Christmas and New Years

Alyssa enjoyed her first Christmas. After we helped her unwrap her presents she sat down and let out a contented happy sigh. Marie got a date to the New York City Ballet for her main gift. I wanted to take advantage of the free grandparental baby sitting, otherwise we never would have been able to go on a 8 hour date. That weekend we all took a ride on the Santa Special where both Alyssa and Grandpa got excited about the old train and Santa and his crew. Alyssa's favorite was a less traditional character, Pablo the Penguin (she sees a lot of Penguins in the Baby Einstein videos). For New Years Marie had the week off and I didn't so she and Alyssa
went to Washington state to see her other grandparents. It was a nice last minute trip, but so last minute she did not take the camera. In their absence, and with me at work during the day, Sophia slowly went feral. Perhaps more about that later...

Blizzard

Thursday we spent a beautiful evening in downtown New Haven which was nicely decorated and local businesses were giving out free cider and hot chocolate. The town green was great. Friday I convinced Marie to watch "Hellboy 2, the Golden Army," which she kinda, slightly, liked. All weekend we had a nice blizzard. Two storms actually. Everything was shut down. Even church was cancelled. Marie spent a lot of time baking and we used breaks in the weather to drive around on the ice and deliver cookies and meals to friends and a couple of families with new babies. We only got the car stuck once, but I had it loaded with rock salt and a snow shovel so we were prepared.

Above is a picture taken from the balcony after the snow and one with Alyssa looking out at the snowfall. Below, is Sophia (who loves snow) running around. After the second storm, some areas are too deep (she falls in over her head) so she is less happy about that.

Merry Christmas

So we got this huge tree and all these decorations to make sure our apartment was fully in the Christmas spirit. Obviously, the tree is too big for our apartment so we had to take some off the top.

I'll post a picture of our real tree once we take one, probably Friday. This picture was taken in September (2 holidays ahead of time, crass commercialism) at a department store. Our real tree is smaller and Marie has designed it specifically to hide the I love New York pigeon. It is grey and blue and has a little red heart for "I (heart) New York." Now we have a tree decorated in grey and blue with little red accents. That little bobble-headed pigeon started another tradition. Now there is an ornament for each year, The pigeon, Kokopelli, A little Yale wreath, a baby ornament and, on its way for this year, a minotaur.

Catch-up: Halloween to Thanksgiving

So our little girl borrowed a lady bug costume and went to the church party for Halloween. Since then Marie had a performance downtown, we've had a few dinner parties, and spent a lot of time at the Peabody museum (its cold outside and the museum is free with Yale ID). We went over to some friends from the ward for thanksgiving. It was nice but we were also invited over to another thanksgiving at another friend's house and Marie would not let me double dip by going to both.

The way home: Farewell to Athens and Paris

We got off the Ikarus (a ship whose name does not really inspire confidence as you board her to cross the sea) and spent the day in Athens. We were able to see the changing of the guard at the tomb of the unknown soldier, the national gardens, and the archeological museum. The Museum requires at least a full day without kids, more if you have a tired baby with you. We did find the mask of Agamemnon. Then it was off to Paris for the night. Beautiful city, but man that place has social problems and racial tensions beyond what I am used to seeing here. At least we got out of the hotel to see the Eiffel tower and grab some food. We left the next morning for New York and were home by dinner. It was a nice trip, and we did learn a few things about traveling with babies.