The night I arrived, I got to visit with friends N & S and their boys J & R. R was the first to arrive home from the evening activities, and is a very happy and mellow 8-month-old. We played and he smiled at my silly accent. J is 3, and full of energy - he was very happy to see me (I think he maybe vaguely remembered me from my last visit?) and kept chatting and wanting me to lift him up in the air for crazy gymnastic jumps; apparently his favorite character is Sportacus from an Icelandic kids TV program called LazyTown. (I haven't yet seen it across the Atlantic, though how much Nickelodeon do I really watch?) We had a lovely baffy time (the two boys share a bath; R is extremely cute and smiley in his little bath seat while J madly plays with toys around his brother) and bed time, and then N's parents watched the boys while the three of us went out for a lovely kosher Indian dinner.
The next evening, I was so glad to be invited to visit with T & B and their son T, who had moved back to the UK nearly a year ago, having been good friends from Zachary's parenting class. T is several days older than Zachary, but of course has a completely different skill set and personality. He was happy and talky, and knows a bunch of animal and vehicle sounds. He also uses utensils a bit and kicks a football (an American one at that; B is a 49ers fan), and eats a fair number of fairly sophisticated/adventurous foods. We all had a really nice time, and then the adults had a wonderful dinner together, including a delicious British sticky banana pudding for dessert.The conference dominated the next few days, but my last night before leaving, I was back at N & S's home for a lovely family Friday night dinner, this time with S's parents (it's wonderful that both of the boys' sets of grandparents live so close by). J was absolutely adorable, helping to light the Sabbath candles and then leading all of us in rousing song after song -- he really does enjoy his Jewish traditions!
It was so good to catch up with our friends and their children, and I thank them all so much for their wonderful hospitality. I'm also looking forward to hopefully welcoming them back to Seattle soon!
While the trip was productive and it was lovely to catch up with our friends, I was still very happy to be back home yesterday afternoon. I arrived during Zachary's dinner time, and he had a giant smile on his face and seemed very happy to see me - though he was also sad to see his temporary nanny leave; we stood in front of the window and he waved as she walked to her car. So cute!
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