Watch out Red Lobster!

This past summer we took a short and sweet trip up to Tahoe to close out our summer.  We met Nginngin and Yehyeh and Auntie Suzie and Uncle Bentley Au up there as well.  Although it was a bit smoky because of the fires, we managed to get out to the beach for one day and Harrison caught a cray fish/crawdad/mini lobster in the crayfish trap with our left over fried chicken bones.  The cray fish was a tiny dude but Harrison asked to bring it home and eat it.  After Yehyeh\"s extravagant steaks for dinner, he boiled Harrison\"s one-clawed cray fish, topped it with some garlic butter, and even plated it with a little flair! I peeled it for Harrison and he got to eat all of the one-bite of meat that tiny tail held.  Harrison gave it a 10/10 and seemed pretty happy.  Red Lobster could never compete with us!!

2021 Update - Reviving this blog!

Caroline here!  I have decided to try to revive this blog.  Katherine and I just started our Junior year at Hillsdale High but I know we only have about 2 years left before we leave for college so I want to save some memories.  That said, I don\"t know if I\"ll be able to match Dad\"s wit and humorous posts from when we were young.  Wish me luck ;)  Here's a picture from a recent-ish trip to the zoo with the whole family and a simply irresistible photo-op with the gorilla.

"Fight Bad Guy!" and Fashion 101

Harrison is not the first 3 year-old to discover the joy of playing "Good Guy v. Bad Guy".  The majority of his time is spent playing "Good Guy, Bad Guy" and running around with pretend swords and guns, while throwing various kung-fu moves and making attacking noises.

But over the past two weeks, he's taken his fight versus the good and evil into the fashion world.  Harrison will now only wear selected shirts that, as he describes them, "fights bad guys."

That means his Mickey Mouse shirts are out.  (Who knew?  I thought Mickey would fight bad guys.)

Plain color shirts?  Forget it.

In fact, there are currently only three shirts in his drawer that "fight bad buys."  They are:  A Los Angeles Kings t-shirt with a cartoon hockey player on it, a power rangers shirt ( a hand-me down from the thrift shop), and this one:

As you can see, Harrison takes his bad guy fighting seriously, and he looks great doing it!

Click on any photo for a larger view.

Little People

Harrison loves to play with Little People.  What kid doesn't?  

He inherited quite an impressive set from his sisters, but he really likes to play with one figure in particular, who he calls his "Wheew, Wheew!"  That's his sound of a fire engine, and of course, his favorite figure is the firefighter: 

Of course, you can't have a hero without a villian.  And of the dozens of Little People figures that he has in the collection, this is who Harrison chose to be the "Bad Guy":  

I mean, it makes sense, right?  Clowns are scary!   

Happy?

Harrison continues to learn works at an incredible clip.  One of his favorite words right now is "happy."

Watching a TV show with us, he will announce, "I happy!"  

Eating dinner, "I happy!"

Playing a game with his sisters, "I happy?"

Harrison even uses the word to check in on our state of mind:  "Daddy happy?"  "Day-Day happy?"

("Day-Day" is the Chinese word for "sister," which is what he calls both Katherine and Caroline. 

With Harrison around, we sure are one "Happy" familly!  

Review of 2015

  It can't really be the end of 2015!!  Although it's going to be a new year I really can't believe 2015 is over.  We did a lot this past year. 

         In March, the girls did their school play of the Gold Rush. The play was called Gold Dust or Bust!!

              This spring break we went to Orlando, Florida.  Nginngin and Yehyeh came with us although Nginngin had just gotten back from a ten day trip in Cuba the day before, so she was tired a lot.  Caroline and Katherine got to experience the wizarding world of Harry Potter, Universal studios down in Orlando, and the famous Walt Disney World!!  

                In July, Harrison ( now three years old ) started preschool at our the girls' old preschool with Ms. Grace.  Harrison comes home daily with many stories about bad guys, good guys, and other things about pewpewing!! 

