Manhattan

Next we went on to NYC to spend the weekend seeing as much as possible. We started off by taking the train in from NJ, followed by a subway ride to Battery Park. We walked around the Southside Seaport, ate in a deli, walked through Chinatown and Little Italy then went back up to Rockefeller Center intending to skate. Oddly enough the weekend before New Year's Eve in Manhattan is really crowded. We couldn't even get get close enough the see the ice. We did see Radio City Music Hall. We went up to the "Top of the Rock" instead and viewed the whole city. Then we walked through Times Square, toured the four story tall Toys R Us store (complete with indoor Ferris wheel, had dinner at The Bubba Gump Shrimp Company and took a cab back to our hotel.

The next morning we got up early, rode back down to Battery Park, caught the ferry to Liberty Island. The kids earned their Junior Ranger badges. We went through the base of the statue, and got to look up inside the statue, then headed on over to Ellis Island for even more history. Sheela will be posting her pictures on her blog and hers are the only pictures as my battery ran out long before this. Late in the day we went through Central Park, had a late lunch and then caught the train back to NJ.

Western New York

Sid, the kids and I drove up to visit Great-Gramma, et al, in western New York for a day. We haven't seen Gramma in years and the cousins in decades. We had a great time catching up, meeting each other's families, doing puzzels, swimming the kids in the jacuzzi tub and walking around in Skaneatales.

There was a little bit of snow but not quite enough to satisfy our southern craving so after the visit was over we headed just a little bit farther north. We stopped in a small field to stretch our legs, build a snowman and make snow angels.

Where's Sunil?

Here Samantha and Katie are opening their gifts on Christmas morning. Can you find Sunil in the picture?

The H2 - revisited

Sunil's H2 was successfully replaced and has turned out to be a lot of fun. We managed to play with it for a few hours before leaving town.

Christmas comes early

Our little family celebrated the holidays here at home this weekend. The kids opened a gift each on Saturday night which then necessitated staying up late to play. Sunday morning we finished up with the home gifts. We did manage to space the goodies out over a couple of hours to better enjoy the individual gifts. In my mind the highlight was going to be Sunil's remote controlled, one-tenth scale, H2 Hummer. It was however an "out of the box" failure which then required us to actually go to a shopping mall two days before Christmas to complete the exchange. Our local Radio Shack, and all the others in a 20 mile radius, had already sold out. It actually worked out pretty well in the end, the mall had them on sale so I recouped some Christmas cash.

Sunil's favorite gift turned out to be his new Razor scooter with the red handle grips and the wheelie bar. Sheela's favorite has to be her new camera.

Tomorrow morning we are off to the airport. We are flying to NJ to visit Ravi, et al. Happy Holidays everyone!

Cowboy cubscout

Sunil and his Akela (Sid) went with his den to visit a local farm. It has been in operation for 116 years. A good and informative time was had by all. As we'd had rain nearly constantly forever before hand I convinced Sunil to wear his cowboy boots instead of his only pair of tennis shoes. The cowboy hat rounded out the outfit perfectly. We even convinced Sid to wear his cowboy boots. He bought them on a whim a decade or so ago and never wears them. Apparently they are a form of torture. I bet he doesn't wear them again for another decade now.

Lost and Found

Well I've had a picture that I wanted to post for almost a week but my camera went missing. Now I'm really pretty good about keeping track of it so I don't need to hear any lectures about having one spot to keep it in and ALWAYS remembering to put it back away. Really that was the whole source of the problem anyway. I'm so accustomed to putting it away that I did put it away with out even realizing it. I've spent days poking through the other junk (that doesn't have a permanent home) in our kitchen (where the camera was last seen) looking for it. I found it last night in the "camera" pocket of my purse where it always lives.

Irish Blessings, Scottish Pipes and Catholic Mass

I went to another funeral today. This time the mother of a co-worker. I've spent more time in church in the last three years than in the last decade and not a single wedding to make it fun. Mrs. Simpson was apparently quite Irish which made for a very nice Mass. I really enjoyed the bagpipes, the Irish ballads and Theo's rendition of Amazing Grace.

