We are back! It was a long and jampacked weekend and we are all beat. But we had a great time – saw lots of family (Grandma Dina and Grandpa Ron, Aunt Darrah and Uncle-to-be Jason, Aunt Deb and Uncle Jonathan), met baby Benjamin for the first time, and spent a lot of time with not-baby-anymore Olivia. We celebrated Grandpa Ron’s birthday, Grandma Dina and Grandpa Ron’s anniversary, and Darrah and Jason’s engagement. M&A also: rode twice in a NYC taxi; ventured to Brooklyn for the first time; slept together in a king bed; and stayed up waaaayyyy too late. They also got to see their buddy Aliya today, which is always special for their moms.

I will upload some photos when I have a moment, but in the meantime, some memorable moments from the weekend:

• Olivia was fascinated by the girls and copied them all weekend. When they danced to the Nutcracker at Darrah and Jason’s, she danced too, doing some pirhouettes and jumps for the first time. She and M ran all over the hotel lobby this morning.  She wanted to eat whatever they were eating, and rejected whatever they rejected. If they took their shoes off, she took hers off. So cute.
• I told M&A that one of the great things about staying in a hotel is that when you go out for the day, some one comes and straightens up. M asked if we should say something to that person about how nice it was. So today, en route back to the room, we passed one of the housekeeping staff. I suggested that they go up and say thank you for cleaning the room. So they did! I am not sure if the woman spoke English or not, but she seemed to think it was cute.
• Today, we returned to our rooms, and decided to open the adjoining door between ours and Deb and Jonathan’s so the girls could all play freely. I told M that there was a special way to connect our room to Olivia’s. She said, "Is it magic?"
• Ok, this is one of those stories that M will kill me for later, but I have to share it. She made a whole bunch of little poops in the potty, and one was floating on the top of the water. M looked at it and said, "That one is the conductor, and the others are watching the ballet."

People often ask me if M&A have different personalities. This little anecdote sums them up pretty well… The girls had a very late lunch, so they weren’t very hungry before bed, but I wanted them to eat something. So I suggested that we have a tea party and invite some mice to eat cheese and crackers and lemonade, and then some gorillas to eat bananas. A got very excited, and asked whether I thought the mice and gorillas would actually come. M, from across the room, said, "No animals are going to come to our house tonight. It’s cold and dark outside and they aren’t going to come." A, however, first decided that if the animals didn’t show, we would leave them a message and then eat their food. Then she decided that the girls’ snow boots would be good stand-ins for the animals. So we set the table with the teacups and saucers, put out all the food (crackers with jelly and cheese, apple juice and sliced bananas), and she put the boots on the table facing us so that they could join in.

We had a lovely tea party.