an afternoon with ah-tai.

phil's mom was here to help out for two weeks- giving me a total of five weeks' worth of help after jonah was born.  this was the most help i've had after any of the kids were born, and it was wonderful.  anyway, while she was here, we drove over one afternoon to spend some time with phil's side of the family.

little known fact- phil's mom comes from a family of eight girls.  you read that right.  eight!!  to keep everyone straight, the sisters often refer to themselves as their birth order number.  so this is auntie #2 holding jonah with phil's mom, #4, looking on.

and this is the woman who gave birth to the eight girls- phil's ah-ma (grandma in taiwanese) and our kids' ah-tai (great-grandma).  and that's #2's husband, phil's uncle, in the background.

ah-tai looks good for 93!  she has the sweetest sounding voice i've ever heard.  doesn't matter that i can't understand what she's saying (she doesn't speak english though she does speak taiwanese, mandarin, and japanese), the kindness in her voice is universally understood.

back when he was in college, phil used to drive out regularly to have dinner with his ah-ma.  such a good boy.

the oldest living relative holding the hands of the youngest.  love that.

because it had been two years since phil's mom had seen her family, we all went out to have lunch together, then came back and settled in to ah-tai's apartment in order to give them time for a nice long visit.

there wasn't much to do in the small apartment.  which made it a perfect picture-taking time!

because i found a spot with sweet afternoon light pouring in, and because there aren't that many pictures of me with the kids, i decided to get a shot with each one.  me and my allie-girl.

me and my sweet mikey.  how come he is so much darker than me?  or put another way, when did i get so pale-looking?

me and my spunky lauren.

me and my baby jonut.

ok, so that's quite enough pictures with me in them.  the relatives were in for a LONG visit, which meant time for even more pictures!

time for some brotherly affection.

time for loving gazes.

time for a pretend haircut.

time to try new foods.  like red bean mochi.  (allie loved it.)  or not quite ripe mulberries.  or durian chips.  (the kids liked it.  but phil questioned the logic of going to so much effort to take a nasty-tasting fruit and end up making it taste like cardboard.)  suffice it to say that i'm very glad our kids are way more adventurous eaters than i was.  am.

time to check if jonah still has his newborn reflexes.

he does.

time to look for good veins in which to place a hypothetical IV.

here's one.

time to bond with daddy.  and time to be very thankful that this little one has never had occasion to need an IV.

time to kiss these sweet cheeks again.  and time to come up with yet another nickname.  jonutter-butter.  because of the butter-smelling poops he emits.  or because of my weird affinity for the banana  song.  just ask bobena.  or ballie.  or bikey.  or mickle-pickle.  huh?  strangely, they'll all answer to the quirky names i call them.  they just seem to know their mother is a little odd.

this is the best i'm gonna get at a group shot.

time with family.  good stuff.  thank you God for creating families.  and thank you for letting me be part of this one.

open house.

it was open house night at mikey's school a couple weeks ago.  we had been hoping phil would make it home in time to go with us, but it turned out that he had to stay for a late case that night.  thankfully though, phil's mom was here and was able to come with me and the kids.  she was a lifesaver as i really don't think i'd have made it there on my own with all four.

so off we went to school on a mission to conquer open house night.

i'm very glad we got to go and see all the hard work mikey has done this year.  and he was very excited to show us all around his classroom.

we were all very glad ah-ma (grandma) came with us.

mikey's self-portrait.  he is a very good boy.  and i like that he's mystery student #8.  it's the small things.

mikey read a book to ah-ma in the midst of a very crowded room.  she was proud of him.  i was too.

and a last minute helicopter spin on the swing before we headed home.

open house: mission accomplished.

rite of passage.

i'm pretty sure every girl has done it at least once in her life.  i know i did it several times.  and last week, allie did it for the first time.

i had just woken up from a nap and this was the first thing i saw...

don't let the bright yellow box of crayons distract you (sorry, remember that i had just woken up.  otherwise, i might have thought to tell allie to put the crayons down before snapping her picture).  look north.  above her eyebrows.

"mommy!  i cut my hair!" she proudly announced.  "do you like it?"

still in a daze, i asked her where she put the hair she cut.  cuz isn't that the obvious first question to ask?  she promptly ran to the back corner of the playroom and cheerfully produced this...

long, long strands of hair that used to be attached to her head.

apparently, she got sick of having to constantly brush her hair out of her face and so she cut herself a little window.

thankfully, she only cut a few clumps of hair.

still in my daze, i somehow decided that RIGHT THEN would be a good time to cut the rest of her hair.  myself.  what can i say, it was a flash of sleep-deprived genius and i ran with it.

