Saya's 9 month Well Check

Saya had the 9 month appointment this morning, so Chio and I took her and the twins to the doctor's. I forgot to grab the stat sheet after the appointment so I don't have the exact figures, but I know that Saya is over 21 lbs and about 30 inches long. She is 90% on weight and off the chart on height. She's a big girl. She's been wearing mostly 12 months clothing but she can fit fine in 18 months ones, too. The twins got their second shot of flu vaccines and they did really well. They didn't even cry! Saya had gotten three shots including HepB and poor thing didn't like them at all. Her iron level is within the recommended range and I am just impressed with my high quality breastmilk! Who knew!

Well, that's about it for today!

Noah's School

I let Aly and Noah play on the deck a few days ago since it was dry.
The kids "cleaned" the deck.

Daddy and Aly cuddle time

Noah was all about smiles tonight. I think he liked school!

Noah just dived into the bath tub with his clothes on while Mike and I weren't watching!


Noah started a class at Kindering Center today. He'll go to a preschool with therapy on Mondays and Wednesday for two hours. I can do the drop off/pick up on Mondays but Mike will have to pitch in and drop him off on Wednesdays because I am in Redmond with Sean for his Speech Therapy. Mike said he was not anxious at all and just took off as soon as he entered the classroom. I hauled all three kids in the afternoon to pick him up. One of the teachers said that he did really well getting to know the environment today. After the class, we all went to visit Hanae and her kids at their house. The kids had a lot of fun playing and I had a good time chatting with Hanae. Noah was in a very good mood when we got home. He was just giggling away, didn't whine even one bit. I think he had a really good day today. How cute!

Date Night

I like doing Aly's hair. Love having a girl!
She was busy trying to put a shirt on in her crib when she was supposed to be napping...

Aly's always up to something...

Now Saya can pretty much go anywhere she wants to go by scooting

Well, our Saturday revolved around the date night and Sunday revolved around the play off games!



On Sat, we focused on getting the kids tired and running on schedule so that by the time Amy came over at 8, the kids would be conked in bed. We came pretty close, the only baby up was Saya when Amy came. We decided to try two places in China Town, "Maekawa" and "Maneki", both Izakaya style Japanese joints. I've been wanting to go to Maneki for a while, so I was pretty excited to try. Since the wait time for Maneki was 1hr 30 mins long, we went to Maekawa first. Izakaya is Japanese tapas where they serve many varieties of small plates and have wide selections of alcoholic beverages. We had a lot of fun trying out different dishes with our favorite beer, Kirin. Mike liked the grilled rainbow trout and my favorite was stir-fried squid with kimchee.



Maneki was just up a few blocks, so we took a quick walk to get there. China Town at night is not the safest place. But of course I was with a 6ft 2" big white guy, so there was nothing to worry about. At Maneki, we sat at the bar and befriended the regulars there. They were a group of Japanese American middle aged guys (and a woman) and they were hilarious! Sort of reminded me of the crowd at Cheers, except they were all Japanese. Turns out, Maneki is the oldest Japanese restaurant in Seattle. They opened its door in 1904 and has been a popular joint ever since. The owner, Jin Nakayama, is a well-known figure in the restaurant business in the area and she even appeared as a judge in Iron Chef America recently. She's modest though. She's a lot of fun to talk to and I understand why people return to Maneki, apart from the delicious food they serve. Next time, we'll make the reservation in advance!



We had a lot of fun!! I am glad we had ventured out of the Eastside. We sort of needed that "away" feeling. We'll try to do this once a month!!

Appoposh!! (apple sauce)

Sick Kids

Sean and Daddy on the race car
Getting ready to GOOOO

Sean at the Family Fun Center

The morning walk in Weowna Park

We are lucky to have a beautiful trail just down the street!

Well, Noah and Saya have been sick for about 5 days. Noah had it worse with runny nose and coughs. He is much better though (about time!!) and in a better mood. Miss Saya is also on the mend. Poor baby could not nurse much because her nose gets stuffy. I cleaned her nose as much as I could but she still cannot breathe while nursing. When the kids get sick and take a while for them to get better like this, I have this urge to keep them from going to places to avoid getting sick again. But of course we can't do that. So, lets hope they'll be cold free for a long time...

We were supposed to go to the mountains today since Mike took a day off and Sean's school was out for Martin Luther King's day. I was looking forward to seeing the snow, but things didn't work out in the morning. Instead, we took Sean for a walk in the trail down the street and then off to a kids entertainment place called "Family Fun Center". I would have liked to play in the snow, but Sean had tons of fun. He loves going for a walk in his "jungle". He's good at finding odd shaped trees or holes in the ground etc... He talked a lot during the walk and was asking questions all the time. At the Family Fun Center, Sean enjoyed the Go Kart ride with his Daddy. He'd seen one on TV but this was his first time on it. He'll remember it for a very long time, I am sure.

Apart from those, not much really has happened. I feel lazy and unmotivated to cook, so have been ordering take outs a lot lately. I reason it as buying time and reducing stress, so it's very much worth it for my money now. Luckily, we have great ethnic restaurants nearby.

I wish I had cooler things to write but it's one of those weeks, I confess. Aly has been talking in short sentences in Japanese and English this week. She is a chatter box and she talks to people, Grace and her toys. She has pretend conversations with her stuffed toys and it's really cute to listen to. Often she'll pretend changing diapers of her favorite bunny named Gasper and puts him to sleep on the couch. She calls our new nanny (Amy's Mom) "grandma" sometimes. She calls old Asian ladies "grandma", I found out, because she called a little Asian lady at Fred Meyer grandma, too! She's a character.

