Enjoying His First Bike Ride!

Finally, Erik is recovering a bit more from his "flu" virus that he could enjoy some outside time with Mummy & Daddy. What better way to spend a "rainy and wet" morning then to go bike riding with your parents?!

We strapped Erik's little Elmo helmet on plus knee pads, as Dora the Explorer says "So we can be safe!". Elbow pads were not "necessary" since, well, Erik was all puffed up with 4 different layers of clothing including his jacket. Plus it wouldn't tie around all that layering. ARGH!

Erik has a grouchy look because we're not "riding" but posing for pics!

Daddy has been dying to take Erik out for a bike ride on his Xmas present, the Radio Flyer Trike. So today was the perfect day! Erik lasted the solid 25 minutes "ride" around the neighborhood. He enjoyed being pushed and steered. Erik even peddled a little bit but his legs are still a little too short to reach it with both feet. So he'd peddled one leg at a time LOL! Guess we shall go walking/biking with Erik a bit more now...let's just hope the rain doesn't last too long and give us a good break to go out (even though we really do need the rain here!)

Erik & Mommy getting ready for a bike ride

Resolutions

Feeling like I am still not spending enough time with my son… resolution of the year… find more time to spend with the son… Read more to Erik… Be more patient… (A fussy eater is way better than unhealthy me) … on the same note “get healthy” live a longer life… spend more time with son. Take more pictures of Erik… (I do hear the WTF more pictures… more quality pictures of Erik)

Can’t wait for the little guy to get better and head back into the pool and continue our swim lessons or just plain goofing around with my dear son. Even though he is still recovering … I am happy that he is not going to school for the next few days (our day care loves to have the kids outside… hence they all have runny noses and viruses) as the weather is cold freezing … well not like Sweden or the Midwest but by California standards freezing.

Get organized... play less WOW.

Every Breathe You Take

Every Breathe You Take
Every breath you take
Every move you make
Every bond you break
Every step you take
Ill be watching you

Every single day
Every word you say
Every game you play
Every night you stay
I'll be watching you

Those were the verses that were coming out of Mummy & Daddy's mouths as we sang the Christmas night away at our friend's, Oliver & Sherry's, for Karaoke Revolution!!


Big Family Dinner

This is the 2nd year that we've spent Christmas Dinner over at the Chen's residence along with two other families from our Baby Group. The 4 boys get to go wild and play together while the parents get to chat away the night. This is ONE night that we really look forward to, just being with friends and family together, relaxing! Well, at least we were relaxed, not sure about the hosts! HAHAHA!!


Daddy Is Looking Forward To Eating Ham

Our hosts were amazing! They cooked a gourmet meal for 10 adults (Erik's Grandparents also attended!) and it absolutely smelled divine! Grandma Katy and Grandpa Tom also made appetizers to bring along (50 Crab & Shrimp Spring Rolls and Stuffed Mashed Potato - Indian Style). Other families also brought things to share including some very delicious Chinese Pork & Cabbaged Steamed Buns, Pork Congee, Homemade Ice-Cream Cake, Homemade Pumpkin Cheesecake! Good lordie, we had a lot to eat!


Executive Chef, Shery, grilling some delicious & health salmon

Plus, we got piano performances from Clark playing many Christmas tunes and also from Sherry, our generous hostess! It was such a great Christmas holiday!! If you peeked through the windows, it was just a great and warm atmosphere where everybody was very comfortable with each other, just like family.


Zingers were flying left & right, Daddy got a taste of his own teasing medicine from Lin


Boys were really into the Thomas Aquadoodle


Erik enjoying some T-ball lessons from Clark

However, as the evening progresses (seriously, it wasn't even late, like 8:00pm!), the wilder we got and this was without alcohol mind you! Our hosts got out their Karaoke Revolution and it was all over!!!! One by one, we were 'forced' to sing and humiliate ourselves!

Daddy sang "I'll Make Love To You" by Boyz II Men. Eek! How embarrassing! But Daddy did sing it "pretty good" according to Mummy! LOL! However according to the rest of the gang, Boooooo! HAHAHA!

Our friend, Joannie sang "Jessie's Girl" next and she had an Big Hairy Belly Elvis as her avator on the screen and it was just hilarious! She was also Booooooed off the stage! Not by us but by the games' audience.

