A few days

and a few blocks.

Friday

Debuting her new  haircut at a fancy diner lunch on the UES:

Our local library, “waiting for shabbos”:

Saturday:

42nd Street NYPL Storytime on a snowy day:

Sunday

Stuck in a hallway traffic jam:

A little non-Newtonian liquid.  And penguins (of course):

Painting with a blacklight flashlight is SO much cooler than painting with the light on (note to our loyal readers, these can be found on amazon for under $5):

Monday

A rainy commute:

Talia seems to be enjoying accesories recently (and yes, Milo was carefully supervised while wearing a necklace which was decidedly not approved for the under-1 set):

Tuesday

Dance!

And of course Milo worked on creating his own obstacle course:

Just a little more birthday left … the after-party, of course

After Talia’s birthday we decided to take a long walk (to facilitate both kids napping), followed by a little playtime at the bookstore and a delicious sushi dinner.  Then it was back to the apartment for present-opening and a little dance party for Grandma, Yeye and Nainai.  Posing with her balloons (thanks Mike!):

You didn’t think Milo was really going to pose happily for a family photo, did you?

The ballerina in action:

A happier Milo with Yeye:

And Grandma:

Not looking in the least bit sleepy in his pajamas:

But Talia was definitely ready for bedtime by the end of the day:

And since these posts have been all over the place, in review we celebrated Talia’s birthday party with cupcakes at Ying’s, a making party, and an incredible trip to see the Nutcracker with Grandma.

Finally, photographic proof of Talia’s big THIRD Birthday Party

For her big THIRD Birthday party, Talia wanted a “making” party.  By making she usually means baking, and while we certainly considered a number of messy baking projects (pretzels was high on the list), but we eventually landed on something slightly more reasonable.  We used the Helen Oxenbury book “It’s My Birthday” to pull everything together:

In the book a little boy prepares for his birthday celebration with the help of his animal friends, so we started by painting animals to play with (we used a salt dough playdoh recipe to make these in advance):

Then we all sat down to a macaroni and cheese lunch as per the birthday girl’s request:

And then it was time for cake and candles!

… and cupcakes … and cookies …

Since the book is about baking, we decided to compromise and let the kids decorate their own cupcakes.  It was a sticky, sugary mess but very popular.

And for our final making project, Talia and her friends made pasta necklaces:

 

If you are wondering how all of that making got down with 7 toddlers underfoot, we had the help of not only Grandma but also Yeye and Nainai who kept Milo far away from the sugar and pasta:

And for party favors Talia gave each of her guests a copy of “It’s my birthday” (thanks to amazon bargain books):

Five minutes after her guests left Talia and Milo were both fast asleep.

 

An afternoon in a lovely but little visited neighborhood in the city

Bay Ridge.  It was our first trip to the neighborhood on a freezing cold day and we still found it charming.  Look at these apartment entrances:

Of course, we were there for a Princess Birthday Party (the big 4), so Talia was in heaven.  Big girls, fairy dresses and wands, pizza, and ice cream cake.  Doesn’t get better than this:

The Birthday Girl and her mama:

Look at that grin:

Needless to say Talia was the last princess/fairy left at the table:

These guys got along fabulously, as expected:

Benjamin showed Milo the best places to climb in the apartment:

And Milo tried them out:

Um, yes, these guys are only 3 months apart in age:

But that probably means a growth spurt is just around the corner for Milo:

Talia was very proud of being in charge of the tape on Becca’s birthday present:

Lots of help opening presents:

Happy Birthday Becca!  One final shot of our fairy princess on her way home:

More books, and marble painting

Last weekend (see, we are getting caught up here) we met Talia’s good friend Corinna at the New York Public Library.  We had not thought to check the schedule, but just managed to catch the end of a storytime:

These girls loves a good book:

Or maybe just all the open space to play in the library:

… and play …

And miracolously they behaved pretty well for a fancy lunch after the library:

Later in the day we broke out the marble painting:

If you are wondering about the lack of art-in-action photos here, this is a pretty good explanation.  Not only do we do most of our artwork while “naking,” but the project of keeping Milo from nosediving into the mess is a full-time job:

The end result was pretty interesting and I was hoping this project wouldn’t be too messy since it was after all fully contained in a baking tray:

But toddler art is after all about the “process not the product”:

And for us that included not only scraping the paint, but adding in a significant selection of items from her tea set:

Coming soon: adventures of Talia, Milo, the great volcano … and a box of cornstarch.

