Special Friend Day

Elina had her Grandparents/Special Friend Day this week. Since Ah-Gong and Ah-Ma are in Taiwan at the moment, J was next in line. Elina also wanted J's friend, JH, to attend the special day, too.

For Special Friend Day the kids show off the things in their classroom and then the teachers have a craft set up for each child and their special people to do together. Then they all go eat lunch in the Big Room (kind of our cafeteria).


Elina, J, and JH used markers, gems and other things to decorate a wooden block together. The teachers took a picture of each child with his/her special friends, printed out the picture and clipped it onto the block. It's really quite cute. It's also neat because the picture can be switched out.

Unfortunately, there were a lot of special friends at the school that day. So many that there were no available seats in the Big Room for Elina, J, and JH. They had to sit outside in the cold for a portion of their meal. The other downer was that I made yummy cranberry almond brownies for the event and there were none left for Elina, J, and JH to try. So sad.

Even though it was a crowded event, Elina was still happy to have her special friends with her!

Changing It Up on My 35th Birthday

This week I celebrated my 35th birthday. I decided that I would change up my hair this year. I mean, I'm 35 and have been wearing my hair in a ponytail every day for about 10 years now...maybe even longer. I've been wearing a ponytail for so long that I have a permanent crease in my hair. I wanted to get the Brazilian Keratin treatment done on my hair so that I would want to wear my hair down more often. This treatment makes your hair look like you used a hair iron all the time...it looks smoother and less frizzy, and feels lighter. Even though I have straight Asian hair, it can still look a little frizzy...and that ponytail crease is hard to get out with a hair iron. Anyway, I found out that since I'm still nursing Evie I can't get this treatment done. So now I have to wait until April or so when I wean her. Oh well. For the time being, I still decided to change up my hair. I got 6 inches cut off, got some layers, and decided to start wearing my hair to the side. The haircut is cute and now that my hair is shorter and thinner, I'm more inclined to wear it down. That's definitely one of my New Year's Resolutions--to fight the urge to put my hair up in a ponytail all the time. So far it's been working. Since I've gotten the haircut I've been good about leaving it down for at least 1/3 of the day. And that ponytail crease has been easy to iron out if I need to put my hair down.

Besides my exciting haircut, I also took a few hours over the weekend to do a little shopping by myself. Then we had a big dinner with some friends at Red Robin so that I could claim my free birthday burger. Gotta love Red Robin!

On my actual birthday B took me out to breakfast with Eli and Evie. I can't possibly have a special day without eating my favorite meal of the day! I also managed to squeeze in a birthday nap on the couch...heaven! Elina and J also bought me a Birthday Princess pin to wear for the day (just in case you're wondering what that tacky thing is on my shirt).
Then B and the kids baked and decorated a cake for me. It was scary watching the kids pour on the colored sugars and sprinkles, but they had so much fun doing it. They were definitely proud of their work! (And the cake tasted yummy, too!)
I got lots of wonderful gifts...definitely a lot of kitchen-related stuff, which I love. Besides that, I also got a label maker, an enzyme exfoliator, and an iPad (thanks, Mom and Dad). Not too shabby, right?

For dinner, B took me to a nice restaurant called Roaring Fork. The portions were humongous and totally delicious. We had a great time eating and talking...and not sharing our food with little mouths. In the picture we are holding up our yummy dessert--a pineapple upside down cornmeal cake. I was skeptical at first, but it was great.

These days our birthdays are definitely not as exciting as the kids', but it's still a fun, relaxing time. It's a nice reason to eat an excessive amount of yummy food, get dressed up, be pampered, and feel loved and special all day.

A Half Birthday with Some Planets

This year Elina's half birthday celebration at school landed on the same day as her planet presentation. Her half birthday always seems busy at school...last year she had their annual Snow Day on her half birthday. Lots of fun things seem to happen around her half birthday.

Elina's class has been studying Outer Space and each student had to present a planet to the class. The planet Elina randomly picked out of a hat was Earth. She had really wanted Saturn because the rings are so pretty, but she was pretty satisfied with Planet Earth.

