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