Xmas 2013

For xmas we have been trying to instill the qualities of family and togetherness over all material items. As a result, we have asked our family to wrap each of their presents in one box, in case there are multiple gifts, so the kids do not keep asking, "Where's my next one." I guess it's, worked, kind of. They still made out like bandits. At least Kyran is 2 and big enough to open his own gifts so Syona isn't do double time.

We had the usual knuclehead party, followed by presents from santa and mom & dad and then presents with ba and dadu and then xmas with nainai.

It was great having Kelvin and baby Addison over from Texas. Logan and our kids had a blast setting up all the new fun car and flying fairy games, and I think uncle greg had fun too.

The kids woke up to santa presents as asked: a cars vacuum for kyran (:/) and princess tattoos, a magic wand, and a princess sofia dress from santa. Paul and I got the kids shiny new bikes that we assembled and place under the tree. Mid-morning, ba and dadu stopped by, got the kids a fun little car racer for the outdoors and a frozen doll and dress. We got ba and dadu some movie tickets to join us for an 11:30AM or so viewing of Frozen.

Nainai got Syona some roller skates, which Kyran was very envious of. We had fun opening presents with Paul's family at night with alarm clocks from uncle roi and kevin and princess and cars embroidered blankies from gou gou.

mother's day 2013 at MDA

So the kids performance was like 90 seconds long at their school this year and unfortunately i was 2 mins late coming from work so I literally missed it :( Not my proudest mom moment! But of course they are happy I am there and have little handmade gifts for me and cute little party in both classrooms. It's funny how since they are both their, and the parties are happening at the same time, I have to literally jump from one class to another to make both parties. Syona did an encore performance of her song for me which was sweet, and she likes the limelight anyways so it worked out.

i see you!

i have the best babies in the whole world (what i often tell them)

summer fun days at disney

I can't count how many times we will have gone to disney in 2013- year of the annual passes, but this place literally NEVER gets old for these little guys. Summer is fun because its HOT, we do the icecream during the parade or, Syona's favorite, during the fireworks. Always a change of princess clothes on hand, from Tangled, to tinkerbell, to sleeping beauty to belle, it's quite an adventure. I like to pack their clothes coordinating so they both wear their Jake & the Neverland Pirate shirts together, or syona wears tangled with her tangled dolls and Kyran wears his cars shirt and pullover top. The kids love swimming in the pool at 2pm and always seem to fall asleep on the way back to the hotel rooms. The best is happy hour on the way to Disney, which paul and I have mastered in our hotel rooms, keeping the party alive at California Adventure as well. Something to do for everyone!

syona on the carousel wearing tinkerbell

kyran running around before the parade

Syona and Muma Roadtrip to Disney

I wanted to do it! I thought it would be super fun for Syona and I to drive to LA together and have the boys meet us in anaheim! Just so happened I had a photo shoot on the day that we were planning to drive down, so I literally drove to Berkeley early in the AM, left the shoot late afternoon, picked up syona by 5:30 and literally did 3 Syona initiated pit-stops before even getting to highway 5. I was ecstatic that we made it to LA in one piece and had SO much fun on our Wonder Woman (we were the shirts all day) road trip and princess day together at disney!

syona as we embark. she put a random pink bow in her hair.

we made it! girls rule!

me and S at disney together in line to meet the princesses

Chatter bugs in the back seat

For a couple of months now, Kyran has really ramped up his capability in expressing himself with words, to mini sentences- he's at the point where you do a double take sometimes with what he just said (dada you eat it; Yona sticker please; no, i want it -usually his toothbrush- he always liked eating the kiddie toothpaste; muma sit down [and watch show with me] )



So today in the car ride home, sYona explicitly said she didn't want music or radio on. She just wanted to talk to kYran in the car. After eating their veggies fries, she started being sillY with kYran. At one point she started switching up the alphabet so that she say: Apple Bah Bah, Baby Aah Aah, Cookie Zz Zz... Basically teaching kYranYee the wrong thing. At first I was telling sYona, please teach your brother the right thing, but then they were having such a hoot. Finally I realize that I think even kYran knew that A was for Apple- not B...
I guess they both have a pretty good sense of humor....AND independence
After we got home, they kept playing on their own - in the pantry and getting at things that they should be asking dad about before eating (Valentines heart). After I said ask me first (and gave them each some candy for asking), I went back to cooking when they both went to hide out in the pantry - usually means they doing something slightly naughty. She then wanted to lock me out and bang me on the head for which I wasn't very happy about. We had a chat after that. Anyways, the point is that this is really a time of ups / down, laughter / cries, learning / testing, exploring / being safe ~

showing Ba what I learned

Ba went to get some fruits for the kids and family. She was playing with the kids till bath time. This was when kYran had a chance to show her that he can go big boy potting on the elmo toilet Bhabhi got Syona (and him before he was born). Since then we clearly lost the white addition part in the front - momentarily asking what is that for- which becomes obvious after you find out your second kid is a boy. Any case, this is valid because in today's story- mind you as much as the myDream teachers are impressed that he points his own gun down - accident still happen. He was about to show that he can control the timing of his pee pee to ba. He needed to work a bit on his aim though. High Fives were handed out all around prior to Syona claiming that she needed her book to be read while she was taking a bath. :)
It was a fun night