Even the kids got into the Karaoke! Jeremy was especially brave and wanted to do a solo! It was sooooo adorable! Oliver had to "distract" them as the adults wanted to play by putting on a movie for the 4 boys and good gosh, they all made a bee dive to the laptop! First row seating for the movie was on the Airplane, Second Row seating was for 2 in the Radio Flyer Wagon, and Nose-Bleeds was the toddler rocker (aka where Erik sat!)

We then dared our hostess to sing. Sherry was a TRUE performer! She sang Britney Spears' "Toxic" and it was freaking awesome!! Matched the tone and everything...good lordie...were we intimidated NOW! Everybody took turns (except our all of a sudden ultra-shy friends' Lin & Jing, who just kept recording us! SSHEEESH!)


A Romantic Duet by Mummy & Daddy

Finally, Mummy and Daddy sang a "duet" cuz well, Mummy is really toned-deaf, according to Daddy LOL! So we sang "Every Breathe You Take" ...it was such a romantic moment that all the couples were swaying back and forth (including Grandpa Tom & Grandma Katy)...in awe of us two love birds singing in complete harmony! YEA RIGHT!!! Come On! We got BOooooed off the "stage" within like 1 minute! PLUS Daddy ditched Mummy right in the middle of the song saying "I can't help you now...you suck!"


Daddy really needed his another mic, thus he used Austin's T-Ball Bat instead

Ahhhh...what a wonderful Christmas Day 2007!! Now we're looking forward to the New Year 2008!!

NOTE: If we get the incriminating video, we shall post it on the blog (...maybe not)

Christmas Day

The Ma Family's Christmas Day was one of the highlights of our 4-day weekend. See previous post on Bad Case of Virus. Erik's fever had subsided and he woke up bright-eyed and cheery (as cheery as he can be after a few days of exhaustion from fighting his fever). Mummy and Erik walked down the staircase together and we saw lots of gifts underneath the Christmas Tree! "Santa" must have arrived. Hmmmm!

The night before, Mummy's plan was to have Erik bake sugar cookies for "Santa" but since he was not feeling good at all. Mummy opted to just leave a couple of white chocolate bisquits and a small cup of Low-fat Organic Omega 3 milk for "Santa". Of course, Grandpa Tom joked that if Santa only got milk and cookies all through the night, he'd be sleeping with all that carb, we should've offered Santa some coffee instead!! Only Grandpa Tom would make such a sassy comment! LOL!

Anyways, back to Christmas Day. Daddy & Mummy basically spoiled Erik! Mummy set a budget range for Erik's Xmas gifts since we figured the most important things Erik would ever want at this age is time with us. Lots of love and time from Mummy and Daddy. Mummy and Daddy gave up long time back in having gift exchanges between each other since we really don't need anything and we really HATE the commercialization of the holidays. It's always so stressful when its this time of year when it should be back to the simpler of things!

However, with Erik, we're spoiling him a bit. Not with any big toys of triple digit price tag. Just things that we know we'll eventually buy for him because we like it too and just so happens to be fitting for Xmas as well. LOL! Daddy & Mummy got Erik a Radio Flyer Trike! Grandpa Tom assembled it the late evening before and Grandma Katy tied a red Xmas Ribbon right in the front. You know, it was the classic "Hallmark Moment" right...for the kid?! Oooh, this was one of the more exciting toys! But Erik really did NOT want anything to do with it except the bell! Sheesh! Such a disappointment but he was still pretty dazed from waking up and getting over his virus.

We proceeded to tear open presents! Lots and Lots of Presents of Galore! YeeHah! Erik basically got an Elmo Potty Seat from his Grandma Katy and Grandpa Tom ...and WOW! Erik flung it far far away as possible! He knew exactly what it was! LOL! He got an Little Einstein outfit from Grandma Wai and Grandpa Tik and again, it was flung far far away! Man! Is Erik hard to please!

However, the gifts that really caught his attention wasn't even bought by Mummy or Daddy! Now that just stinks! Our good friends, Connie & Ed (plus their 3 adorable kiddies: Jonathan, Amanda, and Ashley), gave Erik a Sesame Giggle CarWash with Elmo, Cookie Monster, Bert, and Ernie. It made all kinds of noises, that suited with Erik just dandy!

The other gift that wasn't from Mummy or Daddy was a surprise one. Thanks to Uncle Penjo and his girlfriend, Sarah, they sent it via Amazon.com, a Diego Laptop!! Oh My Goodness! Erik absolutely LOVED that thing and wouldn't stop pressing all the buttons for a solid 10 minutes until we had to urge him to continue with the gifts opening!

