September's Trip to NYC

I've let the blogging lapse again, when really, we had a pretty fantastic month of September.  And now, I've almost let October slip by too.   

We finally made it (as a family) to NYC to see Sha-sha.  It had been months since I'd been up, and this was Saul's first trip, so we were sure to do it right with breakfast at Metro Diner, some takeout Thai, and even a little knock-off shopping in Chinatown (aka in our family as, "Shopolopolis"). 

On Saturday afternoon Max, Isabel, Sha-sha and I all biked up the trail along the Hudson to see the Little Red Lighthouse.  We hadn't been there since Max was something like 6 weeks old.  Lucky us, it was the Little Red Lighthouse Festival that day.  So there were plenty of crafts and games and people wearing sequins walking on stilts waving large windsocks that made it so we ended up spending the entire afternoon there.  The kids even got to decorate red-colored sugar cookies in the shape of a lighthouse.  We had to come home and read our copy of the Little Red Lighthouse and the Great Gray Bridge all over again, it was so fab.

While we were on our bike ride and at the festival, Adam had taken Olivia and Saul to the carousel in Central Park (and then to find something in a yummy and chocolatey and buttery and sugary--with plenty of pink frosting, no doubt).  When we got back to the apartment and told them about our fun day, they decided that they couldn't miss that either.  So they cruised up with Olivia in the back of the bike seat to hit the rest of the festival and see the lighthouse.

Every time we're there, I think, "Yeah, I want to live in NYC."  And I totally do--I love it--but then I come home and park in my own garage and haul my stuff only a few feet from car to door and then I think, "Yeah, this is good too."  I'll just enjoy how nice it is to have such a swell mother-in-law to visit, and that we get to go and pretend that we're New Yorkers.   

Lazy Sunday

More than a few times Adam and I have had the discussion that goes something along the lines of how we should make more of an effort to invite other people over for Sunday dinner.  I've got a list, and I've got good intentions, but then no phone calls are ever made or roast ever planned.  So here's my invitation to all those intended invites to go ahead and call me a big lazy-head. But when push comes to shove, I really like my Sunday afternoon nap, a day off of thinking too much about dinner, and the slow-afternoon time where we can just kick-it as a family.

Actually, I'm having a hard time thinking that I want to trade in on the kind of peaceful day we had yesterday for an afternoon of my barking orders at the kids and Adam just to get some elaborate dinner planned and the toys picked up off of the floor and random papers on the counter shoved into a drawer before anyone shows up. 

Instead the kids turned cardboard boxes into various types of vehicles (air, land, sea) with Saul even getting pushed around the room in a smart little roadster.  And Olivia spent plenty of time dressing up with whatever assortment of blankets, scarves, and skirts were available.  (And then she spent plenty of time dancing to her request for the the Sound of Music soundtrack.) 

We polished off the leftover cupcakes I had made for Saturday's swim meet (stop....it wasn't the only thing we had for dinner!). Isabel, who only licked off all of the frosting (they are made with whole wheat flour and zucchini afterall), handed hers back and said,  "I all done with my cupcake," and then in the same breath, "Please I have another?"

And I'm not even going to apologize like Adam's working on building a wheel for his winter bike wasn't an appropriate Sabbath activity.  It was probably more of a family activity than was my sitting at the computer working on photos and helping Max with his blog posts (oh, and cuing up a new soundtrack from some classic musical theater for Olivia).

But, yes, Max has his own blog now, and it's pretty darn adorable (and hysterical) if you ask me.  He'd been begging us for a while, so one weeked while I was out of town, he and Adam set it up together.  And the creative license has been him completely--right down to the blog's title.  I only have to assist with how to upload the pictures, but even that he's hardly needing me for anymore.  And he's got his routine down as everytime a picture was uploading he would say, "Can I dance while I wait?"  Then there would be 30 seconds of jumping off the arms of the couch and running around the room with Olivia. (And one more groan from me about thinking that I might as well never plan on buying a new sofa since it would only be destroyed within the first year by the circus troupe that always mistakes it for some important piece of equipment.) 

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We made the blog private just to remove some of the worry about him posting what he likes. So far we've sent out invites to basically just his aunts and uncles, but if there's anyone out there who wants to see the inner-workings of Max's mind, as well as a few choice facts about his favorite animal, then send me an email and I'll send you an invite. If anything, he's been way more prolific than I've been lately so you can at least see some of what we've been doing these days. (p.s. He loooves comments.)

So maybe next year I'll reevaluate if we can muster up any sort of energy for dinner guests.  Until then, I'm enjoying the life with a lazy Sunday.