First Update of 2007

so as of the first week of 2007, here's what's going on.

* griffin is on the verge of walking. he had been breaststroke crawling for a while, and since the first week of december (at karen ah-yee's and uncle rex's house) started doing a normal hands and knees crawl. now he can wobbly-walk while holding onto 1 hand (and grasping a sock in the other).


* ally is starting dance class. she LOVES dancing. ah-ma bought her a kids "dance dance revolution"-like toy for xmas, and she just loves dancing on it.

* ally is talking more and more like an adult. today, she said, "he's like, where did it go?" she is also the grand negotiator, always trying to negotiate for just "1 more 64 zoo lane" episode or "3 more pieces of persimmon".

* griffin says "da!" and "uh-oh" and "hao-chur". well, the "hao-chur" actually comes out as "jia-jia", but the intonation is right. and the "da!" has no real meaning, except that if you exclaim "da!", he'll respond with an equally enthusiastic "da!" even his "uh-oh" isn't used quite correctly, as he will say it (with a grin) after he has deliberately thrown something on the ground (for the umpteenth time).

* griffin loves cars. he loves blocks. he loves anything that's hard and makes loud noises when he bangs them together. he has already fallen off the changing table, tumbled down the stairs, and bonked his head and bit his lip countless times. he is such a boy.

* ally is ever the music fan. her latest faves include sexyback (justin timberlake), ye de di chi chang (jay chou), dani california (rhcp), and the little mermaid soundtrack.


* griffin has finally figured out how to eat his food without cramming his mouth full, gagging, and throwing everything up. i'm sure you're thinking, "what do you mean? isn't that a basic skill we are all born with?" no, not this son of ours. if you gave him a slice of apple, he would shove the whole thing in his mouth and start gagging. even if you cut up the apple into small pieces, he would shove them all in his mouth until his cheeks puffed out and then start crying because he couldn't swallow it. but about 2 weeks ago, he finally figured out how to bite off chunks and swallow it before putting more food into this mouth. hooray for no more daily throw-ups!

SoCal Vacation

we had a lovely vacation in southern cal over the holidays. we stayed at a sweet 6-bedroom beach house in encinitas, where we would watch the sunset from the living room in the early evenings and fall asleep to the sound of crashing waves at night. in the mornings, ally loved watching the surfers ("ducks!") riding the waves.

the drive down was rather painful, as we had a couple of false starts and then hit traffic pretty much right off the bat. then our "quick" lunch ended up taking over an hour, and an hour later we had to stop again to feed the baby. the sun was setting, we were 5 hours into our drive, and we couldn't believe that we weren't even out of the bay area. the good news is that ally and griffin were both good sports, and ally was happy as a clam once we cracked open the dvd player and popped on her headset.

here are the highlights:

* we went to legoland for 2 days with mark+ irene+the boys

(this lego santa is the only santa that ally is not afraid to sit next to!)








* m&i took us all out for a lovely sunday brunch at the four seasons















* spent xmas eve at ling-chi's place and saw lots of aunts, cousins, and other relatives

* went to the zoo with vicky jie-jie

* ally and griffin spent the evening with vicky jie-jie and mimi jie-jie + her family, while e&e went with el's aunts and cousins to the casino. it was a win-win evening, as ellen won $500 on slots and ally had such a great time she didn't want to go home.

* spent a couple days in LA, doing a little shopping and just relaxing. highlight meal was fogo de chau, where we feasted on tasty grilled meat.