Of course, one of the nicer gifts was actually handmade and homemade. Grandma Katy was busy knitting all the weeks prior to Christmas. Mummy always saw her holding a black ball of yarn and working away whenever she has some "downtime". We were wondering why. Well, on Christmas Day, Erik got a very nicely knit black sweater vest from Grandma! YAY! We put it on Erik and he looked just so handsome :o) hee hee

Christmas Cards

For those who have not yet received your Christmas Cards, we are sooo very sorry! We have been preoccupied with so many year-end things that were going on, with Mummy having final exams, Daddy going on training, offices going crazy with year-end projects and work. SIGH! We really just pushed it off until the end. Daddy even had started designing the Christmas cards long time back, in November but just didn't get a chance to print and write the cards out properly.

So here's our Christmas Cards:







Grandpa Tom & Grandma Katy's:

Bad Case of Virus

This Christmas 4-day weekend is not what Daddy & Mummy had wished for. All year long, we had been pretty good kids. Erik especially had been a wonderful darling toddler. So...why? oh why us?!

Erik came down with a very bad case of virus on late Saturday night/early Sunday morning. We were at a friend's child's birthday party on Saturday and Erik actually coughed violently and vomited while playing. We really didn't think much of it because Erik does this sometimes, especially when he's on a full stomach and he's running and wanting to play and play and play. So we really didn't think much of it.

However, after we returned home and have gone to bed, around 2:00am, Erik had a fever. Mummy felt Erik's forehead and it was H.O.T! Immediately, tylenol was given, of course Erik put up a big fight. Around 5:00am, again, the fever reached another peak of higher than 100 F., Mummy had to wait for until round 6:00am to give the next dose of tylenol. Sigh!

Sunday, we called doctor's office, and the advice nurse said, its probably a virus, especially with the violent coughing, so no need to come in, just give Erik tylenol and ibuprofen. If fever continues for 3 days straight, then come on in. All day Sunday, Erik refused to eat anything! Nothing, except breastmilk. At this point, I am so glad that I did not wean him off yet!!

Sunday evening around 8:30pm, after Mummy & Daddy gave Erik his fever reducing medication one hour prior, Erik's fever had not gone down. Instead, it was rising higher and higher :o(. His breath became shallow and labored. It was an executive decision, Emergency Room here we come! Mummy, Daddy, Erik, and also Grandma Katy were all packed into the van!

At the ER, the admittance RN measured Erik at 104.5 F (rectally) :o( WAH! Our poor baby! They had to give him a HUGE dose of Tylenol, like 3-4 times the amount that's said on the infant boxes!! Our son had lost 1 lb of his weight already after one-day of no eating except nursing. They had to measure his oxygen intake. They did a strep throat test, they had to do Xrays on the chest to rule out pneumonia! WAH!!! The Xray sucked big time!! We would NEVER wish it on anybody's child!

Then, the ER Doc looked into Erik's ears and saw one of them was blocked. He had to go dig out a gigantic ball of ear wax. The doctor looked again, and said "it might be an ear infection". Eh?! MIGHT BE?! What the F%@K!?! It's either an infection or its not. Nevertheless antibiotics were prescribed.

We went back home, finally, have 3 hours in the ER and traumatizing our little guy. His fever finally came down! However, Christmas Eve morning and Erik's fever is again going higher and every time we try to give him the antibiotics, he freaks out and would throw up afterwards. That's not going to work! We desperately called our pediatrician's office and refused to talk to the advice nurse. Instead, we demanded our doctor to give us a call back! Daddy demanded to schedule an appointment with Erik's pediatrician that same day, on Christmas Eve!

Mummy & Daddy are really happy with Erik's pediatrician because she is so caring and so nice to Erik, very attentative! So when she called and talked to us and walked us through what things it could be, we felt calmer and at the same time, she wanted to see Erik to make sure he's okay, especially for his Christmas.

