"Bear Stays Up for Christmas"

Here are two of the stars of the newest Broadway hit "Bear Stays Up for Christmas" based on the Karma Wilson Book fo the same name. Benjamin was "Bear" and Leah was "Mole" (in case you couldn't really tell from her nose.

It was really great and thought you might enjoy a few shots of my little "animals" (I say that in the warmest way)!

Sir Benjamin Pierce

Benjamin has become very interested (some might even say obsessed) with Knights. He plays Daddy's "knight game" on the networked computers and has become very strategic in his game. When he wants to play, he says to dad in a whisper, (so that I can't hear him, of course): "Dad, wanna go play the N-I-T-E game?" Because of course, the silent [e] makes the [i] say its name. For Christmas, Santa brought him some model knights (and his cousins added very nicely to his collection). He sets up "gargantic" battles on his floor. He has manipulated the fact that they have weapons (most of you know the weapon rule in our house) into a sophisticated story about how they were made and which weapons were used in the colonial age. He can thoughtfully explain to you which country had the strongest army, why and who their allies were. What happened to my little boy?

Mama's Princess

Can you ever get too much dress-up time? Leah is filling most of her days dressing up like a princess and applying make-up (about as well as her mom does) while caring for her orphanage of baby dolls. She is still perfecting the art of walking in heels. But has figured out if, "I tan stay on the wugs for I not swip in my bid dirl shoes." If only being a woman was that simple!

Life is good!

A Beautiful Day for a Hike

Today we visited Cedars of Lebanon State Park for a family hike. It was a beautiful 63 degrees and partly sunny. We hiked about 1.5 miles through the woods (Leah rode most of that in her stroller as she instructed her daddy to run faster!)

Christmas morning

December 25, 2006
Santa sure does have a difficult job. Putting all those presents out ever so quietly and jumping up with every sound to be sure the children don't discover the big delivery at 2AM. There wasn't much sleep to be had at the Daniello's Christmas Eve (except by Rich). Its not easy bieng Santa.

A Day by the Shore (the Lake that is)

We spent the morning at Long Hunter State Park enjoying the unseasonablly warm Decemeber in Tennessee. We climbed on the rocks, searched for fossils in the rcks, tried out Benjamin's new metal detector (a gift from Auntie Jenn and Uncle Mark), and posed for some photos. Leah was not feeling so well, so she "cuddled" up on the rocks for a break.