I have never seen Vancouver like this. Crazy party singing “O Canada” everywhere from the bus to the train to the street for the whole 17 days of the Winter Olympics. How often will the city that you live in hosting Olympics? We have lots of fond memories (Elisa: feel free to add to the list as I often forgot)
- Brought the kids to the downtown core to experience the atmosphere, the concert, the street performers, to the lightshow and fireworks – and how well they were behaving all the time
- Watched the Canada beat USA in OT gold medal hockey game live at downtown big screens with friends. Screamed and high fives all the way through the street after that. On my oh my !!! Vancouver screamed after the goal and did not stopped screaming … even after we left downtown many many hours later
- KK loved all the music and the performance and Miga. Miga is one of the mascot – a killer whale bear.
- En-En dragged us off the couch to dance when there was a figure skating on TV
- En-En pointed to the TV and screamed “GOALLL!!!!”
- How many times did we say “are we done with Olympics?” and went out to absorb the atmosphere AGAIN
- Witnessed the first gold won by Canada on the Canadian soil
- Set history as the most number of gold medals won by a nation (14) in Winter Olympics
- Saw the hot and attractive Lindsey Vonn (of USA Alpine Skiing) – talked to her but did not ask for autograph or take a photo. D’Oh!
- According to BBC’s reporter James Pearce (link here), “I was in Beijing, and I can assure you that you simply cannot compare the spectator experience there with the one here in Vancouver. Vancouver wins hands down.”
After about 3 years away from home, Linda finally came home from Taiwan and Korea. Woo-hoo! For those who don’t know, Linda and I used to go to the same university and faculty. We spent lots and lots of time together studying, staying late for photo projects, real late (3am???). To think of it, I do miss my school years, I miss those time when you don’t really feel the need to schedule a day to meet your friends. They were just there everyday.
We used to treat ourselves with al-you-can-eat sushi whenever we finish our semester. How fun was it?
Now that she is home, I have all the reasons to have all-you-can-eat sushi. Glad to have you home, my friend!
This year pumpkin patch was arranged by Viola’s preschool. The pumpkin patch is fairly big and is “designed” to accommodate lots of preschoolers with Disney, Dinosaurs, Snoopy and Pixar characters filled the land. It was pretty amazing. We had picnic after the their teachers and classmates left. We stayed a bit longer to enjoy the quietness after the madness rush in the morning.
Viola had hard time choosing her pumpkin, she kept telling me it is heavy or it is dirty. I had no clue she was ‘clean-clean’ kinda girl. ^_^
Camping with a baby and a toddler – are you nutz? We did it again. This time at Porteau Cove. What a beautiful campsite. Oceanview and we got to enjoy nature lighting and thunderstorm as well. This is two-for-two for getting rained out camping during the forecasted sunny Summer weather.
First outing for KK as a photographer. You will find her “works” in the gallery.
Going camping with 2.5 years old toddler and 7 months young baby – are you nutz? NO and we are going camping again in a month. We went to Alice Lake. It was such a fun camping trip especially with four other awesome families with young kids. That was the first camping trip for Elisa, Viola and Adelia. And they loved it!!! Viola was having a blast – sleeping in tent with mom and dad, playing and eating with friends all day, running around in the rain, playing with flashlight, and many more. For Adelia, I can only assume that she liked it. She did attempt to eat the twigs from the forest floor.
Serene organized this picnic at the water park in Steveston. The weather was really good, not to mention the food. I love Sam’s curry and I couldn’t seem to be able to move from the table.
After the picnic, we had to go and find Adelia’s car seat. She needs an upgrade and we found one that we love, not Britax but Sunshine Kids. It was perfect for us, since it is narrow-er, we can fit a third person easily and comfortably on the side. One store to one store, we decided to get it from a baby store near us, we love the service and the people’s knowledge. We ordered it!
Yeah Playland. This is definitely a multi celebration. Celebrating Len’s bday (Viola god-dad) , Viola who is now tall enough to ride ALL of the kiddie rides. A chance for me to meet my former colleagues from McKesson and former work partner from Scotland. A great day!!
Carolyn told us about this 5K run for the Children’s Hospital and asked us whether we would love to join her. Without a doubt, I said YES! I registered Viola and I. Then,
Des: “Are you sure? Have you ever ran before?”
Me: “No! But how hard could it be?-WAIT! How far is 5K anyway?”
Des: “……”
I did managed to run/jog/stroll/walk couple of times (2x to be exact) in the preparation for this event with the hope that I wouldn’t be last at least. Yeah, I wasn’t thinking! It did need stamina. Luckily, because this event is considered a family event, most of the runners are families with children.
The feeling couple minutes before the race started was unbelievable. With all runners wearing the white shits and in high spirit, Viola and I were so thrilled to be able to be part of it. Thanks Carolyn!!! Btw, Carolyn started 2K behind me, we missed each other and managed to finish couple minutes ahead of me. Did I mention that she is 4 months pregnant?
We were invited by Natalie for her 2nd birthday.On the invitation, it says “We’ll be putting out a small pool in the backyard and a water-table so bring along water & sun gear!” Apparently, the word ‘pool’ didn’t register in my mind. I just thought that they would be playing in the backyeard with water table and water splashing here and there. We didn’t bring any swimming diaper for Viola, luckily Serene brought extra for Lucas. Thanks! Viola had lots of fun in the water under the Sun.
Worth to mention!!! The fabulous and yummy cake was made from tofu and zuchini, yes you heard me right-tofu and zuchini. Talk about a way to sneak in the veggies to the kids and adults for that matter
One of the downfall of being born during Fall and Winter is not being able to have beaches, parks, and backyards birthday parties. We were invited by Hui Lee for her and Elly cie’s birthday BBQ party at the Lims. The shrimp and the steak were amazing, not to mention the chocolate and rose cakes.