Off to the doctor's office we go in the late afternoon. At this time, our little guy has eaten nothing except breastmilk and sips of Jamba Juice and have lost yet another 1.5 pound from lack of any food intake. Thank Goodness for Jamba Juice (Mummy & Daddy are going to invest in jamba juice!). Doctor looked into the ears again and said "No!", Erik does not have ear infection, please top the antibiotics. Again, what the F$@k was wrong with the ER doctor?!! Instead, Erik has a very bad case of virus that's causing his temperature to rise, and it could last up to 5 days! ACK! We just had to continue with the tylenol and ibuprofen and alternate between the 2 every 3 hours to keep the fever to be low grade. SIGH! There really wasn't anything we could do to help our little guy!

Early Christmas Day came, Mummy checked Erik's temperature all through the night and no sugar plums were dancing, that's for sure. But thank goodness, Erik's fever had faded away and didn't rise to the dangerous level any more. By morning, Erik woke up, still a little dazed but much more energetic and playful than previously reported. His nasal drippings all of a sudden subsided. He still refuses food but will still drink his Jamba Juice so thus Daddy was ingenious to mix rice cereal in there with the juice and Erik got some more nutrition!

What a horrible way to spend a long weekend! WAH!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all

For the last week - we signed up for Paradise Cove and Daddy's been spending some "Quality" time with "BuuBuu" and we are both having a blast. Check out the videos in the Video Section or Day 1 & Day 2

8 Dozen Cookies Later

Mummy had a tough week! It was final exams for school and it was project wrap-up at work. Lots of things going on all at once.

At Erik's school, it was "treats" and "goodies" exchange all over the place! Lots of Erik's buddies passed out their Christmas gifts to all the other buddies. It was just a very festive atmosphere! For Erik, we got his buddies stocking stuffers from our recent Nashville trip. However, because Mummy made an error in counting how many buddies Erik had, we were only able to give those out to our baby group buddies instead.

However, Daddy & Mummy both feel so horrible that the other kiddies didn't get anything from Erik! Such a GRINCH! As a result, right after Mummy's final exam, it was a cookie baking frenzy into the wee-hours! 8 dozen of Chocolate Crinkle cookies later, Boy, is Mummy tired!! Now, we can finally pass some Santa Treats out!



In the afternoon, Erik's school will be holding its annual Holiday Party. Erik will be performing a "Snowman Song" along with his buddies. The teachers said all the kiddies have been practicing very hard! Mummy & Daddy are so looking forward to it!! Video camera will be READY! :o) hee hee We are so looking forward to the 4-day weekend of Christmas!!! YAY!

The Three Musketeers

Prior to having Erik, Daddy & Mummy knew of 2 couples that we hung out with on a semi-regular basis. At least the girls did, we were "workout" partners and always met at the gym every day at lunch, either doing Step Aerobics or Treadmill.

Daddy loved telling this story, there once was a dinner party rotation held. Each couple was trying to get pregnant at the time. After the dinner party rotation (where one couple hosted and the other 2 couples joined in), all 3 of the girls got pregnant, all within 1 month of each other! Daddy joked that it must've been something put in the food.

Anyhow, our boys became "The 3 Musketeers". One couple have moved away to the Bay Area so whenever we get together, we always try to sit down and take a photo with the 3 of the Mommies and the Kids.


LEFT to RIGHT:
Kelly & Ryan (3 months old)
Mummy & Erik (2 months old)
Miriam & Gabriel (4 months old)


LEFT to RIGHT:
Kelly & Ryan (5 months old)
Mummy & Erik (4 months old)
Miriam & Gabriel (6 months old)


LEFT to RIGHT:
Mummy & Erik (20 months old)
Kelly & Ryan (21 months old)
Miriam & Gabriel (22 months old)

Making Our Rounds For The Holidays

We admit, we have been bad friends for many of our wonderful friends. For example, Hong & Chelsy, two of the nicest and generous friends we have. We have NOT seen Hong ever since Erik was born (April 2006). We have NOT seen Chelsy since our baby shower (March 2006), by the way, which both the girls threw for Mummy, along with another girlfriend! Basically, we haven't seen or connected properly with each other for almost 2 years!! Absolutely crazy!

Well, it's about time that we got together and properly have Erik meet 2 of his biggest fans! This past Saturday, we headed over to Chelsy's "mansion" (really, its so spacious and lots of room to run!) for an informal luncheon just so Mummy can catch up with both of them, including Hong, and Chelsy's wonderful kids. We were hoping nothing more than just a couple of hours to catch up with each other properly, with all the ups and downs of our lives.



