At first, Nelson attached the GoPro camera on the front part of Nathan’s helmet. Because of the added weight on the front, the helmet kept sliding down Nathan’s face. So Nelson attached the camera at the back of the helmet.
Nathan biking to the park… well more like walking while on his bike 🙂
Once Nathan got to the park, he didn’t want to be on his Skuut bike anymore. He just wanted to play. Nathan going down the slide.
Today we finalized our adoption for Nathan. We finalized our adoption in China. So we need to do a post placement adoption in USA so that in future, we have proof of adoption for Nathan that is recognized by USA court.
Before we met the judge, there were other people there with their own case that the judge needed to process. Since these cases were public, we got to hear some of the cases. It felt like we were in Judge Judy show. Some of the cases had to deal with eviction and property issues. Since Nathan was making noises in the courtroom, I had to take him out and had Nelson get me when it was our turn to see the judge.
Since our adoption is considered confidential, the courtroom was cleared. After the judge looked over our paperwork, she said ‘Nelson and Suzette Siu are officially parents of Nathan Siu.’ At first, she was getting confused with Nelson and Nathan since both start with letter ‘N’. She thought our son’s name was Nelson. So she kept saying ‘you are here to finalize the adoption of Nelson…’ 🙂
Afterwards, the judge did a surprise for us. She actually baked us cupcakes and gave Nathan a teddy bear! I didn’t expect that to happen inside the court meeting.
The judge even offered to have our picture taken inside the courtroom.
The judge gave Nathan a cup of water. Not sure if Nathan drank any of it, but for some reason he decided to make a big wet mess in the courtroom. He purposely spilled some water onto the table! Then after I thought I had cleaned up most of the water and didn’t realized that there were still more water inside Nathan’s cup, Nathan decided to spill more water onto the table! :-0
Right now, we are waiting for Nathan’s Birth Certificate which I hear will take several months since this process has to go through the State.
Overall, I am glad we are done with most of the paperwork. This Post Placement Adoption took about a year because we had to do a post placement evaluation with our social worker which took a year. She visited us every few months and every few months she wrote a report. That report is one of the paperwork the judge needed to see. Our social worker told us that now there is a new regulation where the post placement evaluation will be 5 years instead of 1 year! Wow, that is a long time! That will cost a lot of money too!
We went to Las Vegas for few days with my inlaws. We brought Nathan with us this time. I thought it would be a bad idea to take him to Vegas, but it turned out to be fine minus his ‘terrible 2’ tantrum 🙂
It was good to be out of town for a while after finding out about my coworker’s/friend’s tragic death, but at same time she was always on my mind especially just finding about the horrible news just few days ago.
Vegas (view from plane)
In Vegas, we stayed at Vdara since it has a kitchenette with microwave. I brought some baby food with me for Nathan’s breakfast and lunch. Good thing I brought some Gerber food for Nathan because we get out of the hotel past lunch time. I always try to make sure Nathan has his lunch at same time so he doesn’t get cranky when we are out.
This time we brought the small stroller with us to make things more easier bringing it to the airport and carrying it along with our luggages… well actually we only had one medium size luggage. I was going to bring two luggages to fit everything but I thought it would be easier to handle one luggage, a stroller, carry-on bags and Nathan at same time.
Vdara hotel
View from hotel
Video of Nathan in hallway and inside hotel room
Our first dinner was at Margaritaville where Nelson loves their ‘Perfect Margarita’. Nathan had a monkey balloon made for him.
Nathan loved throwing coins into the fountain
Can’t believe someone threw a dollar bill into the fountain
Of course I had to have a frozen hot chocolate at Serendipity
At the hotel, we went for a swim. Nelson bought a small GoPro camera that is outdoor and can be used underwater. Since the camera is inside a case, the sound isn’t as great. I like this GoPro camera so much, I can’t wait to use it again!
It was very sunny and humid in Vegas. Here is Nathan in his stroller. I put my sweater in front of him to protect him from the sun.
Nathan enjoying a stroll on the moving walkway or flat escalator.
Nathan on the tram from Bellagio to Aria Hotel
Since we booked our stay at Vdara, we got tickets for Elvis Cirque Du Soliel
So many things to do at work today. Working on a big project and hoping to finish most of it before I go out of town. Most of the time I can go through my job without asking a question to one of our engineers. But if I get stuck with something, I write an email. I work from home most of the time so sending an email with my questions is more convenient.
There is always one person I send most of the questions to because for one thing she replies to me all the time and no matter how busy she gets she still finds time to help others. I sent an email to my friend Jess around 10am in morning. Few minutes passes by then an hour passes by without a response. I just thought that she wasn’t in the office. So I looked at the calendar to see if she took the day off today. The calendar didn’t show anything about her being out of the office today.
