President Obama!

We were on the National Mall today for President Obama's swearing-in ceremony. It was a crazy day with lots of walking (even though we live within a mile of the Capitol, it took almost 3 hours to walk to our vantage point and 2 hours to walk home after!) and detours and crowds (estimates are up to 2 million), but totally worth it to be there for this historic moment. The crowd was very mellow and polite (and incredibly excited when Obama made his appearance), and it was very moving to be there with so many African Americans who had been waiting for this for such a long time. Here are some pics of all the chaos - we were nowhere near close enough to have pics of the actual ceremony, but the news outlets will have plenty of that anyway.

At the We Are One Inauguration Concert

We walked down to the Mall today to check out the Inauguration preparation and also to take in the "We Are One" inauguration concert. It was freezing outside, but we were so glad we were there to be a part of the excitement. We were about halfway down the Reflecting Pool from the Lincoln Memorial, and had a pretty good line of sight to the concert.
There were lots of odd things happening as well, such as a group of Guantanamo Bay detainee impersonators, and various protesters, but all in all it was a very friendly crowd and the security was very good. We're heading back down Tuesday for the Inauguration.

Moving Day

Happy new year! We moved into our new place this weekend and are very busy settling in. Big thanks go out to Andrew, Tamara, Craig, and Scott for getting out of bed early on a Saturday morning to help us out! Here are some pics of the moving crew and of our cats getting settled - check out Pibb figuring out stairs for the first time and Isabella enjoying the enormous and sunny bedroom window from a radiator perch. Stay tuned for more pics once we get settled.

Christmas #4

Kevin, Erin, Avery, and Ewan arrived from the Soo on Saturday, and we had one more Christmas celebration on Monday with the whole clan. It was a fun day, capped off by a ridiculously fun couple of hours playing Guitar Hero, World Tour!

Family Christmas & Baby Shower

We had Christmas #3 on Sunday, when we got together for a huge family celebration with all of Robyn's aunts, uncles, and cousins. It was great to see everyone again! After the family celebration, there was a baby shower for our new little one - thanks to all for the wonderful gifts and wishes. We now have quite the library for baby! (Oh, and if anyone has pics from the shower, please please please email them to me!)

Boxing Day

For Boxing Day, we did a little shopping with Robyn's mom, Jason, Alex and Hailey, and then had a superb lunch at South Street Burger Co, where we had poutine for all our American friends who think it sounds disgusting (okay, and for ourselves too, since it's so DELICIOUS!). We were bummed that we didn't have the camera to take pics, but trust us that the french fry-gravy-cheese combo is divine! After lunch, we headed back to Jason and Alex's place, where we spent the rest of the day. Check out these pics of Hailey in her new jumpy castle. It was hilariously fun, despite the fact that she insists upon listening to "I Like to Move It" from Madagascar over and over again while she bounces.

Christmas!

We headed up to Canada to celebrate the holidays and had a fabulous time! For the first few days, we had a great visit with James's parents, and were able to visit with many of our old St. Catharines friends. We spent Christmas morning with James's parents, and stuffed ourselves with a delectable breakfast smorgasbord. Then we headed to Robyn's parents' place for the rest of the day, where we opened presents with Mom & Dad and Jason, Alex, and Hailey and had a scrumptious turkey dinner. Here are a couple of pics (no, those are not our cats - James's parents have two that are reasonable facsimiles of Pibb and Isabella, though).