Dante's first year at Aaron school slideshow

Here's a slideshow that the teachers at Aaron School put together of Dante and his classmates 2013-2014 school year.
http://vimeo.com/98069957

Password is maple

Dante and his Boa

Dante was only a few months old when I shot this in my studio back in 2006. It's one of my favorites of him.

Augustus is potty trained!

Despite the evacuations of Sandy I have a new type of evacuation to tell everyone about.
After many false starts and failed attempts. Our little boy has entered a new phase of his life. I can only speak for myself, as one of the proud parents. Way to go!! (I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself).  I'd like to thank everyone who made this possible. I know you all must be pooped. We couldn't have done it without you. Thanks Grandma's, thanks Grandpa's. A big thank you to all the nieces and nephews who showed the way and led by example. Thank you's also go out to Huggies. We really would have had a much messier time without you. Thanks also to all the aunt's and uncles, your relative un-involvement made almost no difference but it was appreciated nonetheless. Thank you to the changing table for giving me a unique perspective on things for the last three years that is now all butt over. I for one look forward to wiping butt for the next few years from the bent over position rather than the reclining one. But I digress.
The biggest congratulations of all is due to our little soldier. Our  sweet, funny, charming, smart, friendly, adorable little boy, Augustus who has graduated to a new and exciting level of self awareness and independence that comes with being free of the diaper.  I am so proud of you for taking this step and for 'doing' it when you were ready and not before. Your mother and I whole heartedly congratulate you!! We love you with all our hearts!

Coney Island October 2012

On the Fire Island Ferry August

My house in June

April  2012 at Queens Farm

April 2012 at Children's Museum of Art

June 2012

June 2012 at Figment

June 2012

May 2012 at my house

May 2012 at Penn South
Much love.

Dante turns 6!

Wow, our boy celebrated his sixth birthday yesterday with friends from school and family at LES Dance Academy.

All the pix are here on Google + and Picasa

Augustus and Dante get famous! Photographed at American Museum of Natural History

I took the lads to a press day for the American Museum of Natural History's new exhibit called Spider's Alive and they were photographed climbing on a huge spider model by me for The New York Post. They also got their pictures taken by photographers from The Wall Street Journal,
The Star Ledger (article link here)  shot below is in the Ledger.

and another site called DNAinfo (link to article here) Where Dante was quoted ; Dante Allen-Segev, 6, who climbed onto the huge spider model at the exhibit, said his favorite spider was the notorious Black Widow, with a red spot on its stomach.

"I like them because they're cool," he exclaimed.

What da?

Augustus loves this phrase lately and he's gotten me saying it all the time. What da? What da? What da?
Yes, and SHUT THE FRONT DOOR!!! too.

Dante's first tooth falls out!

Another milestone reached yesterday as Dante's first tooth came out on it's own. It has been hanging in this mouth by a thread for the last week and every time I looked at it I wanted to yank that puppy but yesterday morning when we woke up Dante handed me that sucker and let me know the tooth fairy needed to be called. If you look closely you can see the little hanging tooth in Dante's mouth here.
Over the weekend the boys got a visit from Shalev and his brother Noam at the house in Fire Island.

Toddler Augustus stringing thoughts and ideas together

Augustus put together the most amazing sentence today. We were sitting on the couch and he said " I want you to get me a new Elmo bottle. I want to stay with Amanda while you go to the store and I’ll wait for you to come back".

This just completely floors me. He said this all in one thought. The concepts that he is showing an understanding of are not what you would expect from a 2. 5 year old. This shot is from our trip on the Roosevelt Tram back in March

Augustus singing ABC on Tape - LMFAO and Seal cruise this weekend.

This cracks me up, of course I 'may' be completely biased but I get such a kick listening to this.   https://rapidshare.com/files/1358664421/Augustus-sings_ABC.m4a
Amazes me that the little man can do this.  This was taped back in October 2011 so he was just 2 years two months here.

