Cameron and Colby are 3.5 months old now and they had their red egg and ginger party today to celebrate.  We just hung out at the house playing until it was time to go to the restaurant.  We arrived at the start of the party; we said hello and congratulated the hosts, then found our table.  As soon as we sat down, the boys asked for snacks as usual, fortunately I was prepared.  They ate while we greeted other guests as they arrived.  Shortly after Ian arrived with Kathy, I heard chanting “Ian, Ian” coming from our table (from Connor particularly).  Both Logan and Connor were excited to see him; so Ian had to go between his table to ours to entertain the boys and to play with Brandon.  Julie and Robert had prepared with a balloon guy there to make special balloons for the kids.  Ian was so nice that he stood in line for a long time to get a balloon for himself and Logan.  When it was almost his turn, he came to get Logan so Logan could request a sword.  Logan was so happy returning to the table with the balloon, and it was just in time to start eating.  When the line got shorter, Connor and I went to get him a balloon too and he wanted a sword as well.  After we all were stuffed with good food, the boys were excused to go play.  They were excited to fight with their balloon swords and chased each other on the dance floor.  Later on, Mckayla, Peyton and Ian joined the boys to play too.  They had a great time, but we finally had to say our thanks and take the boys home for nap.  During the drive home, Logan told us that he and Connor were the good guys, and they were getting the bad guys, Ian and Peyton.  He also mentioned that Mckayla was the princess and so she did not have a sword to fight.  When Connor woke up from his nap, his first two words were “Ian, Ian”. 

    Logan came home with a crown today.  He apparently knows all the letters and the sounds now.  This morning during drop off at school, Logan started telling Stuart about letters.  “Vowels, a,e,i,o,u, have two sounds and consonants only have one sound”.  I think Logan may be learning more than I know already.  On the contrary, while Logan and I were reading last night, he was assigning our names to the characters in the book.  He went through all of us, then he looked at me and said “Auntie…Auntie…. Who is the Auntie who just visited us?”  I could not believe how absent minded he can be at times.

     We needed to pick up something from Scott on Saturday morning, and we ended up seeing the family.  It has been awhile since we have seen all of them; the exception was with Logan, apparently Logan sees Auntie DeeDee and Kasey almost every morning as DeeDee drops Kasey off at the same morning classroom.  Hailey and Ashley were very good as usual playing with the little ones, Logan, Connor and Kasey; they all played very well together.  Logan was so happy when Uncle Scott offered him a snack, but he got upset when Connor shared it with him.  Logan was so stubborn that he stopped eating and became grumpy the rest of times.  We decided to go out to eat breakfast together, and Logan finally returned to his normal self at the table.  All the kids had fun drawing and playing while we ate.

     In the afternoon, we made plan to meet up with Rohan and his parents at the Almaden Lake Park.  The kids were so excited to see each other, and they kept running after each other in the playground.  Connor was so demanding with his constant request to “eat”.  We finally decided to all go have an early dinner, so we packed up to leave.  After I wrapped up my bag and turned around, we lost sight of Connor for 10 seconds.  He was running away in the opposite direction, and Rohan’s dad had started to run after him.  It turned out that Connor was trying to bring a snack wrapper to the trash can; after he tossed it away, he smiled so proudly of what he had done.  We could not really get mad of him for running away from us as it was to perform a good deed.

    When we arrived at the restaurant, all three boys found their seats to sit together at the table.  They played before food arrived; they all ate well while watching videos on phones, then resumed playing on some extra chairs next to the table.  Logan, Connor and Rohan played nicely with each other.  We finally had to say goodbye to everyone to go home for bedtime.

      Dora came to San Francisco for the Nike half marathon this past weekend.  Unfortunately she had injured herself recently so she could not run, but she managed to finish the race by walking the entire way.  It was certainly not an easy walk.  On Sunday late afternoon I drove to pick Dora up so she could stay with us for a couple of nights.  By the time we arrived home on Sunday night, the boys were just finishing up with bath.  Logan was excited to see auntie Dora and immediately asked her to read bedtime stories with him.  Connor was shy to look at Dora initially, but every time when Dora stepped away, he started asking for “A-Ra”.  Later he even whined for Dora to read to him too by saying “A-Ra, book!”. 

   The next morning, Logan asked Dora to take him to school.  We had to make sure Connor did not hear the plan so he would not get jealous again.  We went out for dinner that night, and both kids once again wanted to sit next to Auntie Dora.   We told the boys this morning that auntie Dora will be leaving today, Connor immediately said “No!”.  They had a group hug this morning before the boys left for school.  Dora flew home this afternoon.  We definitely enjoyed this little visit by Dora.

       Today was the day we planned to have all three boys getting their flu shots at the clinic.  Michelle was also bringing Mckayla and Marcus in for theirs, so I asked Stuart to pick up the boys and meet me at the Campbell office the same time as Michelle was to arrive.  Since we are employees there, they allowed us to cut through the line a bit and were sent directly to the family injection room.  The wait was not long, but Stuart did not really like the set up there as the kids were able to watch other kids crying while getting their shots.  When it was our turn, the nurse was very quick; she gave the shots to Marcus, Mckayla, Logan, Stuart and lastly Connor.  The kids did relatively well.  Logan and Mckayla both had a short anticipation cry, and Marcus just had a small whimper after the injection.  Connor was a bit scared when I lowered his pants to get ready.  I was rubbing his big thigh with my hand while the nurse got ready, and I guess Connor ended up not noticing the shot when it happened.  No crying!  Logan was slightly mad afterward but Stuart was able to talk him out of it.  All of us returned to our office to re-group after the injections.  To reward the kids for their braveness, they all had some small snacks. 

     After dinner tonight, I went to attend the monthly parent workshop at Logan’s school.  It was a very small group tonight, but it was an interesting topic, Dealing with Children’s behavior.  When I returned home, Stuart was putting the kids in bath, so I was able to take over then.  During the bath, Connor kept pointing to the bandage on his thigh and referred to it as “owie”.  While I was at the school for the hour meeting, the kids had a good time playing dress-up, playing Legos and did some drawing too.

     The day that I take the Ambulatory Care Specialty Board Certification test finally came and went today.  After hours of studying on Tuesdays since July and some additional Fridays in September, and after many many cups of coffee, I was ready to take this test.  I set my alarm at 5:45am, but my “Mommy Mommy” call from Connor came just before that, 5:40.  I jumped into the the shower while Stuart told Connor to return to sleep.  I prepared my coffee and breakfast, and off I went.  I arrived at the hotel in good timing, 7:15am.  I topped off my caffeine load there, and met up with Tina shortly later.  The test finally began at 9am after the registration and all the announcement.  One hundred questions and two hours 15mins later, I finished and met up with Tina for lunch.  It was a beautiful sunny day in San Francisco; we went to grab a lunch and took a nice walk too.  Then another two hours and 100 questions, it was finally over and I was so happy that I started smiling as I walked out of the exam room.  I have no idea how I actually did on the test and will have to wait two months to find out the result, but I am just so relieved and I rushed home to see the boys.

    Stuart had the boys all day.  After breakfast and playing some games at home, they headed to the library to play and to get some new books.  They brought home McD food for lunch, then Stuart put both of them to nap.  Connor was rebellious and Logan was whiny, and they made the job a bit harder for daddy.  After their nap and snack, they went to play at a park.  Stuart told me that Logan was the one who picked the itinerary for the day, and it turned out to be exactly what I had guessed.  After our reunion at home, we went for an early big dinner and frozen yogurt afterward to celebrate.  It has been a long day for all of us.