Things I've learned on this trip

We had such a great time traveling with the girls! I was amazed at their ability to keep up to our activity level and am so proud at how generally well-behaved they are. They also seemed to grow into bigger, funnier, smarter little girls right in front of my eyes! Some of this revelation may just stem from the focus we were able to give them without juggling "Baby BooBoo" (as the girls have been calling him). They've probably been this advanced for weeks and my eyes and ears are just now catching on. ;) But with so many new things to do and see, they probably did grow up a bit. Even with our own city just a few miles away, and Gramma and Opa in Chicago, this was their first big city experience. Alex pointed out how many cabs she was seeing at the airport when we first landed. Dani noticed how tall the buildings were and how some were tall and some short, with so many people on the streets. Alex also had a blast with all our walking excursions (and we did a LOT of walking!) because she loves to tell us whether we should step on the cracks or not. They both enjoyed seeing their cousins every day and the boys were excellent friends to them in return. Funny how we have to travel hundreds of miles to spend so much concentrated time with family who are 10 minutes away at home! This trip was a wonderful break from our everyday busy lives, and we all enjoyed the beauty of San Fran hills, sun, and sites. I loved this time to soak up family life, and it's comforting to know how easily the girls travel. Even though Jack and Jean planned almost every aspect if this trip (thanks!) I still learned a lot:
- Take&toss sippy cups do not work on airplanes. The pressure makes them leak which is less than helpful
- Only 2-3 new kitschy toys per kid is necessary. They get excited enough to play with them for awhile.
- My girls are not quite ready to entertain themselves with stickers yet
- Dani prefers to sleep on her tummy and has more trouble sleeping on the go than her sister, even tho she falls asleep in the car instantly. Hills make for difficult car naps - too many head flops!
- Alex likes sleeping on her back (for once, she's like Dad in this way! Usually she's more like Mom) and is very good at looking out the window to entertain herself.
- Dani likes goat cheese!
- Alex likes to eat treats slowly to make them last.
- Both girls love wearing fancy dresses but hate having their picture taken. The ultimate wedding photographer teases.
- Alex will pretend to be a monkey or mountain climber wherever she goes. Dani will pretend to be a big sister who's helping teach her sister to climb. And then they'll switch (except Dani will actually need the help! How Alex finds those perfect finger holds, I'll never know. She and Uncle Mike will be scaling cliffs in Slovakia before we know it!)
- Almost anything becomes easier when ice cream is involved.
- Sisters make good bridges. ;)

It was wonderful to see our extended family and celebrate love.

Monterey Bay Aquarium

For our first real activity of the trip we visited the aquarium with Aunt Jean, Uncle Aaron, and cousins Clay and Owen. The girls were incredible troupers, walking all day and staying interested in everything we saw. Even after waking at 3:45am pst (which is their usual waking time of 6:45 at home), they kept on looking, listening, being cheerful and asking questions until 4:30pm when we finally gave them a car nap driving back to SF. I'm so proud of them! And all at the young age of 34 months (Insert sheepish laugh of a parent who is too cheap to pay 17.50 x 2 for a child admission...) Before drifting off, Dani told me one of her favorite things we saw were "the birds with long skinny legs" (sandpipers I believe) and Alex said "I liked the penguins." I loved the sea jellies exhibit, the school of anchovies in the Outer Bay tank (one million gallons of water!) and the sea horses - so cute and amazing how they glide like the ghosts in "beetlejuice".

I'll upload better pics later from my real cam but here's a taste of today. :)


Anchovies swim together like the one big fish in Leo Lionni's classic book "Swimmy"!

Beautiful jellies

Alex & Dani make otters swim, bob, and spin. We got to see an otter feeding near the end of the day.

The first Wei family vacation

Thanks to Jack's cousin Yvonne (Congrats Yvonne & Matt! We can't wait to see you soon!!) we're headed back west... to San Francisco! As I write this, we're enjoying our first plane ride with the girls and they are doing FAN-tastic! We all kissed BenBen goodbye in Chicago this morning and headed to Ohare. The girls were so excited about going to the airport but were still able to take a little nap in the car which put them in extra good spirits as they boarded the train from long term parking. Their first train ride! We'll have added three to four new forms of transportation to their resumes by the end of this trip.

Photos: On the train - Daddy and Dani, Alex and mommy.

Enjoying activities for four hours plus a 30 min delay - coloring and Little Einsteins time:

Ben's First Birthday and Easter Eggstravaganza!

