Ten Years and Counting.

My handsome husband recently came up with the perfect analogy for our married life, a circus!

We started out 10 years ago with just the two of us in center ring and have been adding side shows at a steady rate.

That said, our anniversary recently happened and it was a wonderful intermission from the crazy!

The morning began with the usual rush of getting everyone ready for school and preschool but was punctuated with a gift of dove dark chocolate and a fabulous musical card from my hubby, including a lovely letter that made me cry. Once the 3 largest were out the door my husband and I went shopping... for clothes, ...for me, ...with only 2 helpers,... who slept through the trip in their stroller.

After the kindergarten pick up we took the younger 4 to a dear friend (You remember Super P from previous entries) who watched them while Eddie and I went target shooting at a local indoor range. Before you all decide to tease My Man about how he celebrated our anniversary let me say that this was my idea, I haven't been shooting in years and have had it on the calendar several times when someone got sick or something else came up.

I had a lot of fun just being with my man at the range and I was pleasantly surprised that I could still hit a target at 25 feet. Of course we were both surprised when I could hit the bulls eye,... at 40+ feet,... on purpose,... more than once!

After the range we had time to pick up sushi takeout from our favorite local joint and ate it in the comfort of the van listening to country music and actually carrying on a conversation without interruption. It was bliss.

We picked up Ella from school, the others from the super Hherroes and went home to do homework and get ready for the new wonders in our life the Deans who came and babysat while we went out to dinner at the Pomona Valley Mining Co. where my husband has been promising to take me since we started dating 11 years ago.

The food was good, the view was better, and the company was the best!

After dinner we walked back to the truck and enjoyed the city lights and starry sky and then my man surprised me with this.

It was a magical ending to a fabulous day, we were both happy to go home and sneak kisses from the sleeping big 3 and tuck the last 2 into bed.

I'm really blessed to love and be loved by such a wonderful man and I look forward to the next 10 years and the next and the next etc.

The happiest family on earth!

I last blogged about Ella and i wanted to give her her own entry because she is special and deserves it, but now I would like to gush for a bit about my family, and more specifically about my parents and siblings.

They are the best ever.


When we knew that Ella would be baptised so close to the holidays we didn't know if any of my side of the extended family would be able to make it, but my parents made a special trip to be here for her special day. A trip from Hong Kong to SoCal is no little deal. They came out a few days early and spent some real quality time with us, it was wonderful to have time without a lot of demands, time where my kids got to really share their personalities with their grandparents.




Saturday morning, my sister and her family flew in from Massachusetts, they stayed with us at a very inconvenient time for them, right in the middle of a household move to Washington state. They cut their move short to be able to be here with us, I can't say how grateful I am for their willingness to do that, and how much it meant for them to do that.


Finally, my baby brother who is not a baby at all, but a highly successful marketing manager with Harper Collins, took time and money, and time (again) away from his lovely fiancee, and plans for their fabulous wedding this August.

Everyone made it in Saturday morning and were there to celebrate Ella's Baptism with us. We spent a lovely Sunday together, mostly just visiting and talking.

Then came Monday.... I am very grateful to my Brother-in-law and Sister for including us in their trip to Disneyland.

This is a feat I have never before attempted, and for good reason. We had 7 adults and 7 children and as far as I am concerned, that is the appropriate adult to child ratio.

We had a lovely day, the children had a lot of fun. Although I personally think "Mr Toad's Wild Ride" should have a bigger disclaimer, something along the lines of "unless you like to be shaken around in the dark with a loud cacophony of sound do not enter here." Thankfully things got much better after we convinced my scaredy girls that not every ride would be like that. Highlights of the day included personal audiences with princesses, Goofy's backyard, and Small World.

We ended the day with a nice sit down dinner at IHOP close to Disneyland, but far enough thst we got to have a whole back room area to ourselves. A great end to a great day.


Tuesday brought with it a reality check, Mark had to get back to work, and the big girls had to return to school. Though Nina enjoyed a morning with her cousins all to herself. My niece L set up a fabulous school for spies, she called her students her "paddo-wad learners" (we ate lunch next to the jedi-school training camp at Disneyland).

Wednesday we said good bye to our cousins and sighed as we got back to our routine, grateful for the fabulous time we had, but now a little more sad because we remembered what we were missing by not living close to this part of our family. We are so grateful for such loving, generous, helpful, family.

Ella

My daughter Ella is a wonderful girl.

She is kind and sensitive to others,

she is funny and smart,

silly and respectful,

strong willed about things that her choice and obedient to things that are rules.

In short she the best combination of traits one can find.

This year she turned eight years old, and in our church that means she is old enough to choose whether to be baptised.

I am proud of the way she made her decision, she asked questions, thought things through, prayed about it and chose to be baptised.

