We have continued to have a busy and fun-filled week. Since I last posted on Tuesday, we have done the following:

• Day trip to Swarthmore to visit my friend Mary and her family. We had a long drive up and back, but we had a lot of fun once e were there. I hadn't seen Mary in a few years, so it was really a treat for me.
• Haircuts for the girls at a new salon yesterday, which went well. I got my eyebrows waxed there too, which the girls vow they will never do. They look very cute. The only reason we tried somewhere other than Paul is that his salon is threatening to charge the same price for kids as for adults – $80! No can do.
• Puppet show at Glen Echo of "The Nutcracker". It was very creative and cute. The girls seemed to like it a lot.
• New Year's Eve last night – we went to the Chevy Chase Club with some friends of ours who have a daughter who used to be a classmate of the girls. They had a lot of great activities for kids, plus a sundae bar! – and released a huge bag of balloons on the dance floor at 9 PM to welcome in the new year. The girls dressed up fancy and had a lot of fun with their friends.
• M made it to the real midnight last night. A fell asleep at 11:30 but M and I woke her up at midnight to see the ball drop, which it barely did.
• Dim sum brunch today with some friends.
• Grandma S babysat tonight so that Daddy and I could see a movie.

So… happy new year! The girls are excited about the new year – 2010. We also decided to launch the M and A 2010 Reading Challenge – reading every book on their bookshelves. We will try to keep track of the books that we read, and will put a sticker in them as we read them.

Today we spent a lot of time organizing and absorbing all the new gifts into the various places where we keep toys, etc.

I finally uploaded the rest of the pics from December – here are some of them:

A, Aliya and M at Brookside:

A, Aliya, M and Anil:

M & A at the aquarium:

A frigid game of Twister in Mary's background:

Many pictures with Mary, Rachel, Jack, me, M & A:

M dressed up last night:

The Campers:

Cutting a rug:

The girls celebrating: