St. Louis

Went to St. Louis, MO. Mark was at a conference for a week, but Evan and I joined him the last 4 days. St. Louis... how can I discribe it... the city itself is pretty sorry. You can see they're making efforts to revive downtown, but its still not the best place. Evan and I spent a bitter cold afternoon walking around downtown. I was interested in the little mod boutiques of furniture, housewares, and jewelry that were dotted around downtown.
The entire time we were out, I didn't see another tourist, shopper, or stroller. It was weird. You had either business man or bum. There were enough shady people around to send me back to the hotel. There was a park that looked decent, and there were kids playing in a playground. As I approched, one of the ladies there told me it was a private playground, and that we could go play at the playground across the park (just behind the groups of bums laying around). yeah right, woman. Poor Evan started crying and pointing as we walked away from the private playground, but I wasn't about to take him to the other side of the park! I made it up to him by letting him run wild and feeding him popcorn in the Renassiance Hotel lobby. Hehehe I'm glad the hotel staff was understandable.
I should have done more homework, and found the zoo and museums just outside of the city to go to. We did have one highlight of our trip. Mark wasn't too excited to go to the City Museum, but I kept insisting that we should go and the $12 entrance fee would be worth it. I was right.
It was so much fun. Its a warehouse that an artist turned into a kind of amusement park for art. Outside was a HUGE jungle gym of welded scrap steel, found objects, a fire truck, a castle tower, log cabin, tree house, two ball pits, and 2 fighter jets. Its was the craziest maze of twisted metal, slides, ramps, and ladders, that went as high as 4 stories high! Its a bit daunting at first. You wonder if you could really squeeze through some of the tight crawl spaces, but once you get going, you can't stop! You never know where a slide will take you. From the top of one side to the bottom of another, there's no easy way of getting from one place to another. Most of what you're climbing/walking on is thin and you can see clearly how high up you really are.
I am scared of heights. Just seeing someone up high gives me butterflies. I had to force myself to not look down. Evan is a very cautious kid actually. He doesn't take a physical risk at anything untill he's sure he can safely reach. So, taking him on this giant jungle gym was a bit scary at first for him. But in no time he was excited to crawl and climb around with us! If he was unsure about something, he'd look to one of us first to see if it was safe or get help before going on it.
The contruction was pretty safe. It looks like it wouldn't be, but you could see that for the most part you couldn't fall through anything. But if you climbed out of bounds you could get hurt. Mark really enjoyed himself. He was daring enough to climb to the highest parts. At the highest points was an old fighter jet and metal tower and the only thing connecting the two was a 30 ft metal coil (like a slinky) wrapped in wire mesh big enough for Mark to crawl through. It was too scary for me.
Another part of the warehouse had an underwater theme. It was wall to wall to ceiling mosaic tile, glass, and found objects. It was so pretty! Here you could crawl in and out of the "reef" and driftwood into rooms and slides. There were crawlspaces that looked like only kids could fit through, but an adult could fit through if they tried. I liked the white "sea kelp" forest in the ceiling that had a maze of tubes that you could see down from, but people on the ground couldn't see up into.
There was also a skateless skate park, a glass blowing section, an art room for all ages, a toddler play area, a daily circus of clowns and acrobats, an oddities section, model trains area, an aquarium, a 3 story slide, and so much more! I was really amazed at the mix of all the stuff in there. And everything is touchable. Evan had so much fun trying on old hats on a shelves and drawing on a giant chalk wall with buckets full of colorful chalk. There were old pianos for anyone to play or bang on.
We really enjoyed the City Museum, and if you ever happen to find yourself in St. Louis, go there!

We met up with our friend Hillary, who's going to school out there. How do we know her? She's a sister of our good friends out here in DC, and just loved joining in on their family fun. Hillary took us out to this cute little area outside of campus, full of unique little hip stores, and resturants. I wished Evan wasn't so tired and grouchy when we met up for dinner. He was so wasted from climbing around at the City Museum. It was so great catching up with Hillary, and hearing of their family's crazy happenings. I should have called her up earlier on our trip to get more info on things to do!

