Late, Late

It's 12:21 AM and I am exhausted, but I couldn't go two days without posting. Tomorrow is a holiday, so I tonight I went out with the girls. I just got home about a half hour ago. That is the longest I have left Lucy ever, but I did have a good time. We went to a wine bar for appetizers and then to a Thai restaurant in mid-levels. Tonight just happened to be the Coaches' Dinner put on by the school for all the coaches. Pete went to that and then we met up with them. I left the girls in the hands of some coworkers and Pete and I headed home. I am so excited that tomorrow is a holiday (not that I will get much sleep - I am fully expecting a 6 o'clock hour wake up call.

Love Having the Girls Around

I love having my girls around - it's just like old times. I wish they could stay until we leave for the summer. They spent the day at "The Big Buddha," which Pete and I still haven't gone to. Then they came over for dinner and we've just spent the evening chatting. Love it.

Here's Pete getting ready for the BBQ tomorrow night.

Busy, Busy Weekend

We have had lots of fun this weekend with the girls. Friday night we took them to Jumbo - the "floating" restaurant near our house. It was lots of fun. Saturday we headed out to Shek O, the fun little beach town we discovered a few months ago. We had a couple of great meals there and relaxed in the sun. Then, today we took them to Dim Sum in the morning and Stanley in the afternoon. Lucy has been great - she just tags along with us and doesn't seem to mind, even though we have completely thrown her off her schedule. I almost forgot that we had to work tomorrow - it just seems like we are on vacation with them.

The girls are here!

Kimberly and Lorissa are here! Whoopee! I've only snapped one picture so far, but I wanted to post it quick before we head out for dinner. It's going to be a busy 10 days, but I'll try to take lots of pictures for you all!


Jess and Doug - I wanted to write a note on your blog, but I didn't have time. Congrats on the new house! Yeah! Happy moving!

Why didn't anyone tell me?

I had no idea that there were so many P-Town blogs out there until I visited Sandy's blog today. I love that so many of you are blogging! It is such a great way to be connected to home and cure my homesickness that creeps in from time to time. As you can see, my "Family Ties" section is lacking a little - Kate? Syd? Mom? Dad? Marge? Norm? I think it's time you created a blog of your own!
Pete will be home late tomorrow night. We can't wait to see him!
Lucy had a fun day today. Marianne brought her to school and we went swimming with a bunch of other moms and babies all around Lucy's age. It was so fun - I loved it. I had signed up to take Cantonese lessons on Wednesdays, but I think I'm going to take Lucy swimming instead. It is much more rewarding that spending an hour learning that the word "si" has five very different meanings when said in slightly different tones. What I mean by that is: There's a slim to none chance that I will ever learn Cantonese and Slim just left town.
This is what Lucy did when we got home from swimming ... playing is hard work!

Later on she tried to reenact that fun of the day during bath time.

Happy Earth Day!

Just a quick note and a picture. Bob and Jen are over for dinner tonight to keep me company and I am being antisocial in the bedroom doing a blog. Gotta run! Happy Earth Day!

Story of Stuff

This video takes about 20 minutes to watch, but I think it is worth it. I can't tell you how often I worry about the future of our planet and what we are leaving for the next generation - especially now that my next generation has a face and is learning to crawl.

For more information you can go to www.storyofstuff.com

And for today's Lucy Fix ... here is the picture we emailed Daddy after bath time. Both of us can't wait for him to come home!

