We finally arrived in San Diego. Although things were really rough getting out of Princeton (we didn't get to the Rizo-Patron's until 10:30 or 11:00 on Friday night), and although we waited in line for an hour at the rental car place, when we finally got here to the hotel (Marriot Residence Inn at La Jolla), we were quite impressed. The two beds are on separate floors (a loft), with a separate bathroom for each. I would almost say that this is as big as our Butler apartment.
For those of you who don't know my wife, she grew up in the Phoenix area. Being thus acclimated early in life, she is always cold - and now is no different. So much for saying that San Diego has perfect weather year round...
Larson said, "I already miss my friends. But that's OK, we'll go see them soon, right?" We certainly do hope to go back to Princeton for graduation in June - if everything works out.
I better go, since although the clock says 9:40 it feels like 12:40 and the kids will be up at 5 AM local time...
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
FPOE (Defense)
Today I successfully defended my dissertation. Woohoo!! You can also check out Bronwyn's facebook page for her commentary.
If you're interested my dissertation is posted
here.
Now we just have to get everything together to move to sunny San Diego at the end of this week. The packers come Thursday, the movers Friday, and we fly out on Saturday in preparation for me to start next Monday - our 8th anniversary. I figure that's not too bad of a present...
-Sterling
If you're interested my dissertation is posted
here.
Now we just have to get everything together to move to sunny San Diego at the end of this week. The packers come Thursday, the movers Friday, and we fly out on Saturday in preparation for me to start next Monday - our 8th anniversary. I figure that's not too bad of a present...
-Sterling
Saturday, August 8, 2009
My First (Real) Job
I have received and accepted an offer to work as a scientist at General Atomics in San Diego. I have a start date of Nov 16 (our 8th anniversary for those who are counting.) I have the long uproad path ahead to finish and defend my thesis before then...
Britton's mad at me that we don't get to pack and drive our own moving van. (We have helped a lot of other people pack.)
Britton's mad at me that we don't get to pack and drive our own moving van. (We have helped a lot of other people pack.)
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Update (September)
Larson and Britton sure are wild rock climbers!!
Larson really enjoyed the bouncer at Bronwyn's work party.
All right, who let Larson stick his hand in the brownies???
Dallas Souvenirs
After Sterling went to Dallas, TX for the annual American Physical Society's Division of Plasma Physics Meeting, all of the family were very happy to see him, and they were glad to get a 'coon-skin cap as a souvenir. Bronwyn's souvenir was an apron bearing the slogan Cookin' Cowgirl.
Saturday, September 6, 2008
August Adventures
Connecticut Trip:
We visited the Bailey's in the middle of August. The new house they bought is much larger and their yard is much larger, so the kids had plenty of space to run around and keep each other entertained.
One night we built a fire and cooked marshmallows, then looked through Brennan's telescope at Jupiter. One day we went to Old Sturbridge Village in Massachusetts. There was plenty of baseball, jumping on the trampoline, war, hide & seek, Wii, movies, and just general fun! We look forward to going back soon.
First are pictures from the Old Sturbridge Village in Massachusetts.
Britton & Larson have joined the regiment!
We rode a little boat on the reservoir.
Hey guys, did you know those are sheep & oxen and not horses?
Britton, the cowboy. "Howdy y'all." He's just riding toward his farm.
We had fun on the Bailey's blowup waterslide:
Swim Lessons:
Starting School:
Britton started school this week. He's starting to have fun.
Costumes:
Halloween's coming up. Britton's going to be Spiderman, and we're not sure what Larson's going to be, but we have to find out. He could be a dragon again.
Callings:
Bronwyn was recently called as the Achievement Days Leader for the 8-11 year old girls in the ward. Interacting with girls will be a big change for her.
I was just called last Sunday to be the Ward Clerk. I always thought that I would always be in Scouts, but I guess not. For what it's worth, I always said that a secretarial position would be my dream job, so now I got it.
Monday, August 4, 2008
Summer Activities
This summer Britton and Larson have been taking swim lessons every other day. Larson enjoys jumping in the water, but is not as keen on following directions. His job is to 'Scoop the water; kick your feet!" Britton has learned to swim quite well and really impressed Bronwyn today while they were swimming with the Windward's.
