Dear family and friends,
It’s hard to believe yet another year is coming to a close. 2016 was chock full of wonderful times with many loved ones. Christmas last year saw Steve’s brother Dave and our niece Andie visiting, followed by a New Year’s visit with Nancy’s flying buddies Marcie and Susan.
Steve’s annual holiday programming project lasted well into the New Year. He wrote a dictionary tool to help players defeat the iPad Scrabble game set at the highest difficulty level. Others have used the tool (Scrabbler.us) to great effect and Steve used the project to learn new techniques and a new programming language.
We had several visitors during our winter in AZ including Kristi, the Brignoli’s (Sloan classmates), and the Grahams. In between visitors, Steve executed some landscaping projects including a Giant Saguaro and Eagle sculpture. Nancy was able to visit her mother and brother four separate times in Tennessee, as well as attend various Ninety-Nine events, including a fabulous international convention in Ottawa, Canada.
We jointly visited with friends in Chicago and Maryland, attended a Sloan reunion in Minneapolis, and cruised parts of the inland waterway. We became addicted to a new board game, Rummikub, and will be happy to teach it to any visitors!
It was very hard losing our precious poodle Pixie this summer, but we are looking forward to two new puppies in January. One will be a red standard poodle, Brandy, and one will be a mini Irish goldendoodle, named Beckett. Steve will be busy once more as the dog whisperer! He’ll have Casper’s help, for whatever a 22-year-old cat can contribute. Casper will have been part of the lives of all 6 dogs we’ve owned since marriage.
We also decided to get a new set of wings this year, and both Steve and Nancy devoted time to getting current, then training in Nancy’s new Cirrus. Nancy named it Maxwell, and as you can see from the pictures, he’s hard to miss seeing in the pattern!
Steve’s startup Seeq is making progress and has signed some major clients. The team is cautiously optimistic that the ‘hockey stick’ in results are about to hit. Here is a link describing Seeq (that’s Tabitha’s voice): Seeq Intro 1 2. The virtual office environment permits Steve to work from our homes in WA or AZ or while on the road. But Seeq still is a great team. Here is a link to our Holiday video card (that’s my scarf blowing in the wind): Happy Holidays.
Tabitha and her husband Rich are settled in Hood River, but also bought a condo in an up-and-coming neighborhood of Portland. Rich has transferred to Elemental, a Portland-based Amazon acquisition, and loves the more laid-back work environment. He bikes to work from the condo weekdays, then comes home to Hood River for the weekends. Tabitha is still hard at work in partnership with Steve making Seeq successful.
2017 is shaping up to be an busy year, with our calendars already bursting with scheduled events. But we are always happy to host you in Fountain Hills or White Salmon should you have time to visit.
May your holidays and coming year be filled with peace and love.
Nancy and Steve Sliwa
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| Nancy’s flying buddies, Marcie and Susan, joined us for New Year’s. | Steve used his Scrabbler project to score 338 points with Zabajone on a double triple word with doubled J! | |
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| Steve had a team come in with a truck to install a giant Saguaro in the front yard weighing more than a ton. | Seeq was awarded an Innovation Pioneer award by CERA and Steve presented at the annual conference. | |
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| Tabitha snapped this of the Seeq leadership team (less herself) at a team lunch. | Nancy and Kristi Garwood standing by the new eagle sculpture installed in front of our Arizona house. | |
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| Steve nursed Pixie through her vapors injuries and ailments and they were tightly bonded. | Casper the cat at 21+ has now outlived 2 sets of dogs and is now going to help train new puppies this January. | |
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| The Grahams visited us on vacation and it included zip-lining in the gorge. | Steve put his CFI back to work and gave Ethan Graham some pre-solo flight instruction in the motorglider. | |
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| Steve got to take the Nordlund kids to his favorite museum in Chicago. | Chicago included a dinner at the Hancock Building. | |
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| Steve & Nancy picked up Nancy’s new Cirrus which she named Maxwell. | Shortly after completing training, Nancy took Maxwell to SoCal to attend a 99’s weekend. | |
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| At Steve’s Sloan reunion in Minneapolis we took a cooking class and prepared dinner … great teamwork! | Nancy and Steve took a Segway tour in Minneapolis, an item on Nancy’s bucket list. | |
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| We kicked off our trip down a portion of the East Coast with Peter & Gertrud with good times in DC. | Magic Moments cruising yacht is next to a tall ship at Yorktown VA (where we lived when first married). |
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