Chiara's First Birthday Party

We returned from the farm on the 26th and began a whirl-wind bout of house cleaning, laundry, shopping, and cooking for Chiara's birthday party. The guests who arrived on time and early we put to work cutting vegetables and icing the cake and really appreciated the help. Given Chiara's love of puppies and the word puppy that was the party theme. We had a tremendous turn-out but missed the Levines who weren't able to come this time. We know they regretted it and know they'll be with us for more celebrations.



Leah, Asher, Molly, and Keegan work on their puppy puppets (say that 3 times fast). It's possible that here Asher is working on Molly's puppet but we got him working on his own pretty quickly.


Chiara is playing with a musical birthday card.


Kaya played with the cars in the front room for a long time and really enjoyed the riding moose:


We all sang and Rachel, Chiara, and Molly blew out the candle. And our little shy-girl had no problem with all the people singing or talking to her. Yay!


Her first foray into cake was less enthusiastic than some babies I've seen but more enthusiastic than some (including Asher):


I think he's acquired a taste for it now.


Chiara in her party hat!


Happy Birthday, Chiara!

Holiday 2008 Farm trip

Well this is going to be a long post and the next one will be long as well. Of course they will be mostly pictures so it won't stress anyone to read them. Tee hee. We went to the farm to visit the Springfields December 18 and stayed through the 26th. It was a great visit although Andrea had to work most of those days. Christmas day Dwayne, Michelle, Phoebe, and Duncan came out for Christmas and they stayed over night.

Here's a picture of mom playing Wii and Chiara dancing next to her.

Chiara's interest in dancing has exploded. She will dance to anything that sounds even vaguely musical from actual music (we played the Nutcracker Suite over and over) to cell phones or irritating child toys. Here she and I are dancing to a Christmas Carol in front of the tree.


Dude, how cute is this pose? She was dancing here too.


Asher, Granddaddy, and Pud watch TV.


You'll never guess what we got for Christmas!


Chiara loved her new 13-sided toy. She loved it but she also loved wrapping paper and tissue paper.



Andrea opened the beautiful sweater Rachel made her and was quite surprised.


Chiara taking Granddaddy for a walk in her Christmas Eve dress.


In addition to the sweater and 13-sided toy, Rachel also made mom these gorgeous place mats. They were also a surprise.




Asher reviewing the 2009 calendar with Andrea:


Chiara's new push cart so we can put her to work.


Asher's movie:



Chiara wore the dress I made her and the hat Rachel made to match on Christmas:


Andrea is looking at a present but really this picture is supposed to show Asher reading one of Andrea's books (I think something by Georgette Heyer?).


How cute are Chiara and Phoebe together?

Sibling play

The kids were playing early on Tuesday while Chiara was still in her pajamas. Chiara seems to have only two settings: screaming and laughing. This picture shows her laughing. She gets this like super-laugh that seems like she's going to run out of breath or something but she doesn't. It's really a sight.


Ash and Chiara read and play with blocks.


Peek-a-boo!