Christmas is over?!

I packed away our tree and all things Christmas the same day our local Target Starbucks handed me a WHITE cup. White?! Wait a minute, December's not over yet... why are you out of Red cups already?! That day, a part of me died inside as I sipped on my chestnut praline latte. Eleven more months till Carsit and all the decorations return...

CHRISTMAS EVE. 

I'm going to miss this crooked tree

Didn't do a good job hiding the selfie stick... whoops!

Christmas Eve with cousins

Making gingerbread houses with cousins

And Gong Gong/Ma Ma

PRESENTS!!!

 CHRISTMAS DAY.

Turned on a Christmas movie while the parents snoozed a bit longer

Family present time (someone is KO-ed in the corner)

Special Anchor Steam giant Giants beer for Dad

Beautiful unexpected Christmas dress I found in Char's closet

Lucas helping with dinner

Cutting our Christmas dinner centerpiece

Homegirl waiting for Yorkshire pudding to rise

Christmas dinner

I can't believe Christmas is actually gone. We did a lot of driving to the Peninsula and back. The lack of a long enough nap time took a toll on Char. Christmas was fun... but also very busy. Dan and I made prime rib for the first time ever. I'll give it a B-. After our first ever attempt, we already learned how the tweak the next prime rib. 

Christmas is also full of traditions. Besides going to Bethlehem every year, two other important traditions for our family is visiting Po Po's grave site on Christmas and also Christmas in the Park.

Shinn kids smelling the flowers

 In front of Fairmont's Christmas tree, ready for the cold in a few seconds

 Amused by all the lights

 Tradition Christmas pic in front of the tree

 Why did we pay for this when we have membership to HH?!

 Cuz it makes these kiddos happy!

And tomorrow, we take our short little vacation up North to hopefully see snow and build a snowman for the kiddos. Hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas!

It's Christmas Week!

How did Christmas come so quickly? I already missed the opportunity to dry age my first prime rib. And I definitely don't want to miss the opportunity to cook a prime rib. Guess it's time to buy a big slab of meat once the kids are down tonight.

School/work was out at 11:45 this past Friday. Although we were still less than a week away from Christmas, it sure felt like Christmas to me as I lugged bags and bags of presents from my students and parents. It's been six years since I taught and I forgot how joyous of an occasion being a teacher can be around the holidays! 

 Started my weekend off going to Apple's holiday party

 Char started her weekend off with a Heineken

Sad Lucas

 Annual cousins gift exchange

 Kids skipping along as we walk to the Bart station

 Waiting for the Bart to take us to Powell Street

 Christmas in San Francisco

 Our first SF tourist-y thing as a family

 Mr. Cheeseball has got the smile down

Sunday OOTD

And now I'm off and thinking about how to prep Christmas dinner. Merry Christmas everybody!

The Holidays, Week 2

Did I mention that December is my favorite month of the year? Why? Well, not only is it Christmas (both Lucas and I love Christmas music!), but it's also my birthday! The countdown is in full swing in my classroom. As of today, only four more days of school (I'm counting Friday even though it's a total party day) and nine more days till Christmas. Plus we'll be celebrating my birthday this weekend - wewt!

 Aren't these two the cutest little things you've ever seen?!

It's not that cold in SSJ... I wonder how many times she'll be wearing this jacket

The cutest girl in the world!

 However, she's not smiles all the time

 Homegirl's favorite hobby: eating

 Homeboy's favorite: CAKE!

 What our family portraits would look like if Char DNE

For the past five years or so, we've been making a point to go to "Bethlehem" in Santa Clara. This year, the weekend was crazy and rainy, so we went to the other alternative - "Bethlehem" in SSJ. This was more fun and interactive for younger kids, but I'll have to admit that Santa Clara's production is much better and more realistic.

Soulja boy

I think I am done with Christmas shopping. Whew!

Somebody's Been Sleeping In My Bed

For a while, home girl has been throwing a fit when it's bedtime because she doesn't want to be left alone. We used to alternate turns lying on the floor in her room (around 30 minutes long) waiting for her to pass out. After a while, I was fed up with it because I could think of a million other things I could/should be doing instead. That's when I decided to just close her door so she can't get out while she cries it out. That worked for maybe a week or so. However, every night, she would wake up and walk to our room and sleep in my bed. Home girl, well, she's a smart lil fish. She decided to skip the first step (sleep in her room) and just go straight to Mommy's bed every night. Why have I not fought this? 1) I have a million other things to take care of when they're down and 2) I think it's kind of nice sleeping with her. Kids... they grow up so fast! Not before long, she might think I'm uncool and not want to be sleeping with me. I think I'll soak it all in while I can. Plus this gives me an extra excuse to get a king size bed (hint hint). 

Why/how does lil Miss Pint-Size take up so much space?!

Yes, I do get kicked a lot in the face at night.

The Holidays, Week 1

The holidays are in full swing! Over this weekend, I learned to avoid all things shopping. Thank goodness there's something called online shopping nowadays!

 Lucas after his Christmas performance

I don't know if it's cause he's older or is spending much more time at school compared to last year, but he is now a completely changed man. (Remember how unhappy he looked last year during his end-of-the-year performance?)

 Lu wanted to celebrate at McDonalds

 Hanging out in Mommy's classroom and waiting for her class to arrive

 Two honorary second graders

Weird child playing with a toy from his prize bag

The next morning, Lu and I went to a ginormous house in Los Altos Hills for a preschool Angel Breakfast.

 How can you not love a face like this?!

Where are you sissy poo?

 Traditional Sunday morning selfie

Sissy poo having fun

Lukey poo having fun

Both kids are now at the end age where they are independent enough to have fun and run around without their parents. VICTORY!!!

 Pizza @ Gymboree

Cutie girl

And now it's Monday and I have already started my countdown till Christmas Break. 10 more school days (9 more academic days)!

The Belated Thanksgiving Post

The husband has been pestering me about updating this blog. So here's the update. With Christmas performances and all that jazz going on at work and pulling off a big Thanksgiving dinner, this blog was not one of my priorities. I had this great idea to list 5 things I was thankful for before Thanksgiving, but Thanksgiving has come and gone. I'll try to do it next Thanksgiving. Whoops!

 The Thanksgiving spread

 Kid's table

 What the table's actually used for on a regular basis

 Testing out the selfie stick with the silly daughter

 Testing our selfie stick @ Thanksgiving "after party"

 Celebrating Dad Poon's birthday

Overall, I'll say Thanksgiving dinner was a success. Next year, I'll have to try more tweaks to "perfect" that turkey. It's kind of hard to perfect something when it only happens once a year though. Call me Chinese, but my second favorite part about Turkey Day is the delicious jook the husband makes the morning after.

 Playing with the selfie stick once again

 So I decided to go cheap this year (think $20 cheap) and bought a Groupon for JC Penney portraits. All I have to say is... Biggest. Mistake. Ever. That's also the reason why I was using the selfie stick for family portraits (above). I had to go back to JC Penney to pick up our pictures (and trust me, I'm not a fan of driving all the way to Tully). My Zulily deal for Tiny Prints cards expired on November 30 and my pictures weren't ready till December 3. Naturally, I freaked out and decided to improvise. I think Christmas cards turned out okay... but still, was NOT happy with my experience. 

 I love sleep

Too bad that's the girl and not me. The kids went to sleep much later than usual during break and woke up way later than usual. Win for me... wee! And now it's (practically) Christmas!