Cuff Family Journal

Tyler's smitten

2012-01-22T23:47:00.001-05:00

Tyler started talking about one of the girls in his preschool class one day. He was so excited that she wanted to play his Mario games with him. His motivation to get to school on time skyrocketed. When I dropped him off one day, I watched him scan the room, looking for his little friend. When the two of them found each other, they grabbed hands and skipped away to some corner to play their games. So cute!

One day he came home and announced that today they played Care Bears because she wanted to play it. That's got to say something. Usually, Tyler is just too focused on his interests (like Mario, Bowzer and such) to spend time playing other games. Boy, Tyler is smitten!

The Private Boat

2012-01-19T00:14:00.001-05:00

In the book "Where the Wild Things Are," there's a part where the boy gets on his private boat. This became an English lesson when Tyler couldn't help himself but try to point out which parts of the boat looked like a private. :) Maybe it's best to call things what they are.

Tyler loves Mario and Legos

2012-01-08T17:26:00.002-05:00

Tyler has totally fallen in love with video games. Thank goodness Larisa limits their playing time. During our Christmas vacation Tyler played a lot of Super Mario Brothers on the old-school Nintendo (I have controller and an emulator on my computer). He also watched the old Mario TV shows, so everything is about Bowser and Yoshi these days (he already like Mario Kart before this vacation).

Another thing Tyler likes is Legos. He got some kits for Christmas, and today he made one with Mom. He was so excited to show me the helicopter they made and wanted to show me every little detail of it. Apparently he played with it for over an hour today.

Lydia Speaks in Testimony Meeting

2012-01-08T17:19:00.001-05:00

Today only Lydia and I went to church because Nyle and Tyler were sick. Lydia and I sat in front in fast and testimony meeting, and I explained to her the difference between the meeting, that anyone could go speak about what they believe. Then Lydia said she wanted to go. I asked if she had something to say, and she said something about loving God because of what she learns in primary. So we went up and she said,

"I know the church is true because I love Heavenly Father."

Confidence

2011-12-21T23:59:00.003-05:00

Today was incredibly warm for the first official day of winter. I jumped on the trampoline with the kids at about 8:15pm with only a t-shirt on. It was above 65 degrees.

Today, as I was driving home from Sam's Club with the kids, Tyler noticed some blinking yellow lights and asked about them. "What are they for." I explained that we don't have to stop but they mean to be careful because something might come into the road. Lydia then frankly corrected me, "no, that's not what it means---yellow light means slow down." I had a real good laugh at her confidence. Her voice wasn't arguing, and it wasn't directed only at Tyler either. She was very deliberately correcting a mistake in my understanding. What a reflection of her personality.

SuperKids

2011-12-04T21:16:00.001-05:00

Tyler the Perfectionist

2011-12-04T21:12:00.001-05:00

I wouldn’t have guessed it, but Tyler has become a bit of a perfectionist lately. He now creates color-coordinated symmetric “towers” or “forts” on a daily basis. Here he is showing Mom where the guys can stand and why (the yellow and red structures are hiding behind them, and the green one is next to me).

He usually then calls us over to have a battle, using his army men, Buzz Lightyears, and Transformer. The bad guys, which are usually Mom and Lydia, get only a few army men.
Tyler started to do a lot of building with legos and blocks over the last year. He’s able to spend a lot of time playing with these things. He also loves video games, especially Mario Kart, which he’s gotten quite good at. Fortunately, Mom has them budgeting their technology usage with her penny system.

Lydia's Best Day Ever

2011-09-25T14:08:00.002-04:00

Lydia has picked up a habit of expressing approval and disapproval by exclaiming that this is the best day ever or the worst day ever (in a very different voice for the two cases).

For example, yesterday they played in jumpy houses, got balloons, and Lydia got her face painted in the morning as we watched Larisa run a 5K. Then we went to a sports clinic and football game at Princeton (they surprised me and actually took interest in the football game and didn't want to leave, after first complaining that they had to go). At the football game Lydia told me that it was the best day ever.

One the other hand, when we showed up to church today and Lydia discovered that it was fast Sunday (which means they don't eat snacks in Sacrament meeting) she pouted that this was the worst day ever.

Nyle's shoes

2011-09-05T00:10:00.000-04:00

Today I put some sandals on Nyle for church. He could feel the difference. He stood up and appeared to have his shoes glued to the ground. He sort of shifted his weight and thought about taking a step, but his feet wouldn't move, even though I was encouraging him. Finally he started walking, and it was fine but a little bit awkward. Then he bent down and tried to take the shoes off.

It didn't take long for him to continue walking like normal in his new shoes. He only had a few stumbles.

Little explorer

2011-09-04T23:27:00.000-04:00

This afternoon, we took the kids to a nearby park on a walk. Tyler insisted that we go somewhere with the roots. By that he meant forested area. He loves hiking, wading in creaks and looking for new trails. So we turned of the main road which lead us along a reservoir and walked into the woods. It was so fun. We could barely keep up with him. He ran ahead and kept finding new paths to follow. We found horse tracks, recently fallen trees (we figured they went down during resent hurricane), a nice little creak and colorful mushrooms which Tyler demolished with a stick. We loved this adventure. Tyler was the only one that voiced his disappointment about this trip. It was not long enough!

Tyler Knows Planets

2011-08-18T10:35:00.000-04:00

The kids have flash cards with pictures of space, including all of the planets in our solar system. I was surprised that the kids could pick out Mars and the moon, so I looked for more to quiz Tyler on, thinking I would teach him a thing or two. Well, he's much better than me at identifying them.

"The blue mystery of Neptune.”

"The icy planet Uranus."

I was very impressed. I had no clue which planets those were.

You Silly Fool

2011-07-20T09:49:00.000-04:00

I've heard Tyler say, "you silly fool," multiple times in the past week. I'm not sure which movie it came from.

We had such a good time at Hershey Park on Tyler's birthday. I was very impressed with how many good rides there were (including water slides) and how daring the kids were. Early in the day we tested the water with a small roller coaster and a log ride. In both cases they were scared but wanted to go again. By the end of the day, nothing was too much for them. Even when Tyler was obviously scared, holding tight and sitting back with a concerned face, he still always asked to go again as soon as the ride was slowing down. We ended the day with a tall water ride where your feet dangle as you hang from a slow moving roller coaster about 50 or 60 feet up while people launch water geysers at you from the ground. Then we went on the big white wooden roller coaster just before the park closed.

Larisa insisted on riding the scariest roller coaster she could find. I didn't want to look sissy, so I rode right after her (on the very front). The roller coaster we rode was called Fahrenheit.

Sesame Place

2011-06-23T15:37:00.002-04:00

Larisa was gone while the wood floors were being put in. The kids and I needed to do something out of the house. So we enjoyed the beach and Sesame Place.

I was surprised how fun Sesame Place was. We had only a couple of hours, so we went ran all around to get on things. Sometimes Tyler would wonder even though I told him to stay with me. I rubbed it in one time when Lydia got on a ride and he didn't because I had to go back and get him from wherever he was wondering. I showed him that Lydia got on the ride but the rides full, and he of course didn't know we'd stick around for another ride after so he could have a chance. That boy is so sensitive. He started explaining that he wanted to go on the ride and his words quickly slurred into a cry---one of those cries that's genuine but full of short threatening jabs, where every second or two the pitch elevates. I felt bad. Most of the day was very fun for them.

Tyler has a Way with Words

2011-06-05T19:52:00.002-04:00

A month or two ago I was doing something in the kitchen and heard Tyler mumbling at the table: "eins, zwei, drei, vier, funf." I tuned around surprised and asked what he was doing (still remembering German from my high school trip to Germany). He gave a little bit of a sheepish smile. "It's my school. They like fumf."

Lydia’s debut

2011-05-22T21:49:00.001-04:00

Yesterday, Lydia participated in her first recital. It was fun to see her get excited and nervous for the performance. Two of her friends were were in the same class. They loved being together, goofing off and learning to dance. What great memories they will have!

Do you want to jump?

2011-05-22T17:47:00.002-04:00

We've had the trampoline for almost a year now, and still Tyler's favorite thing to do is jump. Whenever he sees me, the first thing is says is, "Do you want to jump?" When I get on there with them, they make me chase them, and play games. They don't give me a moments rest for at least 20 minutes. Any less time is "too short." Tyler always does "falling rocks," which means he lands on his bum and expects me to fall over each time he does it.

Crawling and Walking

2011-05-22T16:34:00.002-04:00

Nyle has decided to do everything in the past several weeks. He started crawling, climbing, tackling, wrestling, and walking (with Lydia's help). He's very fun to play with, but now we have to keep him off the stairs and watch for him toppling over.

We're glad to have Lydia around to help him take steps. Both other kids broke our backs when they wanted to walk with our help all the time.

Father's and Son's Outing

2011-05-15T18:36:00.002-04:00

Yesterday, Tyler and I went camping at the stake Father's and Son's Outing. He was so excited about it, and I don't think he was let down. We had lots of fun together. He especially was excited about the "spooky forest" that his (older) friends Caleb and Corbin (Bagley) had told him about.

In the morning, on the way to drop Lydia and Tyler at school, Tyler said, "I'm not going to school today." Now, you have to understand that Tyler loves his school, so boasting that he's not going to school was a surprise to hear. I realized he thought we were headed to the outing already.

"Tyler, you're going to go to school, and then you're going to come with Mom to pick me up at work, and then we're going camping at the spooky forest. Okay?" Fortunately, he didn't throw a fuss.

We roasted saussages and s'mores, and then camped in our tent. He discovered the doggy door in our tent, and peaked his head out to watch people as we were going to bed.

Forward progress

2011-05-01T21:59:00.002-04:00

Little baby Nyle is growing up so fast, it’s making me sad. We’ve been having so much fun watching him progress through all the baby stages. He is truly a God’s present. He’s always so cheerful and happy, it bolsters my spirits. He has been sleeping through the night from about 4 months on (I mean 11 hours in a row, sleeping through the night). We all love him to pieces.

Here are some things that Nyle loves. He loves to try to suck on Tyler’s face when he gets to close. That usually results into “Nyow” exclamation. He also loves for mommy to hold him. He’s become a bit attached lately. He loves to roll around with and try to bite Daddy. He loves when Lydia plays “Boo” or sings to him. Nyle also likes to shake his head and then have someone repeat the motion. That exchange can go on for a long time before he will decide to stop.

Our little baby has been rolling all over the floor for about a month now. Last week, he has perfected his standing-on-all-four act. I watched him trying to shift his weight forward and try to move his arms. These attempts usually ended in a belly flop, which did not deter him from trying it again and again. A couple of days ego, Nyle scaled the small step that divides our family room and kitchen. Today, though, came a real delight and a shocker.

We were sitting down eating dinner. Nyle was playing on the floor in the family room, which was on the other side of the kitchen table from where I was sitting. Next thing I know, he is on his stomach next to my chair, arching his back to look up at me, all excited. I could not believe he crawled over the step and all around the table to get to me. That’s my boy! Time to pull out the gates and do some serious baby-proofing!

Long treck

2011-03-27T14:49:00.002-04:00

Yesterday was a remarkable day in my life. I ran 12 miles for the first time (I would have like to say that it would be my last, but the race is still ahead of me.) I am aching all over and wondering if I will ever want to train for a half marathon again. Back when I signed up for this, I did not know the consequences (the aftermath of these long runs). I am looking forward to being done and going back to pleasurable 5-7 mile runs (it sounds funny, I know).

I can say that I have been enjoying myself, except yesterday (That last mile seemed to last forever). I remember all the milestones, mile 5, mile 7 and so on. I learned that I love running outside. Seeing the blue sky and having a destination in mind helps me stay the course and actually enjoy myself. Running on a treadmill is just depressing--- staring at the walls and going nowhere. Even watching movies does not help. In some small way, it's like having a baby. Once the discomfort (to put it mildly) is great enough, distractions do very little to take your mind off of it. While running, good music is the only thing that keeps the adrenaline pumping, and therefore my feet going. Even then, I am always too happy to hop off the treadmill.

Well, a couple more 10-milers and I am ready to race!

Newbie - Mr. Nyle

2011-03-13T23:05:00.002-04:00

So I realized that we’ve been neglecting to write about the newest member of our family---the cutest Nyle.

Going back to the beginning, Nyle was the only one of our kids that cried a lot as a newborn. We bounced him, rocked him and soothed him pretty much to no avail. That went on for about 6 weeks and then emerged another Nyle---the smiley cutie pie. He started smiling at us at about 8 weeks and has been generous with his smiles ever since. People are surprised, as they make eye contact, to be rewarded with full attention, huge smiles and a twinkle in his eye. He studies every face he comes in contact with, loving all the attention he gets.

Now Nyle rolls all over the room. We place him on a blanket with some toys and come back to find him under a chair or playing with the curtains.

He has discovered food in the last month. We tried Rice cereal first, and he spit it up just like the other two kids at his age. I should have know and started with oatmeal. He did love diving for the loaded spoon, though.

Now, about diving… That’s Nyle’s favorite past time. He loves to be held, and it’s not because he’s clingy. He likes the proximity to the “stuff” he encounters as he travels around on mommy’s hip. Half of that time he spends parallel to the floor, arm outstretched. Reading is out of the questions when Nyle is with me. All papers, magazines, mail and books get intercepted by his quick fingers. It all ends up wrinkled, wet and slobbery. I don’t know how many times he stuck his fingers in my food. When it first started happening, i thought I could trick him. At dinner I placed toys on the table thinking they might be a good distraction. He was not fooled. I could almost imagine his train of thought “good one, mom.” And of course, he dove for my bowl. I have to conclude that there will be no calm children in our family. It’s just genetically impossible!

Nyle loves to stand and bounce. He was hanging out in a jumper at the child care center while I was exercising. When I came to get him, the lady kept going on and on about how much he loved the bouncer. She said that I might want to get one of those, since it would strengthen his leg muscles and make him walk sooner. The words came out of my mouth before I could stop myself. “ I am not sure I want that” I said. That convenience might not be worth an extra month of chasing my son. We’ll see, though. Those jumpers do look fun!

Over the last couple of month, Nyle has grown to love being around Lydia and Tyler. The baby giggles when he sees them. Lydia plays with Nyle, gives him kisses, sings him songs and he rewards her generously with his smiles and giggles. Tyler doesn't even have to do anything. I think Nyle just finds him funny as we all do.

All I can say is that we love our little Nyle. He is so adorable with his sweet chubby cheeks. He brings a lots of joy to the Cuff household!

The Kids Never Lose

2011-03-09T19:31:00.002-05:00

Time to take the kids to Vegas. They never miss getting heads for dessert. Let me explain.

We started using an idea for dessert for the kids. After they finish eating dinner, they get to flip a coin to see if they get dessert. We got this idea from Tushar Shah at Morgan Stanley. The idea is that they will learn not to cut the meal short for dessert because sometime they won't get it and will end up hungry.

Anyway, I've seen them flip the coin about 15 or 20 times now, and I've never seen them flip tails. They always get dessert. It's pretty amazing actually. Larisa has been done it with them on some nights when I haven't been home, when they flipped tails. But not when I'm around.

Actually, I saw them flip tails once when we first started doing this. It was the second time, and Tyler already had an idea. He held the coin with heads up and tossed it gently on the table. It happened to work and get heads. But I stepped in and told him he can't do it that way (I should have just let it go and corrected it the next time). So when Tyler flipped again he got tails and started crying. I gave in, because I felt like a party-pooper for making him flip again, and I let him flip one last time. He got heads, and they ate dessert. :)

Little tragedies

2011-02-24T14:43:00.001-05:00

In my opinion, one thing that any mother dreads is the day her kid tells her that he does not love her anymore. For me that day arrived yesterday without any warning. What I did not expect was that it would come from my second child first.

We were cleaning up a mess the kids made in the basement. They kicked and screamed about how long it would take to clean up all the rice. Lydia started enjoying the vacuuming experience after a little while and kept wanting to do Tyler’s part. Tyler, a more unwilling participant, kept running away from the job until he received 3 warnings which meant no dessert that evening. He was sad and mad at the same time. That’s when he pulled out the guns, “Mommy I just don’t love you anymore”. ! I told him that I love him a lot, but that did not change his mind, of course. When Paul came home, Tyler rehearsed the whole story to him, including his “Mommy I don’t love you anymore” declaration. Sad day!

Swimming with Tyler

2011-02-20T21:44:00.001-05:00

I took Tyler swimming at the gym where Larisa is a member. It’s a nice place. This was our chance to spend some time together while Lydia was going to a birthday party. Tyler was very excited about going swimming with me.

When we got there, showed me the way to the locker rooms (he tried to walk in the women’s room). Then we went in to change and he got nervous about so many adults in there. I really don’t know what the deal was, but he said he didn’t want to swim, or even change. I changed first and then started undressing him, but he wouldn’t have it. He said the pool was to scary, so he didn’t want to swim.

We walked over to see the pool, and I could tell he was intrigued to see all the kids swimming. But his nerves were still uneasy. When I forced him to undress, his last attempt was to not let me put his swim suit on. He threw a big fuss and started crying. An older man with his handicapped son talked to Tyler to calm him down. I managed to trick him a little to put the suit on while he was distracted. Then I made him budge an inch here and there---“let’s just go to the bathroom”---“let’s just come over here into the shower real quick”---until I had won. Even as we were standing next to the pool he pretended he didn’t want to swim. But once I started carrying him in he didn’t put up a fight.

He really loved it the whole time. We swam for about an hour and 15 minutes. He held on to a couple of noodles for a while and pretended to chase me around or swim away from me. He was so energetic and happy the whole time. It was a lot of fun. He was proud to be at his “swimming lessons” (Lydia had lessons last summer), and he wanted to show everyone that he was swimming by himself. After a while I managed to trick him into giving up the noodles for a floaty that strapped around his chest. That freed up his arms.

We discovered that we could shoot water through the hole in the noodle. At first I was showed him that it worked without making it obvious that I was doing the blowing. The he went around shooting water in the air, and I followed to blow in the other end of the noodle. I asked him how it worked. He demonstrated. Then I asked why it does that now and didn’t before. He said that you have to squeeze the end like he was. :)

Then he decided to keep shooting me in the face. Then it was a little more clear that I was blowing, but I wasn’t sure if it was registering with him. I could tell he was still trying to squeeze the end to make it go. But his smooth transition to reality surprised me. At one point, after doing something else, he said, “let’s do the noodle again where I shoot water out and you blow.” I was a little taken back and asked, “why should I blow?”---“So that the water comes out,” he responded.

On the way home he kept talking about how much fun we had.

Rooster, mud and apples

2011-02-20T21:29:00.003-05:00

We are experiencing long awaited reminders that the Spring will eventually make its way over here. It was in the 60s for a couple of days, and that made me feel that I could actually hold my breath for Spring. I might pass out in the process, but will probably make it.

Not wanting to miss a minute of this we went to play at Turhune Orchards. Kids and I wore boots to make sure we can enjoy the mud to its fullest. Tyler found the deepest puddle (of course) and jumped in it until his pants were soaked. We barricaded streams and got almost stuck in the gooey mud. It was fabulous!

Lydia wanted to feed and pet all the animals. We got some corn nibblets for the geese, guiney hens, ducks and the goats who butted and/or chased each other out of the way to get to the food. At the farm house store, Lydia loved hanging with the cats, dogs and the goose named Egg. There was also a tiny-winy rooster who performed a cock-a-doodle-do for us. Tyler, Nyle and I went into the store to buy some things. After we stepped inisde, Lydia was still on the porch playing with the local cats. Then I heard her voice make an unnaturally low sound, sort of alarming, but more shocked than distressed. Upon arriving on the scene I found Lydia making wide circles around the tiny-winy rooster. As it turned out, she got too close and he went into combat mode.

Snow---Weather, We Like It or Not

2011-01-28T21:33:00.001-05:00

Snow has been piling up here in New Jersey. We got a few snow storms in December and thought that winter might have exhausted its ferocity, but boy were we wrong.

Some flurries came and got us into a playful mood, after all, shoveling was minimal. So we built an igloo. Paul took charge and put us to work. The igloo went up in less than an hour, since we were working with a deadline- night fall and the dropping temperature.

Now we have a second house to hide away from the storm and worm up with hot cocoa (though I still prefer the first one with a roaring fire).

We had our fun and went to bed, waking up to this!

Winter Wonderland and it is beautiful, though I am starting to dream of Spring. It’s going to be a long winter.

Lydia is learning Strategy

2011-01-09T14:14:00.002-05:00

We have a computer game that Lydia likes to play called JumpStart. The grandparents gave it to us two years ago, and we've bought the entire series of games to that Lydia can stay challenged. She hadn't played for a few months, and I noticed that her strategy spontaneously matured in games like tic-tac-toe. She now tries to block the other player from winning when the situation calls for it.

Vivian sounds like Laura

2011-01-09T14:09:00.002-05:00

We watched an old video today of me and Matthew as babies. My mom is on their energetically trying to get us to bounce in the bouncer and play. You can't see her most of the time. When I asked the kids who's voice that was, Lydia said "Laura," (my sister). That's the same thing Larisa had noticed when she first saw the video.

Nyle will be a Kid

2011-01-09T14:04:00.002-05:00

Tyler was excited to tell us all about how things will be when he grows up. "When I grow up I will be a daddy, and you will be a grandpa, and Lydia will be a mommy, and she will be a grandma, and Nyle will be a Kid!"

Record Snow

2011-01-04T00:05:00.002-05:00

Last year we were told that our record snow storm was unusual. Well, this winter is already setting records. We just had the worst December snow storm in four decades. Luckily it didn’t hit us too hard or stop us from having fun. We got about 8 inches. Five miles to our east got double that.

Forgetting Head

2010-10-28T10:18:00.002-04:00

I took Lydia to school yesterday. Our common routine is that we're almost ready to go and then Lydia takes a long time getting her socks on or something. She gets distracted very easily. This time I told her to hurry and get her socks on, and she got upset because she doesn't like to hurry. In the car on the way to school I explained why she ends up being rushed, and that if she'd finish getting herself ready before playing she wouldn't have to hurry at the end. I told her that she knows what she needs to do to get ready for school. Then she plead, "I can't think of everything I need to do because my head is just a forgetting head."

Later in the day she cheered up when I came to eat lunch with her. She's been asking me to do that, so I surprised her. I walked in to the lunch room to look for her and she spotted me first. She was sitting with her friend Elsie with a shy grin on her face. I ate lunch with them and went to the playground. All of her friends tried to get my attention the whole time, to show me all the Halloween decorations and the have me watch them on the playground. But Lydia got the most attention from me. It was fun.

Make you sad and make you cwy

2010-10-13T22:45:00.002-04:00

Tyler has been expressing himself more these days. When he got frustrated that Lydia and I were not letting him make wrong moves in checkers, he said, "fine, I'm not going to play with you anymore," and walked away pouting. I felt bad and chased after him. He also looses his patience and gives up when he waits too long for me to play with him.

The expression that Tyler has been using a lot lately when he's upset is, "I'm going to make you sad and make you cwy." That usually happens after I tell him that 'quiet time' is not over or something.

Lydia the Sleep-walker

2010-10-05T00:34:00.003-04:00

Tonight I was up with the baby, so I watched 'I am Legend.' It was my first try of my new Blu-Ray Drive. Beautiful.

Anyway, I heard a noise upstairs, so I went up to find Lydia walking around in Tyler's room. I'm not sure what she was doing, or if she ever even went to sleep in her room, but when I got there she was clearly not conscious. She was just staring at the ground as she slowly walked around the room. I picked her up and said, "do you need to go peepee?" No reply. Finally I got a response out of her. She said 'no,' so I tucked her back into bed.

A few minutes later I heard more noise and quickly went up. This time she was in the bathroom trying to quickly get her pants off and sit on the toilet. When she finally sat down on the toilet with the lid down, I rushed in to help her, worried that she'd make a mess if she didn't notice. She was panicking. Everything turned out okay. Even after using the toilet, she was mostly asleep. I had to wash her hands for her. I'm glad she's figured out how to sleep-walk her way to the toilet when she needs to. I was laughing and amazed.

Grandma's Visit

2010-09-27T16:07:00.001-04:00

Vivian wrote the following about the things she enjoyed from the trip:

I had fun taking Lydia to school each morning and picking her up,
especially once her attitude changed. (She did not want to go to
school - dragging her feet, crying. All it took was a "star" chart
and she was good as new). She looked so cute in her pink sunglasses.
A little miss! Another favorite activity of ours was looking through
Mom's dessert cook book. This was almost as fun as eating the
desserts, (or you would have thought from the delight she got from
it).

Tyler is such a cuddly bear. We had fun jumping on the trampoline.
(Boy, am I out of shape!). I came up with a great game, the "sleeping
tiger," which allowed me to lay down and pretend to be sleeping,
reaching out to grab them as they ran by. That was a life saver! I
went several times to Terhune Orchards, or "Turkey Orchards" as Tyler
calls it, his favorite place. Every time he sees the tractors it's as
if it's the first time he's seen them - "Oh! Look at the tractors!"
Favorite sayings by Tyler: "Oh my gosh!!" "Infinity and beyond!"
(Buzz Light year quote), "Dyou wanna jump on the twampoline?!"

And of course the other highlight for me was holding the cuddly new
bundle - Nyle! Couldn't get enough of him.

What a beautiful little family. It makes me feel so good knowing that
they are growing up in such a healthy, loving environment. Mom and
Dad are sure doing a good job helping these kids feel good about
themselves. Such patience! More than I ever had.

Grandma is Here

2010-09-05T10:12:00.002-04:00

Yesterday, when Grandma woke up and came out of her room, Tyler was standing quietly outside her door looking up at her. By the time I woke up, Tyler had his Buzz Lightyear toy. He hardly stopped playing with it the entire day. He insisted on me watching him over and over as he pulled Buzz's wings back and pushed the bottom to release them, then pretended to fly Buzz through the air. When I asked him, "isn't Grandma nice to give you that," he responded, "and Grandpa's nice."

Lydia had her birthday party with three friends and her mom and grandma playing miniature golf. Tyler doesn't know what miniature golf is, but after they came back he decided that he wanted to do it too, so I took the kids in the backyard and got my golf clubs out. Tyler's attention only lasted for two minutes, so it's a good thing they didn't take him with them for the party.

Lydia's birthday cake had trick candles. She blew them out a bunch of times and then told me that she turned 21.

Tyler surprised me how well he can use my iPhone. He demonstrated to Grandma this morning how he can swipe the lock screen, slide between menus, and find his favorite game. It's funny to watch because he looks like he's very mature and knows what he's doing.

Tyler's birthday

2010-07-17T22:39:00.007-04:00

Tyler's birthday celebration started last Sunday, on the day of his actual birthday. Kids helped make cupcakes which we brought to Tyler's nursery class at church. He was excited. He talked about having cupcakes for his birthday for a long time.

When we got home, we sang a "Happy Birthday" song, then opened his presents. We wished we had the camera rolling to capture Tyler's "WOW"s as he took out the contents of each present. We played with all the fun toys for the rest of the evening.

Next Friday was the day of his official birthday party. We invited a few friends and played with the water toys. Kids took our new slip and slide for a ride. Even the youngest kids got the sliding action down.

To cool off from the outside heat, we came inside for some cake and ice-cream. Once again, we sang the birthday song. I could see the excitment in Tyler's eyes as he listened to everybody's singing and reveled in the attention. Our little boy was trilled to turn "three and a half" (That's Tyler's new response to the age question).

Three decates

2010-06-08T07:29:00.001-04:00

I turned 10 during my first year living in Oregon, 20 during my first year in Japan, and 30 during my first year in New Jersey. Each decade marked a big change for me. The move to Forest Grove was a transition from being a young kid to being an old kid surrounded by young cousins. I became more independent and played with my own friends, not always with Matthew. At 20 I was transitioning into adulthood, which the mission accelerates, understanding my faith more deeply and developing a firm relationship with Heavenly Father. Now, at 30, I'm in my first career job and have a family and house like I've always wanted.

The Garden State

2010-06-06T23:01:00.001-04:00

Larisa is enjoying how quickly things grow here. Our garden state has greatly changed even during the two weeks since Bob and Vivian were here. We’re impatiently awaiting our first tomatoes and cucumbers. The peas are already grown.

Ice Cream made with Cold Air

2010-05-26T09:24:00.000-04:00

Today I'm going to Lydia's preschool to make liquid nitrogen ice cream. I had to learn how to do it, so on Monday I brought liquid nitrogen home for family home evening with our friends. It was a blast. Tyler kept trying to tough everything. There's fog coming out of the ice cream mixer, and he's trying to reach his hand in. They loved putting marshmallow and balloons in, and poring it on the floor. Lydia has a good memory. We were telling Laura about the activity, and I asked Lydia to explain on the phone how we made the ice cream. She said, "we used air that was so cold you could see it."

I hope things go that well at the nursery school today.

I Wish I were an Adult

2010-05-26T09:20:00.000-04:00

One afternoon last week I was sneaking some ice cream. Lydia came in the room and hadn't seen it yet, but I decided not to be a sneak anymore and just share. So she was happy to get a little bit of afternoon ice cream. Then she asked, "why are you eating ice cream?" I told her something dumb like it's because I like ice cream. Then she responded, "I wish I were an adult---then I wouldn't have to ask to eat ice cream."

The great outdoors

2010-03-30T23:22:00.000-04:00

In our household, life took a huge turn toward normalcy in the last 2 weeks and I am enjoying it immensely.

Since we've finished our carpet project, we have been able to take the time to play outside in our backyard. One day we took out blankets and had a picnic for lunch. Kids loved it. On another day, we just played around our sandbox that we are yet to fill with sand. We also went into our little thicket of trees for a bit of exploration. Those few days have been heaven sent, enveloping us with the feel of Spring. Amidst the pleasantries, I took away a very important lesson from our backyard playing. WE NEED A FENCE! Guess who can disappear in the blink of an eye? Not a big secret. I should not be surprised by our son's quick little feet, but I still am at times. Hopefully, we will tackle the fence soon and will continue to enjoy beautiful Spring days in our back yard. At the present, we are just waiting out the rain.

My own exciting venture is the garden that I am planning. I have to continuously tell myself not to get carried away. I want to start on the small side, with vegetable that we love and use everyday, like tomatoes and cucumbers. I've made few additions to those and am waiting for the seedlings to sprout. The raised bed is still in the works, but it will be ready by April when we are ready to transplant. I can not wait to be able to walk outside and pick some peas and juicy cherry tomatoes for a light snack.

Tyler's expressions

2010-03-14T18:09:00.000-04:00

Our little man says so many funny things each days, I want to attempt to capture them.

Tyler says "cutties" for scissors.

Today, we put a chef's outfit on Tyler and he exclaimed, " I am a maker".

He also loves his "thockow bow", a.k.a soccer ball.

By the way, as I am writing this entry, Lydia is going through our fancy dessert recipe book and picking out cakes and treats for her birthdays for the next decades. We are up to age 29, and she want a hot lime shortcake pudding for that birthday.

Favorite activities

2010-03-12T14:51:00.001-05:00

Lydia has been into making cards for everyone. I have some colorful card stock paper that she loves to use for adorning her sweet notes. She can do it for hours, cutting out shapes and writing out ingredients of cake recipes. Lydia needs writing help because she can't always remember how to write out her letters, but she sure loves doing it.

Also, Lydia loves to play with boys these days (I should clarify---older boys). Chasing them is a total thrill. She threatens to kiss them, knowing full well that they will take off and she will get to chase them. I say to myself, "Boys? Already?"

Tyler's favorite game is being chased. This morning he was wearing only his diaper when he came up to me and said: "Come chase the naked". That of course, caused some chuckles in our family. We go to the gym on Fridays and that's where he really gets his fill of running and chasing. Huge open space, bouncy floors and a bunch of crazed kids, what more can you ask for?

A recollection from the past months

2010-03-06T20:46:00.000-05:00

One day we were trying to convince Tyler to do something. His response to us sounded exactly like this " and...go away". I was trying so hard not to laugh, as I gave him a small lecture on how that's not a nice thing to say. It is still a mistery where this phrase came from, but I wanted to preserve it in writing, so we can tease Tyler about it when he grows up.

Egypt: Day 1

2010-01-31T22:50:00.000-05:00

Egypt memoirs: Day 1

We arrived in our hotel at around 3 pm. We already knew we would be staying in Giza, close to the pyramids, but we did not realize the hotel was practically at the foot of those large structures. From the hotel, you walk up hill about 300ft, pay for the entrance to the "park" and then 5 minutes later you are inside the pyramid. Paul and I dropped our stuff and decided to go check it out. On the way, we were barraged by a hordes of locals offering their services from taxies, and tour guides t0 rides on camels. They all wanted to give you a "good price" which is a vague term there. Our guide, whom we accidentally picked up, took us through the back way to the Second pyramid entrance. We walked through ruins of the worker's dwellings, looking into deep wells, walking through open roofed old rooms and into closed to public and therefore barred tombs. Several times some local guys with camels walked right by us. It was so fun to see those tall graceful animals.

The entrance to Second pyramid was smaller than I would imagine and located on the ground level. Once you go in, you have to practically double over to pass through the tunnel leading downward. I am still really surprise how Paul managed to make it in. The walk downward follows by a small straight hallway which leads you into another tunnel going back up, deeper into the pyramid. At the end, there was a burial chamber, with the stone sarcophagus still resting there, though, of course, missing all the other relics. It feels so strange to be somewhere so ancient. Thousand of years ago someone might have stood in the very spot you were standing in.

The first pyramid was closed for the day, so we just took pictures of it. Then we walked by the sphinx, visited a local shop where we watched them make papyrus and bought some rather expensive souvenirs (as we found out later). What we've learned from day one was that you either have to bargain like you've never had to before, or say "no" about a thousand times and then some.

The sun was going down and it was time to go home when we ran into a man we met earlier that morning. He volunteered to walk us home through Mena village which is located right outside the pyramid's gate. That's where our first adventure started. We walked through the street watching people sitting outside their brick homes, some selling different merchandize, some just observing the surroundings. Some kids were riding donkeys through the streets, others- just waved at us with huge innocent smiles, saying familiar "hello", some were trying to sell us post cards or other trinkets. Waahid invited us for a drink in his house, which we hesitantly excepted. We met his wife and kids, and some of his family who were extremely friendly, but we left shortly because we did not want to walk home after dark. This last part of our first day was a bit unnerving, but ended up being the highlight of the day.

Little boy Tyler

2010-01-31T22:16:00.000-05:00

Tyler is such a fun little kid. He is so adorable and so mischievous. Two incidents happened this past week and I could not pass up writing about them.

A friend of ours invited us to come to a local gym for their free play hour. I thought the kids would be thrilled. When we got there, more people showed up then we expected and we could tell that the kids were going to have so much fun together. The gym leader was trying to involve kids with some activities, so they would nor run wild. I got distracted watching the kids going through obstacle course when I turned around and saw my Tyler in the mid-dive position from one gym mat to another. Those mats where at least 3 feet tall and at least 2 feet apart. It was a picture perfect moment, though I was not thinking of pictures at the time. I was in shock. I KNOW Tyler is pretty fearless, but I still could not believe he did that. I was distracted for only a couple of minutes!

So the second incident happened at Home Depot. I was buying some hardware for our bathroom and specifically told the kids to stay close. Lydia was standing next to me the whole time, while Tyler was exploring boxed toilets behind me. The where packaged so I, once again took a few minute to make up my mind of what I was going to get. When I turned around, Tyler was gone. I went in a little tunnel between the boxes where he was standing. Not a sign of my little boy. I started calling his name and heard a happy little voice, but could not pinpoint the direction. I thought he might be on the other side of the isle. How big was my surprise when I looked up and saw my son's smiling face looking at me from the the third shelf of home depot racks. He as laying on top of the merchandise. I could not even reach that high. I got stern with him and told him to get down, uncertain that he would be able to do so. Then I found a spot between the boxes where he was. There the boxes sort of made a step. He climbed up there and then used steel shelf frames as a climbing structure to get to the top. There was a family with 4 kids in the isle with me. You had to see the shock on their faces when they saw Tyler on top of the those plastic bottles on the third shelf. To tell the truth, I did not know whether I should laugh or cry. The good thing is, he got down, pretty much all by himself and was totally fine. That little rascal!

Update

2010-01-31T21:42:00.000-05:00

So we bought a house in November and since then our life has picked up so much speed, we did not even noticed that we've neglected our blog for MONTHS. This is my appemt to catch us up to date.

So many things have tricepired since then. We moved, and with Papa Branner's help started a gazillion of projects we are still struggling to finish. The wall that was taken down by Dad is now completely patched and painted, which is as much progress as we've made. Well, we did do some small things like caulking the bathtub, painting and repainting a couple of rooms. Just to make a point of how slow things are moving along, we are still in the process of ordering the carpet that should have been in by Thanksgiving. But I have to say we have been busy and not just with the house. Matthew, Summer came to visit us just days after Dad left to go home (and rest from his labors) They spent Thanksgiving with us. That was a welcome break from an intense 10 days of working on the house. They left and we practically shifted into the Christmas gear, buying presents, planning trips and still working on the house. Alla and Vanya came to visit us for a few days which was very fun. They took us to the airport on Christmas. We flew to Portland for a fun filled time at the Branner house. The cousins had so much fun playing together and the adults had fun busying themselves with all sorts of activities from shopping, to participating in the tallent shows to skiing, and doing a whole lot of talking. It was so fun, busy and noisy. We loved it.

From then, Paul and I packed our bags and flew to Egypt, leaving our kids with the grandparents. We has so much fun there and will write about the trip later in specifics. But I have to say it was quite an experience to stay in the hotel right at the foot of the Giza pyramids. We could see them out of our bedroom window. Paul spend a few days in conference while I visited some tourist sights with wifes of Paul's collegues. Then we has some time to spend together, riding camels, visiting a whole bunch of Egyptian temples in Luxor. It was an unforgetable trip.

It was brutal getting back into the swing of things at home. Paul and I were jetlaged and therefore tired and later on sick, for what seems like forever. Only now life is starting to resemble some sort of normalcy. We have been so blessed to get a chance to travel so much recently. But, still, there is no place like home, even when you still sleep on blow-up mattresses.

Lost Photo and Dancing Daddy's Daughter

2010-01-31T21:37:00.000-05:00

On Saturday we decided to take the kids out for fun. We were going to split up, boys together and girls together, but Lydia insisted on going with me, so we all hung out at Chucky Cheese's. No food, just games. Tyler puts tokens in everything indiscriminately. When he put a token in "sketch pad" machine, I picked him up so we could get a picture of the two of us. It turned out really nice picture of Tyler smiling with his unshaven, messed up hair dad squeezing him. But alas, we lost track of this gem at some point during the night, so it will never make it into Tyler's scrap book.

I had something fun and amazing to say about Lydia today, but I can't really remember. She's as amazing as ever. She loves to make up stories and dances. All of the extended family members who saw her at Christmas swore she's not only a four-year-old. And she performed an original dance for the family talent show that amazed everything. How could we not think ahead enough to pull the video camera out?

Help, Help, I’m being repressed!

2009-11-05T09:17:00.001-05:00

Laura called me last night to talk about the Tea Party in Washington tomorrow. She got me thinking about going, so I looked up train schedules and everything in the middle of the night. I told her that she’d know I was there if she saw on the news someone in the background trying to yank himself away from the grip of the cops while yelling, “Now you see the violence inherent in the system.”

On the other hand, I’ll know if Laura contributed to my wiki just by reading it. :)

Lydia is not an Octopus

2009-11-04T23:01:00.001-05:00

Yesterday Larisa was putting the kids to bed. Lydia can take forever in the bathroom, so Larisa had to speed her up to make time for reading a book. She put toothpaste on the toothbrush and told Lydia to take it, while Lydia was still busy putting her pull-up on. Her response was perfect. “Mom, I’m not an optupus.”

Of course, they do get to bed eventually.

Apple Pie

2009-10-12T02:10:00.000-04:00

The Terhune Orchards in Princeton attract visitors from all around. They have fruit to pick and animals to pet. Larisa has taken the kids a few times. We went on Saturday to pick apples. Then we came home and made a pie using a crust recipe that Laura gave us. Fun and delicious.

Where's my hug?!

2009-09-16T21:21:00.000-04:00

I come home from work and usually say to the kids, "where's my hug?" They humor me and come running. Tyler is usually really energetic and exited to see us anyway, even if it's first thing in the morning or just when he hasn't seen us around in the house for a while. But the other day I came home and Tyler stood across the room with his arms wide open and said "where's my hug?" I went running. He didn't stop at that---took a few steps back and did it again.

Pushing the limits

2009-09-16T21:15:00.000-04:00

This post is about Tyler. But it's not about him pushing the limits. It's about me pushing the limits with him.

We were at a playground a block from our new place here in Princeton. Tyler was sitting in a baby swing and wanted me to push him. I kept pushing him higher and higher, and he was loving it. He asked for more, and I'd push as him as high as I could dare, but nothing fazed him.

Then I had another fun idea. I spun him in a circle, winding up the chain, and then let him spin as it untangled. Still, nothing. No shrieks of horror or even signs of panic. So I tried to spin him more, but it still wouldn't go very fast. Then I realized the secret. If I lifted him as I spun him then not only could I twist a lot further, but now the chain twists up in a way that builds up a lot of potential energy.

When I let him go this time his head was flinging back and he quickly burst out, "I'm too busy! I'm too busy!" I couldn't stop laughing at that.

Cuff kids infiltrate Russia

2009-09-05T07:23:00.000-04:00

Larisa mentioned that Lydia loves to run up the stairs. I gave her that idea. I did it once as a trick to beat them up to the top, and then I did it several times for exercise. Now she never wants to use the elevator, and when I'm with her she makes me run up while the others ride the elevator. The problem is that then she gets tired and I end up carrying her up while we race the elevator. Tyler serprised me. During one of Lydia's first times up the stairs alone I rode the elevator with him. When we got to the top ahead of Lydia he walked over to the stairs and looked down calling for Lydia. I didn't know that the whole elevator thing made sense to him and that he knew we had gone up.

Lydia is communicating a little bit better with Grandma, but sometimes the message is not what we had in mind. For example, when we left Lydia and Tyler alone with Grandma, Lydia would stand in the way of Galina with her arms outstretch when Galina was going to get Tyler to stop doing something, sending the clear message that "you're not in charge of us." I saw her do it once again the other day and scolded her (gentle). Her explanation was that Grandma's not in charge because we are. I told her that she's also in charge, especially if we are gone, and that it's okay if the person in charge does things differently than us.

Lately, Lydia has been asking us to tell her stories at night from memory or made up, but the problem is that if we don't tell the story as she wanted she gets upset. I finally figured out that I can use Disney movie summaries as bed-time stories and that pleases her. She's been throwing many tantrums here, probably partly because no one speaks her language. And she's so particular. The other day at the dacha (summer cottage) we wanted her to put on some slippers because the floor was cold. Lydia would not touch the brown slippers because they were boys slippers (belonging to Vlad). She was screaming and backing away as if they would burn her or something, and she wouldn't let up. We discovered that she does a lot better if we make her take a nap, so that's helped.

On Lydia's birthday this week we went on some rides and to a playground at a cafe where we ate. Then we went to pick out a hat for her and a necklace and a birthday cake. She loves shopping. When we were picking out hats and necklaces she wanted to try them all on and loved all of them. Especially at the jewelry store she was so excited and walked around showing me everything. That's the way she is in Galina's store as well. When we picked out the birthday cake, which she immediately identified once we walked in the bakery because of all the flowers in the icing, it was already about 9pm. Lydia looked around at the dark sky and said, "do we get to not sleep because it's my birthday?"

Tyler loves to copy Lydia. When she says something, he repeats it, even if he doesn't know what the worlds mean. He also copies what she does, even if it means climbing up the highest structure on the playground. He still won't listen to us when we tell him to not to run away, so we put him in time out pretty regularly. But he doesn't care. Sometimes he even comes to me and says "time out" and sits down even though he's not in trouble. The other day when the kids were supposed to be sleeping but we instead jumping around the room and on the beds, I came in and said if Tyler didn't stay in bed I would take one of his favorite blankets (which he usually really cares about). He walked over and handed me the blanket and said "here you go."

Memorable things

2009-09-02T04:14:00.000-04:00

We're having lots of fun in Tomsk. The kids enjoy going to the Dacha. It is a summer home, which usually comes hand in hand with a garden and in some cases, a sauna. My aunt Lena and uncle Jenya have both. Family and friends gather there on weekends and some weekdays. A feast follows our every arrival to the dacha. All the fresh herbs and veggies get cut in the garden and all sort of other food is brought in from the city. Arkasha fires up the grill which people call "mankal" and makes shishkababs from pork and chicken.

Kids were a little weary of all those new people at first, but now they know them all by name and get excited to see them. Lydia and Tyler met two remotely related cousins whith whom they half -played, half-fought. But that's not unusual with such small kids. They chased each other and squilled. They played cars, ball and climbed on everything, while Lydia picked black currants, gooseberries and other local varieties of berries.

At night, dyadya (uncle) Jenya would fire up the sauna and people take turns overheating themselves. When Paul and I first went in, I felt like I was going to have a heat stroke any minute. It was 100 degrees celcius on the thermometer and we left the sauna's door open. That detail was not mentioned to my family. They would think we are weaklings. The second time we went we had to admit that we can take such temperatures very well, so my uncle had pity on us and got the sauna to the cool temperature of 80 degrees celcius. Needless to say, we were greatful.

Every Sunday's we went to church before going to the dacha. Our city has a relatively new church building. Last time we came, it was almost finished. So this time was the first time we really attended church there. It was so amazing to see how church is developing here. So many members that I knew and loved from my previous visits were there to greet us and we were something to behold indeed. Our kids made so much racket in Sacrement meeting I always felt like people looked at us funny. Well, what can I say, Lydia and Tyler, active as they usually are, would get extra board since they did not know the language. But I loved hearing people speak. There were many talks and lessons that I felt were inspired to help me.

Nursery and Primary were combined since there were not many small kids in the branch. Because of the language barrier, one of us was always with the kids not so much for transelation of all that was happening, but for reassuring them in the new environment. This is one of the things we had to get used to, since at home, our kids didn't even turn around to say "bye" to us when we would leave them in Nursery and Primary.

The weather in Russia was mostly great in my opinion, though my mom, aunt Lena and others would tell me know much we lucked out with the weather in August which usually is very capricious. We had some rain, but we saw a lot of warm sunny days. We managed to go swiming a few times in a huge lake outside the city. It was surrounded by forrest with water that was cool and clear. Bugs presented the our only problem. Once you pass by some trees, they would surround you and drive you crazy. Once, before Paul got here, my mom and her friend Natasha found a bunch of broken brunches, needles, pinecones and made a fire that smoked like crazy, on purpose, I might add. We all stood there, trying to get the smoke to permiate our clothing, hair and skin. That is a Russian remedy for driving the bugs away. It worked pretty well.

On this trip, I got to see my friends from highshool. It was good to catch up with them. I wished we got together more. Also, we got to see the some of the festivities on September 1st. It is a nation wide beginning of school day. My mom's apparment is close to one of many schools in the city. Paul and I snuck out in the morning, while my mom fed the kids, and got to see kids walking to school with their parents. It is customery for students to bring flower for their teachers on the first day of school. So we saw a small see of people and flowers as we approached the school. We watched as teachers officially announced the begining of new school year. It was a fun sight and brought a whirlwind of memories. I am so glad we got to see it again.

This trip has been a lenthy one and therefore there is a lot to tell, but I will leave some things for another entry.

Things to do when you have a PhD

2009-08-15T18:17:00.000-04:00

Video from Paul Cuff on Vimeo.

One long day

2009-08-02T23:08:00.000-04:00

This entire last week was one long day for me. Actually, the chaos started two weeks ago when I got back from Illinois (UIUC) and I confirmed with Stanford that the only way to get the letter that Princeton demanded by the end of July was to finish my dissertation in the next two weeks. Unfortunately, the timing was terrible. That meant that I would be finishing my dissertation right when the family is leaving for Russia.

I honestly don't know which day was which this last week, except that I remember taking the family to the airport on Wednesday. Here's what I wrote my family about the experience:

How to finish a dissertation in a week:
When you are tired, set a timer for 1.5 hours and lie down on the floor.
When you are bored, go play with kids and wife or check email and news.

But it sure felt good to print out the fancy, acid-free, cotton pages and turn them in. Even with the rush, I think it ended up being pretty good. And Laura stayed up really late the night before to spend hours proofreading for me. Here's a link to the dissertation.

I did have a moment to enjoy shooting some photos with the family. Our friend, Seth Lloyd, took family pictures for us with his nice camera for a going-away gift.

Japan and Korea

2009-07-01T08:17:00.000-04:00

Here was my email to Larisa from Japan:

This is great. I didn't know how much fun it was going to be, but as soon as I got here and saw the bamboo and the Japanese style houses and felt the humidity, it instantly brought me back 10 years. What a flood of memories. I could have believed I was a missionary again. It's so amazing that just the subtle smells and sights can remind you of a place so much. I wish you guys were here.

Unfortunately, I didn't make it to the temple yesterday. I was pretty bummed. Maybe I was trying to pack too many things in. I met with Momomi and Tomoko last night for dinner. That was a lot of fun. Then we walked around Tokyo a little bit.

I went to church in the Urawa Ward on Sunday and ran into so many people I recognized. Many of them were kind enough to remember me as well. In fact, the first person I saw remembered my name and that I used to wear glasses. He even remembered the new members I worked with.

I also surprised myself by speaking Japanese much better than I expected. Once I got going it just all came back. Many of them asked how I kept it up, which I haven't. I could just speak like normal though, for the most part. Very exciting.

I've now been in Korea for several days. I gave my talk at ISIT yesterday, and I've gotten a lot of possitive feedback. I did something silly though. I stayed in the apartment to prepare my talk and missed the awards luncheon where they called my name and waited for me to come up and receive my best student paper award from last year. Whoops!

The Korean language sounds a lot like Japanese. To me, it sounds like Japanese that I'm not understanding. And now I'm learning that they actually share a lot of words. Their food is half similar and half different. They have a lot more spicy and pickled foods.

Today I made my way to the temple by bus. I spent some time there. It's a beautiful plot on a hill in a not-so-beautiful part of the city.

Lydia's Scary Dreams

2009-07-01T08:10:00.000-04:00

Lydia has been giving us a hard time lately when we put her down to sleep at night. She'll try to negotiate to get us to either sleep with her or to have us set the timer like we do for quite time so she can come out when it beeps. We don't always give her what she wants, and she doesn't let go easily. I hate to say I had to let her scream her lungs out the other night to teach her that we don't come when she screams at us. Of course, after she was finally done I went up to talk to her. Larisa always says I know how to relate to her. I can see myself in her position.

She says she has bad dreams at night. The other night when she called for us I went to her and asked what her scary dream was about. She said she dreamed about a clown who was putting icecream in the toilet. That's enough to even scare me.

Disneyland

2009-06-08T00:21:00.000-04:00

Almost two weeks ago, Lydia and I took a day trip to Disneyland. We flew in on one morning, spend a full day there and flew back the next. It was one of our attempts to see all there is to see in California before we move to the East coast.

We struck out on the first few rides--- Lydia got too scared. But then, when we went on Dumbo ride, followed by "It's a small world after all", the fun began. I always liked Disneyland, but showing Lydia all the fun things there was a cherry on top. The most exciting thing was to see her wide eyed amazement at the things she saw.

Lydia told me that out of all the movie characters she would like to see Tinkerbell the most. So we stood in line for what seemed like forever to meet her. Good thing that Lydia slept through that long line experience. She was dazed and drowsy when we first walked in, but it all went away when Tinkerbell talked with her. After this, Lydia got her face painted (instead of buying a souvenir to take home).

Then we went on some more rides, like the Jungle cruise, Matterhorn, carousel, teacups, and a train around all the enchanted castles. Also, we stood in another long line to see Jasmine, Bell and Little Mermaid. Lydia, though she almost drove me crazy in line, loved every minute of those princess encounters. Then we got some food, watched the new version of the main street parade and upon Lydia's request, decided to go home to our room without watching the fireworks. On our way out, I found a way for Lydia to still get a souvenir from Disneyland. Since she decided to paint her face rather than buy something, I told Lydia she could use the money from her piggy bank. Paul counted her little stash at home and told us how much we could spend. Let me just say there is not much you could buy at Disneyland for $7 dollars. I thought we would just have to give up on the idea, when I spotted a wand and showed it to Lydia. It was love at first sight. She did not let go of that wand for a couple of days.

This was such a fun adventure for the both of us. It was quality time spent together with my little princess.

what a big kid

2009-06-07T23:19:00.000-04:00

Our daughter considers herself a full fledged member of the "grown-up" society. She knows how to order food like one. Once, when waitress came to our table to get our orders, Lydia announced very confidently that she would like chicken nuggets. The waitress said that they only had chicken strips to which our little girl replied without much hesitations " We can do that."

Yosemite

2009-06-01T02:35:00.000-04:00

This was a fun last minute trip the kids and I decided to take when Paul was off interviewing for a job. Our friends and neighbors invited us to come to Yosemite on Thursday. The following morning we left for a 5 hour trip. Poor bewildered kids had no idea what happened and why they were stuck in the car for so long. But once we got there, they loved it. That evening, after we set up our tent, we went to see a waterfall where we got wet from running into it's mist. Tyler still talks about the waterfall every time he sees our neighbors, David and Mary.

As it got dark, we roasted hot dogs and marshmallows. I had to keep Tyler in check because he kept stealing every one's chocolate---the only part of smores that he cared about. Kids were exhausted that evening. Tyler was screaming when I was trying to dress him for bed, but once I laid him down in the sleeping bag, he fell asleep without moving a muscle. About an hour later, Lydia, to my amazement, just announced that she's tired and going to bed. That never happens. She was out shortly.

