Happy Birthday Daddy!

This coming Wednesday is Dad's birthday and Little Big Ben helped celebrate by handing Dad a lovely birthday card in the morning and sleeping without a peep at his grandparents' house so Mom and Dad can go celebrate at Fonda.

Ben and Mom think they both are so blessed. Dad is the most wonderful guy. Even with demanding and stressful work, Dad has always put us first. He's also very in tune with Ben from the moment he was born.

Have a happy birthday, Daddy!

We went on our usual morning walk along the canal when Ben noticed a little girl on her tricycle. Not only that, but she came over and said to us “Ni hao”. Ben conversed with her using whatever Chinese vocabulary he had in his repertoire at the time. This includes Zheige (this), Ma-yi (ant), hao (good), gou (dog) then they ran off and played together. Little Big Ben recently started to play very well with kids his age and older. We agree that he’s definitely not shy. Just like a politician, he goes around saying to random passers-by hi, hello, bye. At the playground, he expresses interest in what other kids do and play and is eager to join.

Choo...choo....

Little Big Ben just got a new toy. Hmm...but it’s actually not that new. It’s the train set that used to belong to Dad and his sisters when they were kids. Ben obviously was very excited after having played with just the one Thomas the Train this past few months. Now he has more trains and many tracks. An intricate train track Dad builds would normally last for about 10 minutes before Ben tears it all down…only to be beautifully rebuilt again by Dad. He doesn’t seem to mind. Mom still can’t decide who’s more excited to receive this fun family treasure.

It's now all about the trains in the Taussig household.

Happy hiking

We tried the packpack for the first time to see how it works with Ben. Looks like Little Big Benloves the free ride and the view from up there. So much so that he was singing and wouldn't stop talking the whole hike. Actually the latter semd to be true to most occasion these days. Double B is now unstoppable when it comes to talking!!! Anyway, everyone did well on the hike--especially Dad who had to carry the heavy load. Great job Dad!

How to tell Ben loves Cheerios..

He even said "Cheerio" just perfectly the other day. What a proud moment for Dad!

Petting zoo

We met up with some friends at the zoo down in San Jose back in May. He enjoyed petting the goats and followed some of them around as they walked, ate and or tried to get away from these many little petting strangers.

Ben loves animals and appears to be gentle with them even those in his books. His favorites are dogs, cats and birds. Lately we have been slowed down on our hikes because Ben insists on exploring those tiny ants marching on the ground. "Ma-i" (the word means ant in Mandarin), he shouted with excitement as he aquatted down to watch the marching activity.

Little helper

Ben loves pressing those buttons on the washer and dryer. That's the reward for helping out with the laundry.



And the sounds of the vacuum cleaner didn't seem to bother him.

Now that the house chores are done, we can all head out to the park. Yay!!!