Gingerbread village

Instead of making one big family gingerbread house, we went with the gingerbread village. Although the houses were smaller, everyone could have their own to decorate. The two boys thoroughly enjoyed putting their own style on their house. Tyson on the other hand was more interested in eating the candy than decorating his house. No surprise there.

Christmas lights

The other night, the boys "helped" me put Christmas lights outside. They were more interested in playing with the lights and running around than actually putting the lights on. Kids will be kids. But once they come to age, I'm making them do it.

My wife's birthday

Happy birthday Reed

My other godson/nephew Reed just turned two recently and he had a fire fighter themed party with what else, an actual fire truck. We got to go for a ride on the fire truck and the friendly fire fighter educated the kiddos on various things. I didn't stay for the whole show because it was hot. It's December and I'm sweating outside! Personally for me, the best part of the party was the chicken banh mi. It's the best I've ever had and thanks to Julie, I will be checking out Nguyen Ngo pretty soon. Maybe tomorrow.

Thanksgiving weekend

Once Halloween came, time went exponentially fast. And it will probably remain that way through the new year. The boys actually had the whole week off for the Thanksgiving break but mine began Wednesday afternoon. Here's a quick recap.

How early is too early?

When is the appropriate time to put up a Christmas tree? I've grown up to believe that the earliest one should put up a tree was the day after Thanksgiving.  This was always the standard... or so I thought. But in recent years, I've noticed Christmas decor appearing earlier and earlier. Christmas music is already playing 24/7 on one radio station and it's not even Thanksgiving yet. But I don't care. Why not put a tree up early? The earlier it's up, the longer you can enjoy it. Besides, Christmas is my favorite time of year.

Date night #2

Last Saturday we had date night #2 (since the awesome arrival of Tyson). These nights are rare so when we do have it, I try to make the most of it. I love my kids very much but for those people without kids... don't take your kid-free life for granted. Go out to eat at all the fancy restaurants. Go travel the world. Go crazy and stay up past 10 pm. Okay, that should be the last time I mention that.

Tour de Donut (bike race)

Last Sunday we did the Tour de Donut bike race. It's a 28 mile course that includes two rest stops... to eat donuts. Each donut consumed takes 5 minutes off of your race time so it's possible to finish with a negative time. But it's also possible to gain weight from a race. And it wasn't just any donuts, they were Shipley's! I thought I could easily eat a dozen donuts. To eat my favorite donuts, how hard can it be? Stupid me, it was very hard.

Avengers assemble!

Our spooky house

Halloween is quickly approaching (two more days) and last weekend we finally got around to decorating the house. Well, we did a little bit here and there in the prior weeks but we're finally done... I think. There's still a hay bale in the hallway but Tyson uses it to sit on when putting on his shoes. It will probably remain there after Halloween.

Annual pumpkin patch visit

New Order & Red River Rivalry (Dallas, TX)

Last weekend was memorable... but not the way I would've liked to remember it. It all started in July when I came across a random article that said "New Order to Tour North America for the First Time in Seven Years". New Order was one of my favorite groups when growing up and I've never seen them before. I must go! Coincidentally, it was the same weekend as the Red River Rivalry. We'll be without kids and this opportunity won't ever present itself again so yes, I must go to that too!

Tough weekend (Austin, TX)

This past weekend we headed up to Austin to run the Tough Mudder. After doing a couple 5k mud runs, this was naturally the next step. Tough Mudder is a 12-mile course that included 22 obstacles, ranging from submersion in ice water to getting electrocuted. This was no joke.

Jacob rides a bike!

Superheroes need a break too

Happy Family Day - A Day to Eat Dinner with Your Children

Today is Family Day - A Day to Eat Dinner with Your Children which falls on the fourth Monday of September. I bet you didn't know that. Neither did I but I just learned of it this morning as I was reading my paper (smart phone) in the morning. The sad reality is the fact that this "special day" even exist. Apparently parents don't eat dinner with their kids enough, which led to the creation of this day. Everyday should be Family Day - A Day to Eat Dinner with Your Children!

Bye baby Ty. Hello toddler Ty.

A good weekend

I didn't do anything special or extravagant this past weekend but it was a good one. At this point in my life, if I can get multiple things crossed off of my long list of to-do's, then that's considered a good weekend. But if we have time to clean the house AND go out... that's the ultimate.

Labor(ious) Day weekend

This past holiday weekend was meant to be free of work, to just relax and do nothing, but unfortunately that did not happen. Thursday evening baby Ty spiked a fever. No big deal. Then all day Friday he was still feverish. I loaded him up with Tylenol and Advil and saw little relief. Saturday the fever still raged (102-104F) so it was time to see the doctor. His lungs were clear, no ear infection, throat swab was negative and he had no other symptoms. What could it be? By Sunday afternoon his temperature had finally come down and he was back to his joyful self so at least the weekend wasn't totally ruined.

