bonnie & jason

Trip back east

Our annual pilgrimage back east almost didn’t happen this year. First, we weren’t sure we wanted to schlep everyone cross country to begin with. Second, with Amanda being susceptible to viruses, and the whole swine flu thing, traveling seemed a bit risky. And finally, after we had made arrangements to go after all, Alissa ended up with a fever the night before we were scheduled to leave. In the end, we decided that the trip wasn’t going to get any easier, Amanda would be fine and they do have doctors in New Jersey anyway, and Alissa’s fever broke before we had to leave for the airport so off we went.

All in all, it was a great trip. For the first half of the trip, the plan was to stay with Vin, Denise, Henry, and Gunther. While we were there, Jenny visited with her daughter Maddie. Last time we were in town, Jenny was just a few days short of giving birth, Denise was pregnant with Henry, and we just had Alissa. So lunch was a pretty straight forward affair with all the adults and just one baby. How things have changed! Here’s a pic with the babies and most of the adults.

And here’s me with all the babies:

And Henry having his way with Ashley:

Good times.

Part two of the trip was to attend Mary’s wedding. We hadn’t seen Mary in a while and were excited to witness her happy day and to meet her now husband. This is the first trip where I didn’t bring my big camera gear but here are a few pics I took with our point and shoot:

From the wedding, we were supposed to go stay with my cousin Anna but Aidan was just getting over the flu and we didn’t want to risk the kids getting sick so we ended up staying with Geoff and Asha that night. They were very gracious hosts especially considering the last minute situation and the fact that it’s no small feat to accommodate all five of us. Kiran and Alissa got along fine even though he’s a little bit older.

The next day, we went to the Pepsi headquarter’s sculpture garden.

Then it was back to the Chao residence for the remainder of our stay (after a short visit with my cousin… poor Aidan was sequestered 100 feet away). Henry was happy to see us again. More specifically, he was happy to see Ashley and her feet.

That Henry is a character:

So all in all, even though it was a very demanding trip both physically and emotionally, it was well worth it to spend time with the friends and family we don’t get to see very often. Will we do it again next year. Hmm… we’ll see. I should have taken a picture of us trying to wrangle the two infant seats, two strollers, one car seat, three pieces of luggage, and of course, the three kids. Thankfully, we got help from random strangers on both the flight out and the flight back. On the flight out, the person sitting next to Bonnie was a mom to three kids, two of whom were twins. So she was both sympathetic and also took a stint holding Amanda for a while. On the way back, a nice man helped us with our luggage out to baggage claim. He was also a parent of twins. Anyway, like I said, we’ll see.

Amanda and Ashley’s Red Egg and Ginger Party

Two years ago, we hosted a couple hundred people at the Moonstar in San Francisco for Alissa’s red egg and ginger party. This time around, we ended up with mostly the same crowd at the Daly City Moonstar since the San Francisco one closed down (I think.) Also, the Daly City one is newer and nicer, probably a little closer to us in driving time, and parking is much easier.

We did Kit Kat bars along side bubbles for the kids and twin lady bug magnets for every family instead of the Trades Joe’s chocolate bars this time around. (Happy to offer these up for sale similar to how we did the ones for Alissa for those of you who are interested.)

My mom was able to make it out this time.

These are the four pictures we used in a big frame.

Otherwise, we feel very lucky that so many of our friends and family were able to make it out. Too bad it’s impossible to spend as much time as we would like with everyone, but hopefully, we’ll be able to see folks a little more often now that the twins are a little bit older.

I’d write more, but we’re all pretty pooped out. Here’s the rest of the pictures: http://flickr.com/gp/jasonwang/106988

The Olthofs visit

Our friends Bryan, Sijen, and their son, Lincoln, came down for a visit this past weekend. It’s been forever since we’ve seen them so it was nice to spend some good quality time together, even though last time we saw them, there were zero kids around whereas now there are four! A lot can change in a couple years…

Anyway, just a few pics from the weekend.

Lincoln is 7 months old but already about the same height as Alissa and just a few pounds lighter. That’s the difference between 100th percentile boy and a 3rd percentile girl.

Damn, that’s a lot of kids!

This is Sijen’s sister, Sybil, and Lincoln:

Alissa’s second birthday party

We just had a small group over for Alissa’s birthday party this year. Bonnie made a request for chicken cacciatore and a Panormous Pizza Hut Pizza. So I got up early and threw all the cacciatore stuff in the slow cooker for four hours and picked up a not quite ginormous panormous pizza after picking up the cake.

Here’s my attempt at making the pizza look bigger than it actually was:

Here’s Alissa enjoying my chicken cacciatore:

The Elmo and Big Bird cake from Lucky:

Another potential prom date for Alissa and her sisters

We went to visit the latest addition to Alissa and her sisters’ pool of prom dates, Gavin, earlier this week. I didn’t get to take any pictures because Alissa demanded to be held so she could see the baby. She was very good at narrating and pointing, “Baby!”, “Cry!”, “TV!”

Xiao-Yi and Jeff seem to be doing well, despite the big poop that we witnessed. It brought back a lot of memories… and also foreshadowed a bit of what we’ll be doing in the very near future. Here are some pics that Xiao-Yi took.

I took this not so good one:

Sweet Bea

Ravi and Jen stopped by today to introduce us to Bea (and drop off a couple trays of pasta for the poor housebound family.) We’ve been waiting to meet her for a while now and it was really nice of them to drop by, especially with food!

Anyway, I took a couple quick snaps. Isn’t she a cutie!?

Definitely a mellow baby. She sat there and looked around for a while before drifting off for a nap. Didn’t make a peep the whole time. Enjoy it before she turns into a little monster like Alissa!

Ashlyn’s first birthday party

Alissa made friends with yet another baby today at Ashlyn’s first birthday party. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to stay for the whole thing as it was way past Alissa’s nap time and she was getting cranky. As such, I didn’t take that many pictures (link to them here) but here are a few highlights.

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!

Reid’s third birthday

Another weekend, another birthday party! Alissa is very lucky to have so many friends. This time, we were at a park down in Atherton. After using chips to eat a bunch of salsa, she enjoyed some mango and chicken sausages followed by chocolate cake and lots of fruit. The jungle gym and swings next door also provided a bunch of entertainment but was overshadowed by Alissa’s first pinata experience. Hightlights below, entire album here.

Aidan’s 1st birthday party

Today was Aidan’s 1st birthday party at Kathy’s sister’s beautiful house in St. Francis Woods. As you’ll notice, Mickey Mouse was the theme. Aidan had a small nap half way through, but otherwise seemed happy to see all the friends and family who came to help celebrate. He even let Alissa sneak in a little smooch.

Before we left for the party, Alissa was busy with stickers and more corn. But she did let us put her in a skirt. It’s rare that the weather is nice enough to put her in one, so Bonnie took advantage.