Merry Christmas!

We had a Merry Christmas down in sunny, slightly drizzly Pasadena. On Christmas Eve after 8 hours of work, mom came home and cooked a mini traditional Ukrainian dinner of Cabbage rolls and stuffed zucchini after my gradnmother's recipes. After dinner the three of us cuddled on the couch and watched "Polar Express" for the first time. A very good Christmas eve pick I think.

Christmas day mom worked 4 hours in the morning, then dad and B picked her up and we headed home to a tree full of gifts. Broson received many fun presents but his favorite by far is a little wooden tractor with a harrow that can attach. He plays with it every waking moment of the day. He also received some "DDD's" which he ecstatically stacks and re-stacks (and watches), many books which he reads to his tractor, a "kitty keyboard" with microphone, a bike seat, and a digital camera.

That's right - digital camera. It's made by fisher price and it's kid-durable and waterproof and has big easy buttons. It can hold 500 pics at a time. B has taken over 200, and we've already had to replace the batteries twice...in 2 days. He's a picture machine. At the end of this post I have put a video of all the pictures he's taken over the last 2 days.

After Christmas naps and phone calls we had a dinner of home-made perogies and more cabbage rolls. Bronson loves mom's perogies, though he won't eat the ones we buy at Trader Joe's.

All in all, we had a nice Christmas. It was a little strange with no family but ourselves, but very enjoyable none-the-less.

The wall quilt is my Christmas project which I started back in October and finished December 21st.

Hope that everyone else had a merry christmas, enjoy Bronson' pictures.

We are the Christmas elves

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Our Christmas letter

For those of you who don't have days to peruse our blog, here is a short version of our lives in 2008 and how we are doing:

We started 2008 with a little 1 year old baby and now we have a 2 year old little man. Bronson has grown so much this past year: from a crib to a big boy bed, from barely walking to running and hopping, from gibberish to ... gibberish with the odd clear word thrown in to give us hope of someday having philosophical discussions with him. He's a big boy now, there's no doubt about that.

We've spent the year caring for Bronson on our own and plan to continue our routine through 2009 and beyond. I (Jenn) work 4 hours on weekday mornings at the faculty club hotel, the 'Athenaeum' on Caltech campus. Meanwhile Bronson and dad hang out together. Matthew often has teleconferences in the mornings which he is able to do while Bronson plays or watches one of his favorite movies: Totoro, Curious George, Wall-E or the "zoo" movie.
Two mornings a week Bronson and dad go to the Caltech Women's club Playgroup at the park (or Caltech gym when it rains). They both have a great time there, Bronson has many friends, it's a very international group so it is neat to see him interacting with kids from all over the world.
At noon Bronson and dad meet me outside of the Athenaeum and we do "the switch", Matthew heads to the office and I head home with Bronson for lunch and a nap.
Bronson and I spend the afternoons shopping or playing outside in the backyard with the other kids who live in our building.
In the evenings Matthew comes home for dinner (it's great living across the road from where we both work!) and helps me put Bronson to bed, then goes back to the office, or works from home in the evenings. I use that time to read, quilt or craft, as the mood strikes.
Weekends are family time and we often visit the LA Zoo, or huntington gardens, or plan some other special day out all together.

When we go to any astronomy party or even when we're just playing on campus, we often run in to Bronson's best friend Jesse! Jesse's dad is another astronomy grad (and his mom was too, but she just got her Ph.D and a real job this past year) and Jesse's dad and Bronson's dad work in the same group together. Jesse is 3 weeks younger than Bronson and they get along amazingly well. They both love trucks and chasing each other, so it's always a very active time, and we're sure to get a good nap out of them after they're done playing.

As for Matthew, he is working on two projects with the same advisor. One project; the 40m telescope, he works on with 2 other grad students, and the other; C-Bass, he is the only grad student at Caltech working on. He is really busy with meetings and work and travels often. He is also really enjoying what he's working on, so the business is mostly pleasant.
Both projects are radio astronomy projects and the actual telescopes for them are located 5 hours NE of Pasadena, in Owen's Valley. Bronson and I have accompanied Matthew on nearly every trip up to the telescopes and we love it up there. The valley is desert-like, located in the High Sierra's. The telescopes are near the small town of Big Pine, and the larger town of Bishop is 15 minutes away. Bishop is the rock climbing capital of North America and has alot of neat bakery's, cafes and sights. Most of their business is from tourism and there is a significant international feel to this small town community. It is alot colder up there than in SoCal, we can even happen upon snow up there, it's a world away from our regular life in Pasadena.

