The day after Christmas Aaron and I hosted what has become our annual brunch for my entire family. We cooked up a big meal – Aaron’s famous latkes, tomatoes stuffed with sausage, egg casserole, fried donuts, fruit salad, bagels, yogurt filled strawberries, etc. “Entire family” now means 15 people and it looks like Aaron and I are going to need a bigger dinning room – but we all squeezed in had a great afternoon together. We opened presents and played with the kids. My siblings tried to get all their children to sit still, all in one spot for a photo – which was quite entertaining (see the photo above). I included a series of these photos in the album. We do love being able to host everyone at our place.

Here the album of our Christmas photos. We spent the morning at home, opening our gifts from each other. Then in the early afternoon we went over to Amy and Joe’s. My parents and James, Chrissy and Alice were there as well. We spent the rest of the day opening gifts, assembling or playing with toys and eatting of course. Santa gave Justin a light up stegosaurus lawn ornament (photo below) – which took quite a bit of assembly but was very well received and there were of course plenty of Legos to put together as well. We had a happy holiday and especially enjoyed being with the kids.

Hi all. Happy New Year! Hope 2012 finds you all well. I am still wishing for some snow, but otherwise can’t complain. This is just a quick post of some pre-holiday photos. Aaron and I are still coming back to reality after a mostly lazy week of vacation at home. About a month back Aaron and I finally made the jump to new iphones – yay! And the camera is way better, so I find myself taking more photos with my phone. These are just a few random ones taken in the weeks leading up to Christmas, with a couple I have borrowed from my brothers mixed in there too. We had a busy, but great December and enjoyed lots of time with family. I will post our holiday photos soon. The above is a watercolor of a nutcracker, done by Justin in his art class. I think it’s fantastic.

A couple of weeks ago we went Christmas tree hunting with my mom, Amy, Joe and their boys. Aaron and I had decided to skip getting a tree this year (I was feeling lazy) – but we thought it would be fun to go along anyway. It was a mild day (temperatures continue to be unseasonably high) and so it was nice to be outside, walking in the woods. After a thorough search we got two trees – one for Mom and one for Amy and Joe. We then went back to Amy and Joe’s house and played outside a bit with their boys. Later in the afternoon we helped them decorate their tree. Not a bad way to spend a Sunday. I took the above photo of Amy and Aaron at the tree farm. See how they are laughing together – probably at me – usually means they’re up to something…

For Thanksgiving we made our usual trip down to Washington DC to spend it with Aaron’s family. Travel was actually remarkably easy and smooth. We had great visit with the whole family, except for Molly who is studying abroad in Israel this semester. Her presence was definitely missed. We continued our tradition of making center pieces out of dough – although this year we just did two large cornucopias, and no animals. Emily and I made one of the cornucopias and Aaron and Lisa made the other one, which was entertaining to watch – they are siblings after all. Rita made the decorations and worked on the fine details of the cornucopias – as pictured above. We had a great time catching up with everyone and of course eating all the delicious food. Here’s a small album of photos from our visit, mostly of the cornucopia project.

In November the whole family traveled down to Connecticut to celebrate Alice’s first birthday. The party was held at Chrissy’s grandmother’s house – who just happens to live in the same town as our grandmother (talk about coincidences) – so we went down a couple of days early to visit with Nonnie and Becki. As you might imagine, it was a casual affair, but Alice was surrounded by lots of family from from both sides all there to wish her a happy first birthday. I’m told Chrissy spent days ahead of the party baking the cake, which as you can see in the photo above was no grocery store sheet cake. I think maybe Amy and Chrissy should open a bakery together specializing in kid’s birthday cakes! Happy Birthday Alice!

Aaron and I hosted our first sleepover with Justin a few weeks back. We all had a blast. We got a new Lego set at the toy store, went out to Fuddrucker’s for dinner and even got to sit in the car booth. He’s a fantastic kid and we feel lucky to be a part of his life.

We hope everyone had a great Halloween. We thought you might enjoy seeing some of our nieces and nephews in costume. Lia and Ella are still a bit young for trick or treating, but their parents got them into the Halloween spirit by dressing them up as pea pods. Alice dressed up as a duck. According to James, she is close to walking and it’s tough to get her to sit still these days, even for a quick photo. Justin went as a red hot rod. Amy and Joe bought a car kit, but then spent the weeks leading up to Halloween working on Justin’s specified modifications – adding windows, a trunk, a hood and supercharger, etc. And Brian went as a Tyrannosaurus Rex – which seems like a good match given how fast, strong and vocal he is as of late. Hope you all enjoyed the holiday.

We recently spent a fun and relaxing week on the island of Nantucket with our good friends Bonney and Patrick and their son Rowan. We rented a house on the beach and took advantage of the beautiful autumn weather. We spent lots of time outside on the back deck, down on the beach, exploring the island and took a hike in Squam Swamp. Aaron brought his kites and flew on the beach a couple of days. We windowed shopped (everything on Nantucket was island priced, which means it cost at least 20% more than usual), read books, played games and ran around with Rowan. We also visited a windmill on the island that was built in 1745 and is still used to mill corn. The island was beautiful, almost all the houses were covered with weathered shingles and no matter where you went the sea was never too far away. It was a lovely vacation and great to have the time with Bonney and Patrick, and Rowan.

We celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary with a long weekend in Portland, Maine. We stayed at a great hotel, The Inn by the Sea and had fun exploring the area. We spent a day with Meghan, Louis and Huck – together we visited Portland Head Light and Fort William. Later they took us to The Lobster Shack at Two lights, a fish fry place with outdoor picnic tables and incredible views. Aaron and I spent the rest of the weekend exploring downtown Old Port, eating some great meals at Caiola’s, Miyake and Duck Fat and relaxing on the beach. On Sunday afternoon, we stumbled upon a kite flying event at a park across the harbor from downtown Portland and guess who just happened to have his kites in the trunk of our car? So on a beautiful sunny day Aaron flew kites while I looked on with my book, lounging on a blanket. It was a great weekend.