Tag: family
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A B’Not Mitzvah in St. Thomas
A close friend of our son’s held her bat mitzvah in St. Thomas (U.S. Virgin Islands) at the site of a historic Jewish synagogue first built in the late 1700s. Her younger sister was having her bat mitzvah at the same time (the plural of bat mitzvah being b’not mitzvah, which is pretty much the…
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Spring Break 2015 (London & Paris)
Our exchange student from China had never been to Europe, and so we decided to “sacrifice” our spring break and take her to London and Paris. We started off in London where it was sunny(!) and, if not exactly warm, warmer than in DC. We stayed at the Shangri-la in London, which is located at…
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Inn at Little Washington (December 2014)
Every year, Jim and I try and spend one night at the Inn at Little Washington sometime between Christmas and New Year as a way to relax and spend some time together. This year, we decided to bring the entire crew (the kids, our exchange student, and Jim’s mom) to spend the night there. (Gift…
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Christmas Dinner 2014
I often wonder whether our 13 year old son still believes in Santa Claus or not. It seems highly unlikely, especially given the precocious nature of his school. His sister is convinced it’s all a manipulative play, and she is probably correct. But it’s certainly fun to have a child who is still writing Santa…
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Merry Christmas!!
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Thanksgiving 2014
It was a festive Thanksgiving holiday for us. To begin with, it was the first Thanksgiving experience for Yinan, our exchange student. I don’t know if she was amused or appalled by the amount of food served, but she discovered that she loves mashed potatoes (or, as she calls them, “smashed potatoes”). We had 25…
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Best Buddies Miami 2014
In case you hadn’t noticed, fall is a busy time for us. 🙂 We traveled down to Miami for the Best Buddies gala, which was held on November 21. Best Buddies is a non-profit organization that helps developmentally disabled folks by providing them with friendships, jobs, and leadership training. We flew down on Friday morning.…
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Halloween 2014
Our 13 year old suffered childhood trauma (his words) upon being told he was too old to go trick-or-treating this year. And our Chinese was insufficient to explain the quintessentially American way of celebrating Halloween to our exchange student. (I’m not sure our English would have been sufficient, either—it is surprisingly difficult to give a…
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Disneyworld…the ultimate Americana experience
We now have a third child (a temporary one, before you all get too excited about the news). Yinan is an exchange student from Beijing going to our kids’ school, and she is staying with us for the school year. She is a lovely person, and my only concern about her is how she could…
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Chef Mavro (Honolulu)
We had one of our favorite meals when we were in Honolulu at Chef Mavro. This is the second excellent meal we’ve had there (Jim and I were there in February and had an amazing meal then as well, which is, of course, documented on the blog). We chose a modified summer menu, knowing that…