This has been a long time coming. I haven't found much computer time between a very busy month for twins club and all of us being sick this past week (Dani and I had Strep Throat, Alex and Ben had ear infections, and Jack is covered in Poison Oak. Yikes! Don't come to our house without a hazmat suit!). But we most certainly must record how much fun it was celebrating Ben's first year of life AND the joy of our yearly Easter egg hunt! Here are more pictures than I've posted the past few months combined.

Clay with his stash. He finished first of course and went on to help the girls find more. What a good cousin.

Dani was excited to play "I Spy" out in the real world! It's her favorite.

Alex had a hard time waking up from nap. Gramma helped her get looking.

Aunt Holly and Uncle Mike joined the fun.

Ben and I explored the yard.

Alex had a super heavy basket. 

Ama loves her BenBen.

Clay helps Dani find treasure with Aunt Holly's help.

All the cousins had fun together! Right after the group pic, Ben went on his own egg hunt... in Alex's basket!

Aunt Jean snuggled with our little Chinese Birthday boy.

Uncle Aaron, Ben, and Jack enjoyed the Easter/birthday dinner.

And so did Jean, Clay, and Owen at their table.


When it was time for cake - Ben got to strip down!










Ben didn't dig in nearly as enthusiastically as his sisters did on their first taste of cake. I think he's had far more sweets already than they ever did!

Then: Presents! Ben's favorite thing to do is rip paper! Finally a time when it's sanctioned.




Happy Birthday Little Man!

Fry guy

Ben and I are having a special treat -- mcDonalds! I asked him "where's your nose?" and he answered... Perhaps I should have waited for him to finish eating that fry!

Testing out my new technology... Now I can blog from my iPhone! Maybe I'll be better about catching those cute moments that so often get lost in the daily grind. I'm gearing up to post an epic photo-a-thon of memories from Ben's bday and Easter. So stay tuned!

Girls' Third Birthday Videos

We've now already had Ben's first birthday party, but I've wanted to post the girls' party for weeks. With Ben getting sick last week and a lot of work on the book submissions (all no, so far), plus a few days of party planning/cooking, it's been a busy time Chez Wei.

I don't have many pictures of the girls and their party - too busy orchestrating - but here are the cake videos. The funny lines you see on everyone's faces are face paint. Caillou did face painting on his birthday so the girls just had to do it too. ;)

Kids Say the Funniest Things, episode 4,278

Yesterday we let the girls take a bath in our "spa bath" with the jets on and bubbles and once we finally pulled them out of there, protesting all the way, Alex squealed, "But we want more tickle tub Mommy!"

Today I asked Dani to start cleaning up her toys faster so we could get upstairs to bedtime, asking her to stop looking at everything and start putting it away. She replied, "But I NEED to look at things Mommy. I have eyes."

Ben took his first steps

Not to be overshadowed by the girls' birthday, Ben's latest acheivement is a few steps before he falls int our arms! He took these on Sunday when Ama visited. She brings out the walkies in all my kids! I was happy to get to see them, even if they weren't directed towards me. ;) I'll catch it on video eventually.

Today he figured out how to stack pegs, which have been his fav toy lately along with our little car simulator toy. He's all boy!

The Twins Turn Three Tomorrow!

This post is not only historic in that my babies are going to be THREE YEARS OLD in less than 12 hours from now, but it's ALSO my 100th post! I've probably said it a million times (or at least 100. LOL!) but I'll say it again - man does time fly! Some days it feels like just yesterday that we moved here from Tucson (and I still consider myself an Indy "newbie") and sometimes I feel like the time even before Ben was a million years ago. It's strange, being a mom. Wonderful and strange. And tiring. Which is why I'm off to wrap presents and go to bed. I'll post actual birthday pics soon, after their party on Saturday with the whole family. (We'll have face paints and a bouncy house. Woohoo!) For now, here are some three year pics we took today in their new dresses. Alex is in the green floral and Dani is in white, which she demanded to wear. She's going to be the wedding-happy one, I can tell already. They'll don these at Jack's cousin's wedding in May. If I'd let them, they would have worn them every day until then...
Note the comparison with their birth announcement pic. :) We unintentionally caught them in the same spots even!











PS: Congrats to Rachel and Dave! Katherine is beautiful.

And here's what happens when you play pin the tail on the donkey with three year olds. ;)