Christina and Matt's Wedding Day - May 19, 2012!

The weather could not have been more perfect for a Houston wedding in May!  Sunny, gorgeous and highs in the 80's!!  

Here's Michael and the flower girl:

They did great!  And since they knew all they had to do was walk down the aisle and sit down, they practically FLEW down the aisle!

Here's the beautiful bride with Uncle Jerry:

Presenting The Schwegmans!

We had a great time being there!  I can't imagine being The Mom one day with a son who is 34.  Looks like it's a lot of fun!

Especially when you introduce Uncle John in the mix!  We missed Uncle Bill/Aunt AK/Aunt Kelli:

Here is Michael, playing around:

He did great with the pillow, especially since it held his great-grandparents' wedding rings.  *sniff.*

Here he is.  Not too happy with the posing, and I wish I had been more forward to step in and say, "No, this looks so stiff and disjointed.  Let's channel our inner Kate Middleton's gorgeous wedding photo with her jr. attendents please."

But I am happy to have a picture and I didn't want to step on any toes and be THAT Asian Photographer.

Aunt Sally and Uncle Bob with the lovely bride and her groom:

Christina being gorgeous:

Michael got himself stuck in the pew somehow:

Here he is trying to impress Uncle John who is a kind and patient man:

More pictures next!  I don't know how I didn't take any pictures of Quinn!  I am not a good multi-tasking photographer.  I knew I was taking pictures of Michael as ringbearer and that's all I did!  I will download pics from The Mom's smugmug album and post some reception pictures and our ONE family picture of us all dressed up.

HRMPH.  SO miffed we did not get a family picture.  I tried to do it at my house before we left and it just didn't happen.  I tried to do it before the ceremony but it just didn't happen.  There is a reason I have a tripod and just do it myself every year because if I want it to happen, I am the only one who can make it happen.

Fast Photo Shoot

My mom had a great idea for a fast photoshoot before the wedding since everyone is all dressed up.  

However, I didn't allow enough time for it really!!  So I'm pretty sad I didn't get ALL the shots I wanted.

But glad we got some!

My pink parents:

My Michael being silly:

Sometimes I feel like I blinked and my baby became a 5 year old:

My sister came down to visit us too, which was great!  The newest addition to our family, Cory, came with her:

My mom got some great pictures of ALL of us together on her camera! I hope I can get the file when I go home next time!

We loved spending some good quality family time together.  We just love Texas and miss our family.  Hoping to get back there one day, but we'll see where our lives take us!

Houston - Rehearsal Dinner

Friday, May 18th:  Rehearsal Dinner!

Michael had a great time being ringbearer.  These 2 were born only 4 months apart.

They were both so cute!  Holding hands wasn't too popular between the two of them, but it's just for one aisle:

And we were so thankful that all they had to do was walk down the aisle and sit with us!  Our ringbearer had to stand up front and present the rings!  I can't believe we made a 5 yr old stand there for the whole ceremony!

Christina and Matt practicing for their big day:

The rehearsal dinner was at Los Cucos - LOVE LOVE LOVE!!!!  Margaritas, beer, fajitas - what's not to love!  It was delicious and we were so honored that they asked Michael to be a part of their special day.

So far, trial run 1:  No ninja moves down the aisle.  That was our biggest concern.  We had to have a talk about that.  How ninja moves are not ok in the church down the aisle.  That's ANOTHER talk I never imagined myself having to have in my lifetime.

Texas Part One

We had a super fantastic 6 days in Texas.  Compared to our yearly pilgrimage to Texas for a month duration, the 6 days just FLEW by!

We were so excited to see my Mom for both her 60th birthday AND Mother's Day.

My parents picked us up from the airport and we had to immediately stop at the Asian super market (they have 3 within 5 minutes drive of them *super jealous am I*).  Upon driving up, I see the sign for:

"Live Crawfish."

Awwww yeaaaahhh...

One phone call to Brian later and we decided to have a crawfish boil the day Brian flew into town.

Here's Michael with his first up close look at a "mudbug":

This was just ONE small bowl of crawfish.  We bought 35 lbs.  For 4.5 people.  Go big or go home:

We sat down to some serious grubbin':

Michael is a brave one:

Baby Cat won't eat enchiladas or mexican food or a TON of other things.  But he gave crawfish a go!

