(A brief view of the side of Mamie and Papie's house.)

We made it back to NYC. We're all quite fatigued from the jetlag, but incredibly content because we had an amazing time. It was so great to just hang out (and eat and drink plenty) with Papie, Mamie and tia Jaya, who we just don't see enough. I got to catch up with old friends, grandma Pat and David got to see more of the region, we visited Oma (mamie's mom) a few times and we had fun, as always, with the Jansen/Hillebrand family, visiting from the Netherlands.

It was the kind of end of year family and friends fest that Ruby deserves to have all the time. Towards the end she was happily being carted around by whoever and when David and I left her with her two grandmas so we could have lunch together she acted as if that was the most normal thing in the world.

I have pictures and videos (thanks Jaya!) galore and will post them over the next week or so.

In the meantime, enjoy this list of signs and words that we compiled while away (inspired by a posting about Jente). By the end of the vacation everyone around Ruby knew what her signs meant!

WORDS:
dada
mama
app (=apple)
nana (=banana)
no(n)
shoe
hot-chaud
bye
hi
ya (very rare, the default to any question is "non")
chat (=cat)
cheese (pronounced "cheeeeze")
ball
taxi (she's a city kid)
terci (=merci)
baby sign (seriously--when she wants to watch her dvds or whenever she sees something, like a digital camera, that looks like a tv)

SIGNS:
dog
cat
apple
cheese
cracker
like
cold (which she has confused with "outside")
baby
mama
hot
ball
please
thank you
brush teeth
book
coat
plane
eat
nurse
drink
water
shoe
all done
socks
car
more
train
sleep
frog
fish
boat
plane
bread
hurt