I had a hard time sleeping for the fear of bears and concern for the kids getting out of their covers. But we all ended up sleeping in past 8 am. That also never happens. Then we had to pack our stuff and head home, taking an accidental scenic route through the most rural parts of California's orchards. I have to say that the beautiful drive made me question weather I really wanted to move away somewhere else this year. At the end of it all, we were all tired but wonderfully enriched by this short trip. It made me yearn to come back and bring Paul with us this time. But, I am afraid time will not permit it.

Our friends

2009-06-01T02:13:00.000-04:00

About a month ago, we had friends come and visit us for a week. It was a fun and crazy experience with some field trips and sick children. The kids loved playing together. Arden and Lydia played as if the they never were apart. They loved all our outings. We went to the tide pools and climbed over rocks to see live crabs. We also went to the San Francisco zoo where the kids took up chasing the peacocks. There was a big barbecue where the kids had a play date with a bunch of friends, which I missed, and where the famous princess puke happened. Karen and I had a fun time catching up all of this past year's events and cleaning up the signs of kid's sickness (we will leave off the gross details). It was so sad to see them go not knowing when we will see our good friends again. Lydia cried.

Excessive traveling

2009-05-22T01:51:00.001-04:00

I've taken so many round trip flights this year. It's unbelievable. Let's count them:

Allerton Conference, Illinois (September)
Qualcomm research open house, San Diego (October)
MIT invited talk (November)
Joel's wedding, Oregon (December)
BYU interview (January)
Microsoft Research interview (January)
ITA, UC San Diego (February)
UCLA interview (February)
MIT and Princeton interviews (March)
Illinois visit (March)
L-3 interview, Salt Lake City (April)
Morgan Stanley interview, NYC (May)
Qualcomm interview, San Diego (May)

Comming up: Santa Barbara, Princeton, Seoul, Tokyo, Illinois, Russia.

So in one year's time I'll have flown to 20 places. (counting MIT and Princeton separately on that multi-destination trip)

Princess Puke

2009-05-03T23:14:00.000-04:00

Lydia is a rough and tough, persistent, go-getter, but she's also at times a gentle, motherly girl. Here she has just set out a blanket and food on her own for a picnic in our backyard. One morning recently I came downstairs when she was the only one awake. She had the TV paused and was making breakfast. I followed her instructions to make myself a sandwich. She had out the bread, laughing-cow cheese, provolone cheese, and jam (I replaced jam with smoked salmon). Then we cut the sandwiches into fun shapes with the cookie-cutters which she had ready for us. I thought this was a fun idea she must have picked up from Larisa. Then Lydia went back to her TV, and when she unpaused it I noticed that they were making cookie-cutter sandwiches in the Curious George episode.

This week we had friends over who got the kids sick. Poor kids. Lydia threw up for several days, and apologized profusely for it. Apparently she didn't mean to. On the second night, after having eaten very little during the day, she had trouble again. She came into our room in the middle of the night and said her stomach hurt. Then she saw the bowl we had there for her during quiet time. She leaned over it and let it go. Then she stayed kneeling over the bowl for a few minutes until she finished. We felt awful, and I sat there rubbing her back and thanking her for being careful. After the last couple of dry-heaves, she abruptly stood up and started marching back to her room. I said, "Lydia, where are you going?" In a definitive voice, without turning back, she responded, "I'm done!"

Tyler speaks

2009-05-03T22:53:00.000-04:00

It's suiting that Tyler would attempt to type over me while I'm trying to write an entry about him. He's sitting on my lap right now. We were just going through a counting book with him, and he's pretty good at it. Lydia is already asleep. It's rare that Tyler can flip through a book however he wants, so he's enjoying the occasion. He's pretty good at counting with us. Then he asked to count houses, so we turned to a page that has three houses and let him try counting himself: "House, three, nine." Then on to counting five snowmen: "Three, eight, nine, eight, fourteen." After that everything on the page was "fourteen." But really, eleven is his favorite.

He recently reached the point of being able to put his puzzles together very proficiently. For both Lydia and him, that came very suddenly. Just a week or two ago he had a lot of trouble.

In the car, on the way home from church, Tyler learned how to spray water on himself. We have a water spray-bottle that we use to flatten his hair. He kept spraying himself in the face and saying, "Wawa, fun!"

Morning laugh

2009-04-23T12:53:00.000-04:00

Lydia was sitting at the table and eating her yogurt when she said "Daddy, do you want some yogurt?" When Paul said that he did, she announced, "Ok. Then you can go get your own."

Listen to the little ones

2009-04-20T01:03:00.000-04:00

Paul and I often crack up at what our kids say. A few days ago Tyler woke up before Lydia and requested to watch "Nemo" first thing. He absolutely adores "Finding Nemo", but I rarely let him watch it. So this particular morning I agreed farely quickly. Tyler looked at me and with a smile on his face said "so happy". It was cute to see him express his feelings about something since he can barely put two words together.

Tonight as we were putting kids to bed, Lydia announced as she gave me a hug goodnight " I love Daddy and Tyler loves you and that's how we love each other". She's got the division of love all figured out.

Bus ride

2009-04-13T01:45:00.000-04:00

Here is our cutest little boy riding a bus. We rode a bus a week ago and once again yesterday. Boy, did Tyler love the ride! While we were waiting at the graduate community center to go to the Easter Egg Hunt, Lydia and Paul would wonder around the building. First, Tyler would run after them, then turn around and say "buff" with a worried expression. I could see that he was afraid to miss the bus. When we got on, he sat so still and just looked out the window the whole time. That in itself is a shocker, because Tyler, well, he just does not like to sit still.

On our way back, once again, at the bus stop, we had to wait in line to get in. Upon seeing the bus pull up, Tyler was pushing past everyone to make sure he got on. When I held him back, he was so eager to find his seat that he started turning to a horizontal position while I was holding him. I figured that it was his only way of getting closer to the door. As we waited, the longer it took for us to move up the line, the harder his hand was squeezing my skin into a pinch. Once he was on a "buff", he was the happiest kid ever. My point---Tyler loves busses... and cars... and trains... He is a boy through and through!

New things

2009-04-11T03:24:00.000-04:00

I wanted to show off Lydia's creations. She loves making cakes in all shapes and forms: she makes them out of play dough, out of sand and all other materials she can find. She finds new delicious looking pictures in cookbooks and begs me to make it with her. Once in a while we let her.

Today our little girl really wanted to eat crapes for breakfast, but, I was not paying enough attention to what I was doing and mixed up a batter for blintzes. When Lydia spotted my mistake, she was not happy. Oh, no, she was not. She ate the blintzes, though was still begging and pleading that we would make crepes for lunch. I promised that when she was done with her quiet time, we will make crepes. I even tried to to tempt her to make brownies instead, but she refused. So we made crepes.

Lydia and Tyler started a gymnastics class last week. They are in different age groups, but basically are in the same room. They both love it. Lydia loves to do somersaults and swing on the rings. Tyler loves to climb and run like the wind on the tumbling track. He looks so funny and unbalanced as he dashes back and forth, but seems to maintain his vertical position just fine.

Rainbow school has also been added to our daily routine. When Lydia found out she would go there, we told her that she had to practice going potty on the toilet to make sure she did not have any accidents. I don't think I have ever seen such cooperation from Lydia before. The first day of school when I came to get her, she looked at me and said very sternly "What are you doing here?" Well, I guess I could say she already fully adjusted.

Video for Dad's Birthday

2009-04-11T03:22:00.001-04:00

We played around with video editing and made something fun to send to Dad for his birthday. Then I went a step further and embedded it into a website. I'm very proud of it: Video slide show.

Cal Train trip

2009-04-11T03:08:00.000-04:00

One fine Saturday afternoon we decided to go for a train ride. We have a Cal train station very close to our house, and as we drive around, we come across railroad tracks quite a lot. Kids love watching the train go by. So we decided to treat them to a ride on one of those trains.

Lydia loved exploring the train. Tyler would have loved it, too, only we did not let him. As good as he is on his feet, he's still rather tipsy on the level ground at times. So we did not really want to find out how many injuries he could accumulate running around the moving train. The railing on the second level was rather sparse and like a good friend of mine once said "we ought to have healthy respect for gravity." I am not fond of heights, can you tell?

So, back to Lydia. She walked around the train as far as we would let her. She would go upstairs and sit down by the window and watch everything race by. She sang as we rode. It was fun to watch her. She is so curious, wanting to explore and experience everything she can.

We made it to San Francisco in about an hour. There we took a bus and another train to Fisherman's Warf. We walked around Pier 39, indulging ourselves in a yummy crape and watching the seals sunbathe on empty docks before we headed back for home. It was such a memorable trip for all of us.

Funny kid stories

2009-04-06T01:42:00.000-04:00

I have to record a couple of fun kids stories before I forget them.

I went to Illinois (UIUC) last week for a few days. When the family came to pick me up at the airport, Lydia gave me a hug and hushed me because she was listening to Jamaima Puddleduck in the car stereo. They've been listening to that several times this past week. When I asked her what the story is about, she said that the fox and the dog got together and ate the eggs. Larisa had to fill me in on the background. Apparently the story involves a duck laying eggs and a bad fox who wants to eat them, but in the end the dogs eat the eggs. Well, after several times of listening through the story, Lydia finally asked Larisa about the eggs. "The fox ate the eggs, right?" When Larisa told her that the dogs ate the eggs, Lydia was shocked and brought to tears, insisting that it was the fox. So then she decided that actually the dogs and the fox got together and ate the eggs (probably the fox talked them into it, I assume).

Today we cut Tyler's hair. He looks cute. Tonight we were getting ready to read a book, and Tyler went off on a talking spree. "Nemo," "Shaw" (shark), "Wayow" (whale), "boat," "tudo" (turtle), "ate," "Dowi" (Dori), and then back to Nemo and shark and so on. We laid down with our heads on the toy couch, and he was very particular that were on his left rather than his right (if we were on the wrong side he'd push our head off the couch). He was very excited to tell us the story, and we kept repeating back to him everything he said.

Updates on the Kids

2009-03-17T01:49:00.001-04:00

Tyler loves his "blankie" and asks for it day and night. He holds it up to his face or lays down on it and pretends to sleep. He still calls water 'juice,' and he points out anything that he knows how to say and looks us straight in the eye to say what it is (on the second repetition). He's 100% playful.

Lydia loves to make jokes about poopoo and is very opinionated, especially about food. But I do manage to get her to eat vegetables after some struggle. Today she had me tie a cape (blanket) around her neck so she could run around and be a super-hero. I tied it so well that she couldn't get it off. I love how good of a communicator she is. She's such a clever girl. And it's fun to hear her annunciate her answers when we ask her things---"yes."