Back to school

Good music

More often than not, whenever I turn on the radio I'll hear Rihanna, Katy Perry, Pitbull or some other overplayed song. And I like Adam Levine but if I ever hear "I'm at a paaaayphone..." I immediately change the station. For the majority of the time, I just leave it on ESPN Radio (97.5 FM). But that  can get irritating too. I can only listen to so much of Penn State and Sandusky. So then I go to my backup, my "mix-tapes" (mp3's on CD).

Tyson will grow up to be a...

Basketball playing, scholarly physician. Well that's according to the items he chose. When Jacob turned one we placed random items in front of him and depending on which one he picked, it would predict his future. We heard about this somewhere and didn't know how to "officially" do one of these future predictor things and just winged it. As for Andrew, we totally forgot about. Now that Tyson is one, my mom nagged me about it and if it wasn't for her, I'd probably forget again. I decided to research it and see what items to put out and how to interpret them. Apparently this is part of Korean celebrations when a child turns one called toljabee.

Tyson's first birthday!

Baby Ty is officially one-year-old. Can you believe it's already been a year? This whole week has been all about birthdays. First it was my birthday, then it was Ty's birthday preparations, then it was the actual day of his birthday, and then it was his party. Non-stop birthday craziness.

It's my birthday?

As Johnny Tran would say, "Yes, indeed." My birthday ceased to exist once Tyson was born, which is two days after mine. The first days of August would be spent getting ready for Tyson's birthday party and my birthday would be pushed aside... or so I thought. My family proved me wrong and made it a special day.

Chick-fil-A sandwich #2

Say "Cheeeeeese!"

"Say cheese" is the common phrase you hear adults blurt out to kids in order to get them to smile at the camera, or at the very least to look in that direction. Tyson, being so accustomed to hearing that phrase, will automatically give you a big smile when you say "cheese", regardless of whether there's a camera or not. It's quite Pavlovian. I wonder at times if he could even control himself, i.e. to not smile if he heard the word "cheese". Just to be on the safe side, I tell the two older boys not to overdo it because knowing them, they would never stop making him smile.

This week in pictures

Andrew gets a (much needed) haircut

Cruisin' & drinkin'

One more month until he turns one! Oh how time flies. I must soak up all of his baby-ness before it's too late. Sigh. All of our kids were different in someway when they were babies but when compared to Tyson, he is the odd-ball out.

Happy birthday to my dad

This weekend my dad turned... hmmm I'm not too sure actually. He has a real birth date and then he has a not-so-real one. Apparently his parents decided to change his birth year, making him younger, all to avoid being enlisted in the Vietnam military. (It didn't work since he ended up in the military anyways.)  I think that's the story or something like that. I'm sure something was lost in translation with my poor Vietnamese communication skills. But the bottom line is, he's old.

I'm no longer 21

Slowly but surely, I'm getting older and my body is just not the same as it was ten years ago. Duh right? And yes I know, I'm still "young" but I only hear that from older people. This past weekend definitely showed my true age. (The picture on the left is of one of my newly sprouted grey hairs.)

Fourth of July

The Fourth of July landed on the fourth day of the week, also known as the worst day for any holiday. It's in the middle of the freakin' week! Are you supposed to take Tuesday off or Thursday? Or take Thursday and Friday off and have a super extended weekend? For me, it was just one random day off. Nothing special. And with that, we really didn't do anything special for the Fourth.

Tyson goes out to eat a lot

Or maybe Lynn and I go out to eat a lot. But when compared with the other two boys when they were babies, we never/rarely went out to eat. Jacob was crazy difficult. He would not last long before crying to get out of his seat. A typical night out would consist of Lynn sacrificing herself to hold a fussy baby Jacob as I would inhale my food so that I could relieve her. If I'm paying $10-20 for my food, I want to savor it and not eat as if I'm in a contest with Kobayashi. With Andrew, he wasn't a difficult baby but Jacob was still young and hard to manage. Now that the two boys are older and self-sufficient, we tend to go out to eat more often since Tyson is the calmest baby in the world in regards to eating out.

Hot damn

Summer is in full swing and this heat is killer. Have you ever heard of people getting the winter blues, well I get the summer blues. Actually, the emotion I feel is more hatred than sadness. The unbearable heat makes me grumpy. I get hot easily. I sweat. I feel sticky and dirty. I need a shower. But it's only noon. Dammit.

Draw something... stoopid

So the other day while we were all at the dinner table, I had my phone out and was playing Draw Something. I was playing with my cousin Jon and it was my turn to draw. Jacob read all three of my word choices and one of them caught his intention. (We'll get to that word later.) Of that one word, he said it was super easy and that he wanted to draw it. Easy is a relative term my son.