We had to do some research together and fill out a fact sheet as well as decorate a poster board cutout of Earth. It was fun figuring out creative ways to decorate Earth. In the end, we decided on cotton for the poles and for the clouds. For the green part of the land Elina used green gems and for the dry or mountainous areas she used orange gems. Underneath it all, Elina painted the planet itself with 2 different shades of blue. It turned out pretty well, don't you think? It was awfully sparkly...just what Elina wanted!

At home, we had gone over a few interesting facts about the Earth, but Elina seemed to freeze up when she got in front of the class. I can't blame her...I'm a horrible public speaker and I used to be SO quiet whenever I presented anything. I would rock from left to right on my feet, look away from the audience, and whisper my presentation to the class. It helped that Elina's teacher asked the questions off of the fact sheet and all Elina had to do was answer the questions. It didn't help that the kids in her class were extra rowdy that day. I've been to class many times and this was the first time I had seen them that worked up. They would answer for Elina and she would just nod her head in agreement with what they said. We were still so proud of her hard work in decorating her Earth and in researching her planet.

Here is Elina quietly (really quietly) answering the fact sheet questions...(hint: you might have to turn up the volume to even barely hear her responses)--


Later that day, we celebrated Elina's half birthday at snack time. I made strawberry cupcakes (because Elina wanted something pink) with lemony buttercream frosting...DELICIOUS! (S, it was too bad you missed this one!) I placed the cupcakes on Elina's table so that it said "1/2" and everyone sang "Happy Birthday" to Elina. She was in heaven! Eli was also really happy to be able to join in the festivities!


At the end of the song, the teachers sang, "And many more..." Later that day, Elina asked J what they were saying because she had never heard that part.

J: The teachers were singing, "And many more..."
E: Many more? Many more what? Cupcakes?
J: No, they wish for you to have many more birthdays.
E: Why?
J: You know, it's like they're wishing you luck...so that you can have more birthdays to come.
E: Oh, in case I die?
J: Sure, Elina....

Is our little girl morbid and serious or what?? I thought it was funny, but weird at the same time. Oh, Elina.

We hope you had a happy 1/2 birthday!

Evie's On the Move

Evie is officially on the move. Not only is she mobile, but she's quick. Uh-oh.
This is what she was doing about 10 days ago...it was still slow-going...


Now she is quick. In this next video, it didn't take her long to figure out that my mug wasn't for her. She kept crawling towards it and I kept moving it away. You can tell she's definitely mastered that military low-crawl--


Go, Evie, go! (Just don't go too far and too fast...just slow enough so that we can stop you from getting hurt...yeah, that's all.)

A Yummy Visit

We just had a wonderful visit with Auntie S from New York. The weather didn't cooperate as much as we would've liked, but we still had a great time. It wasn't nearly as cold as NY, but it was cold and yucky for San Antonio (temperatures in the 40s-50s and cloudy and drizzly). Auntie S was sad she didn't bust out her sunglasses once during her entire stay. We were sad we couldn't take S to the Wildlife Safari and to some outdoor eateries. In the end though, we still managed to give our guest a relaxing, delicious, and fun long weekend.

