christmas wahoo!

It's been great:























































Anne gave Nico the "Mr. Happy" book. Brilliant! He loved it, but reacted in his usual somber way. The irony was delicious.



















Ellie got Little Miss Somersault. Right again!



















Anders and Liam had no idea what was going on, of course, but as everyone else seemed happy they went along with it.



















Later that day was delicious Christmas dinner with the Riches.



















We had no snow on Christmas, but today it blizzarded. We were all very pleased.



















Hope you had a great time too!

nirvana

I am pleased to report that I have discovered the Path to Enlightenment. I'll be releasing this dogma in bestselling book form soon, but I'm happy to give you a sneak preview. The method is simple. Assemble the following ingredients:
- Homemade rolls, hot out of the oven
- Homemade pot roast
- Oregon horseradish cheddar
Garnish this construction with a bit of gravy. I dare you to try stopping at five.

Twins???

No, they aren't twins, but I think they were supposed to be. Any guesses as to who's who?

November in a Nutshell

Many of these topics deserve their own posts, but that's just not going to happen. Instead, here is a whirlwind summation of our November.


Alex and B. Ray eating Alex's birthday burgers.



The birthday present of dreams.



For Nico's birthday cake, he requested "a pumpkin with a sword slicing through it." Go figure.


Aunt Jenni did well in choosing this game -- it has delighted us many, many. many times.


Aunt Laur, as always, hit the literary nail on the head. If you have kids, be sure to check out Shark vs. Train. It is fantastic!



Next up: Setta and Jane come to visit. Unfortunately we don't have that many pictures, but we had a greaat time having them here!


We did have Thanksgiving, but I have no documentation. You'll just have to believe me. I do however have proof that we got our Christmas tree.




And. of course, there are the many babies we have.


The boys on the activity mat.



These we aligned correctly, I swear.




What Nico wants to do all the time.


What Alex and the boys want to do all the time.


I was around in November too, but have no documentation except the following picture. Those are my thumbs.

Halloween Strikes Again

(Disclaimer: Our graphics card is not happy with us at the moment and as a result, the formatting of the text and pictures you see bears little to no resemblance to what I put together. Sorry.)




For some reason Halloween is popular with our kids. In spite of recent, time-consuming, additions to our crew, we managed to fit in all the important activities.


The Halloween Stand:

As usual, Ellie and her friend, Abby, concocted their own plan for an activity. Rather than a costume parade like last year, they planned a Halloween stand where they would sell all things Halloween. Ellie and Abby (and Nico and Grace to a minor extent) spent the last month drawing Halloween pictures, making homemade Halloween mazes and other games, and then Monica and I drummed up some Halloween treats. Grandparents of both girls showed up with financial support and kudos to Monica for getting the word out to all her neighbors and "encouraging" them to come. If I'd had any more family around, you'd better believe that you'd all be encouraged to come too. In the end, it was a raging success and nearly all the goods sold.


Pumpkin picking:

Although the patch was not nearly as cool as last year's location, it was a veritable sea of possible jack-o-lanterns.









Anders and Liam came along too.











The Big Day:


Every year I let the kids choose what they want to be and then I do my darnedest to make it happen. Nico picked a skeleton. I was simply delighted! We already had a skeleton costume in our dress up bin, and he was happy to wear it. Hallelujah! Ellie however, picked a phoenix. We did not have a phoenix costume and I defy any of you to find one for sale. They simply don't exist. So, yet again I got to make a costume. Let me just say that my $12 hot glue gun is one of my better life's purchases. The costume turned out better than I could have hoped and the most important part is that Ellie loves it. Wahoo!

Here you can see Ellie "in flight," and the kids in action at our neighbor's house.












The kids also got to carve their pumpkins today - with Alex's help. Nico went with a more traditional approach while Ellie decided to model her pumpkin after her phoenix self.

Nico was happy about his pumpkin, just not having his picture taken.












It was a great Halloween, and if the candy haul is any indication, the kids will be enjoying it for many days to come.

baby avalanche

Everywhere I look these days, I see babies. Have you seen Raising Arizona? You know that scene where Nicholas Cage is trying to round up the octuplets? It's sort of like that. Anyway we are doing great, sorry for the lack of posts lately. We'll get back into it soon (or so I keep telling myself).

Anders

















Liam

















Liam again

















Grandma Anderson and one of the many babies

















Anders, one of the many babies

Deputized?

If that's not a word it should be. And it can now be used to describe Alex!!

Alex is the new Deputy Team Leader for the Manhattan Team of the NYC Parks Department. As such, he will help oversee all the design projects in Manhattan. Pretty cool, eh?! More meetings, more responsibility, and more money....

Way to go Alex! You're going to do a great job!

names

After days of thought, discussion, and analysis (probably overanalysis), we have decided on the names. Here they are:

The Baby Formerly Known as A is Anders Nathanael Hart.



















His younger brother by 18 minutes is Liam Henry Hart.



















Our primary motivation for choosing those names is just that we like them, and we like how they sound with Hart as a last name.

Anders also references our many ancestors named Anderson on both sides, and some actually named Anders. Liam is an Irish version of William, which recalls my Irish heritage. Nathanael and Henry were initially inspired by Nathanael Greene and Henry Knox, two great (if far from perfect) Americans. But really the primary motivation came from just liking those names.

Here are a few more photos from the last few days.

Ellie, Nico, and Grandma Anderson came to visit in the hospital. We're all home now, by the way.



























































































Have to throw this in here. Since the birth took place in the OR, in case a c-section was necessary (it wasn't), they required full nuclear-proof gear. Here's the proud father about to embark on a germ-free trek.
























Delivering at Stonybrook was a great experience overall. The people were so good to us at every step. Even the views from our rooms were pretty nice. We'd recommend this place to anyone around here.



















Ever since the birth, it seems like time is divided into two categories: Sleeping and (more often) Not Sleeping. There is some of the former though.










































I love this shot.
























As nice as Stonybrook was, we were happy to get out of there. The boys celebrated their first ever car ride by falling asleep.
























Thanks for stopping by!