However, we were so surprised that they had a full-fledge luncheon setting going on. Seriously, it was a page out of Martha Stewart with the whole charger, dinner plate, glasses, etc. We have not had such a lovely and elegant luncheon in a long time. Those 2 sisters absolutely go out of their way all the time for us! We had some awesome homemade butternut squash soup (Daddy's Favorite), some homemade lasagna & salad, along with Hot Apple Cider! Mmmm Mmmm! WE LOVED IT!

Most of all, we really just enjoyed the company. Erik behaved so well at the table (well, he's still a toddler, he still wanted to throw a little whatever he doesn't like to eat around and spit things out occasionallly but in general, he behaved very nicely for the whole 30-40 minutes with some gentle reminders).





We ended up staying for a solid 2 1/2 hours just for lunch. Erik was very at home, which was surprising! He loved all the toys they had out! He loved looking at the oscar fish and the 2 birds they had. They even had a little turtle!! Chelsy's oldest daughter, Tiffany, who is in high school, even wanted to play DDR with Erik!! When we had to say good-bye, Chelsy was the one who got a kiss from Erik! Could not believe it. Hong who gave Erik little backrubs when he was just way too tired, was shunned from the kiss, instead he gave out a hug! HAHAHA!

Christmas Lights 2007

Mommy – got us out of the house past our usual time to bunker up at home. After a quick dinner we all bundled up into warm cars – and scrambled into the “super” minivan and we were off to view some neighborhood Christmas light decorations. We ended up on Madison and Walnut in Fair Oaks – at Dovecourt who put on a good show. (Even got Grandpa Tom amazed – someone who doesn’t easily get amazed or wowed).

Fall Pictures

Sorry about the delay but I never got a chance to put up Erik's Fall Pictures. Here it is.... & Here is Mommy's Post

Do You Believe In Santa?

This past Saturday, we went to our now "Annual" event of visiting Santa at Mummy's work. Yes, Mummy is definitely on Santa's Nice List because Santa visits her at work! ;o) hee hee

This year, we also invited Grandma Katy and Grandpa Tom to come and visit with Santa too. Not sure how it would be since Erik does have stranger anxiety nowadays (which is a good thing!). All week prior, Daddy has been prepping Erik about Santa Claus, asking Erik, "what does Santa say?" and Erik will reply "Ho Ho Ho". So he understands the concept.

We even brought him over to the local shopping mall to see Santa and to see how the kids plop on Santa's lap for a "picture-taking" opportunity. We'll ask Erik if he wanted to sit with Santa and he'll nod his head in yes. So, we thought we were pretty much home free for this past Saturday's event. Eh, NO!

Erik did fabulous sitting with Santa while Mummy & Daddy were there too. Think he got on Santa's NICE list too! hee hee. Then Mummy & Daddy quickly got up to snap a shot of just Erik and Santa 1:1...and...that's when Erik bawled! His cry is quite cute, actually. He'll take in the air he can before letting out one big wail that anybody within a 15 feet radius can here. Mummy shall coin it as the Sonic-Cry. We kept snapping away!

Then we sent in the backup troops, Grandparents! They also "sat" on Santa's lap with Erik. Erik calmed down as his Grandparents settled in cozily with Santa. It was their first time hee hee. Grandpa Tom was a bit bashful :o). We always refer to Grandpa Tom as one of the 7 dwarfs in Snow White, majority of the time, he's Grumpy but with Santa, he became Bashful. LOL! Maybe Tom was hoping he'll be on the Nice list too! HAHAHAH!

Side Note: Our pictures did NOT come out too well. At least Daddy was complaining. Thus we may have to opt out on Santa in our Xmas cards this year! ARGH!

20 Months: Milestone Update

Okay, Mummy is a few days late and Daddy hounded Mummy to update the blog to date his milestone updates before we forget. Erik turned 20 months old on December 9th on Sunday. He's such an active little boy and we wouldn't want it any other way.

Counting
Erik can now count up to 10 in English. He will also count up to 5 in Cantonese. If Mummy or Daddy points to a book and there are multiple animals, shapes, or objects on it and asks him to count. Erik will use his little index finger and point to the picture one by one (randomly) and count. It's quite cute! Mummy is working on getting him to count up to 10 in Cantonese! Sometimes Erik loses interests though so we take a break and do something else :o)

Colors
Every morning, Mummy drops Erik to his school. We'd take the time to walk down the ramp together. Erik loves to stop and smell the flowers planted in front of the school (Really, this appreciation of life is definitely a Daddy trait since Mummy is like the Rabbit in Alice in Wonderland! LOL!) So Mummy takes this opportunity to do some morning color lessons in Cantonese.