Pix below are from a Seal and bird watching cruise we went on over the weekend. We actually saw seals in the water right off the Verazanno Narrows Bridge. Turns out they spend the summer in the harbor here on a bunch of little islands in the bay.

 

Goooooaaaallll!!!!

Dante scoring a very nicely played Goal in soccer last week. He keeps at it, taking the ball from the goalie and then kicking it in with his right leg which is his opposite foot. It wasn't his first, in fact he scored two that day, but it was the first I ever got on tape.

Dante turns Five!!!

Wow, five amazing years. Dante turned five on Thursday October 6th this year. We had cupcakes and presents for his classmates at school and then a party for the lad afterwards at my house with some of his friends from the neighborhood and school. Here's a few pix and a gallery link.

Visiting a New York Farm with the boys

Last week, I took the boys three hours north to the Catskills to experience a working farm. As you can see from the pictures, the boys and I enjoyed ourselves. We milked cows, fed calves, played with kittens, bunnies, ducks, chickens, went on a hayride and through a corn maze and more. What a great experience!

Here's More PIX

Augustus one handed riding his scooter

The kid could barely walk a few months ago, now he's cruising the playground with one hand on the steering wheel of his scooter the other clutching a dump truck. Next up - texting and driving.

Dante starts Kindergarten

Dante's first week of Kindergarten is over. His teachers Clara and David are excellent and we couldn't be happier with EVCS and the environment in the school. He has been doing great and acclimating to the new classmates and class room perfectly. Here's some pix of Dante and Augie on the way to school last Thursday, Dante in the hallway and with his teacher Clara. The class has their own blog ; http://kindergartenevcs.blogspot.com/ as well.

Augustus First words

I've been terribly remiss with this list as it pertains to our adorable little Augie but here are some of the lad's latest. This weekend was big, he actually said 'why' for the first time. He's also starting to combine words so we are hearing things like help me and 'go mommy house'.
Sat Apr 2 knock knock, car, Dante asked me his first knock knock joke on the way back from car shopping.
Thu Jun 9 help
Thu Jun 16 how are you? I asked " Good" he said!
" out " when trying to get out the crib
Tue Jun 21 " open" yesterday he said "go, hold, light, house "
Fri Jun 24 "Diego" his favorite person these days
June 25 'Way' I had no idea what this meant for a while till it became clear that he was saying "Go this way"
July 1 'Milk' Baba used to be good enough for his bottle, now he's getting specific about what he wants in it.
July 8 'hot dog'
July 9 'Share', 'Digger' and the big one - 'Why' when we were telling him he had to let go of something
July 10 'Help me' when he was trying to get on the bed "Put" as he pointed when requesting that I place his soccer ball in his little stroller
July 13 'fast boat' slow boat' which is cool cause he is differentiating between how fast things are going

Dante graduates EVCS pre-K

Our little man is graduating Pre-K in a few days. Yesterday the whole school had a graduation ceremony and Dante got up with his class and teachers Georga and Kofi and another class and sang a song.

Thanksgiving through New Years, Washington, TX, London, Paris, Israel, NY, TX, NY.

We covered alot o' ground over the holidays. Some of the pix from the trip.

Thanksgiving through New Years 2010

Augustus's first music class

I think that by this age in Dante's life we had already completed two or three music classes. I guess it's the second child syndrome, but I'm determined that we put an end to the deprivation Augustus has had to undergo! Hence I took him to music class today which the munchkin seemed to enjoy a great deal. Wednesday we go to our first storytime!

Augustus playing Marimbas and Dante in DC

Augie showing some clear signs of early music talents. Notice how well he had started to walk at this point. Nov. 25, 2010

Augustus takes his first step!

This is for reals. His first one ever!! (As far as I know anyway) Well really his second, he had taken one just before this but I didn't have the camera out yet. This was on October 11, 2010. I love the way he is clapping for himself. I got so excited after he did it the first time that when I took out the camera he already knew he was doing something cool.