It’s not like her to not respond to my email. After I took my lunch, I noticed that she didn’t respond yet. So I sent her a second email. Still no response.
After lunch around 1:30pm, the engineering manager emailed the entire staff for a meeting. I google talk to one of my other coworker to ask what the meeting was about since she was working in the office that day. She told me that the news is very bad. I told her what does she mean. She told me it was about our friend Jess. She emailed me an article that talked about the gruesome murder of 5 people in San Francisco. I said ‘I hope this isn’t true!’
After reading the article over and over again, I was in shock. I cried out. I couldn’t believe this was happening. Learning about it was so hurtful. I was like ‘Jess? She can’t be dead!’ Luckily my son was still napping. I didn’t want him to see me cry.
I called my office at 1:45pm. All staff were in the large conference room. The engineering manager told us that something bad happened to Jess and that she is dead. I asked if it was really her who died and whether if she was acting differently in the office the past few days. My coworkers told me that she acted normal and nothing was out of the ordinary. After hearing the news, I still didn’t want to believe she was dead.
While in the car later in the day after work with my husband, the radio station 106.9 KCBS reported that one of the victims who was found dead in the house was named Yingxue ‘Jess’ Lei who worked as a software engineer at a medical office in Emeryville. At that point, I had to accept the truth that she was gone… that she was one of the dead victims.
Later in the night, I watch the 10 o’clock news on channel 2 and the 11pm news on channel 5. The news on channel 5 even showed a video of my company in Emeryville to show where Jess had worked.
I was tired but I couldn’t sleep. I kept waking up in the middle of the night. I was thinking about the pain she had to endure and the fear she had to face. I was still thinking ‘my friend gone?… why?… how could someone do this terrible thing to her and her family?’ ‘Why do bad things happen to good people?’
I have known Jess for about 5 years. She was a gentle person. She isn’t the type to hurt anyone. No matter how bad and stressed things got at work, I always saw her happy side. Out of those 5 years I have known her, I have only seen her vent out her anger once about something. We were having lunch at Buckhorn Grill in Bay Street Emeryville. While eating, she was venting out certain issues about something in her life. I was actually kinda amazed to see her angry because I wasn’t used to seeing her like this. But overall, she was the nicest, happy, thoughtful person.
One of the things I like about Jess was that she was neutral. She never took sides. She was there for me when I needed to vent out. She never got tired of listening to my issues. She was always there to listen and give me advice.
When I went to the office to work, Jess was always the person who visited my cube to say Hi, Goodmorning and to just simply chat. She would always ask about my son Nathan. She met Nathan one time when I took him to Emeryville and I had time to stop by my workplace.
Jess loved Buckhorn Grill. Whenever we go out for lunch, she always wanted to go to Buckhorn Grill. I asked her ‘why do we always go to Buckhorn Grill?’ 🙂 I got her into liking the lamb shank at Elephant Bar because that is what I always order from there. So whenever we had lunch at Elephant Bar, she always ordered lamb shank.
Between 2pm – 3pm, we always took our breaks together. We would just go downstairs and walk for a while and just talk about anything (life, work, vacations, etc).
Now everything about her are just memories. I will never be able have more fun times with her.
Earlier when this incident first came out in the news, the reporters said it may have been a murder-suicide. Now the story goes that it may be that the family were specifically targeted to kill due to some stupid debt. One of Jess’s family member named Vincent Lei had some ties to a Chinese gang about 10 years ago according to the news. The gruesome deaths may have been gang related. If the killer isn’t among the 5 dead, I hope the bastard(s) gets caught. This was a senseless murder.
I feel angry, I feel sad. My friend didn’t have to suffer like this.
Here is the article from SF Gate
Jess has been my coworker for some years but I also consider her as a dear friend. She was so young. She will be greatly missed.
Wow, can’t believe there are many appts for one little guy. Few weeks ago, he had an appt at UCSF. Today, my husband took him to his first dental checkup in the morning. I didn’t go since I had to work. But I did go to his cardiologist appt in Fairfield in the afternoon. My son will have a 2nd dental appt for clean up.
At the cardiologist office, they took his height and weight. Then the receptionist took us into another room where she turned on a TV and played Cars 2. Out of all children’s movies, they showed a Pixar movie at the office. Just weird how we always see things that remind us of Pixar. On the plane coming back from a trip, they showed a Pixar movie. At Best Buy, they show a Pixar movie. When we were in London, my husband saw one of his Pixar coworkers. When we were at Napa Rose in Disneyland for my bday at the chef’s counter, John Lasseter was having dinner there. On Highway 80, I see Pixar license plate covers. On the cruise ship we were on few years ago, two little girls were playing with Woody, Jesse and Buzz. Even people I follow in Twitter, they talk about their nephew wanting Cars toys as gifts. Pixar is like everywhere.
