bonnie & jason

Happy Thanksgiving, 2008

No Wangsgiving this year, but I did make an apple pie (from scratch thank you) to bring over to the family get together later tonight.

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I thought I’d put a short list of things we’re thankful for this year.
1. First and foremost, we’re thankful that we’re healthy and that Alissa (and the twins) are developing just fine. Along those lines, our ultrasound appointment yesterday revealed that Bonnie’s bedrest is working very well so that makes us feel less nervous about pre-term labor.

2. Especially in these economic times, we’re thankful that I still have a good job that I like and is flexible enough to allow me to spend time with my (growing) family.

3. Finally, I’m thankful that we have such a strong support group of family and friends to share all of our experiences with.

I’ll close with a picture of Alissa from last year:

Next year, Thanksgiving will be very different with an almost three year old and two nine month olds at our feet. Ai-ya!

EDIT: More pictures from Thanksgiving day.

Alissa spent some time chasing and making bubbles:

At Bonnie’s cousins’ house, it seems the kids will soon outnumber the adults:

Nicholas’ red egg and ginger party

Another weekend chock full of fun. The first order of the day was for Alissa to wear a dress that Bonnie made her for the first time:

What’s the occasion? Nicholas’ red egg and ginger party. It seems like we go to one of these every month these days. I guess we’re just in that phase of our lives. If it’s not a red egg and ginger party, it’s a kiddie birthday party. Soon enough it will be recitals and plays and soccer games. I’m starting to see the genesis of the mid-life crisis! =)

Before I get too far ahead of myself, here are a couple more pictures from the party.



This last one is a 2/3 preview of what I have in store for me. The other preview I got was watching Alissa spend about an hour chasing after all the little boys. Andrew seemed to be particularly fun to chase, probably because he’s closest in age to her. He was also the first boy to kiss her so that might have something to do with it. Of course, he was like 8 months and she was about 4 months or something like that at the time so I’m not sure if that really counts. Regardless, will be interesting to see how all these kids grow up together.

So after a brief rest at home, we made our way down to Deeann and Calvin’s place for a feast of a dinner prepared by Deeann’s aunt and uncle.

Man, such great food! It was like going to a fancy wedding banquet except the food was tastier! After stuffing ourselves while watching the Eagles lose a close game to the Bears (Boo!), we observed Alissa and Abigail play sort of together.

Alissa was really into the pretend tea party. Abigail was amazing with her letters. And otherwise, the two kinda played in parallel. Again, it will be fun watching them grow up together. It’s going to just get more hectic once we throw the twins in the mix along with whomever else happens to be born over the next few years. Remember that game, “Life?” I guess it’s not a game anymore!

Alemany Farmer’s Market

We went to the Alemany Farmer’s Market this morning with Connor, Jen, and Ken. We’ve driven by it a bunch of times before but never took the time to actually go. So today, we ended up going, looking, and buying. The tomatoes were really good and we picked up some grapes and kettle corn as well. Here are a few pics of the produce:

Totally off topic, but here are some pictures of Alissa making her self comfortable in Bonnie’s body pillow and boppy:

First annual family BBQ

We’ve been anticipating today as the day we share our big news with Bonnie’s family at the first annual family BBQ down at Rengstorff Park in Mountain View. As you may remember from the last post, Bonnie’s plan was to have Alissa be the bearer of good news. Here she is, posing for a shot at home and again, hamming it up at the park.

I think everyone had a good time. First, the park was setup very well. The picnic area was really clean and organized. We were all especially impressed with the size, cleanliness, and features of the grill setup. Also, the tennis, pool, and field facilities were very well maintained and not too crowded. We took advantage of all three, kicking off what will surely become the traditional Dodge Ball match.

Otherwise, there was lots of grilling, eating, and playing going on.

