edison knows about all the coolest places that i’ve never heard of.  today, he invited me to check out the ardenwood historic farm.  it was sheep day!

a sheep farmer taught us about sheep and what they eat.  then he gave us a tour of the farmhouse and taught us how to milled corn.  after that, we brought the corn out to where the sheep live, and we hand-fed them the corn that we had just milled!

in exchange for our help (and maybe as a bribe to keep quiet about the 2 year-olds doing his job), the sheep farmer gave us some organic popcorn.  it’s actually just a whole cob of corn with dried kernels on it, but he says that if mama puts it in a bag and microwaves it, it’ll turn into popcorn.  i’ll let you know how that turns out

after we finished our sheep duty, edison and i explored the rest of the farm.  we saw bunnies, piglets, peacocks, turkeys, cows, chickens and roosters.  there was also a real live pumpkin patch — the pumpkins were actually growing out of the ground!  one of the chickens followed me all over the farm everywhere i went.  i’m not sure if she wanted my corn or if she just thought i was cute.

aside from that stalker chicken, ardenwood farms was so much fun.  i hope we get to go back for rabbit day and goat day later this month.  i think i’ll skip chicken day.

10/5 UPDATE:  my one cobb of corn made two giant bowls of popcorn!  i LOVE popcorn

remember when i borrowed chloe’s bike seat and took mama for a ride around the park?  well, mama got the hint and she got me one for my birthday   apparently, some of my other friends got their own bike seats, too.  i dunno how — it wasn’t their birthdays.

so today, chloe, abby, logan, greyson, and i took our daddies on a bike ride along the los gatos creek trail.  mama couldn’t go with us because one of my aunties borrowed her bike and wouldn’t give it back.  i won’t name names, but it starts with a “j” and ends with an “udy”.  well, there’s that, and also the fact that they don’t make helmets small enough for baby sister’s head.  it’s okay though, mama and baby sister met us for a picnic lunch at vasona park.  it costs $6 to park there, but the ranger let mama park for free

i had so much fun that i didn’t want the ride to end.  dada had fun, too.  he wants this ride to become a regular thing.  mama disagrees.  she says that next time, my friends and i should take our mommies on the bike ride!

this morning around 10am, my friends and family starting coming over to my house.  everyone was hugging and high fiving me and wishing me happy birthday.  then all of a sudden, we heard a train whistle right outside the front door.  we all rushed out to see what was going on.  it was a train!  a real live train!

dada gave out train whistles to all my friends, and we blew them as we rode around the neighborhood.  most of my friends took turns riding the train, but i was having so much fun that i stayed on the entire time.

after an hour of train rides, we all went inside and decorated wooden trains with markers and stickers, and then we played with them on my new train table.  (we also decorated the couch, the carpet, and ourselves.)  mama also gave everyone train coloring books personalized with their own names.  we colored with a set of brand new crayons from the 1970′s.  it had colors in there that you can’t find anymore — like indian red and teal blue.  (mama hesitated to open the box because it’s probably a collector’s item now!)  cool, huh?  oh yeah, and we even had a thomas the train cake!  that’s a lot of train stuff.  mama said that my party was just as much work (but more fun) than planning her and dada’s wedding

thanks everyone, for coming to my train party and making my birthday extra special!  i wish i could have invited more people, but my house just isn’t big enough to fit everyone.  (click here to see more photos from my party.)

i didn’t get to go to my first wedding until i was 8 months old.  baby sister is only 8 weeks old and she went with us to a wedding this weekend!  we got all dressed up in our fancy clothes.  i heard that sweater vests have been “out” since the 90′s, but i wore mine anyway.  gung-gung says that fashion trends cycle every 20 years or so, so i wanted to bring the sweater vest back in style for this fall.  i guess logan had the same idea because he was rockin’ his sweater vest, too!

during the wedding ceremony, auntie judy was playing the piano.  i kept telling mama to bring me over there so i could play too, but mama wasn’t listening.  i know she must have heard me though, because i was the only one talking.  everyone else was quietly watching the wedding party walk down the aisle.  maybe chatty kids like me are the reason for adult-only weddings.

