Something New - A New Blog Site for the Chau Family

I've decided to try a new blog with Cozi. I've been using Cozi for our family calendar and for lists for about a year now. It's great and has been keeping our family really organized (which is well needed for a family of six almost seven!). Do I sound like an online ad? Anyways, I'm going to try to use their journal for our family updates too. It's a lot simpler and doesn't leave room for comments, so I guess if you really want to leave me a comment you'll have to email me :). If you want to take a look at it, the new site is:

http://family.cozi.com/chaufamily7/

The other great thing is it will automatically generate monthly emails w/ all the picts, so if you just want to be added to our email list, let me know.

Celebrating 4 Years with Lydia

This Monday was Lydia's "Gotcha Day" - August 17, 2005. It's hard to believe how fast 4 years have past since we first picked her up in Changsha, China. Now she's starting Kindergarten! She's still just as smiley and expressive as day 1. We praise God for placing this special little girl in our lives and allowing her to be part of our family. Of course, to celebrate we had to take her out to Soup Plantation. It's become a tradition after 4 years. Her passion is the MacNCheese of which she gladly ate two huge helpings. She was born Chinese, but just like all American kids she sure has a taste for good old American foods like MacNCheese and Chicken Nuggets!

Gotcha Day August 17, 2005 ----------------------- Playing Dress Up August 2006

Soup Plantation August 17, 2007 ------------------ McDonald's August 17, 2008

This week at Soup Plantation August 17, 2009

And the results are IN . . .

Just thought I'd share the results of our ultrasound from last night. Here's a picture of it's cute little head. Does it look like any of our other children? We think it looks like Micaiah. We won't show you the picture of its other parts :) - but we'll put it this way . . . Micaiah's going to have a BROTHER.

4th of July

4th of July was celebrated as usual with the families from Pathway Bible Church at Heritage Park. Just like all Santa Clarita days in July it was HOT, but this year was at least bearable (approx. 100F degrees). This year, Kari celebrated her first 4th of July as a US Citizen, but I think she was mostly interested in the bag of Chexmix someone brought. She wasn't keen at all about getting her face painted - it took me about five tries to get a decent looking star on her cheek. Micaiah, of course celebrated by getting himself into a water-fight and ended up completely drenched, which he loved. That evening, the 3 older kids and Mike climbed the hill and stayed to watch the nearby fireworks, but I got smart (and I was still weak from morning sickness) and took Kari home early for a bath and bedtime. I forgot my camera at home that day, but thankfully my sister brought her new fancy Nikon to take picts. Thanks Cheryl!

Happy Birthday Mimi + Mimi's Blog

It's hard to believe Mimi turned seven last week. Unfortunately she was sick on her actual birthday, but thankfully she was well for her party that she planned to celebrate a few friends for school. Mimi's only seven, but she's a girl after my own heart - she loves LISTS! She made a list for the food she wanted at her party, the crafts she wanted to make, the games she wanted to play, etc. She is really into art and making crafts this year, so the theme of her party was crafts. The girls enjoyed decorating their own aprons, making party hats and painting cute buckets.

After crafts, snacks, playing games, ice cream decorated in the shape of a paint palette (Mimi hates cake), and presents, this was what the party girl looked like.

BTW- not to be outdone by her brother, Mimi has started her own blog :). You can find it at http://mimichausjournal.blogspot.com .

Summer Updates + Micaiah's Blog

Well, summer started for us over two weeks ago, but morning sickness has had the best of me for the past 8 weeks, so I haven't been up to blogging. Thank God I've reached my 14th week and morning sickness is finally over! The kids have been keeping me on my toes - well, more like keeping me in the driver seat of our minivan driving all over town. Last week the enjoyed VBS at a large local church across town. They loved it. This summer the kids all picked at least one activity, but with four kids, that's a lot of activities! Lydia's doing gymnastics, Mimi's taking ice skating lessons and art lessons, and Micaiah's taking tennis lessons and going to volleyball camp. What's Kari doing? Well, guess she gets to ride all over town with mom :) - she's a real trooper. Oh and of course, lots of swimming. This week is the first week the temps have been in the hundreds. I haven't had a chance to get any picts of the kids swimming yet. I've got to remember to bring my camera!
These are a few picts of the kids with their father's day gifts for Mike. Mimi and Micaiah made him some glass art pictures. Can you tell what they are? Lydia made Mike a picture of himself. Can you see the resemblance?

I know some of you have been checking out Micaiah's blog. In an effort to keep him writing this summer, he's been updating his blog fairly regularly. If you haven't had a chance, I know he'd love to have you take a look and leave a comment or two. Actually, he updates his blog w/ Chau events even more than I do! micaiahsblog.blogspot.com

Kari - Official in the USA

This past Wednesday was Kari's court date to be adopted in the USA. She was officially adopted in China and recieved her US citizenship in September '08, but we chose to "readopt" her in the US so that she could get a US birth certificate. My parents and Lydia came along to witness the event. The court even gave each girl a teddy bear to match their sweaters - which was nice because for them this was a pretty boring event!

The LA Children's Court is in Montery Park, so the best part of the deal was a delicious Dim Sum meal for lunch! Kari loves ChaSiu Bows - buns filled with BBQ pork. She loved those in China and she still loves them! We had to put a limit on the number she could eat since she was eating non-stop. Then we topped it all off w/ a Boba drink for the ride home :). Kari will have to wait about 15 months or more to get her birth certificate b/c the CA government is a total mess right now, but we're thankful Kari could once again become officially ours even though she's been officially ours for 9 months now.

