Ho Ho Ho!

No crying  this year!

Nana's Birthday

We just got home from a crazy week in S. California, which was highlighted by Nana's (60th ... shhh) Birthday celebration. In honor of the milestone, we visited Disneyland and had a fabulous overall trip. Sonia was as excited as ever to hang out with her cousins and see her favorite princesses. We watched the Aladdin musical, and a boat parade on Balboa Island. Neal was also very excited about everything, and may have come home with a Pluto doll. We won't know for sure until Christmas, of course!

There were too many pictures to post, so we've put them in a web album below (click on the picture to open the album):

Neal update: Sick Day

Neal was home sick yesterday. He was actually "fine", but had a temperature that exceeded acceptable daycare limits. To pass the afternoon Dad took him to check out the Cougar Mountain Zoo. It was our first time there, so we were excited to get an up close and personal look at some new animals. Also, we were (literally) the only one's there, which was exciting. Santa was at the zoo, and walked over to us to say "hi." Over the past month or so, Neal has really turned into a toddler. His vocabulary now includes: doggie (of course- still used to describe any living object, airplanes, and buses), dada (occasionally), uh-oh (as in, "I dropped my milk"), ball (pronounced "ba"), bear (pronounced "ba"), moooo ("cow"), and oo-oo-ah-ah ("monkey").

The cranes at the zoo were cool. They had tigers and cougers as well, but we couldn't get a picture quite as close to those ones.

The llama on the left is named Biff. Biff has, without a doubt, the worst teeth I have ever seen on an animal. Get that alpaca some chewing gum!

Going for a ride on Santa's sleigh.

Big Changes!

The blog has been neglected lately.... but not without good reason. We've moved!

Good bye Queen Anne :(

We sold our house in Queen Anne, and bought a place in Bellevue. The whole process was a bit of a whirlwind, as our Queen Anne house wasn't even for sale! The buyers' agent reached out and we let them know we were interested. One thing lead to another, and here we are in the suburbs! The trick was that we had to be out by Halloween, and (see post below) we had a 2 week trip to India in between. BUT, we found exactly the house that we wanted... in the neighborhood that we wanted. We couldn't be happier, and are very blessed by the way everything worked out.

We moved in just in time to take "Princess Jasmine" and "Aladdan" trick or treating in the new neighborhood. But, with everything in boxes, we didn't realize that we didn't have any candy to give out. Sonia unknowingly donated some of her loot to the neighbor kids, at least until one of our neighbors gave us a few bags of candy bars.


We should also give a huuuuuuge thank you to Nana and Papa, who took a week out of their busy lives to come up and help get us settled. They worked incredibly hard getting things packed/unpacked/sorted/organized/re-sorted/re-organized/moved in. So, THANKS!

Moving has been fun for the kids. They have easily adjusted to their new rooms and all of their playing space - and have had fun with it! Here is a school bus we made from one of the furniture boxes!

And here are some more pics from Halloween and moving day. Now that we are much more settled, we will make sure we update the blog more regularly with more pictures!

Halloween and Move

India Trip

We just returned from a fabulous trip to India! The 4 of us went through NJ and picked up Ammamma and Tata before heading on our VERY LONG flight. Thankfully, we had grandparent support on the flight which turned out to be quite manageable! I packed lots of games, snacks, activities, every distraction you can think of and we did just fine.

We spent a total of almost 2 weeks in Bombay and Hyderabad visiting family and relaxing (and lots of shopping and eating!) I was so impressed with how well the kids adjusted - making the trip seemed to be a piece of cake for them. They quickly acclamated to the heat, the food, the crazy schedules and all of the other wonderful things that come with travel. Aside from some jetlag - which kept us all up a few nights - they really seemed to have a good time. And as a result, so did we! The kids had such a great time playing with Ammamma and Tata which was such a treat! While we were there, we celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary and my birthday. In commemoration of such momentous events, Erich decided to shave his beard and leave only a mustache...it was not received well by anyone, much to his disappointment! Thankfully, it's gone now :)

Here are some highlight pictures, as well as a full album below. Enjoy!

Click on the photo below to see the full album of pictures:

India 2011

Sheila Aunty and Bab Uncle's visit

A few weeks ago, we were so lucky to have Sheila Aunty and Bab Uncle come visit us for a few days. The kids had such a great time with them here (as did we!) and it was so fun showing them Seattle. It was so nice to have another set of "grandparents here" as we got to get away for a dinner out, and as it turned out I was really sick that weekend, so they helped take care of the kids while I got to rest. We were so happy they visited, and now we can't wait for a cousin reunion with Aditi and Pooneet and Ananya and Amisha :)

Here are some fun pics from their visit:

Road Trip (version 2)

We headed down I-5 for Labor Day. The kids got dropped off in Medford, and then we headed farther south for another 7 hours to Sonoma. Sonoma was great, since we hadn't had much of a summer in Seattle, and spending a couple of days wine tasting and hopping around Healdsburg was quite a treat. Here's a "self portrait" and a couple pics we took at the Truett Hurst Winery in the Dry Creek valley:

After this brief interlude from parenthood (thanks Nana!), we headed back up to the Rogue Valley to bake some more in the 100 degree heat for the rest of the week. Olive is doing great, and is ahead of schedule on her surgery recovery. Sonia and Neal, of course, had a blast hanging out with their cousins. Sonia got some swim lessons, and is practically officially a "swimmer" now (ok... maybe 1 more week of lessons. But, she's really close.) Here are most of the cousins on the green machine getting ready to visit the pond:

Neal takes on a slide

Golden Gardens

Is there anything better than Seattle on a sunny day? Not much...

Road Trip (version 1)

Do I really need this silly cone again?

After visiting GiGi, Erich, Neal, and Olive headed to Medford for a quick trip. Erich had work, Neal wanted to see some cousins, and Olive had two surgeries. Olive is out of surgery, and is in recovery (thank you Nana and Papa for taking care of her!), and will be staying at Nana and Papa's house for awhile for some much needed R&R. The All Creatures Animal Clinic is really the world's best vet- this was Olive's second ACL surgery in as many years.

This was Neal's first solo trip to Medford, and with the Patten and Kemmling cousins at Nana's it was pretty exciting for him (5 boys at the same time?!). The first night, all of the boys headed down to the pond.

Stay tuned for summer Road Trip II.... We are all headed down to Medford on Labor Day, and Erich and Deepa will be going to Sonoma for a few days without the kids (wha?!!?!? no kids?).

Trip to Grass Valley

We have two trips this month. The first was last weekend; we went to visit GiGi (Erich's Grandma) in Grass Valley. Grandpa Mark and Becky were also there to pick us up at the airport (or at least Deepa and the kids....to make a long story short, Olive and Erich "missed" the cut off for the flight, so had to come down on a later plane in first class- while Deepa got both kids on the original flight). 

GiGi and Sonia chllin on the couch

GiGi took us to Janet's house, where there was a beach for the kids to play and swim. Neal, to no one's suprise is a born "water baby," but Sonia has really started to love the water also. She has a week of swim lessons in September scheduled at Nana's house.

OK... we didn't have Sonia's swimsuit, but we improvised! (She's wearing NG's shirt)

Too cool for school

Kiddos with GiGi

Family hike

Last Sunday, we headed up to Index (about an hour out of town) to hike Bridal Veil Falls. Mom and Dad didn't realize that the hike was pretty much straight uphill to the falls! But, the kids were troopers, and we made it all the way up to the top...Sonia only needed to be carried about half the time:). Despite being exhausted, we were very self-congratulatory about doing the whole thing, and the falls were beautiful.... so all in all it was a great time!