Hernandez Family Blog

Well, it seemed to go with the glasses

2012-01-30T02:09:39Z

We picked up the acoustic bass as an accessory to go with the new glasses. And yes, he plays it like he's been playing for years. First gig on fat Tuesday.

The Trinity Cross

2012-01-24T01:13:06Z

Yesterday, I received a very great honor from my church, Trinity Episcopal Church. Peter Gregory, Arianna's godfather, delivered a very nice speech, and what his words could not convey, his emotions did. He is a devoted father and Christian. He sets high standards and has his priorities in the right place. And he himself was honored with the Trinity Cross many years ago.

I was so happy that Cyndi was there at my side to witness(yes, she cried), and I immediately thought of my parents. Mom, Dad, this is for you. The note below is from Fr John, who describes what this is about:

PS: although the lighting makes it seem like gold, it is actually a beautiful pewter.

Dear Friends,

When I first arrived at Trinity, someone said to me, “why do we only honor people at the end of their lives?” It was a great question, and at the annual meeting in 1987 we began honoring people each year who had served Christ and this parish through many years of ministry and service. Every year at the annual meeting we choose a few people who have shown us the light of Christ day in and day out, and who make the ministries here better.

You cannot “win” this award, nor can you “earn” it. We pay tribute to a few people each year with the Trinity Cross as our way of saying, “you have inspired us, and served us for many years in the name of Christ-and we pay homage to you and give you our thanks.”

Someone recently said to me, how are the people chosen who receive the Trinity Cross. Usually I come up with a few names of people that I think have done outstanding ministry for a long time and talk to several other long time members, asking their opinions. And then I choose the 3 or 4 who best exemplify for that year the gifts of long standing service, excellence, and faith in our parish.

A few years ago I opened it up by asking those who have been awarded the Trinity Cross for their thoughts. It worked so well that we continue it this every year. So, let me know who you think should be honored . Please mail me the names of one or two Traditionally we choose 3 or 4. You must put your name on the nomination, and it would help if you could explain briefly why you believe they should receive the Trinity Cross. This will be kept in confidence.

The criteria that I use are:

several years of service to the people of Trinity,
great ministry, touched the lives of many, and
an inspiring faith in Christ.

Believe it or not, this is how you were chosen.

God bless,
Fr. John

She's definitely your daughter

2011-12-17T02:52:36Z

The highlight of my week was Thursday evening. Arianna has piano lessons, and has come a long way. She doesn't prefer to read the music, and has developed a great ear.

Some time ago, she was practicing a song, and started on the wrong note and accidentally played in a minor key. We had just finished a conversation about what it means to play in a major key and a minor key, and I asked her why she thought she was playing it wrong. She said, "Well, it sounds sad". I told her THAT is what a minor key is, and told her to keep playing the song that way, the sad way. So, she figured out the rest of the song in this minor key, and then played it correctly in the major key, and began to switch between the two.

Thus encouraged, she likes to learn a song, then change the key, and sometimes change the feel from major to minor. Sometimes, it sounds like the modulation in a video game when you 'level up', so that's what we say when we want her to modulate the song" Level it up, Arianna!" She likes this, because you can't read this from her lesson music; you have to invent it.

Meanwhile, during her lessons, I play on the pianos in the store, often without music. I tend to get lots of compliments from other students, and even her teacher. SO, this week, Arianna apparently was showing off this talent for her piano teacher, using Carol of the Bells, and when she came out of the room, her teacher was beaming at me, telling me that Arianna has such a good ear and talent for this sort of thing, changing the song and still play it right. Her teacher finished by telling me "Yes, she is definitely your daughter!"

Yeah...he made that

2011-09-13T02:25:14Z

Some of you might know we have someone in the family who can forge iron: Cyndi, who took a forging class at MIT in her undergrad years. Yes, she is a rocket scientist, and she can also pound iron into submission, bending it to her will. Yeah, yeah, she can also knit socks and fingerless gloves, and makes THE BEST gazpacho in the world, but we're talking about a rocket scientist who can forge iron, and has two degrees from MIT! Anyway, where was I going with this? Oh, yeah.

