Christmas Morning

At exactly 6:30am on Christmas Day, I came bolting out of my room to see if Santa had visited us. Indeed he did make a stop in Brooklyn to place some presents under our tree and to stock our stuffings. He also managed to take a little cookie and milk break too. When Everett woke up, I showed him the evidence.

I guess we were good little boys this year because Santa brought everything on our list. Envelopes, Young Cam Jansen books and tracing paper for me and Jellyfishes for Everett. Plus a few other assorted items. Juno received a dragon and a triceratops - just what she asked for!

After we opened our presents, we packed up the car and headed down to New Jersey for Christmas #2 (or is it #3?) while Juno headed off for her own adventures.

And yes, I'm fully aware that we are about a week behind in blogging. 

P.S. Happy New Year!

A picture says a thousand words...

Or in this case, just four words: Otto. Whole. Pizza. Gone.

A Quiet Christmas Eve

After all the hoopla of Christmas cookie decorating, Christmas lunch and presents, we had a pretty mellow Christmas eve at home. We made our own pizzas and read some of our new books. Clearly there's a specific way that the Yu-Dawidowicz boys make their own pizzas.

Uncle James and I got to know each other and rubbed heads.

Then, it was time to prepare Santa's milks and cookies and carrots of his reindeer. We had a little bit of a debate as to whether we should leave the cookies and milk on the kitchen counter or on the dining table. We opted for the counter because we thought that it would be easier for him to get to the cookies without tripping. With all the excitement, it was hard to settle down to sleep!

Christmas Lunch and Presents

Part 2 of our Christmas tradition - Christmas lunch and presents!! Well, actually, it used to be Christmas dinner and presents when Mommy, Yee-Ma, Auntie Alison and Auntie Tracy were all living in NYC a long time ago. 

I guess things had to change when the little people came along. For the last couple of years, we've still managed to have Christmass dinner - out at a restaurant like Frankie's Spuntino or Blue Ribbon Brooklyn, ordering La Villa at home the last year and the year before, and even one time at Yee-Ma's house in Oakland!

This year, we switched it up again and decided to have Christmas lunch at Juventino - a local restaurant near home. It was delicious.

Then we rushed home to open gifts, even though it was way past naptime. We got so many great presents and dug into them right away.

And this was only the beginning of the present extravaganza...

Christmas Cookies and Cookies and Cookies

Sorry that it's taken us a few days to blog but some of you know that a certain cousin of ours has arrived in town and well, we've been busy to say the least. If you read Juno's blog, you know that we baked cookies at our house this year. It seems like every year, the cookie decorating is taken to another level.

Jasper helped Auntie Tracy make the frosting and then all the children - me, Jasper, Juno, Nazla and Lucas - helped color the frosting super bright colors.

Then it was time to get down to business and everyone took cookie decorating very very seriously. We all worked really hard this year and I think that we impressed the adults with our patience and concentration at the table.

What do you think of this year's collection. Yee-Ma decided on a fish theme for some of the cookies - just for me! And I think that we caught Jasper red-handed!

And now for the most important part - the taste test!! Yummy! Did you have Christmas cookies this year?

Everett and Jasper sightings

With all of our Christmas preparations now complete, all that's left is to keep looking out our window trying to spot Santa streaking through the sky with his reindeer. Speaking of which, there have apparently been a number of phantom sightings of Everett and Jasper lately as well.

For example, Dziadek was recently watching a YouTube music video by one of his former students in Poland who is now a singer (Dziadek used to be a Physics professor back in the day), and about half-way through the video, spotted this - 

That's right - Everett! As in, the City of Everett, Washington.

Then, not too long ago, Daddy was walking by Barclays Center in the evening when he spotted this -

Can't see what I'm talking about? Here's a close-up -

Yep, looks like the Manhattan College Jaspers will be playing a basketball game right down the street from us. Go Jaspers!

Then finally, as has happened before, Daddy spotted both of us on one of his current clients' website - can you believe that?

Whew, that's quite a few sightings. Now, where's Santa?!