December Solo at church and Solo at Funeral
In the early part of December I was asked to sing a solo at church for Sacrament meeting. It was a much better turn out than my last solo where I played the piano and sang at the same time. About a week after my solo I got an email asking if I could sing at a funeral of a young man who used to live in the ward. The family asked me to sing "Somewhere over the rainbow". The room was full of tears after I sing and I almost choked up but made it through the whole song. The family was very grateful and even though it was sad I'm thankful God blessed me with a voice so I could help comfort a family through their trial. That was the start of my holidays. Then came the photography and staging for the ward Christmas party. They sure know how to make me busy and these aren't even related to my calling.
Debrie's Winterfest
Debrie had a winterfest at her gymnastics class. We all got there and were very excited to watch her. She is very brave in her class and does very well. There are 5 kids in her class and she is very comfortable with that number. Unfortunately she did not anticipate that all the classes her age would be combined and there were more kids and more people watching than normal class so she got very shy. All she wanted to do was cling on to me. I got special permission to be with her but that didn't help. She did a few moves but was very shy. She definitely prefers smaller groups.
Reena missing school due to Vacation
My sisters made fun of me for being an Asian mom. I don't like it when my kids miss school for something other than sickness. I battled about taking her out of school a whole week before she gets out so we could be in Philly. But I did it. Yes, you would be proud.
Our ward building's Christmas tradition is bringing in thousands of nativities from around the world. They really go all out. The rooms were decorated as such. We just had sacrament meeting and the rest was dedicated to visitors.
This year I decided to make some homemade cards. Then I realized that our trip was coming sooner than I had time to finish 100 cards. Yeah I don't know what I was thinking. So I ordered more cards.
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| We opened gifts before we left. New phones!! Now if we want to share something with each other, we simply touch. Love our new phones. |
Philadelphia was our first stop and we went to my parents house when we arrived. We stayed for 5 hours, ate dinner, put the kids to bed and then went to Delaware where Dan started his first FC visit on the East coast. Here is the insert from Dan's newsletter
Dan's Newsletter
We flew to Philly. I was out there for work so the girls stayed with their grandparents and
Thuan and I went to Middle(of-nowhere)town DE, for the first week and Allentown, PA for the next.
Thuan went back and forth, sometimes staying in the hotel with me, sometimes staying at her parents with the girls, undecided about who she missed more. I also went back and forth a few times. After a week and a half of the girls having exclusive access to their grandparents, the rest of the family started showing up.
Philadelphia Please Touch Museum
My sister's friend that stayed over our house in the summer when my sister was getting married gave us tickets to the Philadelphia Please Touch Museum. She works there so she got some complimentary tickets. The kids really enjoyed this place. I did too!! It was the fanciest kids place I've ever seen!! I would rate it as the best Kids' Museum. We've been to 3 Kids museums and so far this one is the best. It's HUGE!!! Complete with an indoor Merry Go Round as well.
My Reena, I just have to mention here how proud I was when she asked me a few days before Christmas when she saw all the gifts I bought for everyone. She asked me "mommy, if Christmas is Jesus's birthday, why isn't He getting all of the gifts but we are?" Yes, baby, you are so correct. We need to give to the homeless, the poor, and that is giving to God. To ourselves let's save that for another occassion, like our birthdays. My kids did not get very much gifts from their mom and dad on Christmas day but we made it up to them since then.
Christmas Eve - It snowed. Reena was in heaven. Mom and dad treated everyone to dinner.
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| Nutcracker with the family. My sister bought tickets for everyone. What a treat!!!! |  |
New York New York Manhattan Yo
[From Dan's Newsletter] We visited New York and cursed I-95.
Seriously, follow it on a map sometime. It goes through NYC, but if you
start in Philly going north, you'll end up in Delaware heading south,
having circled Trenton, NJ, proving that the only way to get people to
stop in Jersey is to get them lost and hope they run out of gas. The
entire population of New Jersey consists of lost tourists who have
simply given up hope.“But you got a new smart phone with the internets
and the GPMs [sic]”, you say. Yes, but it wasn't fully charged and we
didn't have a car charger so I was trying to preserve battery life. I
had to turn it on. It wasnearly dead by the time we got there, which was
fun since we were also trying to contact Tiffany & Co (of the
sibling variety, not the Audrey Hepburn variety). Once in NY, we toured
the Empire State Building, and then headed to Times Square to catch the
Applegates. We found the back of a small deli and gathered all 20+ of
us for a snack and good discussion. After parting ways, we walked some
more, taking copious pictures. I stopped to get a car charger in the
hopes of being able to pump my own gas for the rest of my life, and then
we headed home. Good times were had by all. Sadly in rushing out but Dan and I were drivers so we got one thing in mind, our phones for GPS so neither one of us grab our cameras. Here are just a few from my phone and my sister's.
12 year Girls High best friends reunion
I facebooked about going back to Philly and a few of my friends were home for the Holidays and a few have moved back so we decided to do a fancy get together. We got a place downtown and spent $20 for valet parking, then paid $400 to dine in a super nice place. It was the most expensive dinner I've ever had but we all said it had to be extra memorable and special since it doesn't happen very often that we are all able to be together. It was a very fun get together. We stayed until we were the last ones out of the restaurant.
Cliff's notes: We had an awesome Christmas Eve story, starring two real virgins who are not yet
engaged. I changed the ring tone for Thuan's sister, Thuyen, to a Geiger counter sound. Passyunk Ave, 2.5 miles, 4 sandwiches, and you too can unlock the greatest Philly achievement since the Declaration of Independence. Then we flew home. It was a short sleep, a long flight, and then a second Christmas. Thuan found that a picture of her Mom's B-day was accidentally deleted. I tried to recover it, but wiped out all of our pictures from the trip. Thankfully, I am still alive.
Debrie opened up to everyone fast. She became particularly fond of her uncle Alan. She was in
heaven getting so much attention from all of her aunts and uncles.
Reena nearly had a meltdown with excitement when it started to snow on Christmas Eve. It was
wet, didn't stick at all, and only lasted an hour or so, but she was absolutely beside herself.
Thuan was happy to see her family and a lot of old friends. She had a girls night out dinner, and a breakfastturned-lunch with another group. Thuan took the kids to the Please Touch museum. Had so much fun she took them twice.
I left work on December 7th and didn't return (if you don't count the warehouses anyway) until
January 2nd. That was a hard day.
The best part for Dan - CHEESESTEAKS IN PHILLY
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| Here he is at Jim's Steaks with all his brother in laws. Just super excited for some mouthwatering true Philly Cheesesteaks |
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| My favorite is still Phillips Cheesesteaks |
