(oh yes it's) Ladies Night

Every month, I get together with an awesome group of ladies, and we have our "Meeting of the Minds".  We generally do something special around Christmas time, but this year because of all the garbage with me going up north & just the timing in general, we decided to have a special ladies night at the Melting Pot restaurant.  They have a Ladies night every month, so we decided to splurge just this once... we  had a BLAST.  I arrived a wee bit late, since I had to drop the munchkin off at her Nana & Papa's house, but I arrived in plenty of time to enjoy the first course of standard cheese fondue!



Nancy even won a door prize of a bottle of wine!  WOOHOO!  (She tried to get them to exchange it for her favorite White Zin, but they couldn't... oh well)

Kim & Rita enjoying their Dark Chocolate Dessert fondue.  Nancy shared with them, while Donna & I went to town on the WHITE chocolate... YUMMMMMMMM.... we both agreed the fresh jumbo Strawberries were the best!

Just a few random shots... Spread over a couple of days... yes, it's cheating, but I keep forgetting to update the blog, so this is an easy way to share a few of the latest details!

Here is our little ball player... she has recently decided she wants to be more like daddy, so she wants to wear a hat all the time!  just too cute!

This one makes me think she's practicing Karate! 

Gonna Buy Me a Dog

I am always posting pictures of Rach & her best friend, our cute pup Penny... well, this time I thought I'd post a video of Penny & her favorite past time... playing HOSE!

If it were up to her, this would be done every single day... but if it were, I think that mud pit would be ten times bigger!!

I'm also posting some pictures of Rachel & Penny cuddling.  They are truly the best of friends!

Penny gets her revenge... usually Rachel is laying on top of her... this time, the roles are reversed!  It seems Rachel makes a nice comfy pillow!

Silly Girl

Today was just a day for being totally silly.  

Rachel wanted to play goofy little games today, hanging upside like a monkey... 

Doing anything she could do to just be funny, crazy, & FUN!

 

Wearing Dora Stickers

Just the perfect day for silly, happy, funny kids to be their silliest...

New Year's Day

Xin Nian Kuai Le (Happy New Year)

It's Chinese New Year, so tonight we all got dressed in our Chinese clothing to go out for dinner to a new restaurant we found.  Very disappointed to realize that there were no CNY celebrations going on anywhere locally.  We had thought at least one of the Chinese restaurants in town would have done something special, but we made our own good time... 


Traditionally served on CNY, we had Peking Duck.  We also all shared a Pu Pu Platter (so we could sample a variety of things from this new prospective eating establishment!) and we had Moo Shu Pork.  The staff was VERY nice & so interested in our little Rachel.  Before we left, the manager handed her a red envelope with a $2 bill in it.  She was VERY excited, of course! 

She also couldn't wait till we were outside so she could get her picture taken! (Her daddy took one of she & I together, but my head got chopped off! LOL)


I couldn't get over just how grown up my little princess looked!

She's growing up to be a beautiful young lady.  TOO SOON!!!!

Baby What a Big Surprise

Mom's First Ever Birthday Party!

It was a really special evening tonight!  Mom's friend Ruth organized a surprise party for her birthday.  She remembered Mom telling her that she had never had a birthday party, so she wanted to make it special!  It was a small gathering of friends, and it was so nice.  

Mom was, without a doubt, surprised!  Ruth is such a wonderful friend!

Rachel was busting at the seams, waiting not very patiently to give Nana her present!  We gave her a framed portrait of Rachel, of course!

Rachel got to spend a lot of time on Nana's lap.  That is one of her favorite places to be!

Happy Birthday, Nana!!

Best of Friends

 Ok, so I looked at this picture and wondered who switched my toddler with this young lady!!! 
She was enjoying her salmon & asparagus so much she insisted on eating with BOTH hands! lol

Oh, and in case you were wondering, no, she is NOT enjoying her own martini! LOL

 Her new favorite position.  She keeps climbing up on the chair with Penny, snuggling into her, and then asking me to take their picture!

 I get the feeling these 2 are friends for life... Especially since Penny tolerates SO much from
Rach... her daily routine now includes climbing onto Penny's back while we are all laying in bed... she has fallen asleep on top of her several times now!

