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This journal is about raising identical twins.Seventy Ninth Month
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Friday, Feb 6, 2004 (6y+6m)
The twins are 6.5 year old today. The twins went to school as usual. Since our other car was still at the shop, daddy and mommy took the twins to school together. When the kids were in school, daddy dropped off mommy at the hospital to check her recent discomfort. Daddy returned to work. Daddy's gout problem is coming back. Daddy took off work early due to a lot of pain in the foot. Daddy picked up mommy from the hospital and the twins from school in the afternoon. The twins did some homework before we went out again to pick up the other car from the shop. The car repair caused another $700+. The bills added up to over $1500 in less than 3 months. I wanted to get rid of the unreliable European car as soon as we find a replacement. Mommy thought we should wait a little because we had already spent so much in the up keeping.After dinner, the twins did some abacus exercise. For bedtime reading, we finished the chapter on World History and Geography. We started on a chapter on visual arts today. It was Joanne's favorite topic, she wanted to read it herself.
Saturday, Feb 7, 2004 (6y+6m+1d)
In the morning, the twins said they wanted to wear short sleeves T-shirt. We asked why, they said it was a sunny day and when they touch the window, it was hot. We told them their window didn't count because it was facing east and it was always warm in the morning. The twins worked on their homework after breakfast. They complained the house was too cold even when the heat was raised to 72°F. We told them how wrong they were when they thought they could wear T-shirt today.Hing and Lucy brought lunch to us in the afternoon. Terence and the twins played in the backyard for a while. Jasmine wanted daddy to remove the two training wheels from her bicycle because Joanne wouldn't let her to ride hers. Joanne later wanted to try Jasmine's bike. Jasmine wouldn't let her as a revenge. Joanne did it anyway when Jasmine was not looking. Jasmine was very upset and they almost got into a fight. Though it was a sunny day, it was pretty cold. The kids needed to wear jackets to play outdoors. Terence and his parents left at 4pm for his afternoon nap.
Mommy asked the twins to work on their homework again. But the twins said they wanted a nap too. We let them go to bed, but they chatted until daddy sent them downstairs to do their homework.
We joined Terence family again at a Korean restaurant for dinner. They bought us lunch, so we bought them dinner. The restaurant was full with over 40 people waiting outside. We were glad that we made a reservation a few hours earlier. We didn't wait long and the dinner was great. After dinner, they came to our house to watch a movie on DVD. Lion King was on ABC, the kids watched it before we started our movie. They brought dessert and we offered some fruits.
The twins silently went to bed by themselves when they felt tired. They didn't disturb us nor the guests.
Sunday, Feb 8, 2004 (6y+6m+2d)
Joanne came to our room in the morning, she complained that her comforter was not warm enough. She said that because she wanted to climb into our bed. When Joanne got her permission, Jasmine jumped into our bed too.We went to lunch with grandma. Daddy went to see a herbal doctor for the gout problem. In the afternoon, Joanne did her homework. Jasmine finished her homework early but Joanne didn't, so Joanne needed to stay home. Jasmine told daddy that Joanne spent her time writing wrong numbers into her homework and then erased them over and over again.
Daddy took Jasmine out to practice her riding skill on two wheels. Jasmine did pretty well on her bike without the training wheels. She managed the balancing within a minute. She still had trouble controlling where the bike went. Daddy asked her to practice making big cycles in both direction around the cul-de-sac. It took more control to go in a large arc then swirling around in tight turns. I told Jasmine that she needed to do the figure-8 test after she practice enough. Her eyes brighten up when she found out Joanne didn't take the figure-8 test yet. She said she might be able to do better than Joanne. I told her it was quite unlikely because even though Joanne didn't take the test, she had been riding on two wheels for the past six months. Joanne would have no problem passing the test.
Mommy told Joanne that she could not go to Nathan and Adam's birthday party if she failed to finish her homework on time. When Jasmine came back from biking, Joanne still hadn't finished her homework. Jasmine said goodbye to Joanne and went to the birthday party with daddy. Mommy stayed home with Joanne to let her finish her homework.
Nathan was 3 years old today, his brother Adam would turn one year old 5 days later. They had a joint birthday party at Gymboree. Jasmine was the oldest kid among the guests. The closest second was just a little younger. Jasmine was uneasy at first. She whispered to daddy saying the party was for babies. Daddy told her to have fun and don't worry about it. She did have a good time. As usual, she loved the parachute time. When the leader sang "Itsy bitsy spider", "Wheels on the bus" and "Twinkle twinkle little stars", Jasmine told daddy she knew how to play these songs on piano now. Joanne called daddy on the phone to tell daddy she had finished her homework already. But the news came too late because the party was already winding down. Before we left, Jasmine picked up the goodie bags and gifts for Joanne too.
When we got home, mommy was mad a Jasmine. It turned out that Jasmine missed a whole page of her homework, no wonder she finished so soon. Jasmine cried because she didn't know about that page and she didn't lie about finishing her work. Mommy wanted her to finish the page before dinner.
The twins played with the new toys they got from the goodie bags. Joanne lost her tiny Hello Kitty doll within the first half and hour. She demanded daddy to search for it. When daddy got up to their room, it was on her bed. Daddy scolded her for not even trying before bothering daddy. Within two minutes, she lost it again. She made it a big deal that daddy must find it for her. The whole family, including Jasmine, lectured Joanne that she must be responsible for her own stuff and no one would help her on that. When it was time for bedtime story, Joanne refused to come to bed because nobody helped her to look for the doll. Daddy told her that the bedtime story would not wait for her. She wandered around the house "looking" for the doll. She missed her story on purpose as a protest. Jasmine taught her to retrace where she had been before she lost the doll. Joanne yelled back and said she had already done that. Jasmine joked that Joanne opened her eyes but didn't see with them. After the twins went to bed, daddy came downstairs and immediately saw the doll lying behind the sofa. Jasmine was quite right about Joanne's vision.
