Travel Log

2008

August 23 : Nippo Lake, Barrington, New Hampshire : Splashing and kayaking with Isaiah Bunten and friends.
August 7 : Manchester, UK : Shopping for Jiu Jiu, Pizza Express, and playing in fountains at the town hall.
August 3 - 6 : London, UK : Whirlwind tour of major tourist spots and lots of food and karaoke in Chinatown.
August 1 - 3 : Northampton, UK : Visiting Uncle Oscar and touring Warwick Castle.
July 31 : North Wales, UK : Day trip from Liverpool to tour Conwy Castle.
July 28 - August 1 : Liverpool, UK : Visiting Jiu Jiu (Uncle Mike) and Jiu Ma (Auntie Hye Jin) and touring Speke House.
July 11 - 12 : Lake Moxie, Maine : A Charis Whitewater Adventure on the Kennebec River.
July 5 - 10 : Rochester, New York : Visiting Uncle Bob, Aunt Karen, Ruthie, Rhianna, Buddy, Brian, and Taylor.
April 26 - 27 : Mystic, Connecticut : Celebrating Auntie Jen's Birthday with golf, gambling, and brunch.
February 16 - 19 : Lindenhurst, New York : Celebrating Uncle Steve's 40th, visiting Uncle Mike et al.
February 8 - 10 : Sunday River, Maine : A Charis Ski Adventure II!
January 19 - 20 : Poughkeepsie, New York : Wedding of John & Joy Schreck; visiting Auntie Irene.

2007

December 19 - 31 : El Paso, Texas : Christmas with family (on Mommy's side).
November 21 - 25 : Lindenhurst, New York : Thanksgiving with the entire Sailer family.
October 12 - 13 : Nice, France : Bye bye car, hello beach, explore, relax, and head home; bye Auntie Hye-Jin.
October 11 : Avignon, France : A fancy little city, the Pont du Gard, and wild white horses.
October 10 - 11 : Arles, France : French food and wandering in a small riviera city.
October 10 : Monaco : Lunch, exploring, and mingling among the rich and famous.
October 8 - 9 : Cinque Terre, Italy : Vernazza, Montorosso, Manarola, and Riomaggiore (four out of five).
October 8 : Pisa, Italy : Lunch, a leaning tower, lots of tourists, then back on the road.
October 7 : Siena, Italy : Another old city, but with a piazza like none other.
October 7 : Orvieto, Italy : More food and more exploring in this old, small, hilltop city.
October 3 - 6 : Rome, Italy : Exploring the city, lots of Roman ruins, and the Vatican; bye Uncle Mike.
October 1 - 2 : Florence, Italy : Best Italian food, art, sculptures, and Michelangelo's David.
September 29 - 30 : Venice, Italy : Joined Uncle Mike and Auntie Hye-Jin in the sinking, tourist-packed city.
September 27 - 28 : Reutte, Austria : Climbing around castles, museums and ruins in Füssen/Hohenschwangau.
September 26 : Rothenburg, Germany : Exploring a walled-in medieval city.
September 25 : Munich, Germany : Enjoy food and fun at Oktoberfest, pick up the new car at BMW.
August 23 - 26 : North Conway, New Hampshire : Story Land and Echo Lake with Lee's, Bunten's and Yeh's.
August 17 - 19 : Schroon Lake, New York : Charis SG outing at Daddy's parents' cabin.
July 27 - 29 : Schroon Lake, New York : Visiting Daddy's parents with the Yeh family.
July 14 : Nippo Lake, Barrington, New Hampshire : Sunning and boating with Isaiah Bunten and friends.
June 1 - June 3 : Pine Acre's Resort, Oakham, Massachusetts : Daddy and Mommy's 11th anniversary.
May 12 : Rafe's Chasm, Magnolia, Massachusetts : Uncle Eric Ding's [GCTS] graduation party.
April 8 - April 25 : El Paso, Texas : Visiting family (on Mommy's side).
February 17 - February 19 : Camp Maranatha, New Durham, New Hampshire : CBCGB Sr. High winter retreat.
January 12 - January 14 : Sunday River, Maine : Charis Ski Adventure!