What an incredible pair... these two are inseparable! We are beyond lucky with both of our girls!!!  Adoption is by far, the best way to make the perfect family! :-)

Bicycle Race

 So now that the holidays are over, it's time to really get into playing with all those presents!  Naturally, Rachel's first choice is her brand new bicycle. 
She's having a great time with it, even if she is having a bit of a hard time with peddling.  And Daddy is actually having fun teaching her how to ride!

Don't worry... it only took me till her 2nd lesson to go out and get her a helmet!  Oh, and it came with a cool bell too!  So now she has a great addition to her handlebars!

Wonderful Christmastime

Once again, the holidays are upon us.  This year was a little tough, considering my back surgery and not being able to do what I normally would have wanted to, but we still managed to make it a special time for our little munchkin!

Our family portrait for 2010... Too bad we couldn't use THIS shot for our holiday cards this year! Would have been SO nice!  Thanks, as usual to our favorite photographer Margie!

Margie & Charlie spent Christmas Eve with us at my parents party. It is always so nice sharing the holidays with friends & family you love!

Even with all the stuff they've had to deal with this year, Mom & Dad went above and beyond as always.  The house is beautifully decorated, and the food was outstanding as usual!

Mom's chemo has taken it's toll, but she looked terrific in her cute reindeer sweatshirt!

Dad was wearing the very appropriate "Bah Humbug" sweatshirt... lol...

 Santa was VERY good to a certain little girl!  He left a wonderful new bicycle at Nana & Papa's house just for her!  She sure must have been good this year!

 

So despite the fact that things were a little tight for us all, obviously Rachel did not notice a difference!  Here she is demonstrating her ability to be a game show hostess! LOL

 And the gifts just keep on coming!  She had so many neat packages to open!

 Even Penny got to open a package from Nana & Papa!!  With a little help from Daddy, of course!

You can even see the smile on her face!  Now we have to make sure she doesn't eat any of Rachel's fake food!

 Rachel loved all of her gifts, but there were some obvious favorites... Naturally, her bicycle, her dancing Frosty the Snowman, the box of food to go with the kitchen we got her, and this really cool play tent!

Since Hanukkah fell so early this year, we were actually up north to celebrate that one. We brought our own little Menorah with us on the trip, so we lit our candles by ourselves when we had to, but we also lit them with friends when we were able to!
All in all, this holiday season was full of good memories and we are so glad we were able to share them with so many people. 

Happy Holidays to all our friends and family from all of us!!

New York New York

We had an awesome day today. Woke up early, got ourselves up and moving, and headed out for a day of sightseeing!  Margie's first trip to NYC was going to be a memorable one if I had something to say about it!

Our first stop was Liberty Island, to see the lady with the lamp... She sure is a grand sight to see!  I didn't get great pics of her, but I think Margie did, so I will add one of her pics here later... we saw some beautiful sights from the park, including the historic train station and the amazing view of Manhattan!

 This is the train station where all the immigrants would head off to their respective parts of the country.  The signs are still up pointing the way to the various stations!

 Next stop, Carnegie Deli!!!  The sandwiches there are MASSIVE and we had LOTS of leftovers! Rachel loved the Matzo Ball Soup, and she also enjoyed the Corned Beef. 

 Margie may have been a bit overwhelmed by the size of her sandwich... ok, so she was more taken in by the size of TOMMY'S sandwich!!!  It was big enough to feed all of us TWICE... at least I would have thought so...

 Here is MY sandwich.  I got Corned Beef & Pastrami on Rye. 4 days worth of meat packed in there... but it was OH so yummy!!!

 We all stared in amazement at this sight.  Tommy actually FINISHED his whole sandwich!!  OMG, we couldn't believe it!  I never would have thought it possible!!!  Even the people at the next table were floored! LOL...

Macy's Window - "Yes, Virginia, there IS a Santa Claus"

 Rachel's favorite part of the day... the tree and the skating rink at Rockefeller Center!
I think next time we are here in the winter, we will have to rent her some skates and let her have at it!  She really had a blast watching, but I know she would like it SO much more to skate herself!

 The store was closing, so they weren't letting anyone else in, but Margie got the "guard" to take a picture with her in front of FAO Schwartz!  Too bad Rach was asleep in the car already! Actually, probably a GOOD thing... she would have wanted to go in the store for sure!

 Every year, whenever we come up to NY, I feel compelled to go to Central Park & visit Strawberry Fields. It's still so hard to believe it's been 30 years already.  R.I.P. John Lennon... forever in our hearts!