Happy New Year!

What do you do for your first New Year's Eve living in New York City with 5 children under 10 years old? Why, you bundle everyone up and head down to Times Square, of course! Never mind the huge crowds, the temps in the teens (with a windchill factor near zero!) and the fact that the closest we could get was about 58th street...we still had to at least go check it out! We had no intentions of staying until midnight, but it was fun to brave the weather and the crowds, and the boys enjoyed yet another new experience in NYC!

This is as close as we could get. The two columns of bright light at the center of the photo are the huge TV screens in Times Square. We are a good 16 blocks away or so here.


Jenny, Joshua, and Jonathan...


Joseph studying the crowd...


Jeremy lifting Joshua up for a better view...

Before going back down into the subway station at Columbus Circle, we stopped to take a few pictures in front of the Time Warner Building.

Poor Jordan...his hat is so low on his face it looks like he can't even see! They were bundled up well!

Ahh, back where we should have been all along...watching the Dick Clark show on TV in the comfort of our own living room!

Even Josiah stayed awake for the festivities!

Is he adorable, or what?!?!

He's watching the TV intently...just waiting for the ball to drop! :)

After ringing in the New Year, we all gathered at the table (minus Jordan and Josiah, who were ready to sleep!) and had hot chocolate and toasted pumpkin bread. It seems a certain Mommy had promised some boys a snack while we were out, and of course promptly forgot about it when we got home and started watching the New Year's Eve show. I was insistently reminded as soon as the celebration was over that snacks and hot chocolate had been promised, so I had to follow through! I think all the boys finally got to bed around one a.m. Hopefully they will all sleep in this morning!

On a parting note, here are a few photos from the park earlier this afternoon. Now how many kids do you know that have snowball fights with THEMSELVES?? Well, I've got one. Joshua, when he couldn't get his brothers interested in throwing snowballs with him, decided a one-man fight was in order. And I took the pictures to prove it! May I present exhibit one, the snowball:

Now here we have exhibit two--said snowball being smacked into Joshua's face:

And finally, exhibit three--the snowy aftermath...with a big grin! :)

That's my silly boy!

I'm thinking I might post later (much later) today about some New Year's resolutions, one of which might be to keep up with this blog better! But I'm not making any promises...;)