trip.This tiny device captures GPS coordinates every 30 seconds and shows route and speed on a map after the data has been downloaded. I pointed out to him that I could have easily placed this in the car without his knowledge and that I was being open with him about my intent and expectations. This did little to diminish his displeasure with my “request”. A review of the log after the journey confirmed he was in the right places at the right times and that he generally traveled with the speed of traffic although I am still questioning a 2 minute “passing” maneuver with speeds above 80mph and a peak of 88mph!

Kyle recently joined members of the SCU Outdoor Adventure Club on an overnight excursion and climb of 3,889 foot Mount Diablo. I could not be more thrilled that he is taking advantage of the opportunity to experience the great outdoors and beauty of California. Jeanine and Maya leave today to join him for an extended Parent’s Weekend visit. Nico is occupied with college visits while work obligations prevent me from joining them. I am, however, sending the tent pictured here, a proper sleeping bag, inflatable ground pad, and various other camping essentials for Kyle to use on his next adventure. Notes for Kyle: The tent can be used with or without the fly (shown in both configurations). Study the photos so you know what the proper setup looks like, practice setup and tear down once before heading out. Never pack the tent if it is wet. If you must pack it wet then it is essential that you unpack it as soon as possible and let it dry completely. I have taken this tent to some of the most beautiful places in the world. I hope you will do the same. Love, dad.

Followers of this blog will recall a recent post about the wisdom of giving a woman a toaster as a Valentine’s Day present. For the record, our new toaster, which arrived today, is neither a gift to Jeanine nor connected to Valentine’s Day in any way. Maya enjoyed first toasting honors and we split the perfectly browned English muffin. Bread is lowered and lifted automatically and toasted with digital precision as a countdown timer indicates the time remaining.

UPDATE: After 12 years of daily use, this toaster is still running strong but we are retiring it nonetheless. Despite its functionality, toasting times are significantly longer than any toaster I have ever used.