As for myself, I am 6 months pregnant, expecting the final component (a boy!) to our family in late March. I have been very happy this year, working part time and spending time with my boys is great. In the early part of the year I did alot of art, but during the pregnancy I am avoiding toxic paints and doing more crafty pursuits. Since September I have been taking a Jane Austen undergraduate course at Caltech, which I have enjoyed thoroughly. I also love my job, it gives me something to organize and keeps me sane, and I think I'm a real asset at work.

We've had many visitors this year and went up to Canada this summer for a month. We hope to have many visitors in the new year, after we get settled with the new baby :) and are hoping to visit Canada for Christmas next year.
As for this year, we will have a Christmas of just the 3 of us (and large kicking bump in my belly), the smallest Christmas gathering any of us have ever experienced, but since Matt and I will both work through the holidays, we'll need every spare moment we can get to relax. My big gift this year is a week at a resort in Newport Beach late in January where neither of us will work, we will just swim and relax and play, that's what I'm counting down to.

Best Wishes to all our friends and family,

Love Jenn, Matthew and Bronson

LA Department of water & power light display

Tonight after dinner we got ourselves some hot chocolate and headed out to the ZOO... where we parked and walked through the Department of Water and Power's Christmas light display along the road in Griffith Park. It was alot of fun, and so very SoCal. There were plenty of elves, etc, but I mostly just took pictures of the displays that made me giggle, enjoy.

Hollywood elves filming

Griffith Park Observatory display

That's a lady in a bikini and a shirtless guy playing volleyball.

Bronson's List.

Jennifer instructed me to post a Christmas list for Bronson.

I would like to emphasize a certain movie starring a certain robot...

Happy Friday!

Matthew

Jenn's Christmas list

Two can play at this game, Matthew!

OK here is the Amazon version so that duplicates are avoided: Jenn's list

1) Vacation in So Cal near a beach before baby #2 comes during which I get to relax (no sightseeing)
2) massage
3) pedicures
4) Cute Apron, something girly and frilly that my boys won't steal and mess up
5) Becoming Jane DVD
6) Jane Austen dvd's: 2008 version of Persuasion
2008 version of Sense & Sensibility
(these are available on Amazon)
7) Penelope DVD

Also, here is an image of the type of apron to which I am referrring

Matthew's Christmas List.

A few people have been asking me for a Christmas list, so here's one from Amazon. Some of the items are a bit expensive, but there's a load of books at the bottom, too.

Also, there are a few boardgames that I'd enjoy. I think the best prices are at a retailer called Thoughthammer, although I'm not sure how much they'll charge for shipping. Here are some the games I'd like:
Citadels (New Box Format)
Lost Cities
Pandemic

Jenn and I are also putting a list together for Bronson; I think we'll have it ready tomorrow.

Hope you all had a nice (American) Thanksgiving. We had some tofurkey.
Matthew

Happy Diwali!

Last Saturday after seeing Thomas in the morning, and napping in the afternoon we went to a Diwali celebration on campus in the evening. It was wonderful! We stayed until 9pm because Bronson was having so much fun - normally he's cranky and ready for bed at 6:30.

There was a yummy Indian buffet, a variety show with dancing and singing and lots of lights (Diwali is the festival of lights). Here you can see a coloured sand drawing made by our friend Swarnima.

(This photo courtesy of monx)

Here is a picture from the variety show, this is Radhika who is an amazing dancer, every year she does a solo performance in the most beautiful gowns. Bronson was very attentive during the whole show, but he especially liked watching her dance.
(This photo courtesy of monx)
Bronson's favorite part of the party was the dancing! The sticks are a part of traditional dandya dancing done on Diwali, but Bronson used them for every dance. He was a dancing machine!

