Our Beautiful Baby Girl

Cassandra gets more beautiful every day. Those cheeks are just too kissable too!

Play Dates with the Boys

Calista had a couple of playdates recently with Alex and Fin. Although it's still mostly parallel play at this point, there were some really sweet interactions and sharing. Yay friends!

A New Decade...New Family Photos

Wow - it's 2010. Although I can't even begin to imagine what discoveries, experiences and growth are in store for us -- I hope they are all great. Here's to a fabulous new year everyone!

The photo of Scott holding Cassandra is particularly cute because she is practicing standing up at 10 weeks here. You go girl! And I love this picture of Calista reading. :-) The girl can't go anywhere without her books - or in this case the New Yorker! The picture of the girls with their bucket hats is especially precious to me because Calista has always loved wearing that bucket hat -- and she wanted Baby Cassandra to have one too. Very, very sweet older sister.

New Year's Eve

Calista went to "camp" at Pacific Primary with her teacher Sarah Watkins for a few days between Christmas and New Year's, one of them being New Year's Eve. Sarah painted the kids faces, and here is our beautiful butterfly.

To celebrate New Year's, we went out to Tokyo Go Go. This is by far Calista's favorite restaurant - yes the girl is obsessed with sushi and loves to order tamago, kappa rolls, vegetable tempura, edamame and even eats the ginger and sometimes California rolls. Although I was asleep by 10:30, it was really special to go out and have fun with the family.

Apres-Christmas Fun

Eloise and Mike stayed a few days after Christmas which gave us some time to relax and enjoy their visit. We took them to see the play "39 Steps" at the Curran Theater (so fun - lots of Alfred Hitchock references) and they took us to Morton's Steak House for a night out.

Cassandra and Calista loved seeing their Grandma Weezie and Grandpa Mike, and Calista often "flies" her Fisher Price toy airplane they gave her for Christmas to Connecticut. Calista's dear friend Eden also lives in Connecticut now, so Calista is especially fond of that state.

A couple points of reference in these photos...Calista loves to play with Baby Cassandra's new toys from Christmas (like the animal bowling set she is holding). And Aunt Kiki gave Calista those super cute red slippers she is wearing.

Baby Cassandra smiles all the time now, and is such a good girl she can still put herself to sleep without crying, which never fails to amaze me. She loves her big sister and follows her with her eyes everywhere. She's very alert and interested in everything around her. She's growing a ton, and every day I find she has outgrown at least one outfit!

Stephanie, Theo and Georgia also came to visit one day while Calista was at Pacific Primary, which was a social treat for me!

Christmas Day

Christmas was so fun this year because Calista was excited about the holiday. As you may recall, she especially asked Santa for a "crying doll and a laughing doll" and then was so happy to see it under the tree. She loved all her presents, and her unadulterated joy and pure enthusiasm were contagious. It made for a very lovely celebration! Baby Cassandra on her first Christmas (so exciting!) was darling of course and in a sweet lovey mood all day. Scott and I felt like Calista gave us the best present ever when she slept until 7:30 am. Nice! We woke up and played with Santa's presents, and when Eloise and Mike arrived shortly thereafter we had coffee and opened stockings. We were done opening presents before lunch (phew) and spent the rest of the day playing and relaxing. For dinner we had a delicious prime rib from Bi Rite - I remember my Grammy Evelyne and Grandpa Charles making prime rib for Christmas growing up. It's been fun combining Brady and Vannice traditions!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve arrived! Eloise and Mike flew in that day, and we had fun catching up with them. Calista was so happy to have new reading partners! After eating braised lamb shanks for dinner (yum!), we opened presents with Uncle Matt since he was leaving the next morning for Barcelona - lucky fellow. Calista was especially psyched to listen to the Sesame Street CD from Matt - a classic growing up for them. We left the cookies Calista baked for Santa under the tree. Apparently they were a big hit because he wrote a very nice thank-you note for her. :-)

Our Little Counting Olive Monster

From December 22...

Cute Photos

Backing up a bit here...these cute of photos of Baby Cassandra and Calista were taken the weekend of December 18th on our "big camera." It was Calista's idea to hold Baby Cassandra with their Elmos.

Uncle Matt Comes for Christmas

Matt arrived on the 23rd and we went, where else!?, to Tokyo Go Go for dinner. Delicious, naturally. Matt read Calista her bedtime story, and Calista corrected him on the correct pronunciation of "bellow" (not "below"). Sorry Matt!

Making Maki

On December 22 Scott and I went to Pacific Primary in the morning to make sushi with the kids. Actually Scott did most of the work - but I helped with entertaining Cassandra and supervising the kids when needed! In hindsight it actually went really, surprisingly well. All the kids participated and were very cooperative. Almost everyone gobbled up their rolls too! We brought rice, crab, egg, cucumber and avacado for the fillings - yum! Calista's teacher Eric said that he could tell it was a really successful activity - he compared it to giving the kids chocolate - because they all stayed seated, were quiet and concentrated the whole time. :-)
Scott would like me to mention that we were inspired to do this after learning about another parent making Challah bread with the kids in honor of their family's Jewish heritage. Although we aren't Japanese, we definitely have a yen for making sushi (no pun intended - ha!) and Calista is currently obsessed with eating at Tokyo Go Go - a great sushi restaurant on 16th Street. She can even say, "arigato" which is thank you in Japanese.

Tutu by Claire

Claire knitted Calista this beautiful tutu for Christmas. I love this photo.

Holiday Baking

Calista helped me bake some yummy oatmeal cookies for the holidays. I was floored when she took an egg and cracked it over the bowl! Apparently something else she is learning at Pacific Primary that I didn't know about. Wow. She is also quite the good helper when it comes to stirring and tasting the batter. :-)

Big Sister Love

Calista has been showing more of an interest in Cassandra recently - like wanting to hold her and nurse her on the Boppy (these photos were taken on 12/19). Just tonight she tried to give her a bottle. Really sweet.

This is how we entertain oursleves...

...in the doctor's office while waiting for a check up (Calista got an ear infection which fortunately cleared up just fine and didn't need any antibiotics). Personally speaking, I was thoroughly entertained with her rendition of "The daddies on the bus go grump grump grump all through the town, babies on the bus go waah waah waah, parents on the bus go shh shh shh, etc." to the tune of "The wheels on the bus." Pretty sure Cassandra liked it too!

Peter's Party

Scott, Cassandra and I went to our friend Pete's house for a holiday party - so fun! Cassandra loved the party, no surprise to her parents - she is a Brady girl after all - and instantly liked Nathalie. She's hoping she can play with Emilie and Charlotte soon too! :-)

Toy Chest Repurposed

Hi - catching up a bit again (Scott is traveling and the girls are asleep, so it's the perfect time for listening to music and blogging!). Here's our little girl back in December deciding she and Elmo (aka Mo) should be in her toy chest, rather than all her stuffed animals!