only...  only, i didn't quite realize how thick allie's hair really is.  (she has her dad to thank for that.  lauren and her wispy, super-fine hair has me to thank.)  and i also didn't realize that using a pair of kid scissors would probably not be the best tool for the job.  finally, i didn't realize that wetting her hair would probably make the task ahead infinitely easier.

my bad.

so what was intended to be quick haircut kept taking longer and longer as her hair kept getting shorter...  and shorter...  and shorter.  as i vainly tried to even out her hair.  allie wondered if the haircut would ever end.

an hour later and much to allie's relief, i finally gave up even though it was still lopsided in the back.  i didn't want her to end up bald, after all.  phil suggested that maybe i could take her to a hair salon to even it out.

and so, after a quick trip to supercuts, allie ended up with a brand new 'do!

thankfully, she loves it.  and kept asking if we could go back to the hair-cutting place next time.  i think she just wanted to make sure i wouldn't try to cut it again myself.

and it only took a very quick and gentle talk to let her know not to cut her own hair again.  i believe we both learned our lesson:  the business of cutting girls' hair is best left to the professionals.

but every girl's gotta try cutting her own hair at least once, right?  it IS a rite of passage after all.  :)

five things.

this is kinda belated now, but still better late than never.

allie-girl turned five last month.  i still can't quite believe she's so big now.  i mean, just yesterday she looked like this:

back when she still had those delightful rolls on her arms.  i miss them.

anyway, where was i?  oh yes, the business of turning five.  it's a big deal.  but it also happened to be dangerously close to when baby jonah was due.  so phil and i decided that this year would be our no-birthday-parties year and that we'd celebrate by doing something special with each of the kids instead.

and lucky allie got five special things to celebrate turning five.

special thing #1:  to kick things off, we took her for her first grownup tea at the tea rose garden.  lauren came along by default and both girls got all dressed up for the occasion.

me and my girls.  lauren was in a poopy mood that morning.

so excited to use a real grownup teacup!

and soon enough the yummy tea food arrived!  originally, phil wanted to go to the all-you-can-eat tea at the huntington library because in his words, "if i'm going to have tea, i want to leave not still feeling hungry!"  unfortunately, they were closed that day, so my choice for trg and its prettier ambiance won out.

this girl's poopy attitude slowly began to dissipate with each sip of herbal peach tea laced with four lumps of sugar.

 

meanwhile the birthday girl was having a wonderful time.

daddy and his girls.

special thing #2:  a couple days later, we went to build-a-bear where allie got to make her very own hello kitty and picked out a couple dresses for her.  (she's BIG into dressing her dolls and stuffed animals up lately.)

special thing #3:  the day after that, she got to celebrate at her preschool.  i had previously signed up to bring the cupcakes for the party, and still being in denial about jonah's imminent arrivial, planned to make something special.  but alas, back pain and pesky contractions reduced my grand plans in favor of something way simpler.  though it still took me 'til midnight to get them all done.

because i didn't realize when i signed up that i'd be making SIXTY CUPCAKES.  as in FIVE DOZEN.

all strapped in and ready to roll!  because phil had started his vacation/paternity time off, he had the honor of driving allie and her cupcakes to school.

allie's preschool throws a monthly birthday bash to celebrate all the kids born in that month all at once.  there are three classes in her preschool.  hence the sixty cupcakes.

special thing #4:  the kids were at their grandparents' house the week of her actual birthday and they had a little party and cake for her there.  so sweet that they remembered!  

special thing #5:  daddy got her an ice cream cake so we could sing happy birthday to her the day they returned from grandpa's house.

happy fifth birthday, my sweet allie-girl.  we are so glad you are part of our family and wouldn't know what we'd do without you!  we are so thankful that God gave you to us and have loved watching you grow these past five years.  may He continue to bless you in the coming years as you grow into a lovely young lady in his sight.

future.

assignment #28:  the future.

big changes await us.  i don't know exactly what life will be like over the next hill.  i can't predict what the future holds.  but i trust in the Lord to faithfully take care of us tomorrow just as he has done for all our yesterdays.  and Lord willing, as long as we're all together, i know we're gonna be just fine.

ready to tackle our next adventure...

WOO HOO, i did it!  finished the joy of love series and thank you thank you thank you for coming with me.  i have been so blessed to recount our stories and share our pictures and have been so encouraged by your comments and love for our family.  i am so glad i did this little project and now have a series of pictures that i'll cherish forever.  and boy, am i glad it's done now!  whew!

jonut.

this is my baby jonah.

lauren calls him "baby donah".

which makes me immediately think of donuts.

this obviously, causes me to call him "jonut".

his sweet cheeks have nothing to do with his new nickname.

and neither do his teeny tiny fingers.

or his teeny tiny toes.

eh, who am i kidding?  it has everything to do with the sweetness of these toes.

all the way up to his nose.

the only downside to this, of course, is my disturbingly frequent craving for donuts.