At the cardiologist office, the doctor used his stethoscope to listen to Nathan’s heart. He had Nathan sit up, lay down and stand up to see how his heart beats. Afterwards, he had Nathan lay down and placed some type of electrodes near his chest. He put some ultrasound gel on his stomach, chest and neck and used a machine with a monitor to see the heart. The machine was very small like laptop but with more fancy switches, buttons, etc. The image on the monitor was actually very clear. I found it fascinating seeing my son’s heart beat.
While the doctor was busy with the examination, Nathan was very good about not throwing a tantrum. Nathan was too busy watching Cars 2 on the TV screen. From time to time, he would turn and look at what the doctor is doing. But he didn’t make a fuss.
After a while, I was getting anxious because the doctor wasn’t saying anything while he was doing the examination. I wanted to ask him how things are looking so far but I just allowed the doctor finish his work. The only noises we heard inside the room were Cars 2 movie and Nathan’s heart beat. During the examination, my son had to let out two farts! It was so embarrassing.
After the doctor had time to listen to and examine Nathan’s heart, the doctor finally told us that our son’s heart is good and healthy.
Interesting poster in the doctor’s office
Nathan watching Cars 2
Also today, we had a meeting with the educational therapist Mary. Mary brought another woman with her named Debbie who will be working with our son in the coming weeks. Not sure what Debbie’s plan is for our son yet. I guess we’ll find out. Our son’s appt with Debbie will be a home visit. Then our son will resume his speech therapy with Cathy in Napa. But Cathy will be retiring and we will be assigned to another speech therapist.
For a little guy, my son has a lot of appts.
Also today, we went to the court house in Napa to ask about some paperwork. We are doing a post-placement adoption. Since we only finalized adoption in China, we need to do one in USA. Also in future, if we need to show proof of adoption, we can show adoption paperwork from USA. Right now, we only have adoption paperwork from China. Once we have all paperwork ready, we will have to go to Court and meet with a judge.
Nathan was given sunglasses after his dental appt. Just funny how he was trying to put it onto Smeagol
About 250 Pixar employees got free tickets to see Disney On Ice at the Oracle Arena. My husband was able to get tickets for the show.
At the Oracle Arena, there were tables setup outside where Pixar employees can check-in and get the tickets. Also with the tickets, our son got free gifts. He got a Mickey Mouse hat and coloring book.
After check-in, we were lead to some kind of dining room where they had snacks and drinks just for Pixar families. I didn’t realized this was a big Pixar family event. I just thought we were there just to watch the show.
We even got cake too! There were two cakes (white and chocolate cake). I had both cakes. 🙂
Just for Pixar families, we got to take pictures with Woody and Buzz
Hey, where are you taking those balloons!
Afterwards, we walked to the stadium for the show. All of the Pixar families sat in the same area. While waiting for the show, Nathan met new friends. He also got some glow-in-the-dark bracelets from his new friends
Some pics of the show
Nathan’s reaction during the show
Other videos
Nathan had a 3 hrs appt at UCSF this morning to see the following doctors:
Speech Pathologist
Nurse
Genetics
Orthodontics
Plastic Surgery
First appt was with the Speech Pathologist. After evaluating Nathan, she recommends that Nathan should continue his weekly speech therapy . Nathan talks a lot and beginning to say short sentences such as mommy eating, Smeagol home and my book. He says a lot of words but most of the words are not as clear. He still leaves out the first letter of the word like ‘addy’ which is daddy or ‘ain’ for train or ‘anket’ which is blanket or jacket. Since we spend more time with Nathan, most of the time we know what he is telling us. But if he is with other family members they may not be able to understand what he is saying. March is the month when he will begin speech therapy again but we need to call his speech therapist in Napa to schedule.
After meeting with the Speech Pathologist, we waited for 30 – 45 mins in the waiting room. Waiting was boring for me but Nathan had a good time playing with the toys.
After 45 mins of waiting, we met with the Nurse and asked us how Nathan’s health and if he is eating OK, etc. Then we met with two genetics doctors. The genetics doctors were pretty much out of luck in getting answers from us because we really don’t know anything about Nathan’s family history. We only know that Nathan was dropped off at a hospital the day after he was born and he lived with the orphanage thereafter. So we only know about Nathan’s life at the orphanage and nothing about his bio family.
But what the genetics found after examining Nathan is that he has a heart murmur. From what they were saying, it kinda scares me because they made it look like it is something serious. So they called Nathan’s Pediatric doctor in Benicia to let them know what they found. We have an appt with his Pediatric doctor this Thurs late in the afternoon.