Lunch and a good book, or many

Before Dada had to rush off to work we had a lovely lunch in our neighborhood a couple of weekends ago:

And then we headed cross-town for an exhibit about one of Talia’s favorite authors:

We started in the art room upstairs making a collage:

Milo was as ever into everything:

And then we headed down to see the original collages from The Snowy Day, as well as about 10 of Keats’ other books:

There was an awesome playspace inside complete with beanbags and littered with Keats books to read, but this is our only photo (not to suggest that the museum discourages photos inside, or anything):

And then we headed out to the street for a very long wait for a bus line which apparently doesn’t run on Sundays … we had fun anyway:

and eventually moved to a different bus stop and made it back to the West side.

How very logical that since our last post ended on Long Island we will continue with …

some lovely photos from Yeye and Nainai’s.  Henry just e-mailed them to me yesterday so they must be pretty recent, right?  With no further ado, some incredible family photos from Thanksgiving:

Look at that mischevious grin:

Happy guy:

A photo for the annals.  Perhaps rivaling this fine one.  Needless to say I picked part of Talia’s outfit, and she picked the accessories (note the Curious George bookset which is obviously part of the outfit and even reappears in the next photo):

With Yeye and Nainai:

And my favorite photo by far:

And a few shots from later in the day.  Talia had a great time with her cousin Patrick:

And Milo playing with his cousin Cathy:

And a slightly unconventional game of checkers with the big boys:

Pajama time the next morning with dada:

And of course bubbles!

Karachi Day 6: The Formal Wedding

You’ll have to trust me that the bride and groom looked even better than their wedding cake since I have not a single photo of Huma:

Christopher before the ceremony:

And then dear readers two unfortunate things happened for this blog: 1. Milo fell asleep on my lap so there are no further photos at the ceremony itself (which was quite small and held at Huma’s house but of course included yummy sweets and traditional soup and tea) and then to make it worse 2. the final dinner was held at a club which did not allow photos.  Absurd, really.  They also did not allow babies in, so Milo spent the evening relaxing in a hotel room upstairs.  Here’s a final photo from the evening of the guests heading out and sneaking in one little shot in the parking lot:

And then we decided to stay up since our flight was at 6 am the next morning.  Jenny, who is a professor after all, encouraged Milo’s appreciation of fine 2 am Pakistani programming and a delicious TV remote:

And then we headed to Karachi airport and back to Long Island via Dubai, a 14 hour flight, and a 1.5 hour drive from the airport to Yeye and Nainais.  Milo napped occasionally in transit, so we were all quite glad to be back on Long Island.

Karachi Day 5: A garden party and dancing

We started the day at a lovely garden party hosted by Huma’s aunt.  Milo blended right in, of course:

And got to talk to a lot of friends:

I think these two are going to do a good job come this spring:

Milo spent a lot of time chatting with Kat:

Portable nan maker!

Hot dosas are always good:

These are also quite brilliant.  Donut dough deep fried in the shape of pretzels …

We headed back to Naseem’s for a nice nap and then out for a wild dance party.  Huma’s house had been transformed yet again into an orange extravaganza (Sarah B. – make sure to read that with a Macho accent):

A little Milo snack, imported from NYC which happens to show off my henna quite nicely:

Catching up with Kat again:

Playing pass the baby:

Milo quite liked the marigolds:

Just a little yawn as the clock struck 4:

Karachi Day 4: Shopping and henna

We reconvened the next day for a late lunch at Huma’s house.  Milo jumped right into the conversation:

This photo cracks me up.  Just saying.  Not exactly how most brides and grooms prepare for a day of entertaining guests:

Traffic is a little different in Karachi:

But Milo was entirely unconcerned:

He also slept through most of our shopping excursion so no photos of that.  However, here’s what we bought (note the bracelets and the classic Montessori pouring practice):

And clean-up, of course:

We gathered at Huma’s house again in the evening for a little henna.  And a beer for the guys:

Milo definitely enjoyed himself:

Has anyone seen the baby?

Or his clothes?

There were three women applying henna at the same time, so it was very social:

He certainly seemed interested in the henna:

But then again there were plenty of people to hang out with:

Another great Matt dance session:

And then we called it a night a little before 2 …