Handmade with care by Sheela

For Sheela's birthday she received a pattern for pants and as much fabric as she wanted to choose for her use. She selected three fabrics and began making her own clothes last night. The first pair will be denim with a silver under layer. She cut out the fabric, sewed the button holes and joined the side seams for the legs. Tonight she will join the legs, create a wist, thread in the elastic, add the fake tie/draw string and hem them. They should be wearable by morning.

She has some super-soft plain denim and black fleece to choose from for the next pair.

Christmas Cashews...

Two weeks to go until Christmas and I've already eaten myself sick.  One vendor sent tins of cashews to all of us that handle their products, one vendor sent tins of Belgian cookies dipped in chocolate to all of us that handle their products, our Italian sisters sent a selection of gourmet, Italian cookies and chocolates, the baking ladies are making fudge, cookies, tartlets, cakes, popcorn balls, salsa and tamales (it is Texas after all).  Yesterday was a vendor lunch and a vendor dinner, today was lunch with a co-worker, Thursday is a departmental lunch, Monday is a holiday luncheon, Wednesday is a baby shower (lunch and afternoon cake) and Saturday is the holiday party complete with dinner and dessert buffet.  All of this does not even take in to account our baseline assortment of chocolate, candy and birthday cakes.  It would be easy to gain a pound or two everyday around here if you don't exercise willpower.  Luckily, I ate so many of the cashews that I can't even look at the rest… except for maybe one chocolate dipped profiterole…… and maybe some divinity…..

Miscellany

Sid bought a new car this week. A slightly used 2007 Nissan Sentra in a pretty pearl grey metallic. He is suffering some adjustments to the smaller vehicle but the savings in gas money should help cushion the blow.

Mom and John have taken water samples from the hot tub to have them analyzed. It appears that we mixed brands of treatment chemicals with a negative effect... more to come on that after we get the results and recommendations.

I finally caved and went to the doctor last night (after sleeping all afternoon). I decided I had strep but as I don't know any one with a confirmed and antibiotic prescriptions and went back home to sleep. I feel great again today but given 10 minutes in a quiet place I'm pretty sure I could still fall asleep.

Sheela woke up to our traditional breakfast in bed in honor of her 10th birthday. We made her fresh cinnamon rolls and hot chocolate, marked her new improved height on her giraffe and sent her off to school where she was featured on the morning announcements. Her birthday traditionally concludes with dinner out at the location of her choice but this year she has requested that we have chinese food sent in and watch the Polar Express on TV. Works for me.

This weekends adventures include a DI workshop for Sunil and a shopping spree for me. I've been elected to buy the door prizes for our holiday party. My goals are quantity, diversity and sheer bulk. The prizes will be displayed at the party and a larger display is more impressive. We've already purchased most of our technological gadgets, so I get lower tech and mass appeal items.

We also plan to pull down the Christmas decorations and get the house set up. Luckily the housekeeper came today so we are staring with clean floors and neat surfaces.

Tubbin'

We took the inaugral dips into the hot tub last night. It was pretty nice, the air temp was in the low-50s and the water just over 100. It was dark enough to have a good view of Mars, some stars and the comet.

Bonus

One of the bonuses of having Grammylyn come visit is that Sheela gets to ride her bike to school. Grammylyn goes along too. It was pretty chilly this morning but they suited on up and headed out early.

Party 2007

Sheela celebrated her 10th birthday with a few friends at a local mosaic studio. Each child made a project (mostly vases) and ate cake. It was a lot of fun for the girls.
In keeping with the theme we tiled her cake with Jell-O . I can't believe she is going to be 10!

Parade 2007

Here are a few pictures from Saturday's Children's Parade. Sunil ended up with a reindeer that really flies (with a pole and some help), Sheela chose a light up Santa hat. The Santa float marks the end of the parade and the beginning of the Christmas shopping season in Dallas.