July 4th Weekend

July 4th weekend, mama Lyanne had invited all of her cousins up to hang out for the weekend. It was a fun and busy weekend. On Saturday, mama Lyanne had planned for an all park day. The day started with softball in the morning when the temperature was still cool. Including mama Lyanne and papa Matt, there were a total of 10 people which perfectly formed 2 teams of 5 people. The teams were randomly picked. Uncle Christian, auntie Christina, auntie Leslie, auntie Joanna and mama Lyanne were on one team. Aunti Jessica, uncle Jimmy, uncle Kevin, auntie Katherine and papa Matt were on another team. After playing an hour to two, mama Lyanne's team won. Then they break for lunch, eating sticky rice cooked by Great Auntie Dau (uncle Christian's mom), yesterday's left over pizza and chicken bake, peaches and vietnamese dessert cooked by Auntie Jessica and auntie Jessica's mom, Great Auntie Jeannette. Mama Lyanne also packed watermelon, but it was touched because there were so much food.

After lunch, they played 3-legged race. Once again the 5 pair of teams were also randomly picked. Each round of game had 2 teams racing against each other, each team played at least 3-4 round of games, and the team with the most wins won the game. The last round of game determined the winning team. It was between auntie Leslie and mama Lyanne's team versus uncle Christian and auntie Joanna's team. The rest of the teams stood by to be the judge. The final round had to be played 2 times because the first final round was determined to be a tie. Finally, on the 2nd (final) round, auntie Leslie and mama Lyanne won the game. Hmm...do you see a trend here? Heheh.

Lastly, the park games ended with "Motion Telephone". Similar to 'telephone' or 'rumor' game, a message is passed on from one person to another until the last person determines what was the original message. In 'Motion Telephone', the acting is the message so the member in each team must pass the acting to the next team mate until the last team member must guess what was the message that was trying to be conveyed.

All the while, baby Kara was playing and relaxing with Great Auntie Jeannette in the shade by a tree. The day ended with bbq burgers and hot dogs at home, while Great Auntie Jeannette, auntie Jessica and uncle Jimmy drove back to OC.

Yesterday, everyone was sore from the park games that they all relaxed at home during the day while mama Lyanne went to buy fish for sushi night. After she came back from grocery shopping, everyone went swimming at the community pool. Baby Kara has had many 'water day' at day care with auntie Yammi, but this was the first time that mama Lyanne and papa Matt saw baby Kara in her bathing suit and watched her play in the pool. She loved the water! Baby Kara kicked and kicked her legs when she was in the water.

After the pool, mama Lyanne got ready to make sushi dinner. Sushi included white tuna, yellowtail, halibut, salmon, shrimp tempera, masago, and baked mussles. Delicious! After dinner, the plan was to go to Valencia Town Mall to watch fireworks, but dinner went late and therefore going to Valencia Mall was cancelled. However, just when dinner was finishing up, they started to hear fire works. Some went upstairs to watch while others were still watching TV downstairs while mama Lyanne and papa Matt were packing and cleaning up dinner left overs. In the end, mama Lyanne got everyone to go upstairs to watch the fireworks. Couple minutes in, auntie Christina asked if she could watch from the roof, which was accessable through the balcony bedroom window. Of course, mama Lyanne didn't even hesitate to think about it and gave the OK. Not everyone wanted to go on the roof. Only auntie Christina, uncle Kevin and mama Lyanne went on the roof with a blanket to keep them warm because it was mighty cold outside. In the end, they didn't miss the fireworks afterall. After the fireworks, papa Matt drove uncle Christian home because he had work the following day, and auntie Christina followed home as well.

Today was the last day of the cousin get-together so it was just board game day. They played Apples to Apples then Monopoly. The Monopoly game lasted couple of hours until it was time to meet with uncle Christian and auntie Christina at Asia Buffet on Van Nuys for dinner. While everyone was getting ready and packing their belongings, mama Lyanne bathed baby Kara. Baby Kara had graduated from the infant sling, so it was the first time mama Lyanne let baby Kara sat up in the tub without the sling. Baby Kara loved it! She kept on kicking and kicking so much that water started to splash out of the tub and onto the floor.