Lunch time exercise // Rotary playground // Tree work // Kai Jujitsu // Visit to the ER

 Not too much going on this week..

Since the beginning of the year, with the Omicron spike, I haven't been going to the gym much and trying to exercise at home is always very difficult.  Hopefully as the weather gets nicer, I can start to bike to the clinic again but for now I'm trying to incorporate exercise into each clinic day by doing push-ups, sit-ups and squats.  It's not perfect but does get me moving in a day when I'm mostly at the desk.  The hardest part is getting going at the beginning of lunch hour when I'm hungry but I'm trying to allay that by eating a snack at 11am.  Let's see how long I can keep it up!

On the yoga mat on the office floor

I was away at work this past Saturday so Amy took the kids out to the Rotary playground.  We haven't been there for a long time (it was also closed for much of the last 2 years) but it was a lot of fun for them.  I remember we would always go there, then go to Petsmart to look at the animals, go to Sweet Tomatoes  (we miss you, unlimited buffets!) to eat and then Trader Joe's for groceries and lollipops.  It was a whole day thing :)

Strike a pose, kids!

They loved the merry go round

There was a crazy wind one day this past week and a number of things got blown around our yard.  One of the trees in our front yard, which was already mostly dead, had a big branch break off. It didn't fall but is suspended in the branches and quite hazard.  Yesterday, our helpful neighbors showed up and we tried to push it down to no avail.  While that probably means it's stuck up there for good, we are hiring a tree service to take down the whole tree.

This will make quite a story later
when Kegan shows up in the ER :D

Randomly, Sunny and Pam got puffy jackets for all the kids and also for the grandparents.  So nice!

Bunch of Puffins!

Kai also started back into Jujitsu this week.  He had to be convinced to go to Lute but Amy says that when he got there he quite enjoyed it.  I'm glad and hopefully, it'll help him with discipline as well as self control as he continues to get bigger.

Back to rollin'

Lastly, Amy's dad fell yesterday.  While Amy's mom was out, he apparently thought it was a good idea to stand up on a toolbox and try to replace the furnace filter.  Amy rushed over and it turned out he was ok but she took him to the ER at Washington Hospital.  I must say it sounds like they are more backed up than we are and it took from 7pm when they arrived to 1am before he got a head CT, stitched up and discharged.  Luckily, everything is ok.  It's nice that we live so close to Amy's parents and can help them out.

Gotta get a shot for the 'gram 

Til next time, everyone!

Jad home for the week / Neighborhood Campfire / Switch update / ShawUdom day / Mom's condition

I think we're in our third school week of the new year.  Kai and Sora are doing well though we are getting emails everyday about some positive COVID case on campus.  Agape closed for a week because of a positive case so Jad was home all of last week.  We're lucky that one of us is always home so it didn't disrupt our routine too much but it was tiring to have him home all day.  As noted last week, Jad loved it though.  I think he's always had Kai and Sora around and rarely gets to be home or with us without them so this was a big treat for him.  We also tried to take advantage and take him out to a few things that Kai and Sora used to get to do when they were younger and we had more bandwidth for like Emma Prusch Farm and the playground.

Feeding some chickens at Emma Prusch.  He
had a blast :)

At the library playground

While there, they saw Sora and Wally at Noble.
They look like they are in jail :)

After two weeks, we were itching to get back together with our neighbors so we did an outdoor dinner at our house.  It was really nice to see everyone again and we were kind of good about wearing masks some of the time.  

RCC campout complete with bonfire!

Roasting marshmallows on an open fire..

Eventually the kids did make it into our house .. it's nice
to have things more normal again

The Nintendo Switch has been mostly successful.  It has given us a bit more leverage especially for the Kai and Sora as timeouts are less useful for them.  They are pretty happy playing Smash Bros for now, but we'll probably have to get more games soon.  It's also nice that it's so easily portable..

Getting Gung Gung and Uncle David into
the brawl too!

We had 3 days off this past weekend for MLK birthday and we hung out with the Shaws.  Ansel brought the kids and we piled into the minivan for a day trip to Santa Cruz.

