Cute pics

Sometimes we just do a post of cute photos, with no theme but the cuteness. We'll take a break from the beach and get back to that in the next post.

Did you know that Liora can read? Novels even!

She loves popsicles, and asks for them at breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Look at that pose! Standing in her sleepsack and still modeling.

Beach #4 - Rainy Day

We had great weather the entire week we were in Brigantine--except for one day. That day, we went out to breakfast, visited the ocean "wall" in town, and headed to the New Jersey aquarium in Atlantic City.

Every day, Liora likes to pick out a barrette for her outfit. This day, she picked out a hello kitty barrette for Sammy, who gladly put it on. He looks pretty pleased with himself.

Liora loves her Uncle Paul!

She is a doll!

After breakfast, we went to the seawall to see the ocean. It came very close! So close it turned Leo into a monster, which is what he said this face was (or maybe the devil, I don't really remember).

I love this photo! The drama! The hair up the nose! The spit dribbling off the chin.

Kids love watching fish.

This was a tank you could put your hands in (or at least Liora thought that was what it was for; see the blurry hand shaking).

Sammy got comfy in Liora's stroller.

Sharing her applesauce experience with a horseshoe crab.

Beach #3 - Loving the Ocean

Here is some more coverage of Liora's love of the beach. Last year, we took a video of Liora walking right into the water, and so this year I wanted to replicate it.

Here she looks like she is unhappy, but she was seriously rolling around in the sand trying to get as covered in it as she could. This was fun to clean up.

If you look closely, you can see "Brigantine" in the sand in front of DeeDee and Liora. It appeared there magically.

Gabi in her super cool sun hat.

This series of photos cracked us up. Sammy was sitting in the rocker. Liora want to be there too. So she pushed her way on there.

Sammy looks really happy about that, doesn't he?

Beach #2 - Paul & Leo Join Us

Before I get to more beach, newsflash! Liora has now peed on the potty not once, not twice, but three times in the past day. It is as if something clicked in her brain. She is very excited! So are mommy and daddy.

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On Monday of Beach Week, Uncle Paul and Leo joined us. On Tuesday, we followed what became our pattern of heading to the beach in the morning (right after breakfast; we perfected getting out of the house by 8 every day with kids sunscreened and everything), then showering, having lunch, taking a nap, then doing some sort of afternoon activity.

Following last year's braveness at the beach, Liora was much the same this year. She loved the sand, the water, the shells. This year we had a little bit more sand play, and less sand eating. She very resolutely strode into the ocean, and showed no fear of it. 

Liora and Sam enjoyed making sand castles, as well as personal pools of water to sit in near the water's edge.

Paul and Leo hard at work.

Gabi demonstrating the "drippy castle" technique refined by the Yaunches family.

In the afternoon, someone had the bright idea to go to Atlantic City to play mini-golf (I really don't remember who it was, I could be to blame, but we'll really never know). With toddlers in tow. To Atlantic City. Oh, and did I mention that we left the house really late in the day with no strollers, and no plan for dinner? And that we had to walk to the boardwalk from what seemed like blocks away ? And that it was Atlantic City (not known as a family friendly destination...)?

We DID manage to enjoy the mini-golfing. Liora captured the goal of the game right away: look cute carrying around a golf club and put the ball in the hole. At some point, we realized that no real competitive game of mini-golf was going to be happening that evening, and we just sort of walked through the holes with the kids having fun rolling the balls around.

First Days of Beach - Liora and Sam Reunite

In early August, Liora and I packed up the car and headed for the Jersey Shore, to rendezvous with DeeDee, then be joined by Aunt Gabi and Sammy, Uncle Paul and Leo, and cousins Heather, Jeff, Lane, and Conor (in that order).

We left daddy at the townhouse to pack everything up (I really did do a lot of packing before I left, I promise) and move it back to our house--which incidentally was still being worked on by the construction crew. For the moment, Liora and I lived in ignorance of what was going on back in Bethesda (i.e., no house to return to), and enjoyed the beautiful weather and beach times in Brigantine, New Jersey, just north of Atlantic City.

The first day, Liora and I met up with DeeDee and got eveyrthing settled in the house. Liora did very well in the four hour car ride there; she napped, then we had a picnic at a rest stop, and she watched some Elmo on the portable dvd player. We got to the house, had a look around, and had a nice seafood meal with DeeDee.

The next day, DeeDee drove to the Philly airport to pick up Gabi and Sam. Liora was thrilled to see Sam. Sam was a little unsettled by his cousin who was up in his face as soon as he arrived. They seemed to get over that relatively quickly!

Here, Liora and Samy are jumping on the bed after coming back from the beach and getting showers. They did this almost every day together, screaming and jumping and being crazy.

And here they are chasing each other up and down the hallway at the rental house. This also occurred fairly often! I think they both enjoyed having a cousin there of about the same age.

Visiting DeeDee & Memorial for Pop-pop

In late July, we took a trip up to Pennsylvania to visit DeeDee and attend Pop-pop's memorial service at Sherry and Dan's farm property.

This was our last weekend at the townhouse...we left for the beach the following weekend while daddy did all the moving all by himself! He is a rockstar.

Bye-bye banister!

What a beauty!

DeeDee took care of the cats for the four months we were in the townhouse, so Liora was very excited to see them during her visit at DeeDee's house. Here is Lexy saying "oh yeah, I forgot about you." We are happy to report that now she is back to being very friendly with Liora.

You make good snacks DeeDee!

They look alike, don't you think?

At Pop-pop's memorial service, most of the family was there to mark the occasion of his birth and remember the great man he was. It was nice to have everyone together, and take a break to talk about him and his legacy.

With cousin Becca, a favorite.

The family out in the field next to Pop-pop's memorial.

Sherry had some wonderful words to say about Pop-pop. He was such a good dad and grandfather, we each thought we were his favorite. Fay had to break it to me that I wasn't...!

Liora next to the memorial, which has Pop-pop's requested inscription "Glad you could stop by."

We were glad to stop by Pop-pop. And so glad we had you for so long in this lifetime.

Last Swim Lesson

Hello! We are back! It's been almost a month since we posted last, and so much has happened. We lived with Nurit and Roy for 3 weeks (they are awesome). We moved back into our house with the nice new addition. We sadly said goodbye to our beloved cat Zooks, who got a surprise diagnosis of renal cancer and passed away very quickly. Liora moved into the 2-3-year-old classroom at school! Daddy started his new job in July, and started biking to work every day in August.

We have a backlog of 300 photos that I have only begun to go through. So, stay tuned for some time machine posts.

I now take you back to mid-July....

Liora and mommy took swim lessons this summer! Liora loved going to the pool every Sunday morning, while daddy went to his softball games. The goal of the class was just to get the kids feeling more comfortable in the water. Liora did indeed get more comfortable floating on her back and trying to blow bubbles in the water.

She also perfected the "get out of the pool by yourself" maneuver (see below) as well as the "1-2-3 jump back in the pool" skill.

On the last day of class, daddy got to come! So mommy stood by and took photos.

Liora really can get out of the pool at the wall all by herself! She learned how to use her elbows to hoist herself over the side and the pull her legs up.

We will certainly take more swim classes. Liora had no fear of the water at all, which made us very happy.