I am pleased to say we can now add another artisan skill to the family: Aaron can blow glass. He is taking glass blowing at Baron GlassWorks, here is Michigan. I hope to add more pictures of the stuff he's making, but here is the first one. This is a seeding dome, with a leaf curled over on the top. Those of you who know Aaron well can totally picture him blowing glass, can't you? Totally.

BTW, of all the totally cool side benefits that come with having someone in the family who is blowing glass, my favorite one so far: I have finally seen, with my own eyes, a pool of liquid glass, right there in the furnace. Wicked.

Toledo Zoo

2011-08-31T16:52:47Z

I went to the Toledo Zoo with Kathryn Truesdell and we saw the baby eliphant Lucas

In the aviary there was a cool bench with Kathryn's favorite statue . My favorite bird in the aviary was this purple shiny bird it was so pretty but it kept going so high I couldn't see it. Another section of the aviary there was a baby bird he was so cute!

thanks Miss Kathryn for taking me to the zoo

Images of a Summer Saturday

2011-08-14T20:43:18Z

This weekend, I was home alone with Arianna while Cyndi went out shopping, and the boys were out at the zoo with their girlfriends. The weather was so nice I invited her to come outside. So I lay in my hammock, and she lay in one of the lounge chairs, and I couldn't resist taking this shot with my phone(we were both reading our books, but my book is not bigger than my face):

Later that night, we went over to a party for current and former leaders of the church youth group. A storm blew in after dinner, but afterwards, there were some beautiful clouds lit from underneath by the sunset. This is sort of what they looked like. At time like this, a phone camera really doesn't do it justice:

The Harrisville Beach Spa, Part I

2011-08-01T00:56:43Z

This weekend, we went camping at Harrisville State Park with the Hansknecht family, one of our close friends from church. Arianna and Tessa(whom you've see high in a tree in an earlier post this summer) spent much time together on the beach. Here is a pair of sand bath tubs they made, on the coast of Lake Huron:

They can play, So What?

2011-07-22T02:29:35Z

The other day, I was listening to jazz on the way home from hockey, and I heard a rendition of Miles Davis' So What. A couple of days later, I couldn't get the song out of my head, so when I came home from work and finished dinner, I sat down and played it on the piano. Then I picked up the nylon string guitar and had a go at it. It's tough for me to play any kind of scales on guitar, but I did figure it out. Sort of. Then I asked Aaron to play it for me.

A few minutes later(which is all it took for Aaron to nail it), I called Adam to please come downstairs; I had gone back to the piano and we needed a drummer, badly: it was one of those moments where the music begins to gel. Adam, whether he was listening to us practice or not, immediately picked up the groove, sensed the changes and the phrasing, and one chorus later, he even put the rim shots exactly where Jimmy Cobb put them in 1959. Meanwhile, when we were done with the head of the song, Aaron said "Now what do I do?". I said "Take a solo." So he did.

Wow. If you haven't heard this song played on a nylon string guitar, you're missing something.

The boys practice almost every day. They never play jazz unless I ask them. But when they do play jazz, it's pretty amazing. Several choruses later, I went back to the head of the song, and the boys followed, and we faded out together. The look on their faces said that they liked what just happened. Aaron even said "that was pretty cool!" I was thinking how lucky and blessed I am to be a part of this.

I've said it before, but I'll brag again: we have amazing kids. Maybe this weekend, we'll record it. But I wasn't going to stop the playing tonight and interrupt the magic. I love my kids; they can play.

Sunsets, card games and friends

2011-07-20T02:21:05Z

Each year, we take a trip to Boston to visit with our college friends from Cyndi's dorm that was called Russian House, or RusskiDom. Every several years or so, we try to have a special gathering. Some years ago, we went skiing in New Hampshire. This year, we postponed the February trip for a special reunion in July, again held in New Hampshire.

