Anna Grows

May 2016  It was with great sadness that we said goodbye to Storm on March 23.  He was suffering from arthritis and dementia, both of which had worsened significantly in the past month.  Storm spent the last 7 of his 17 years with us and quickly became an integral part of the family. Storm joined us in May 2016 as a rescue.  Anna had lobbied her parents for years to get a dog and one of the criteria was that someone needed to be home during the day.  Joe met the criteria when he retired in March 2016.  As fate would have it, Anna's carpool mom worked with a rescue group and sent out a message looking for an emergency foster for a senior cockapoo whose owner had to go to a nursing home.  Theresa, who was never a dog person, thought getting an older dog would be good as he was already trained, so the family went to meet Storm.  At this point, Joe could see he was going to be outnumbered as Anna and Theresa immediately took to Storm.  Anna was having significant anxiety issues with tr

Anna with Buckee enroute to Disney  After 16 years, Anna at last made her first trip to Disney World!  This is an epic milestone for Anna.  While her friends and seemingly most families in Northern Virginia have made the pilgrimage to Disney (often multiple times) for family vacations, Anna was denied the opportunity.  Oh sure, she's traveled to beaches and national parks around the country, but somehow Disney was denied.  Thanks to the Madison High School choir and orchestra program, Anna made the trip to sunny Florida for her first Disney experience. It should be noted that to take 3 busloads of high school students to Florida is no small feat.  This demonstrates the level of dedication of the teachers.  They left Wednesday night and rode the bus all night before arriving at 9 AM at Disney Hollywood studios.  Apparently, there were a couple of stops along the Way at Bucee's travel center ( Home - Buc-ees ).  It is worth checking out the website for what is considered the ulti

February 17, 1973  Grandma & Grandpa celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary on February 17th.    This is a major milestone that only 3% of all married couples make it to!  Celebration plans were a bit altered this year as Grandma is still recovering.  Theresa, Joe & Anna had planned to come for the weekend and a family dinner celebration; however, Theresa ended up sick and the trip was postponed.  Instead, grandma was the recipient of lots of flowers.  They had a take-out dinner from the local Mexican restaurant and Tim and Aidyn surprised them for a weekend visit.  In the meantime, Theresa was feeling better and managed to make it back for a quick visit the following weekend.   In other news, Anna performed with the Jammers All-stars on Saturday at a performance by the Legacy Dance Company.  In addition to drumming and marimba, Anna got to add vocals as well as their group played the music for the dance finale.  It was a cool experience and something new.  Stay tuned for vi