Typhoons, China, and a New Obsession

First of all, we woke up to complete calm this morning. The storm had passed and the sun was shining. As long as it doesn't get too bad or too scary, it's all kind of a fun experience.
Secondly, Pete left for China today. He'll be gone for four nights and I'm already wondering how I am going to make it that long without him. I know, I know, I am the cheesiest person alive, but I don't mean to sound like that. The thing about doing what we have been doing the last few years is that we are together all the time. I'm completely not used to being by myself anymore. He's been gone for six hours and I already want him home now. I'm going to console myself, however, by watching a chick flick tonight that Pete would never watch with me. At least that will be positive side. :)
Thirdly, I'm obsessed with my camera and taking pictures. I just uploaded 83 pictures and most of them are of Lucy doing the same thing over and over again. The problem is that if I don't go through and erase the ones I don't like I am going to use up all the memory on our computer. It's much more fun to take them than to erase them. Here are a few highlights from the past few days. By the way, as you can see from the pictures, Lucy has learned how to pull herself up on the couch. She's not super good at it yet - it takes a few tries, but the girl keeps trying until she does it. The problem is that once she's up, she's like, "Cool, I'm up ... I guess I can let go now because obviously I am stable and will not fall." The girl is fearless. I can't tell you how many times I have caught her falling in the last few days.

Typhoon Season Begins

Don't freak out (especially our parents and especially Kimberly and Lorissa who are days away from arrival), but we are in the middle of a typhoon here in Hong Kong. We are currently at a level 3 warning with a black rain cloud warning (the black rain cloud is the highest level I think). It is supposed to all calm down tonight though, so we have just been enjoying the storm from our little apartment on the 42nd floor that overlooks the South China Sea. Pete is really hoping it all calms down tomorrow, as he is leaving for a week-long trip to China with the 8th graders. We'll keep you posted.
Here is a video of today's events ... Lucy enjoyed the weather. We took her back inside right after this, so don't worry.

More crawling

Here's yet another video of Lucy crawling. I know I am obsessed with this, but I can't believe we are at the crawling stage already. It's crazy!

Love my new camera

O.K., I know these aren't the best pictures in the world, but can I say I love my new camera? Love it.

She's a-crawlin' ... pretty much

Of course right before I recorded this she was powering down the hall, full-speed ahead. She takes probably six "steps" that look like how you imagine crawling and then sprawls out on her stomach and starts scooting. It's too cute. Notice my amazing mothering skills as she spits up and then crawls through it ... nice. It doesn't get better than that.

One more from vacay

Today was hectic! Pete and I went grocery shopping right when we got home from work and once we got home it was time to make dinner and put the shmoo to bed (simultaneously, which doesn't quite work.) Anyway, I didn't get a chance to take any pictures of the shmoo tonight. I will, however, take some tomorrow on my NEW camera! Yeah! Aside from groceries, Pete and I also finally purchased my Christmas present - a Nikon D80. I am so excited I can barely handle it. I told Pete that aside from really important gifts like wedding rings and such, this is the most excited I have been since I got my first set of skis. I know nothing about using this mammoth camera, so I have a lot to learn, but hopefully I'll catch on quickly.
Anyway, instead of picture, here is a video I didn't post before from our trip. Ignore the fact that I hadn't cleaned Lucy's face in a while :)

Lucy's New Toys

Saturday we woke up and decided it was time upgrade some of Lucy's stuff. So, we headed to Toys R Us (a place I really haven't spent much time in since I purchased two records -yes, records- Michael Jackson and Footloose. Both had pictures on both sides of the record that I loved to look at while memorizing the words to "Thriller." I guess I'll probably be spending more time there for other reasons in the next few years.) She got a new high chair, a new bath seat, a play station, and some mats for the floor. Hardwood is really, really hard (ironically, haha) when you are learning to crawl. Check out her new gear :)

Last day in Chiang Mai

I think these pictures finish up the trip. On one of our last days in Chiang Mai we toured around the city and visited a couple of wats right in town. I guess wats in Thailand are like cathedrals in Europe - after awhile they all start to look the same, but it was neat to see nonetheless.




Here's a video of Lucy being silly while we were playing cards. She totally cracks us up.

Cards and Cooking

O.K., I've looked through the rest of the pictures and it looks like after tomorrow's post I can move on to other things. :)
Here are a couple pics of the cooking class we took.


