Aidan’s at that fun (yet dangerous if you have a potty mouth) age where he copies everything we say. Here is a cute video of Bao teaching him colors in Vietnamese. The amazing thing is, he actually remembers it. We always say, “That big head definitely has something in it!”

No recent post because since Thursday…VAN WAS IN TOWN! We’ve been busy busy busy! Between her visit and the kids getting a nasty cold, here’s a quick preview of posts to come:

• Kids turning back into newborns
• Ba Noi’s 90th birthday
• OC Fair 2010
• Disneyland with the Abris

Busy but so much fun!

In 1998, the family when on a road trip to Yellowstone National Park. My mom decided to bring a notebook and pen to document and log the trip. We all thought it was such a lame idea…until now.

12 years later, Van found the log and emailed it to us. I was tearing up from laughter! Best part is, we still all have the same jerky personalities we did back then! I had to blog about it to keep it somewhere I can go back to read it anytime!

Please enjoy:
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We celebrated Jackie’s 26th birthday and her first birthday as an official Ngo on Sunday at China Garden in Irvine. As always when hanging out with the cousins, we were laughing off the calories the entire time (which is good since that’s a lot of calories). One important thing we learned over dim sum? Chi Hai is the funniest. I win!

For Jackie’s 26th birthday, I made a dozen banana cupcakes with simple fondant toppers.

Jackie’s 26th birthday

Ready for transportation!

Fresh banana cupcake with banana Swiss meringue buttercream. Great banana taste and very moist. Recipe can be found on our family food blog.

We were able to get the webcam going this morning and the kids got to see their daddy and vice versa over in Japan. They haven’t seen each other since Sunday morning.

The internet has completely changed the way we communicate. We’ve all known that for a long time now. Instead of letters, I made Mike a few short videos and uploaded them to YouTube for him. Aidan just started putting two words together “Hi Daddy”, “Bye baby”. Brooke is always a little behind but a lot more verbal now:

Aidan’s ‘letter’ to Daddy in Japan

Brooke’s turn to say hi to Daddy

Dee asked me to turnaround a dozen cupcakes for her coworker the last minute and I was up for the challenge. Here they are. I tried a new buttercream recipe that was half the butter I used and I love it. So silky and not too buttery.

Chocolate with vanilla Swiss Meringue Buttercream

The kids are 19-months old now…and talking up a storm! As well as signing! They’re just two little goofballs and I love it! So far in July we’ve been to Maui and been hitting the Irvine Spectrum to play in the fountains. They are obsessed with ‘wah-wah’. Both are climbing all over stuff but Brooke is definitely our little monkey. She climbs into her stroller herself these days and tries to buckle herself in! Aidan’s starting the dreaded tantrums and we’re just ignoring him but I have to say that boy has strong will. Both are still sleeping through the night and are wonderful eaters. We just introduced spinach into the mix and they love it bringing us to 6 out of the 7 superfoods with just salmon left. I know they like salmon, I just don’t cook it much at home. Nobody’s perfect, right? :)

Here they are randomly doing ‘downward dog’ at the Spectrum