This is the courtyard at the San Xavier Mission just outside Tucson. Beautiful old mission presently undergoing renovation. It was actually interesting to see the damage caused by the great number of birds over the years that nested in the various Saints and such. Missions are neat though. Let's see - I am home in Georgia now, and Veronica's latest addition to vocabulary is "My"...so it's My Evan this, or My Elmo, My whatever. Cute. :) 

I just got back from Tucson, AZ where I attended the AAMVA Region IV Conference (see www.aamva.org if you don't know what an AAMVA is). Great meeting, beautiful area - it was really nice to see so many old friends I have not seen in years. It's also nice to see such a large gathering of civil servants who actually have a passion about their job and doing things better. Commiseration is always good, but so is problem solving. Anyway - Tucson was a little hot...I guess it got up around 110F each day I was there, but it's a dry heat. :) (It really does make a difference...but so does air conditioning.)

94!

If she won't brag, I'll do it for her - Jen took the GA real estate exam yesterday and scored 94%!Congratulations Jen! I guess that means the pressure is really on now, eh? :) I was invited yesterday evening to dinner with friends here on the project in Helena, MT. We went to dinner at an establishment only accessible by boat - I'll have to update this post later with the name. I want to say Indian something something, but it's not quite sticking. The lake was beautiful and we had it mostly to ourselves because most of the boaters who would have come from Helena were scared off by thunder, lightning, and hail that hit the town as little as a couple hours before we hit the water - zapped the electric a couple times in the office and caused a bunch of us to loose works in progress. We all forgot cameras for the outing though - I guess I'll have to finagle an invite from our host again when I get Julie, Jen and Veronica out next month!

Action shot 1: I forget what she was laughing at, but she just picked up the telltale sounds of a big jumbo from the nearby airforce base. She likes to point out airplanes and birdies as they fly overhead. 

Action shot 2: "Boss! The plane, the plane!" 

Action shot 3: post-airplane sighting.

Mommy is putting Veronica's hair up to prepare her for model action poses. Cookie is very interested in the background. That, or she's really hoping a banana dreamcicle will slip from a pair of little hands. 

Veronica and mommy enjoying banana dreamcicles on a beautifal Marietta father's day weekend. Yes, you can actually tell that the grass is growing out beyond the sod! I understand our nextdoor neighbor's son cut our back lawn for us on Monday...can't wait to see how it looks. :) Actually, by the time I see it again, I won't know the difference...which is probably good...in a way. 

This is Veronica's casual "rock star" look. I think she's waiting for mommy to fetch her water for her. ;) 

The Ice Cream Series

This is an "experimental post," to see how / whether an MPEG movie post will work. This is a slideshow compilation of the pictures that preceded in chronological posting (they appear individually below). The experiment didn't work - can't share movie files using the Hello software. But...in case you are curious, you can still view the movie. I had to upload the file to my rootresource site and make it available there. You may be able to just click on the picture below, your it may be quicker to right click on it and indicate "save target as..." to copy it to your local drive before playing. The file should be about 1.8 megs.

Sadly, her toes cannot always keep up with her mind and she stumbled in hot pursuit. I stole this picture of her after she hauled herself up and cried for daddy to pick her up, make her boo-boo better. The boo-boo disappeared as soon as I showed her the pictures stored on the camera...then reappeared when I wouldn't let her monkey with it! ;) Let's see - Montana is pretty and green, nice temps and all that. The rain blew in early this evening as I left work to return to my room, and think about doing more work. I'm looking forward to visiting Tuscon at the end of the month and spending a lot of July with Jen & Veronica! We'll be recruiting soon for a house and dog sitter when we pull a family field trip to Montana and Yellowstone. :) 

I tried to get a picture of her handiwork along her shirtfront when she got down from the table. She inherited her daddy's fascination with cameras and was compelled to chase after the photographer! 

Of course, some foods can help you learn to write. They can also serve as a nifty facial disguise. :) 

She experiments with strategy - you never know what'll work till you try it...I guess. 

First in the "ice cream series." Veronica is refining her spoon handling strategies. Mommy gave her ice cream for dessert over the weekend.

Jen News

Root Family - Marietta
Still nothing on the job front. I hate waiting. Oh well - it gives me more time with Veronica, who is napping peacefully. Oops there she goes... not so peacefully!

"My Yahoo" module for RSS feeds

Greetings again,
If you have a Yahoo e-mail or are otherwise "registered" with Yahoo, do you ever use the "My Yahoo" page? If not for work, the My Yahoo page would be my home page - it's my jumping off point for links to other sites I frequently use, stocks I track, and news articles as they are published by the various wire services. But, did you know that you can keep track of updates to RSS fees, like this blog?
Hopefully this will work for you, if you are interested (and assuming you are registered at Yahoo and use the My Yahoo much). It should work for you by just clicking on the following link for a preview, and it will give you the option to add it to your My Yahoo page. You may have to sign into Yahoo if you are not already:
http://e.my.yahoo.com/config/cstore?.opt=content&.sid=1010626
Anyway, seems the weather has cleared in Montana and Georgia at the same time, though I'm holed up in my room working (and tinkering with my new toy/blog), and Jen just got waylaid by a cold! I can already see the writing on the wall...Jen will get well just as I return home, but Veronica will come down with it. I'll be okay till the day before I return to Montana, and I'll export the whatever to Montana. Eesh. I don't remember being warned about this aspect of parenthood. It is still worth while. ;)
Take care,
Nathan

Veronica trying to put Cookie back inside...or maybe she's just drying her hands and looking for mommy at the same time. ;) 

Veronica ENJOYING her swimming pool. 

Veronica trying to re-fill her swimming pool. 

Veronica arranging her swimming pool. 

Veronica MAD

Ahh...each photo is an individual post. We'll see how this works. Here, she's giving mommy the Damien look. It's not that she's mad, she just gets that look for a second. I think she's practicing.

Root Family - Christmas 2004 - Charlottesville, VA 

First Post

Greetings!
Finally getting around to establishing a spot to update family and friends on the Root family of Nathan, Jennifer, and Veronica...and company ("Cookie" for example). Will hopefully share pictures and such via Picasa / Hello. Not sure if we will maintain the web site at www.rootresource.com/Veronica/veronica.htm or not. Certainly has Veronica's archived photos there, mostly from our beginnings in Sacramento, but including our trips back home to Virginia/D.C. and other places.
Hard to keep things updated with Jen handling things virtually single-handed with Nathan commuting from Georgia to Montana for 2 weeks at a time. We are hoping to change this arrangement for the better very soon.
Stay tuned!
-Nathan