Monday, Feb 9, 2004 (6y+6m+3d)
Mommy had a doctor appointment early in the morning. She woke up the twins before leaving the house. The twins put their Hello Kitty alarm clock next to daddy's pillow and set it off. The twins were worried when daddy took a last minute bathroom trip before leaving the house. Daddy managed to take the twins to the school 10 minutes before the bell rang.Today was the 40th anniversary of Beatles' US debut at the Ed Sullivan show on TV. The TV showed the news footage about Beatles' visit. The twins were amazed that daddy watched black and white TV at their age.
After dinner, the twins turned on the Chinese music and performed a Chinese dragon dance for us. They made a dragon head of paper complete with eyes and mouth. Joanne wore it over her head, Jasmine held the tail behind her. They paraded the dragon around the house. The dragon ate whatever offering daddy fed it. Joanne pushed back some out of its mouth. She said the dragon threw up all over the house.
We continued the bedtime reading on the topic of visual arts. The twins were joking and making funny remarks. They were not interested in the topic. They cheered when daddy decided to return to story reading tomorrow.
Tuesday, Feb 10, 2004 (6y+6m+4d)
The twins went to school as usual. Jasmine said she drew a picture of a dragon at school. Her classmate Kimberly said it looked like a dog. Jasmine added very long antenna to make it look like a dragon.The twins finished their homework early today. They were allowed to play with the computer after dinner.
We added story telling back into bedtime reading again. The twins requested Rapunzel to be the first story. They loved the line spoke by the witch, "How dare you climb into my garden!" They laughed every time they read the line.
Wednesday, Feb 11, 2004 (6y+6m+5d)
The twins went to school as usual. We went to a nice dinner at a French restaurant. We celebrated Valentine's day early. Joanne had a runny nose, she sniffle constantly throughout dinner. She didn't have much appetite. She didn't finish her dinner.Jasmine brought home her painting of a green dragon. She stabled it above her bed. For bedtime story, Joanne read the book she borrowed from the school library today.
Thursday, Feb 12, 2004 (6y+6m+6d)
The twins were 6 year, 6 month and 6 day old. Daddy took a week off from work. The twins took the next two days off from school. We got up early in the morning, getting ourselves ready for a vacation. Joanne's runny nose had not recovered yet. Despite the symptom, she was quite energetic. Mommy said we shouldn't worry because Joanne didn't have a fever.Hing came to drive us to the airport at 9am. We went through the security checkpoint after we checked in our luggage. We had breakfast inside the airport terminal. We boarded the airplane at 11:30am. The plane took off at 11:56am. Mommy took out the twins homework but to find that they didn't bring any pencil. The twins refused to do their homework with ballpoint pens because they couldn't make corrections. So the twins chose to take a nap on the airplane instead. After 5 hours and 12 minutes, we arrived at Kona, Hawaii. We got off the airplane in the traditional way, by walking down the stairs. We got an opportunity to take some pictures with the belly of the Boeing 757. After we claimed our luggage, we took a taxi cab to the Hilton hotel at Waikoloa village. It was 18 miles north of the airport and the fare cost a bit over $40 dollars. We figured that taking a shuttle bus cost $10 per person. With additional $2, we didn't have to wait for the bus and suffer multiple stops along the way.
After we checked in to the hotel, we strolled around the hotel to get ourselves familiar to the huge place. We found where the water slide was, we passed by the dolphin encounter pool. We could see from a distance the dolphins swimming in the pool. The twins wanted to swim with the dolphins. We convinced Jasmine that she was too young to played with the dolphins. We told her that if the dolphin dragged her across the pool, she may drown because she couldn't swim well. She was kind of scared because she remembered how Shamu in the Seaworld dragged and tossed the performers around in the pool. It was easier to turn down Joanne because she had a runny nose, she may make the dolphin sick.
We came to our room and took a shower before going to dinner. We had a nice Japanese dinner inside the hotel. We went into a store to buy some pencils. The twins picked up couple of hula dance grass skirts too. We returned to our room and went to bed early to recover from the long tiring trip. Besides, due to 2 hours difference in Hawaii, it was the twins bedtime already.
Friday, Feb 13, 2004 (6y+6m+7d)
Jasmine got up before 7am, it was 9am in California time. She told us that she didn't sleep all night, she was too excited about going to the swimming pool. We didn't explain to the twins about the time zones difference. So they were fooled by their own biological clock when they woke up at 5am local time. Daddy heard her heavy breathing when she was sound asleep, so she only thought she didn't sleep.We left our room at 8am after having a bite of snacks. We headed towards the pools and the twins wanted to visit the dolphins first. The dolphins were not out in the pool yet. We went to the water slide. The twins had many runs down the slide. In the beginning, daddy stood at the bottom of the slide to pull the twins out of water. Towards the end, they wanted to swim to the edge of the pool all by themselves.
At around 10am, we had a big breakfast by the pool side. After the meal, the twins went to the beach pool to play with sand castles and waded in the swallow kid's pool. They got bored after a short while. They wanted to go back to the other pool to get back their swim goggles. However, when they saw the water slide again, they didn't want to go back to the sand again. We spent the next few hours around the slide, the jacuzzi, the 3 feet pool. The twins could practice their swimming in the swallow pool because they could stood up whenever they were out of breath.
