Trying to Get a Smile

Sawyer took a long nap today, woke up to eat, and went back to sleep. When he finally woke for real I was sure he looked so much bigger! He is 6 weeks today, and I tried to capture his newfound alertness.

This Morning In Brooklyn

It was a lovely morning in Brooklyn. Just look!

Splash Pad!

I promised Sadie a "nature walk" this past weekend, so on Saturday morning Sadie and Jasper and I headed out to Prospect Park with Sadie in the jogging stroller.  First I got some exercise and ran around the park.  Then we went to the Long Meadow to give Jasper a little running around time. There we ran into Momo, Arash, Toshiro and their dog, Einstein. 

They liked the idea of a nature walk too so we all headed down towards dog beach.  

After a little doggie playtime at dog beach, we were off on a nature walk on the path through the foresty middle section of the park.  We saw a couple turtles sunning themselves on a rock in the pond, and we saw a waterfall and we saw a lot of trees.

After walking a while, I realized I was sort of leading the group towards LakeSide, the recently completed, wonderful recreational area on the other side of Prospect Park.  I told Arash and Momo about SplashPad and they wanted to see it, so we just kept walking.

When we got there, Sadie and Toshiro wasted no time taking their shoes off and wandering out onto the shallow, cool pad.

It wasn't long before Sadie wanted to do more than dip her toes.  I hadn't brought a bathing suit or towel, but that didn't stop her.  Her WonderWoman undies did the trick and I borrowed sunscreen from another friendly father I didn't know.  Sadie stuck her head under the fountains and ran around screaming and having a wonderful time.  Since it was only 10am, it was not yet crowded - perfect time to be there.

That's our friends Momo and Toshiro.

We had a great time and, since we had nowhere to be, we stayed until Sadie said she was ready to go.  
It's really nice when a full morning of fun evolves by itself.  Our daughter sure knows how to enjoy herself.

Handsome Guy

Look at this cutie! Sadie is being watched by her old teacher Olivia today, along with her and old buddies Keno and Arthur. I am catching up on some snuggling time with Mr. Sawyer. I think he is getting ready to smile.
We think his eyes might be fixing to stay blue-grey.

Sawyer: One Month

Happy one month (Sunday), Sawyer! He had his checkup today and he is up to 9 lbs 2oz.
He looks so different and is much more alert. He can follow objects with his eyes. He is perfect! Look at those froggy feet.

Sadie's Plea

The past several nights, Sadie has asked me to read her the story 'The Letter' from her anthology of Frog and Toad stories. Without going into too much detail, the story goes that Toad is sad because he never gets any letters, so his best friend, Frog, rushes home and writes him one and mails it (by giving it to a snail) and then comes back to Toads house and they sit on Toads porch and wait for it to arrive (4 days later). It is a very nice letter and Toad is happy.
Sadie would like to receive letters (or postcards) in the mail too. And, now that she can write her own name, she will be a diligent correspondent!
Hint. Hint.

Sawyer and Yumi!

Sawyer had his first baby playdate today with Yumi. They got along swimmingly. Thick as thieves they were.  (Sawyer is the one in white in case you couldn't tell.)

Sadie and Yumi

Sadie accompanied her mommy and brother to our friends Nancy and Michael's house today for a visit. In addition to a boy about Sadie's age, they have a new daughter, Yumi, just a few weeks older than Sawyer. Sadie got to hold Yumi and seemed very happy about it.  So, now that Sawyer is a month old, his immune system should be up to similar treatment from his loving sister.

Sleepy baby, sleepy parents

Sawyer is plumping up and he is heavenly.

Sleeping Beauty

Sawyer spends a lot of his time sleeping. Happily, he looks good doing it.

Happiness is Still Homemade!!

Sadie already had a family birthday party with her Uncle and Aunt and Cousins and Grandma followed by a school birthday party with her Summer Camp class.  But we still had to do her "friends" birthday party with some of her school friends.  But with a newborn and the impossible heat and our general exhaustion, we decided to keep Sadie's "friends" birthday party relatively small and homemade.

Anyway, that party was this morning and everyone just left and I am happy to say I think it was a roaring success.  So here goes...

I know folks might just want to hear about and see pictures of the kids, but V and I are pretty proud of all the stuff we put together for Sadie's birthday party so I'm going to start with that. 

First of all, I invented a new game which, for lack of a better name, I'm going to call "Color Rules".  It involves colorful belts and colorful ribbons attached to the belts with velcro.  There are no official rules.  I just thought the kids might like it.  It took way too long to make a belt and set of ribbons for each kid coming to the party, but I'm pretty excited about the idea.

Then, Victoria and I discussed having a game like "pin the tail on the donkey", but we didn't want anything competitive so we opted for "put the features on the face".  We decided to do it as a felt board with a big blank felt face and lots of felt features that can be stuck on.  We also discussed having a "cornhole" beanbag toss game.  I bought all the felt for the face game and found a bunch of my old shirts to make beanbags from, but we were still trying to figure out how to build the backdrop for the felt game with holes in it for the beanbag game, when, as we were walking home from Zooey's birthday party yesterday morning, we found a child-size painting/chalkboard easel on the street.  The Stoop Provides!  

The easel was perfect.  I cut holes in the chalkboard side for the beanbags and adhered felt to the other side.  Victoria set to work decorating it and making the facial features.  While I cut up old shirts and made a bunch of beanbags.

Here's the easel with the blank felt face shape stuck to the blue felt background.

And here are all the facial features Victoria made.

Those black areas are the holes I cut with black velvet hanging behind them. 

And these are the beanbags I made.

Even Sadie contributed with the designs on the gift baggies.  We love how it all came out!!  I suspect some of it is going to live in our living room for a while. 

Everyone showed up around 10:30.  Everyone is (Sadie's friends in all caps - parents and baby siblings in Initial Caps only): JACK, Jess, Dan, ARTHUR, Miles, Jamie, ZOEY, Baby Ollie, Matthew, Lena, GABRIEL, Baby Sophie, Bridget, Michael, DOC, Victoria, Jonathan and the Host of Honor, SADIE.

We had a lovely time and the kids seemed pretty uninterested in our preparations - they mostly just clustered around Sadie's train table while the adults gathered around the food and coffee in the kitchen.  There's a lesson about over-preparing in there somewhere, but I don't know what it is.

So here are some photos from Sadie's birthday party.  It was so unbearably hot and humid out that we kept it all indoors until the end when everyone was leaving.