There are some advantages to the minivan, though
it was still a tight squeeze with all the car seats

Our first stop was the Mystery Spot!  We had always heard of it and Amy had been as a teenager but it was pretty cool.  Smaller than I thought, more of just a shack rather than a whole house, but it was really cool to see all the weird gravity distortions with us standing sideways, balls rolling and water flowing uphill.  Apparently, it's called a Gravity Hill and they are combination of optical illusions to fool your brain.  Pretty cool and the kids had a blast.

Looking good, Kai.. I like how Jad is trying 
to find his footing in the background too

Sideways pull-up

Our funny guy guide Henry telling jokes
Jungle Cruise style

Free bumper stickers for everyone!

Afterwards, we went for a quick hike in the mountains.  The kids are much faster than I am already and I'm very proud of them.  Gotta get my own cardiovascular health up.  I am trying to incorporate more exercises into my clinic days.  That's a couple of days a week of some exercise at least.

Wandering around the mountains

Our third stop was the beach.  At first we weren't sure if we had the energy but Amy decided to push for it and it was great!  We went to Natural Bridges in Santa Cruz and it was a warm day.  The kids had a great time running around and digging up sand crabs.  

Just another winter day in California

Warmer than we thought it would be

We finished up the day with dinner back at the Shaw Shack where Yukari could join us.  All in all, an excellent day with friends, new experiences, kids hanging out, physical activity and good catching up!

Lastly, Joe made it to Chiang-Mai finally after a long flight and stopping in Bangkok for COVID testing.  My mom isn't doing well.  Her alzheimer's is progressing and she's having trouble walking and swallowing now, mostly just eating soft foods.  It will likely slowly get worse from here so we're going to try to go visit her in April.  There are some sad feelings but they are compartmentalized from the day to day.  What can we do?  It's life.

She's happy here with Joe

Pandemic goes on.. and on.. :(

 Since last week, things have just gone down hill with the pandemic.  Cases are exploding and the hospital is super busy.  Our ER is overflowing and the census hasn't gone below 50 in at least 2 weeks (keep in mind we only have 45 beds in the ER.)  We're doing the best we can and have chosen to keep away from Amy's parents, larger gatherings like church as well as our neighbors.  Tam got COVID and their household is locked down.  We're feeling the isolation..  We did have a zoom lunch with the entire Huang family this weekend.  Matt and Nicole both got COVID and are doing well now but Nicole did lose her sense of smell (hopefully, it comes back soon).  David was sick but it wasn't COVID.  Amy's parents are hanging tight.

That spike is ugly..

It was hard decision whether to send the kids to school or not but, in the end, we decided to do it.  One, I think an asymptomatic person wearing a mask likely has a very low viral load and isn't at high risk of spreading COVID and two, I'd go crazy with them at home :)   Kai and Sora have both done well at school though Sora's friend Caleb tested asymptomatic positive.  Jad has been fine too but someone at his school got COVID so Agape is shut down for the week.  Jad is really enjoying his time at home with us and I think it'll be hard for him to go back to school next week.  

I thought we were done with distance learning :(

Agape sent an activity packet for Jad

Amy has been cooking more because we have been stuck at home and we also want to introduce more Asian tastes to their palettes.  

Amy made yakisoba

Eggs and leeks, Char Siu and Choi Sum (?)

I made friend rice and basil chicken but didn't capture that on camera :)

We have also been doing more indoor activities, like playing board games and pretend sword and nerf gun battles.  

A bit late on the gingerbread houses..

but the kids weren't complaining.

Jad even did much of his own this year.

Sora is still doing piano and Kai also gets to go over and play with Brandon at the same time.  Brandon is such a nice kid and hopefully, he'll be a good influence on Kai.

They had fun running around the trampoline too..
I joined but was quickly exhausted :)

That's about it actually for this week.  Joe is going to Thailand to visit my parents because my mom's condition seems to be deteriorating rapidly.  My dad says that she can't walk well any more and sometimes chokes on food (both of which are signs of later stage Alzheimer's.)  The COVID situation there isn't helping either as she's not able to see people or exercise like she used to.  Hopefully, Joe can give us a full assessment and plan.  I'm hoping to go in April so I can see them too.