This was one of the best vacations I've ever had. There were 25 of us, including our spouses, children and a sibling. We went hiking, took a canoe trip on a river, braved a canopy tour(zip lining), participated in a cupcake eating contest, watched an incriminating video of the first reunion from 1991, played cards every night, cooked all our own food, and cleaned up after ourselves. There was much laughter, no quarreling and no drama. There was even dance lessons in Flamenco, Argentinian Tango and Swing.

We took lots of pictures, some of which I will share here. The others will be closely guarded state secrets published on a secret database until the next reunion. Earlier, I posted an entry with some photos of our at the top of Cathedral Ledge. Here are some photos of our last night, before we tried to polish off 20 bottles of wine, whiskey, and tequila(I think the vodka disappeared fairly early in the vacation. I think.), and hence, are submitted to the public domain for safe consumption(RusskiDom'ers, all of these are available in full resolution upon request):

The 'family photo':

One of our original members, Tanya, daughter Naia, the newest edition to the clan, plus one more on the way, all posing after sunset on the amazing property where we stayed:

I took a dozen shots of the sunset, and I think this one is one of my favorites. This is the view from the balcony:

Cyndi and friends playing cards at ONE of the card tables:

Some of the kids, wait, I think ALL of the kids, playing cards with some of the grownups. Well, playing cards with some of the adults, anyway:

Can't go wrong with smiles and dimples, can you? And that's me drinking, um, orange juice:

And Aaron playing guitar in the parlor, singers and drinks abound. There was also a ukulele and a saxophone that night!

At the edge of the world...

2011-07-08T01:02:54Z

So, we are communing with nature(and about 20 college friends and their kids) out here in New Hampshire's White Mountains. We took a hike to Cathedral's Ledge, and at the top of the ledge, Arianna sat down to check out the view. Cyndi took these great shots. Later, I want to try and crop them into a poster or something, but thought I would share them unedited for now(apologies for the large file size):

Fashion Designs by: Arianna

2011-05-14T14:39:00Z

Here is one of the sketches that Arianna made with her klutz kit she got

Here is the other and this one is based off of Aaron's "Awesome Purple Vest" and black skinny jeans

Easter Sunday 2011

2011-04-30T22:00:00Z

Easter Sunday at Trinity Episcopal Church is always a special event when we're here. Some years ago, the church decided that we ought to go the extra mile and wear hats, and the congregation responded with enthusiasm. Here's ours:

Here are some shots of Arianna with some close Trinity friends. The short one is Elizabeth, and the tall one is Ariel. Ariel's father is Arianna's godfather.

Over the last several years, I have been asked to play "Lord, I Lift Your Name on High" for the recessional, but this year, the Praise Band was asked to play it with me. I decided that the kids could do it by themselves, and once again, they rocked the house. We added yet another musician by asking young Riley to play cowbell on the shout chorus. The last time we played, he came up to talk to Adam about playing the drums, and began taking lessons. So I put him to work! Here's some pics of them rehearsing before the service:

Bolivian Tree Llamas

2011-04-14T02:15:00Z

Sunday, I went out to the backyard and found these things crawling around in my tree. I decided to feed them, hoping they'd come back. Their names are Arianna, Elizabeth and Tessa.

For some reason, Arianna is not the kid on the highest branch. She's slacking off, I think we're gonna have a talk about that.

My new addiction

2011-04-06T02:46:00Z

Hello, my name is Eddie and I'm an engineer addicted to cool electrical and mechanical things. Like this helicopter I built on my newly found workbench. I flew it tonight. Allow me to repeat that: I FLEW IT TONIGHT, WOO-HOO!!!

Oh, and just to brag a bit, in the same evening that I finished building this chopper (which has a mind boggling number of screws, every single one of which I painstakingly used lock-tite on), I also installed our new garbage disposal (Adam helped me). AND THEN I FLEW THIS THING!