Then after another boring 30 mins of wait, we met with the final team: Orthodontics and Plastic Surgery. The Orthodontics looked at Nathan’s teeth. The surgeons who operated on Nathan’s palette looked at his mouth to make sure that the palette is healing properly. When Nathan turns 5 years old, he may need to have another surgery.
So overall, Nathan’s repaired palette looks good. But now I am just concerned about the heart murmur. Not sure why his Pediatric in Benicia didn’t hear this heart murmur when Nathan had a doc appt with her few months ago.
Since it was a nice day today, we went to have lunch at Five Guys Burger. It was our first time eating there. Their cheeseburger was actually pretty good.
After lunch, we took Nathan at the Nut Tree Plaza to ride the carousel, train and do other fun stuff. There is a $2 fee to ride the carousel and train. This kind lady bought an extra ticket she didn’t need. So she gave us her carousel ticket.
Our little critter excited to be on carousel
Then hopped onto a rocking horse with daddy then mommy
Nut Tree train
Nathan and daddy on train ride
Nathan playing chess
He loves riding those cars
Nope, it’s not child labor! Nathan wanted to carry the hamper himself. He is such a good helper!
Nathan love’s drinking milk!
Feb 17
Nelson and I had a ‘date’ night last Friday Feb 17. Since we have Nathan, having a date night is very very rare. Last Friday after work, we dropped off Nathan at my inlaws’ house in San Francisco before the Bay Bridge west bound closes for road work. After we dropped Nathan off at my inlaws, Nelson and I went to Pixar to watch the movie The Chronicle which wasn’t a bad movie. I love any sci-fi movies more than romance movies.
Before the movie, I didn’t want to spoil my appetite for our late dinner by having a sandwich or burger. So I decided to have one cupcake ‘Matcha Green Tea’ from Sweet Treat Stop.
After the movie, we headed for Walnut Creek to have dinner at Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse. We both got the 3-course dinner for $50. If you order the rib eye by itself, it already costs around $40. So we thought getting the 3-course for $50 is better deal than just getting one entree for $40. My husband and I had rib eyes in other steakhouse restaurants. But we both feel that the rib eye at Ruth’s Chris is the best so far. For appetizer, I got the Caesar salad while my husband got the garden salad. If you order salad by itself, it will cost about $10.
For main entree, we both ordered the rib eye plus two sides (mash potatoes and garlic green beans). If you didn’t choose the 3-course dinner, the sides would be extra between $3 – $10.
For beverage, I only had water while my husband got Long Island Iced Tea.
For some restaurants that offer 3-course meal, you have to share dessert. However at Ruth’s Chris, each of us got our own dessert plate.
Feb 18
Next morning, we picked up my niece Jewel because I wanted to take her out for her 13th bday! She is a teenage brat now. 🙂 And I know she will be reading this. hehehe
We headed to San Francisco. My husband took Golden Gate Bridge to go to SF since the Bay Bridge was still closed for road work.
My husband dropped us off at downtown then he headed off to his parents’ house.
My niece and I went to Sais Vietnamese restaurant on Washington Street to have appetizers (lemon grass chicken spring roll and pot stickers)
After appetizers, we went to Peets Coffee for hot chocolate and to take advantage of the buy one get one free drink.
Afterwards we went to the Ferry Building to check out some stores like Miette, Sur La Table and others
Inside the Ferry building, we found this interesting gelatin art that you can actually eat
Since it was still early for dinner, my niece and I walked towards the shopping area near Union Square.
For dinner, we had dinner reservations at Roy’s Restaurant.
We got the 3-course dinner. For 1st course, I got the duck confit flat bread. The duck confit flat bread was a big portion. I couldn’t finish it.
For 2nd course, I ordered the pork chop while my niece ordered the stuffed chicken.
For 3rd course, we both ordered Roy’s popular dessert… the melting hot chocolate souffle.
Since it was my niece’s bday, she also got an extra mini-dessert and fruits
Feb 20
Nelson, Nathan and I went to Palo Alto today. We had lunch at Sancho Taqueria which got 4 out of 5 stars from Yelp. My husband ordered chicken burrito, nachos and steak tacos.
Nathan just loves playing with the straw
After lunch, we walked around Standford Shopping Mall. Only thing I bought from the mall were two cupcakes from Sprinkles.
When we were about to leave Palo Alto, I noticed this bakery called Paris Baguette. Since we don’t often go to Palo Alto, I told Nelson I wanted to check it out. I bought a chocolate twist bread and white chocolate brioche. Paris Baguette sells desserts and makes specialty coffees too.
Since we pass Berkeley going home, we made a stop at Cream Nation. I got two ice cream sandwiches which cost $4 total. My husband had the cookie dough ice cream with chocolate chip cookies while I got their ultimate chocolate ice cream with the regular tuxedo cookies.
