A Wonderful and Tough Year

The year 2021 blessed us with many miracles but, like everyone, we missed seeing all of our friends and family on a regular basis.

Levi started preschool at Mishkon and was welcomed by a wonderful community where they have music programs and even do yoga on Fridays! Additionally, he survived summer day camp before that in 110 degree weather and learned several songs. He turned two in July and we were able to go to Disneyland with Ryan’s parents and have a small outdoor birthday get together in the park with a few of Levi’s buddies from mommy and me. He’s running like crazy, loves music, and has made good friends with a local jazz band that plays restaurants in Santa Monica. Levi continues to learn Hebrew and got a special visit from Roni’s family who spoiled him with food and Donald Duck impressions.

We welcomed Terra Lynn into our family in November. She’s quite the grounded, driven little girl; regularly growling for attention, milk, or tummy time. She seems on a mission to be able to crawl and stand up like her big brother. Levi has been wonderfully welcoming although he’s a little frustrated she can’t play with him immediately. We’ve been lucky to have time off work through the end of the year in order to spend time together as a family.

After more than 10 years in progressively growing roles in Sourcing and Supply Chain and taking on Leasing and Retail, Jessica was promoted to SVP at Caesars supporting Corporate Operations, IT, and new ventures for the CFO.

Ryan continued his work in Augerented Reality, helping lead Niantic’s quest to create real-world, persistent experiences that grow and change over time. The most recent prototype was so well received internally that it’s expected to rush into development toward becoming a public feature immediately. Hopefully anyone and everyone will be able to experience it soon enough.

Other highlights..
Our Las Vegas Condo flooded and we moved into a beautiful house in Henderson where we hope to host some friends someday. We closed on a small place in Santa Monica that will likely stop us from continued renting and will allow us to rent out during our travels.
Ryan and Levi got to attend a Cubs game during a work trip with Jess and all enjoyed the Riverwalk light show.
We made it to the big island of Hawaii; Levi loved Moana’s home, didn’t mind the fierce storms, and wanted “more” fire dancers and volcano views.