8/22 - 8/28/2022

8/22 - Monday

The girls have been reading a lot of full metal alchemist, and finding new details. When I was prepping breakfast for Ella, she pointed out a conversation of king Bradly with a shadowy figure, and said here is pride. So pride is not father :O

I made waffles on the spur of the moment. I first made waffles from the Costco protein waffles batter. Mimi: "I like these better than maffles." We called my waffles maffales - mama waffles. I them made some sesame maffles. I accidentally added 1 tbsp of salt instead of 1tsp. The salty waffles turned out delicious! Girls and Jam loved them :) 

Ella was wiggling while doing NNAT. She then said: "I'm singing a little song in my head."

8/23 - Tuesday

Had my personality test assisted career discussion with Anhang. I'm supposed to be a calm conflict resolver :') Well this optimistic harmonious person just spend half an hour looking at intramuscular injection videos and getting anxious.

I was calm mama when I told Ella that she doesn't need to do any NNAT or homework until she's ready. She needs to control her anger, not flip out when she gets a question wrong, before she's ready. Half of the time she can control her frustration, so I have hope. She might even pass the hi-cap test without practicing, while Amelia fails :') More mama daughter chanting of "life is supposed to be hard" :')

Wow Pinocchio kills the cricket :O

8/24 - Wednesday

Egg count is not bad, but kinda low. Put it out of my head for now. Alto again dropped my GonalF when I tried to change pen capacity. Note to self, just take the extra pokes and 300IU pens, eventually will give me more backup drug in total :')

Ella disrupted me many times today, alternating between asking for homework and complaining about homework after I give it to her. Hugs and repeating that she doesn't need to do homework until she is ready worked somewhat. It took time, but she did not destroy any homework today. 

After doing NNAT and fixing kids's daytime homework, I offered dessert them dessert. Jam brought 3 pastries home yesterday and made some muffins. I asked Mimi to fetch dessert while I heated the muffins. She brought one of the pastries and asked, with her downward frog mouth and big eyes, if she could split one with sister. I told her they can each have one. Mimi yelled to Ella that they can each have one. Ella quickly ran over and got hers. I also gave them a muffin each. While eating, the girls kept coming to me to thank me. Ella: "mama you are so nice. I didn't know you will give us so many desserts."

8/25 - Thursday

Got my 纯味 meat snacks delivered in the mail! Ice packs all melted and the meats were warm to the touch, but initial taste test was fine. Just need to eat them faster :)

When Ella was going to bed yesterday, she asked "did you put some of the 地牢很好吃 upstairs?". I found two more books from the upstairs book bags and gave them to her. She has been reading it, while refusing my offers to read it for her. Today she asked me lots of questions about the monsters in the 地牢。So I read the chapter that described how Mithran became dungeon master and got his desires eaten. The girls asked lots of questions about specific Chinese phrases. Good Chinese lesson accomplished.

Had difficult injections. Probably due to straying too far from belly button, so two pokes really hurt and I decided to redo them instead of pushing in. Plus had one extra gonalF shot to not waste small amounts of medicine. my right side seem to heal slower and have more problems - bumps and bruises. After sending the girls to bed, I treated myself to a glorious meat snack feast. While watching 鼻妹, which Ira sent to me, the videos are so funny!

The girls came back down and Ella asked me to read Pinocchio. I said yes, but after my meat feast. Mimi added that she needed Pinocchio because 地牢很好吃 was too scary. They lingered and watched 鼻妹 with me. They said they couldn't understand anything. I could barely understand 鼻妹's weird taiwanese accent + (super funny) tone. Despite not understanding the narration, the kids still found the videos hilarious. They demanded I don't watch without them. I finished up eating and went upstairs with the kids and read a chapter of Pinocchio. Where his legs were burned off, and he lied to his dad about it being clawed off by cats for no good reason. Then despite starving, asked his pears to be skilled. The girls went wild with laughter, even I found it so ridiculously funny, and accurate descriptions of a little kid. 

Got mysterious 刺 in finger at the end of the day T_T Brave Jam got it out quickly and precisely. So I have hope for the intramuscular injection!  

