Monday, January 26, 2009

Woot Woot!

Well, it finally happened. I am finally a permanent U.S. resident. It only took 12 and a half-ish years! But I'm very grateful that Heavenly Father has blessed me through the years with parents, school status, missionary status, and a job status, all of which has allowed me to legally stay in the U.S for this long before I am now on U.S resident status. Thanks to my family for supporting me and especially to those who participated in trips to the border so I could renew my visas and continue living here. Thanks to Jason for being born in the U.S (I guess we should thank mostly Heavenly Father and mom and dad for that one though...) so mom and dad could get their green cards and citizenship, which has allowed me to also receive the same blessings and privileges! I just wish mom were here to rejoice and celebrate with me and see all her hard work unfold to this! I'm sure she is and has though. Now just 5 more years till citizenship comes my way!

Also this weekend, I made this lovely chocolate cheesecake, recipe courtesty of Michelle, and it turned out amazing and delicious! The fresh raspberries were a nice touch!


PS. Happy Chinese New Year!!!!

Sunday, January 11, 2009

For Mom

Dear Mom,
Happy Birthday!
I love you!

love, nancy baby

Monday, January 5, 2009

Michigan!

I spent the Christmas and New Year's holiday with Clarence, Annie, and family in Ann Arbor, MI. We had a splendid time, all of which passed rather quickly. Between the hospital visit and all the puking going on, we still managed to have a fun, noisy holiday filled with too much food, plenty of movies and not enough sleep.

In memory of mom. The sweater will now be retired while the hat made its debut and will continue a new tradition...

Here are the kids Christmas eve in their new pajamas. That extra baby in there is Laney Wilson, who she and her parents had Christmas dinner with us. That night, Isaac said the family prayer asking Heavenly Father to bless Santa to "come safely and bring as many presents as possible." He mentioned Santa 3 or 4 more times in the prayer and we did manage to get him to mention baby Jesus once too. Unfortunately, I didn't take pictures of Christmas. Mostly because Christmas ended in 10 minutes flat (the present opening part) after which I had to take a 2 hour nap because I was so tired. We successfully, then unsuccessfully talked to dad through the web cam, but due to an unfortunate power outage on his end, that got cut short too.

A couple of days after Christmas, Clarence and I took the boys to the children's museum where we pretty much had as much fun as the kids... possibly more.

When you ride this bike, the booth lights up next to it and you can see what your skeleton is doing while you're pedaling.

A couple of days after that, we took a trip up to Niagara Falls. I'd never been there so it was pretty cool. That was actually my first trip to Ontario as well.

Isaac was kinda being a stinker and never wanted to show his face for the camera. The falls were pretty cool, even though it's just a ginormous waterfall. But you have to experience it at least once in your life! We stayed overnight in Ontario and headed back the following afternoon. But not before stopping at the T&T Chinese store for hot pot food and duck, and then Costco to look for Dino-sours for Jason. Unfortunately they didn't have any...

...but you can find kids in large quantities. We got 4. hahaha.

On New Year's eve we played in the snow for a little bit. Clarence and mini Clarence also shoveled the driveway.

Clarence and Annie had friends over for New Years Eve, we played games and ate food and rang in the new year via the internet. I called dad to do the countdown with him and he said there were 15 seconds left till the ball dropped, while the internet was showing a minute left. Oh well, what does it even matter?

New Year's Day was my last full day there. Clarence hooked up his new speakers and Lilly and Isaac showed us their ballroom dancing skills while James rifled through the trash...

I already miss everyone! Thanks for a fantastic holiday!! But I guess we can't be in vacation mode forever.