My Father's Day

Usually for any kind of holiday (Thanksgiving, Christmas), we spread it out. Even for Mother's Day we did something on Saturday and Sunday but not for Father's Day... we crammed it in all on one day. Why? Because Saturday was spent at a neighbor's kid's birthday party in the afternoon and eating a cheap $3 pizza buffet at night. Note: A buffet that cheap and at that location (Missouri City) will attract a clientele I would rather avoid.

Paleontology Hall

The Houston Museum of Natural Science recently opened the new Paleontology Hall a couple of weeks ago and since the boys are such dinosaur fanatics, we had to go.

My little hillbilly

Tyson crawls?

Jacob graduates kindergarten

Another year, another graduation. This should be the last time Jacob dons a cap and gown, well until his high school graduation. I can't be doing this every year. But I guess kindergarten is kind of a big deal. He's so big now...

Wedding, water and weigh-out

This past Memorial Day weekend was non-stop action. It was fun but very exhausting. I think I have finally recovered and it's Wednesday... and I just woke up from a nap... and I'm drinking coffee. So I'm good, for now.

Oh snap!

Take me out to the ball game

Take me out with the crowd. Buy me some peanuts and well, you know the rest. I wanted to take the boys to at least one Astros game this season and with the summer heat creeping upon us, the sooner the better. The Rangers were in town this weekend so this was the perfect time to go. Because really, who would want to go watch the Pirates or Brewers? Not me.

My favorite distraction

Mother's Day Weekend

Happy Mother's Weekend to the mother of my children and to my mom. Why a weekend? Because they deserve more than just a day. Awwwww. Yes, I know. Just remember that comment when Father's Day rolls around.

Jacob makes me look foolish (again)

My boys ♥ boy bands

Baby Ty is one goofy, fun baby. Slowly he's starting to reveal his personality. He is adventurous, has a contagious laugh and loves to dance. That sounds like a personal ad. Here's a video of him in action, bopping to The Wanted's Glad You Came. My favorite moment was at the 29 second mark but it's quite obvious as you can hear my girly-like laugh. Damn I hate the way I sound.

Who (or what) am I?

I eat, sometimes

It's funny how when something is restricted or off-limits, I want it that much more. In this case, I'm talking about my diet. Last week (or was it two weeks ago) I decided to be serious again about my diet and start counting calories so that I can calculate my caloric deficient (or surplus). So the beginning of what was supposed to be my hardcore diet was actually the start of my bad eating habits. Tell me I can't have something and I will continue to think about it until I get it. But tell me I can eat as many donuts as I want and I will probably stop at one two. So a new month starts tomorrow and maybe I'll restart this diet. Maybe. We'll see. Bleh.

Tyson knows what he wants...

This week in pictures

It's been insanely busy but my goal is to post something, anything at least once a week. So here's what happened this past week as seen through my eyes (and a crappy cell phone camera). I went a little Instagram crazy.

Flu during springtime?

This whole week has been yuck. It all began Tuesday when my body ached for no good reason and I found myself tiring easily. I left work early that day and took a long nap. I woke up feeling fine so I thought maybe it was due to a lack of sleep. The next day I went tried to run but my body was not having it. My whole torso cramped up and shut down. My body was screaming, "Stop running you idiot!" So I obeyed. The next day I developed a low grade fever. My throat started to hurt. I got goosebumps while taking a hot shower and had crazy chills at night. I was wearing my hoodie and wrapped up in a down comforter but I could not stop shivering. Uh oh. But this can't be the flu. It's not that bad. I wasn't coughing and didn't have any sinus related symptoms. And it's April... flu season is over. But dammit, those symptoms lasted longer than a typical cold. Friday came and I had yet to recover so I took that day off to rest. Now it's Sunday and I think I'm okay. I'm tired but then again, I'm always tired at this time of day.

Easter egg hunt

TGIGF

Thank Goodness It's Good Friday. This is the last day of the year to abstain from meat and normally this is not an issue for me but last week, work forced me to the middle of nowhere (San Augustine, TX) and I was ill prepared. My plan was to drive around and stop by any fast food place to get their designated fish sandwich, also known as the Lent special. I was even willing to settle for the dreaded Filet-O-Fish but there was no McDonald's around. I used the Yelp app from my phone and the closest one was in another city, some 20 miles away. Now what?

More running in the mud

Last weekend we ran the Mudder Dash Mighty Mud Dash. The sudden name change was probably due to a conflict with the bigger, more popular Tough Mudder (which we will eventually do too). Now that I'm more fit and in shape, I would like to do a 10k race, then a half-marathon and God willing, a full marathon. I can't imagine myself doing a marathon but then again, I never thought I could run a 5k without stopping. Now that's child's play.