First off, S is all about food, so this visit was centered on restaurants. Prior to her visit, S requested that there be delicious Mexican food and BBQ. So we took her to La Gloria (a new find for us) and to La Fonda for Mexican. La Gloria serves "Mexican street food" and it is absolutely yummy! It's definitely lighter than Tex-Mex and there are so many different things to choose from. On our 1st visit (that's right, we went more than once during S's stay because it was THAT good), we got the grilled fish taquitos, a pork torta, and beef served sizzling in a molcajete (the Mexican version of a mortar and pestle). Everything was great...the fish perfectly cooked, the pork was crispy but moist, and the beef was so tender. (I'm drooling right now as I type this.) The 2nd time we got beef and pork taquitos and ceviche. Again, yummy! Can't wait to go back!Besides the Mexican food, we got Rudy's BBQ takeout one night and we had a delicious brunch at Auden's Kitchen on another day. Then one night S just simply ate chocolate chip cookies (that we had all made together) for dinner.
Besides all the eating we did, we also went to storytime (for Eli), bowling, and B's workplace to check out the impressive campus. We also baked some delicious Test Kitchen chocolate chip cookies. S is really great with kids and she spent a lot of time playing with the kids at the house. They loved reading books and doing puzzles with her. S must've done Eli's dinosaur puzzle at least 20 times during her stay. At least S now knows a bunch of dinosaur names. But, in all honesty, the kids' all-time favorite game with Auntie S was "Stinky Feet." The kids were peeking in on S under her door and they saw her feet, so they started saying, "Stinky feet!" (Recently, they've developed a thing for "stinky" anything...stinky feet, stinky socks, stinky shoes...everything's always stinky for some reason.) Then when S came out of her room, she started chasing them and the kids started shouting that Stinky Feet was going to get them...and that's how the whole game began. So for the rest of the weekend, they would ask S to play Stinky Feet and S was a great sport about it and always complied. It got to the point where Eli would finish a meal, rip off his bib, and say, "It's stinky time!" It was awesome!

Here are the kids just making silly faces and sounds with S...I love how Eli always wants to copy whatever Elina does.


At night when the kids were in bed, we stayed up playing board games and Wii. It was lots of fun to play Guesstures, Scattergories, and Taboo!

When we dropped off S at the airport, the kids got SO sad. Honestly, I've never seen them like this. Eli just kept saying in a soft, whiny voice, "I want to play puzzles with you." When I got back in the car after saying my goodbyes, Elina had tears in her eyes! She said, "We're so sad that Auntie S has to go." I told her, "I'm sad, too. She's one of my best friends." And Eli sadly piped in, "No, it my friend." Awwwww.

S's visit reminded me that the thing I miss most these days is having a close friend nearby. I'm lucky that J is temporarily living with us for the time being, or else I would be somewhat lonely (or I'd have to work harder at developing better, local friendships). Since KT and KL have moved away I haven't really been able to find another friend my age who I can just call up with random questions or comments. I talked to S about this a few days after she left and we agreed that this is just what happens as you get older. I guess I'm getting older then...

We miss you lots, S! We had so much fun and we hope you can come back soon!

Snow Day!

Elina's school had their annual Snow Day where they bring in a big pile of ice for the kids to play in. This year, the weather was actually freezing when they brought the "snow" to school. The night before the ice was delivered, it was below 30 here. That's cold for us!! J and I didn't even want to go to Snow Day, but we wanted to take Eli and we wanted to take pictures, so we had no choice.

Last year Eli wouldn't climb up onto the snow hill. He just stayed at the edge and dug around. This year he had a blast. I think it helped that his favorite Christmas movie and song right now is "Frosty the Snowman." He loved the whole experience....especially the hot cocoa at the end!This year they even had a bubble machine that would blow foamy bubbles resembling snow. Elina and Eli were in heaven. It was so cute to watch them play in the "snow."

Here Eli is trying to put a carrot nose on Frosty--


In this video Eli just got "snow" on his face and he's in shock--

This is Elina shoveling the snow--

What a fun and chilly day!

Evie is 9 Months!

Evie is 9 months old now. I can hardly believe it.

Here are her current stats--
weight: 14 pounds 14 ounces (less than 5th percentile)
height: 25 3/4 inches (5th percentile)
head: 17 inches (25th percentile)

We went to the pediatrician's office today and now suddenly, Evie can do all sorts of different things. It's weird that babies do that. While you're in the doctor's office, the doctor asks you if your baby can do this and that and I'll say, "She doesn't really do that yet." Then when we get home, the baby starts to do everything the doctor asked me about earlier. I remember Eli used to do this to me all the time.

