Thomas showing off his artwork

 

  

thomas doesn't like to do a lot of coloring, but he's more open to it now that he's started school. we try to keep his school projects for about a month, on the fridge. then we take a photo of it and finally into the circular file... :)

3 Month milestones

Just a couple days ago, she started talking to us. Really vocalizing, cooing and aaahh-ing, very cute. Here is a video of her that William got when she started smiling last month. Will try to post her talking soon.



I like this pictures because it looks like she is sucking on William's thumb. Her fingers are so small!

 

 Hey look at me! I am riding a mountain bike, down a big category 5 downhill. Waa hoo!

 

Thomas had the most adorable feet & toes, like little, round toe-berries. Natalie's toes in contrast are long and spindely. Her feet are actually long too, longer than thomas's when he was a baby. We like to think that means that she might be a little taller... at least taller than me :)

She has turned out to be a really good baby, very mellow and easy going. We discovered last week that she is an Ox - a cow. we laughed because it suits her personality to be a mellow, gentle cow :)
She likes to feed every 2-3 hours during the day, but sleeps from 11pm-5am, or 12-6am, then sleeps again from 7-9:30 or sometimes even 10am. it is so nice, but makes it hard to get anywhere early in the morning. then she usually naps from 12-2 and 4-6, with a cat naps here and there in the evening. depends on how tired she is.

another great thing is she doesn't demand to be held all the time. she is perfectly happy just looking around, sitting in her bowl swing, or in her bouncy seat. i can pick her up, but she doesn't need me to keep moving/bouncing. she's just a really happy, content little girl as long as she is dry and not hungry. even when she wakes up, she never really cries. she snuffles, cries out and grunts as she is waking up. but once both eyes are open, she just looks around, talks a little, waits patiently for someone to notice that she is awake and start paying attention to her. very serene.

the things that do make her cry? she hates it when i change her clothes! something about having that shirt pulled over her head, just really bothers her. ESPECIALLY after her shower. who knows, maybe she is hot after bath and doesn't want clothes put on? any other time I have to change her clothes, she either cries or fusses. she also cries if i am not on the ball and wait too long to feed her. poor thing... sometimes, i am trying to get one last email sent off and she is just sitting there waiting. but

Smiling now

I managed to catch this photo of her, smiling, just couldn't get one with her eyes open. She is 3 months old this week, and over 15 pounds! William started calling her "little mochi ball", and "mochi ball cheeks" this week because she is so soft and plump and rolly-polly all over :)

big burrito...

I was watching Oprah a couple weeks ago and found out that Chipotle (of all places) is really good about trying to make sure all of their meat and produce is sustainably and locally grown. So we got some burritos and boy are those big burritos for $6:

 

Thomas said, "Look it is as big as Matalie" (he's a little lazy with the "N" sound, so it comes out as "M" :)

New place to play!

We finally put grass in our backyard! This whole area used to be just black tan bark that had to be filled in with new bags of tan bark every year and always gave thomas splinters when he tried to play in that area. Yay for a new place for thomas to play. He loves it and it is much more functional for kids now too. This weekend, william and Thomas put a tent up and camped out for a couple hours with a bunch of toys. it was a beautiful weekend :)

Look how bundled up Thomas is, courtesy of his grandma. :)  The green grass makes the backyard look much more inviting. Can't wait to have backyard playdates!

Some photos from December 09

Nice and warm in daddy's arms, dreaming about milk...

Getting yummy milk from Daddy too :)

Sooo hungry.... ooo trying to slurp it down as fast as possible....

  

Clowning around with mommy!

Sleepy but happy trio at the end of the day :)

Does Thomas look like Natalie?

Here is Natalie in the puppy suit:

 

Here is Thomas in the puppy suit, at about 3 months:

 

 

He definitely looks different! They share a few features, but Thomas has William's head shape, eyes, eyebrows and nose. Her face is rounder, and she is a little darker than Thomas. He still has the most beautiful, porcelain skin I have ever seen. I love touching it! Of course, his little hands push me away now when he is trying to focus on telling me something and I am trying to touch his face at the same time. Pretty funny.
Their lips look similar so she probably has my mouth too. I'll have to post my baby picture at some point. She looks a lot like me when I was a baby.

