The Pierce’s Holiday 2025 Letter
Jerry and Barbara Pierce wish you a happy, healthy, holiday season and a great 2026!
Another year for the books. I really think we should start looking at our expiration date and we SHOULD be slowing down – at least a little bit. But that doesn’t seem to be happening. Not only did we get in a number of international trips, we also did a major family trip! Jerry did a number of backpacking adventures and to top it off we really challenged ourselves and did a major home update. We are working hard to have as many “SKI” trips as possible (Spending Kids Inheritance).
Our grandchildren are growing like weeds. Way too fast! Miles is now taller than Andrea! Everyone remains healthy and living-the-life. No major health events (as long as you don’t count Andrea’s minor foot repair or Miles Orthodonture).
We visited Boston in September
Once again our year was a delightful set of trips to see children and travel. No big health issues (thank goodness). We were able to travel to South America / Patagonia for a few weeks! Read the trip report. We also did a delightful trip to Morocco with Odyssey. Read that trip report! We had a wonderful Disney Cruise with the FULL family to Alaska! Here is that trip report.
Copper workman in Fez Morocco
The family in Alaska
Patagonia
Barbara continues volunteering with the San Mateo History Museum on their major addition – the Carriage House. It’s almost finished! They should be occupying it early next year. She also continues on the Water Board – BAWSCA. It’s a lot of work, but very rewarding. The knees are doing very well so she has been keeping up the walking around the neighborhood and gets in some rowing when conditions are ideal. Travel has been no problem!! Trips to Patagonia, Mexico, Morocco and Canada. Very little grass is growing under our feet, but lots in the backyard!
Jerry continues working on Digital Cinema and is the Executive Director of the InterSociety which is the umbrella organization of ISDCF (InterSociety Digital Cinema Forum) where Jerry is the chairman. Such a great way to keep in touch with friends from work! (And accomplish things.) He continues rowing, photography and backpacking. This year he has been proving that he knows a little about plumbing and electrical as we work on the house.
Jerry got in yet another four wonderful backpacking hikes! Read all about each of the trips by clicking on the red titles below.
The Redwood City house got special recognition in 2025 as we decided it was time to work on the kitchen. As anyone that has ever done any work on a house knows, once you touch just one thing it expands to fill the available budget. So in this case we decided it was time to get a solar system. And that meant a new roof. And if you have solar, might as well get a heat pump HVAC system. And the kitchen? Well, it was great, but pales in comparison to the other major updates. We have more to do (flooring mainly), but it’s waiting for the dust to settle (almost literally). It has been 25 years since we did the major remodel so it was about the right time to do a refresh.
Kitchen Before:
Kitchen After:
New roof going on
Solar in place
And refresh in the bathroom!
Even without having a domesticated pet, we still have lots of friends in the yard / city.
Coopers Hawk in the backyard
What’s life without a wet golden retriever? A wet mom/pup harbor seal
A coyote visiting the backyard
This year the main birdhouse had TWO families created: the first a Oak Titmouse and then a Bluebird family took it over.
Long Beach
Amanda and family are doing well in Long Beach. They did a wonderful back yard refresh that included starting over with grass, a concrete deck and area for plants. It’s really great! Waverly is 7 and in first grade. He has Barbara’s chatty gene so can carry on a conversation with just about anyone. Melissa has helped Waverly on the baseball and (touch) football teams.
During spring break Andrea came to Long Beach and we went whale watching and saw some whales, but got closer to dolphins.
Waverly at Baseball
Boise
Andrea and family are doing well in Boise. Miles is 13 and really happy in 8th grade/junior high school. Analiese is 10 in 5th grade and has a really excellent teacher this year (Andrea). She continues gymnastics and soccer. Martin and Miles have done a lot of fishing and hunting over the year. They were both successful in a deer hunt so we have enjoyed venison and fresh fish!
Analiese (in blue) playing soccer
Miles playing/learning Ice Hockey
Andrea / Miles / Analiese preparing for the rope course at Bogus Basin
We were in Boise during two downtown protests – the No Kings and the Mayday protests. We made signs and joined the crowd of 10,000! Everyone was well behaved. One woman had a sign that said she was “Aunt-tifa.”
SKI Trip Adventures
(SKI is “Spending Kids Inheritance”)
We did a big all-family adventure in June this year. We went to Vancouver to board the Disney Cruise ship to go up to Alaska inland passage for a week! All 9 of us were on board. Of course Disney does it right and the opportunity to sit down for dinner with everyone each night was worth it. We saw whales, glaciers and had a great time! Food was fabulous, entertainment was fun. Lots to do and see. I don’t want to do it again, but it was great for a unique adventure. Then again, that was Jerry’s opinion and never say never 😉
Some of the photos from our Alaska trip with the whole family!
Can you tell that Miles is related (and turning 13)?
Mexico
In January we started FAST by joining Keith and Nina to help celebrate their wedding anniversary near Puerto Vallarta Mexico. It was delightfully warm with free flowing margaritas at the pools. We even hired a small boat to take us out to see the whales frolicking in the bay.
Boston
After Jerry’s Appalachian Trail hike, Barbara flew out to Boston to meet up with our new friends Michael and Gay, then spent a few days in Boston! What a wonderful time! We would do that again!
Our hotel was across the Charles River from MIT and we walked the bridge (measured in Smoots). Of course I got pictures of rowing teams.
Jerry walked up the 294 steps to the top of the Bunker Hill Monument and took multiple pictures out of each of the four viewing ports. He put them all together to make a wonderful city panorama.
Patagonia / South America
Some pictures of our trip to South America!
We set out on our first big trip – Patagonia! It was actually a tour of South America in two weeks! We made it to Iguazu Falls, walked on Cape Horn at the bottom of the continent, walked with the penguins and then experienced fabulous weather in the hills of Patagonia! We even saw a Puma in the wild. We also found a number of fabulous new friends!
Boca Section of Buenos Aires
Iguazu Falls
Opera House
We walked on Cape Horn – many times ships can’t land because of the weather
Kitty Cat (Puma) above and his Fast Food (Guanaco) below
Morocco
We took an unexpected trip to Morocco! Unexpected since it was planned in the last minute with new friends from the South America trip. Here are some pictures of our trip to Morocco! (Click to see more.)
In the Sahara Desert they found fossils and have turned them into art!
Want a rug? We sell rugs.
Yes, we did ride on camels (for about 20 minutes)
One of so many palace gates
Bread making
Leather factory in Fez
Etcetera
And some random pretty pictures
We again went to Hetch Hetchy to stay at the cabin for a weekend.
We joined our friends Spencer, Lynn, Moon and Chu to visit a fancy Tahoe condo for a weekend. (Picture by Spencer’s Drone.)
Our deck in Redwood City offers a perfect view of the full moon right in front of the landing pattern for Oakland and SFO. If you wait long enough you can catch a plane going through the moon!
As usual, we wish you all health, time enough to do the things you wish, and money enough to afford them. Come by and see us if you are ever in our area! We would love to visit! Then again we might be in Boise, Long Beach, Hiking or on an International trip!
Barbara & Jerry Pierce
Our Emails are: Jerry: jerry@jerrypierce.org; Barbara: barbara@barbarapierce.org Andrea: andrea@jerrypierce.org; Amanda: amandaapierce@gmail.com