We stopped by the dolphin pool again and watched how other kids had their encounter with dolphins. After we finished watching the half hour dolphin encounters, mommy said that was it. She actually meant it was a ripoff for such a short encounter at $125 per kid. The kids got to touch the dolphins perhaps 4 to 5 times over the entire encounters. There was a photographer taking pictures when the kids hug the dolphins, but the photo probably cost another $50 no doubt. It was a big relief for Jasmine because she saw the other kids were safe with the dolphins. She wanted to have her dolphin encounters too. Daddy explained that she had already touched the dolphins before at Seaworld during their feeding time. $125 was a lot of money just to touch them a few times and take a picture.
We returned to our room at 3pm. After taking a shower, the hair dryer broke, the twins took a nap at 3:45pm as soon as room service brought us a replacement. We woke up the twins at 5:15pm. We changed to twins into their hula dance costume. We went to the Luau dinner show. It was a buffet followed by some Polynesian dance performance.
We got back to our room and put the twins in bed before 10pm. The twins brought along a Lizzie McGuire novel as bedtime story.
Saturday, Feb 14, 2004 (6y+6m+8d)
We got up after 9am. We ate some snacks before leaving the room. We went to the hotel lobby to get a rental car. We packed some swimwear and left the hotel. We went to the Kings' shops near the hotel. We had a brunch before we shopped around in the mall.The next stop was Costco Hawaii. The merchandise were very similar to those at home except they had extra supply of books with Hawaii theme, they carried a large collection of Hawaii shirts at $17 each instead of $60 at the Kings' shops near the hotel. Mommy bought a beautiful Hawaiian skirt. We bought 2 sets of snorkelling gears for the twins. We also bought a load of Hawaiian Maccademia nuts and chocolate to take home. There were at least 5 to 6 varieties instead of one or two at the store at home. Mommy worried that the chocolate may melt in the car under the hot Hawaiian sun. We returned to the hotel to unload the cargo.
We then headed to the Hakuna Beach state park which was close to the hotel. It was late afternoon when we got to the beach. After we changed into swimsuits, we went into the ocean waves. The twins had a great time bopping and dunking into the pounding ocean waves. They held on to daddy's hands for security. The current was pretty strong. The waves hit us from two different directions. One went perpendicular and another parallel to the beach. After just a few waves, we were washed 30 yards from the vacant life guard tower. We had to reset our starting point once in a while to avoid getting too close to some rocks down the beach. Daddy lost an expensive swim goggle to the pounding waves in the first few minutes. The twins really had fun. A one point, they didn't want to hold daddy's hands anymore and each twins went different directions. When the ocean waves tossed them around, they laughed and giggled. That made daddy very worried because they could be washed away within seconds. Daddy ordered them to hold on to me, or we would leave right away.
We took a short break to watch a beautiful sunset on the Pacific horizon. The sun went down very fast and we found that the last second green flash was true. We returned to the waves for a few more minutes until the ocean breeze picked up speed after the sunset. After we washed off the sand and sea water, we returned to the car for a quick snack.
We returned to the hotel. The hotel was jammed with traffic because of the Valentine's day especially when it fell on a Saturday. There were several wedding banquets at the hotel. The restaurants were filled with lovebirds. We had a hard time finding a parking space. The twins wanted to go to the pool. Daddy thought it was a good idea for the twins to get rid of all the sea water on their body. We were disappointed to find that the big pool in the hotel was closed because someone puked in the pool earlier in the day. We heard that one adult puked and followed by a child. We didn't know if the two persons got sick because the water was contaminated in the first place or the first person got drunk because of the valentine's Saturday and his puke caused the child to puke too. The hotel closed the pool to treat the water chemically. They only allowed people to go into the jacuzzi. The pools at the other end of the hotel still opened. It would take at least 10 minutes to wait for the tram and another 10 minutes to travel to the other end of the hotel. We decided to just use the jacuzzi. The twins still had fun in the jacuzzi which was under a 10 feet tall waterfall. The twins found out that the pouring water of the waterfall gave a good massage on the back. They demonstrated that to the other couple in the jacuzzi.
We rode the boat back to our hotel room. After we all took a hot soothing shower, we ate the dinner we bought from Costco earlier in the day. The twins were so tired that they got in bed without asking for their nightly bedtime story.
Sunday, Feb 15, 2004 (6y+6m+9d)
We got up at 7am. We went to Kings' shops before 9am. We took highway 19 to go around the island. When the twins found out that we were going to see waterfalls and volcanoes, they were disappointed. They wanted to go the ocean to play in the waves. Almost 2 hours later, we stopped at Kelokelo Beach state park. The twins were asleep and refused to come out of the car. Joanne complained that she was not feeling well and need to sleep. She had a runny nose for a few days. She giggled when she managed to convince daddy to carry her around. We all knew she just used her illness as an excuse for more privilege and services.We went further to Akaka falls. We managed to wake up the twins and hiked a trail with them to see two waterfalls. We continued on and stopped at Hilo for lunch. We stopped by Mauna Loa Macademia nuts factory's visitor center. We bought some souvenirs and took some pictures in the garden. Jasmine picked some Macademia nuts with shell on the ground. She tried to break open the hard shell with no success. We went to the Hawaiian Volcano National Park. We followed the park ranger to go around a trail for an hour to see the cauldron and crater and some native planes along the trail. The twins laughed hysterically when the ranger told a story about the king's wife hugged the Ohea tree. We watched a short film in the auditorium before leaving the park. On the way out, we walked through the lava tube.
