Holiday in NY

Some belated photos of our very memorable Christmas holiday and vacation in New York.

Our three munchkins looking so grown up...

We left on Dec. 26 for our 8-day holiday.
First stop: Bovina, chez Vera, Cristina and Kiki. Maisie was clearly a big hit with all the kids.
It was a somewhat snowless first morning, so we had to abandon the sleds.


Basti still enthusiastic about walking.

Ilo dusting off after some muddy play by the lake.



After all that hard work we came home to feast on Uncle Kiki's delicious stuffed cabbage.

After a couple of days we moved to our own little rented cottage in Phoenicia. Fortunately, Vera and her parents came to see us the very next day, so we didn't have to say goodbye right away.

By that time we had also gotten lots of snow. Poor Adrienn - it's not easy being the eldest...

Thankfully there were lots of hills and mountains all around, so there were plenty of opportunities for downhill sledding as well.

On the way to NYC we stopped by Bard College to visit the Gehry-designed Performing Arts Centre.

Once we arrived in NYC we had just a few hours to prepare for the New Year's celebration. The girls (and Basti too) were busy cutting streamers and making origami balls to decorate the apartment.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

First day of sightseeing. One of the first places we visited was the Columbia campus. Evidently the most exciting thing about this campus was the ramp in front of the main library, which the kids ran down about 50 times before being dragged away by their parents who were eager to see the rest of the city.
Since we had only managed to leave the house by around 1:30 pm or so, it didn't take long for night to arrive. The kids were dazzled by the lights everywhere.

Adri and Hama in Times Square.

And one for our Jewish friends...

An encore performance of S'Vivon at Kiki and Cristina's (which Ilona performed on solo violin at the daycare's "Festival of Lights").




The lyrics:

S'vivon, sov sov sov. Chanukah hu hag tov. Chanukah hu hag tov, S'vivon, sov sov sov! Chag simcha hu la-am, Neis gadol hayah sham. Neis gadol hayah sham, Chag simcha hu la-am.

Dreidel, spin, spin, spin Chanukah it is a good holiday Chanukah it is a good holiday Dreidel, spin, spin, spin A happy holiday for our people A great miracle happened there A great miracle happened there A happy holiday for our people

Silent Night

The best part about Christmas for Basti was singing his favorite song - Silent Night. He loves this song so much that he even sang it at Adrienn's choir concert, causing the audience to turn around and look at him instead of the choir...He was happy enough to perform it again, as long as he got to see the video afterwards...

Recital - Ilo

Fall

Last week we had a small window of opportunity to go out and take in some fall colors (yesterday the wind and rain blew most of the foliage away :( )



Our tree-hugging girls.



Thankfully, after the trees lost their foliage, there was still Hallowe'en to brighten up our spirits.
Ilona carving pumpkins with her classmakes in kindergarten.


Ms. Hicks the teacher getting everyone calmed down after all the excitement over the pumpkins.

For the Hallowe'en parade at school, Ilo was radiant as Tinkerbell.


Basti showed up as a ferocious lion.


Apparently the only person he managed to scare in his costume was himself, and he refused to get back into his scary costume on Hallowe'en night. For going out trick-or-treating he ended up wearing a white bunny costume instead. But this little bunny could not be persuaded to eat any carrots...

Croatian holiday

We took a holiday from our holiday in Budapest, driving 7 1/2 hours to the stunning Dalmatian coast, where everything was blue (sea and sky), white (light, rocks), and brown (our tans!). We spent the first part of our vacation in a farmhouse near Sibenik, about 50 km north of Split.

The entrance to our farmhouse. Not pictured: the chickens, goats and sheep that ran around just outside our gate.

We shared the garden with a family of turtles, to the great delight of Adrienn, who likes nothing better than to catch and photograph little animals.

Practicing was fun with the great acoustics in the big farmhouse. We didn't bring Basti's violin along, so he (and cica-meow) just stood next to Adrienn to give moral support.


Boat excursion on small motorboat, exploring nearby islands from the island of Murter.

Ilo's Condé Nast photo.

Basti smiling after a long nap on the cruise to Kornati islands.


Ilo still napping away...Thank goodness for papa-pillow.


They day we left our kind hosts surprised us with a wonderful fish lunch and plentiful wine (which made it rather hard to leave)


But we did manage to leave in the end and decided to visit Sibenik. We climbed the hill to visit the fortress, and the view was well worth the effort!

(the other side of the view; photo by Adrienn)

In the 0ld square in Sibenik Basti tried to have a conversation with a little Croatian girl who couldn't understand a word he said. He was feeling a bit shy so he brought his big sister along.


One of many, many ice cream stops.



Part II of our trip was at the Makarska riviera, where our local beach turned out to be not only clean and beautiful but also filled with the most spectacular fish we had ever seen in Croatia.


Adri's ready to chase after some fish.

Enjoying the view from our balcony.

Adrienn was happy to spend her birthday by the Adriatic, having been named after it.

And she was thrilled to find, in the bottom of her present bag, two different kinds of Croatian liver pâté (her all-time favorite food).

Halmuni and Harabuji came to visit...

...And we spent a day at Webster's Falls, one of our favorite daytrip destinations.

Bast-Ilo digging around with some make-shift sand toys.


Adrienn was more into creepy-crawly things than dirt, and took good care of her new caterpillar friend, who was provided with free transport and a new apartment decorated with flowers.

Harabuji-style babysitting.

Halmuni was stationed by the river to keep Basti from jumping in. He usually needs at least two or three grown-ups to keep him out of trouble....

Unless he is safely perched on papa's shoulders!