July 2 – 4, 2011
7.2.2011 Happy 16 months!
Simon enjoyed playing in our front yard this morning. It was warm weather and so was the water. He is wearing Ron’s visor since he insisted.
We had a date with our friend Tiffany to see Avenue Q in San Jose so we dropped Simon off at Grandpa Chung’s for babysitting. Simon cried when we left and apparently cried for another 45 minutes after we left. We are still learning how best to leave so that he won’t have this type of reaction again in the future. We think we left too abruptly but we had done it before and he was fine. He’s older now though so probably understands a bit more but is also afraid that we won’t come back. My poor baby. I felt bad but I knew he would be well taken care of.
We were running a bit late and the original place we wanted to go to for dinner was packed so we looked on Yelp and ended up at Mama Chen’s in Santa Clara for some Taiwanese cuisine.
Ba wan. Good amount of meat and large slices of bamboo shoots plus it was a large sized ba wan itself.
Their special beef noodle soup. The noodles were nice and chewy but the beef itself was a little tough. The broth is light in taste, dark in color. Next time I would skip this.
Shrimp pancake. Loved the chewy gooey texture and the crispy thin layer outside.
Of course we tried the stinky tofu, yum yum!
Green onion pancake with egg. Hard to describe but if you like egg and green onions, I think you’ll like this.
It has a thick layer of egg and was well cooked so the entire thing was flaky.
After dinner, we made it to the show a little bit late but they let us in to sit on the side seats until intermission. If you haven’t seen it, it’s a riot. It really is like muppets for adults. It’s a little bit raunchy but that’s what makes it hilarious. Long live the bad idea bears!
We picked up Simon around 11:30pm and he was fast asleep. Apparently he waited up for us until 10:30pm. Poor little guy. At least he’ll have all day with us tomorrow.
7.3.2011
We explored the Walnut Creek Farmer’s Market this morning then took a walk around downtown. Of course once we saw this fountain, we had to stop.
Our boy loves water features.
7.4.2011
We went to visit my parents’ house for a late afternoon BBQ. They bought Simon an inflatable pool and a new swim outfit. He was really excited.
My mom also bought this turtle sprinkler that Simon enjoyed splashing around with.
Simon showed off what he learned in swimming class. His frog kick! This was my first time seeing him swim, I’m so proud of our little guy!
Thank you Grandma Tam! I love my pool!
Simon not only had fun splashing in the pool, he also had fun experimenting with buoyancy.
In between Simon’s playing, we had a late lunch. Kalbi, asparagus, crackers and crab dip, corn, and ribs (cooked by Tim).
Simon played in the pool all afternoon, in for one hour, out for 15 minutes to eat, in for one hour, out for 15 minutes to eat, and repeat for 4-5 hours total.
We didn’t get to see fireworks though except from the freeway on the way home. Simon couldn’t stay up that long and it was pretty crowded everywhere.