We asked the twins to take a nap when we drove 2.5 hours back to the hotel. We stopped by for some gas and had dinner at Kings' shops. The place was packed with tourists and locals, all the restaurants were fully booked. We had no choice but to go to the food court. We shared a Hawaiian Pizza as dinner. The twins wanted to do some shopping at the shops after dinner. Jasmine bought a toy surf board for her Hello Kitty doll, she lost hers earlier. Joanne bought a jewelry box made of shells and a pair of earrings. She told daddy that mommy promised to let her pierce her ears someday. Daddy told her she might not be able to use the earrings until 12 years old. We returned the rental car at the hotel before going back to our room. The twins took shower and they went to bed. Daddy read them the Lizzie McGuire novel as bedtime story.
Monday, Feb 16, 2004 (6y+6m+10d)
We let the twins sleep as much as they wanted. They got up at around 9am. We took it easy to get ready for snorkeling. We applied extra layers of sun screen before leaving the room. We went to an early lunch at the side of the lagoon.After the meal, we let the twins play on the sandy beach for at least half an hour before letting them into the water. Mommy was not feeling well, she stayed out of the water all day. Jasmine was enthusiastic about snorkeling for the first time. Daddy set her up and asked her to float on the water face down. Jasmine didn't listen to instructions, she just kicked away. After a few kicks, she tried to stand up with the fins on her feet. She stumbled and sucked some water through her snorkeling tube. Since she kicked away so fast, by the time daddy caught up on her, she already choked by some sea water. She immediately quitted. She didn't want to try it anymore. After daddy removed her gears, she fetched her regular goggles and wanted to swim instead.
Learned from Jasmine's experience, Daddy wanted Joanne to start differently. She only wore her diving mask and snorkel. I led her into the water and asked her to kneel down with her head in water. She stayed under water for awhile to look for fish. Nothing approached and she got bored. She quitted also within a few minutes. We bought two sets of gears and they only used them for a few minutes.
The twins built some sand castles on the beach. We let the twins swim in the lagoon for awhile. While swimming, about 4 puffer fish swam towards us, they approached and looked up like 4 puppies waiting for a cookie. Jasmine was scared at the staring fish. After daddy showed her how to scare away the fish, she felt confident the fish were not fearless. Daddy asked Jasmine to put on the snorkel and mask to chase after those puffer fish. With daddy holding her hand, she followed those fish around. Without putting on the fins, she swam like she did normally. She later told Joanne that snorkeling was easy because she could breath under water through the tube. Joanne probably was jealous when daddy could only teach one kid at a time. She refused to try again.
Jasmine didn't want to hold daddy's hand anymore. She made daddy very nervous when she just swam away into the deep water. Daddy chased after her and left Joanne on the beach with mommy. We later played a game of diving for rocks from the bottom of the beach. They had a lot of exercise. When I saw that they took longer and longer to achieve the same dive, I ordered the twins to stay out of water to rest for awhile. When they were bored of playing the sand, they wanted to go to the jacuzzi.
We gathered up our belongings and moved to the jacuzzi. After a few minutes, they wanted to go to the water slide. The twins played on the slide for several times. When the line becomes longer, they returned to the jacuzzi. They didn't sit and relax in the jacuzzi, they used it as a small warm water swimming pool. They jumped from one side of the pool to the other, back and forth. Joanne jumped into the middle of the jacuzzi and proudly told daddy that she sank and her butt touched the bottom of the pool.
We returned to the room at 5pm. We made a dinner reservation at the oceanside steakhouse at the west end of the hotel. We took the next 45 minutes taking showers and freshening up for dinner. We sat down at the restaurant before 6pm. Before the meal arrived, the twins and daddy ran out into the patio to watch the sunset. There were low clouds at the horizon. We could see the setting sun turning purple through the thinner clouds. The sunset was quite different from that of several days ago at the beach. This time, the sun disappeared behind the thick clouds before reaching the horizon, hence we didn't see the green flash. Right before the sunset, a Hawaiian native blew a conch shell announcing the nightfall. Immediately after sunset, he ran with a torch and lit other torches along the shoreline of the hotel.
We had a nice dinner. Daddy ordered seafood; mommy ordered a steak; the twins had pasta and alphabet soup. The twins were exited to see the alphabets in their spoons. We just realized that we fed the twins Cantonese soups all the time, and they had not have alphabet soup before! The twins were very tired after dinner, they just cuddled on their chairs to take a nap while daddy and mommy finished dinner.
We had to carry the sleeping twins out of the restaurant. Joanne woke up just outside the front door and she walked on her own. Daddy carried Jasmine all the way, riding the tram and getting back to the hotel room. As I put Jasmine on the toilet, she laughed loudly because she tricked daddy. She woke up at the same time as Joanne did, she just pretended to be asleep because daddy was carrying her. Daddy told her that was not very nice because it hurt daddy's back for carrying her for so long. We put the twins in bed early because they swam very hard all day. They were sound asleep before 8:30pm. Mommy went to bed early too because she got a sore throat and a fever.
Tuesday, Feb 17, 2004 (6y+6m+11d)
We got up at 8am. Daddy freshened up and went to the lagoon immediately. Mommy stayed behind to get the twins ready for the day. We hope that we would be able to get a cabana or some beach chairs under the umbrella. We had no luck, all the good spot were already occupied before 9am. Daddy picked a shade under some tall palm trees.Jasmine was looking forward to more snorkeling. Joanne on the other hand said she wouldn't swim today because the water messed up her hair yesterday. She had a hard time removing some rubber bands from her ponytail and we had to cut off some of her hair to get it untangled.
