We went outside!

 

Every kid (and nanny/mom) in the neighborhood turned out for the first warm day in months. It was absolute madness. Little kids, big kids, and over-protective moms, all climbing around the play space and dragging the slush in with them.

But Cora had great fun! She also looked super cute in her little coat, a gift from her birthday buddy (also born January 8th, although about 25 years earlier), Kathy.

My mom also gave me an awesome pocket-sized video recorder, so I looked just as nutty as the parents in the jungle gym, following Cora around and filming her attempts at climbing ladders and such.

I guess we both had fun.

Cora's First Birthday: Travel Theme

Why do people always say children grow fast? They don't! Cora's first year has been the longest year of my life, and she has seemed to grow remarkably slowly. I guess, though, looking back, time always seems to pass faster than when you're in the moment. No matter how quickly or slowly the year seems to have passed, however, every 365 days (roughly) demands a birthday party! And we delivered.

Cora's first birthday party was travel themed. Here was the invitation:

Now, I did not design these lovely invitations. Jennifer of Nounces on Etsy.com (plug: http://www.etsy.com/transaction/40790734) customized her design for me for a mere $15, then I could print as many as I wanted. Genius. I did have the paper cutter, corner rounder, and perforated-line cutter to add those realistic touches.

For decor, we had a map with pins showing all the places Cora had been this year, a sign saying, "Thank you for flying CM Airlines" with a bowl of peanut/pretzel baggies, and plastic cups with the CM Airlines logo, most of which was handled by my awesome sister, Darcy.

The big hit of it all was the cake made by Lauren, my talented sister-in-law, who flew in that night and stayed up till all hours of the night, finishing this masterpiece: a partial globe with a cute fondant airplane and a trailing streamer reading, "Happy Birthday Cora!"

For the remainder of the decorations, my wonderful mom handled flowers and balloons in the blue, pink, and green colors of the party. So, yes, team effort was the key word here! Cora conveniently woke up at 12:45 from her nap, almost as if she knew her cue. She was happy as a clam for nearly three hours of BBQ lunch, bubbles, candles, singing, cake-eating, and assisted present unwrapping. Cora made out like the baby bandit that she is with a plane full of toys and was proud of it.

Lastly, I did actually make the party favors, pocket-sized passport photo albums. The first page has her actual passport photo, and each of the rest of the pages has a picture of Cora traveling (in a carrier, baby bjorn, gift sack, rolling bag, cannon, backpack, etc.).

If you would like to DIY, here's the gist: I ordered these little passports from JoAnn's. (http://www.joann.com/joann/catalog/productdetail.jsp?CATID=cat2607&PRODID=prd27727)
Then, I picked out 13 photos, resized them in iPhoto (crop to iPhone 2x3 size), printed the photos out on sticker paper (available at Staples and such), and peeled and stuck! Well, it was pretty tricky to cut them all out and peel them all, so I got help from my very large family. We had a passport-making evening. 4-6 hours of work split up among 4-6 people worked very well. And now everyone has a pocket-sized photobook of Cora's travels.

Happy birthday, baby!

Hoboken

Yes, what a silly name for a city, but that's where we live, and it's better than our Northern neighbor, Weehawken. I thought ya'll might like a little info about our new city. (By the way, I'm having a very hard time not saying, "ya'll," but I'll have to stop because I'm getting pretty tired of repeating myself. One "ya'll" in a sentence and everyone acts like they didn't understand a thing I just said.)

Hoboken has about 40,000 people stuffed into one square mile, right across the Hudson River from Manhattan. The streets are fairly wide, room enough for four cars across, but most of the streets are one-way. So, there are two lanes of parking on the outsides, one lane of double-parking (which can be on either side and sometimes causes problems), and hopefully one lane is left open for moving cars. The major two-way street in town, Washington, can fit six lanes of cars, so each side has parking, double-parking, and hopefully some moving traffic.

Theoretically, Hoboken is easy to navigate. All streets are in a grid, and the numbered streets (1-14) run East-West. Unfortunately, all the one-ways and buildings that take up 2-3 blocks make it a bit of a maze. So, we've started to opt more and more for walking, but we'll see how long we hold out, since the winter weather will probably make the car increasingly tempting.

The first officially recorded game of baseball in US history was in Hoboken in 1846 between the New York Nine and the Knickerbocker Club. (Guys, seriously? You're just asking to get your pansy knickerbockers knocked off. I don't know who won, though.)

Frank Sinatra is from Hoboken, and every year, there is a sound-a-like competition in Sinatra Park.

Carlo's Bakery of the Cake Boss TV show is in Hoboken, and on the weekends, there's a line 2 blocks long to get into the tiny shop.

In the Northern part of town, I've even seen a warehouse full of giant plaster animals and vegetation, which I assume will either be part of the Macy's Day parade or a giant's lawn decoration collection. --In fact, I just looked up Hoboken in Wikipedia, and yes, Hoboken is home to the Macy's Day Parade Studio! Because why would Manhattan waste space on plaster sculptures bigger than a $800,000 condo? Send those things to New Jersey.--

As late as the 1960s, though, Hoboken was actually a cruddy industrial port with slum-like housing. In the 1970s, NJ built a new port in Newark and an Interstate that connected NJ to NY, bypassing Hoboken and leaving the little town obsolete. It wasn't really until the 1990s that NJ started to reclaim the waterfront, build open park spaces facing the NYC skyline, and encourage commercial real estate. Now, Hoboken is considered a "bedroom community" of Manhattan, since most of its residents sleep here but basically live in Manhattan. You can get to Manhattan by subway (called the PATH train), ferry, or bus in 25-45 minutes.

I will say that Hoboken is growing a bit of its own downtown entertainment, though. It has a cute main street, lined with small shops, Italian restaurants, and a few Starbucks. There are even a couple bars that do live music and such. And there is a brand new movie theater! Five screens, that's right.

I hope you all (ugh, takes too long to type) enjoyed getting to know more about Hoboken.