Here is a really beautiful photo of B and daddy dancing, taken by a member of OASIS. (This photo courtesy of monx)

Bronson was totally starstruck when Radhika came and danced with him, he was captivated during her solo performance earlier during the show, and who could blame him, she's lovely!

Bronson made lots of friends during the course of the evening :)

Since the Stevenson's can't attend an event without getting tattooed, I got mehndi done on my hand. I've been scrubbing ever since to get it off, since I don't think they really appreciate it at the hotel :)
Here we are with Laura and Varun. When we got there, Bronson pointed across the courtyard and said "Varun!"
Here are Laura and Walter. They brought Bronson and I our outfits when they visited India earlier this year. Varun brought Matthew back his shirt. They also brought Bronson squeaky shoes that make a sound with every step. We took them out of hiding for the party.

I should mention that for the past week we have been well. On Friday Matthew had surgery on his wrist to have a cyst removed which was causing him mobility issues. Today he is hopped up on codeine and recovering. Unfortunately this means that neither of us should be picking up Bronson which is hard, but we are managing. Mostly I throw a toy to the top/bottom of the stairs and race him to get it. We will have a quiet weekend of recovery and videos and hopefully be back to our active selves next week, just in time for the Thanksgiving holiday.

A(nother) Day Out with Thomas

This summer we saw Thomas in Winnipeg, that's where Bronson's love of all things Thomas began. Well, Thomas continued to travel West (as did we, but we were alot quicker), and we were able to meet him again this morning in Perris, CA. That's right, we drove 90 minutes each way to do this all over again.

We did not tell Bronson where we were going, though he got some hints, like the conductors hat instead of his regular ball cap and the fact that mommy was humming the Thomas song all day.

He was very excited when we parked and joined a whole lot of other toddler boys in conductor caps and Thomas paraphenalia. When we arrived at the gate to buy tickets and he saw a Thomas billboard he started to grin and grin and grin!

First we played a little on the mini trains at the railway museum...

...then we met Sir Toppham hat.

Then it was time to get in line for the main event, a ride on Thomas!

I am very happy to be riding on Thomas!

Next we did all the other activities which were icing on the cake, a STRAW bale maze, playing on trains, Thomas tattoos, playing with Thomas toys and the petting zoo!

We've had a very fun morning. On the drive home we passed near one of the fires, it was smoky. We are fine where we are in Pasadena. The 210 freeway is closed further up, as is the 5, which would cut us off from any northern travels, but as we are not scheduled to go anywhere, that's ok for us.

OVRO working holiday

We were up at OVRO for the past 3 nights and had a wonderful time. We had 2 great dinners and Bronson and I had alot of fun visiting the park each day, and playing outside. It's autumn up there, so we threw leaves in the air and wore pants and long sleeves.

On the 2nd night we went out to dinner with all the grad students who were up there; Walter and Joey were up working with Matt, Laura was up working at CARMA, an array near OVRO and Swarnim and Shrihirsh are 1st years who wanted to visit OVRO, having never been before.

I forgot to bring the camera, but Matthew let me use his on the last day. It seemed to be broken, so I didn't get all the pics I wanted... and as I fiddled with it, Bronson lost his balance and fell head first in to the duck pond. A local called it his 'High Sierra baptism'.

So, that was that. Luckily we had a bag of clothes for Goodwill that hadn't gotten there yet, so B wore one of daddy's old shirts for the 20 minute ride home from the park.

I read 2 books in the evenings and absolutely loved the dinner we had at 'Whiskey Creek' our last night. I had artichoke canelloni and we split a 6 layer piece of chocolate cake for dessert. It was awesome.

We were going to visit CARMA on Sunday morning before driving home, but there was a snow storm and the road was closed, so we did not venture that way. There was no snow on the Sierra floor where we were, but CARMA is on a higher plateau in the mountains. Poor Laura was snowed in up there.

Also, here are a couple pics from Halloween that our friends sent us:

The Wednesday prior to Halloween, Matt and Bronson wanted to dress up for park day. I did not want B to ruin his costume, though, so we came up with a backup that was park appropriate - Matthew.

Here are a couple of 21 week belly pics that Matt just took of me. Baby is kicking like mad!