On the topic of the Windward's, Nick & Maddy moved into our ward a few months ago, with 3 boys of their own. It is interesting that Nick & I served in the same mission (Dominican Republic, Santo Domingo East) with some time overlapping. Maddy and Bronwyn have hit it off well. We went with them to the Mercer County 4H fair at the Howell Living Farm on Saturday. Highlights included touching several sheep and ducks, a goat pulled wagon, a pony ride, seeing oxen, sheep, horses, cows, rabbits, chickens, swans, ducks, guinea pigs, and rats, and enjoying some homemade strawberry/blueberry ice cream. The flywheel engine they used to churn the ice cream was very interesting because it only fired every once in a while to keep the flywheels going. The guy running it said that they could run for a very long time (8 hours) on less than a gallon of gasoline!
In the middle of July, Grandma & Grandpa Smith came to visit. Although the original plan was to go to Palmyra to see the Hill Cumorah Pageant as soon as they got here, we had to make a change of plans to help the Hardy's and Rugh's move. The Hardy's are homeless (living with grandparents) for the next year while Jeff does research in Russia and elsewhere. The Rugh's just moved across campus.
So after helping the moving families, we went down to D.C. My dad had never been there, so everything was novel. On the first afternoon, after driving for 4-5 hours, we went by the White House, to the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial, to the Lincoln Memorial, past the WWII memorial, past the Washington Memorial, and rode the Metro back to our hotel (~1/2 mile south of the Capitol building.) We were sure happy to be in our beds that night.
My dad and I went to the Washington Memorial early on Tuesday to get tickets. We ended up with 6:00 tickets, so we met Bronwyn, my mom and the boys at the Air & Space museum. We got to see an IMAX movie about operation Red Flag: an aerial War Game for fighter squadrons to practice aerial combat and strategies. Larson lasted most of the way before he and I went out to ride the escalator... Britton, who is quite the Air Force/Navy plane enthusiast really enjoyed himself. We ate lunch in the Air & Space museum, then made our way up to the Longworth House Office Building to the Office of Rush Holt, our Representative in Congress.
We had arranged for a tour of the Capitol through his office about 1 week ahead of time. After leaving all of our possessions, except diapers and wipes, in his office, one of his interns (Matt), took us over to the Capitol. Matt was a very cool guy, not least of which he is studying physics and philosophy at Johns Hopkins. Luckily Britton and Larson slept through most of the Capitol experience, so we had more time to ponder what was around us. However, they both woke up at inopportune times. Britton woke up while we were in line to get into the House Gallery, and desperately needed to change his oil. So Bronwyn and Matt took him while the rest of us waited. They finally got back and we got through the metal detectors and into the gallery. As we were sitting there, with the House in session, Larson woke up and yelled out that he wanted to go home. So we beat a hasty exit, before they could call security to extricate us.
By then we needed to get to the Washington Monument for our ticket times. It is quite unfortunate that there is not a Metro line that runs the direction of the National Mall, because it takes a lot of walking to get from one part to another. The observation deck on the Washington Memorial was much smaller than I remember from when I went for the FHA (now FCCLA) National Meeting of 1995.
We ate dinner at the ESPN Zone, which was kind of disappointing since they didn't have their molten lava cakes. My dad ended up forgetting his bag in the reception area, and the workers couldn't find it when we were ready to leave. We were fairly convinced one of them had stolen it. Eventually, after talking to the manager, the bag was found, but not after we had left, so my dad had to go back to the Zone the next day to retrieve it, which was another hassle of 20-30 minutes and talking to 2 workers. The final museum we visited was the National Museum of the American Indian, which was a real hodge podge of Indian cultures. The final D.C. stop on our way out of town was a visit to the temple where we did an endowment session.
Other summer activities for me have included softball, soccer, and a week of Scout Camp. Britton has gone to a few days of summer camp with an elementary teacher in the ward. The boys and I have played some baseball and bowling, and watched the original Star Wars trilogy, taking advantage of the later nights possible when there is not school the next day.
I guess we'll have to see what the coming month holds.
On the topic of the Windward's, Nick & Maddy moved into our ward a few months ago, with 3 boys of their own. It is interesting that Nick & I served in the same mission (Dominican Republic, Santo Domingo East) with some time overlapping. Maddy and Bronwyn have hit it off well. We went with them to the Mercer County 4H fair at the Howell Living Farm on Saturday. Highlights included touching several sheep and ducks, a goat pulled wagon, a pony ride, seeing oxen, sheep, horses, cows, rabbits, chickens, swans, ducks, guinea pigs, and rats, and enjoying some homemade strawberry/blueberry ice cream. The flywheel engine they used to churn the ice cream was very interesting because it only fired every once in a while to keep the flywheels going. The guy running it said that they could run for a very long time (8 hours) on less than a gallon of gasoline!