Til next time, everyone!

Happy New Year! / Switch time / Amy 1000 / Playdate with Micah / LSCC Snow trip

 Happy New Year!  Here's to hoping 2022 is better than 2021 and we make our way out of the pandemic.  

One of the big things that happened last week was that the Nintendo Switch arrived.  Amy and I had decided that they were old enough to get it finally after many years of holding off and them watching and playing on friends' consoles.  We've tried to be moderate in their screen and video game time and I think we've not been too extreme in either direction.  I actually ordered it from Target back at the end of Nov and went to pick it up to stash in our closet but then, about a week before Xmas, the OLED switch became available on Amazon.  After some deliberation, I decided to return the regular one and order the OLED.  The only catch was that it wasn't going to arrive until Tuesday the 28th.  The kids were super excited, especially Kai who is our gamer, and were very patient.  Then on Monday night, we got a notice that it would be delayed (oh man!)  Still the kids were patient but we were worried it wouldn't get to us before we went on our Tahoe trip on Thursday the 30th.  Luckily, it finally arrived on Wednesday evening :)  The kids loved it, of course, even if they only have one game so far..

When we were notified, Kai went out to 
the street to wait for the delivery..

The joy on his face

First play of Super Smash Brothers!!

On the opposite end of the activity spectrum, Amy also completed her goal of running 1000 miles in 2021.  She was really pushing it to the end but she did it!  She always talks it down but what a  great accomplishment .. great work, love!

The last run to 1000!

Kai also had a playdate with Micah.  We're so glad that they still enjoy time together.  Micah is such a cute and innocent kid :)

They got to play on the Xbox because the
switch had not arrived yet

While I worked for much of the week, Amy packed and borrowed snow clothes (and boots, etc.) so we could pack for our LSCC Snow Trip.  With the outbreak of the COVID omicron variant, we were a bit unsure about the trip and there had been heavy snow the week before, but this had been in the plans for many months and we decided that we would still go and just pray/keep fingers crossed for good weather and health.

Someone showed me this picture before we left and
we almost cancelled

But actually it turned out not to be too bad.  The storms stopped on Tuesday and roads were cleared by Wednesday evening.  We had a very smooth drive and didn't even need chains.  It was clear the days we were there until we drove back on Sunday, again without problems, and started snowing again this week.  Luck or divine intervention? :)

There was still an impressive amount of snow

The snow was all powder, having just fallen the week before, and very soft.  It was very thick in places and made it hard to walk around.  I think if we were big ski/snowboarders it would have been great but it actually made it harder to play in the snow because Jad couldn't even walk around without sinking and snow kept getting into our boots.  

Kai and Liam throwing snowballs

All three bundled up

Selfie!

The other problem were the other people who were there.  Usually we have so many families going on the snow retreat that our church takes up the entire building but this year we had less people so there was enough room for another church to be there as well.  Unfortunately, they were not as good about masking, broke several of the facility rules, often walked through our area and even took some of our food.  If it wasn't pandemic time, it wouldn't have been a big deal but it made us weary of the common room and cafeteria and I hope that it didn't contribute to anyone getting ill.

We spent a lot of time with the Shaws

Sora tried to go ice skating but the rink was sold out.  The kids ended up mostly running around with each other from room to room, playing nerf guns or on various screens.  We did go sledding one day which was fun but Vivian (Drew's 3rd) did a header into my upper back which I'm still recovering from.  Luckily, she was fine.

Jad and I on the sled before heading down

It was very pretty with all the snow covered 
trees and icicles

Jad was so exhausted after 3 days of nonstop
fun that he passed out during dinner on the last day

We made it home safe and sound and no one has been sick yet.  We'll keep fingers crossed and prayers for this week as the kids return to school.  There was a debate about whether to keep the kids at home (the Connicks are keeping theirs out for the week) but we decided as long as they are asymptomatic and keep their masks on, that we would send ours.  Hard, doesn't seem like a right decision, just more how comfortable each person feels.  Darn pandemic.. Hopefully, things improve this year.

Sunset over the lake