Archive for September 2007

Kids will be kids

These are random pictures of this past week. It is to fulfill the demands of overseas viewers(no names will be mentioned here)



So every Tuesday and Thursday after Brennan comes home from school, the boys goes to the backyard and play in the sandbox. They can play for hours on it. Don't know why but they do. Plus it also helps with Clayton's standing.


Da's Sydney Australia friend, Jennifer moved to New Zealand, came to visit our family. She is great! Though she's a visitor, she loves to help out even with diapers, babysitting, and giving the boys bathes. Da doesn't seem to be refusing the offer at all.



Jennifer is doing a great job to balance the cart training Clayton to walk. In fact he walked three circles all by himself pushing the little plastic cart. Prior to this Clayton has not been on his two feet yet.


For dinner we went to a Tex-Mex restaurant at RIO. The food was really good and the night was just perfect as we were eating outside under the moon.



Even Clayton didn't complain, though most of the time he doesn't complain anyways.



Our family, lots of food, and its all gone. Da eats the meat, Abbey eats the veggies, and Brennan with Clayton eats the bread.



After dinner, we walked around the lake and had a great time.



Another day: Here on our usual visit to the grandparents house, we make sure our boys do their part of the cooking. Brennan is peeling the veggies that his grandpa grew in the backyard.


After dinner, there can't be more fun than a horse ride with your cousin. And its good that Da's back is still strong because carrying 50lbs is not easy on the back. But then again sacrifice brings joy to others.


So yes we went overboard with doing thing at times and mom's involved with it too.


So here you go! my boy the circus acrobat/stunt person with his dad. (I think we need to start putting a small bowl in front of us to collect...)

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A family friend's wedding

This is about a week old now but nevertheless I finally have time to post these. The wedding reception was semi-traditional Chinese. It was still have nice reception and we had a good time.

It was interesting though because the bride and groom wanted a wedding without children and when my parents found out that no children are allowed they freaked and did not want to do. They have always been to traditional Chinese weddings where everyone in the family is invited. After several weeks of no reply, the parents of the bride called saying why was there no reply. That was when my parents told them that if the grandchildren weren't allowed to attend the reception the whole family (all eleven of us-my family (4), my sister's family(4) and my parents and brother) So in the end everyone went to the wedding.



Here we requested that we sit in a corner of the restaurant so the kids would not make so much noise.



Mom and Clayton is having a good time and enjoying the music and baby food.



A new way to use the napkins









Brennan have a great time with Emilee


Look at that..the sweet smile from grandma


Groom: Benny, Bride: Yee
Photo by: Da


Here are the Eleven of us. From Left to right: Brother in law, Christopher, grandpa, grandma, sister, Emilee, bride, groom, brother, Brennan, Da, Clayton, and most beautiful Abbey


Our family with the newly weds.


Best photo of the night, Brennan and Clayton somehow with their charms together got three, yes three girls to happily hold hands and hold things for them to walk them to the car. Unbelievable, but again maybe it's in the Zhao blood ;)

More photos can be seen here: Benny & Yee Wedding Reception

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Grandpa's vacation

This past week Da's dad was on vacation and since his dad don't know what places to go, we all just went to RIO and walked and paddled on the boat. RIO is a small area of town where commericial retail surrounds a lake with boardwalk and paddle boats. It was a great day. The grandchildren and grandparents had a really great time. Its amazing that Da's dad lived in the Rockville area for 15 years and have never been to RIO.



The boardwalk leading to the boats. There are lots of people that take their families here to walk, shop, and eat. Its a really nice stroll after dinner.





Since grandma is affraid of water and Clayton too smal for a life jacket, both stayed on the walk way and walked while we were paddling.



That's us in the water!!



Here's how RIO looks like from the water's view.


Look who's on the boardwalk.



We forgot about bread for the ducks, so we improvised and used Cheerios. I think its healthier for the ducks anyways, they get their fiber.





We paddled into the night. It was just beautiful place to enjoy a slow and relaxing day. So for his vacation we didn't have time to take him to some place exotic or far far away. He just stayed local and enjoy his time around the grandkids.