Kyran and myDream

What's neat is that we are not the only ones teaching him. Around January (after putting him into myDreamAcademy), I was teaching Kyran Do Re Mi's on my car ride home. He started repeating everything we tell him when we transitioned him to My Dream Academy. Since then, we could say one thing and he would parrot back the same words. He actually was pretty good with Do Re Mi's and getting the right pitch of the tone along with the word. So I did that a couple of times in the car. After that Syona would pick up next time in the car and start with "Kyran say this: Do", "Do", "Ray" "Re", "Me" "Mi" "Far" Fa" etc etc... After getting tired of this- she would improvise to "Kyran say "A" "a", "B" "b", "C" "c", "D" "d", "E" "e", "F" "phf", "G" "du"
Any case you can see how he is learning every day at incredible speed when he follows everything his "Yona" tells him.
Of course, MyDreamAcademy teachers are doing an awesome job. He likes his circle time and has really picked up all his colors (he likes saying Orange) , knows his shapes pretty good now (Ciarcal, Quare, Recangal, TriAgle), and of course his transportation type (heCopter, Bus, Choo Choo, car- blue CAR)
For a few weeks now he has been tinkling in the toilet starting in the afternoon and almost throughout the day now.  Still have to do the wiping for the big ones though. Awesome that he's picking this up- maybe we'll be out of diapers by this year (X X - fingers on both hands crossed).
Kyran likes his class so much that most of the time when i pick up, it takes me 5 minutes to coerce him to leave Ms Jennifer's class. Syona and Kyran still do the wonderful hug when they find each other in his class. They generally go on doing either art work, playing with dolls, and just plain hanging out around that time.

Kyran's first day MDA

WOOHOO! Both kids in one school. Kyran had his first day of MDA after the holiday season. I brought both babies to school and dropped Kyran off for his first day as big boy. It was nice dropping him off with some of the teachers that Syona had. His new teachers at MDA are Miss Elena, Miss Sintia, Miss Jennifer and Miss Amy. All such good teachers! We tried to get Kyran to adapt to the school but sitting in the class with him the last few Wednesdays I had off. Of course the little bugger cried when I left :(. But the teachers said he did amazing even for his first day. And his first week too. Obviously his time and growing at Action Day Care paid off!

Syona turns 4

syona bringing her own bday cake. she insisted.

We celebrated Syona's birthday and we did it tangled style! She was very clear on who she wanted to attend her party, her friends, Gabriel, Maya, Araya and Shauraya as well as her grandparents of course. When I asked if she wanted a a Rapunzel princess to come to her party, she said no muma, how will a princess fit through the door. And she was concerned about where the princess would sit, obviously with muma and dada, because the princess is an adult. So we went with a simple face painter because that is all she wanted :) We also got a rainbow pinata which she said was her favorite party, collecting all the candy and had a pin the tail on the Rapunzel chameleon game! Paul and I had fun making a 4 foot tangled yarn braid at 2AM that we glued outside the house. I have a good memory of him hobbling around the room since he had a sprained ankle as he showed me how the yarn braid needs to be done. After the games, and before the party ended, we had our siblings all come to hang out and stay for dinner! It was a good time to introduce more people, as we had a good inflow and outflow through the day so Syona was not too overwhelmed (which is what we felt like it was for her at her 3rd birthday). So that was good! I had a lot of fun with my creative projects but I am learning I need to start them earlier so I am not crunched for time! Kyran also had a friend that came, Gabriel! He started laughing when he saw his friend Gabriel at his house. We had so much fun with Gabriel's parents they ended up staying for dinner with the family! Garbiel is almost 3 so he was at a good age for both Syona and Kyran to play with! Other than getting hit on the head with a frying pan during the pinata, I think that Syona had a great 4rth birthday party!

drinking pink lemonade from jars muma made. she liked the purple straws.

pinata time. syona with a frying pan. we hit that thing 30 times.

kyran with a knife?

Gabriel, Kyran, Gabriel, Syona, Araya

rapunzel tower, after syona had a donut. lil sailboats in back.

Cultural Day at MDA

Syona and Kyran had their first combined cultural day at MDA. Luckily mommy and daddy just came home from India with new indian clothes for the kids. Syona has been waiting and waiting for an excuse to wear her new outfit so it was perfect! On their list at school, Paul and I marked their countries of origin as Indian and Taiwan so they carried both flags which was really cute. Since it was raining that day, each class took turns parading around the classes inside. It was really cute to see Kyran sitting in his class listening with his flag around his neck. See below: