Here are some cheerful photos of Miles and me together. Cheri's the one behind the camera saying "big smile now!"

The boys look pretty mellow here.  We're sitting on a bench in the Lihue airport, on Kauai, getting ready to fly back to Seattle.  It's February.  It's snowing back home in Seattle.  It's taken us a couple of weeks to wind down and we're just now feeling like we belong on the island.  We had a great trip, got lots of sun, built many big sand castles, barbecued a lot, saw whales offshore.  This is sort of an "after" picture if you know what I mean.

The lads on another beach, this time Richmond Beach, down the hill from our house.  It's a nice long beach, with a mix of sandy and rocky shoreline.  There are houses at one end of the beach, and also on the hillside above.  The Amtrak train runs along the shore, very close to the beach - kids wave and the engineers blow the whistle really loud for them.  Miles loves to build sand castles; we'll go to the beach sometimes just so he can dig a big hole. 

When Entricom went toes-up in the summer of 2001, I had a bit of time on my hands in the summer and built a treehouse for Miles.  It was a great project.  The platform spans two trees and has a moveable joint at one end so the trees can sway independently.  This photo shows the platform framed and floorboards newly laid down; Miles and I are trying it out for size to see what we think.  Without the rails up, both of us were a bit nervous up this high.  The completed treehouse has rails around it, like a small deck that just happens to be up in a tree.  Miles and his friends have fun in it, but I think Cheri may be the biggest treehouse fan; she climbs up to contemplate the garden and enjoy the yard. 

For a couple of years in a row, we all went to Mt. Rainier on vacation in August and stayed at the Paradise Inn.  Great location, stuffy rooms, fancy restaurant with great breakfasts (the huckleberry waffles were my favorites, yum!).  We'd take hikes every day, wear ourselves out, then drink a pop on the deck and goof off.  The mountain is truly glorious.  Anyway, here are our lads, relaxing on a bench, probably just about to fish around in the pack for a granola bar.

My all-time favorite picture of Miles and me is this one, taken by Cheri on a walk through the Arboretum in Seattle.  This is very much old stomping grounds for Cheri and me - the Arboretum was an easy walk away from our houseboat on Portage Bay.  It was sprinkly out, a bit cool, autumn leaves mostly off the trees, gray light, a Seattle sort of day.  Miles and I were happy just to walk down the path hand-in-hand; we didn't even know that Cheri had brought the camera with her.

When I built a small tool shed at our other house in Shoreline, Miles wanted to help as much as he could.  He had his own set of tools, gloves, cap, work clothes.  He was a busy hard worker, and a safe one too; when I needed to climb up on a ladder or use a cutoff saw or something like that, he'd stand clear and supervise very intently.  The shed got built at the far end of our property from where the van got unloaded, so there was a good deal of hauling involved.  Miles was a sport and carried light things for me, or alternately rode atop the wheelbarrow.  Good company he was on the job.

Miles and I are here standing in front of our flat in Holland, where I was working in the summer of '94, during the World Cup.  Holland was one of the competitors, and on game days the streets would be full of bare-chested fans painted bright orange.  One fellow in Amsterdam gave Miles a whistle and taught him to shout "Hup Holland!" which he was happy to do; here he's wearing his Holland cap.  We were all a bit surprised by the heat wave in Den Haag - some of my coworkers had visited in the winter and froze.  We got suntans. 

This trip to Europe was where I discovered the international soccer game.  The World Cup was big, and most idle conversations came around to it eventually.  Work began every day with strong coffee all around and a good dissection of the previous evening's matches. 

Here we are performing a very rare four-handed piece for the oud.  We didn't have a piano in our other house, so I played the oud a good deal.  It's a very beautiful, simple instrument, made by a master craftsman in Izmir, in western Turkey.  I'm not especially gifted at playing the oud, but I do love the deep thoughtful sound it has.  Sometimes I'll bring the oud to the Baha'i Feast and play for the Persian friends.  They're patient listening to an untutored beginner; I think it makes them a bit nostalgic for the old country. 

This shot was taken on the upper deck of our houseboat on Portage Bay.  It's the Opening Day of Boating Season, the first Saturday in May, 1992.  Local boaters get dressed and liquored up and sail about in a yacht club-sponsored parade.  Some years the bay would be so filled with yachts you could walk across their decks from one shore to the other. 

Miles is a bit small to remember, but I recall this Opening Day as nice and warm, lots of boats, and Cheri and I were very happy being new parents of our young lad.