A long overdue blog

Hi everyone,

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

It's been ages since our last blog. This having 3 little boys lark is proving to be pretty time consuming and exhausting as well as obviously a complete joy. Leo's 6 months now and is sitting up, playing, swimming and being very very cute. Sam has started Kindergarton and is doing very well. Max is growing up fast. He's now 3 and has really embraced his role as a big brother. It's so lovely to see. We're used to Max being the little one and here he is looking after Leo.

We'll give you a summary of the last 6 months and then you can look at the photos. If you click on 'show info' on the slideshow, you can see a caption explaining the photo.

We've had loads of lovely visitors, I had my 40th birthday, we went to England, came back and had more lovely visitors, the boys have been growing up and Tom and I have been very tired. Poor Tom has been working extremely hard at work as well as doing all the home stuff.

After Leo was born, we were very lucky to have a stream of lovely visitors who came to help out. Rachel came for 3 weeks to look after the boys while I was in labour, then my Mum(Sybil) and Joe came and then Tom's Mum came and spent my birthday with us. Anna was in new york for that time as well. Then just before we came to England, my old colleagues Lynne and Brendan came for the night. It all seems like a bit of dream looking back but a very happy one. It was so nice having so many loved ones around as we were all getting used to having an extra family member and not much sleep.

My 40th birthday was lovely. Tom compiled a happy birthday video with little films from lots of people I love. I've watched it about 200 times. It's wonderful. Thanks ever so much to everyone who contributed to it. After watching my video and opening my presents, we played mini golf. I had a great day.

Photos of the summer, which you may have already seen, are here

We went to UK at the end of July. We had a fantastic time. It was great seeing people, although I wished it was for longer. It was prolonged by a couple of days, thanks to Tropical Storm Irene blowing its way through New York. It meant that Sam got the chance to spend his 5th birthday with his Granny, Grandad and Rachel, as well as having a birthday party with all his cousins a couple of days before. This made up for the fact that on his birthday most of his presents were the other side of the Atlantic! He got them a few days late when we finally got home, and then had a birthday party in New York with his friends. He managed to keep his birthday going for weeks!

Photos of our three weeks in England are here

Shortly after returning from Blighty, Doctor and Kim came to see us. It was really nice to see them and they were here for quite a historic event - the 10th anniversary of 9/11. Living a block away from the World Trade Center site means that a lot of our neighbours were extremely affected by 9/11. It obviously had a big effect on so many people and so it was an emotional time here. People were pleased that the memorial was opened and they now have somewhere to focus their grief. The security was like we've never experienced before - all the roads and pavements were closed and we weren't allowed out without proof of residence (which Doctor and Kim didn't have). There was also a warship parked outside our back garden. Never let it be said that New York don't take their policing seriously.

Sam started Kindergarten, which was a big step for him, as last year he was only at school in the afternoons. Now he's in proper school with lunch in the hall, playing in the playground and full days. He knew a few kids in his class from last year, but they split them up across the four classes, so he now has lots of new friends. There are 100 kids in his year at school and he seems to know them all! It took him a couple of weeks to settle in but now he loves it. His teacher Dahlia is really lovely and enthusiatic and they've been on four trips already, including to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which I helped on. It was lovely going on a school trip not as a teacher. We went on a proper yellow Simpsons type school bus - very exciting. The education system is a lot less academic here than in UK and I do wish that Sam was stretched more - but there's a big emphasis on community and respecting others which is more important. It would be great if they could do both though. Unfortunately he's starting to get a bit of an American accent, so it might be time to move on...!

Sam has also enjoyed his first season in the Downtown Soccer League and has been scoring goals for fun. The league is really well organised with over 100 kids in his age group. The play little five a side games, although sometime some of the kids are on the sidelines so it's 1v1, 2v2 or 3v3. Tom has been looking forward to this since Sam was born and is so proud seeing him run up the wing and put the ball in the back of the net. He has been coaching the kids alongside the professional coaches and has also played a couple of 11 a side coaches' games.

At the end of September we went to stay with for a weekend with our friends in Lancaster Pennsylvania. Daniel was in Sam's class last year and Lyn is friends with his mum Denise. They moved out of the city in the summer. It was really nice to see them and we had a lovely weekend in surburban America playing in the garden, having a barbeque and going to a theme park. Sam and Max enjoyed driving Daniel and Emma's little electric cars and both Lyn and I really enjoyed taking Sam on his first proper rollercoaster ride.

Photos of the first half of Autumn are here

Occupy Wall Street has been really interesting, especially as it was just up our street and Tom passed every day on the way to work. As far as I am aware, from talking to various people, New Yorkers don't really go in for mass protests, especially about anything American. From my perspective, New Yorkers seem far too positive, stoic and patriotic to ever complain. Also they all work so hard, I can't imagine they ever really have time. I think Occupy Wall St was a very positive step that normal New Yorkers were taking a stand. A lot of the protesters went to work every day and then came back to protest. The movement seemed very popular and teachers took kids there for school trips.

There was probably about 200 or so permanent protesters with their tents and banners and about 1000 police and several whirring police and media helicopters hovering above all day. It felt like a very peaceful community. My only real complaint was that there was such a myriad of issues being raised there was no single argument. I think that let the powers that be off the hook. The camp was eventually broken up by the police because of disruption to local residents. The only thing that disrupted us was being kept awake all night by police helicopters when they decided to evict them at 2am.

Leo is now seven months and is able to play with toys and entertain himself for a bit longer now, which is nice. He is a lovely little boy and adores his big brothers. If he could just start sleeping through the night we might be able to recover some of our sleep debt! Lyn and I are so tired at the moment that it's really hard to keep up with housework and everything else that needs doing (that's our excuse and we're sticking to it!)

Last Friday was Max's third birthday and we had a nice time. It was also family friday at Sam's school, so we got up, opened presents and then all went to Sam's classroom to be shown the fruits of their term long apple project. It's always great to go into Sam's school, which seems his own little world. Later his friend Liam came round and they had cupcakes. Lyn put candles in Max's and he freaked out - "Why did you give me the one that's on fire!" He then blew them out and felt like a heroic fireman saving us all. On Saturday Paul came round and we celebrated Max's birthday (and this time he was ready for the candles...) It's amazing to think he's now as old as Sam was when we moved here. He loves his presents, so a big thank you to those of you who sent things for him.

Photos of the second half of Autumn are here

Christmas is nearly here and we have two very excited boys. I'm really looking forward to 10 days off work and it's going to be really nice to just all be together. Sorry we didn't get around to Christmas cards this year. If you haven't already seen it we've sung you a Christmas message - the link's at the top of this blog. Also sorry that we haven't really been in touch with most of you during the last six months. Please look out for us on Skype over Christmas, it would be lovely to talk to you all.

As well as all the photos, we've also uploaded a few cute videos of the boys to youtube. They are all less than 30 seconds so won't take long to download:

Max blowing out his birthday candles last weekend

Sam and Max driving a Police Car

Leo playing peepo

Sam and Max rollerblading and scooting by the River Hudson

Max is Buzz Lightyear

Batman and Buzz at Halloween

Max loves techno and dances like his dad

Sam learnt to ride his bike on Governor's Island this year

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and lots of love from us all!

Tom, Lyn, Sam, Max and Leo xxxxx