We went to the famous St. Louis arch. Mark didn't believe me when I said that we could go to the top of it. I didn't know how, but I knew that there was a way up there. When you get to the arch, it looks like a huge metal arch stuck in a massive lawn, and nothing around it. So, I started to doubt that there was anything else there than to just look at and take pictures of this metal monolith. We walked right up to the thing and saw that there was a walk way down into the ground from the base of the arch. There's a whole museum underground! You'd never know it was there cause there's no signs and the lawn is perfectly smooth over it. They have a kind of elevator that takes you to the top of the arch. There's 8 pods that hold 5 people each that are linked together like a chain that take you up and down the narrow structure. The higher up you get the more the arch curves to one side, and the more the pod will shift degrees to compensate for the change in angles, so that the riders inside aren't on their sides when the doors open. It looks so closterphobic at first, cause you kind of crouch down to get through the door into the pod. Then you sit in one of five seats listening to the voice on the PA system tell you it's about a 4 min ride to the top. It's one crazy elevator, but the view from the top is amazing. It happened to be a very clear day and just after sunset when we were there. At the highest point you're 630 feet high. It was pretty cool. I'd chalk it up there with the experience of going to the top of Taiwan 101. :)

Thats it for now... I've actually been typing this up for a week now. I haven't had the same motiviation to update the blog. I guess I've been distracted.
I'll post about the home improvement projects I've been working on soon. Oh, and pics from St. Louis are in order.

Just Get it Done! Or I'll Beat You With My Gibson!

In season 6, Jack Bauer saves the world from terrorists with the Kiefer Sutherland Gibson guitar.

Don't mess.

Our Little Nursery Boy

Our little man has turned 1 1/2 and attended Nursery for the first time last Sunday! It's too bad I was sick so I wasn't able to enjoy the benefits of having Evan in Nursery, oh well. For the last six months to almost a year, I have had to walk around with Evan in the church halls, outside in the parking lot--anywhere to keep him busy while Bev teaches class or whatever. I actually want to be in my meetings now. At first I thought it was cool to be able to skip Sunday School or Elders Quorum legitimately, but now I yearn to be in these classes, let's hope this Sunday I'll be able to enjoy it! Or, I may spend the whole day on my Swash 600...

Evan can now turn on the radio by himself to play his CD, and say "radio". When I was watching Wheel of Fortune, Evan said "wheel", and also imitated the bankrupt sound. He's really starting to say more, do more, understand more, tear apart more, etc etc etc!



Ok this is Bev... Mark failed to really explain why Evan turning on the radio himself is REALLY amazing! I started making playing classical music at bed time part of his routine. He has seen me do it, but I never had him push the buttons until a few days ago. To play the CD you must press a couple buttons on this stero in an exact order. So, I just let Evan press the last button, the play button.
The other day while I was washing up in the bathroom, I told Evan it was time for a nap, and to go to his bed. Surprisingly he went to his bed! but then I heard him talking so I knew he wasnt in bed anymore. "Evan, go to bed!" Then I saw him walk from across his bedroom to his bed. "what are you doing?" I walk in and realize that his music is playing. I know I didn't turn it on, because I only turn it on at bedtime. "Did you turn on your radio, Evan?!" "rayooo!" he says. WOW! I'm blown away. There are so many buttons all in a row and he knew exactly which ones and what order to press them!! He's growing up TOO FAST for me!
I also have to add, how sad I was to drop Evan off in nursery, last Sunday. He just got right in playing with the toys, and I was the one having a hard time leaving him! I was so excited to see him after church, but he just acted like, "come on, mom, it wasn't a big deal." Well, at least I got a "ma" out of him when he saw me. *sigh*
He was so cute wearing his "I'm a child of God" crown! I guess he must have had a really good time in nursery cause he actually wore the crown for a while. He never wants anything on his head, unless I tell him its cold outside. And all week, every-so-often he'll hand me his crown to put on him! too cute.
I love this new outfit that his greatgrandma Lau gave him. It makes him look so grown up. He's got more designer clothes than Mark and I have together!

The Swash 600: It's Heaven on Earth!

At last, the final gift from Christmas has arrived! I was hoping for a Toto Washlet, but the Brondell Swash 600 is just as good! Made in Taiwan versus Made in Japan, we'll see how long it lasts!

Some of you are wondering, what's so cool about a toilet seat? This is no ordinary seat, mind you. Notice Lucy even fiddling with the remote. Yes, there's a remote for this toilet seat! The seat is heated, the lid doesn't slam down when you put it down, there's the nice cold butt wash for guys, warm butt wash for girls, as well as the bidet...and there's even an air drier mode! Although you may have to sit there a while for your rear end to completely dry, it's still a nice feature!

I've been wanting one of these things for almost six years now. When I studied abroad in Japan I stayed at a home where they had one of these toilet seats, and I fell in love with them. It beats baby wipes (and those of you who've gone on missions know that baby wipes are amazing), and once you've used this seat, you'll never be satisfied with anything else!!!

For some reason, Bev's not totally convinced. She think's it's "cool" but it took forever to get her to sit on it and try it. I think when it comes time to actually use it rather than "test" it, she'll enjoy it. 