8/26 - Friday

I took the afternoon off to catch up on chores, and have a playdate with Sabrina. The girls both decided to take 1 full metal alchemist book over to the playdate, and they both decided to take a 3 in 1 volume. Ella: "If I take the manga, if I don't want to play I can read the manga." 

I asked the girls to pose pictures for me. After one picture section Mimi said "Hey we shouldn't take pictures, Clement is waiting." I agreed and we picked up the pace. 

The kids had fun at Sabrina's. They each jumped in the trampoline for about 10 minutes. All 3 kids  played separately XD Clement didn't want to play with Ella and Mimi, even with Sabrina's encouragements. He did look at full metal alchemist a little after Mimi and Ella took turns trying to show him. 

Sabrina took us to the back of her house, which is overran with blackberry vines full of ripe blackberries. The kids had a lot of fun picking.

Mimi threw a tantrum when I called for the kids to do NNAT. I told her she doesn't need to do NNAT unless she wants to learn. I explained why we were prepping, and what hi-cap class means. And reiterated that she doesn't need to go if she's not ready, and I'm sure she'll be ready one day. She seemed to understand and calm down, so i went to play with Ella and left her watching Jam's game. After a while she got mad at Jam about something and was taken away to timeout :') 

After both girls ate, it was too late to do NNAT. I made a notebook for them, and wrote down all the rewards they would get for doing homwork. We planned what reward they wanted tomorrow, Mimi immediately picked one dollar. Ella whined that she didn't want money because she had nothing to buy. Mimi, with big eyes, said excitedly "we can buy loom bands." Ella seemed intrigued. We checked the prices on Target.com, $22, very much in reach. Both girls picked one dollar, and requested to do two NNATs tomorrow, one for money for the future, and one for candy for now (tomorrow).  

I had laundry to do. I told the girls I might give them a reward if they do chores, although not one dollar, that's for harder work. The girls ran over and started folding immediately. I said I would give them a small candy. I'm not sure if they heard, but they continued folding. I got all the adult clothes and started going upstairs. Ella: "lets hurry and fold, before mom comes back." I came back from hanging laundry, and the girls really folded all their clothes. Neatly! I tucked them away. 

Ella decorated the reward notebook

I washed some blueberries for the girls. As I went to put them in their bowl, I noticed the plates had been put away at the sink. Ella said she did it to help :O I praised her for proactively cleaning up. Then asked her to take one back. She did, and said "oh I need one for Amelia". And brought another back. Mimi walked over for blueberries, she said "good job" to Ella. (for putting down the plates._ Ella said "you too." After eating blueberries, Ella said "Amelia this time you put the dishes with the sink, so we two both did good job, and we can ask mama for a dollar." I said one dollar is too much for putting away dishes, and gave them each a nerd candy. Ella gave me a nod and Mimi gave me a thumb up.

Injection bled more today again. I thin the skin fold is not a good place to poke.

The girls watched 鼻妹 with me, while I had my after shot meat splurge. The two videos are about a vacuum cleaner that vacuumed cat shit all over the floor, and her itchy butt. The girls LOVED them.

8/27 - Saturday

Had ultrasound at SRM Seattle. Eggs grew slow and unevenly. Monday appointment has to be in Seattle. Problems with SRM, just hope for one good embryo please.

After appointment I messaged jam asking where he was. I got no answer, so started walking towards MOHAI. After walking for a bit, I saw a small MOHAI in the distance, and decided it was too far. I messaged jam again, still no answer, so I called him. He said he just got back to the car. I went back to the car. And we headed for hangry panda for food. On the way there, I got a message from Ira: "啥？”。 Turned out I msged her instead of Jam, since she was the last person I messaged on gchat. I was mad at Jam for nothing 😂 Good thing I didn't mention until mystery solved. 

We walked around the block twice to wait for Hangry panda to open, and then for the food to be made. Hangry panda's sesame drink is salty and sweet and so tasty! Like my waffle that I accidentally put too much salt in 😆 Food was very tasty too.

