Phuong's an amazing worker; she shopped at 7 stores yesterday and 3 this morning to put together the Mother's Spa Day at our church, and is also putting together the baby shower for the Barkowskis tomorrow. She stayed up late last night preparing stuff, and got up early this morning to finish things off. The only thing she asked me to do was to take the kids for the day, which sometimes turns out into a bit of an adventure for me, but I was happy to be able to spend some time with my kids.

My plan was pretty simple; take them to 3rd Street Promonade and then perhaps to the LA Festival of Books at UCLA afterward. After lunch though, it was pretty clear the kids were tired and so we just went home to rest and cook dinner for Mommy instead.



Waiting for the bus...





The girls ask to have their pics taken.





The kids love the dinosaur fountain on the Broadway end of the promonade. We bought a bus card at the Big Blue Bus store near there and the cashier gave us three free keychains!



After we picked up a couple of footbags at REI, Kaitie asked to go to the Lighthouse (an inexpensive asian sushi buffet) for lunch, and the kids were pretty well-behaved while we were there so it wasn't too crazy (I could leave them at the table while I sprinted to and from the food counters to keep up with their demands). As a treat they got sushi-shaped lollipops for dessert.







For dinner, the girls and I made pork and shrimp won tons. It was a team effort from start to finish, and the girls were justifiably proud of their handiwork. Getting ready for bed, I heard them talking to each other about their favorite parts of the day, which made me feel undeservedly lucky to have days like this.

Since our families are up in the Bay Area, we end up driving back and forth a few times a year.  The drive from San Jose to Los Angeles seems to have two bottlenecks during crunch times (like this weekend) - the 152 east of Gilroy and the 5 right before Lost Hills.  While there's little that can be done with the heavy traffic near Lost Hills, we've been taking an alternate route to hit the 152 that has saved us an hour or more during our drive home after Thanksgiving.

Speaking of driving, Andy treated me out to lunch yesterday (thanks Andy!) and the subject of biking to work came up.  My office is about 5 miles away, so it might be do-able and I rather badly need the exercise, but I'm concerned about the level of safety biking on local streets which are pretty narrow and/or hi-speed in our area.  I haven't biked in SoCal, and was curious if anyone had any experience to share about cycling to work.

We're up in the Bay Area enjoying time with family right now, having fun and eating well already.    'Hope everyone will have a great Thanksgiving holiday!

 (Daylight savings, I resent you so, but your demise tonight has gifted me the time to write this, so I dedicate this post to you.)

Letting five months pass between journal entries kind of misses the point of a journal, and makes it real hard to pick up again.  I'll miss a lot of important stuff in this post, but oh well.

The makeup of our household has changed with the graduation and departure to NorCal of our good friend Alice last month.  After a bit over two years living with us and commuting to CSULA, she's received her biochem degree and moved back home.  She was a terrific roomate and the kids have become really close to her, so it was a big transition for all of us.  But we're happy for her and she plans to visit regularly so we're adjusting.

With our 2nd bedroom no longer occupied by Alice, we tried something that Phuong's been wanting to try for a while - we hosted a couple of exchange students.  Last Friday, Hitomi and Mizuki arrived from Japan to attend a 5-day program for students studying hair styling.  They were very excited to be in the US and we had a good time taking them out to eat and to go shopping.  While we had a hard time communicating, I think they really got attached to us and our kids, and we got to be fond of them; it was a sad parting.  Because their stay was so brief, we spent a lot of energy while they were here to try to connect with them and we were pretty exhausted towards the end of it.  We were very happy to have done it and we really enjoyed the experience, but we're not sure if we would do it again unless our schedules lighten up a bit.  But we really hope we'll see Hitomi and Mizuki again sometime in the future.

We went to four weddings the space of six weeks - it was a very fun and very social time, particularly since we got to see several old friends and boths sides of our families.  Not all news was happy, however - a couple of months ago my aunt was diagnosed with cancer and my cousin's son (the groom's nephew at one of the weddings mentioned) was diagnosed with leukemia.  I got a chance to see my aunt at my dad's birthday party, and was glad to see all my relatives doing everything they could to support her.

Our kids continue to grow and develop in new and mysterious ways.  They exasperate us with their selfishness and mean-spiritedness one minute, and surprise us with their tenderness and compassion the next.  I think Kaitie is learning how to look out for her younger siblings, and recognizing the special nature of family relationships, at least sometimes.  She's developed a bit of a temper and will shout and scream for a while, but at the end of the day she'll still stick up for her sister and ask to be held just because.

Krista is FUNNY.  She loves mirrors - she'll put on an outfit and smile at herself in the mirror.  When she gets in trouble and starts crying, she'll watch herself crying in the mirror.  She'll run up to you, stop and pinch you, then just run away, then do it again a minute later.  She follows Kaitie in everything, mimicing her moods and decisions.  I think most of their fights start when Kaitie begins resenting that.

Then there's Sammy.  Poor Sam patiently endures the unfathomable whims and wiles of his sisters, until they go too far and he starts looking around for Mommy or Daddy to rescue him.  Perhaps that's why he's taken so quickly to his walker - he loves to scoot around and the mobility lets him have some control over his situation.  But lately I think he can tell he needs to compete for the attention of parents, and for him attention means being held, so he's starting to be more insistent on being held a lot.  He ain't heavy, so we don't mind too much.  He'll be too old to be held like that much too soon.

We've been fortunate in so many ways, and despite all the stumbling and mistakes we make along the way, God is faithful and our lives are full (although we wouldn't mind if a little more sleep were to be sent our way )  We celebrated seven happy years together last month, and I still can't keep my eyes off of the pretty young lady in the picture.