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Here is a great shot of Thomas last week when they had a school fieldtrip to San Jose Children's museum. William FINALLY got the chance to go there with him. Thomas loves the fire engine in the front, the bubble room and the ball maze.

Not sure how William got above him, but that is a wonderful shiny smile :)

Some photos from today and updates

 

Here I am! :)

Wearing big brother's suit. That P suit was one of our favorite outfits for Thomas when he was a baby :)

Hey is this a 45 year old man's balding head?

NOPE! It's just me :) he heh...

We had her two month checkup last week and she is actually as long as thomas was at 2 months, 22.5 inches, and almost as heavy, 12.3 lbs. Thomas was 12.7 lbs. She is FINALLY settling into a more routine sleeping and feeding pattern. Still a very good sleeper at night, from 11pm to 3-4am. Then she wakes up to feed and goes back to sleep 5-9am or 6-10am. Makes it hard to get to places early in the morning, but at least I am getting at least 6-8 hours of sleep at night. Then another nap in the afternoon. helps a lot!

She is getting really pudgy, so cute. We call her our little squirmy silkworm, cause all she does is eat, sleep and look around. When she squirms, she looks just like a big fat juicy silkworm, ha ha... i know, so terrible to compare a baby to a worm, but somehow it fits her and it makes us laugh :)

 

Hey look at me, I'm dancing.

And here's my kicky little feet, signing off... kick, kick, kick...

3 week update

An update that I saved but forgot to post...
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This wednesday will be 3 weeks and so far, Natalie has been a really good baby. She slept a lot the first 2 weeks, so it was easy to pay attention to Thomas. Just feed, change diaper, put her back in bassinet and she'd be fine for another 3 hours. The last 4-5 days, she has definitely been more alert, so getting her to go back to sleep has been more of a challenge. She complains now sometimes, until someone picks her up or starts talking to her. Once she is deeper asleep, we can still put her down, but not until she is asleep or almost ready to sleep.

We're finding her very different from Thomas, even at 2 weeks old. The main difference is that she sleeps. Thomas wanted to be awake, even early on, so we really never had a a period where he was a good sleeper. Thomas took little 1.5 to 2 hour cat naps.
- really dislikes wet diaper
- really dislikes cold wet wipes
- hate to have her mouth wiped (seems that is common to ALL kids)
- seems pickier in general with everything

ok, time to go back to sleep...

Thomas is now a big brother

Nov 18th, 2009 7:03am. 6 lb. and 2.8 oz.

Finally gave her a name, almost 6 days after she was born. Natalie Eva Kuo.

Mom and baby doing great!

Will have more updates later...from a tired William..

Some pics from our last get-a-way before Baby #2

I'll comment later (or Catherine will).

As you can see, I'm trying to get Thomas to enjoy the ocean & waves... :)

Updates...

Thanks for all the well wishes regarding our second baby coming along! We are about 11 weeks away from the due date, and trying our best to enjoy every day with thomas. he is very outgoing, talkative, and active. always negotiating, and always pointing out the obvious to us. but we did realize that he is only very outgoing self when he feels comfortable. In front of strangers, he gets a little performance anxiety and clams up. He doesn't run away, but he refuses to move.
In July, he did a one week drama camp in the mornings, and his teachers all loved him, said he was a natural. BUT on the final day, during the "performance" and example times, he just stood there, and then turned around and gave everyone his butt, while peering at us stubbornly refusing to act out the directions he had learned during the week :)


He also went to his first live concert! The Wiggles at HP Pavillion! We loved watching his reaction and he loved going. He got to meet Murray and Jeff as they walked around the auditorium. They were both so great about making eye contact with the kids as they walked up and down shaking little hands. Thomas was THRILLED!

