Christmas

In honor of Washington's Birthday, we'll post pictures from another holiday ... Christmas! Here are just a few lovely highlights from our bigger-than-life Texan Christmas.

Santa and Mrs. Claus drop in at the DeLuca's on Christmas Eve with presents and candy canes for all!

Bruno goes present diving.

Thelma and Louise on Christmas morning.

Djeda

For the last two weeks of Baka's visit, Djeda Pero came to join her. It was his first time meeting the girls, so you can imagine how happy he was!

He brought a fresh batch of goodies for Nina. A loved knitted outfit (made by her great-aunt), necklaces and bracelet. Some of those were probably supposed to be for Lola, but what are ya gonna do?

Djeda Pero also brought some of his children's workbooks, and Nina spent no time creating her own game out them.

He has also been putting Lola to work, dangling toys in front of her encouraging her to do her commando crawl across the floor. She is getting quite strong as she tries to drag her little body to get the toy and vigorously stuff it into her mouth.

Baka has been keeping our stomachs happy these several months, and Nina is eager to help out, stretching and cutting the dough for pita or mixing up the batter for palačinke.

Baka and Djeda leave tomorrow to spend some time up in Calgary with Stefan and Filip. We will miss them very much!

Baka

We are thrilled to have Baka Dragica visiting us for a while. She has already been busy getting our household in order, getting caught up on our laundry, cooking for us, and keeping the house neat and tidy. It is a wonderful help!

The language barrier is still a bit difficult for Nina although the situation is way better than when Baka visited a year and a half ago and Nina had a really hard time warming up to her. Nina now invites Baka to color with her and on car trips wants Baka to buckle her in her seat.

Lola, of course, loves more arms to hold her, and Baka speaks "goo" and "ugle" just fine.


We've been getting some nice use out of the baby gym. Turn on the lights and music and Lola smiles and squeals, pumping her little arms and legs.

Andrea & Lucia

We had a wonderful visit from Andrea and Lucia a couple of weeks ago. It is hard to believe that when we last saw Lucia when she was younger that Nina is now. She seems all grown up now!

I was pleasantly surprised at how nicely the two girls played together. Granted, they did get into an occasional spat - there was one memorable incident of breaking up a major tug-of-war over a small broom on the balcony. Oh, and the car! Those two could absolutely not sit next to each other nicely for even a short trip! ("She's touching me!") But the vast majority of the time they got along great, playing for very long stretches with minimal supervision. They marched around and around the house playing a lot of "Mommy (Lucia) dropping off Baby (Nina) at school".

Doctor and patient was also popular.

Not surprisingly, the girls mostly ignored little Lola. Nina was understandably much more interested in her new, more interactive playmate, and I think Lucia has been around babies enough lately to not be too impressed.

Lola did manage to get in on the pillow fort action.

We kept everyone busy with trips to Stanford campus, Ardenwood farm, the local park....

but left plenty of time for good ol'rough and tumbling around the house.

Lola was happy in the arms of her Auntie Andrea.

And we were all sad to see them go.

On the way home from the airport, I asked Nina if she enjoyed the trip and she said she "really, really, really, really, really, really [there were literally about 20 more really's] wanted them to come back!"

Grampa, Grampa, Grampa!

Grampa joined in the fun as well! Nina was very excited to have a new playmate (although he was summarily dismissed as a swing pusher when he wouldn't push her high enough!).

Luck of the Irish

More hands to hold me - Lola was game

Stroll on Stanford campus

More bath time fun

Grammie to the Rescue

Lola changes so quickly, it is tough to keep up with the pictures! . Here is a lovely one from a couple weeks ago...

Lola's 2 week portrait

Lola particularly reminds me of Nina when she is wearing one of her old outfits.

3 weeks, 1 day

Grammie arrived on the scene on Mar 6. Nina has enjoyed taking a break from school to spend time with her, and I have enjoyed a clean house, delicious food and good company. Yay for Grammie (or Gramina as Nina recently dubbed her)!

I think I see a resemblance!

Grammie!

Grammie was in town for a visit last week. Nina very much enjoyed skipping school and hanging out with her, but the highlight of the trip for me was Friday when I got to skip school and we all went to the beach!

Santa Cruz, where the water is warm enough that you can actually put your feet in without your toes falling off!

Surfer girl.

Highlight of Santa Cruz is the boardwalk with games, rides, and french fries.

Nina rode the helicopter all by herself. That is a first!

Wonderful visit!

Nina and Grammie spent a lot of time at the pool. On the last day of the visit, Nina figured out how to hold onto a noodle and kick her legs to swim around. Of course she wanted to do it "all by myself!". So now she is becoming an expert at motoring around like a half-drown rat while swallowing gallons of pool water. "Again, again!", she repeats.

Beach, of course

No visit from Grammie would be complete without a trip to the beach, no matter how cold the water is!

Grandparents

Grammie and Grandpa came for a visit last month for a fun-filled week. First up on the agenda was coloring Easter eggs! Nina was game for an Easter egg hunt the next morning.

And with just a little help managed to find them all! Eating them... not so interesting.

Easter lunch at our new favorite place in Los Altos.

Nina very much enjoyed spending the week at home with her grandparents. She definitely remembered Grammie from her visit last fall and won't let her out of her sight for the first several days. She was slightly more wary of Grandpa at first, but they bonded over a walk to Walgreens that possibly involved the purchase of a pink beany pig.

Grammie, are you feeding Nina chocolate for lunch??

A highlight of the week was Mirko's birthday, more specifically Mirko's birthday cake. We lit the candles a couple times and must of sang the birthday song 50 times. She loved it!

"Happy Birthday, Daddy!"

Les Trois Mousquetaires

Between the various cameras snapping away like mad for a week, we have some 800 pictures of various adventures with the cousins, Stanford campus, the farm, the zoo, the park, San Francisco. Of course, only a handful when they are all together, in focus, and with somebody looking vaguely in the direction of the camera.

Filip, Nina and Stefan.....already up to no good.

Lovely Auntie

Trip to the Stanford museum.

Nina's favorite statue, "Little Girl with the Broken Fingers"

Snack after a visit to the Lego store.

Quiet play.

Movie snacks!

"Cooollld!"

Somebody's ice cream was starting to melt.

Either our tolerance for chaos has massively increased or our guest were particularly well behaved because our house didn't seem quiet as crazy as one might have expected with 7 people in it for a week. Wonderful visit!

***

In other news, overheard just this morning:

"I am improvising my thingies"

"I am done with this activity. I want to do another activity"

huh?!