I even heard him tell someone, "You have to suck the heads too."

NICE.  It is so interesting how he won't eat bell peppers.  But he'll eat crab, crawfish, fish sauce, cha lua (asian ham), all sorts of hard to eat Asian food.  Goes to show you some of your taste buds are inherited!

My dad seems to never age:

My mom either!  Look at her chowin' down.  Look at my DIY-er Mom strippin' her wall paper down!  So proud of the kitchen remodel she has started!

For the first part of our trip, we hung out with my mom and dad and they spent some great quality time with Michael.  He ate 6 bowls of pho in 2 days.  He just LOVES my mom's cookin'.  I can't hold a candle to it!

Play Time

I LOVE SUMMER!!  No having to be somewhere at 8:30am (THE HUMANITY!!).  No set plans.

I love it even more as a mom now than I did as a kid.

We put together his Hot Wheels Wall Track that Christina/Matt gave him for being ringbearer and it is pretty cool:

I am planning to repaint this room pretty soon.  so I'll have to take it down.  But it goes up with those 3M Commando stickie thingies so I'm hoping I can just get some more of those.

Now this picture, you have to enlarge using that new Blogger enlarge it function to barely see what is going on:

If you look closely - it is a long, WET, dirty, Muddy trail of footprints.

Michael and Abbey had a water gun fight and were reloading in the kitchen.  Luckily, I had to mop anyways so I let them REALLY muck it up because I  needed SOMETHING to force me to clean.  I am not a clean person by nature.

I love summer!  I might take a picture of our mulch pile next for you to see.  I've been spending some time with it lately.

Last Day of Preschool: June 6, 2012

Wednesday:  June 6, 2012

Michael's Last Day of Preschool.

They had a program, which was very well done!!  They had separate ones for every class this year, which was excellent.  Last year, they had ALL the preschool classes together and that was a little bit of mayhem.

Here they are:

There was a lot of variety in the program, which I loved!  They had each kid come up and say what they wanted to be when they grew up.  We got some great answers:

"When I grow up, I want to be a teenager"

"...A movie star"

This cuter than cute little girl came up and said,  "A COP!"

Unexpected and hilarious!

One little girl came down the stairs doing the cutest hops and skips.  But had to hop and skip back because they hadn't called her name quite yet.  And when they did, she did the same cute hop and skips back down.  I just love this age.

Michael came up and said, "An Engineer."

I may be Asian, but I can swear I'm not feeding him this stuff subliminally.  He wants to be just like his Daddy so we know this is the answer for now.  We'll see when he grows up.  But as engineers ourselves, we feel the need to really explain to him what engineering really entails.  For me, I thought I "liked calculus and chemistry" so engineering naturally.  CHEN204 came as one of the biggest shocks of my life.

I digress, back to my graduating Michael:

Then, came some cute songs and nursery rhymes and pledges.

Then some kind of bean bag dance:

Handbells wasn't so popular.  I was just excited Michael got the super mario one:

Michael with his just super sweet and wonderful teachers:

They both were excellent.  So great at feeding back and just being warm and loving with Michael.  They taught him so much and even had science programs for the kids.

I asked Michael where he wanted to go for lunch for his last day of school.  His initial answer was RITA'S WATER ICE!!

I told him that was fine AFTER lunch.

For lunch, maybe McDonalds?  Or Mi Cocina?  Or Capriottis?

Instead, Michael picked the place 40 minutes away:

Can't say I complained about that!  Here's Michael with his buffet plate.  He loves buffets where he can pick what he wants to eat:

No worries - we made it to Rita's!  For those of you who have never heard of Rita's, it's a water ice place.  Which is a fancy way of saying a "smooth sno cone in a cup."  It actually is quite good and we've been quite smitten with it as a family:

Here's Michael's Scrapbook from School.  I just love his self portrait and that silly picture of him on the cover:

This is a funny montage of Michael:

And again with the engineering:

 I like the way he has dad working at the computer.  It is partly true!  And only what he sees!  We need to drag him into a chem lab one day.  ;)

A perfect end to a wonderful year.