Now the day is over

After 131 miles, one meeting, one afternoon of running around getting four-five things done--including a presentation and a final exam due in the evening, and then giving the presentation in class, fourteen hours later, the day is finally over. Wednesdays have been the longest days because of meetings in faraway places in the morning and class in the evening well into the PM. Thursdays are just as great--meetings at 9, sometimes 10, and sometimes 1:30. And sometimes there's another one around 2-2:30...and it's usually the night I go out with the missionaries. So another almost 13 hour day. Anyone who wonders why we travel so much, it's strictly so I can stay sane living in this area, working where I am working. There's always a need to get away, unwind, return recharged and ready to face the world again. Thank goodness now I have a Zune. Endless music for a temporary getaway!

Christmas and New Years Pics

It's been a holiday with family. We spent Christmas at home with Mark's mom, and New Years in LA at a family reunion. Here are the pics!

Christmas & LA 2006-7

I also forgot to mention that Jerin was in town too! I kept forgetting to post that pic. Thanks to his company for dinner at Todai!

happy new year! have a virus!

We're back from LA where we were enjoying a family reunion (my Mom's side of the family). I've been working HARD since October and staying up late the last 3 weeks prior to the reunion to put together a family history book in time, so it was great to finally get everything complied and printed and delivered just in time for the reunion and be DONE!
It was a rough road getting things organized and complied and formated and translated from english to chinese and chinese to english and designed and last of all printed. I was on the phone with the printers in LA while still in VA trying to get this 120 page book printed just right, and delivered on the 28th of Dec. I'm so grateful for the people at the printers working extra hard to push my order through, especially over christmas and keeping it all within budget. It was so great to hand them out to everyone and see that they really loved the book. Of course, I just did the manual work, the contents of the book is what really matters. It's got bios of both grandma and grandpa. Grandpa passed away when my mother was just 16. My grandma and mother worked to raise my 6 other aunts and uncles, all ranging in age down to age 5. My uncle was away at college, but sacraficed to send money home to the family. It was so wonderful for me to read eveyrone's tributes to grandma as well as their personal rememberances of grandpa. I've always wanted to know what he was like, and never got what I was looking for until I read these essays from what my aunts and uncles remember of him. So I'm really glad I was able to be the catalyst to get this book made. It turned out better than I thought.
So the reunion was great. I love our reunions, and I was excited for Evan to join in this year. The last reunion I announced that we were expecting, so it was great to have Evan be 1 yrs old and able to play and really interact with the relatives. I was surprised that one of my cousins really loved playing with Evan. She's in high school and doesn't have younger siblings so she was hesitant at first at what do you do with a 1 yr old. But as soon as Evan started learning how to roll an orange back and forth on the table from her they were so cute together!
We went to the Getty Museum (I was excited to go cause the last time I got sick and puked at the museum and spent the rest of the day in the car), we went to the Regan Library, the Nixon Library, LA Temple, NewPort Temple, New Port beach, Huntington Gardens, and the best Mayalsian resturant ever.
Half way through our reunion we were scheduled to have a 81st birthday banquet for grandma at Empress Harbor Seafood Resturant. It was a nicer chinese restaurant and a bit pricey. We even had karaoke. However, the next 3 days, one by one the cousins started droping like flies. Then the aunts, then the uncles, then a phone call from extended family that were also at the banquet, that they were also sick. 2 of my cousins fainted from dehydration. The cousin that loved playing with Evan fainted at the airport just before boarding the plane to return back home to Hawaii. We thought it was food posioning, but it's pretty clear that it was something like the Nora virus, that causes diarrhea, vomitting, and severe stomach pains. We lucked out, I only had to vomit once the last night, and just felt nauseous on the flight home. Mark and Evan are fine cause they didn't eat too much at the restaurant. Evan caught something else. He's got a runny nose and cough which I'd rather him have. I feel bad for my sister. She tried so hard to avoid getting sick, but once she felt stomach pains coming on she was down for the rest of the trip and she's recouperating at home in Seattle. My mom said she had a rough time getting to and through the airport with her stomach pains and weakened state. I think almost everyone caught some of the symptoms. Its such a downer on what's supposed to be a gathering, everyone is just spending time in bed and waiting for the bathrooms to be available. I guess that's just something to add to the family history book.
Overall, we had a good time. Mark, my sister, sick cousin, and I spent New Years night playing a game where the loser has to take a shot of nasty tasting Holiday Jones Soda. Flavors like peas, dinner roll, turkey and gravy, sweet potato, and antiacid. Just thinking about the turkey and gravy flavored one gives me a headache. I'm glad we only paid 2.50 for all of them. nasty.
So that's about it for now. I'll post pics later tonight. I've got to go pick up Lucy from a friend house and get us some groceries...