Happy New Year!!

Hi everyone -- We hope you all enjoyed your holiday, and are having a great start to the new year! We've had a busy past few weeks, but we're all doing really well, and had wonderful holidays.

We spent Christmas Eve at my parent's house again this year. Alex and Hannah enjoyed opening their presents that Santa left at Nonna and Grandpa's house. The highlight of the evening was when Alex opened his Candyland DVD game that he really wanted. Hearing a 5 year old scream 'Oh Yeah!!' is just plain good fun! On the way home from Syracuse, Alex kept an eye on the sky looking for Rudolph's nose.....remember those days??

Christmas was great fun. We all woke up together and went downstairs at the same time. Alex and Hannah dug right in, and the unwrapping began!! Of course, with Hannah, we might as well have given her wrapping paper and empty boxes and she would have been happy! Alex enjoyed his new toys, games, and books, and even showed Hannah how to play with some of her new toys. We enjoyed a quiet day at home, and Darese and I are really thankful for everything we have.

Since Darese and I always have the week off between Christmas and New Year's, we got to spend a lot of time breaking in all of the new toys and games. The Candyland DVD is pretty much burned onto the TV and computer screens by now, and one can only take so much of 'Mr. Mint Says.' We had our neighbors over our house for New Year's Eve. The adults enjoyed a wonderful dinner with filet mignon and crab legs, while the kids feasted on mac and cheese and chicken nuggets. Everyone was happy!!

On New Year's Day, we went up to Syracuse to have dinner with my family, and to celebrate my mother's 60th birthday. Both her's and Hannah's birthdays are on January 3. We had a nice dinner on Hannah's birthday (her favorite....spaghetti), and she had her very own cake, which she rather enjoyed.

Alex has been doing well. It took a while to get back into the swing of things after being out of school for a week. He continues to be a good big brother, and is still enjoying his toys and games that he got from Christmas.

Of course, Hannah got to experience a lot of 'firsts' this year -- she had mom's cinnamon rolls on Christmas morning, and even tasted some of Nonna's cannolis. She did shy away from the squid salad, though....

Hannah's adoption announcement was in the Syracuse Post Standard on January 1. You can see the announcement here. Also, Cornell was interested in doing a story on our adoption journey for their faculty/staff newspaper. Because we were one of the first families to take advantage of Cornell's new Family Leave Policy, they asked to meet with us to learn a little more about Hannah and our journey to China. A writer and photographer met us at Cornell the day we had the party, and the article was published in the on-line news site on January 3, 2006 (ironically, Hannah's 1st birthday). The article came out great, and includes a few cute photos. You can see the article by clicking here.

We hope you all have a wonderful, prosperous new year!!

















Alex enjoying a good game of 'Grandma Nutt's Musical notes.'












Hannah loved her new purse she got for Christmas.



















Had to get a picture with her Santa hat on.....














Birthday girl digging in to her cake.
















Hannah got a new Princess chair for her birthday.