Graduation

A major milestone - Lydia graduated from Preschool on Wednesday :). Going into the day, I don't think she had a clue what "graduation" meant. We kept trying to prep her, but being only four she still seemed pretty clueless. Regardless, she hammed it up quiet a bit. I wish I had a photo of this, but she strutted up the isle to her seat flashing what looked like a "peace" sign or a "V" for victory sign with her two fingers. All the parents were laughing and she had this big grin on her face. Turns out the "V" sign to her was - you guessed it - BUNNY EARS! She even flashed her "bunny ears" again when it came time to receive her certificate. Mrs. Cindy awarded her the "Mild Mannered Award". Mike was like, WHAT? How could Lydia be considered "mild mannered"? At home she certainly is NOT mild mannered, but she does come across as being so in the classroom. So, she sang the songs - sort of, got her certificate - while flashing the "bunny ears", and saved the best for last - cake! Oh, I have to add one more thing. In her school yearbook, put together by some of the parents, the children were all asked what they want to be when they grow up. Lydia's answer - "Big Bird". Yes, that in a nutshell is my dear sweet off-the-wall Lydia :).

Blueberries!

Our family loves three day weekends. With Mike working full-time at his secular job and being involved with ministry part-time and on the weekends, having an extra Monday for a family day together is a special treat. This Memorial Day we headed out to Underwood Family Farms to do some blueberry picking. The kids picked about 5 or 6 pounds of blueberries and had a great time feeding all the farm animals. Kari was especially taken by the goats and couldn't get enough of hand feeding them. The kids like fresh blueberries, but I still have to figure out what we're going to do with some of them - maybe blueberry jam? blueberry scones? blueberry pancakes?

BIG Surprise Bonus

Well, for those of you who are non-facebook users, I guess you haven't heard the news about the Surprise Bonus we received this month. Not the typical bonus you would expect in the form of a raise or a vacation. It's more like: give birth to two, adopt two, get one bonus baby for free :). Yep, the Chau Kids are now 5. Baby #5 is due to be born around December 30. If you're surprised, so are we. Ever since before we were married, the family plan was to give birth to two children and then to adopt two - Lord willing of course. After Kari arrived in September, we were thrilled. Our plans for our family were complete, or so we thought! Guess God has other plans for us. I'm still a little shocked, oh and very tired and a bit nauseous too. But learning to trust that God has what's best for our family - even beyond what I can see and understand.


I love this picture. My mom's face says it all. It's the moment we told her we were expecting again. She's saying "FIVE?" and my sister, she's saying "WHAT? WHAT?" in her typical Cheryl fashion. It's kind of how we all feel right now.

Shocked and yet Rejoicing.

Going Green

Well, it's official. The Chau Family is Going Green. :) At the urging of Micaiah, who has been learning about composting at school, we recently started a worm bin and a compost bin. The kids are mostly excited about the worm bin - eagerly saving their banana peels, egg shells, and other scraps for the worms. Did you know that half a pound of worms can devour 1/4 pound of food scraps in one day! Our family easily generates that much green waste, so were hoping our scraps can soon go to good use in our yard.

Heat Wave!

Well, Spring Break came and went w/o a blogspot post :). But I did have a delightful time w/ my three girls. Micaiah was traveling to AZ and NM with his beloved grandparents for the entire week. We missed him dearly and hoped he would blog (micaiahsblog.blogspot.com), but he and his "Gigi" and "Boppy" were much too busy for blogging! The house was VERY quiet w/o our dear son. The night he bounded back into the house talking non-stop we realized how quiet the house really had been.

So this week the weather decided to take a turn and skipped straight to summer. It was over 95 degrees for two days! Mimi decided it was time to wash the car and Kari was ready to help out. As a family, I think we are really ready for summer vacation.

Happy 40th Birthday Mike!

My dear husband (very fondly aka "Daddy") turned 40 this weekend. He was greatly encouraged by a surprise fishing trip with some of his closest friends and men from Pathway Bible Church - oh and Micaiah too. Then on Sunday we celebrated with a BBQ at the park. I constantly give thanks and praise to God for allowing me to have such a such a partner in life who loves God and his family so deeply.

Kari @ 18 months

We were able to enjoy Kari as an infant for about 1 month :). Ever since then she's been going full steam towards being a toddler (or an adult). I think it's the siblings. Whatever they eat, she wants to eat. Whatever they do, she wants to do. This week she turned 18 month and has been with us for 6 months. What a joy she is to us! On Tuesday morning, Lydia was supposed to be doing her chore - emptying the dishwasher. In typical Chau-kid fashion, she declared "I have to go to the bathroom". Ha. All my kids use that one. They conveniently need to go to the bathroom EVERYTIME there is a chore to do. Anyways, Kari decided Lydia was taking to long, so she took over. (This is a 1 minute video, if you want to have a look). I kind of wish she could stay a baby just a little longer, but that doesn't seem to be on her agenda.


The Final Result

Happy Birthday Uncle Eric!

My younger brother's birthday is Feb. 27. The kids adore their Uncle Eric (maybe it's because he's way cooler than their mother and is a rock star?) . Mimi is the Craft Queen, so she found this craft to make a cardboard guitar from Family Fun Magazine (the perfect magazine for a Craft Queen). We're always really encouraged by her heart to give. She spends hours making things for people. We pray that her heart for giving to others will continue as she matures.

BTW - Eric has a gig next week with Delirious and I'm super proud of him!

Delirious/Future of Forestry Show
House of Blues Anaheim CA
Wednesday, March 18th, 7pm
$23

FoF has less than 100 tickets left to sell that don't have the ticketmaster fees. You can purchase them at:

http://originaldin.com/fofstore/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=7&products_id=16

They will be for sale for just one week (after March 13th, you will need to go to ticketmaster and/or door charge).

Happy New Year! Xin Nian Kuai Le!