In the middle of July, Grandma & Grandpa Smith came to visit. Although the original plan was to go to Palmyra to see the Hill Cumorah Pageant as soon as they got here, we had to make a change of plans to help the Hardy's and Rugh's move. The Hardy's are homeless (living with grandparents) for the next year while Jeff does research in Russia and elsewhere. The Rugh's just moved across campus.
So after helping the moving families, we went down to D.C. My dad had never been there, so everything was novel. On the first afternoon, after driving for 4-5 hours, we went by the White House, to the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial, to the Lincoln Memorial, past the WWII memorial, past the Washington Memorial, and rode the Metro back to our hotel (~1/2 mile south of the Capitol building.) We were sure happy to be in our beds that night.
My dad and I went to the Washington Memorial early on Tuesday to get tickets. We ended up with 6:00 tickets, so we met Bronwyn, my mom and the boys at the Air & Space museum. We got to see an IMAX movie about operation Red Flag: an aerial War Game for fighter squadrons to practice aerial combat and strategies. Larson lasted most of the way before he and I went out to ride the escalator... Britton, who is quite the Air Force/Navy plane enthusiast really enjoyed himself. We ate lunch in the Air & Space museum, then made our way up to the Longworth House Office Building to the Office of Rush Holt, our Representative in Congress.
We had arranged for a tour of the Capitol through his office about 1 week ahead of time. After leaving all of our possessions, except diapers and wipes, in his office, one of his interns (Matt), took us over to the Capitol. Matt was a very cool guy, not least of which he is studying physics and philosophy at Johns Hopkins. Luckily Britton and Larson slept through most of the Capitol experience, so we had more time to ponder what was around us. However, they both woke up at inopportune times. Britton woke up while we were in line to get into the House Gallery, and desperately needed to change his oil. So Bronwyn and Matt took him while the rest of us waited. They finally got back and we got through the metal detectors and into the gallery. As we were sitting there, with the House in session, Larson woke up and yelled out that he wanted to go home. So we beat a hasty exit, before they could call security to extricate us.
By then we needed to get to the Washington Monument for our ticket times. It is quite unfortunate that there is not a Metro line that runs the direction of the National Mall, because it takes a lot of walking to get from one part to another. The observation deck on the Washington Memorial was much smaller than I remember from when I went for the FHA (now FCCLA) National Meeting of 1995.
We ate dinner at the ESPN Zone, which was kind of disappointing since they didn't have their molten lava cakes. My dad ended up forgetting his bag in the reception area, and the workers couldn't find it when we were ready to leave. We were fairly convinced one of them had stolen it. Eventually, after talking to the manager, the bag was found, but not after we had left, so my dad had to go back to the Zone the next day to retrieve it, which was another hassle of 20-30 minutes and talking to 2 workers. The final museum we visited was the National Museum of the American Indian, which was a real hodge podge of Indian cultures. The final D.C. stop on our way out of town was a visit to the temple where we did an endowment session.
Other summer activities for me have included softball, soccer, and a week of Scout Camp. Britton has gone to a few days of summer camp with an elementary teacher in the ward. The boys and I have played some baseball and bowling, and watched the original Star Wars trilogy, taking advantage of the later nights possible when there is not school the next day.
I guess we'll have to see what the coming month holds.
Friday, June 13, 2008
Britton's heart color; Festival of Parables; Food Storage
Today Britton turned to his mom and said,
"You make my heart turn pink with happiness. Sometimes my heart is black when I'm sad, and it turns a rainbow color when I'm very happy."
Tonight we participated in a 'Carnival of Parables' at the church. After a potluck dinner, there were several different carnival games, which you got to participate in after you could answer some questions about the story or parable from the New Testament associated with that game. Bronwyn ran a station related to the widow's mite; there was an open jar of water (>2 gallons) with a quarter on the bottom. You got two or three pennies (mites) to drop in the water with the goal of making the pennies touch the quarter. Some other stations were to make sheep from an apple slice, peanut butter, popcorn and pretzels to represent us as sheep and Christ as the Shephard; a bolo game with the purpose to land a bolo on the highest wrung of a ladder-like device, which wrung represented the good ground on which a sower threw some seeds; receiving gold coins (talents) with the opportunity to multiply them with a bean bag toss; and several others.
As floods ravage Iowa and the greater Midwest, we are made keenly aware of the need for lots of water, both fresh and otherwise, and we appreciate the warnings of church leaders for many years to lay up in store so as to be prepared. The other factor highlighting the need for food storage has been the recent dramatic rises in commodity (rice, wheat, corn) prices. We are grateful that we have been living well within our means (thanks to Bronwyn working), such that we do not have to do without food. For the last few months we have been making a more concerted effort to obtain more basic food storage - wheat, potato flakes, and oats - in preparation for more bad times to come. One thing I wish we had space for is some fuel storage, since, unfortunately, I don't see any end in sight when gas prices will stop rising.