Let's just say I'm extremely excited!!!

Hey, I found the workbench in the basement!

2011-03-12T03:35:00Z

Several years ago, my very thoughtful wife bought me a workbench for Christmas. Adam and I used it to build our first airplane. Aaron and I have done much soldering on it. Arianna and I have used it for various projects. Like all workbenches, it was The Place for Tinkering by men of Very Little Brain.

Over the years, however, it became more and more cluttered, and the wood surface, despite my obsessing about it, somehow got glue and epoxy all over it. It had become the place to take things in need of repair, where those things languished until, by some miracle of motivation, they finally got fixed, or they received their last rites. More often than not, things simply languished, and this place became more of a junkyard/graveyard than a place to do work.

This week, thanks a very nice bonus from Ford Motor Company, I was able to afford a cool, new project. But first, I was in need of a place to build it. After some hours in the ruins of our basement, and with the help of the boys, I was able to excavate my workbench so I could get started with that project. When I was done, Aaron said "Wow. LIke, wow".

I thought I'd share my discovery with you, and re-express my thanks to my wife. Now to get started on that project...

Trinity Youth Sabbath Feb 2011 Video

2011-03-02T16:55:00Z

Here's a link to a video posted of the recessional .

Here's a link to a video posted of the processional video posted of the processional video posted of the processional.

Trinity Youth Sabbath Feb 2011

2011-02-27T21:12:00Z

After much hard work and planning, today's Youth Sabbath at Trinity Episcopal Church was PHENOMENAL! We are so blessed to have a church like Trinity filled with such youth. The readings were well done, the acolytes performed their tasks smoothly, the prayers were said with sensitivity, the Eucharistic Ministers administered with care and reverence, and the sermon team was fantastic with their message and their unique tag team delivery. All of this and more was accomplished by our youth. I want to take some time here to acknowledge especially the gifts of the Trinity Youth Praise Band : Travis Anderson, sister Lizzie Anderson, new recruit Josh Hansknecht, and my two boys, Adam and Aaron, along with our new sound system engineer, Eric Travis.

Each time we do a Youth Sabbath, we stretch our wings a little bit more. Not too long ago, this was an annual event. The feedback was so positive that we began doing this every six months. The church wanted to give the youth a little more more latitude in planning and organizing it, and the youth and their youth group leaders responded to the challenge with interesting ideas about the service language, the Creed and, of course, the service music. Six months ago, Adam was the first youth to organize the music under adult supervision, collaborating with the Trinity Praise Band. This year, Travis Anderson volunteered for the task, developing a unique vision and exercising additional latitude. They recruited a new musician, Josh, hiding in the midst of the existing Trinity youth, and got him to play and sing and even lead a portion of the worship.

Travis and his peers worked very hard on the music, writing new lyrics for secular music, including the Beatles' "Twist and Shout" and even Bon Jovi's "Dead or Alive." I overheard them discussing the spiritual needs of the congregation, particularly for communion, and they put a special effort into the recessional, intending to send the congregation out into the world highly charged and inspired. For the Creed, the Confirm Not Conform class wrote not only new words expressing their faith, but composed new music to sing it by. They rehearsed and revised and rehearsed some more. They even responded to a last second(literally) need for additional, unplanned music right smack in the middle of the service.

The results were simply amazing. Even after listening to the rehearsals, the revisions, and the inevitable debates that occur during the creative process, words to describe the outcome that was service today escape me. I have often said that kids are sponges, and will absorb everything you feed them, therefore, feed them, feed them, and feed them some more. What I was reminded of yet again today was that they can in their turn feed others. A LOT of others.

I am so proud of Travis, Lizzie, Josh, Adam and Aaron. They are all immensely gifted, and as youth, invaluably so, probably more than they realize. Furthermore, I think their willingness to share their gifts, especially something as intimate as their Creed, takes, on the one hand, courage, and on the other, not just confidence, but conviction. I hope everyone present was as inspired and charged as I was. We are truly blessed to have youth like this, and a church like this in which they can express themselves. I do truly hope they will continue their ministry, here and elsewhere.