Larisa told me a story that happened while I was gone last week. Lydia was still playing in the bath while Larisa got Tyler ready for bed. It takes a while with the lotions and everything we put on them. When Tyler was all ready in his pajama, Larisa had to run to our room for something (maybe the phone). Then she heard Lydia laughing herself to death and ran in the bathroom to find that Tyler was sitting in the bathtub with her, in his pajama.

Bowling

2009-03-07T23:32:00.000-05:00

We had an Escondido Village activity-Family Bowling. We showed up a bit late, but were still able to participate in all the fun, though we missed out on pizza. Tyler and Lydia had so much fun bowling, that Paul and I hardly bowled ourselves. We were working as damage control, holding our kids back from lifting and throwing the bowling bowls in all directions. Kids loved the ramp, it really made them feel like serious bowlers. I have never had such good time bowling (watching someone else bowl).

So big

2009-03-07T22:43:00.000-05:00

Tyler is getting so big. He talks all the time, though I am not sure how much of it others can actually understand. He started to copy phrases we say. Recently, after he put something in it's proper place he said "I did it, I did it". He gets so excited when we acknowledge his talking. Another time when we were out at our playground, swinging, I heard Tyler say "So high". He kept repeating it over and over all the way home. I guess you never really know what you say until your kids start repeating it.

Funny thing happened today. Today I went to get Tyler out of his bed after his nap (I could hear him making noises) and was utterly surprised by what I saw. Tyler was out of his "Pack-and-Play" bed walking around the room and unpacking Paul's bag. The room did not look too disturbed yet, so I figured he has not been out for long. I still have no idea how in the world he got out. All I have to say is that he keeps me on my toes.

Slick new clothes

2009-02-22T02:38:00.000-05:00

Thanks to papa and mama Branner, our graduate-to-be is wearing his new slick suits. We thought we would take some photos to show off these cool clothes. Paul looks like he's ready to take on the business world, even if it's not his field. Watch out, y'all.

Cute Kids

2009-02-18T11:03:00.000-05:00

Our kids are so cute. You can see from the rough-housing that Tyler is used to it. The problem is that he pushes other kids around now. We're working on manners with him. He says many words these days like light, ball, football, food, etc.

Lydia uses the bathroom by herself and dresses herself. She only wears what she wants, which is a struggle on Sundays. And she wears it her way. When we try to turn her skirt around right-side-forward she gets mad and turns it back. At night she stays up "reading" by the night-light.

Both kids sleep in the same room, and Tyler has trouble getting to sleep if he doesn't see Lydia in the room.

Animoto Valentine's Card

2009-02-14T22:17:00.001-05:00

I got back from San Diego last night, and today we're been running around having all sorts of fun. But in the middle of it all we celebrated Valentine's Day by making a photo-video using Animoto. Take a look here.

Riding together

2009-02-02T01:57:00.000-05:00

Yesterday Lydia and I rode our bikes around Escondido Village while Paul and Tyler were running errands. We went to return some things we borrowed from friends. Lydia has been insisting on riding her bike everywhere we can since she got it for Christmas. She usuallly rides along side me while Tyler sits in the trailer that's attached to the bike. He's probably the only one not totally loving this arrangement.

Tis the season

2008-12-15T00:43:00.000-05:00

Most kids like to get presents. Tyler just likes standing on them. Honestly, this really captures Tyler's personality---he really likes to stand on things. I am so glad we took this picture, because now, this little idiosyncrasy will never be forgotten

This holiday season is inspiring Tyler's growing vocabulary. So far, his favorite word is kiki (a.k.a. cookie). He knows where we keep all the treats we've been given and he demands them quite often. He also loves all the balls (a.k.a Christmas ornaments that are round) and picks them off the tree everyday. As the matter of fact, the bottom third of our tree is pretty much bare, except for the lights. It's a good thing the ornaments are all plastic.

Our baby learned the word "baby" and he sure uses it. He always points out all the newborns. Today, as we watched "Luke 2" video, Tyler kept saying "baby," "baby." So I talked to him about baby Jesus.

Last bit concerning vocabulary: once Tyler learned the word juice he has managed to call a lots of things that. First, he started calling the drinks "jiu," then it spread on to his pacifier, then to other things. Now, thankfully, he only says that when he's thirsty, but I've got to say he is as adamant about getting his "jiu" as he is about getting "kiki"s.

We have this Christmas decoration---stuffed moose in a rocking chair. Tyler calls it "goggy" (a.k.a. doggy). He loves to hear the moose sing. Also, our little boy loves to push the button on the our jazz Santa, only he is not patients enough to hear the entire song; he just turns it on and off, on and off.

Lydia and Santa

2008-12-11T14:22:00.000-05:00

Lydia is not shy about telling Santa how his singing really is.

When we got to this Christmas party at the church, Lydia got out of the car and said, "Hey, it's the church." I agreed and started getting Tyler out of the car. Next thing I knew Lydia was starting to cry, "I didn't want to go to church." Then I told her that the party was at church and her cry turned into one of those evil laughs of hers.

Lydia says and does funny things. She picks up things we say even just once. Yesterday I got sick. When I came downstairs after a long sleep Lydia asked "Why did you caught a bug?"

Boston trip

2008-12-01T01:58:00.000-05:00

Yesterday we returned from such a fun trip I don't know where to start my story.

So it all started because Paul was invited to give a talk at MIT. To our utter surprise, they offered to fly us all to Boston. We flew out the weekend before the talk to have some time to look around.

In Boston, our home base was a fine historical hotel located within a block from MIT campus and a minute walk from a subway station. The morning after we arrived, we made a short excursion to see this well known school. Sadly to say, campus inself was small and grey, but we got the feeling that people who study there are serious about their work.

On Saturday afternoon we decided to go see Boston and it's many historical monuments. All I have to say is that things did not go exactly as planned. On our way to the USS Constitution, we faced some seiour weather challenges. It was about 30 degrees and the wind was pretty bad. Lydia was sitting in the front of the stroller and was almost in tears, begging us to go home. Needles to say, we did not see much that day except the "Old Ironsides". There, we tried to listen to one of the navy officers telling us about the history while kids climbed the stairs and cannons, and played with the cannon balls. Just kidding. Actually, those were all the things we tried to prevent them from doing.

On Sunday we went to church just a few block from our hotel, visited the campus of Harvard University and ate Bertucci's pizza (the best pizza Paul and I have ever tried).

Monday and Tuesday Paul was at MIT giving his talk and meeting the facutly while kids and I were riding around the "T" (subway), trying to find our way to various attracktions like Boston Chilren's Museum and Aqarium. Then, Tuesday night we almost missed our bus to New Haven, Conetticut. Luckily, the bus was late, and we got to spend the rest of the evening in traffic, trying to help our kids fall asleep.

So, last leg of our trip consisted of visiting Butlers, eating delicious Thanksgiving dinner while celebrating my birthday, taking a short drive through Yale university and a day of running around New York city trying to see all the tourist attraction. We've made so many memories in one week I feel like we've been gone for a long time.

Glamour Shots

2008-11-14T00:41:00.000-05:00

We had a fun photo shoot today. Larisa set up some backdrops, and we played around for as long as the kids would cooperate.

I have to say a few things about the kids. They are so awesome. Lydia is very comfortable using the computer. I set up an account for her. It just takes her a single click to login to her account (the flower picture) and another single click on an icon to start playing games on pbskids.org. Now that she learned to use the printer, she prints out about 10 coloring pictures a day.

We're trying to teach Tyler not to hit, but he's determined. He thinks it's funny to hit Lydia. Then we hold his hands still as punishment and he gets very angry. But the moment we let go he takes a swing at one of us again and laughs about it.

BYU vs UW

2008-11-14T00:27:00.000-05:00

Larisa and I were lucky enough to still be in Redmond when BYU came to UW for a football game. It was the beginning of what looked like a tough schedule. BYU squeaked by and won by a point. They blocked the extra point attempt with only seconds left. What an exciting game to be at.

Looking back it turns out that the schedule was pretty weak after all. BYU is now 9-1, which is pretty good, but the teams like Washington and UCLA that they beat at the beginning of the season have turned out to be pretty awful. Washington still hasn't won a game, and BYU was one of the only close ones. But, a win is a win.

Land Before Time

2008-09-27T19:30:00.001-04:00

There is a reason why Lydia thinks that computers are for watching movies.

Lydia is watching "The Land Before Time," and I told her that I used to watch that when I was little like her. She said, "When you were going poopoo? When it was too hard for you?" I'm glad that she understands that I was once young.

Lydia's birthday

2008-09-18T19:52:00.000-04:00

This year we celebrated Lydia's birthday in Seattle. We've invited two families that we knew in the area and and had a great time. Lydia loves parties, especially if they follow Strawberry Shortcake story fortmat. So she requested for everyone to wear party hats, make mini-pizzas and friendship bracelets. The birthday girl had her cake, too, and of course, it was stawberry shortcake. The party was so much fun! Paul and I still can't believe that Lydia is 3 years old already.

Rowing

2008-09-01T00:30:00.000-04:00

This is the umpteenth episode of Cuff family summer adventures. We only have 3 weeks left here in Seattle and we are determined to see and experience all we can.

This weekend we went on a little row boat excursion. There is a place on lake Washington that has been enticing us with its beauty for a long time. So we rented a boat, rolled up our sleeves, and "sailed to sea" (to lake, to be exact). Our route took us under freeways and into little quiet lagoons. We loved having ducks for company and even saw some black turtles sunbathing on a log.

Lydia was such a good sport and helped Daddy row. Paul got pretty good at navigating our boat and I acted as a restraining jacket for Tyler. He got so wet from trying to crawl around our row boat. I guess we exhausted him that day, cause he fell asleep in my arms (something very unusual for this active kid) before we reached shore. All in all, we wished we could have stayed out longer, but kids are kids and they need their naps. However, we can surely say that this little adventure was one of our best this summer.

Trip to Victoria

2008-08-27T12:42:00.000-04:00

We had a great trip to Victoria last weekend. We took the fairy from Anacortes, which is an absolutely gorgeous trip. While we were there we saw all the stuff downtown, including the wax museum, and we enjoyed the Butchart Gardens. Those were magnificent. They even had a firework show that was spectacular.

Our hotel was across the street from the legislative building. We had our car, so we took several scenic drives. We also attended one of the Victoria wards.

Lydia was climbing on the base of some statues as we walked downtown and some Japanese tourists just had to take a picture with her in it rather than just a boring statue. They all took turns trying to get her to make peace signs with them. But something even more interesting happened every time Lydia found something to climb on---she started orating a speech. It was so funny to watch her give a soap-box speech from the steps of the legislative building, "Everyday we go poopoo."

I should mention that Tyler has been saying several words. He says "dada," "mama," and "this." But the word he says with the most urgency is "ball." He absolutely loves balls.

Tyler's Birthday

2008-08-01T03:23:00.000-04:00

Tyler is one years old! How did the time fly by so quickly? He's almost a big kid, but to us he's still our sweet little baby!

