Last birthday in July

So our summers are crazy busy with birthdays. Crazy! But we all love getting together and celebrating every one of our family members. The last birthday of the month is my father-in-law's.

 

Yeah, I forgot that I had flash off from our trip to the aquarium that morning! Oops!

Sasha practiced writing numbers with grandma and grandpa

My mother-in-law forgot the "6" candle, so instead of 56, my father-in-law turned 5. Awesome!

August is a pretty tame month for us, but this September is going to be nuts! My sister's wedding, Sasha's birthday, our trip to Ireland! My aunt, uncle, cousin, and her husband are coming from Russia for the festivities, so it's going to be loads of fun.

Super awesome kids day!

I don't know if I've mentioned this before but Z's job is fantastic! Not only do they have a very close group (who get together outside of work to hang out all the time), but they also throw all sorts of wonderful parties. One year, their Winter party was at the Natural Museum of Science, how awesome is that?!? We've gone to Rye playland a couple of years ago with them. And let's not forget their beer-tasting and sake-tasting parties! Yesterday was "Kids Day" at Z's work and we had a blast!! There was face painting (for some, arm painting, but still exciting), sand art, cotton candy (the adults took part in this activity very eagerly), shows, and workshops (playtime with the actors from Paperbag Players).

Sasha's cousins Daniel and Jonathan were also there, and the kids had a wonderful time playing together! And  yes, I blurred out the last names on the name tags, I'm paranoid like that... I don't want random internet strangers to stalk us (provided people other than my parents and a few friends read this of course)

Happy birthday to my mom!

... who also doesn't always photograph well:

But then, sometimes does:

We went out to celebrate my mom's birthday last night and had a blast (and I even remembered to take my camera with me this time!) Happy birthday to the best mama ever!

Z's parents

 

Sasha likes to steal my shoes and then walk around the apartment making clicking noises

Silly girl!

Yesterday when my parents came over, Sasha was enjoying dancing and playing with them. Then suddenly she came up to me and asked for her "pink dress". So I handed it to her, she demanded that I leave so that she could put it on by herself. Then she proceeded to twirl around, dance and tip-toe like a ballerina. Everybody loved it.
After her nap, she put on her pretty princess dress again, pulled out her train set, asked me to put it together and spent nearly the entire evening playing with her Thomas train.

And made faces with her equally silly mama:

She kept asking me to see this picture over and over and was laughing hysterically!

She's not a 100% girly girl, nor is she a 100% tomboy.  Some days she's a tip-toeing, tutu-wearing ballerina and others she's a ball-throwing, soccer-playing, Thomas- and Woody-adoring little tomboy. And some days, she's both at the same time!

Happy birthday to my husband!!

... who apparently doesn't always photograph well!

But Sasha's face more than makes up for it, don't you think?

Yesterday, we celebrated Z's 27th birthday with our families. And I somehow forgot my camera, which never happens. I mean, I literally almost never forget my camera! Oh well, at least we have this shot from Z's parents camera!!

Two more July birthdays and then a little break before the next batch of festivities!

Happenings and cuteness

Yesterday, Sasha and I went to the movies to see Charlotte's Web - Sasha's first time in a movie theater, and she loved it (but somebody should've warned me how sad this movie was). And honestly, for a dollar, I wouldn't have cared if she needed to leave half-way through the movie, but she sat through the whole thing, asking me questions about what was going on. It was so much fun!!

And because last post was so long and picture-less, here's some recent cuteness of our girl:

 

Lots of birthdays are coming up in the next week (papa's on Friday, then my mom's a few days later, and then my father-in-law's the next day), so stay tuned for a ton of picture-filled posts. Summers are totally insane with birthdays for us!

Playing catch-up

I haven't posted since last Monday - bad bad blogger! But, to be perfectly honest, nothing much was going on really. Most of last week we spent at home since it was so bizarrely hot and disgusting outside. I did get to the city on Thursday for a lunch/coffee date/shopping with my good friend Inna, Z, and my sister, so that was nice. The weekend was pretty exciting though. We dropped Sasha off at my in-laws and went to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part II. When I say it was spectacular, that's an understatement!! It was so good, I seriously don't think I've ever cried and laughed and clapped so much watching a movie, ever! And granted, I haven't been a huge fan of the series from the beginning and only really got into it pretty recently, I think I blended in with the long-time fans pretty nicely. Sunday, we went to look at houses in NJ - which was fun, but so tiring.
Today, my braces came off!! Woohoo!! That's so exciting, though the process was not a very pleasant one, but at least, I'm done with them! Now I do have to see my dentist for a deep cleaning, so that's a pretty terrifying prospect, but I have no choice in the matter, sigh.
Tomorrow, I'm planning to take Sasha to the movies for the first time ever to see Charlotte's Web. There's a $1 summer movie program in a theater near us, so I figure even if she hates it, we can leave and it's not like we paid $19 for each ticket (and yeah, we paid $19 for each ticket for HP in Imax 3D - how ridiculous is that!)

Celeb-obsessed

If you know me, you know I'm a little bit celebrity-obsessed. I love the gossip, I love the dresses, I love all the drama. And I love Harry Potter. So it was only natural that I should attempt to brave the premiere in NYC today. It was completely insane and very disorganized, almost unbearably hot and crowded. I was close to leaving at a couple of different points throughout the day, but I stuck it out. And even though I didn't get lucky and get a wristband for the better spot, I had a great time!!

Matthew Lewis - Neville Longbottom

Tom Felton - Draco Malfoy

Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker

Alan Rickman - Professor Snape

Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley), Emma Watson (Hermione Granger), and Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter) were also in attendance, but disappeared rather quickly; and the sea of hands with cameras in front of me made it hard to take pictures. All in all, a fun, memorable, amazing day!
Edited to add: a girl I met that day just sent me the pictures from her camera, and she did manage to get Rupert Grint (love him!) and Emma Watson! Woohoo!

Finally back home!

Or as my sister put it "back to the civilization". There are no bugs or moths in our apartment. Our mattress is divinely comfortable. I can actually go places (in fact today, I went to the Harry Potter premiere in the city or, at least, attempted to, but more on that later).
Here's the remainder of our time in the Catskills though (because, no matter how much the bugs annoyed me and the horrible mattress was nearly impossible to sleep on, we really did enjoy our time there!)