7/7/2003

Monday

After a lengthy period of fabulously moderate temperatures in the Southern California, the mercury finally shot up into the 90's for our Indepent holiday weekend. How was our July 4th's weekend? Here you go...

July 4th, Friday

We departed from home at 1:00pm (due to Edward had to work from home in the morning-on call-Red Alert) & went to Discovery Science Center. We spent 3 hours there. Kids like that place. It's definitely better than the Kids Museum. It's a good place to go. I think Alan will like that place very much.

We left the Science Center at 4:50pm & had an early dinner at El Torito Mexican Restaurant in Anaheim. When we walked into the Disneyland, face to face to the big crowd, that was 7:00pm. We went on the train & went to the Tomorrow land to take the ride of "Stars Tour" & "Honey I shrunk the audience",watched the 8:00pm parade plus the firework at 9:30pm. We arrived home at 10:50pm.

July 5th, Saturday

We were resting at home till evening. We went to the Flamenco Dinner Show. At Café Sevilla in Riverside, it's absolutely lovely, romantic and a bit exotic". But I think to your guests, this is not a good choice. The price is too high. We spent about $260 there for 6 people. The program was not the greatest in town. For the price I paid, I expect to get the better program than that. But all my 3 kids & my mom were enjoying the show very much!

July 6th, Sunday

We departed from home at 11:00am & had a lunch picnic there at the Getty Center Museum. On the way home we went to Golden Deli-the authentic Vietnamese Cuisine at San Gabriel for early dinner. Our kids joined the Artful workshop. I sat on the floor with my kids just to draw & copy the portrait hanging on the wall inside the museum. That was part of the workshop. My kids were very enjoying the trip. We also joined two mini tours (30 to 45minutes for each tour) to look around their Gardening & Architecture of the building. We would like to go back there this summer. The Getty Museum is really a friendly place for kids & families to visit.

7/15/2003

Tuesday

At this hot days of summer, I feel home is the only safe spot for me to stay away from the heat. We didn't went out last weekend. But we were quite busy & had big fun at home. We had our good neighbor Alan with us, two surprise visitors-Howard(Andrew's friend) & Otto (our children's cousin) joined us on last Saturday. Last Saturday morning at 9:30am,I received a call from Howard's mom & in 2 minutes he was arrived our front door. Otto came in at 11:00am. He brought us a big ice cream cake. His parents, which is my sister & my brother-in-law were came as well. Otto's parents was planned to have a Birthday Party for Otto at our house. Since I didn't get informed, I was totally surprised but enjoy this special event. After Nellie's dance class & Charles, Andrew's Conversational Spanish Class, all our children & guests were sang Happy Birthday song to Otto. We did in English & Chinese version. Otto's real 7 years old birthday was on July 10, last Thursday. We had a Happy Belated Birthday party for Otto!! That was fun!!

With kids, we can do video game, movie, ice cream break, cookie break, cake break. We can do painting, word finder contest & piano recital. It was another wonderful weekend.

By the way, I just bought more colorful clay, big fat pencil, colorful painting tool & plain drawing book for Alan, Charles, Andrew & Nellie. I bought 4 pcs for each item. I am ready to teach them drawing every weekend. We'll make a artful weekend!!

I have quite experience to put 4 of them together to work as a team now. I like to see them love each other & become a good sharer to each other eventually. Edward still work 7 days a week. That gives me more time only focus on our children after work.

Our children are growing so fast. Charles already told me that he is too heavy for me to lift him up. Last night after I hugged Andrew in my room, I called Charles, he said so. Well, at least now the baby girl-Nellie & baby boy-Andrew are still like to have me to hug & lift them up. Charles & Andrew being play piano every morning & night. Last night after we played the Go game; Edward, me, Andrew & Charles we were played the ocarina. Nellie was played the bamboo flu. We made big pleasant noise. We all enjoyed the night. Life is beautiful with the people you love.

7/25/2003

Friday

It's a busy week. Grandma planning to go back to Taiwan. She already stop working at our home since last weekend. This is not the first time, we are just doing fine. Life is full of challenge but we are always looking at the positive side of our life.

Our children's summer activities are just all the way fun, fun, fun... Charles & Andrew are good at swimming & play better piano now. They being swimming & practice piano everyday. Their Chinese & Spanish class are going well. We are super busy here. I am now ready to pick them up at Chinese School. Later Edward & our entire family will send Charles to play Go Game. While Charles have his Go Game class for 2 hours, the rest of us will go to one of our favorite restaurant to have a nice dinner...

We'll go watch the new released movie: Spy Kids 3 tomorrow at 7:05pm. This is requested by our 3 kids. They are going to use their good credit award to exchange this movie.

7/30/2003

Wednesday

This is just another busy week.... Grandma was back to Taiwan last Sunday. We are pretty much on our own now. I really enjoy to spend more time with our children. Andrew & Nellie both are quit from diaper at bed time. This is the 3rd day without any incident happened. How nice! We don't need the diaper any more! It's great to celebrate this big progress tonight. We'll go to El Torito Restaurant after the swimming class. The following is some highlight for this coming weekend.

This & next Friday night Charles has no Go Game. Due to there's a National wide Go Game tournament going on this & next week. His teacher will be out of town for the event. We have two free Friday night!! We'll go to Disney this Friday evening after 6:00pm & come home after the firework. This is the only way to escape from the heat. We try not to get too much suntan.

Saturday

Edward has to work. I am planning to take our kids to "Planes of Fame Air Museum". The first aviation museum in the west , now features a new jet aircraft museum. World War II Cal Aero Field-Chino Airport.( www.planesoffame.org ) We'll depart from home at 1:00pm & come back around 6:00pm.

Sunday 10:00am-12:00pm Artful Class

we'll continue to do our "Artful class". I already mark on my calendar to conduct this class myself. I have total 4 students at my class, which is my 3 kids plus our good neighbor Alan. This will be the year round program. It's nothing about math, reading but artful stuffs every Sunday morning. We like to have routine life, it's easy to follow the pattern, that make children feel secure this way.To Alan & Charles: This class focuses on developing skills for 3d drawings. We'll use different materials to help them understand their differences and their uniqueness and can change it from typical boring drawing to more active, and fun activities.

To Andrew & Nellie: They will learn to be more creative with their 2D drawings. Since they already learn the basic shapes like Triangles, Squares, Rectangles, Circles, Ellipses, through drawing of simple animals and insects. With added creative colors, they'll learn about these colors and how to use them.

Sunday 12:00pm-4:00pm Lunch/Words Finder Contest/Piano Recital/

We'll have Thai BBQ Chicken, Fry Rice for lunch. After lunch we'll do Words Finder Contest. Piano Recital& Story time. Please bring Alan's dictionary & Piano Book. The story we'll read is "Harry Potter, Book I". Charles & Andrew both enjoy reading that book very much. Alan, Charles& Andrew, each person has to read one paragraph at a time. The reading part may last for one hour. Each person have total 20 minutes to read his own part. We'll have afternoon snake time before we start to do the Gaming.

Sunday afternoon-4:00pm-8:00pm Gaming Time
Alan, Charles, Andrew will play the video game or watch the movie. Each person will have total one hour time to play their favorite game. Every 20 minutes we need to alternate the player with the next person. Dinner will be the Pizza. (Now, you see we take the "Grandma Not Home Menu".) Please don't buy the Pizza for us though. I haven't try to bake the Pizza by myself yet. I really want to try it. Let me go to Costco tomorrow to get a big giant frozen pizza & see how it goes. We'll make Strawberry, blueberry, raspberry, blackberry, "all berries milk shake" for our dinner dessert. They will participate to make their own dessert.

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