Hello and goodbye

Our neighbors across the street had a baby girl, Amy, two weeks after Sophie was born. Amy's mom and Amy dropped by to say "hello" because we haven't been outside lately during the evening because both girls are asleep by the time it cools down.

Sasha's new owner, Bonnie, picked her up tonight. No test run this time; we are officially cat-less. I got to chat with Bonnie for awhile and I feel fortunate that Sasha will be living with a very nice, animal-loving person.

Baby Buddies

Wendy, Nick, and Kaitlin came over for a dip in our community pool and then some breakfast for dinner. The babies "played" on a mat together while we ate and seemed to really enjoy each other's company.

Head to head combat

Kaitlin couldn't get enough kisses from Lydia.

Armed and dangerous

We got a special swimsuit for Lydia that has a total of eight foam floaties to help her stay afloat by herself. It works pretty well, though we still use the arm floaties too, but I think it looks funnier than it works (if that makes any sense). :PLydia has always loved swimming, but now she can do it all by herself.

Growing Up

Lydia is enjoying playing with her big girl toys. She can play by herself for stretches at a time now which gives me a little break . I don't know if I have gotten more patient or if Lydia is behaving more (likely the latter), but she hasn't been going into time-out as much nor have I had to raise my voice as much. The change is more noticeable at home; she's still quite rowdy when we're out. Sophie finally rolled over for the first time today. YAY! Here she is in her "stuck" position...
then me trying to catch her in the act, but with no luck. Though, is it me or does Sophie say "Ma" and Lydia say "Sophie"?

Life or something like it

My brother Mike drove into town this evening to hang out with us for a couple of days. He had initially planned to stay in Houston, but with everyone working, it got pretty boring during the day. I didn't think that I would see him again before he left for Dubai, so I totally welcomed the visit. We plan on hanging out and watching some movies while he is here; he wants to watch "Sex and the City" which I had never really kept up with, but heard was good. I've been told that my cell phone ring tone is the theme song for "Sex and the City", but I'm not quite sure.

Though Mike had already been gone for over three months, it honestly seemed just like yesterday that he was hanging out with us in Austin. To him, his last visit seemed like years ago because so much has changed since he left, for example, Sophie was born. I guess that's what happens when you have a family and especially when you stay at home, life kind of goes in slow motion. One day, however, the kids are going to be all grown up and I'll wonder where the time went. Gotta live life and enjoy it to the fullest. :)

Dip

Everything tastes better with ketchup.

Uncle Weekend

Sophie got to meet her Uncle Mike for the very first time this weekend. He flew in from Dubai Thursday around 1:30 PM and stayed up until we got to Houston around 9:30 PM even though he had had only one hour of sleep on an almost 24 hour flight (including layovers). Here's a picture of their first meeting...
We took professional family pictures Friday morning in Jimmy and Cora's neighborhood. During a break...
Afterwards, we had a family lunch at Saltgrass, and then Jimmy's family went to a birthday party while the rest of the family took naps. After dinner and putting Sophie down for the night, Trung, Lydia, and I went to see fireworks as shown in the previous post.

Saturday, the family had dim-sum and then Mike, Trung, the girls, and I went to a mall for a little while. We went straight to Jimmy's house afterwards where the men built desks and chairs and the women filtered through toys. Calvin and Jennifer dropped by with a scrumptious apple pie. After dinner at my parents' house, Mike, Trung, and I went to watch "Wanted", which I thought was quite entertaining.

Sunday morning just after a feeding, Sophie took a pose with the bib Uncle Mike gave her.
Before everyone headed off to church, Mike took one last shot with the Ly girls because we headed back to Austin straight from the church.
Mike will be in the States for another week and a half, but we probably won't see him before he returns to Dubai. Hopefully he will decide to return home permanently next year, so that we can see him more often :)

July Fourth

The setup...the watchers...
the finale...

Lydia thoroughly enjoyed her first Fourth of July fireworks show at Katy Mills Mall. She was completely mesmerized by the bright lights and loud sounds; and would look up at me once in awhile, point to the sky, and say "uh". If you missed the fireworks, I hope you enjoy our digitally taped show. :P Happy Fourth of July!

Encouragement

Lydia always helps me encourage Sophie during her tummy times though she can be a little rough at times...notice as she bumps Sophie's face with the ball. Hmmm...must be tough love. :) Oh, also notice as Lydia mumbles "a ma" (aka "grandma on Mom's side in Chinese) as she goes for the phone; we had just gotten off the phone with my mom when I recorded the clip.

That's strange

I remember being compared to my cousin who is the same age as me and not liking it, but now I see myself doing it. I only have to deal with it every now and then, but Lydia and Sophie will probably be compared quite often for the rest of their lives, so I need to make sure to watch myself. Nowadays I've just been analyzing how differently each child develops. For example, Lydia started flipping over right when she turned three months old while Sophie shows no signs of it. Tonight she barely slept from 7-10 PM when she is usually knocked out, but I'm sure she'll sleep better the rest of the night. Maybe Sophie couldn't sleep because she was thinking of ways to flip over. :P