ML&V Take a Christmas Tree Photo

Tonight, after a day of festivities and the Community Meeting, we took round 2 of the kids picture in front of the tree. After all, the picture we took earlier in the week was incomplete. It only had 2 kids, so we needed to initiate Valentina and take another picture with all 3 kids present.

But first....a little gum brushing. What's great about it is it looks like a banana and she can hold it and gum it all by herself. Sooo cute!

Ok now for the photo. The kids wanted a montage - this one is silly faces

Strike A Pose !

And traditional..nice

Mateo & Lucia Perform at the Community Meeting

Today we were the proud parents of two kids who were set to perform in the community meeting at their school. Lucia was chosen to represent the Kindergarten class on stage for a sing-a-long and Mateo was going to do a reprisal of the Kuumba performance with his 3rd grade classmates. The results were a bit of a mixed bag.

Lucia was so excited about performing and even picked out a special dress to wear, but when she got up on stage she froze and almost had a meltdown. She wanted to get off, but we convinced her to face her fears and at least stay up on stage, even if she wasn't going to perform...well she stayed up there stoically...and didn't say a peep. Check out her performance in the link below.

Lucia's performance?

Mateo Performs his Kuumba Dance again

Mateo says his part of the homage to Mandela

And the finale!

I am so proud of both of them. Lucia for getting up on that stage even though she was terrified and Mateo for doing such a great job after weeks and weeks of practice.

MLV Have a Christmas Exchange with LAM & Decorate the Tree

Like what happens every year around this time, today Mateo, Lucia and now Baby V celebrated an early Christmas with Navita, Lucas, Alma and Milla. They also got a Christmas tree...yah!

The kids first did a gift exchange in the morning with Navita

Later in the afternoon, Mateo and Lucas did an exhange

Mateo scored a Lego set

And Lucas got a Madden game for XBox

Lucia and Milla also got to unwrapping their gifts...

...where Lucia scored a Marker making set

Milla got a baking set

And Alma got a closet for her Barbie collection

In the evening, the kids were really excited to decorate the tree

And as usual, the annual kids pic in front of the tree

And they insisted on doing one shot where they "strike a pose"

Lucia Celebrates Amelia's 6th Birthday

Today Lucia attended Amelia's 6th Birthday party at Diamond Gymnastics. I can tell from all of the festivities that this is going to be a popular birthday place for the young kids in Hoboken.

Here is the birthday girl, Amelia, doing a form of table top

And our little gymnast Lucia...she runs

...she jumps and does a somersault! 

And Alma was there too to show off her moves

Lucia and the rest of Amelia's friends wait for the big birthday surprise

The birthday star gets harnessed and pulled high up into the air (much to the envy of my daughter who has now decided this is where her birthday will be)

Amelia's birthday guests

Amelia's mom and my friend and coworker, Benat, shares a snuggle with little V

Happy Birthday to the birthday girl and her family

Mateo's Landform Project

Today I went to Mateo and Lucia's school to look at the team project Mateo has been working on for weeks with his partner Sienna. Their class assignments were to research different continents and landforms and create a 3 dimensional model and Power Point presentation.

Proud partners Mateo and Sienna did a great job on their North America landforms 

Valentina is 6 Months

Today Little Miss V got to the halfway mark. She is now eating solids, sitting up for the most part and really showing us a little more of who she is.

This is the epitome of her personality...a smirky 6 month old

Mateo's Kuumba Day

At Mateo's & Lucia's progressive school, there are a lot of occasions that are anticipated and celebrated. One of the more special times is a performance that takes place during the students' third grade year...Kuumba. For the first 3 months of school the students learn an African dance and practice weekly until the day of their performance. It is a proud and touching right-of-passage .

Lucia enjoyed some of the Kuumba day activities - here she is decorating a homemade African drum

Final results look pretty good

Mateo and some other 3rd graders doing the cake walk up on stage

Later - a little face painting

And some Chileando Sunglasses that we used in the photo booth

Before the real performance, Mateo warmed up and practiced some dance moves by playing Dance Revolution

Later Lucia designed a bean tile

Valentina waited patiently until the performance began

There's our boy....waaaay in the back

This is a snipet of the actual performance

Kuumba rock star Mateo with his very proud sister

Another Kuumba initiate, Kasper, also did a good job

I think Kuumba warmed up their dance legs

Check out these moves