Halloween Festivities Continued...

Today we had a Halloween themed playdate with Colden and Tiffany. It just so happened that Colden is Prince Charming for Halloween which worked perfectly for Cinderella and Gus Gus.

On the way there I said to Ella, "Hey Ella since Colden's Prince Charming you can marry him (We're very in to weddings and being married right now)." She looked at me and said, "No, Mommy, Colden can marry me!"

Because Tiffany is the hostess with the mostess and the best nanny in the whole world she had Halloween music, a baking project, and a craft project. We had such a great time. Unfortunately, little Sofia was just beginning to show signs of being sick and was not very happy about. But Ella thoroughly enjoyed herself.

Cinder"Ella" practicing her dance moves before the ball
The playdate spread
The Cranberry Muffin spread
The Prince and Cinderella
CinderElla letting Prince Charming know how it's going to be...
Gus Gus
Prince Charming and CinderElla baking

Working on their craft, paper bag Scarecrows. Ella really enjoyed doing this!

Taking a little break together
This picture about sums up how Sofia was feeling
Poor girl.

We had a wonderful time. Thank you Colden and Tiffany!

I'm officially Chop Liver

Seriously, I carried this child for 9 months. Labored almost the entire time without an epidural, and dealt with 3 months of horrible colic and she refuses to say mama! She now says Dada AND Ella but no Mama! I'm seriously going to ground her if her next word is Mikka. Oh, her hair is huge because it was in pigtails but I took them out for her nap.

She's such a chatterbox! I feel like a bad 2nd time parent because I don't keep track of her words but off the top of my head right now she says:

Ella
Dada
All Done
More
Milk
What's that?
That
hi
bye bye
I did it
baby

She's very into signing videos just like Ella was and signs:

baby
milk
eat
done
more
shoes
hat


I am loving this age with Sofia (14 months). Sometimes I wish I could just freeze her at this age.

Westwood's Raggamuffin Parade

Today was our town's annual Raggamuffin Parade. It's really cute. We start at the train station and walk down Westwood Ave to the Community Center, where they put on a little show and provided apple cider and doughnuts. They even shut down the streets and had police blockades up to stop traffic.

Poor Ella was so worried that there was a car accident because of all the police cars but I assured her it's just because there was a Princess in town...

We had reports of horrible rain but lucky for us it held off until after the event was over.

Cinderella (aka Ella) and I went down ahead of Gus Gus (Sofia) and Daddy since she was napping.

Cinderella on her way in to town

Walking to the Community Center
It was a really nice turnout of kids (see Ella in the bottom left?)

Daddy and Gus Gus showed up about 15 minutes after the show started although Daddy dressed Gus Gus and put on jeans instead of the mouse pants (oh, there were matching pants?) and didn't put on a shirt over the mouse costume to make her offically Gus Gus, so really she was, well, a mouse with jeans on?!

Ella was so excited to see Sofia and kept saying in her "mommy" voice, "Hiiii baby Sofia. Do you want to come sit with me? Come here Sofia. You look so cuuuuteee."
Sofia kept getting scared when the performer would blow his whistle or the kids would all start laughing loudly, so Ella held her on her lap so she wouldn't be scared. Ella was so proud to be with her. Sofia turned around to "talk" with the kids behind her and Buzz Lightyear was a total brat and told his sister, "Get away from her. Get away from her!" I said, "She's just a baby. It's not nice to talk to a baby like that." So Ella turned around and said, "That's baby Sofia! Don't talk mean to her!" I know I shouldn't be proud of that...but I am, so there.
Little Mommy, Cinderella, leading Mouse with jeans on to get apple ciders and doughnuts.
It was a really fun morning and so nice that the town does this for the kids. It was a good practice run for Halloween...hopefully Sofia can be Gus Gus and not Mouse with jeans. It was a good try though, Daddy.

