Better Late Then Never… Cape Cod 2011

As I’ve been reminded by more then a few of my family members, I usually get my Cape Cod  photos up right before Thanksgiving.  But as I was working on getting the images processed and uploaded I had a catastrophic hard drive failure.  Not only did I lose all of the work I had completed, but I thought I had lost over 3 years of files from my computer… including the photos of Camryn’s first 3 months.  I was devestated.

Luckily, after some forensic magic that would make the folks over at CSI a little jealous, we were able to restore many of my files.  The only problem is the data and details from the images were lost.  So I have tens of thousands of files I need to sort through, but at least I was able to get back these memories.

It’s going to take me a while to get the entire trip uploaded and sorted, but I was able to cherry pick some of the best pics of the bunch to help warm you up this winter.  Enjoy!

It’s Chanamas Time!

It’s Camryn’s first holiday season.  Delaney has told her all about it and she can’t wait.  It’s also a great excuse for Samantha to dress the girls up in all kinds of seasonal outfits.  It’s like having two American Girl dolls… but more expensive, if that’s possible.

Halloween Dreams 2011

Halloween was filled with firsts this year.  It was Camryn’s first time taking part in the festivities.  It was Laney’s first year not dressed as a Lady Bug.  And it was the first year that Bailey didn’t have to be medically sedated.

The weather was perfect as the little ghouls and goblins set out to collect as many calories as they could stuff in their bags.  Laney decided early on that she wanted to be a princess this year and thanks to Nana, she had the perfect Rapunzel dress and flowing locks.

Laney teamed up again with her partner in treats, Kaitlyn, and the neighborhood didn’t know what hit them.  No candy bar was left behind as the duo hit every house in a 2 block radius while Mommy and Camryn handed out candy at the house.

After inspecting her candy and sampling the take, Laney was already making plans for next year.

 

The Great Pumpkin Patch Adventure 2011

Last month, Laney and her friend Lia hit the local pumpkin farm to make their all important pumpkin selections for Halloween and take their first pony rides.

Editor’s Note: Sorry I haven’t posted any new photos lately.   Until a couple of days ago, I thought I had lost these and thousands of images forever after I had a catastrophic hard drive crash.  Luckily, thanks to a little bit of human sacrifice and some other things I rather not speak of, we were able to rescue them.  Enjoy!

Eat Yay! Love

Camryn is growing like a sprout and believe it or not, she just had her first meal that wasn’t attached to Sam.

She’s been getting very vocal at dinner when we all sit down to eat and she’s in her swing.  She doesn’t like the fact that she can’t be at the table with us, so even though I wasn’t ready, I brought up the high chair from the basement.  After that, it was only a matter of time before she wanted to eat with what we were eating.  (She doesn’t know that we don’t eat warm rice cereal, but she’s a baby and babies are easily fooled.)

So it was time for Camryn to try her first bowl of “real food” and just like every Schrager before her, she took to it like Schragers take to eating food.  It’s all down hill from here.

 

 

Easy Like Sunday Morning

How do you cap off a busy weekend filled with skating Disney Princesses and Break Fasting with the Tuckers, Barrons and Hughes?  Well, Sunday brunch with the Spieglers of course.

Ben, Ethan, Jason and Karen were kind and brave enough to invite us over to their house for bagels and and a shmear this Sunday and they didn’t even lose a bet.  We had a great time trying to forget about the Yankees and Phillies getting eliminated from the Playoffs as the kids had a great time tearing the place up.

We may never get invited back, but we’ve got some great pictures to remember them by.

View the whole gallery here on SmugMug.

 

The Schragers (and Giasis) Take Manhattan

Although we only spent 1 1/2 days in New York City, we packed 2 1/3 days worth of goodness into the trip.  To kick off the festivities, we were greeted at the hotel by our long-lost friends the Giasis who arrived just in time to help us avoid paying a bellman to lug our 3 tons of luggage to the hotel room.

After Lily, Lucy and Bill had a chance to meet Camryn and reacquaint themselves with Laney, we headed off to Central Park for an afternoon of adventure and horse poop. (Seriously.  There were horses everywhere.  You couldn’t throw a pretzel without hitting a horse.  It was like they hadn’t sprayed for horses in years.  You get the picture.)

First stop was the Central Park Zoo where the only thing more plentiful than horse poop was the delightful pleading of “… can we see more animals?” every time we stopped to see a new animal.  We saw everything from the more exotic seals, polar bears, snow leopards and monkeys to the native squirrels, pigeons and sewer rats.

But nothing seemed to excite the kids more than the penguins.  You should have seen Delaney’s joy as she pressed her face against the glass and stole her first look at an animal she had only read about in books.  As a majestic emperor penguin came gliding by gracefully, seemingly turning at just the right time so as to wave to use, Delaney pointed into the tank, looked up at me with her big blue eyes filled with wonderment and exclaimed with pride, “PENGUIN POOP!”

That’s my girl!

After Kristin joined us, we continued to the kid’s zoo where the girls could wreck havoc on smaller, more unprotected animals and climb on more dangerous objects before we all trekked for what seemed like 20 minutes across town to eat at the famous Serendipity.  Unfortunately the wait was over an hour and they didn’t allow strollers, so we had Italian food on the corner.

At the end of the day, we were all exhausted and ready to collapse… right after we went to Crumbs for cupcakes to replenish all of the calories we had walked off that day.

It was a great time for everyone and the perfect introduction to NYC for the girls.  Next stop… Yankee Stadium!

A Bronx Tale

It was an historic day in New York on Monday, Sept. 22, 2011.  Not just because it was the day that Mariano Rivera threw his 602nd save, becoming baseball’s best reliever of all-time, but it was also the day that the Schrager Family visited the new Yankee Stadium for the first time.

It was quite an experience for everyone involved.  From the long trek across Central Park to catch the only subway line running to the stadium that day, to Laney’s first Nathan’s corn dog and Carvel helmet treat,  to realizing we could be witnesses to history as Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” started blaring over the stadium speakers, it wan an exhausting and memorable adventure.

I hope Fenway Park is ready to provide an equally memorable experience when we take the girls there in the future.

 

 

(That’s Mariano Rivera over Laney’s shoulder!)

 

 

Pretty in Plaid

Laney woke up one morning and decided that she wanted to wear matching outfits with  Camryn.  Luckily she didn’t do the same for me and Sam.

Heeeeere Come The Gators!

The Schrager Family loves the Fall and not just because it means cooler weather is right around the corner, it means another year of Gator Football!   With the first game tomorrow, Laney was rocking her new Gator outfit and looking forward to a season full of W’s.

She has high hopes for the new coaching staff, but still has some concerns about whether the team will be able to adapt to the new pro-style offense quickly enough.  She really takes this stuff seriously.

Flashback:

– All For The Gators, Stand Up and Holler! (2010)

– Laney and the Gators Snack on LSU (2009)

– Laney Celebrates Her First Gator National Championship (2008-2009)

– Florida’s Chances of Winning the BCS Make Laney Drool (2008)

– Delaney Celebrates UF’s Win Over Miami Photo of the Day (2008)