2006

November 23 - November 26 : Schroon Lake, New York : Thanksgiving with family (Daddy's side).
November 4 - November 12 : El Paso, Texas : US wedding of Uncle Mike and Auntie Hyejin.
September 22 - October 2 : Seoul, South Korea : Korean wedding of Uncle Mike and Auntie Hyejin.
August 12 : Nippo Lake, Barrington, New Hampshire : Summertime chilling with Isaiah Bunten and friends.
August 4 - August 6 : Lindenhurst, New York : Visiting Cos Stephen and Matthew et al.
July 27 - August 3 : El Paso, Texas : Visiting family (on Mommy's side).
July 15 : Salisbury Beach, Salisbury, Massachusetts : Charis small group outing.
June 27 - July 1 : Grand Bahamas : Sun, sand, and surf with Uncle Chris and Auntie Emily.
June 24 - June 25 : Rochester, New York : Cos Rebecca's graduation party (Monroe College).

Originally Posted 2/16/2007

While heading back home to Boston yesterday, I realized that as a 13-month-old I've logged a fair number of trips under my belt.  Well, I don't wear (or own, for that matter) any belts, but you know what I mean!    So, I figure it's about time I start a travel log, including [more-or-less] all trips that have taken me outside of my home area or where I've stayed overnight, in reverse chronological order.  Wow, that was a mouthful!  I think I might need some help from Mommy and Daddy, tho.  Maybe they'll be nice and pitch in with some details for me.    Okay, here we go..

A Backdated Update

Due to my repeated attempts to backdate my posts, it seems that they are not being properly emailed to my subscribers.  So, please click here to view my 26-month update (only 2 months late)  ...

... and to see me do some incredible and dangerous things with high-powered construction equipment!! 

CLICK HERE NOW! 

Months 25 and 26

I'm all done turning two, and on to bigger and better things!  Here's what's been going on during my first two months as a two year old.. 

For Easter dinner, Uncle Milton and Auntie Maggie had me and a bunch of people (big and small) over for a very nice dinner.  Here I am playing with my good friend Charissa.  I have no idea what's going on in those two pictures on the right - so embarrassing!

Here is baby Benjamin - just one day old!  Welcome to the outside, Benjamin - you will like it here!  Us March babies will rule the world some day - one playground at a time.

Nana and Papa came over in late March to hang out with me.  Here I am helping Papa and Dada with nailing studs together to frame the walls of the basement office.  Without my help I don't think they'd ever get done!

This tool made lots of noise and sawdust - it's very cool.  I didn't get to operate it (nobody would show me how), but if they would have left me alone for a few minutes with it I'm sure I would have cut something up pretty good!  Many thanks to Uncle Kris for lending this to us, by the way.

Break time!

After a couple of days I got promoted to site supervisor.  Here I am hard at work again.  "You!  Put that camera down and bring me my Nemo milk!"

Every once in a while my parents take me out to Lemongrass for Thai food.  It's so yummy and I get to eat oranges for dessert nearly every time.  While I was distracted chomping on some sweet oranges Dada took the opportunity to give me chopstick antennae and pretend to eat my head.  I know he won't really eat me, although I have to remind him a lot that "Jaden is not food!"

Kaelan invited me and a bunch of other small people and their parents over for dinner at his house in April.

Lots of my friends made it out, including baby Alison.  It seems like she's really into cups these days.  She has such a cute little stare and it's fun to try to get her to smile.

Abby was there, too, and we had a great time playing together - that is, until we had a minor skirmish over a very comfy chair.  All in good fun!

Early in May Uncle David was baptized at CBCGB, and a bunch of us went out to lunch with him to celebrate.  I was having a good time with good people, good food, good stickers, and okay parents.  Somebody must have let out my secret that I really like rice.  Uncle Ben got a little carried away with that information, don't you think?

I really like yogurt, too, and so does Clarissa.  Here we are taking a break after some intense playing and couch jumping.  I'm not sure exactly how much yogurt got on the chair that day, but I'm absolutely certain it wasn't my fault (or Clarissa's).