In The Heights

I rarely blog about things that involve just Ricardo and me because I know our faithful readers (Hi Gaga, Abuela, and Tiffany!) could care less about us and really just want to hear about the girls, but I did have to blog about what Ricardo and I did today.

This afternoon Ricardo and I caught the matinee show of the 2008 Tony Award winning Best Musical, In The Heights
This is an emotional, moving, hysterically funny musical about living in Washington Heights (a poor, mostly Hispanic (Dominican, Puerto Rican and Cuban) area in Upper Manhattan-155th St and up) with an extremely talented cast. The comedic timing is priceless and just when you thought you would miss the rest of the show from crying, they brought you back with an amazingly uplifting dance number, song or a very funny dialog.

I have been lucky enough in my life to have seen well over 25 musicals on Broadway, as well as 5 shows in London, and countless others in San Francisco and I can honestly say this was one of my all time favorites if not my #1 favorite. I know for sure, this is Ricardo's all time favorite.

I haven't been this impressed with a show in probably 10 years. At intermission, Ricardo and I looked at each other and at the same time said, "We have to buy this CD!" and then "I want to see this again!"

If you are in the NYC metro area, I highly suggest you see this show. If you are not lucky enough to live here, then make sure you catch it when it starts to tour. You will not be disappointed.

Pumpking Picking, Apple Picking, Zucchini Picking, Pear Picking....

On Tuesday, Ella didn't have school because of Rosh Hashanah so we decided to celebrate the New Year by going to a local farm, Demarest, with Tiffany and Colden to take a hay ride and go pumpkin picking.

On the hayride

Abuela, Tiffany, Sofia and her darn paci, Colden, Ella, me

Ella and Colden, too cool for you
Sweet Sofia in the pumpkin patch
This picture cracks me up.
I couldn't title it any better than Tiffany did, "The Great Pumpkin Inspector!" Demarest is already pretty much out of apples but they told us if we could find some, we could pick a couple so the kids each got one.

Ella picking her appleColden and Ella very proud of their apples
(Ella towers over Colden. Granted she's almost a year older than him, but geez she's tall)With the best Nanny in the world, Tiffany!

On Sunday, we celebrated our 6th wedding anniversary by going up to Weed Orchard in Marlboro, NY to pick our own apples, pears, tomatoes, zucchini and eggplant. It was also their fall festival so there was BBQ, face painting, a hay maze, petting zoo, bouncy house and more. We had a great time.

Sofia and Mommy (it was really bright)
Ella picking Apples

I found oneDetermination
She loved putting them in the bag
Sofia "picking"They had the most amazing vegetables.
Abuela and her girls!
Once again, an attempt at a family photo...we'll never stop trying
Ella on the bounce house slide

Ella admiring her rainbow face painting, which she picked out because it matched her shirt.

Ricardo and I were wondering is it a coincidence that "Weed" orchard is in "Marlboro"? On our way home we passed an ice cream shop named, "Mary Jane"....hmmmm, put that in your pipe and smoke it,

6 Years Ago Today...

6 years ago today Ricardo and I started our lives together as husband and wife. Since then we've done so much it's almost hard to believe it's only been 6 years!We honeymooned in beautiful Fiji

We were so young (I just turned 25 and Ricardo was 26 about to turn 27) and had no clue where life would take us and here we are 6 years later as happy (albeit a little crazier!) as the day we got married (possibly even happier).

In 6 years we have:

• Moved from San Francisco Bay Area to San Diego (12/02) and rented an awesome house in Pacific Beach
  
• I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis (6/03)
• Purchased out first home (10/03)
• Had our first daughter, Gabriella (9/05)
• Moved to New Jersey (4/06)
• Bought a house in NJ (sold ours in San Diego) (6/06)
• Had our second daughter, Sofia (8/07)

Here's to another 6 years filled with as much joy and happiness (but maybe not so many big events!).

I love you honey and wouldn't want to spend my life with anyone else. Thanks for being you.

Last night we went to sushi together while Abuela babysat and today we're going apple picking with the whole family. Life is good!