Baby's First New Year

Our New Year's Eve is usually very low key, and this year was no different. We spent the evening at home. Mandy and Tam came over with Maddy for dinner - takeout from Mr. Pi's Sushi and some left overs.


Maddy and Calvin got to spend some more time together. Calvin has started his pinching phase though so we had to be a little more careful when they were playing.

Mandy, Tam and Maddy headed home early. Phil and I actually made it to midnight without completely passing out. Even Calvin was awake to ring in the New Year. What was Calvin doing as we rang in the New Year? Eating... (of course ^__^)

Happy New Year, baby!

Snowed In - 2010 Snowstorm

The Monday after Christmas we had our first snow storm of the season, and it was a doozy. Over 2 feet of snow! It felt almost like we were back in Cleveland, except now we have to shovel the snow ourselves...


The cars were completely buried.

Since it was the first real snow for Calvin we decided to get him bundled up and take him outside to take some pictures. He looked so cute in his little fleece pullover, but it was so hard getting it over his head this might be the only time he wears it. It's supposed to be for a 9 month old, but his head couldn't fit through the opening...

The snow was piled so high some parts went past Calvin's head.

And then it was quickly back inside, back to where it was nice and warm.

Christmas 2010 Part 2

On to part 2 of Christmas. In the afternoon we left my sister's place and headed into NY to Phil's parents' house. We opened some presents just between Phil's immediate family before the rest of the extended family arrived.


Winnie bought Calvin a toy Octopus that teaches you the colors in different languages - English, French and Spanish. Sorry no Chinese...

Since we just came from Christmas with my family, we had shoved all of the presents into the car and brought everything with us to NY, including Calvin's new jumper. Good thing we have the big car or else it never would have fit. I think he was still getting used to it so he sat nice and still for his picture with Winnie.

The Christmas tree at Phil's parents' house is overflowing with presents too.

Slowly lots of people started arriving. Calvin with his grandma and Aunt Winnie (with her mom's enormous glasses).

Calvin and Lea.

While people were upstairs playing rock band the food was being laid out downstairs. Mostly the usual stuff - sqiud, chicken, cha siu, veggies aand soup. There was even some XBOX Kinect playing going on.

Then there's always the overflow table.

Phil shared his lovely rendition of Taylor Swift's "You Belong With Me". I was tempted to post the video, but it was too long...

Time seemed to fly by with Calvin being around. Before I knew it, it was time for dessert. There was carrot cake, strawberry cheese cake, and the infamous Wegman's fruit tart from the Wegman's grocery store. The first time Phil and I got this was for my mom's birthday dinner, and it was delicious! So we ordered it again, this time for Phil's family.

They even had a special Christmas tree shaped one for the holidays, with a star fruit at the top. The tart was a big hit.


There was also an apple turnover cake that one of Phil's aunts made. That was pretty tasty too.

Poor Calvin isn't old enough to enjoy any of the desserts. He looks so sad.

Phil's aunt Ruby shared some stories about Kevin when he was a baby.

Calvin and grandpa. For once Calvin doesn't seem scared of him. ^__^

After dinner and desserts it was time to open presents. Calvin made out like a bandit! All of his presents are piled high at his feet like a little emperor.

Family picture time.

One of Phil's favorites of the evening was actually a gift for Calvin - a Transformer's shirt to match the one Phil has. It's a little big though so he'll have to wait a little before he can wear it.

Kevin, Phil and Phil's dad sporting their matching ties.

Check out more picture from Christmas (part 1 and 2):

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/KLl_L00dMilhKDVaLrLQwQ?feat=directlink

Christmas 2010 Part 1

It's time for Calvin's first Christmas! And our first Christmas with a baby. Spending Christmas with a little one definitely makes things more hectic, but fun too.

Just like every year we spent Christmas morning with my family. So we got Calvin all bundled up in his car seat to make the trip to my sister's place in Bridgewater. He had Tigger to help keep him warm.

Mandy always gets a real tree for Christmas. Because of the 2 babies there were tons of presents this year.

Luckily Calvin was in a good mood. Probably excited to start opening presents!


Look, Calvin even fits under the tree!


We had some dim sum and gingerbread for breakfast.

After breakfast we sat in front of the fireplace and attempted to take a family photo. You would be surprised how long it takes to get a good photo with 2 babies involved. You would never know it by looking, but someone just made a mess in their diaper...

Once we finally got a few good family photos and all diapers were changed, we started opening presents. Calvin was very greedy with his presents.

He even tried to claim some of daddy's presents too.

Phil even got a special present - a sleep and play outfit for Calvin with mops on the knees, so he can clean the floors when he starts to crawl.

Present opening is a lot of excitement though, so Calvin had to take a nap halfway through.

Calvin was busy sleeping and missed his big present - a baby jumper from my mom. I think Phil was more excited about it than Calvin was. Phil got right to work putting it together.

Even Calvin's cousin, Madeline, was pooped from all of the presents...

Madeline got a cute red winter coat, just like the cartoon Madeline.

After we finished opening all the presents Tam's brother and sister-in-law, Nahn and Veronica, came by. Veronica made a whole bunch of homemade cookies. They looked professionally made and were very yummy.

Calvin finally woke up from his nap in time to meet the new visitors. He seemed to really like Nahn. I think it's because he reminds him of himself - no hair ^__^

And now that Calvin was awake he was able to try out his new jumper. He seemed more confused than anything. He's a little too short and his feet didn't quite touch the ground, so we had to wedge a blanket under him. But he'll grow into it. Hopefully it'll grow on him and we won't have to carry him all the time.

Jersey Diary is "Press"

This is a bit of a diversion from our standard content, but I came across this and Phil said I should post about it, so here it goes...

So, there is an updated Stats section in the blog where you can check out information on visitors to your blog - things like number of visitors per day, country of origin, how they are getting directed to your blog, etc. I was taking a look at the information on how visitors get directed to Jersey Diary and found the following link: http://www.meltbakery.com/press.html

Check out the very bottom of the page...

I think this is from a post from one of our many trips out to the Hester Street fair, but apparently Jersey Diary is now "press". Too bad the Hester Street fair is closed for the winter. Melt Bakery was mighty tasty ^__^

Jets Fan

Over the weekend Calvin was sporting his first piece of Tartan pride - some baby wear from our alma mater, CMU. Who knew that they even had University baby wear?



And despite our best efforts to stick to the no TV rule, he still manages to strain his head to catch a glimpse of the football game. Phil thinks this means Calvin's a Jets fan. I guess time will tell...

Holiday Pictures

My sister and her husband recently got a new digital camera - one of those fancy ones with the extra lenses and image processing. So we decided to enlist their help in taking some holiday pictures for us. We figured it would be easier to catch Calvin in a good mood at home rather than dragging him to one of those studios. The day started out well - Calvin was very happy and playful in the morning. This is one of the few pictures where we actually caught him smiling.


Once Mandy and Tam arrived we got Calvin dressed in his holiday best.


We took tons of pictures. The hardest part was trying to figure out how to get Calvin to sit up on his own so we wouldn't get any of our hands in the picture. We still managed to get some good ones, and a couple where he's actually smiling! Or smirking...but that still counts.










We even got to take a family picture - our first holiday photo as a family.


We also took a couple pictures of Calvin by our Christmas tree. We cheated and propped him up on the stuffed puppy dog that we had gotten from one of Phil's friends. Calvin was gripping the dog so tight he actually pulled off chunks of fur.


After taking pictures of Calvin we got to spend more time with our niece, Maddy. She keeps getting cuter and cuter!


What a sweet picture with mommy.