Blast from the Past: Blue Skies Trio

2011-01-15T05:00:00Z

About four months ago, I'd gotten a little fancy and somewhat ambitious and launched the Trinity Youth Praise Band on ReverbNation and Facebook . At the time, I promised that I'd follow that up by doing something similar for the Blue Skies Trio. Well, it's finally done!

This was a really special time, and I'll always remember it fondly. We think we were pretty decent, people told us they loved to hear us play, and most of all, we had a really good time playing and sharing the gift of music. I was privileged to have had that opportunity, and will treasure that always.

As I mentioned in that other post, Cyndi helped me put together a quarter, but that effort and experience so far is worthy of its own post. I hope you enjoy listening to the Trio as much as we enjoyed playing. Troy, Garrett, I miss you guys!

Somebody poisoned the water hole!

2010-12-12T20:44:00Z

This morning, while Cyndi and I were laying in bed, debating the merits of getting out of said bed, I heard a muffled "Cool!" followed a few minutes later by the creak of the back door and brief sounds of shoveling. During the last two snows, Arianna was bent on shoveling a path, one shovel wide, from the back door to the garage. I guess it's the little things that count...

By the time we got back from church, there was still plenty of snow to shovel, and when we were done, Arianna began rolling up a snow man. It was good, wet, heavy snow, the kind which, when you roll up a snow man, leaves behind bare ground. Here's the result:

Hey, that's MY name up there!

2010-09-15T01:39:00Z

At just about every department meeting I've attended, someone is celebrating an anniversary. Since we meet about once a month or per quarter, there are often quite a few names. Occasionally, someone is celebrating a rather large number of years compared to the rest. Last month, that someone was me. Even though I knew my name was going to be up there on the big projector screen, I was still surprised to see my name there next to the phrase "20 years." I almost thought to myself, 'wow, who is THAT guy?' before I realized it was me.

Ford has certainly gone through a lot of changes in the last twenty years. We are a much smaller company than we used to be, but we have managed quite a turn around without going into bankruptcy, and without taking so-called bail out loans, while at the same time producing higher quality, higher fuel efficiency products laden with high technology. We have lost quite a few people, and at one time, quite a lot of experience. One particular day some years back, we held a mass retirement party, and one of my buddies lamented to be losing so many people, so much talent, all at the same time. Some labelled those of us who stayed as 'being brave for going down with the ship', but I chose to think of us as the ones who could be part of the comeback team that would save the company. I'm certainly glad I turned out to be right! Thank you, Ford Motor Company!

I always think of my dad during August. Each year, he calls me up to reminisce about our trip to Michigan in 1990. I recall leaving San Antonio one morning with my car loaded so much that it was riding on the bump stops, and mom was crying in the driveway. As luck would have it, my water pump died by the time we got to Waco, TX, but Dad and I repaired it in the parking lot and kept going. When we got to Michigan, I began to have starter motor trouble. The day before I started my first day on the job, the solenoid on the motor quit for good. Fortunately, I had made contact with another new employee who gave me a ride to work. But while I was at work, my dad walked all the way down the access road and across the interstate to the nearest auto parts store, bought a new solenoid, walked all the way back, and repaired my car. I've never measured the distance accurately, but I think it's at least 2-3 miles each way, plus navigating a four lane bridge with no sidewalk. Thanks, Dad!

The other evening, I was talking with a colleague in the parking lot, trying to remember how many Ford vehicles my family and friends purchased since I've been at Ford. Between my immediate family, my extended family, and my friends, I come up with 27 vehicles, more than one for each year of my employment. In fact, I just 'sold' one more last week, a brand new red 2010 Taurus SHO to Debbie. Thank you, friends and family!

So I'll leave you with that thought, one of gratitude for my dad, my family, my friends, and the company where I work. It has been one heck of a ride, and I still want to keep driving.