Happy Birthday Amelia!!

Birthday Dinner -- Pot Roast leftovers converted to Steak and Broccoli

Happy 9th CC!!!

You came into our lives nine years ago...and it has been a really fun journey with you in our lives since. I can't believe time has gone by so fast...soon you will be a little tween. Your mind wants to grow up but I see your mistakes and stop you. Sometimes I don't know if I should let you learn from your mistakes or teach you how to make your decisions. Parenting gets tough but just remember when I yell..it doesn't mean that I don't love you. And when I don't say it...it does not mean that I don't love you either. Deep in my heart, there is a niche carved with a pocket full of love for you, Mun Mun and Dai Dai. Mommy expresses her love different from most people. I do a lot and expect nothing but smiles back. Even though I said you can only buy one book for the year...I have let you buy two already. How can I say "no" to that?

Always remember that...I will shelter you from each raindrop, protect you from any harm and kiss every teardrop off your face.

We wish you a healthy year...do well in school..and continue to learn from mistakes because we are always there for you if you are lost.

With love from your mommy and daddy.

Happy 4 months Aidan!!

I love bath time!!!

Just came home from Aidan's 4 month check up. He is growing day by day...and we can tell by our sore arms each time we hold him. I think my wrists are hurting a bit after holding him while we were waiting for the doctor to call on us. Anyways...his development is progressing well. I answered "Yes" to all the doctor's questions. Then it was time for her to examine him..and all is well. He liked staring at the doctor while clutching to her stethoscope (sp?). He was also interested in the blood pressure instrument that was hanging next to the bed. I took him to the weighing room and he is now 16 lb, 4 oz. No wonder I get sore everywhere after having him in the Snugli for 2 hours!

He let out two loud cries -- his eyes scrunched like bug eyes and face all red. But when I put himin the car to go home...he was back to his giggly self.

Next celebration...Amelia's birthday on Wed!!

New Years and Valentines

Happy New Year!! Too much landed on this weekend...the Chinese New Year, Valentines Day and Family Day. The long weekend should have been more fun...but it seemed to drag a bit. Not sure why...maybe because this year things have changed. Even though there were less of us at mom's...but there was a new addition of Joyce's new baby. I think that her arrival made this years celebration special such that it cancelled out the bitter part.

NY eve' dinner at mom's was nice...at first, I did not feel the special tradition and I wasn't sure what it was. Ahhh...we did not have to move the table to the centre of the living room, nor did we have to open up the middle flap. But the dishes were no less.

NY day lunch at the ILs was no different than any other years. Sometimes I wonder they even bother to go all out. We all do not sit down at the same time to eat. They make us sit and eat while they are continually preparing (reheating) dishes. We keep insisting to wait as a family to sit down...but they want us to eat first. I can understand that they want me to eat before the baby wakes from his nap. But we are all used to it. If he cries...he cries. Sometimes I just think they make the feast so that we come over and can stay longer than our regular visits. Or maybe it is a competition since we are over at mom's for one big dinner...they think they need to make a big lunch/dinner. No matter what...we would still visit for CNY..lunch or not. To this day, I am still not very fond with their tastes. Everything seems to blend into one flavour -- fish and squid. I know they try hard...but when the puzzle piece does not fit...it will never fit, no matter how you force it.

Finally the load off Joyce

Congratulations to Joyce and Samuel on the arrival of their baby girl. No word on the name for the little princess except that she will be mini Po Pok for a while, as per Joyce. But not to worry...I still have some pink clothes that the girls wore when they were little.

We can't wait to see ya!!

Valentine Cards

Last night, I let the girls write their Valentine card to their friends. This year, we did not go for the gender specific ones like Princess cards or super hero cards. Amelia chose the Penguins of Madagascar and Amanda chose Ni Hao Kai Lan. They did not want to run into "why did you give me MICKEY?" from the girls. Or one that liked Cinderella but was given Ariel. Sigh...and these were comments from girls in their class. Very spoiled brat behaviour. While the guys..did not care less unless it was a princess card otherwise Mickey was fine.