Sometimes I let my parents do awful things to me, just to keep them amused.  Yeah, I'm a good kid like that.  Here I am at Iguana Cantina pretending to enjoy wearing a foam flower lei.  It looks much better on Mama.

Now that the weather has been getting really nice we spend a couple days each week at the park with friends.  Isaiah and Nathan have come a few times and Charissa, too.  She showed me how to count while bouncing a basketball.

So I tried to do it just like her, but when the ball would stop bouncing I'd go right into kicking.  Dada reminds me to try my left hand and left foot every once in a while so I can be a good dribbler (in basketball and soccer) some day.

Most people at the park throw around a Frisbee disc the whole time.  I haven't had much luck throwing the disc, so I found a few other things I can do with it, like wearing it as a hat, rolling it on its edge, jumping over it, and doing a partial headstand on it.

The past two months seem to have marked the end of cold weather and snow.  Here is one of my last outings - walking Willie - where I needed to wear my awesome blue winter coat.

It's a good thing for me that my Yeh buddies gave me this awesome green rain coat!  And if the weather is just too yucky to go out, I can always find something crazy to do indoors - like jump off the humidifier and over the bedroom heater.  Most of the time I land right on my feet and Dada cheers and yells something about the Olympics.  I'll have to look that up somehow - I'm worried he's up to something!

Overall, these two months have been kind of rough for me.  I started out with a sinus infection and got some amoxicillin, but that led to an allergic reaction and I ended up with hives for a month.  Thank goodness they finally went away.  On a happier note, these days I'm picking up words at a fast pace.  I put sentences together regularly and I'm happy imitating pretty much anything my parents say, but with varying success.  They seem to know what I mean most of the time anyhow, so I get by okay.  I sometimes surprise them by pulling out words that they didn't teach me.  They just look at each other and go, "Where'd he learn that?"  Duh, Dada, Mama, you send me to school everyday!  Every once in a while I'll count to 13 (I stop at 13 because Mama counts the steps as I jump down each one in the mornings) or sing the alphabet (I first did this at my Chuck E Cheese party) - this really gets my parents charged up for some reason.  When I count I usually skip the number 4; not sure why I just can't seem to remember it!  I like to fill in the words at the end of each line to some songs, like Twinkle Twinkle Little Star (though I started with this one before turning 2), Bumble Bee and The Wheels on the Bus.  I have a great time at playgrounds now that I can climb pretty well and do all the slides.  It's great to be bouncing and kicking balls outside these days, too!  I'm starting to think I'm right-handed, but I still like to swing a baseball bat left-handed like Papa.  I don't know about golf, tho - I'd be bummed if I couldn't use the nice bag of right-handed clubs Dada got for me last year.  I like to color things - mostly purple.  I'm all adjusted to K2 and Toddler 2 class at daycare.  I have lots of fun at both.  I love pointing out school buses, bicycles, and motorcycles and any kind of helmet.  Mama even bought me a bicycle helmet of my own!  Now I have a football helmet and a bicycle helmet.  I love my baseball cap too.  One of my favorite games at home is bouncing on the sofa and flipping myself over the big green ball.  Dada has lots of video of me doing this, and if he ever buys a computer that can convert AVCHD video format to something I can post online you might even get to see it yourself!

Being two is tons of fun.  I'm just learning so much everyday!

On Turning Two

* Note: This entry has been cleverly back-dated, but covers the time period of my 23rd and 24th months "on the outside." 

As I approached the big T-W-O I couldn't help but reflect.  All my life my age had been described in months, but here Mama and Dada were trying to teach me to say, "almost two" in reply to questions about my age.  "Two what?" I thought at first, but then quickly realized I was reaching the age of years.  Wow.  It was a little scary.    So, let me share with you a few goings-on in my life as I approached this new milestone, and a few of the many challenges I've faced along the way (many due in large part to my parents, for better or worse). 

In late January we all went to Jordan's Furniture in Reading to eat yummy Fuddrucker's burgers in celebration of Uncle Milton's birthday.  I had a great time riding around in the cars with Charissa and Lucas afterward, crashing into numerous people and stationary objects.  There was also a neat water show and a flying trapeze.

