A visit from a friend

A little while back our friends Lexie and Rachael came to see us on their way home from their grandmother's up north. We met them downtown and had lunch together at a little Mexican restaurant. The girls were excited to see each other and so were we. They used to be our neighbors so we had spent a lot of time together. We are so happy they took the time to see us.

Decorating the Christmas tree

Here we are decorating the Christmas tree. I know it is small but Will is not interested in buying a new one so I at least get the small tree. Elsie had fun putting the decorations on this year. She was very excited to do it as we had the tree up for a day before getting to decorating it. Some day we will need a new tree as not all our ornaments do not fit on this small one. Plus I bet Elsie will start making new ornaments for us very soon.

Fun in Vermont

We were in Vermont for just under a week and spent most of our time with family. We got to see one friend which was fun too but we did not take any pictures. We went out to lunch a lot which was a fun change for us as we never go out to eat when we are at home. Alora moved out of home to go to the local college so we got to visit her at her new apartment in town. We also spent several mornings going to my parents house. We tried to keep the afternoons and evenings free to hang out with my sister as she was working during the day. It was a lot of fun. As you can see we played a few games with the kids and went ice skating. It was Elsie's first time ice skating and she was a trooper. She tried pushing the crates around and that sort of worked but really you had to hold her up because there was on way she could stay on her feet. She seemed to like it but it did get a little cold in the arena as it was not heated. On Saturday just before leaving we had a big family breakfast. It was a lot of fun and we are sad we had to come home so quickly.

Next stop Vermont

Will, Elsie and I headed to Vermont on Monday and had a very nice drive. One of the first things we got to do was go see Abby and Ray at the playground. It was pretty cold out but we still had a lot of fun. We played tag, used the swings, and climbed on the equipment. Joe and Lars and Arya where there too. Here is the whole group of them the only Vermont cousin who is missing is Alora.

The banana crumb fight

I am not sure when this all started but Levi and Julia have been fighting about banana crumbs for quite a while. I am not even sure of the exact argument but it is something like do bananas leave crumbs or not. I think Julia said no they don't while Levi said yes they do. So they have been fighting about this for years. Julia decided to battle out the waves with Levi, whoever ran first lost the banana crumb fight. Levi accepted and they were off. It started out quite small with just their toes but they slowly rolled up their pants and walked one step further in after each wave. As you can see below they got pretty far in and at the end I was afraid that Julia might get swept away!! But she didn't and she also did not run...Levi lost the battle and the banana crumb fight. They had a great time doing it and Julia was ecstatic that she won but they where soaked and it was freezing out remember it was the beginning of November. Luckily they made it back to the cars and managed to dry out a bit before we went to dinner that night.

Long Island

While we were in NYC we actually stayed out on Long Island. Will could not find a good hotel rate in the city as the NYC Marathon was being run that Sunday (the wedding was on Saturday). So on Sunday those of us who stuck around went to see a few things around Long Island. Mostly we went to an island called Fire Island and walked on a board walk to see the light house there. It was pretty but really cold even with two sweat shirts on I was freezing. Despite the cold we decided to walk back to the cars on the beach. It was beautiful and Elsie and I were able to pick up a few shells. The walk was quite eventful with a few encounters in the water for Julia and Levi (Will's sister and brother)...more to come in the next post. The sun set was beautiful and we got lots of fun shots. Including the ones with the sign to let us know where we could sunbathe nude and where we had to use proper attire. It was a long walk back especially for Julia and Levi who were soaking wet! After we left the beach we made our way to a Italian restaurant where the show Man vs Food had gone and ate a ton of food. Including but not limited to a huge platter for meat which is where the huge meatball came from.