Mommy and twins joined daddy at a restaurant for a late breakfast. We spent at least half and hour playing on the shore after breakfast.
Joanne settled on the beach chair to rest under the shade. She brought some of her homework to do in front of the lagoon. Jasmine practiced lying on the water using the snorkel. Daddy also rented a set of snorkel, mask and fins to practice going into the deep end of the lagoon. After both of us were warmed up, Jasmine locked elbow with daddy and we snorkel out to the deep water. Jasmine was excited to point to many other colorful coral fish in the lagoon. We saw some yellow tangs (Bubble), some butterfly fish, some banner fish (Gills), some needle fish, some blue parrot fish and many other that we didn't recognize. As soon as we returned to the shore, Jasmine ran to Joanne to tell her about the fish we saw. They referred to the fish by their nicknames in the "Finding Nemo" movie, e.g. Gills is a banner fish.
While daddy was taking a rest, Joanne joined Jasmine in playing in the sand. Jasmine also made a friend on the beach. The little girl did not know how to swim. She later floated around in a lifesaver ring in the lagoon. Jasmine put on her snorkel and swam out to join her new friend. That made daddy very nervous when she swam to the deep water without daddy around her. When I chased after her, Joanne was left alone on the beach. Though she decided not to swim early on, she didn't like to be abandoned. She later changed her mind and mommy changed Joanne into her swimming suit. Mommy didn't bring Joanne's snorkeling gear along. So Joanne could only swim near the shore.
We later rented a floating board with a view hole and transparent bottom. The twins lied on the board to see fish through the view hole. Daddy chased them around the lagoon chasing after the tropical fish. The twins were not paying attention to see the fish. They explained that the clear bottom had a lot of scratches and they could not see the fish that well. Instead of wasting energy to push them around for nothing, I returned the floating board. We also rented a double hydro-bike and pedalled around the lagoon. The twins' legs were too short to reach the pedals. They just sat on one side and daddy did all the pedalling. We had some hard time steering the hydro-bike because only one of the propellers push the bike at one side. We use the rudder to compensate for the skewed propulsion. The bike slide through the water very fast. We managed to visit different area of the lagoon with half and hour. The trip was quite fulfilling because we could see many different kinds of fish from above the water. We also saw several sea turtles.
We left the lagoon at around 3pm. The twins wanted to go to the jacuzzi. Mommy parted with us so that she could return to the hotel room to take a nap. The twins played in several jacuzzis. They swam in several pools. They played in the water slide couple of times. They even imitated another girl in the pool to do some hand stand under water. We returned to the hotel room by 5:15pm.
Joanne had a late start, but Jasmine spent the whole day from 11am to 5pm in water. Despite a thick coat of sunblock on her, Jasmine still got a cross shaped tan mark on her back. Later that night, she complained about itches on her back. We determined that she got a mild case of sunburn on her back.
After shower and shampoo, we went downstairs to have dinner at an Italian restaurant. We were just in time to catch the sunset before dinner. After dinner, we took a boat ride to circle around the hotel grounds. We sat at the open end of the boat and looked up to watch the stars in the night sky. The twins were bored and complained after we have done half the loop. We returned to our room as soon as the boat arrived at our building.
We put some moisturizing cream on Jasmine's back to sooth her sunburn. Daddy read them the bedtime story. As soon as the story ended, they fell asleep with a minute. We told the twins they could watch "Finding Nemo" DVD tonight, but they didn't ask for that because they were too tired.
Wednesday, Feb 18, 2004 (6y+6m+12d)
Jasmine tossed and turned all night. When daddy asked what she dreamed about, she said she played golf. That was one of the activities we mentioned before bedtime last night. We got up at 8am. We ordered breakfast from room service. The breakfast arrived after 9am. After breakfast, mommy went to the "back of the house" tour of the hotel. She learned how Hawaii's largest hotel operated. There were 1500 employees. An underground conveyor belt system was used to handle luggages by the bell boys. The towels and linens used in the hotel lasted only about two months.Daddy got the twins all oiled up with sun block lotion. We packed some swim gears and headed towards the putting greens at the north end of the hotel. Jasmine wanted to go to the restroom when we were waiting for the boat ride. When we came back to the dock, we just missed the boat. Mommy just returned from the 45 minute tour and joined us. We decided to walk instead of taking the boat. We walked past some swimming pool along the way. When we got to the putting greens, Joanne wanted to go to swim. Jasmine wanted to play golf. Since she dreamed about it all night, we decided to play a round of golf before swimming. The attendant described Jasmine's golf as hockey style. We played all 18 putting holes, most of the holes were par 2. The twins' scores were between 5 to 7 for each hole. Mommy's scores were about the same with an occasional 3 when she was lucky. Daddy was the official photographer of the event. In the only hole I played, I scored 1 over par. When we returned the equipment to the attendant, he instructed us to wash the balls in a scrubbing machine. The twins liked to crank the machine so much that they each offered to wash 4 extra balls. The attendant pointed us to the ocean and said "Whale!" We turned our heads and saw a whale bleaching at a distance in the ocean. It was so far away that it looked as small as half the length of the finger nail at arm's length. We saw the whale surfaced two more times before we lost sight of it.