And we did somehow manage to collect everyone for a group picture:

All in all, a very fun day. But pretty tiring too! It was fun to share our news and receive everyone’s congratulations (and condolences =P). But between all the packing, unpacking, tennis, dodge ball, grilling, taking pictures, eating, drinking, talking, sharing, driving, and finally blogging, I’m pretty beat. With that I’ll close by saying thanks to everyone for coming and making the day so fun. Thanks especially to Deeann for taking care of the park reservations and bringing her famous marinated chicken. (Rest of the pictures here.)

Sunday meanderings

We spent the first half of Sunday hitting some San Francisco “hot spots.” First, we picked up Jeff and Xiao Yi at the Legion of Honor to go to brunch at Ella’s. We tried out their corned beef hash with big chunks of lean corned beef, the pancakes which are about 8″ across and super fluffy and tasty, the folded egg omelet with sweet corn, roasted cherry tomatoes, and yummy cheese, and finally, the chicken hash which had a nice farm fresh taste with a thyme and sage herb treatment.

Since the wait was so long, however, we spent an hour walking around the pacific heights neighborhood. Man, there are some fantastic houses up there. From modern, to neo-classical, to roman, to cottage, they were all huge and had great views. One was a little strange as it had this statue standing guard out front:

After lunch, we drove to Fort Point and walked over to Sports Basement and back. Alissa was a bit grouchy as her sleep schedule was a little messed up from having some friends over last night, but she enjoyed the walk for the most part. Her highlights were the plethora of dogs out and about.

I also took a few pics of Jeff and Xiao Yi taking advantage of some of the background scenery:

All in all, a great day. Great friends, great food, great views, and even a little exercise. What else can you ask for? (All of the pictures here.)

July 4th fun

Not too much going on this weekend except a small BBQ today and dinner for Bonnie’s mom’s birthday tomorrow. Here are a few pictures from the last week or so:


We bought Alissa a tiny bike with training wheels but it’s not tiny enough… Alissa can’t reach the pedals. So I guess she’ll have to keep riding her little scooter.

She likes walking around the house with just one of Bonnie’s slippers on.

Alissa plays Wii Fit too. She’s pretty good at imitating our movements in the ski jump, hula hoop (which she pronounces, “who who who”), and some yoga poses. We also gave her one of my old physics books (good ole Tipler) for her to use as her own balance board.

Daddy’s little bear.

Right before The Wong’s left today, I took a few pictures of the kids in their jammies. Alissa snuck in a kiss or two. And even some hugs (although some of them look more like headlocks.)

Memorial Day BBQ with Bonnie’s cousins

Most of you know Bonnie has a ginormous extended family. As such, sometimes it’s tough to see everyone on a regular basis as folks are busy with school/work/family/etc. So, as an excuse to get together, we had a BBQ down in Mountain View today (kudos to Vivian for the idea and Deeann for the park). It turned out to be a great day! Not too hot, not too cold. Great food. Some fast and furious frisbee/football/tennis action. (Vicki Chan and I have Vivian Chan and Calvin lined up for Double Trouble Part Deaux at the next BBQ.) And the never ending entertainment that toddlers provide. Anyway, here’s an illustrated review with my usual running commentary. The entire album is here.

Deeann, queen of the soy/ginger chicken/steak.

Said soy/ginger chicken. Looks good, doesn’t it? We also had ribs, burgers, sausages, corn, two fruit salads, potato salad, smores, rice crispy treats, and a bunch of different drinks.

Alissa and Megan have similar “backpacks.” Alissa has the monkey, Megan has the doggie. If you didn’t notice, the “tails” act as leashes. I prefer to call them “safety restraints.”

Girl Power!

Kissing cousins. Alissa likes to kiss everyone, especially kids, these days. It’s to the point now when we’re out in public and there are other little kids around, we have to pull her back. She also likes to hug and pet kids’ heads. Hopefully this phase will pass quickly.

Alissa may be turning into a bit of a ham.

Alissa managed to get the monkey off her back. (HAH!)

