Gabriel's 1st Birthday Weekend

We all headed to St. Louis for the weekend to celebrate Gabriel's Birthday. It was great to have everyone together.

Stacey had a lot of activities planned to keep us all busy. Saturday was Gabriel's party. I do not have any pictures from the party since I was taking pictures for Stacey and Josh with their camera....so you will have to wait for them to post theirs' to see Gabriel putting his face in the cake!

Sunday we headed to Purina Farms and Meramec Caves. At Purina farms we also were able to catch a dog show, with diving dogs! And at Meramec Caverns we took a guided walking tour of the caves....Olivia fell asleep and we carried her the whole way (no strollers allowed) and Isaac loved it!

Monday we took the kids to the children services at temple and that night the Wallachs had us all over for dinner.

To see a few more pictures we took and some videos click here.

It was great seeing everyone and we are excited to be together again in Albany in December!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GABRIEL!!!

Gabriel's Birthday Weekend

It was great to see everyone in St. Louis this weekend for Gabriel's 1st Birthday. I think it will be a few days until I get a chance to edit the videos and upload our pictures. We had a great weekend and the kids have not stopped talking about it.

Make sure to check out the pictures from Cousin Jessica and Grandma Hillary in the lower right hand corner of the blog in the "Other "Lubin" related photo sites" section.

Cake and Candle Ceremony

Sunday morning the kids had breakfast in front of the TV...I took a few pictures...Later, Lita and Gus came over, we played some baseball in the yard then headed in for cake, followed by some "Madden NFL 2010" on the Wii (this was a present from Lita).

Gus and Isaac beat the computer 91 -0...it was quite impressive!

Here is the link to the the candle ceremony video...

David's Birthday

After taking me to dinner on Friday night, Miriam also planned quite a day for my Birthday on Saturday.

When I woke up the kids helped me open my presents. Then we got ready for the "Nature Hike/Adventure". We drove out to Kensington MetroPark. When we arrived we headed to the nature center. On the way, we saw a turtle hanging out in the pond, and a chipmunk almost hit us in the head with a few nuts!!

At the nature center, we learned a little bit about the wildlife in the park. Then we had a nice picnic lunch (with falafel Miriam and kids made that morning!) and some Pie from Lita!

After lunch, we headed out on our hike. From the trails, we were lucky enough to see quite a bit of wildlife ; birds, chipmunks, squirrels, spiders, an owl and two deer. After the hike we took the kids on a paddle boat since none of us had ever been on one. It was nice and relaxing and we even saw some swans. Of course, when we needed to get back to shore nobody really wanted to help me peddle back....
On the way home we stopped at Dairy Queen for some "Hot Eats and Cool Treats".

Check out the video and some more pictures from our adventure.

Stay tuned for the cake & candle ceremony tomorrow night.

Olivia Dancing with here Dancing Doll

Olivia decided she wanted to get dressed up like a princess and dance with her doll. She put on her tutu and necklace and began dancing. Miriam and Edith saw this called me upstairs and caught a little bit on video. Oli needs to work a little bit on her lead....she gives a new meaning to "break" dancing....as far as Isaac's train table is concerned.

Also note, in the background of the picture above you can notice the 2 newest members of our family (or their habitat at least) "Clip" and "Clap"....the hermit crabs we adopted.

Grandparents' Day

Today was Grandparents' day, so we took Lita to lunch. We all wish Grandpa Rick and Grandma Hillary could have been here as well but we will see them soon in St. Louis.

Of course, Lita let the kids choose where we went and they decided Max & Erma's(AKA: "Makes me nervous") so they could make there own sundaes! Our table was right in front of the bathtub so it was hard for them to stay focused on lunch, but Kraft Mac-n-Cheese (at 4 times the price) did the trick!

After dessert we walked around Rochester Village. We played in the small park for a while and then we happened to hear some live music so, we walked towards that. When we got there Miriam and the kids were in heaven! It was all your typical dance songs...the Macarena, the Chicken dance, the Hokey Pokey, Mambo #5....you get the idea. If not you can watch the 2nd video for a nice laugh..it is funny on quite a few different levels! It is a bit long, but I did my best to edit it down...

Here is the link for a few more pictures and the 2 videos.

Olivia Fell asleep in Isaac's Bed

Last night while Miriam and I were on date night, Lita was putting the kids to sleep and Olivia wanted to sleep in Isaac's bed with him. I snapped a picture with my phone before we put her in her crib.

U of M vs. Notre Dame Tailgating

Today we all drove out to Ann Arbor for the Michigan/Notre Dame game. We met Tony and Gus, who secured us a great spot....right near the Ameri-Cans (AKA: Porta Potties).

Gus cooked up hot dogs and bratwurst, per tradition, then we played some catch on the golf course. The kids really seemed to enjoy it. Unfortunately, we could not get enough tickets to all go to the game...which was too bad because it turned out to be quite a good one. Isaac and I did get to watch it once we got home though!

See some more pictures from this year here.




Also you can look at the last few years of tailgating below:
2005
The first time I took Isaac tailgating (9/10/2005). Jacob was there too...
2006
The last time Isaac and I talked about Notre Dame Game (9/16/2006 - maybe you will remember the video!!)
2007
Olivia's First time tailgating (9/01/2007).
2008
Isaac's First game last year(11/15/2008).

Isaac's 1st Dat at Pre-K

Isaac has been looking forward to Pre-K for a long time now and today was finally his first day. He was extremely excited to see his teachers and friends. Olivia was excited too, she can't wait to go to school (in January). Lita took her to pick out a lunchbox today so Miriam and I could take Isaac to School. On the way to school Isaac practiced his "funny faces" in the car.

When we go there, Isaac signed in himself! He went in to the classroom and we checked out the bunny, fish and hermit crabs (just like his!...but smaller). He also showed us the music, reading, art, construction, puppet, play dough areas....

See the video of the kids getting ready and a few more pictures here.

The Zoo, Bublewrap and Elefun

Friday Miriam took the kids to the Detroit Zoo and they saw the dinosaurs again. A few more pictures from the zoo here.
On Saturday, we had to run some errands. While I was inside Fedex shipping a few things the kids were outside dancing on bubble wrap.

Then later we went to Target where the kids both picked out Elefun. See the video here.