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Friends visiting from NY

A few friends from NY came down this week to visit us. There wasn't anything that was particularly interesting for them to see or visit. Since they were here for Tuesday and Wednesday there was not much to think of. They wanted to go visit the Washington DC Temple. They did that on their own, but then I took a day off to show them the local things. It was fun.




Here Brennan has been cordially asked by the ladies in the morning to walk to the lake with them.




Sister Chan and Sister Chin at the lake.







Sister Lai. Seems like all her pictures, she's always on the phone. Either she's a busy woman or her phone controls the camera to take pictures.





Sister Kwok. Hm trying to look pretty and all. Maybe I should post her picture on some dating website, lets see if she keeps her smile after she meet the guys from online. hehehe.





After the morning walk and breakfast, we headed down to the Washington National Zoo in DC. Its a perfect day to go down there. And since its a weekday, no one was there. They didn't miss much from the Pandas since all the Panda's really do is eat and sleep total oblivious to the visitors to the Zoo. Wish the Pandas were more like the animals in the movie Madagascar.






Here's the gang at the zoon.





I wonder who took the photo and who's looking after the kids when this photo is taken. The kids might have taken to custody probably put in a showcase they way Da train his kids.





You can barely see the tiger in the distance but they were just laying around in the sun not really doing anything. But the video is worth the day at the Zoo.




Even the Tiger gets annoyed because at the end, the Tiger can't stand them anymore and walks away.




After the Zoo trip, the next trip is to go to my dad's house in Rockville, of all places to pick farm fresh produce. All produce from my dad's garden are chinese vegetables. Here is Sister Chin piling up her pickings of the bitter melons with the help of her sister.





Sister Chan is posing for the camera for her gentleness picking the bitter melon.





Sister Kwok was over doing it. We told her to pick one by one, look at how greedy she is picking at these vegatables. But the smile on her face says it all. What you going to do? fight with a woman on it?





Sister Lai is claming her prize. I just feel that like these are big kids bringing home a pumpkin to show to their parents during Halloween time. Such innocent and sincere smiles and enjoyment.





The hairs on the squash/melon are really hard and sharp so George uses a bag to pick up the biggest one. Notice the white substance on it? -well during the Anthrax scare a few years back, there was a shipment of this same types of melons/squash from China and the border patrols thought is was Anthrax and so they made this huge deal about it b/c they didn't know and sent the whole huge shipment of this food back to China.







So for a grand finale for their trip down to DC, each family took a huge melon/squash with them back to NY. It's ironic how the locals here think that NY produce were fresher and yet New Yorkers come here to take food back up there b/c we have foods that you can pick, cut, and cook with in 5 minutes. Its fair to say that NY don't have everything.

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Ethan's birthday party


Since Ethan is 'obsessive' Thomas the Train the whole party revolves around the train. Brennan is trying to coach Ethan how to blow the candles..hahaha just too funny. Its incredible that his grandma made the Thomas train cake for him.


So when it comes time to unwrap gifts, it was crazy..hahaha. I think Brennan thought it was his birthday for a moment and then he's told the gifts are not his. So he keep bringing them to Ethan telling him to open them.


This hat is pretty cool. Almost like a train station master's hat or a golf hat..but its still cool.


These are all the kids. Don't know all the names but they were very fun and had lots of fun!



If you look close at Da's face, he would claim that he got beat up by his wife and not from basketball. But b/c we are in a birthday mood here, the kids had fun riding the train around the Wheaton area.



This is a pretty cool Thomas Pinata. At first I thought Brandon, the dad, was brave holding it the pinata so the kids can swing at it and if they miss they might still get the dad where it hurts. But apparently these are the 'pull' ones, where you pull one lucky string out of many and it would open the door and the other strings just are there as decoy. I was hoping that Brandon get swung at..that would be a cool birthday party..hahaha


Lots and lots of candies!! and of course since Brennan really dont' know candy yet he just collects them as if they were just stuff to collect with the other kids and then he would give it to me. No worries I will take care of the candies for him, plus its better for everyone. ;)



Its interesting that Brennan has no idea what he is riding on. He knows he just likes it, so I had to teach him its the Merry-Go-Round. At first I was a little scared of him riding the horse by himself but he didn't want me to ride with him, so I stood next to him and he seemed to do well by himself.

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