With Aviva, Leo, Ellie, Jen, Tamir and Hadas!

This was a super fun day with my nieces and nephew. Jen invited me to join the kids at the Bounce House. Ellie wasn’t feeling well, so the early part of the day was with just Aviva and Leo. Later, we had pizza for lunch, then went to the park with Tamir and Ellie and played outside. It was a nice way to spend a chilly but sunny day in February!

Our day started at the Bounce House. They were doing some sort of bounce day in the dark. Even though the darkness wasn’t great for photography, it was a lot of fun.

Here we are playing and climbing:

Bounce!!!

Climb!!!

Slide!!!

Eventually, Aviva convinced me to climb inside the giant “spiderweb” with her. It was hard work! She’s such a great climber (she’s done this once or twice before) and she managed to coach me through it, by telling me where it was easiest to climb and also saying things like, “You can do it, aunt Hadas!” What a workout for me! It was actually really cute. Is it strange that a 5-year-old was coaching me through a climbing unit at the bounce house?

I finally reached the top where Aviva was waiting for me.

Our reward for climbing was a giant slide!

Back at home, it seemed Ellie was feeling a little better:

Then we were off to the park to do some more climbing!

I think this photo is funny. They look like two little spiders stuck to a wall.

Then we started taking photos of us jumping:

Back at home…

Jen with her crew:

Then a little piano practice before bed:

Stories, kisses and lights out! Thanks for playing with me today, I had a wonderful time with you guys!

Dan’s new funk band, the 9s, played at Triumph and a lot of people came out to see them, including some friends of ours. It was a fun show!

Newstudies is a KYW Newsradio program for high school students. They spend 6 Saturdays learning the news business and creating a news story. This particular week, we took the kids to our sister television station. Here are the pics from that fun day!

Jim Donovan chats with the students and answers their questions:

Television News Director Susan Schiller joins us in the studio:

This cocktail party was a taste of the Red Cross’s fundraising “Red Ball” coming in March! Erica met me there and we had a fun time catching up. Here are the pics:

Dan surprised me with some jewelry…

We had a nice meal together and spent time together; it was a lovely holiday with my husband!

Another Monday funday (my day off) playing with my nieces and nephews! I came over to hang out in the evening and so we spent our time playing hide-and-seek, games in the playroom, reading bedtime stories and chatting a little before bed. Aviva, Leo and Ellie are such sweet, fun kids! Here are the pics and videos from our casual hang-out day at home (Tamir and Jen’s home)…

Ah, sister love:

Hide and seek time!

More playing:

Ellie’s in a box!

Flipping tricks with aunt Hadas!

Finally, bedtime! Goodnight, sweet dreams kids!

See you next time!

Ellie turned 3 years old this month! Jen and Tamir hosted a cowgirl and cowboy themed party for her. A little coloring, a little cake and some 3-year-olds running around with Ellie, Aviva and Leo.

Dan and I had a great time… here are the bday pics and vids:

Aviva holds the hats that Ellie and her friends will be decorating!

Coloring and concentrating:

Ice cream decorating time!

Birthday cake time!

Isaac and Courtney stop in at the end:

Ellie opens the present that Dan and I made for her: personalized books!

Before Dan and I leave, Leo and I re-visit our famous flipping trick! (We haven’t done this in a while, but Leo’s still got it!)

Happy Birthday, Ellie!!!

It was so much fun to hang out with my friend Liz… I hadn’t seen her in a while.

We checked out a new restaurant in Bella Vista and spent time catching up. Here are the pics:

I love girls’ nights out!

For their last few hours in Philly, Melanie and Jeremy leave Manayunk and spend some time with me in Center City! Everyone cheer for Mondays off! Woo hoo!

I make it my personal mission to make sure Melanie eats a cheesesteak before she leaves. (I would force feed one to Jeremy, but he’s a vegetarian and that wouldn’t be very hospitable, now would it?)

So Melanie and I indulge:

We didn’t have too much time after that, so we went over to Reading Terminal Market for a quick look at how the indigenous Center City inhabitants live and shop:

All too soon it was time for J&M to head to the airport. :( Come back and visit us again soon!!! We had a great time with you guys!

Dan and Dave’s first cousin Jeremy and his wife Melanie have friends here in Philadelphia, so they came down from Boston to hang out.

Lucky for us, we got in a little family time with them too, which was pretty awesome.

So… I guess that means I have more cousin-in-laws now?

We all met up and then spent the afternoon at Dave and Mary’s house eating and playing with the kids, Jason and Allison.

Here’s a self portrait of us adults (As you can clearly see, I am the self portrait master!!!!):

Dan was telling me stories about sleep overs he and Dave used to have with Jeremy and his brother. So sweet.

Melanie and I were talking about where we fit in each other’s families. Since Dan and Dave are first cousins with Jeremy, that means when Melanie and I have kids, our kids will be second cousins.

(Melanie and I are both especially into the whole family tree thing since we’re both still newlyweds… Dan and I got married in July, and she and Jeremy got married in September.)

Anyway, we spent Superbowl Sunday morning catching up over some good junk food. (By the way, Melanie your chocolate covered peanut butter balls are… amaze-balls. Incredible. Send me that recipe, ok?)

Here are some fun family pics and videos:

Thanks for hosting us, Dave and Mary!

Afterwards, we hung out with Jeremy and Melanie’s friends for a bit when we dropped them off. We watched the first half of the the Superbowl together… in my opinion the best part of the Superbowl was the Madonna Halftime Show!

Happy Superbowl, thanks for visiting you guys, see you tomorrow in Center City!