Hey Buonos!!

Happy 27th of May, fellow progeny of Alphonzo and Maria! I know I haven't been here recently, been busy on Facebook and with church and Scouts....but wanted to let you un-Facebooked among us know what's been happening here in rainy Georgia!

John's last day of the 3rd grade was on Friday, if you can believe that! On Thursday, he was given the following awards: Merit List (all As and Bs all year), the REACH Award for Speech (there is one regular REACH winner from each class, and only one speech award given for the whole grade) and with this award, he and I got to have our hand prints added to the REACH wall outside the cafeteria at the school, and also a cool gold star pin! He was given a Speech Student of the year award, and a "High-Tech" award from his homeroom teachers for being the most knowledgeable about the tecchy stuff they use in the classrooms.

He scored an 807 on the GCRCT in Math and a 776 in Reading. 800 is baseline, so he did pass his math, but not the reading portion..normally, this would force him into summer school and having to retake the test, but since he's still considered "resource" this has been waived for him, and he's been placed in the 4th grade. I had him placed because his reading level has gone up 2 grade levels since the beginning of the school year. He's been working really hard this year and has just shown awesome improvement this year in his new school. We've been re-districted though, so next year he'll be going to the brand new elementary school right down the road.....

Aaron's still at the plant, he'll probably be carried out of there toes up....gets stressful at times, but he does seem to love what he does, so if that's the case, so be it. He was nominated for the company's Safety Committee, and from what he said yesterday, it sounds like he was approved for it. The committee travels to all of the Harcros facilities to do training and inspect them and make sure they're up to Federal standards. More travelling for him, but it gets him away from the everyday stresses here that he has with his older kids. He's also volunteered to be a teacher at VBS this year at church, which should be interesting, plus he's the Cubmaster of John's pack.

My elbow surgery went ok...the first one was kind of a bust (literally!), started leaking joint fluid from it, so Doc had to go back in and fix that problem. Seems to have taken ok, not in near as much pain as I was before in the ol elbow. I'm currently awaiting 2 more procedures, one in my shoulder joint to put in new anchors and tighten in back up, and one in my bicep to re-attach my biceps tendon that was attached there a few years ago in a tendonisis procedure. Still out on disability (yippee for me, right?) but it gives me a chance to spend some more time with John this summer, and we don't have to worry about the cost of day camp. I'm doing crafts at VBS this year (I'm still trying to figure out how THAT happened!) and I'm the Pack Trainer for Scouts, I've been helping our District Exec from Council with some stuff, and hoping to be nominated for Order of the Arrow this year, it's a pretty big deal, so keep your fingers crossed!

That's about it from here....will talk to you all soon!

Love and miss you all!
Cheri

Happy Memorial Day

Happy Memorial Day weekend to all the Buonos! Let's take a moment to reflect on the service and sacrifice of all our veterans. They deserve it. In fact, they deserve a lot more.

Matter of fact, I just watched "The Court Martial of Billy Mitchell" on our Netflix subscription. It's absolutely amazing to me how prescient the man was, in 1925, about the future use of air power and the nation's need to prepare for its implications. If you haven't seen it and you like military flicks, check it out.

Sandy and I are just hangin' out, enjoying the good weather, working in the yard and getting some garage cleaning and house painting done. We'll have our neighbors the Giulianos over tomorrow, and Pete & Beth over for some grill-out fare on Monday.

The other bit of news....we just signed on a new '09 Honda Accord, delivery due this coming Wednesday. Can't wait ( & can't beat that 0% financing)!!

Cheers to all.

Harry

Catching up

Hey Guys -

Traffic's been so low here over the last few months that I got out of the habit of checking in.  Was thinking maybe we should join the kids over on Facebook.  Jenny, Cheri, Fran, Sandy G. Lorraine and I yak away over there pretty regularly.   But Facebook is pretty public, and this page is set up for family only.

Harry - New golf clubs!  May you wear them out this summer.  Sandy and I play pretty regulary at an executive course up in Brea.  My putting is atrocious, so I must need a new putter!  The Dodgers got off to a good start, feasting on the weak teams in the N.L. West. Then Manny got suspended for a third of the season, just in time for a swing through the East.  I figured they'd come back down to earth then. But, two out of three from the Phillies ain't a bad start.  So we'll see. Losing an impact player like Ramirez can't help.

Also, nice photo of your mom and young Mark.  She called me a week or so ago about the availability of the movie my dad was in back in 1951.  I have vague memories of seeing it on TV when I was a kid.  It's available from Amazon so I ordered it and we watched it. It's called Yes Sir, Mr. Bones, and is a salute to the Minstrel Shows from the 30's and 40's: white guys in black face.  It's a cringe-a-thon of racial sterotyping, but it was fun to see the old man in action again with his vocal quartet,  even if they were in outlandish get-ups. No blackface, thankfully.  I'll post a couple of photos from it here shortly.

Lorraine - That is so cool that your job includes international travel.  We'd love to visit Vienna some day.  Hope you have some time for sightseeing.  Take pictures!

We are off to Vegas next week for a computer conference. looking forward to a break in the routine.

Cheers,

Don

I'm Here

Hi Everybody,

It's been so crazy lately, I haven't even thought about stoppin' in to say hi. So here I am.

Work is going great. I'll be in Boston next month for a meeting. Unfortunately, I won't be there long enough to say hi to anyone. Flying in on Tuesday and out on Thursday with an all day meeting in between.

In September, I'll be going down to Georgia to visit Cheri, Aaron and John. We're going to the NASCAR race Labor Day weekend at Atlanta Motorspeedway. We'll be camping in the infield for the whole weekend. Unfortunately, in a tent. I hate tents. John doesn't know anything about the race. It's going to be a huge surprise as it's his early birthday present. He knows we're going camping, but that's it. I'm so excited. I can't wait to see his face when he realizes we'll be there all weekend. Our space is very close to the garage area, so we can walk over and watch what's going on through the fence.

In October, I'll be going to Vienna for a week for another meeting. Very excited about that. Only foreign country I've ever been to is Canada and that doesn't count. :)

Sad news is that my car blew a head gasket. Good news is that someone bought it. So now I have a down payment for another car.

Enjoying Logan and very happy I can see him grow and thrive. Miss John alot though.

Can't wait to go to Long Island and have a mini family reunion to see a Met game at the new "Shea" Stadium. I know it has a new name, but to us die hard Met fans it will always be Shea. Then that Friday, Joni and I are going to see Huey Lewis and the News. One of my faves. And I'll spend the rest of the weekend with Mom.

Well, I guess that's it for now.

Love,
Lorraine

Just a Reminiscence

Hi Folks,

Sandy just loaded a bunch of old slides onto our computer, and I just thought I'd post an interesting one. It's of Mark and his "Grandma Lou" at his first birthday party in January, 1979. Check out the train cake!!

BTW....where is everyone? No posts, no comments? In the words of Blues Traveler....Hey baby, let's keep in touch.

Harry