They even had a place for Lucy to hang out while we cooked. It was great!

I LOVE Thai food - it is one of my favorite types of food, so I was so excited to learn how to make my favorite recipes. At the top of the list is Panang curry! My favorite Thai food (until this point) came from Thai Tom in Seattle (I can just see Annie grimacing right now). Pete and I used to eat it once a week when we lived there and since then I have search the globe to find Panang Curry that is at good as Thai Tom. Now, I found it - and I can make it myself. Yeah! We also learned how to make Phad Thai, Tom Yum Soup, Stir Fried Veggies, and sweet sticky rice with mango. Sticky rice with mango may sound gross, but don't knock it 'till you've tried it. It's awesome!

This is what we spent a LOT of time doing. Pete and I have played cribbage and rummy in over 20 countries now. I'd say we're pretty close to being tied for wins in cribbage, but my rummy skills need some work. Pete wins most of the time, which gets me all fired up and makes me want to play more and more. Eventually, Pete declares it's time to go back to playing cribbage - he probably gets bored of winning!
As you can see, Lucy took our card tournaments as an opportunity to get in some more daddy naps.

Wats

I promise that I will get done posting about our trip soon, but I think I still have a couple of days to go. I'm sleepy tonight, so I am going to make this short and sweet: These are pictures of a very cool wat (Buddhist Temple) that we visited on our tour.





And just for fun, here is a video of Lucy from today. Enjoy. She is getting so big.

Elephants

Now back to more pictures from the trip ...
One day in Chiang Mai we took a trip to the Elephant Conservatory. It was very cool to see the elephants close up. Next time Marge asks me what my favorite animals are, one of them will definitely be the elephant. For the remainder of the trip I was obseessed with elephants and any thing that had elephants on it.
Here's Lucy in a cute elephant hat ... can you tell by my red face, dripping with sweat that it was HOOOOOTTTTTT outside?

We opted out of an elephant ride, but that option is available if you ever want to go.


Here are the elephants taking a bath. The people in the blue uniforms have signed up to be an elephant trainer for a week. They go to the conservatory specifically to get some hands on time with the elephants.

Cute babies.

Lucy getting a close-up with one of them.

Six Months ... Can you believe it?

Lucy is six months old today! I can't believe how fast time has gone. Everyone tells you when they are first born that the time will fly. I didn't believe it at first ... that first month seemed pretty long, I think, but once we got the hang of things, time has flown by. Our cute little baby is growing up so fast! She will be crawling before we know it - even now she can pretty much get to where she wants to go.
I normally don't give myself too many props on the blog, but I feel the need to give myself a "shout out" today on Lucy's six month birthday - I achieved a huge goal: Six months of breastfeeding, while working full time (at least for most of it)! Whoppee! I estimated today that I have pumped around 300 times. It actually hasn't been nearly as bad as I thought it would be; however, with that said, I am giving myself permission to quit any time I want now. We took Lucy to the doctor today and he said that I have done a good job and it is fine if I want quit now. My plan is to do it slowly over the next few months and, hopefully, be done by summer. Lucy is pretty o.k. with formula, so I'm not too worried about the day time - it's just the night that will be hard to give up. I guess we'll just take it as it comes. Anyway, I'm sure you don't want to her about my breastfeeding triumphs and tribulations, but it has been a huge part of my life since Lucy was born, so I wanted to share it here.
Like I said, we took Lucy to the doctor today. Here are her stats: Head circumference, 97th percentile; Height, still 90th percentile; weight 75th percentile (a bit over 17 pounds). Her weight is probably a bit down due to being sick and to being so much more active lately. I secretly hope it also means she has her dad's metabolism - Lord knows mine isn't one of my most stellar genes I could pass on. :)
Tomorrow I will return to pictures of our trip, but for now - happy six month birthday sweet girl!
Oh, one more thing ... Happy Birthday Auntie Ali! We all send you lots of love, hugs, and kisses!