The celebration took place while we were in Detroit visiting Matthew, Summer and the kids. Tyler liked his cake. He used his hand to get a sample after which he just did a face plant. Watching him we realized that the use of hands or utensils while eating is highly overrated.

Also, we had to literally make Tyler open all his presents. He was not into wripping the wrapping, he just wanted to play with his new toys. For a birthday activity, we hung up a bunch of baloons from the garage ceiling and let the kids run through them, spraying them with silly string. They loved it. Then we went to Chucky Cheese's and that was a ton of fun also. Of course, and sadly, Tyler would not remember this celebration, but we will never forget it.

Lydia Swimming

2008-07-28T03:03:00.000-04:00

I wish a had a video that captured Lydia's first time in the pool by herself with only floaties on her arms. She was trilled and wanted to keep scooting around the pool with her little walking motion all night. We had tried using the floaties before, and she wasn't really thrilled. But I took her to the pool last night and within a couple of minutes I toughened her up. She finally trusted me enough to let go of her and let her bob up and down in the water. Then she said "woe!" about 50 times in a row, getting more and more excitement in her voice with each one.

Before long Lydia was having a blast in the pool but still wasn't comfortable to move her arms much or put her legs back to do some real kicking. As a consequence I had to wait 10 minutes when she insisted on swimming across the pool one last time before getting out. But she's doing real well. She can pull herself out at the edge of the pool. And I had a great time watching her face as she squeezed her lips together the whole time to make a water-tight seal since the floaties barely held her face out of the water.

Brief update

2008-07-28T01:28:00.000-04:00

Paul and I were just discussing Seattle weather. It's been rather cold here, for summer that is. I can only remember a hand full of days in the last month, since we've been in Seattle, that the temperature outside went above 80 degrees. People say that this year is unusual and I hope that's true.

Other than the weather we've been loving it here. Seeing all the lush greenery makes me feel at home. We've been downtown Seattle a couple of times for family outings. Last one was past Saturday. We visited the area adjacent to the Space needle, splashed in the nearby fountain, enjoyed a few rides, and stopped by the Children's museum. Too bad we forgot our camera. Some memories would just have to live on only in our hearts.

I have to say that we do miss California. There are days when I think of all the things I will do when I go back, specially on those days when it rains here. Lydia loves telling people where we are from and she says it proudly. We miss our friends and wonder what fun things we are missing out on this summer. Also, we are sad that some of our friends like White, Funks and Carter's are leaving our Stanford community, but we continuously think of them and remember the fun times we've had.

Paul is really busy working and trying to finish up some papers that he worked on last school year. I am back to exercising and painting which makes me very happy. Lydia is mastering the art of potty going and Tyler is starting to say a few words like "baa" for "ball" and "tis" for "this". Kids are getting cuter by the day, but they also keep us on our toes. All in all, life is good!

Moving and Traveling

2008-07-09T10:22:00.000-04:00

This past month was like a whirlwind. We spent some time in Portland with Paul's family, then moved to Seattle. After a week we were about to switch to another apartment when our plans have been canceled the day of the move and put off for another week. That weekend we had some family in town. A few days later we ALMOST moved again after which we decided to just forget about that whole idea and stay in our 2 bedroom apartment. A weekend trip to Portland followed all that moving commotion.

Now we are in Detroit for a week and a half visiting with Paul's brother and his family. We've had a fun 4th of July going to the ward pot luck and lighting our own fireworks. The next day we've spent on Lake Eerie, at the beach. The water was so warm, which is an upgrade for us since I never feel like getting in the freezing water in the bay area. Now, Paul is in Canada at a conference while I enjoy Summer's and Matthew's company. Lydia loves playing with her cousins Russle and Natalie. The play with trains, dress ups and Tyler. He is such a hit with those kids. Russle loves to run away and Tyler loves to chase him. Yesterday, our almost-one-year-old ended up in a kid's grocery cart and the older kids took terns pushing him around the house. It seemed like all had tremendous fun!

The house is in potty train mode and we had had much success. The girls go to the potty several times a day, persuaded by candy, of course. There are some struggles in that department, but when days like today happen ( Lydia was out on the town all day with us and have not had an accident once), I just forget about the bad and hope for the best in the future.

Summer and I have gone walking early in the mornings, took the kids to the library and shopping at the Mall, visited Greenfield Village ( which is one of the coolest places I've been to) and gone to Matthew's baseball game. This has proven to be a great vacations, even when I do wish that Paul could be here to enjoy it with us.

Sea-Tac vacation with Laura and Spencer

2008-06-22T20:44:00.000-04:00

Yesterday Laura and Spencer were over for the day. They've now moved on to the next stage of their vacation on Vancouver Island, but while they were here we had a full day of fun. We went first to the Museum of Glass in Tacoma and watched a team of 6 people spend 45 minutes to make a large, clear flask, only to crack it while they were removing it from the bar. So we got the full experience. It would have been boring if everything ended well. We enjoyed the experience and saw some great pieces of art in the Museum.

Then we went into Seattle to see Pike Place market and eat on the pier at Ivars (the take-out part). We didn't have time for the space needle, but we enjoyed walking around lazily. We also bought some raspberry pepper jelly and fancy cheeses to snack on in the evening.

Tyler

2008-06-22T20:24:00.000-04:00

Tyler walks very fast now. His transition was gradual. He was letting go of our hands and taking a few steps for about a week before he finally ventured around the room on his own. Two years ago when Grandma Galina visited, Lydia started all-out walking on her own the very day she left (July 4, 2006). For Tyler it was within about a week. What mean children. Grandma comes thousand of miles to visit, and they torment her by making her slouch her back to walk them around everywhere. So Tyler was up and walking during the week that the family was with Grandma and Grandpa in Oregon. I'll set the date as Friday the 13th, June, 2008. A late birthday present for me, and exactly one month behind Lydia's walking expeditions (by age).

Tyler is both smiley and cute, and whiny and resolute. People love to watch his bit smile and laughter, especially when they smile at him or tickle him. It's also hard to distract him when there is something he wants, and he doesn't calm down easily when he's upset. Holding him doesn't calm him down either, unless that's what he was complaining for.

I think Tyler will turn out to be more methodical and calculated than Lydia---maybe not so energetic but even more stubborn.

Lydia

2008-06-22T20:09:00.000-04:00

Yesterday Lydia's diaper was irritating her, and she finally got excited about wearing underwear again. That's progress.

I get a kick out of Lydia's ability to communicate. She was sitting on the toilet playing with the toilet paper and said to me, "we only need a little one." I was a little confused, although now I think she was talking about a piece of toilet paper. But I asked her, "a little what?" She got a little bit frustrated that the communication wasn't working and finally said, "little means really tiny," as she made a gesture by putting her fingers close together. How amazing. She could explain to me what 'little' means, which she thought I was confused about.

Lydia likes to point out to us things she can't do now but she can do when she's bigger, like saying that she'll cook well when she gets bigger, or that she'll paint or something. Today we watched some videos on Youtube of Shamu and his trainer doing stunts. Lydia asked if she could do that when she's bigger. So here she is at almost 3 years already knowing what she wants to do with her life. Maybe I should ask her for decision-making advise.

Laura and Spencer were here in Seattle visiting us yesterday. Lydia likes both of them very much. She also really enjoys spending time with Grandma and Grandpa (Oregon). The family spent a week there without me while I finished getting our apartment ready at Stanford and doing research. Mom also got Lydia a nice haircut that really looks good on her.

Football

2008-05-11T02:32:00.000-04:00

Larisa let me join the a semi-pro football team again this year. Two years ago I played for the Bay Tickets 49ers. Now I joined the California Warriors. I like this team a lot better and have made a lot of friends on the team. But it still had its rough periods. I joined the team late in the season, after the games had already started, because I wasn't willing to commit as much time to it as I did before. I play in the Golden Coast Football League, and our team is doing quite well.

Today I played almost the entire game (on offense), but I've had many games where I haven't played much at all. I was riding on a record of never having dropped a pass in my semi-pro carrier (totaling seven receptions). :) Then about a month ago I got my first touchdown, even though I got hit hard while catching it in the end-zone. But the following week I played terribly and dropped two passes among other things.

I tend to get down on myself for the mistakes I make. It's both good and bad for me.

Today I had another touchdown, only to have it taken from me because of a holding penalty. It was a replay of the John Beck pass to Johnny Harline at the end of the 2006 BYU-Utah game. We were on 4th and goal (7 year-line), with 2 minutes left in the game, and down by 8. I ran a post from the right side of the field, and our quarterback held onto it for a long time as he rolled right. At the last possible moment he chucked it across his body to me, waiting open on the left-hand side. His pass was short and almost knocked away by a defender, but I dove for it and came up with it. I would have been a hero if it weren't for the penalty. We ended up losing the game.

The most important thing to report is that I don't have anything to report in the way of injuries. That's what I get most worried about as I live out this fantasy. Although I did get hit pretty hard today by a teammate as I tackled someone on the kickoff.

Camping at Big Sur

2008-05-11T02:04:00.000-04:00

I was supposed to write about our overnight camping trip in Big Sur with the Porters in March. Better late than never.

There was a very nice looking beach, with water on both sides of a strip of sand that ended with large rocks standing up to the crashing waves. As beautiful as it was, it ended up being way too windy. We ate our lunch, and the kids played, but before too long they were crying and wanted to leave. Tyler didn't seem to care though. :)

Other than that, we did all of the usual fun camping stuff. We made smores, hiked among (and through) the tall Redwood trees, visited Pfieffer Falls, and drove home listening to "Where the Red Furn Grows" on our Garmin Nuvi GPS.

Tyler's escapes

2008-05-10T23:53:00.000-04:00

Tyler loves being mobile and escapes from us all the time. Favorite places are the stairs and our back patio. If the gate is not up and we are not paying close attention, Tyler usually makes it to the top of the first flight of stares before we catch him. He starts giggling when he sees us coming for him.

Also, once our little guy hears the sliding door open, he makes a beeline for it. When he manages to crawl out, Tyler looks for a piece of chalk. And that's how we usually find him-- leaning on Lydia's easel, lips colored by the chalk he's gnawing on.

I am a good cooker

2008-05-10T23:11:00.000-04:00

Lydia has taken up cooking lately. Some of her favorite things to do include mixing my spices in a bowl at the stove and looking through dessert recipe books. One particular book she really loves. Our little girl begs us to looks through the pictures of recipes and always asks "can we make this for my friends?". Each time we reassure her that we can, sometime later. So one day we decided to pick a dessert, go shopping for it and make it for family home evening. Lydia chose a fancy no-bake cheesecake with praline crust and Italian cream cheese. It took us a while to figure out how to caramelize sugar to make pralines, but overall it was a fun adventure. The cheesecake was more like an ice-cream cake. It was wonderful! But it seemed that we were more excited about it than Lydia. I don't think she quite comprehended what a creation that particular cheesecake was. We enjoyed it so much that we forgot to share it with Lydia's friends.

As to Lydia's cooking, she told us once "I am a good cooker".