We went to hang with Caitlin, for Jessica was in town. Hailey also came with her 8 month old Elaine. Baby Elaine is so very sweet. I pottied the girls at Caitlin's and we immediately left for Greenlake. We picnicked at the playground while the kids played. They played very well by themselves. I was able to make a few calls with SRM for the ^ problems, unsolvable :') And chatted a little with the adults. And of course played pokemon.  Greenlake raids get full so quickly. I caught a few buzzwoles :) When I showed off to Jam, he corrected me that they're not buzzHoles XD

The kids half watched happy feet while the adults did a puzzle and I traded Pokemon. Happy feet was kinda scary. There was a part where the penguin almost got eaten by birds and seal.

8/28 - Sunday 

Met with 骏驰 and his wife! Last time he was just done being a teenager, and now he's a mature adult with wife and good conversational skills :') Although he was always a good conversationalist. He reminds me of 老姨. 老姨 was always so nice and patient and encouraging, I loved her so much when I was a kid. 

We met at din tai fung for food. Instead of my usual ordering of too much food, I ended up ordering too little. The kids refused their rice, so Junchi finished it all, and I bet was still hungry XD In the morning Mimi woke up with a temper. It continued to din tai fung. Junchi presented the kids full metal alchemist books as gifts, vol 25, 26, 27! Ella gladly accepted. Mimi pouted and looked away with a 小 angry grin. She turned around after few minutes and accepted a book. The girls mostly ate car snacks, which we accepted in exchange of a pleasant get together. I learned some interesting things about Junchi, like he had a girlfriend in middle school, he was crafty asking yong xin out, and he feeds sugar to proteins XD  

We then went to the top of Microsoft office next door at Lincoln square. The view is so pretty as usual. Soda machine had lime coke! It might always have been there, I kinda miss the MSFT coke machine :') 

Next stop is bubble tea. We went to Bellevue square. We came in right at the matcha ice cream place, and had to get some. The kids shared a yam fish, which was very good! Happy lemon was busy as usual, and mi-tea was empty as usual, so we got mi-tea. I chatted with Junchi & watched the kids run around the candy store pulling Jam in all directions. Tough are the years without visa and clear path to permanent residency. Although starting out a job sounds exciting, and they both have clear careers they want to pursue. 

We then went to Bellevue downtown park to burn off the sugar. They talked about getting married during covid in the US. Their parents decided to get together in 沈阳 and have a feast themselves XD With them on zoom. We chatted in the sun, then it got too hot, and we moved into the shade. 

The kids played very well for a long time. Until Jam came with a crying Mimi. Junchi gently asked Mimi if she fell. Jam said no, Ella kicked her in the face. A grumpy Ella soon joined us. Jam wanted to take Ella to play, since she's the kid not crying. But Ella insisted she wanted to stay with mama, so she did. She read full metal while us adults chatted. She read very well for a long time. Junchi and YongXin commented on how quickly Ella was flipping through the book. After a while Ella found a page she wanted to show Mimi. We couldn't find Mimi, so Ella wondered away to the playground, holding the book to her chest. She roamed for a while, alternating looking for Mimi and reading. Eventually she came back, said grumpily "I think dad and Mimi went away without us." I replied maybe they took a walk to cool down and they sure will be back. She was still grumpy. While trying to comfort her, she suddenly yelled "I see her! MIMI!" We turned and saw a Mimi by the ducks. Mimi ran to Ella and Ella ran to Mimi - after failing to climb the wall Ella took the long way around. They met and looked at the page together. 

We took a loop around the park. Mimi gave up half way. Ella walked around with us. She tried to chase every duck.. One time she ran back and forth and chased many ducks into the water, then come back to us with a smile and said "I just like chasing ducks too much", and a little Ella chuckle. Junchi seem to really like kids :)  

We met up with Mimi and Jam. I decided to end the outing with a mooncake snack as reward. I opened one and gave to Mimi. I did say share one mooncake, but Mimi probably didn't hear and took the biggest bite into the mooncake, one bite and half was gone. I decided to give Ella another mooncake. The kids wolfed down the mooncake so so fast. We walked together to the car and I bid Junchi and YongXin goodbye. Feels so good hanging out with family. Really hope my aunts can move closer to my ma, relieve some loneliness and stress for her.

We headed to Uwajimaya for a grocery shop. The girls happily picked one dessert each, while pinching their nose near the bbq isle, where Jam also got 火肉 for us. We found the mooncake Junchi gave us in the store. They were $10 per mooncake :O No more one bites XD