Noah said "baby" the other day and we are pretty excited about it. We started speech therapy every week at home and I think he'll make good progress. He will also start preschool very soon (it includes speech therapy). My little calender is going to be so full and I'll have to rely heavily on my little iPhone even more.

The Start of 2010

Obviously, I've been having a lot of fun with my new camera I got for Christmas~

Saya gets the most photos taken because she cannot run away from me (yet) and likes to stare at the light flashing. She is at the cutest stage with one little tooth smiles. She can scoot now. She uses her legs and upper body to scoot forward to get what she wants. She is still slow, but steadily mastering the art of moving forward. I don't think she will be a crawler and sort of amused that I have a scooter as my fourth and final child.


Grandma left last Tuesday and it was really sad to see her go. Alyson and Sean have been asking for her. Mike and I have finally gotten used to not having her help. It was fun having her here. Thanks a lot Grandma for all your help and love!


We took the kids to a beach park off the south of Lake Washington in Renton today. It was not too cold and sans rain, so we wanted to try out a new park. The beach park is situated near a big shopping center called The Landing. It has several boat docks, children's play structures, nature walkways, lots of resident ducks and geese, two restaurants and fishing piers. It was hard to keep track of all three children running around at the park, but no one went missing. We walked on the dock looking at boats and birds after playing. It was quite beautiful and serene. I like winter parks for that peace and quiet.

Tomorrow the 11th is my last day at work. I am going into the office to return the equipments and submit some paperwork. I cleaned up some personal stuff from my work laptop and I discovered some funny pics I'd saved over the years. One of them was saved as "Mike_Girl" and it was a photo of a woman who looked like Mike except she is a woman. I had to laugh!!

Well, I better to go sleep now. I was going to write more - I have tons of things to blurb, but Saya will be up very shortly for a feeding and I need to crash afterwards!

"The glance"

Side by Side, brother and sister

Aly studying her hand

Aly is a natural model

I got your back, brother

Kids society

Saya in a dress today

Noah at the park looking around

My kids almost occupied the entire swing structure

Dock Walk

Adorable smile

I wish I'd taken the zoom lense. Wanted to focus on the shimmering water.

Saya showing off her dress

Ok, Mom that's enough for today!

Holidays at the Campbells

Enjoying the Japanese New Year's food called Osechi
With Amy on the New Year's Day

The food was tightly packed and all of it weighed about 5lbs!

Kids playing with new toys

Sean was so excited to open all the presents

Saya, too!

Sean with BSU Bronco's cap

Sean with new food toy

The twins with new toys

Aly plotting something...

Aly plotting somethig II

Sean with giant water slug

Sean and tiger -- Sean does this face when we say "Cheese!"

Saya was still warming up to Grandma

Sea of presents -- ridiculous, I know...

Noah cuddling with Grandma

Aly and her cupcake

Saya in her tiny bath

Happy New Year everyone!

We, the Campbells, want to wish you a fruitful and joyous new year~

My Mom arrived on the Christmas Eve in the morning and we have been having non-stop fun since her arrival. We started out by attending a beautiful service at our church on the eve where we all vowed to try our hardest to make 2010 the best year ever.

The Christmas morning was a little insane, kids being overwhelmed by all the presents they got, but we got through it and had busy kids immersed in all the new toys they got in the end. I think we'll buy less toys next time... A better planning would do all of us good! I think the winner though was me. I got all the nice things from my lovely family amongst it was Canon EOS SRL camera with built in HD Video Recorder. I can take professional grade picture with this one. Obviously I need to practice and read the manual, but pictures posted above are much better. I am really excited about taking nice pics of the kids. Mike got Wii from me and he was all teary when he found out. He is 35 years old but I think he believed in Christmas miracles!

Mike took Sean to Tacoma Zoo and Aquarium on Tuesday and I took my Mom to see an old friend in Lacy near Olympia. I've never been to Olympia before, so it was a fun road trip. I want to take my family to the Olympic Peninsula and I saw a glimpse of what it looks like. It's very beautiful. (Olympic Peninsula is a home to Forks, the town in Twilight Saga series...)

The New Year's Eve was a looong day for us as Mike, I and grandma stayed up passed midnight, but it was interesting. We decided to attend the neighborhood progressive New Year's Eve party and visited two houses. We went to the second and the last house and met many many neighbors. The last house we went is situated diagonal to our house in the woods and we never expected to be the way it was. The house is hiding behind thick woods and cannot see it from the street. It was a very old log house built in 1930s and they made addition to it as the original structure was small. Inside the house was what I imagine it would be like in some cabins in Yosemite. It was quaint and effortlessly comfy looking with a moose head and crackling fireplace. We cheered for the New Year with a bunch of new friends (some drunk) and we had a lot of fun!

We've been enjoying the Japanese New Year's special cuisine called Osechi, since the 1st. We get it from I Love Sushi in Bellevue every year. It's $200, but worth every penny! We also have nightly competitions on Wii, grandma included, and having a good time. I think we had the best Holiday ever this year. I am so thankful for the good health of all my family the most. The kids lit up our Holiday experience with all four cute faces and I cannot ask for more. Our new friend in the log house said (we decided that Bob should meet him as he's a big fly fishing guy) that he would trade anything to go back to the time when his four children were little. I thought I would keep that in my mind because I know I would be thinking the same thing 20 years later.

Happy New Year everyone!!