I know that this is only the beginning of her life, but I know that this same method of making decisions will serve her well her whole life through.

I love my Ella girl, and if you know her then you probably love her too!

Catching Up.

Christmas happened, and we enjoyed it!

Christmas Eve we went to San Diego area to see Eddie's godparents Andy and Rose Tong

The girls loved seeing their home which was beautifully decorated for Christmas, A.J. just loved the attention he got from his bonus Grandparents.

We played with their animated singing Christmas stuffed animals, enjoyed the hand beaded necklaces Kieh Mah made for all the girls, and went out for the best Dim Sum you can get, at Jasmine's of course.

We woke up the next morning to see what we got in our stockings!

The twins got to enjoy their first Christmas at home.

They are each only saying a few recognizable words still, but if they could talk I am pretty sure they would say that they much preferred this year's version of Christmas, sitting around in their pajamas ripping paper off of things versus being in the NICU attached to any number of tubes and sensors etc.

We talk about having the Christmas Spirit all year through, so...

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Groundhog Day!

NINA STRIKES AGAIN









I know I have skipped Christmas and New Years etc. as far as journal writing goes, but Groundhog day just happened and after the morning rush of bundling the two oldest girls off to school Nina and I had this conversation:



Nina - Where are we going?

Mom -We are going to get ready so we can go to the grocery store before we pick up Liana.

Nina - Then can we go see Grandpa?

Mom - No.

Nina - Why not?

Mom - Because he lives in Hong Kong.

Nina - No....I meeeeean, can we go see Grandpa in his hole to find his shadow?

(at which point she breaks out in riotous laughter to show me that she has been saving up this joke for quite a while :)

Naughty Grandpa

I interrupt my previously scheduled recanting of the holidays to bring you the exciting adventures of Nina's imaginery friend who is lovingly known as "Naughty Grandpa"

Nina has been creating pretend friends for a while now, mostly she mentions them in the context of something she really wishes she were big enough to do, for example
"My friend Tinga goes to my dance class and we get every color of starburst every time"
We don't have and friends named Tinga, but Ella and Liana go to dance class and recieve candy if they put in good effort, Nina has been promised that she can go to dance class when she is 4, but in her imagination she is happily already there. This kind of imagination I understand, but half way through the Christmas break, Nina started telling me things like this:

"My Naughty Grandpa put a sticker on his wall." (a big NO-NO in our house)

"My naughty Grandpa dropped some presents down the stairs."

"My naughty Grandpa wears swim glasses (goggles) to dance class."

"My Naughty Grandpa likes green, it's HER favorite color."

"My Naughty Grandpa put really spicy in his food and it didn't taste very good so he put in in the trash, so he put juice in his food and it taste very good cuz he likes juice. And he likes jumpin jack cheese."

I must interject at this point that while Nina does have 2 actual living Grandfathers and a few other great uncles etc. none of them in any way resemble these descriptions, though picturing it does make me smile, the Christmas holiday continued and the stories kept coming,...

"My Naughty Grandpa got popcorn for Christmas and it was so yummy and it was so little you have to chew it with your broken teeth"

And most recently....

"My naughty Grandpa was naked and he go-ed to school naked with plain tap shoes."

Certainly, we know now why he is called "My Naughty Grandpa!"

If you are laughing now, watch out cuz her attentions are wandering, now a new character emerges, ...

"All my aunties have light red hair and they always go poo-poo in the potty, and they are coming to meet my church friends..."

Liana at 6!

In the middle of the holiday season, I have an extra reason to celebrate,

Her name is Liana

What makes her so great you ask?

She is there when you need her....

When you need a lift...

When you need someone sweet...

Someone tricky...

Someone to be fabulous with...

Someone sneaky?....

Someone to observe and report...

For all this and more, Liana is your girl!

I'm glad she is my girl all year round!

One year done twice!

The babies have survived their first year, and we have celebrated.

A week or so before their birthday it really hit me that we have "survived" this year. I don't mean to be dramatic but at the time each event in our lives happened I only just had time to get through whatever it was and try to enjoy moments along the way. Now that I am a little distanced I can be grateful as I consider what could have easily happened.

The babies were born at 35 weeks, while they were small and had their own health issues, by making it that far, they were born with good vision, hearing, and normal development.
The babies only spent 17 days in the NICU - there were plenty of families whose babies were there before they were born and were still not home when we left.

My mother came to stay with us 5 days before they were born and stayed with us for 6 weeks. If the babies had been born earlier our big girls would have been in turmoil and Eddie would have had to balance work, family at home, and family in hospital. As it was Grandma was able to help keep the home side balanced and allow Eddie more freedom to be with me at the hospital. Then, my father came for Christmas and he was able to drive me to and from the hospital allowing Eddie to keep working a while longer and take his leave when the babies came home.
My oldest Brother and his family came for Christmas too, they have survived and thrived after a much longer and involved NICU stay and my tween- niece was a welcome sign of hope every time I came hope.