We changed the twins into their swimming suits. We let them try the water slide at the pools at the north end of the hotel. Jasmine said the slide was too fast for her and she quitted after her first run. She said she was not feeling well and she lied down on a beach chair and fell asleep. Joanne liked the slide and repeated about 15 times. Most of the seven pools here were at close to 5 feet deep. Only a few spots were at 3.5 to 4 feet. Joanne had a hard time keeping her head above water. Even daddy had a hard time helping her at 5 feet deep of water. She asked for the jacuzzi when she found the water too cold. We found out that all the jacuzzi were located at the south end where we spent the past few days. Jasmine was sound asleep. Daddy took Joanne to the south side while mommy watched Jasmine.
Joanne hopped between the three jacuzzis. She liked the extra hot one at 100°F. Daddy liked the one with the waterfall. She also played the water slide for couple of times. She did quite a lot of swimming too. In the middle of the afternoon, Joanne leaned on daddy's shoulder when we soaked in a jacuzzi. Daddy suggested her to take a nap too. Since she said she was not warm enough, daddy wrapped her up like a mummy in hotel towels under the sun. I put a baseball cap on her head to block the sun from her eyes. She was asleep when Jasmine and mommy came to look for us. Mommy and Jasmine also enjoyed the jacuzzi when daddy went for a swim.
Mommy wanted to go back to the lagoon before it closed. Daddy carried the sleeping Joanne while mommy carried our belongings. It was 4pm when we walked back to the lagoon. We rented the double hydro-bike again for half an hour. Jasmine went with mommy to show her where we found all the colorful fish the day before. Joanne and daddy waited on the shore. Mommy came back after about 15 minutes. She also found the bike hard to steer when only the propeller on one side was used. Daddy took Joanne out to the water fall again. We didn't see many fish except 4 "Gills" playing at one corner of the lagoon. The bike was getting harder and harder to control when the rudder was twisted to one side. Daddy was so busy maneuvering the bike back to the beach that we didn't find many fish on the way back.
Jasmine played the dive for rock game with daddy. Joanne stayed on the beach to munch on some snacks. We returned to the room when the lagoon closed at 5pm. We all took shower to wash off the sea water and sunblock lotion. We all put on moisturizing lotion to sooth our sunburn. Despite soaking amount of sunblock on our skins, we still got some minor sunburn on various part of our body at some patches of skin that we missed over the past few days in the sun. Jasmine expected the sunburn on her back would go away tomorrow morning. Jasmine was surprised to learn that it would last a couple of weeks.
The twins watched the first half of "Finding Nemo" DVD before dinner. Daddy checked the sunset out on the balcony. There was nothing to see today due to some cloud covering. We returned to the Japanese restaurant for a nice dinner. After dinner, we strolled around the grounds of the hotel. Due to the 65 acres enormous size, we only took a short scenic route. Yet, the twins complained that we should have taken the boat or tram rides. Since both of them had taken a nap in the afternoon, we expected them to have enough energy to walk around a bit. When they complained too much, mommy threatened them that if they were tired of vacation so much, we would stop doing it. We knew the twins loved to go on vacation, that threat was sufficient for them to shut up. We returned to our room. The twins finished the second half of their DVD movie. Mommy was busy packing the luggage for tomorrow's departure. Daddy decided to read only 6 pages of the bedtime story. The current chapter had 24 pages. I knew the twins wouldn't last long enough for it. Joanne fell asleep before we reached the end of the six pages. Jasmine struggled to stay up till the end.
Thursday, Feb 19, 2004 (6y+6m+13d)
We got up at 8:30am. After we freshened up, we packed the rest of the luggage and left the room. We missed a tram when we went downstairs and lost about 15 minutes waiting for the next. We took a taxi to the airport at 10am. We originally planned to have breakfast at the airport. We found out that the only restaurant was inside the security checkpoint. There were no more lockers at the airport since the 9-11 attack. That means we had to lug along all our baggage wherever we go. After we checked in the luggage to the airline, we went to the Onizuka space center next to the airport terminals. The place had some hand-on exhibits about the US space program. The twins were more interested in the toys instead of the more scientific stuffs.We passed through the airport security checkpoint at 12 noon so that we could get to the restaurant. We couldn't have breakfast because we didn't want to go through airport security twice. We had a quick lunch then we waited to board the airplane. Mommy and the twins did some last minute shopping at the airport stores. They bought a colorful book that showed the Hawaiian fish. They wanted to find the pictures of the fish they saw in the lagoon in the past few days.
We boarded the plane at around 1:30pm. The plane took off a bit after 2pm. Joanne had the window seat on the first trip. This time, Jasmine had the window seat. She took some pictures through the window of the plane. The twins did their homework on the plane. They had not done any homework for a few days already. After finishing the homework, Joanne took a nap on mommy's thigh. Joanne missed the dinner, Jasmine ate almost everything in the meal. Jasmine stayed awake and watched the in-flight movie "Loony Tunes back in action". Joanne woke up towards the end of the movie. Mommy asked the stewardess to bring Joanne the dinner. She finished most of her meal too. Jasmine asked if we had flown 24 hours because she noticed the sun was setting very fast. She didn't know we lost two hours when flying from Hawaii to California. We arrived at SFO in less than 5 hours. Jasmine enjoyed looking down at the city light before we landed.
Hing came to pick us up at a little bit after 9pm. When Hing asked the twins when they would like to go back to Hawaii, Jasmine said tomorrow. The night was quite chilly at 48°F. Our home was cold after the heat was off for a week. It took almost two hours before the house was comfortable again. I asked Jasmine if she missed home, she said she missed Hawaii. I told the twins to played some piano because they had not play for 7 days. Jasmine went to the piano and played 7 notes, one for each day. Joanne followed suit and had a great laugh.
