Kindergarchy

If you have not heard of this term "kindergarchy", check it out! Even all of the comments are of interest to me. As usual, not every reader agrees with the article, but I did learn something from this article.
http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/families/article4232385.ece

Personally, I think the key is to strike a "balance" between unconditional love/lots of cuddle and discipline when needed. However, any parent knows that it's easy to say the word "balance", but it's probably impossible to achieve in practice!! As first-time parents, S and I are constantly learning from our family and friends as well as from Di-di. I sincerely believe that every child has his/her own personality and respond differently to criticism and discipline.

It may seem that Di-di is the CENTER of our life when you read our family blog, but it's not like that. This blog is mostly about his childhood mainly for 3 reasons:
1) S and I are not as cute as Di-di and our jobs are not that interesting (who wants to hear about my presentation on attach and pen rate for SWD support:),
2) to give updates to our family and friends who live in 3 countries (soon to be 4 countries) about how he is doing, and
3) most importantly so that Di-di will always have a record of his childhood in one place, even if I die unexpectedly (like in a car accident or during an earthquake.)

There are lots of other things that S and I do day-to-day besides serving our little master's needs and tracking his life...hahaha... I want to assure our families and friends that we will not make Di-di into a little Emperor so that he doesn't drive you crazy when we visit. If you ever catch us "cuddle" Di-di too much to the point that you feel that he can't take any stress or failure in life, PLEASE let us know right away!! We will not be offended and will thank you for being honest with us. Hey, I grew up in a period in Taiwan when parents begged our teachers to spank us regularly & I have the thick skin on my hands and butts to prove it! :)~

(BTW, Di-di LOVES the new Thomas shirt that Grandma and Grandpa got him!! When he wears the shirt, he constantly points at Thomas and say "Thomas" to anyone who looks at him.
Tonight, he insisted on wearing his Thomas again.
Grandpa and Grandma- Thanks, for this fabulous shirt!)


(We now take Di-di to KidsPark for a couple of hours on weekends when we run errands.)

Certificate of Citizenship

Finally, more than a year after submitting Di-di's COC application, today we received the notification from USICS that we will get his COC on July 11!! It took much longer than I had expected, because of a huge backlog. Supposedly, many people rushed to apply for their COCs the same time as we did before last July's fee increase.

Since Di-di came to the U.S. with an IR4 visa, he only received a "Green Card" when he entered U.S. which means that he could be deported back to Taiwan if he commit a crime (is it too early to worry about that?:) The quickest way to get his COC was to readopt him in CA, which we had always planned to do anyway so that he would have a "delayed" birth certificate from the state of CA. We figured that it would be a pain for him to try to track down his original birth certificate in Taiwan if he ever need a new copy in the future. In addition, with the readoption, we petitioned the court to officially change his name from "Chen-Yu" to "Shaun Paul".

If I had not gone through an international adoption myself, I couldn't have imagined the amount of paperwork required throughout the process (for both governments), even though Taiwan is supposedly a country that requires the least amount of paperwork compared to the other countries. Of course, I would have walked on water if that was what it took to bring Di-di home, BUT it is nice to finally finish the paperwork and not to worry about it any more. COC is absolutely the "final" piece of paperwork we need in regards to the adoption, so we are celebrating!! WOOHOOO!!!!

River Cats Game

We took Di-di to his first "real" baseball game on Tuesday, even though it's minor league baseball game!!

The company I work for has a suite that employees can use, so my team and families go to the River Cats game once a year. Since I am not into sports games of any kind, I usually go to the RC game for the food and fun.. :) Both Di-di and I had no clue what was going on or even which team RC was playing against this Tuesday, but I loved the fact that Di-di was having so much fun with everyone. The food was awesome again. This was one of the rare exceptions when I allowed Di-di to stay up past 7:30PM (hahaha... I know I am a sleep and nap time Nazi!) Di-di had so much fun that he was still on his baseball game high that he couldn't sleep before 9:00PM for the next 2 nights!







Aunite S even brought Di-di his own bat!



(Is this a baseball game or wrestling game?:)

Kinder Music Class

Wow...can't believe we have finished the 5-week Kinder Music class. Last Saturday, S went to Di-di's last class with us. Di-di loved it when daddy was there. He only wanted to sit in daddy's lap most of the time!
We are looking forward to the next class, Creatures at the Ocean, which starts in mid July.

Happy Father's Day!

Di-di and S met with Grandpa, Grandma and auntie Melissa to celebrate Father's day. I woke up with a sore throat and extreme fatigue on Sunday morning, so I was not able to join them. S told me that they had a great Father's Day:

1) Started with a surprisingly smooth one-hour drive from Sac to Napa without any tantrums!
2) Had a nice lunch at a golf course, then
3) catching up with each other while Di-di happily played with his toys, and
ended with 4) another surprisingly smooth drive home from Napa!
It turned out that the best Father's Day gift Di-di gave to Daddy was an almost tantrum-free day so that Daddy was not too stressed out!

The pictures that S took didn't come out good, but here's a good one of Grandpa, daddy and Di-di.

Di-Di is a Daddy's Boy

Even though I spend more time with Di-di than S on weekends, Di-di is totally a daddy's boy. As soon as Di-di hears the garage door opens, he runs to the kitchen door eagerly waiting for daddy to come in. He can't open the door yet, so he would just pound on the door excitedly, calling "ba-ba....ba-ba..." until S comes through the door.

I am a little jealous of S, but I can totally see why he loves his daddy so much: S is just such a warm and loving person and he hardly says "No" to Di-di. :) On the other hand, mommy is the enforcer who "tries" to enforce all kinds of rules and rarely gives in to Di-di's terrible-twos tantrums...hahaha. Yes... Di-di is not immune to this terrible-two syndrome, even though he was the most lay-back and easy going baby I have ever known! Nowadays, he says "NO" with a big attitude at least 20 times a day!! :) I should write more about this terrible-twos stage, because it will be so fun to look back when Di-di is a 30 year old man!

This video captures how much our Di-di missed his daddy one Saturday when Daddy' was out studying for his CFA exam. Ba-ba was only gone for 3 hours in this video!

One of the many many reasons why I am so in love with my baby

Di-di does not like to snuggle, but he did make an effort to snuggle with mommy in one morning for as long as he could bare... (like 10 seconds each time:).

Dance

Here's a sample of Di-di's dance moves. Because mommy and daddy cheer him on most of the time, our poor little guy thinks that he is the greatest dancer in the world and dances anytime he hears music. Hope he doesn't hate us when his girl friend laughs at his "moves." :)