Last week, Amelia had a little accident in gym class but the evidence of the "damage" did not show up until Monday. She is learning badminton in school. Which is good to know at an early age for hand/eye co ordination skills. But with twenty kids with less than average control in a tiny gym, racquets waving, shuttles in all directions, anything can happen. Amelia got hit near the eye by someone's racquet. I got the call from her teacher when it happened.

It wasn't until Monday that I looked at her eye..she looked like she had light eye shadow on her left eye. I thought it was just the light and Dickens did not notice. Last night we rubbed her eyelid with some chinese medicine to help blood flow to the bruise to flush out the dark scab. This morning, you can see the bruise darker...which means the medicine was doing its job. Going to rub another round tonight to clear it more.

Counting the days to the New Year

This past weekend, we went over to mom's for our annual pastry making for Chinese New Year. We made the deep fried (yes, to prevent any repeat eyebrow accidents, they were deep fried in a shallow pot of oil) crescents stuffed with sugar and peanuts. I am not quite sure what they symbolize for...but they do look like little wallets stuffed with gold. And they are darn tasty too. Mom threw the ingredients together to make the batter for the outer shell. No measurements required...just some smart hands to tell you that you need flour -- 3 cups, no...make that 4 cups. I slowly poured each cup into the sifter....and mom assured me that she needed more...my cups were usually 3/4 full. When mom was satisfied with the texture...I put the sifter on the table. Somehow my hand jerked...and the little flour in the sifter dusted the table -- oops. I guess I was too cautious.

Karen made her famous Rice Krispie squares. Although this year, we put a twist on them...I rolled them into balls. More gold or "smiley" balls. Then our imagination started kicking in...I wanted to poke them with a stick --so they looked like lollipops. Then dip them in chocolate and rolled in colourful sprinkles. Samuel added that the stick should be a pretzel Pocky stick...then you can eat the ENTIRE thing! I think we have a great business idea right there!

Back to the crescents, CC also helped and made her first crescent. It was much bigger than the rest of them. Mainly because we let her use the dough that was leftover. Mom said that she was going to save that one for her. CC will be so happy to see creation ready to eat.

At home, we started to do our cleaning -- out with the old and in with the new. Welcoming the new year with a clean start is what we do every year. Also, remember when you are sweeping your floors...sweep and gather the dust/garbage in the middle of the house -- or the middle of the kitchen floor. Never towards the door because it means you are sweeping the good luck out the door. As most of the cleaning is on Dec 28 lunar, we prefer to do it bit by bit so that we do not have to spend that entire day to just cleaning.

Better get back to the laundry..the bedsheets are nice and clean.

One Night Getaway

Hello...we survived our first overnight trip with Aidan. I booked the Warm Night Getaway package at the Sheraton on the Falls hotel at Niagara Falls. The package was $89 that included one night stay, a 40 dollar dining card and a Hershey gift basket (value $50).

We left the house at 10:30am on Sunday...we seemed to have packed quite a bit for just an overnight trip. We needed 2 bags. But Aidan's stuff occupied the most space. The drive was about 2.5 hours. Since our check in time was 3 pm, we had to find something to do before then. We found the outlet mall in the Lundy's Lane area. When we got there...we were kind of disappointed because the shops not situated inside a mall..but in a strip plaza. And the food court was bad...just one place to eat -- Burger King. At least, it was not so busy -- we were able to hog many chairs as we wanted. We only visited a few stores -- Carters/Osh Kosh, Esprit, Stokes, Hilfiger and a shoe store. There were other brand names stores but the plaza was in a "c" shape...we only wanted to walk half of it. It was too cold. Anyways, we did spend some money and the girls were bored shopping. It was also time to check in...so, we headed to the hotel.

