Blogging from Sacramento...

January has been a busy month. We had a weekend in Bend, an Employee Appreciation Dinner in San Jose, and Roger has been traveling two out of the last four weeks. This weekend we are in Sacramento for Shell & Mia's birthday.

Flying down to Sacramento was quite entertaining. While we were waiting to board in Portland, the girls starting playing ring-around-the-rosie as they circled around one of the big Southwest Airline poles that tells you where to stand when boarding. They were very loud, but cute and for humor Maile would bonk her head on the pole every now and then. We survived the flight through some coloring books and candy. Overall the girls did OK. When we landed in Sacramento Maile insisted on walking by herself. She would run as fast as she could yelling "I faster! I faster! I finished!!!" And then throw her hands up in victory. Very entertaining.

And we should also say a belated Gong Xi Fa Chai, or Happy Chinese New Year! Last weekend, in a continuation of our Singapore traditions, we went out to celebrate the Chinese New Year. We passed on the Pig's Feet, but still had a great time reflecting on our past Chinese New Years in Singapore. Check out the Flickr page to see photos of the girls all dressed up.

Another big adventure we had recently was our trip to Bend, Oregon. Our Worldmark Timeshare has a place there and they offered us a two night stay over the MLK Jr. Holiday weekend in exchange for listening to an"Owner Update". The main event was inner tube sledding on Mount Bachelor. We thought it would be some good fun for the kids, but did not realize how steep the run was. The girls were both a bit scared at first, but we eventually got them to go down the hill with Roger sliding down at the same time, holding onto their inner tube. The routine for the day was that we would tell the girls to just try it one time and then they could go out to the car with Grammie. However, when they got to the bottom of the hill they would be so excited and want to go again. Then when they would get back to the top they would get scared again. By the time she seemed to get over all their anxieties at the top of the hill, it was time to go home. But all said, and despite Roger taking a quick conference call from atop the hill, it was a real fun day in the snow. :-)

Later that week Nisa kept asking when we could go back to the snow and insisted on wearing the jacket that had her ski pass attached to the zipper. When it fell off one day, Mika needed to replace it with her unused ski pass before Nisa would wear the jacket again.

The weekend after our trip to Bend, Roger and Mika flew down for Savi's Employee Appreciation Dinner. It was great to get away from the kids for a whole night and a great evening event. We stayed at the Fairmont in downtown San Jose and the next morning had a nice brunch with Gram. Special thanks to Grammie, Betsey and Brian for watching the kids.

Last Sunday we were running too late to make it to church so we decided to go for brunch instead. In going to the restaurant the girls all pointed out that right next to it was a McDonald's Playland. After a minute of incessant begging, Roger and Mika gave in and ageed to go to McDonald's for breakfast. Once we sat down to eat Nisa said, "This is the best day of our lives!" :-/

The other weekend Grammie took Ellie & Nisa to see Click-Clack-Moo and the loved it. Now we have a new set of interesting songs we get to hear the girls sing at random moments throughout the day.

Maile's potty training is still going nowhere. When Roger picked her up out of the bath a couple weeks ago Maile peed all over him. :-( Roger did play this to his advantage the other day on the Southwest Airlines flight. One time when Ellie got up to go to the bathroom, Maile got up and wanted to go to. Roger said to Maile, "Ellie is going to the potty. Do you want to go sit on the potty too?" Maile sat down immediately. :-)

The other day the girls went to an indoor rock climbing party and everyone was really impressed with Nisa's climbing skills. Toward the top of one of the walls Nisa managed to scamper straight up without using any of the footings. It reminded Mika of the way that Xena would jump up the cat tree. Even the spotter who worked there was impressed.

And here is one last Nisa story for the blog. Nisa and Mika went to the gym with one of Nisa's friends and his mom. Nisa's friend did not like the daycare so his Mom stayed behind in the daycare for a few minutes before going to workout. Nisa thought this was odd, so she walked up to her friend's mom and whispered subtly, "You know, this area is for the kids. You can go work out now if you want." It was if Nisa thought her friend's Mom didn't understand the concept of the daycare. :-)