          We also went to San Clemente for the Lim family vacation. Daddy and Caroling went on a half day fishing boat and Yehyeh caught a yellow tail! Caroline caught a good sized bonita, Daddy caught a bonita as well, and Mommy, Harrison, and Katherine stayed home due to sea sickness!! We went to the beach or the pool almost every day. We were also lucky enough to get a  trip to lego land while we were down there.

               Caroline also joined AYSO ( American Youth Soccer Organization ), for the first time and her team made it very far!! Her team was undefeated the entire regular season in San Mateo and they won the championship.  They then went to play cities nearbye like Foster City, Redwood City, and Belmont. The made it through that tournament undefeated as well! They won the championship again!! Finally, they went on to play places farther away. Fortunately, the tournament was hosted right there in Foster city, the neighboring city of San Mateo.  Unfortunately, they tied against San Bruno then lost against South Lake Tahoe in the Semi-finals.  Still, Caroline's team enjoyed going on to many tournaments.  Caroline also got lucky and got invited to the winter select team.  Out of 26 teams of girls in San Mateo only about 10 make it to the winter select team.  You must get invited then you have to try out. Each team was about 9 girls.  Caroline was very lucky because it was, again, her first year. 

              Monkeyson remained being loved by Caroline, and he also had a very good year.  He traveled every where with Caroline.  He also loved Caroline just as much as Caroline loved him!!

                Katherine remained doing swim team and advanced to silver shortly after Caroline and our friend China.  

                 Katherine and Caroline also started fifth grade wich meant that they started doing instruments in school. Katherine is one of the two girls that chose trumpet as their instrument.  Caroline chose to join a couple of other friends in choir. 

                  Mommy had a busy time of just taking care of all the kids.  

                  Daddy remains busy with his city counsil and as of last year he was vice mayor.  

                   Mommy and Daddy remain with their jobs as pharmacist and prosecuter.

                   Within the last month we've been having rain!! Finally!! Lots of snow up in Tahoe was also accounted for.  If this keeps up all winter we should make quite and impact on this long lasting and severe drought. We'll keep our fingers crossed!!

                   This year the new Star Wars #7 : The Force Awakens, came out Daddy, Caroline, and Katherine went to go see it in 3D.  They got cool BB8 glasses as souviniers too. 

                   Also last night we had our big New Years Eve party.  It was lots of fun especially when Caroline hooked up the wii!!   Katherine had some of our friends, Anika and Andi, over and Caroline had some of her soccer friends, Athena and Maddie, over for the big celebration!! 

              Overall it's been a great 2015 for the Lim family.  

               Finally, like I said it's been a very quick 2015 for us... Quick but busy!! Every body is still in perfect health and everybody is still on there toes!! 

               Luckily this coming 2016 is going to be year of the monkey so this should mean luck!!:) 

Mickey Backpack for the 3rd Child

One of Harrison's favorite items in his life right now is his "Mickey backpack."  He takes it EVERYWHERE.  To the library, to preschool, on trips.  He fills it with his favorite books, stuffed animals, and assorted toys.

Here's a photo of the "Mickey backpack":  

Notice anything unusual about Mickey? 

Yep.  It's not Mickey.  It's Minnie Mouse.  

Quite obviously Minnie Mouse.  

This is what I like to call "3rd Child Immagination."  

You see, like all good 3rd children, Harrison gets a lot of hand-me-downs.  

(Okay, just about everything he gets is a hand-me-down.) 

And in this case, Harrison was invited to pick a backpack out of a box containing backpacks previously used by his sisters. 

He immediately gravitated to this backpack.  But from day one, he called it his "Mickey backpack."  Even though he watches "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse" and clearly knows the difference between Mickey and Minnie, he insists on calling this his "Mickey backpack!"  

That is "3rd Child Immagination" hard at work.  "Of course we bought this Mickey backpack just for you, kid!"  Dream on 3rd child, dream on!