This week signaled the start of school for Nye. (Seen to the left being buried alive by his friend Ivy. Oh wait that was just a sand sculpture. - No worries.) This is in some regards the end of summer. I admit that with predictions of mid-70+ degree weather every day it is a bit hard to think of this as the end of summer. For reasons not worth enumerating San Jose starts school crazy early. The good news is that it ends very early in June. No snow days here to trouble the calendar!!Nye is excited to see his friends and to be starting 4th grade. Yep that's right 4th grade. It's just crazy to think of him as getting that close to the end of elementary school. He is in a mixed 3-4 class this year which I think might be good for Nye. He is much younger than a lot of his 4th grade classmates owning to the discrepancy between NYC's December start date and CA's September start date. (I can explain all that if anyone really cares about the details.) Suffice it to say he has a lot of friends who are already 9 year old, but Nye will only turn 9 in November.
We're happy we've been able to keep him in the same school he was going to in Willow Glen owing to it's proximity to my work. Yippee! This year he'll be in Mr. Grigg's class. We're crossing our fingers that will all work out well and will of course do our best to make sure. Mr. Grigg's is new to Hammer Montessori. We're thrilled that for the second time he will have a male teacher(s). Now that all is sort of settled on the school front we'll start to investigate the very complex decisions around middle schools. But not right away!!
Art Scene
We continue to investigate the area art "scene". Arch is part of a group show up in Palo Alto which is themed to Faces & Figures. We went up to the opening as a family and had fun exploring the center and its class offerings. I'm very happy to see that venues are opening up for Archil in the area.Back in San Jose the city is preparing for the 01 Biennial which is a merging of arts/media and technology. This year one of the centerpiece installations will have a link to my museum. We're working like crazy people to ensure a good experience for our young visitors and very excited about the Rockwell Groups piece. The challenge seems to be the integration of a smallish museum with limited staff time and resources working with a NYC design firm able to mobilize large resources (but not able to plan in advance.) Interesting things should happen!
Also connected with the same event I spent time decorating a piano for a Luke Jerram piece called "Play me I'm yours" which has been in NYC and will be coming to San Jose. My friends Lisa, Francis and I spent the afternoon preparing a piano for outside the museum. Lots of fun!! I'm very much looking forward to the event in September.
The house continues to be a great project. Today a dumpster arrived. I'm very excited to see all the debris we've removed from the house and shed placed, tossed, and otherwise thrown into the dumpster and hauled away. Our back yard is now mulched and growing vegetables and a few flowers. The fruit trees yawn with fruit, since I failed to thin! And the compost heap is looking like it will be fertile if we can just find some time to turn it. Oh, and the hummingbirds continue to duel in our backyard much to my continued delight. Who know that such small creatures could be so fierce!!
I'm slated to participate as a panelist in a symposium connected with the Ultimate Block Party in NYC on October 2nd. I'll be in town for just a couple of days and hope to see as many folks as I can. I'll be in CT prior to the event to spend time with my family.
All our love and best thoughts!
xo
Sara, Nye and Archil
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