August 2012

Samantha is eight months old, crawling everywhere (including up steps), starting to cruise, and waving up a storm at people, while Marcus is just a few days away from being four. He starts school (K1 at the Orchard Gardens) in a couple weeks, so we've been enjoying every day together that we have between now and then. Samantha is on the cusp of outgrowing size 2 diapers, she still is not a fan of water (bath or beach, either way), she relishes her newfound freedom to move around the house, and she is of course Marcus's biggest fan. We've had a great last few weeks. Samantha has tried lots of foods by now, though she doesn't consume large quantities of any of them and often still makes a face while reaching for more; she's had carrots, broccoli, pork, beef, chicken, black beans, strawberries, banana, watermelon, peaches, peanut butter toast, carob graham crackers, corn soup, and on and on.

On my birthday, we had mochi waffles for breakfast, inspired by the Korean rice waffles we had at a great place in Flushing when we were last in New York. Delicious--chewy inside, crispy outside.

Then we went to Robert's softball game, and had a great time spectating, blowing bubbles, and playing with all the other kids and the umpire's old blind dog.

In the evening we went to the Prudential South Garden and had a picnic with Jef and Jin Yoon and their kids, Bob, Karen, Sarah, and Sean, before watching the new Muppets movie, which everyone enjoyed (possibly Marcus least of all, actually).

Earlier this month we raised butterflies and then released them into the butterfly garden in the Southwest Corridor Park just a couple blocks from our house. It was very exciting to watch them fly happily straight to their favorite flowers.

We also enjoyed many tennis lessons, foursquare games, beach days, storymobiles, playgrounds, and fun trips to the Aquarium, the Frog Pond, and other places this month.

In the evenings, we watched much of the broadcasts for the London Olympics.

One Saturday after seeing Helena we braved the long drive and went to Frankie's fourth birthday party at an indoor bouncy-house place down in Sharon.

The next day, we enjoyed the fan dances, lion dances, dragon dances, sword demonstrations, and martial arts demonstrations (as well as the bubble tea and frozen yogurt) at the August Moon Festival with Marissa and Alex.

And at home, it's like there's a new world order! Since Samantha can climb up into the dining room, Marcus gets to use his "too-small toys" (aka, Playmobil) on a tray on the dining room table while she has free run of the other toys.