And apparently, this signaled that she was the dominant toddler and ready to feed Megan to which Megan apparently agreed?! These have to be the funniest pictures I’ve ever taken… it was even funnier in person. Especially with Vicki’s commentary that Megan won’t let her or Tony feed her.

The now dethroned dominant toddler literally up in arms with the new regime. She took her aggression out on the adult empire later in the afternoon with what can only be described as Lollapapoopa.

Tony can throw a Frisbee really well. Hitting a tennis ball is more of a developing skill.

Look at that extension!

Karate chop!

Such balance and grace! (And mega-cool awesome sunglasses that exude sex appeal.)

It’s all about the follow through.

More good follow through.

Less good follow through.

Good times, good times.

P.S. For anyone interested, these were all taken with a 20D and 100mm 2.8 macro lens.

Bonnie birthday dinner #1

We had Aidan, Eric, and Kathy over to help celebrate Bonnie’s birthday tonight. I made some parmesan seared scallops, potatoes lyonnaise, garlic bread, and pasta. Overall, I give myself a 7 out of 10 on the meal.

I tried a Michael Mina recipe for the scallops, but I thought the presentation was a bit bland. Also, I substituted pancetta with turkey bacon (which were a bit overcooked) and the potatoes that were supposed to go along with them were way too mushy.

The Lyonnaise recipe I tried was pretty good, but I think they called for too much butter. I should have halved it since I thought they were a bit greasy.

Finally, even though I thought I did a pretty good job getting everything ready at the same time, by the time we sat down to eat, everything kinda cooled down a bit. I have a new respect for caterers who are able to serve hundreds of people hot food.

Otherwise, even with the mediocre food, we had a good time. Eric and Kathy brought a tasty birthday cake and Bonnie made some cupcakes. Alissa and Aidan seemed to enjoy themselves as well. Here are some pictures:

Alissa eating noodles

We had wontons and noodles tonight for dinner. Alissa just had the noodles. It was messy. The series is here.

And here are a couple favorites:

Back from Vegas

We’re back from our holiday trip to Vegas to visit my family and there’s a lot to share!

First off, we ended up driving since plane tickets around the holidays were so expensive. The Pilot only ended up getting about 20 mpg so we probably spent one plane ticket’s worth on gas. Here are some shot of Alissa in her new car seat, ready for her longest drive ever:

PEACE OUT!

Mmm… elephant

Alissa was actually amazingly well behaved throughout the drive. She slept through most of it and only complained if the sun was in her eyes and towards the end of the trip when we were all itching to get out and stretch our legs. It probably would have been even easier except we ran into a lot of holiday traffic when we merged with the Socal holiday travelers on I-15. All in all, with four stops for breakfast, lunch, milk, dinner, it took us 13 hours. A long day, but overall, not a bad drive.

Once we got there, we were afraid Alissa wasn’t going to sleep since she had napped so much during the drive. Fortunately, that was not the case as can be seen here:

The next few days were spent walking around some new shopping areas, eating, playing Wii, opening presents… typical family time stuff.

Alissa loves her new bundle-me and hat

But it messes up her hair

Hanging out with great-grandma

The tree Anna had mailed to grandma!

Playing with grandpa

Massive bedhead

Christmas morning presents

For some reason, Alissa loves the wind in her face

Xmas display at the Bellagio

Alissa “playing” Wii

Mmm… hotpot

The drive home was easier than the drive in since there was much less traffic. However, it did have one dramatic section around Edwards AFB where we had to drive through a sandstorm! As we approached, it just looked like a dusty cloud, but once we got closer, we could clearly see a it was much much more.

Here’s a video of the ordeal:

Driving through sandstorm from Jason Wang on Vimeo.

All in all, a pretty good trip despite having the Pilot sand blasted. (It seems to be ok…) We probably won’t be doing this drive all that often since flights to Vegas are usually pretty cheap. But it’s good to know that Alissa is capable of tolerating such a long drive.