One HUGE thing that Evie started doing today was babbling. It's different from cooing because cooing is just making sounds, but babbling is actually producing syllables with sounds (you know, "mamama," "dadada," "bababa"). After we got home she was "talking" up a storm. Her favorite is "vavava." It's so weird to hear her talk like that...it's like she's officially become a real baby or something. What's funny was when we tried to videotape it on the camera. When we had the camera on, she wouldn't say anything. Then when we clicked it off, the camera would make a "beep" sound and then she would start babbling right away. She did this a few times, so we decided to test the theory. We videotaped her, but then we just made the "beep" sound without really stopping the recording...and 'lo and behold, she started babbling...that's the ONLY way we could manage to videotape this thing! Can you believe that?? So that's why you'll hear us all saying "beep" in the following video--



She can pick up small pieces of soft table food (like bananas) and feed herself. This is another thing she didn't do before we visited the peds office today. What gives?? Speaking of eating, Evie has this "cold" face that is one of our favorite faces. After she has the first bite of yogurt, she always makes this face because it tastes so cold. In this video, she is really sick and congested, so that's why she looks so tired...poor girl!



Evie can also wave "hi" and "bye" now--properly. When Elina and Eli learned to wave, they would wave to themselves because that's how they saw the wave...the hand was always facing their own faces. So we thought it was pretty weird that Evie learned to wave the right way. Sometimes she waves her arm up and down with her hand in a fist or with her pointer finger and thumb touching. It looks like an angry wave or a politician gesture. It used to be hard to get her to wave, but now she does it often.



Evie has 2 of her bottom teeth. Those little things are jagged! They make her look so grown up! (FYI, Eli actually took this close-up picture of Evie...pretty good, right??)

Evie loves crinkly paper. She loves the sound. She loves to tear it up. She loves to play in it. And, of course, she loves to eat it.


Evie is a great jumper! She jumps so high in the jumperoo. With Elina and Eli we would have to help them jump and they never really went that crazy. Evie really takes her jumping seriously. She loves to jump!



Evie loves to play with the sensory tub, just like Eli and Elina. Who doesn't love dried macaroni pasta that is a potential choking hazard?? (But seriously, we only let her play with it while we watch her closely.)

Evie can pull herself to standing and she stands for long periods of time playing.

She loves to be held, but she's also becoming a squirmy little girl. She would skydive out of our arms if we let her.

She can travel great distances by using a combination of rolling and scooting on her belly. It's amazing how far she can go. She's definitely trying to crawl though...getting up on her knees and rocking.



Our little baby is growing up so quickly!

A Sick, But Happy New Year

New Years was less than exciting this year....mostly because I got sick AGAIN! But this time it was totally Ah-Gong and Ah-Ma's fault. They have a tendency to make us all stay up late until 1am or so to play mah-jong with them. Then when it comes to waking up with the kids early the next morning, B and I are on our own. It's sad, but true. The grandparents don't wake up until 10am and we're up around 7am with the kids. Usually this isn't too bad, but Evie got sick right after Christmas, so she wasn't sleeping well and waking up extra early around 5am. I had 3 nights of that combination and my sore throat came back...along with everything else. So I had to go through all this again. It wasn't full on bronchitis this time, but it was still awful.

New Years Eve was when I felt the worst, but I still had to go on with the festivities. During the day we introduced Wii Party to the kids and they loved it. It really is a fun game. At night, I didn't do as much (for instance, we got dinner from Sea Island--who doesn't love fried seafood??), but we still did our fondue and sparkling cider. I wanted to do more to make it more fun for the kids, but I didn't have the energy. It was sad because I didn't even eat much of the fondue because I practically couldn't taste anything. But at least the kids had a blast.

Here are some cute fondue faces--
The kids thought it was so fancy to drink the sparkling cider from real wine and margarita glasses (I know, we just have a hodgepodge of stuff). They were just mezmerized with the bubbles in the drink. Love these pictures!

Other than that, the kids went to bed a little later than their usual time. B and I relaxed by playing some Wii and then we went outside to watch our neighbors' fireworks.

I guess if you start the New Year off with an awful cold and horrible congestion, things can only get better, right? Here's to hoping we all have a healthy 2011! (Elina's serious, we better have a healthy 2011! She's tired of everyone around her being sick!)