It doesn't matter who walks by. Its just Mummy & Erik time while we go through each of the flowers that he's interested in. His favorite color to say is "Yellow" in Cantonese. He'll say everything is Yellow just because he likes to say it. We'd go through the purple-ish flowers, the orange flower(s), the white flowers, the pink flowers, etc. And then we'll continue our journey into school.

Alphabet
Well, this is all English here, there is NO translation of the A-Z alphabet into Cantonese! PHOOEY! However, Daddy loves to work on the alphabet with Erik in the evenings. Daddy made alphabet construction cards that had different animal or other objects for each of the letters.

As Daddy shows the alphabet card to Erik, he'll say "A is for ....(waits for it)" and Erik will answer "Alligator" in English then Daddy will ask "...and in Chinese we say....(waits for it)". Erik will reply in 鱷魚 (pronounced "e yu" in Mandarin, "ok yu" in Cantonese)! Very cool and a round of high 5s and claps go around between Mummy and Erik and then Erik and Daddy! Mummy has to now look up Cantonese dictionaries to keep up with all the different animals to tell Erik! hee hee!

ASL Signs
Erik is still signing strong. He loves to sign as he says things but it also has taken a little backseat. He'll use it a lot more often if his mouth is full and can say it but want to get his point across. Mummy has to research on ASL words to teach Erik as we go. It's great to sometimes tell Erik and Daddy something across the room without shouting LOL!

Swimming
We've started taking Erik to his swim lessons again! It's middle of winter we know but the pool is indoors and its heated! Doesn't get better than that! Erik LOVES the water! He actually asked Daddy to take him swimming! Daddy and Erik gets adventurous in the pool, Daddy will glide Erik into different swim exercises and let's go of his hands...and Erik will actually kick his feet and hands by himself to stay afloat for a few seconds before he's way too tired. Of course, we still let Erik know that he must be careful around the pool. During the weekdays, Erik misses the pool so much that he'll pretend to swim in the bathtub! LOL!

Have you been elfed?

Last year, we "elfed" ourselves silly with cute little project that OfficeMax sponsored. Basically you upload a picture of yourself and you see these little pixelated elf of yourself dancing to a Xmas tune.

Well, this year, they've expanded the feature to allow a whole group of people to be elfed (up to four). Thus we got elfed again!



Click on the URLs below for some "action-packed" adventures!

The Ma Family

Grandpa Tom & Grandma Katy

Erik’s Artsy Side

I cannot believe it has taken me this long to showcase my son’s artsy side. Pre-Erik I was always excited about introducing Erik to be creative and artistic – and I guess I have failed in this area as I have not spent a whole lot of time drawing and being creative – though I do teach a lot of a thing that are considered “Naughty” but that is subject for another post.
I do have a stack I mean a whole stack of these stashed somewhere around the house and hopefully I will get down to scanning them all one of these days – Daddy’s is all about being digital – but I will frame up a few (Erik if you are reading this – Daddy loves them all) I will keep all his artwork on this PICASA Album

Big Marathon Fans!

After a busy weekend, the whole family decided to drive out to cheer on one of our good friends, Brenda, for doing the California International Marathon! Being one of our old roommates pre-Erik, we got to know each other quite well and definitely think of her as part of the family :o). So driving out downtown on a mid-morning in a cold windy winter day is really nothing! We even got to make a great sign for Brenda (thanks to Daddy's creativity)

This will be Erik's 2nd time attending the marathon as a spectator! His first time was one year ago when it was Brenda's first marathon! Erik was about 7 1/2 months old! Can't believe it! We're hoping the event would inspire Erik when he's older to do it! Maybe we can do a relay team as the Ma Family?! That would be absolutely awesome! 28.2 miles split among the family of 3, that's do-able right....eh, for a 2 year old?! HAHAHA! Okay, maybe we'll wait for about 6 to 8 more years, but that just means more time for Daddy & Mummy to train right? ;o) hahahaha!

Going out there and seeing these runners do the marathons absolutely inspires Mummy and Daddy (well, maybe just Mummy) to be in better shape and to push the body a little harder. Gotta have more discipline and go workout on a regular basis! What Mummy recalls differently from this year than last year was the lack of weekend hiking that we used to do.