oh and yes, i gave in and wasted almost $20 on that ridiculous, flashing wiggles wand he is clutching so happily in above pic. basically a fancy flashlight. and after the first 1-2 weeks, it now lies ignored in a bin next to his bed. *sigh* :)

------------------NEW BABY SISTER----------------------

So regarding the second baby, it is going to be girl. We're very happy, but very apprehensive about girl poopy diaper changes. there is a lot more places you have to clean for a girl and we're NOT looking forward to that. ha ha... out of everything that comes with a girl, we're most worried of her anatomy :)
We've gotten tons of girl clothes from our friends with girls that are older so along with all the stuff we kept from Thomas, we have everything we really need. William even finally installed garage storage this past weekend, so we can start cleaning all of the boxes and tubs out of the new baby room, and actually get it to look like a kids room.

Also thank you too everyone who knew I had problems with my vision. I really appreciate all your prayers! Thanks to God it is getting better now! Such a relief because for about a month, in July and August, I had very limited vision in my left eye. Thankfully, it is now to the point where I feel like I almost have my normal vision back. The doctor at Stanford still wants me to go back for a checkup in October, which I am dreading because it takes up half a day to go out there, but better safe than sorry.

Applogies for the lack of posts lately, but with William busy at work (RHI has been having lots of IT and storage related problems lately) and me falling asleep at 9 or 10pm, we just haven't had time to post. will it get any better once baby's born? just give us a month or two to get back on track :)

Thomas's 2nd visit to SF Chinatown

Thomas, Catherine and I went into the city to attend Robin & Stan's 2nd son's red egg & ginger party... It was a great time of seeing friends from UCLA days that we haven't seen in quite some time.

It also made me realize we are approaching 40 fast! How sobering...yet the kids distract us quickly from feeling sorry for ourselves hahaha.

Anyhow, after lunch, we headed up the street towards a bakery to pick up some egg custard cupcakes (as we did 1.5 years ago during their 1st son's reg egg/ginger party.)

We came upon this alley way and Thomas took to the pigeons and decided to give them a chase...

Thomas & the "bonking" game

Thomas has recently (last 4 weeks) been hooked on a game show from Japan. (Look up "human tetris" on YouTube.)

He gets a kick out of watching it (we let him watch it about 10-15min per day online, and almost always the same you tube clip)....

And he's been improvising the game at home, asking me to become the "wall" coming at him and he'd put himself in poses to make it through the imaginary wall...

ipod favorites

happy to show off his half eaten cupcake:

helping to make some morning omlets...
and helping to eat the omlet fillings

william got a free ipod touch from a big vendor presentation back in March and he gave it to me for my birthday. I am so stuck on this thing now, and understand why people love their Apple products... i love that i can get my email on it, and news headlines, weather and all my calendar events, all in one place. pretty much everything except for a phone and camera. and i have a cellphone, so i am pretty happy with it.
i managed to keep it hidden from thomas for 2 weeks. but he discovered me using it one day and his little voice, as he bounced up and down trying to peer over the kitchen counter, "hey mommy, what's that? can i see it?"
so i gave in and let him see it. at the time, i had nothing fun on it. the only thing that was remotely entertaining was this little mini-piano and drum pad i had downloaded free. but even those were enough to keep him coming back to me to ask for it, whenever he saw me using it. *sigh*

so i started combing through itunes aps for good free educational games for thomas and found some really good ones. a couple friends have asked me about games thomas plays on it, and ha ha.... yeah, that's what i did for several nights, rather than check email, or catch up with all my mom's group emails... waste time on itunes!

here are the best ones we have found so far. if you know of any others, please let me know.
some are free. all the others are under $2 and really worth the cost. enjoy :)