Our room was on the 19th floor with a city view. The price for a falls view would have been much more. And because it is winter...the falls was really not as pretty to see. The room was clean, there was a LG LCD tv, coffee maker with Starbucks coffee packs and the bathroom was clean too.

Dinner -- we made reservations at the Rainbow Room dining restaurant which was located in the Crowne Plaza next to our hotel. Both hotels were connected so, there was no walking outside. We took some time to dapper ourselves -- changed into skirts, dresses and nice shoes. Dickens changed into a new sweater -- no dresses for him. Aidan changed into different outfit sleeper -- not because it was dinner, it was because he had a diaper blowout.

The restaurant was nice. The atmosphere was candlelight with every table overlooking the Falls. When we got our menus, our eyes widen. The prices were a-hem pricey. The dining credit was just enough to pay for one person. : ) Dickens ordered the halibut while I decided on the prime rib (it had the most sides with it). The girls had chicken fingers and fries and some of my prime rib. Amelia loved the horseradish and Amanda loved the meat because it was done so tender and juicy. Even I enjoyed it. The yorkshire pudding was yummy too. Smothered in the au jus from the prime rib. Of course, enjoying dinner and the Falls just was not going to happen -- that would be too perfect of a night. Aidan is afraid of the dark. The candlelight setting was too dark for his liking...so, he fussed thru the entire dinner. I made 3 trips to the bathroom where I tried to nurse him..but he stopped fussing in there. The lights were very bright in the bathroom. That was the solution...while Dickens ate, I sat in the bathroom with Aidan. When he finished, he called my cell and it was my turn to eat...while he could hold the baby. I wished I took some pictures of the plates...but we wolfed everything down quickly.

Casino fever -- after dinner, we went back to our room. I nursed Aidan and the girls changed into their PJs. Dickens thought that we should try our luck in the casino. I did not want to because the kids looked tired. But Dickens wanted me to have some fun -- maybe I had some luck at the slots to make me smile (more). So, we all went to the casino. Dickens gave me 10 bucks and minded the kids while I went in to look for some extra change.

I played on a couple of slot machines..but was losing my money..I was down to half. I found some penny slots and decided to play BIG on those. wooooo... I played a few minutes and found myself back in the black. I decided to stop before I become addicted to that machine and cashed out. I left the casino with $18.13!! $8 richer! Yeah...I was smiling. Dickens, on the other hand, played with 5 bucks and lost it. No big deal.

It was getting late now, so, it was definitely time to head back to our room for some shut eye.

Shut eye would have been really nice. Aidan kept crying. I think he missed his groove spot in our home bed...or maybe even our pillow smell. But when we finally got him to sleep at 11:30...I could not sleep. I never thought coffee would actually keep me awake. It never did before. So, I rested my eyes and listened to the tv. We had the Discovery channel on...nice. I was listening to Planet Earth documentaries. I could have sworn that the episodes at 1 am were beginning to repeat or was I in between winks? But I think I was getting nightmares from the seal attack on the penguins. Did you know that the weakest part of the penguin is its neck? That was where the seal was aiming for it attack. Once the teeth held on that part...it was pure head thrashing...gross!!!!! I better stop describing before it sticks in my head for another nightmare tonight.

I kept looking at the time...it was 6 am ..and I was finally dozing off. Two hours later..I had to wake up because the bed next to us kept giggling with "ah gooo"s.

The package did not include breakfast -- a good thing. There were several options for breakfast outside the hotel...Perkins, IHOP, McDs, Golden Griddle...TGIFs .. notice the theme??...but we settled on McDs for the sausage n egg mcmuffin combo and double chocolate cupcakes, I mean muffins. The seating area was nice too...we hogged the kids play area. The girls were good at finishing their breakfast because that was my rule before I allowed them to play on the video games.

After breakfast, it was time to head back to start packing. The girls were sad to leave. In a way...so was I.