Home sweet home

It was so nice to come back to a beautifully decorated home ready for Christmas, thanks to our friend Pati!

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The end is near

The end of our trips north are always the funnest -- after 4 hours through New York and another 4 through Pennsylvania, the passage through Maryland and West Virginia fly by at just a few minutes each and then WE'RE HERE!

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Walking the line in PA

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Jessie asleep...?

I think Jessie just fell asleep, about 10 miles into Pennsylvania. So now comes the dilemma -- take advantage of her sleeping to drive straight through (getting home around midnight), or get a hotel as planned and risk a repeat of the sleepless night we had last week on the way North...?

So far, we've had a nice trip, some lake effect snow in NY but otherwise nice weather and relatively content kids.

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Trip back home. Winter wonderland to come

Also sweet jessi picked a pack of cherrie tomatos as her snack at our first gas stop she is such a health nut. And will keep us all eating better
She only slept from kemptville to the boarder so not very long we shall see how we will make out hugs for now all of us
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Back in the U.S. of A.

And a cold, snowy U.S. of A. It is!

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Jessie and Tony

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Walking the line somewhere in PA

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First stop, Orchard Hills, MD

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Benihana

Any of you been to Benihana's before? It's a super japanese steakhouse where the food is prepared right in front of you, by chefs who make the food preparation a show. Our chef (somewhat unauthentically named Francisco) twirled knives through the air, flipped eggs into his hat, created shapes with the food, and ended up serving us a delicious three course meal in great style. The picture below is of our group, mostly made up of the technicians from my lab. They are the ones who actually came up with the idea, as a thank you to one of the other managers who has helped us through the big schedule crunch we're working through. If you have a Benihana near you, I highly recommend you go at least once.

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The many uses of dominos

It was so fun to watch Jessie discover dominos yesterday... the first thing she did with them was to pick one up and point it at the TV and push the "buttons" on it! What a 21st century girl! And a little while later we found her wandering around the kitchen holding it to her ear and "talking" in it. :-)
 
 

She's been under the weather the last several days with teething and (we discovered today) a double ear infection. And yet she's still such a smiler, as you can see in one of these photos. She wowed the doctor with her smiles this morning, the drive-through teller on the way home, the pharmacist where we got her antibiotics, and of course she continues to impress her parents at home. On top of that, she can't wait to wow her grandparents, cousins and uncle and aunt in just a few weeks!

Apple Butter time

It's Apple Butter time again at our friends, the Bakers, and this time they put on quite a show. They had booths set up for their organic farm business, Day Spring Farm, as well as booths for other businesses, a pumpkin carving contest, a petting zoo, and of course their traditional large copper kettle of apple butter. They had a good turnout too, and we all had a good time, Jordan playing soccer while Jessie got up close and personal with a goat and a calf.
 
 
 
 

iMac fun

We actually had to stop this prematurely, because Jessie started to cry whenever she looked at the pictures. Can't say I blame her...

Finger Pain

In the competition for most painful finger among the cousins, Jordan took home a silver medal this week with a solid performance in the garage door (thankfully failing to leave any of it there). It was certainly a painful event at the time, but it's also gaining him brownie points among his friends as he shows off the black, blue and green results.