"You make my heart turn pink with happiness. Sometimes my heart is black when I'm sad, and it turns a rainbow color when I'm very happy."
Tonight we participated in a 'Carnival of Parables' at the church. After a potluck dinner, there were several different carnival games, which you got to participate in after you could answer some questions about the story or parable from the New Testament associated with that game. Bronwyn ran a station related to the widow's mite; there was an open jar of water (>2 gallons) with a quarter on the bottom. You got two or three pennies (mites) to drop in the water with the goal of making the pennies touch the quarter. Some other stations were to make sheep from an apple slice, peanut butter, popcorn and pretzels to represent us as sheep and Christ as the Shephard; a bolo game with the purpose to land a bolo on the highest wrung of a ladder-like device, which wrung represented the good ground on which a sower threw some seeds; receiving gold coins (talents) with the opportunity to multiply them with a bean bag toss; and several others.
As floods ravage Iowa and the greater Midwest, we are made keenly aware of the need for lots of water, both fresh and otherwise, and we appreciate the warnings of church leaders for many years to lay up in store so as to be prepared. The other factor highlighting the need for food storage has been the recent dramatic rises in commodity (rice, wheat, corn) prices. We are grateful that we have been living well within our means (thanks to Bronwyn working), such that we do not have to do without food. For the last few months we have been making a more concerted effort to obtain more basic food storage - wheat, potato flakes, and oats - in preparation for more bad times to come. One thing I wish we had space for is some fuel storage, since, unfortunately, I don't see any end in sight when gas prices will stop rising.
Larson's First Prayer
Tonight Larson said his first full prayer by himself, including blessing each individual in the family by name to feel better and Britton's bus driver. He also blessed his bottle that he was about to drink for the night. He ended his prayer in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen. All was without any prompting from us.
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Britton's games, Terhune Orchards, & lightsaber
On Friday we went shopping for a lightsaber for Britton, which is significant, because it is the first time that he has provided all of the money for a purchase.
Britton played some great soccer yesterday, including some dribbling and some stealing the ball. This morning Britton & I played Star Wars chess. After a few mistaken identities of the piece types, I finally won, which is different than the last game of chess we played.
Hopefully Bronwyn & the boys can go to Hershey Park this week with Wendy Rizo-Patron, whose father lives across the street from the Park.
Yesterday to beat the heat, we donned our swimming suits and played in the water. Britton particularly liked a little slide that was directed into a little pool and onto the slip'n slide.
Yesterday, Britton (and Bronwyn and Larson) also went to the Terhune Orchards for a goodbye party for one of Britton's classmates, Lenny Chen. They saw goats, geese, a horse, wild turkeys, chickens, a bunny, ducks & swans.
Britton played some great soccer yesterday, including some dribbling and some stealing the ball. This morning Britton & I played Star Wars chess. After a few mistaken identities of the piece types, I finally won, which is different than the last game of chess we played.
Hopefully Bronwyn & the boys can go to Hershey Park this week with Wendy Rizo-Patron, whose father lives across the street from the Park.
Yesterday to beat the heat, we donned our swimming suits and played in the water. Britton particularly liked a little slide that was directed into a little pool and onto the slip'n slide.
Yesterday, Britton (and Bronwyn and Larson) also went to the Terhune Orchards for a goodbye party for one of Britton's classmates, Lenny Chen. They saw goats, geese, a horse, wild turkeys, chickens, a bunny, ducks & swans.
Monday, April 28, 2008
March for Babies
On Sunday morning we did the March for Babies at Mercer County Park. Although it was still sprinkling when we got there, by the time the March started, the rain had gratefully stopped.
On the left is a picture of us before the March in the skating rink with our shirts from Bronwyn's work team.
On the right is the after picture. We might look a little more tired since we just walked 5 miles in less than 1.5 hours. We got the shirt Britton is wearing because we raised at least $150.
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Welcome
After seeing that everyone else in the world is publishing online, we're going to try it out ourselves.
Tomorrow we're going to walk in the March for Babies. We have a website at
www.marchforbabies.org/spsmith with details. Hopefully tomorrow we can write more about it.
Tomorrow we're going to walk in the March for Babies. We have a website at
www.marchforbabies.org/spsmith with details. Hopefully tomorrow we can write more about it.
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