...and manners too!

Claire and I were both thrilled and amazed to here THIS exchcange emanating from the family room while were finishing breakfast the other day.

Speaking of fish...

In addition to feeding fish (see previous post) Sammy and Henry have also been watching fish get fed, and get fed to other critters, at the Long Beach Aquarium. Henry seemed to like the Sea Lions best, Sammy of course was most entranced by the guitar painted on the wall leading into the cafe...

Keeping up with Friends

Okay, this blog has officially cast loose from the bounds of chronological order. This post predates the last post, but not the next post. So there.

The Friday after X-mas we took a drive with the boys up to Santa Barbara to see our friends the Brewer family (Dagmar, Tim and identical twins Kaja and Katrina) whom we met while staying at the Cedars Sinai NICU after Sammy and Henry were born (gee.. "staying at" sounds SO much more pleasant than that really was...) Other than seeing how wonderfully healthy and charming the girls are growing up to be, one of the highlights of the trip was FEEDING FISH! As you can see from the photos below, Sammy also sampled the fish food, and decided it was rubbish. Stupid fish. In the words of Charlie Tuna, they got "no taste."

Choo Choo !!

Henry & Sammy take their first solo train ride! This was the fun part of our rainy day trip to the mall.............

Henry does his cool Christmas dance with shades

Henry danced to the Christmas music on the pier at Long Beach. He picked out his own sunglasses at the aquarium gift shop!!

Christmas at Grandma & Grandpa Mullen's house

Henry and Grandma took a rest while dinner was cooking.
And the orange tossing continued....
The boys loved the play kitchen that G & G gave them!!
Uncle Chris helped Grandma in the kitchen.
Grandpa wasn't feeling well so Sammy joined him resting on the couch.

Christmas 2007

Christmas. Santa brought trumpets and drums!!

Drums for Christmas!

Christmas Eve waiting for Santa

While sitting waiting for Santa Sammy attempts to give Henry a big KISS

Christmas Eve!

We started the holiday with the annual Christmas Eve orange tossing and Grandma & Grandpa Mullen's house.
Festivities continued with our first taste of mushroom barley Christmas soup. Henry actually like it. Sam ate rolls for dinner.....

Later, after bedtime, Santa left some presents under the tree. Emma (the cat) is trying to take a sneak peek.

Pretend snowfight!

Lookee who invited us to pelt him with snowballs for the holiday? Ooohh... if ONLY!

Don't send a lame Holiday eCard. Try JibJab Sendables!

And who knew that goy was such a DANCER?

Don't send a lame Holiday eCard. Try JibJab Sendables!

A night out in Oldtown

Henry and Jonatan tested out the furniture at Crate & Barrel
Sammy thinks this ornament would look great on our tree!!

Our first Christmas Extravaganza!

It was decided that Sammy just wasn't ready for his stage debut this year , so he was content to look on , even calling Henry(seen here in mid-spin) backstage to tell him to "break a leg"

Henry takes center stage AGAIN!

Note how he keeps adjsuting his position to make sure he is in the spotlight!!

Henry is the hammiest Christmas tree

Henry decided that the other kids were clearly supposed to be his backup and proceeded to walked to center stage...

It's Official: Sammy Can Read

We weren't sure if Sammy just had a good memory, or if he was actually reading, but now it's official: Sammy can read. He clearly indicated that the editorial staff of the LA Times has gone completely insane by yelling "Star.. Banana!" repeatedly at the front section of today's Times... proof positive that he not only understands written text, but can recognize when it is lame.

Henry we're still not sure about. He did say something that sounded quite a bit like "corrupt oligarch war-profiteer" while pointing at a picture of Dick Cheney, but we think it may have been a coincidence.

Decorating our First Christmas Tree

Violins!

We attended the Instrument Petting Zoo at the Pasadena Civic Center last Saturday, and Sam and Henry finally got to lay hands on VIOLINS! I can report with some confidence at this point that there are NO other 2-year olds in Pasadena who can come within a country-mile of Sam's enthusiasm for the violin. After 30 minutes or so, I had to pry the suprisingly undamaged instrument from his fingers and carry him screaming from the auditorium. We'll see how he does for next months repeat of the event!

Our first real Christmas tree

Henry experiences snow... decides it's lame.

Okay, so someone decided to dump a couple tons of man-made snow (i.e., basically shaved ice) on Holly Street in Old Town Pasadena. Henry checked it out, and appeared unimpressed. Sammy couldn't be bothered, and made a sprint for the jazz combo playing the theme to the Charlie Brown Christmas special on the street... and had to be pulled physically off the drum set.