lots of my friends were at the wedding, too.  logan and chloe were at my table.  at the table next to us were greyson, abby, and my new friend allison.  some of the other kids went home early, but baby sister and i partied until past 10pm!  maybe that’s why we look drunk in this family photo

i am getting old.  it used to be that when i went to parties, i was always one of the youngest kids.  but not today.  we went to abby’s birthday party, and i was one of the oldest kids there!  (baby sister was the youngest.)  her party was at park.  there was lots of yummy food to eat (hot off the grill!), and a lot of my friends were there for me to play with.  we played with the awesome bubble guns that abby gave out as party favors, we played in the playground, and i even got to ride in chloe’s bike seat (with mama).  riding in a a bike seat is so much fun!  when i grabbed the handlebars, extended my legs to the sides, and yelled “more!  more!” mama knew that was a hint that i wanted one for my birthday.

parties in the park are so much fun.  too bad my birthday is in october — the weather will be unpredictable, and i’d be bummed if my party got rained out   happy birthday, abby!

abby’s party was so fun that we went to her house to see her again, today. (plus, we had to drop off her birthday gift since baby sister forgot to bring to the party.) baby sister and i have been arguing about whose friend abby is. baby sister says that she’s her friend because she’s only 10 months older than her, and she’s a girl. i say she’s my friend — even though abby is almost a year younger than me, there are more things that we can do together now that she’s walking. plus, i met her first. what do you think?

i don’t get what labor day is all about — nobody is actually laboring.  but i know that it means mama and dada get a three day weekend, and that’s good enough for me!  holiday weekends are the best because i get to hang out with family and have playdates with my friends.  here are some of the highlights from my long weekend:

auntie barbara flew up from southern california to spend the weekend with me and sienna.  mostly me   we played at the playground, we went out for froyo, and we hung out all weekend long.  we even had dinner with all the tanakas to celebrate uncle randy’s birthday.  uncle randy let me help blow out his candles to practice for my birthday (coming up next month)!

i got to see my friends, too.  i had a sushi lunch with isaac, and then i had a dinner playdate at matthew’s house.  the playdate was supposed to be just us boys hanging out, but baby sister wanted to go with me.  i told her that there were no girls allowed, but she got all dressed up anyway.  and then i felt bad, so i let her tag along.  matthew has so many awesome toys.  he even has a super cool balance bike that he let me try out.  (mama is trying to decide if she is going to get me one of these or a regular tricycle.)  i had fun playing with logan and matthew.  baby sister just slept.  how boring.

yay for long weekends.  can’t wait til the next one!

baby sister was under-weight at her 2 week checkup, so our doctor told her to eat more and get chubby.  umm…  i think she’s gone a little too far.  she’s been packing on the pounds, and now, she is growing up too fast!

mama is sad because baby sister is outgrowing all of her cute clothes.  and she never even had a chance to wear some of them!  baby is not even 6 weeks old, and she is already too big for all of her newborn outfits.  she can barely even fit the 3-6 month onesies that she has!  yesterday, mama made her wear one of her newborn outfits just so she could wear it one time and have her photo taken in it.  mama is so mean, huh?  poor baby sister couldn’t even extend her legs in that thing

i am sad that baby sister is growing up because that means that she’ll be going out without me more often.  she had her own playdate today!  she went out for sushi with her friend malia, who is my friend maddie’s little sister.  can you believe that baby sister is 1.5 weeks older than malia?  i didn’t think she was older than anyone — but she is growing up so fast.  (if you can’t tell, that’s malia on the left and baby sister on the right.  the waiter at the restaurant thought they were related.  it must be because they have matching hairdos )

when baby sister got home from her lunch date, i laid down, stretched out my arm, and patted the ground so she would lie down next to me.  i put my arms around her and kissed her.  i missed my baby sister!  i don’t want her to grow up too fast.  although, it would be nice if she would play with me instead of just sleeping all day.

ever since baby sister came along, mama hasn’t been able to spend as much time with me as usual.  it seems like she is feeding baby sister all the time.  but that’s okay — it has given me and dada a chance to do some male-bonding.  like, if mama is busy when it’s time for lunch/dinner, dada makes my meals and helps me eat.  and if mama isn’t available to do my bedtime routine, dada helps me wash up and puts me to bed.  and if i get up in the middle of the night, dada comes to tuck me back into bed and stays with me until i fall back asleep.