You've already seen some video footage of my time in Maine during the Charis Ski Adventure II in February.  But after doing some additional digging around in my parents computer I found evidence of all the fun they'd been having without me at Sunday River! 

As if that weren't bad enough, later that month I discovered that my parents were starting to sell off some of my stuff (probably to pay for their luxury ski trips and other junk).  Can you believe they put my jogging stroller on the market after we've used it only once?  It's totally brand-new!

I really shouldn't complain, tho.  I get fed well - I had lots and lots of hot cereal to fill me up through the winter months.  Some mornings I'd get two bowls of food, but always I'd have a big spoon to help me shovel everything into my mouth and a clever bib to catch any runaway food so I could be sure to eat every last bite.

Papa came by (with Nana, of course) in February to help me work on the basement office.  We started out leveling the floor and putting down some plywood.  Papa did most of the work - I'm more of the visionary type.

After careful inspection of the initial boards I gave Papa the go-ahead to finish up the job.

Looks pretty good, right?  Soon (I hope) Mama and Dada can get all their junk out of my room and down here in the new office so I can have some space of my own.

March was a very special month - not just because it was my second birthday, but because my new buddy Madeline was born!  Auntie Liwen let me hold her, so we now have a very special bond.  I did my best to reassure her that life on the outside is very good, and that she has lots of great big people (not the least of whom are her parents) to take care of her and show her all the things she can do.

I got an early birthday gift - what a surprise!  I guess my parents are tired of hearing me bang away on my toy pianos so they got me something that sounds like a real piano.  I was so taken by surprise that I totally forgot I wasn't wearing any pants and I let Dada take all these embarrassing pictures.    Mama was sweet and showed me what to do.

But soon I was on my own.  This keyboard really sounds great, and it makes all sorts of crazy sounds, too, so I can still drive my parents nuts whenever I want.

I was so impressed with my new keyboard I just had to see if I could belly-bump it.  Don't try this at home - at least not in front of a camera - trust me.

My buddy Clarissa came by one day so I showed her how to jump on and off the couch.  After I demonstrated the basics she caught on real quick and we had lots of fun - no injuries!

We spent some time playing with the Little Einsteins, too, and the new piano.

Mama, Dada, and I spent the weekend doing all sorts of fun stuff for my second birthday.  It really helped ease my anxiety about the whole T-W-O thing.  On Saturday we went to a fair at a church in Lexington.  At first I wasn't so sure about it all, but the magic show was fun and I got myself a sticker and things just picked up overall from there.

I worked on some Shrinky-Dink art, coloring in a nice tractor.  We melted one there and also took one home and melted it ourselves afterward - that was cool.

Also very cool was that Auntie Shang came out to take pictures of us at the fair - she's so sweet, and a real pro at her art.    But what's *not* cool is Auntie Shang taking pictures of me while I'm picking my nose!

Several of my buddies came to the fair also - even little Alison.  She couldn't do a whole lot except sit in her cozy stroller and look cute.  Here's a picture of her doing just that - isn't she really good at it?

Some games came with prizes - look at these great sunglasses I scored, just for hunting around in a treasure chest!

Other games involved feats of great skill, such as corn chucking.  I did the best I could - let's just say there's a reason why there are no pictures of the corn going into the basket.

There were lots of other fun things to do at the fair, and I learned a lot.  I'm ready to start milking my own cows, catching my own fish, and doing my own laundry - I'm practically self-sufficient!  Boy, are my parents lucky?!

The place was so huge that I got lost, but eventually found my way through some kind of blue space portal or worm hole kind of thing which transported me back into Mama's arms.  It's true!  Don't listen to anything my parents say, that's exactly how it went down.

I was having such a great time and just when I thought things couldn't possibly be any better Mama bought me a balloon and we headed out to Bertucci's for lunch with everybody.

Clarissa, Samuel, Charissa, and Joshie all partied with me over lunch - what a great time!

The next day I partied even more at Chuck-E-Cheese's with a bunch of other folks who couldn't make it on Saturday.  There were many more rides and games I could enjoy since I was a lot bigger than I was at my first birthday party.

