First Day of School!

Last week was the first day of school for both Tristan and William. Tristan is returning for the 3's program, and William has taken over Tristan's classroom from last year. Both boys are very excited about the new school year.





Tristan has grown a lot since last year's pictures...

Upgraded

There is a blog worm going around...so I had to risk upgrading the system today. Looks like it worked. If you have any problems, let me know ASAP.

Tom

Development Alert: William's First Sentence

His mother and others will insist that he has pulled together 3+ word sentences prior to this, so this may just be his first documented sentence. His mother will also be appauled by the topic, but dad thinks it is adorable.

This morning while playing with Wall-e and Ev-a, daddy was making coffee, with the news on in the background. We have been having some trouble with the TV (a bad connector has the screen go green and fuzzy every once in a while). This morning is happened again and a concerned William noted "Daddy, TV no work".

Old Barney

Today's adventure (and blustery weather) took us to Barnegat Light at the northern tip of Long Beach Island. This year, the lighthouse is 150 years old...and was relight on January 1, 2009, after years of retirement.



Since it was a nasty day, we had to wait quite some time to get into the lighthouse, but after about 45 minutes on line, we were able to start the ascent...



William lasted about 10 of the 217 steps to the top of the light. Jennifer had a hard time making it to the top...due to a bad issue with heights...but braved onward for the sake of the boys.



Apparently, the boys do not share mommy's fear of heights (she is probably queezy just looking at this picture).

NightSabers

On his trip to Busch Gardens, Uncle Skull bought the boys light sabers. They have gotten significant use...so much so, that they are on their second set of batteries.





The sabers have seen some water action as well (down at the beach), so they are a little flakey at this point. Dad may have to do some work with a solder iron when he gets home.

Rain Day

We woke up to torrential downpours this morning. We thought to ourselves..."thank goodness we brought all these videos" for the kids. The sentence wasn't out of our collective mouths when the power went out.

Luckily, Andrew had prepared for this and had collected the supplied for a seaside art project. Initially, the kids enjoyed the project...glueing shells to posterboard, drawing beach scenes...and the occasional ocean front nuclear power plant. But the novelty wore off pretty quickly ("they have the attention span of a three year old!")



With this plan shot, Jennifer quickly reviewed the local vacation brochures (they still have these on paper? Thank goodness they were not only online) and discovered our next plan...the Aquarium in Atlantic City.

Upon arrival at the aquarium, we discovered that many other people had the same idea.



None the less, the kids had a blast. Here Tristan checks out a Moray Eel. ("There something alive in here!")



Tristan and Rory discover a sea urchin in the aquatic "petting" zoo.



William and Jamie had a good time, as well.



...and then again at the Borgota after lunch

SuperKids

Friends Annelise and Andrew brought some gifts for the boys when they arrived...matching PJs for everyone!



The next morning, with sun glistening in their golden hair, our hero's survey the world around them.