Friday, Feb 20, 2004 (6y+6m+14d)
Daddy slept till noon because daddy took the whole week off work. Mommy and the twins were up earlier, but not by too much according to their readiness to go out for lunch. We had lunch after 1pm. We then went shopping at Costco. We were surprised that gasoline has gone above $2.00 when we were on vacation. I noticed the gas was at $2.30 a gallon in Hawaii, I thought it was just the Hawaiian price.Mommy went to grocery shopping when we all waited in the car. The twins even crawled out of the moon roof of the car to wave at mommy as she walked back. We returned home and stayed home the rest of the day. Joanne complained that she still had a sore throat. When Joanne had her sweet medication, Jasmine said she also had a sore throat. By judging from the high energy and activity level when they fought, their illness was not serious at all.
Saturday, Feb 21, 2004 (6y+6m+15d)
We stayed home all day long. The twins spent all day doing their homework. It was not too much homework we gave them, it was a problem in their attention span. For example, Joanne spent more than two hours for two pages of abacus work that Jasmine took 15 minutes to do. Joanne just stared at the page instead of doing her work. When daddy check the correction of her computation, she got less than 50% right. Mommy was very mad at her because she was just goofing off and wasted a great amount of time. Daddy told her that if she did her homework seriously, we could have spared the time to go to the park. Instead we stayed home all day.
Sunday, Feb 22, 2004 (6y+6m+16d)
The twins and mommy got up early and had breakfast before daddy got up. We went to Oakland for lunch. We went to grandma Ling's home after lunch. We showed them our vacation photos. We went to Aunt Jun's new condo. Last time we went, it was still being remodeled. This time, Aunt Jun already moved in with furniture. The twins played with her treadmill. They let it run slowly and then they sat down at the top end and let the belt move them to the low end. They basically played it like a motorized slide that didn't need gravity to work. Great grandma was at Aunt Jun's place. We showed them our vacation photos also. We left her place at 4:30pm. The twins took a nap once they got in the car.We dropped off great grandma at her home. We went to Anita's new townhouse for a housewarming party. The invited families included Ming, Connie and Cynthia; Tom, Irene and their 6 month old daughter; Daniel and Christine; Sera, Simon and Kingsly plus one baby still in the womb; Raymond and Abby. Of course, the host family include Anita and her husband, Wayland, Lori and Nathan, Anita's mom and Anita's sister in law and her husband.
Anita & Christine were mommy's high school classmate. The rest of the guests in the party were friends from mommy's church before she got married. We were the last family to show up. Connie's Cynthia and Sera's Kingsly and Anita's Nathan were about the same age. They played together in a group. The twins were a bit bigger and they stuck to Anita's 10 year old Lori. Wayland was much older and he played alone on his computer. We had a great potluck dinner. The twins fitted in quickly and they remembered Lori and still liked her.
The adults chatted after dinner. We also showed them our vacation photos. We left before 9:30pm. The twins took showers and got ready for bed. It was past 10:45pm when we started bedtime story. Since the twins took a nap in the afternoon, they said they were not tired at all.
Monday, Feb 23, 2004 (6y+6m+17d)
The twins went to school after a 10 day vacation. When they came home, they complained they were tired. It is understandable when they took such a long break from school, in addition, the jet lag might have some effect. Mommy let them take a nap in the afternoon.Daddy went to HomeDepot to buy some pots and soil. I planted a White Plumeria, a Red Plumeria and a Stephanotis in pots. We brought these tropical flowering plants from Hawaii. California is too cold for them, they may stand a chance indoors.
The twins slept past dinner time. They had a late dinner and did their homework and practice piano afterward. Due to the long nap, they didn't go to bed until after midnight. Daddy cancelled their bedtime story because it was too late.
Tuesday, Feb 24, 2004 (6y+6m+18d)
The twins went to school as usual. In the afternoon, Annette and Nicholas came to our house to play. Unlike yesterday, the twins were not tired today. Jasmine told daddy that "Annette made them ask her to wear the Hula grass dress." It was hard to understand at first. It turned out that Annette saw the twins' vacation photos in Hawaiian Hula grass dresses. She wanted to try it on herself, but she couldn't do that without an invitation. So she coerced the twins to give the invitation. We took some photos of Annette in the Hula dress. Even Nicholas tried one on!The twins finished all their homework before dinnertime. Mommy was happy today because of that.
Wednesday, Feb 25, 2004 (6y+6m+19d)
Our area was hit by its biggest storm in the past decade. From the observatory on one of the mountain top, 100 mph wind was recorded. The news reported 10 inches of rain within 10 hours. Within one of those hours, two inches of rain was recorded. The heavy rain caused flash floods in many low places. Some cars were flooded to the window level. The storm had calmed down a little already during commute time.The twins went to school as usual. Mommy said their umbrella was inverted by the strong wind while they walked from the car to the classroom. The twins had their raincoats on, so they were not wet. Many kids were late for school because of the bad weather.
They went to abacus and piano class after school.
Thursday, Feb 26, 2004 (6y+6m+20d)
The twins went to school as usual. The storm seemed to be gone totally. It rained a little but no more strong wind.
Friday, Feb 27, 2004 (6y+6m+21d)
The twins went to school as usual. They went to Nicholas' home after school. Joanne were excited to call daddy at work to tell me that they watched "Just like Lizzie" on DVD. We have been reading the same book as bedtime story for the past two weeks. She said the Lizzie McGuire episode was exactly like how daddy read it.We came home late in the evening. Jasmine was watching TV. Joanne was alone upstairs working on her homework. No doubt, Jasmine must have finished her work sooner than Joanne.