While the babies have enjoyed fairly good health, we have struggled with a myriad of viruses and bacteria, they babies as preemies qualified for RSV shots and other vaccines that kept us out of the hospital. I will trade a sleepless night in front of a humidifier for a hospital any day!
Our Church friends have been incredibly supportive, I have in my immmediate circle of close friends 3 mothers of twins, in my congregation at least 5 mothers of twins, some whose children are now in their mid-twenties, I have a wealth of helpful advice and sympathetic support around me. All the books I read to prepare for twins said I should join a support group, something i probably would not have found the time to do, but God provides and I am blessed.

So happy birthday my babies, thank you for thriving!

My Beautiful Birthday

Continuing on in the spirit of catching up.

The morning of my 36th birthday I woke up late (thank you Eddie)
Ate breakfast I didn't cook (thank you Eddie)
got ready for church, went to church, and came home from church.
ate lunch I didn't have to cook (thank you to the Chavez family, our Home Teachers)
enjoyed a beautiful afternoon and laid down to rest a minute and think about dinner when the doorbell rang and my two good friends arrived with their families and food
I enjoyed a lovely dinner that I didn't have to cook (THANK YOU EDDIE)

I got a lovely present, exactly what I wanted, but it made my friends laugh, it was a canning accesories kit, lid lifter, jar tongs, the whole kit and caboodle.

Then I got the children into bed and went to bed myself.

All in all, I had a lovely day!

Much to be grateful for.

Thanksgiving happened.

I think I should probably disclose to those of you reading this that "happened" is code for the following;

A lot of memorable things took place but I didn't have/find/scrape out time to sit and write about it, so even though it is well past the event, I will now write down what I can remember so that I don't lose even more of what happened to the sands of time.



So Thanksgiving happened and was a milestone, a year from the time we moved into our new home.

We have officially survived the move.

I have survived moving a month before delivering baby/babies twice now.

I survived having twins via c-section

I survived being a NICU parent

I survived leaving the hospital without my babies, and bringing home 2 newborns

I survived my mother and mother-in law each in turn returning to their regular lives

I survived Eddie returning to work after his paternity leave.

Liana starting kindergarten and Ella starting 2nd grade (2 different pick up times)

Teaching my rotation of Nina's preschool co-op.

breastfeeding twins for 11 months (they weaned themselves)

Twin teethers (they each have 4 teeth)

twin crawlers

and any day now twin walkers (Amalia is already training for a 5K and AJ took 4 steps on his birthday!)

I don't mean to imply it was bad when I use the word "survive" it just hits me more and more what we have lived through this past year. It's a lot, but it is all good stuff.

I feel incredibly grateful to be in a home large enough for my large family to live in and not have to step on eachother's toes all day and night. I am grateful for a husband who works so hard to provide for all of us without me having to w0rk outside of the home. Grateful for extended family who come to visit and help out every chance they get. Grateful for smart children who did the best in school in spite of all the upheaval in their lives. Grateful for good friends who have really helped me get through this past year with a smile on my face...or at least on my heart, sometimes I have been too tired for it to make it to my face.

So Thank You Heavenly Father, for all these gifts which I am still recieving.

The magic of Nina

There is a magic to three-year-olds,

-

Something not found in other ages.

A 3-year-old is a changeling child who gets all the perks.

Old enough to climb the monkey bars, small enough to fall asleep on some one's shoulder.

Smart enough to import the bathroom stool to the kitchen so as to reach goodies on the counter,

innocent enough to get off light - or lets face it get off completely with the right smile and that glint in her eye.

Nina has a little more magic then most some days.

She is a brilliant singer, with a vibrato that she uses to great effect when she desires. In addition to a vast repertoire of toddler and primary favorites, she composes her own songs, and will even compose on demand;

"Nina will you sing me a song about ladybugs?"

"Ladybugs don't hurt you, they just will tickle you, and ladybugs are pretty...."

She has a great smile and when she wants to be funny she turns it all the way to one side and squints at you through half closed eyes.

She is all girl - with frequent applications of "chopsticks and lip glasses" (chapstick and lip gloss of course!) She looks "Ferfect, like a princess" - I didn't miss type, anyone who is anyone knows "Ferfect" is the correct way to pronounce "perfect."

Nina is a shoe fanatic. With a special fondness for high heels -of course! The ultimate in shoes of course are Tap Shoes, which in spite of being too small for Liana are still 2 sizes too big, this does not stop her from wearing them every chance she gets and they are not only a fashion statement, she will dance command as well - requiring an introduction and a round of applause every 30 seconds or so as payment.