1. MiniPiano, by JYProduct (free)
2. KanonDrum, by SHIMIZU kenichi (free)
3. KidArt, by GP Apps ($0.99) - simple, easy to use drawing program, saves art in photos
4. Shape Builder, by Darren Murtha Design (free lite version or .99 full version) - simple drag and drop puzzles
5. Cute Math, by BokanTech ($1.99)- the BEST numbers and math game I have seen so far for kids, has 7 different games that include simple games to teach basic counting, as well as harder games that teach addition and subtraction
6. Word Magic, by anusen.com (.99) - great spelling game with cute graphics, gives option to guess missing first letter of the word, or a letter in the middle of the word.
7. Baby Flash Cards, by Dream Cortex (free) - just like baby's first flash cards with 200+ high frequency words
8. Letters A to Z by Refresh Media/True Learning (.99) - cool way to learn ABC's, includes cute animated graphics and option for phonics
9. ABC paint, by HappR (free lite or .99 full) - this is just another set of ABC flashcards, but thomas likes these b/c for each "card" you can color in the graphic for that letter. many of the characters have many different parts you can color in with the 8 different colors, so you can get pretty creative
10. 2 memory games we like:
10a. ABC Match by Lima Sky (.99) - memory game using ABC/abc's.
10b. AniMatch, by Lima Sky (.99) - memory game using cute animals that make sounds as you flip them over. both have 20 card grid, shows cards just long enough, then flips them back over, so you can pick the next two cards.

11. abc PocketPhonics, by Apps in My Pocket (free lite and .99 full) - this one combines phonics using vocal prompts, with a demo of how to write the letter, plus practice writing/tracing. Also has basic letter combinations that change the way the letters sound when used together, i.e. ch, sh, st, qu, etc. we like that feature. And the little included game is not bad, it is a spelling/fill in the missing letter game.

these last three are not educational, but thomas loves them and we often play them together. amazingly, they are all FREE!
1. jellycar, by walaber - ridiculously cute game, trying to get your little squishy car out of all these different levels. thomas likes making the car go, spinning it out of control, and seeing it change from big to small with the tap of a finger
2. twistism, by paul bentley - kind of like solitarie scrabble, figure out as many words from those as possible from 6 given letters
3. trace, by kevin calderone - amazing addictive game! your little man has to reach the star on each level. you have to draw him a way to walk or jump to reach the star. each level has obstacles that you either have to avoid or can draw around. has 100+ levels, and is so great for young ones and adults, william is even hooked. a lot of the levels require strategic thinking to determine how to reach the star. it is a great thinking game. this is thomas' current most favorite game. give it a try and you'll be hooked :)

The little boy

Catherine and I are constantly amazed and get re-amazed at how we have another human being living with us at our house! (We were married 10 years with only cats as the other living creatures in the house before deciding to have kids.)

We love just watching him sometimes; and yesterday he was over at grandparents and he decided he wanted to pick these red fruits off the vine (they're not tomatoes) for everyone...

I just took several pictures spur of the moment to capture the "little boy" in his Thomas-the-Train briefs and green sandals against the back retaining wall....so little. So time-less as each day he grows older and older....if only I can hit pause...





As you can see he chases down anyone in the yard and offers up his pickings....

Congratulations to Jenny & Jason!

William's sister Jenny got married this weekend in beautiful Foresthill, CA. It is a tiny little township near Auburn, CA. Thomas got to be the ring bearer and we were quite surprised by the fact that he was put off by all the strange people staring at him. here i am during the rehearsal, trying to placate him and letting him know he had a very important job to do. The panda bear had a little pocket with the rings inside.


here are some photos from the day of the wedding. as you can see, thomas has decided that getting his tongue into as many pictures as possible is the new mission of the day. maybe it is from watching KISS perform on the American Idol finale?? William retaliates by tickling :) and my motto has been if you can't win, might as well join him :)



Here he is enjoying his post ceremony rewards: a lollipop and getting his hands on my ipod.


And a series with William... more sticking out of the tongue and lots of tickling :)


His hamburger mouth...


The backdrop for the ceremony was this fabulous vista of the California mountains and despite our best efforts to get a nice family shot, thomas was just such a goof ball. Either more hamburger mouth, or funny poses, or testing out his funny faces. instead of getting a frame-able shot, we got bad exposure from bright sun and more silly Thomas!