Prelude to the New Year

We've had a busy few days leading up to the beginning of the new year. On Sunday morning we went to brunch with Miri and Opa at "the club," which gave us a nice opportunity to take an updated family picture, the first of which was taken on Kira's first outing right after she was born over a year ago:
Sunday evening we were supposed to go along with Sammy and Izzy and their parents to visit our friends in Virginia but our Virginia friends came down with a stomach bug so instead we had Sammy and Izzy and their parents over for a pizza dinner, celebration of the last night of Hanukkah, and a repeat trip to see the Winter Lights display. It was very special to spend the last night of Hanukkah with our good friends but we certainly missed the other 1/3 of the group. Luckily we've already made plans to get together with them later in January after everyone gets better!

Monday we had a playdate with Ari and Alex's school friends at friend Chase's house. Alex was happy to find a train table just like ours at home and all the kids enjoyed seeing their friends even though we're on vacation from school.

Tuesday we hosted our neighborhood playgroup and had a chance to spend some time with the newest addition to the group, Sarah's new baby sister Emma. Andrew and his big brother, Justin, came over too, along with friend Sydney. Ari and Alex were very good at sharing all of their toys with their friends and Kira was excited to not be the youngest one at playgroup!

This morning we started off our New Year's Eve celebrations early with a playdate at friends Brenden and Neve's house. Ari, Alex and Kira had their first chance to see a Christmas tree, which was very exciting for them. Alex was happy to see that Brenden has lots of diggers and fire trucks, which Brenden was very gracious about sharing. Ari must have been hungry, as she ate one and a half bagels in addition to some grapes and lemonade! All of the kids were excited when we had a sudden and quick little blizzard that was over as quickly as it started. We were joined by a bevy of our twin friends including Rina and Celia, along with little sister Eliana to Kira's great delight:

Tonight we'll be celebrating the New Year with more friends and we'll see how late the kids make it before we call it a night. In fact, we'll see how long Mommy and Daddy can make it before we call it a night! Hopefully Mommy can get in one more post on our blog before the new year with pictures from tonight's celebration...