Last year we used to walk around one of our favorite trails all the time around this time of year. But for some reason this year, we didn't get a chance to do it as much. Maybe its Mummy's back to school schedule. Maybe its because we're also hosting Grandpa Tom & Grandma Katy so weekends are filled with Extended Family Time. Maybe its because of the ridiculous weekend activities we have scheduled too! Whatever it may be...if the weather is good, Mummy is going to start the family hiking again :o). Some winter fresh air does a body good!

Indoor Play Area

We attended a TWO-Year old birthday this past Saturday morning. Em, after a late date night (we didn't get home until past 11:30pm), a morning party was not what we were prepared for! LOL! Needless to say, we had to rush out of the house! HAHAH!

It was Erik's good buddy, Austin's 2nd birthday, also a big fan of Curious George! Austin's parents decided to hold his birthday at an indoor play area of foam structures and a gigantic slide with a net to climb to the top.

Erik fell asleep in the car ride there and Mummy & Daddy really had to wake him up so he can enjoy the festivities! LOL! However, once he got up and saw all of his buddies playing, he really got into it! Absolutely LOVED to climb to the top of the slide and go Weeeeee! all the way down!!

He got to parallel play with a whole bunch of his buddies from birthday boy, Austin, to DuDu (another soon-to-be 2 year old), current classmates (Gabriel, Jackson, Kelly, Audrey, and Karalyn), to his old buddies Jeremy & Nolan (who have been moved up to the 2 year old classroom already) plus there were 2 older toddlers there (Talia and Zach - both are 3.5 year old already). The toddlers were definitely having lots of fun! I think the Daddies were too! LOL! Erik got to enjoy some delicious cake, he even had Mummy's slice! Sheesh!

Indoor Play Area rocks the house!!! Even though it was a quick 1.5 hour play time, it was great! Mummy & Daddy definitely wants to come back again with just Erik so he can work out some of those toddler energy! Pretty cool!

Our First Date

Mummy absolutely loves this time of year when its so chilly that you just want to huddle together for some warmth. Mummy loves walking down the street in the middle of a winter night to feel the brisk cold air. WHY? Simply because it is during this time of year was when Mummy and Daddy went to Paris for the very first time!

Well, to be exact, it was over the Christmas holiday. Still, it was memorable to us both! Of course, Daddy is the complete opposite on the winter weather, hates the cold like no man's business but still, the winter does bring back warm and fond memories for us!

So for a winter chilly night, Mummy & Daddy finally went out on a date! YES, you read it correctly. A DATE! Just the two of us. No Erik. No Grandpa Tom. No Grandma Katy. Just Daddy & Mummy! Sure, we've been to the movies before (seldom) alone but it was always a rushed event and we never really get to talk to one another. It's really just parallel "vegetating" together. Nothing wrong with that either but for this winter night, it was out of the norm for us. Boy! Did we really needed a date bad! LOL

We went out to a semi-upscale California French Restaurant on a Friday night after work, the closest French we can get out here, I guess. The ambiance was definitely date night material with warm glowing candles everywhere. A romantic fireplace in the middle of the restaurant and for those brave enough to dine al fresco, a fire pit was also available. Guitarist playing up some music in the background. We had a fabulous time! Our conversations was not consumed by 100% of Erik. We still had things to talk about BESIDES Erik! LOL! That's pretty awesome! In reality, our little boo boo only crept in a little bit here and there in the conversation (but it doesn't mean we didn't miss him)

Our dinner date lasted quite a long time, we even noticed people that came after us left before us. That's so good! We didn't even bicker or argue or get on each other's nerves, which is pretty usual when you've been married for so long! LOL! Both Mummy & Daddy just really needed some time together to talk the night away, and reminisced a bit of our Parisian nights!

When dessert was served, both of us didn't want the night to end so quickly yet and return home yet. We made a quick call to our babysitters, Grandpa Tom & Grandma Katy, and they reported everything was okay with our little baby. So we decided to hit the movie theaters to watch the Disney's Enchanted movie together. We've been wanting to see it since it came out but just never had the time or the chance. The movie was great! It was quite funny and hilarious at times. Definitely a recommend!

All in all, our "First Date" (as in real date) after Erik was born (an almost whopping 20 months afterwards), was absolutely wonderful and great! Now, we just need to schedule these "Date Nights" to be a little more regularly instead of once ina blue moon deal :o) Hahaha!