~ LAST POST OF '08 ~

Just want to catch up on our last photos from '08, so I wanted to document that we ventured into the city the day after Christmas to the (American) Museum of Natural History. Not sure where we got the energy or how we got the kids to leave all of their presents behind, but we did!

Anthony has been studying rocks & minerals in his 5th grade class. He is such a great student (proud mom talking), but he really is! Whatever his class is learning about at the time, he gets really into it all. I think we all know more than we ever thought we would about rocks & minerals - thanks to Ant :)

The museum had an awesome display and we spent most of our time in this room (it helped that the room had steps covered in carpeting and Eddie & Mia had a ball climbing and crawling around - with daddy close behind) ~ I was able to walk around and read with my big guy about all these "rocks". I loved seeing his excitement and we were on a "mission" to find his birthstone - peridot.

Eddie (with Mia's butt beside him) taking a rest from climbing

Anthony found mommy's birthstone (amethyst) ~

some of these rocks were huge and just beautiful!

"I think it would fit on my finger or maybe a braclet!"

Very poor lighting,

but , this is Ed with Mia & Eddie on top of a piece of jade.

Mia's Chinese name "Yu" means jade :)

Happy he was able to climb up to this rock!

Happy boy, found his peridot!
We did many other exhibits ~ the dinosaurs being another favorite,

not sure what happened to those photos though?! Primates & "ancestors"

was interesting too ~ the boys thought they needed some underwear though :)

The kids are in front of this tree decorated entirely with

origami ornaments! It was just something to see!

*One funny part of our day was eating our lunch. We wanted to eat outside the museum, as the food would have most likely been taster; but we had such trouble finding parking that we decided to eat there. Mia must have been very hungry (I'll give her an excuse) because when she saw me balancing her pizza over her stroller she started having a tantrum...sliding out of her stroller and yelling - everyone was amazed and I guess had never seen a 2 yr old flip out - I was a sight and glared around for hubby and the boys...finally finding them and trying to find a seat together was tough. One of the employees came over and told us she had a place for us to sit.

We followed her out of the cafeteria, down the hall, around the bend ~ at this point I'm looking back at my husband with a smile, thinking "they are either kicking us out of the museum" or "they are finding us a spot out of every one's ear shot". After passing some garbage bins we were escorted into another cafeteria with a few people inside. There was plenty of space and once Mia was out of her stroller she was "performing" and dancing around the room to the delight of others - psycho or what?! She certainly keeps us on our toes!!

Next, I was finally able to get Eddie to pose for a picture with his missing teeth. He lost his first tooth a few days before Christmas (12/22/08) and was highly annoyed! He wouldn't open his mouth to show anyone (except me). It was honestly the strangest thing. . . He was even annoyed after the tooth fairy left him $10 for his first tooth! Two days ago he lost the tooth beside the other one - he was annoyed again - this tooth only collected $1 from the tooth fairy; which was a new thing for him to be annoyed about!!

Oh, he's lucky he's cute and charming when he wants to be. Sometimes I feel like I am living in a nut house!

Anyhow, Happy New Year to all my friends, relatives, neighbors, etc. I hope 2009 blesses us with continued health & happiness. It will be a very exciting year in our neighborhood, as two more cuties will be coming home to their forever families: Miss Paige and Mr. "Wen" !

Good-bye 2008 and Welcome 2009!

Be safe and have a wonderful night!