They had a fight in the bathtub when they were taking a shower together. Joanne took control of the shower-head and sprayed into Jasmine's face and made her cry. Mommy told them not to take shower together if they couldn't stop fighting for the shower head. They were both giggling and laughing before they came out of the shower. I guess twins would never have a real fight.
Jasmine asked me if she was born in China. I told her that she could still be Chinese even if she was born in the USA. They wanted to see where they were born. So I asked them to take our the first photo album. They both found themselves funny looking when they were infant. When they saw their first picture, they said they were ugly and dirty (because of the blood on them). When they look at their sonogram, they couldn't tell what it was. When I pointed out where the head and body were, they said "Yuck! That is scary!"
Joanne was so tired that she fell asleep before daddy finished the bedtime reading. Jasmine agreed to cut short the story because she didn't want Joanne to miss anything.
Saturday, Feb 28, 2004 (6y+6m+22d)
We slept late into the morning. We went to lunch with grandma Chui and Aunt Elaine. We went to grocery shopping at a Korean supermarket before going home. The supermarket gave out toy alarm clocks to every kid through the checkout counter. The twins got two clocks that shaped like soldiers.Daddy's high school friend Kwai Lam and his wife Noella came to visit us from Tennessee. He was in town for a conference last week. His friends Dee and wife Linda and his 15 year old son Gregory from Napa Valley drove them down from San Francisco. They all stayed for dinner. We also invited Frank, Winnie and their two kids Stephenie & Christine because Frank was also daddy's high school friend. Clement was invited too, but he didn't show up.
Frank's girls were 10 and 8 years old. The twins met them for the first time. But it took no time before they had a great time playing together. We fed the kids with pasta first. They returned to play after dinner. When they ran out of things to play, they watched the Lizzie McGuire movie.
The adults had hotpot dinner on a separate table. We took our time chatting and eating around the hotpot. It was 11pm when we finished dessert and coffee. Most of the guests left at 11:30pm. The twins stayed up till 1:30am. Kwai Lam & Noella stayed overnight with us.
Sunday, Feb 29, 2004 (6y+6m+23d)
Today is a special day. The 29th of February only happens once every four years. The 5th Sunday of February only happens once every twenty eight years. the next one is in 2032.We slept till 10am. The soldier alarm clock Jasmine got from the supermarket yesterday went off at 10:10am. The alarm woke them up in spite of our plan to let the twins sleep as much as they wanted because they went to bed late last night. Mommy cooked a quick breakfast for our guests and the twins. Daddy took Kwai Lam and Noella to the airport after we took some photos together. The twins gave our guests a big hug before they left. The twins received some books and couple of stuffed animal with the word Tennessee written on them.
After daddy returned home from the airport, the twins wanted to go to park. They specially requested a park that Hing took us before. They spent two hours in the park. They swung on the monkey bars and swings. They also fought for their turns on a spinning pole. They said they felt dizzy every time they came off, yet they wanted to do that again and again. They were reluctant to leave when the sun set low in the sky and the wind picked up a little.
On the way home, we passed by the hospital where they were born. We went inside to check out the nursery. To our disappointment, there was not one baby in the nursery.
When we got home, the twins were tired. They went to their room directly, changed into their pajama, and took a nap without telling us. When we went upstairs to look for them, they were sound asleep.
We invited Hing, Lucy and their son Terence to dinner. We had plenty of ingredients left from yesterday. We had hotpot dinner again tonight while watching the Oscar ceremony on TV. Terence asked many times where the twins were. We let the twins sleep until we were almost done with dinner. We then woke them up and fed them. They ran around the house with Terence after they finished dinner. Our guest left around 10pm. We sent the twins to the shower. Daddy helped them dry their hair, read them the bedtime story and they were in bed before midnight. Since they had a long nap just a few hours ago, they were not really ready to sleep though we force them to.
I posted two albums ( Hawaii & playground) to our collections today.
Monday, Mar 1, 2004 (6y+6m+24d)
The twins went to school as usual.The twins were fans of the sensational Internet Idol William Hung. When they knew that he would appear on tonight's episode of American Idol, they demanded to see it. Mommy told Joanne upfront that she must finish her dinner. However, Joanne left some food at the bottom of the bowl before she went off to do something else. When American Idol was on, mommy pointed Joanne to her leftover and then sent her to a different room. She hurried to finish her leftover in 10 minutes and then she joined us. When Will appeared near the end of the show, the twins had a great laugh at Will's performance of "She Bangs."
Tuesday, Mar 2, 2004 (6y+6m+25d)
The twins went to school as usual.Mommy took the car in for regular maintenance. The shop took longer than expect to address a manufacturer recalled repair. Mommy left the twins at Nicholas' home when she picked up the car. The twins finished their homework and played badminton with Nicholas. They had some snacks at Nicholas' home. They played so hard that as soon as they came home, they went to bed without eating dinner. When daddy came home, they were both asleep already.
Wednesday, Mar 3, 2004 (6y+6m+26d)
The twins went to school as usual. They had abacus and piano class after school.We went out to dinner with Annette's and Nicholas' family at a Korean restaurant.
Thursday, Mar 4, 2004 (6y+6m+27d)
The twins went to school as usual.Annette came to play with our twins. Jasmine rode her bicycle inside the garage. She said she fell down twice.
Friday, Mar 5, 2004 (6y+6m+28d)
The twins went to school as usual. After they returned home, they quickly finished homework and practiced piano. We all went to bed early in preparation of a ski trip tomorrow.
Saturday, Mar 6, 2004 (6y+7m)
The twins are 79 months old today.
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started on Mar 6, 2004