And when I got tired of all the partying and game playing and ride riding (?) my sweet Auntie Amy held me in her arms for some quality snuggle time - sorry Uncle Erick!

Finally, on Monday - my actual birthday - my parents let me open up all my cards and gifts.  Everybody was so thoughtful and got me such nice stuff!  I feel so loved.

Dada got pretty excited over some of my gifts, too - mostly the small paper ones that I have no clue about.

My last gift was this awesome football hat (Dada calls it a helmet).  I've had a lot of fun playing football in the house now, and I can even get tackled, fall down, and crash into things without needing ice for my head!

I have lots and lots of video that I want to show everybody but I'm having too much trouble uploading it all so I guess this is it for the media portion of my post. 

I've been trying to say lots of words and short phrases, such as, "bye Mama/Dada," "hang it up," "ready to go," "put it away," "have a good day," and "love you." My enunciation has improved and I'm becoming more confident and doing my best to imitate words and phrases I hear throughout the day.  I can say longer words too like motorcycle (although it sounds like mamadycle.)  I like to point out the obvious, and I know what belongs to whom.  I think I'm pretty much adjusted to daycare - there are lots of fun things to do there, after all.  I'm having some trouble adjusting to K2 at church though.  I have such fond memories of the nursery!

I love to run and jump, and climb and jump off of things (sometimes holding someone's hands, sometimes not), and draw O's and footballs, and throw and catch balls and swing my tee-ball bat (my crazy parents let me hit the tee ball inside the house, and I try not to break stuff).  I recognize a bunch of colors now, and I can say most of them, including "blue," "red," "black," "purple," "green," "yellow," "orange," "pink," and "white."  I count to 2, and can say "2" when my parents ask me how old I am or how many jellybeans I want.  Oh, and I still like play-doh, coloring, and cutting stuff with Mama's craft scissors.  Toy cars are fun too.  Of course balls are still my favorite.  I also play and like to cuddle with my stuffed dogs, tigers, bears, and all sorts of cuddly, furry stuffed animals.  I like playing football with my tigers.  I grab the football and run and they chase after me while I run away squealing.  Then they tackle me and I laugh.  It's tons of fun!  I also like watching football, but since there are no games on tv nowadays, Mama and Dada put on "Remember the Titans" for me.  I usually insist on fast forwarding through all the non-football scenes.   There was a time where I wasn't so fond of baths, but I think I've gotten over that now.  I guess that about covers it!   

I've heard a lot about two being terrible, but it hasn't been bad at all.  I haven't had many tantrums, although I definitely know what I want and I whine or cry to try to get my way.  Mama and Dada make me ask nicely before they give it to me though.  Tough life!

Thanks for reading through my reflections on turning two and for showing me so much love as I learn more and more about life on the outside.  I'm sure there's a lot more to learn and many more challenges and struggles I'll get to face, but I feel like with all those around me that love and care for me so much (and play with me a lot) I'll get through it without too much trouble.  Cheers! 

Oh!  My stats at age 2:
Height:  35 inches
Weight:  27 lbs 6 oz
Head circumference:  19.5 inches

Playing in the Maine Snow

Note: If you're viewing this in email, be sure to click here to view the video footage/evidence of the claims made herein.

This past weekend my parents took me up to Maine because they wanted to go skiing with lots of Charis people.  While they were off trying to kill themselves on the snow-covered slopes of the Sunday River ski resort, I stayed back at the cabin to finish up a draft of their will.    Once I was done with that (and a nap) I went outside to play in the snow with my friends and had a great time.    Feeling guilty for having neglected me all day, Mom and Dad made me go play in the snow with them the following day.  Things didn't go quite as well, however. 

First off, Mom whips a snowball at my face, which I totally did not deserve! 

Being the calm, cool kid that I am  I made the best of it, having quickly learned that Maine snow tastes pretty good!  Thanks, Mom. 

No big deal, tho..  I got her back. 

And I was undeterred when she tried to direct my vengeance toward Daddy.. 

All in all it was a great weekend.  My parents are still alive and uninjured, I got to clap during Sunday worship singing in our cabin, and I ate lots and lots of cereal and hot pot (not at the same time).