dada says that baby sister is still too young to go out in public (and you thought i was going to be the overprotective one!).  and since mama has to stay home to feed her, dada and i have been going out by ourselves a lot more, lately.  dada takes me to gym class, he swims with me during swim class, and we go out to do other fun things, too.  the other day, we went to the park with grandma and auntie barbara to have a picnic and play in the playground.  fun!

tonight, we went to pump-it-up clare’s birthday.  it was a pajama party.  how cool!  it was my first time getting to go out and play in my pajamas.  since i have never liked jumpy “earthquake” houses, mama and dada thought i was going to hate it there.  well, i’m still not a fan of the earthquakes, but i had a blast playing on the slides!  both dada and i got a good workout.  plus, i made a new friend and got some awesome toys to take home in my goodie bag  happy birthday clare!

i’ve been having a great time hanging out with dada — he’s my new BFF.  but i hope baby sister can come out with us soon.  i can’t wait to introduce her to all my friends and show her all my local hotspots!

usually, our weekends are packed with my social activities.  but mama was so sure that the baby was going to come last weekend, that we didn’t make any plans at all.  in fact, mama came thiiis —> <— close to telling dada not to go to work last thursday.  she even packed her bag for the hospital.  but nothing.  and then last night, mama was so sure (again) that the baby was coming that she took a shower and got all ready to go to the hospital.  but after she got out of the shower… nothing.  next time she says that today is the day, i’m not going to believe her.

but even though we didn’t have anything planned this weekend, it was an eventful one.  everything we did was a game time decision, but it worked out great.

on friday night, i went to gym class.  uncle henry came to visit, and we all had dinner together.  he was planning to take koda home with him since mama was so sure that she was going to be in the hospital.  but since there was no baby, koda stayed home with us.

on saturday, i met matthew and chloe at CDM.  now that i know how to peel bananas by myself, i kept trying to peel the one in the wonder cabinet.  it was defective.  mama said it was plastic.  (why would they put a fake plastic banana on the dining table?  that’s just mean.)  there is also a new mammoth discovery! exhibit at CDM, so matthew and i went on a dig for fossils.  chloe didn’t want to help us.  i guess girls just don’t like getting dirty.

in the evening, auntie mabel and auntie jillie drove down for an impromptu visit and we all went out for hot pot.  i had fun staying out past my bedtime hanging with the quon girls

on sunday, i had swim class.  after class, we saw auntie jan, uncle harvey, and their new goldendoodle puppy, huey.  (dada called him a “snickerpoodle” )  then we went to visit grandma and had lunch at her house.

busy weekend, considering that we had no plans, right?  and then i realized that the baby didn’t come because we had no plans.  i’ll bet if we had organized a big party, the baby definitely would have come last weekend.  that’s how i know that the baby’s a girl — she’s waiting for a big crowd to gather before she makes her grand entrance.

after spending the day at gilroy gardens with matthew and logan, i passed out in the car on the way home. the park especially wore me out today because it was sooo hot (temps in the high 90s) and it was practically empty! we were all shocked because we expected big crowds and long lines — but we didn’t have to wait in any lines all day long. yay for gilroy gardens on the 4th of july, yay for matthew for the great idea, and yay for auntie audrey for taking these photos

after that exhausting day, i could have napped until dinnertime. but mama recently figured out that if i only sleep 10-11 hours per day (including my nap), i sleep through the night. and when i sleep through the night, that means that mama and dada get to sleep through the night. so, mama interrupted my nap and woke me up from a deep sleep. how rude.

after dinner, mama let me stay up until 10pm. she said that it was a special occasion and that she wanted to let me see fireworks. but i know the truth — she just wanted me to be tired enough to sleep through the night. we looked out the window for a long time, but we didn’t see anything other than a few stars and an airplane. we sure heard a lot of fireworks exploding around our house, though. oh well. maybe next year

happy 4th of july, everyone! hope your holiday was safe and fun and that you got to see more fireworks than i did.