She lays claim to any and all belongings she deems desirable, most often she firmly believes said items were given to her for Christmas by her grandma (even if said item is oh, say, her big sister's library book.)

The exception to her being girly is he hair, she does not want it done up in bows, she wants it "long" which is translated as " a swirling octopus of tendrils reaching out in to the cosmos, drawing life force from the atmosphere." her world is not happy if her hair is tamed into a clip or ponytail.

There are days when I forget to see the magic in Nina,

Days when the twins are all over me or getting themselves into dangers,

days when the big girls have homework and laundry is piled knee deep,

Days when I can't think what to make for dinner, what I needed at the store, where the important paper is, what time we need to be somewhere, etc., etc., etc.

There are too many of those days lately.

Days when Nina shows her temper, she throws tantrums and yells or cries when things are not going her way, and when I take her to time out, she will kick and scream and thrash,

But then, after sitting for a moment she will call to me;

"I sorry mommy, I said I sorry... Hold me?"

And then the magic happens, she suddenly becomes very small, so little and tiny, and she looks at me with her big eyes and I am compelled to pick up my little "Ninabirdy" and hold her close.

She folds herself into your lap when you hold her, she compacts herself into a little egg of comfort and warmth,

And the magic of Nina takes over once again.

Nina in November

November came and brought with it the winds. We had previously decided to have a birthday party for Nina at the park.
We had games planned, "Put the tiara on the princess," "Pass the Present", etc.
We had decorations planned, streamers, balloons, banners, etc.
We had cupcakes with candles and even remembered to bring matches.
Unfortunately Mother Nature was using her leaf blower.

Balloons blew away as we handed them to the girls to put out.
Decorations ripped and scattered.
The poster sized "Put the tiara on the princess." princess Blew off in spite of being taped on all 4 sides.
We had cupcakes but even with a blanket wrapped around the table as a wind block, candles were futile.
Eddie was at work, but thankfully, we also had good friends who helped keep the small children from blowing away, consoled the medium sized children when the decorations blew away, and even helped the big children practice their tree climbing skills safely.

Ella said it was the worst party ever,
Nina had a wonderful party at the park.

Halloween happened.

Ok so it happened a while ago, but we didn't actually take many pictures that night so last Saturday I made everyone dress up again for the photo op. Before we get to the adorable-ness let me share our fabulous pumpkins.

Liana and Nina's are direct translations from their drawings, Ella's was her idea with a few adjustments for size and amount of detail, I am not on the right level of skill to carve individual broom straws or cat whiskers.

Now to the main event, here are the girls

and some friends on Halloween night,

and the individual pics,

Nina decided to be a ballerina, fabulous not only because she was cute and we got to call her "ballernina" but also because we already owned everything she wanted to wear.

Liana was Red-Riding Hood she wore a cute dress-up dress we already owned and I am pleased with how the cape I sewed turned out, as I had no pattern.

Ella wanted to be Wendy from Peter Pan and I am VERY happy with how it turned out as I had no pattern and only a blurry picture in a story book to go off of.

AJ and Amalia may have wanted to be many things but as they have yet to talk they got to be Captain Hook

and Tinkerbell.

Credit for both costumes goes to my dear friend Margie who has rescued me many times and in many ways.

So in recap, kids were cute, costumes were worn, and mass quantities of candy were acquired (most of which is now in my cupboard waiting to be stuffed into the Thanksgiving Turkey Pinata a tradition 4 years in the running now.)

BONUS FEATURE!

Ever wonder where all those pirated movies come from?

Real twins

The babies had their 9 month check-up yesterday, (Yes they will be 10 months in 3 days, but it still counts if it's in the 9th month right?)
A.J. and Amalia are both 27 inches long now.
They are both crawling and thinking about standing.
Of course Amalia had to get a leg up on her brother, she now weighs 1 pound more than her brother.
But A.J. got to be first in a major milestone, he cut his first tooth on Monday and his second on Tuesday.

Family on the go

Our family has really been on the go latelyWe loaded up our limoand went to the LA County FairWhere we went hog wild for the day.The babies have turned being on the go into a competitive sport.
The first point goes to AJ, for reaching the top of their recreation blocks. Amalia quickly responds by using the blocks to stand up.

AJ learned from his sister and for a while, we thought there would be peace.

Until Amalia decided to put her knowledge and ability towards loftier goals.

Unfazed by her strides, AJ decided to take a break and fortify himself with Green Beans. (and grew a mustache to add to his macho intimidation factor.)

Feeling strong in his machismo, AJ set out to new frontiers and discovered...

THE STAIRS!

Oh yes, the stairs, the pinnacle of pre-toddler adventure. There is no topping that... right?

Wrong.

Oh so wrong,

for sheer determination, in the face of the impossible, (and in pursuit of her daddy's laptop)

Amalia wins the gold!