Ever since Anders knew that the screen on the back of the camera will show pictures and videos, he kept coming to ask for watching his videos. He would not stay to let me take pictures; he would just come to force me to sit down so he can see the screen. 
He was 18 months old back then.
We started potty training for Anders about three months ago. He normally has his first poop in the morning around his breakfast time. So we put him on the toilet in the morning everyday. He pooped in the toilet three days in a row and then stopped.
About a month ago, we went to our cousin’s place and I didn’t realized that Anders pooped in his diaper and didn’t change it till a few hours later. Somehow his skin was red, swollen and watery. Apparently it hurt since he would cry every time when we changed his diapers. We then let him not wear his diapers hoping that it would heal faster. We just kept asking and taking him to pee in the toilet from time to time. Of course there were many “accidents” at the very beginning. Since it took a few days before his skin healed completely, we might as well potty train him again. Surprisingly, only after a week, the number of accidents decreased significantly and he can also tell us when he wanted to pee. He pointed either front or back depending on if he wanted to pee or poop but he only said “尿尿” (pee pee in Chinese). Three weeks later, he now has been pooping in the toilet every time for seven days in a row.
The funniest thing was a couple weeks after we started his potty training, he woke up in the middle of night and kept saying “尿尿, 尿尿” (pee pee, pee pee). He sit up with his eyes closed, pointed to his butt and asked to go to the toilet.
This past weekend, we drove down to Los Angeles to visit Mandy, Will and Andy. We only took Anders since it would be a bit too much to take both Anders and Arden for such a long road trip. Mandy is my high school classmate and we just realized that this year is the 20th anniversary since we knew each other. Can’t believe that the time we knew each other can be counted by decades now. Harrison was also amazed that it’s also almost a decade for our friendship with Andy.
This was a nice and relaxing trip. We started driving down highway 101 around 8:30 AM passing by Santa Barbara. We looked up Yelp for some tacos at Lilly’s Taco and walked on the wharf. Anders had so much fun running around and looking at the ocean and boats while I was so scared that he would fall over the fences into the water.
We arrived San Gabriel at Mandy and Will’s place around 8 PM and had a nice late Shanghai dinner. Since Anders was too tired, we skipped the “must” stop, pearl milk tea.
Mandy and Will got their PhD last year and both worked at USC now. We explored at the neighborhood on our own since Friday was still a working day. Andy could not escape from his work either. We went to Huntington Library and were just amazed. It was a very nice and well maintained park. Poor little Anders walked so much since we didn’t bring his stroller from the car. He also got his first boo boo at the Chinese Garden in Huntington Library. Too bad that we missed out the English Tea Room inside the Rose Garden since there was no seat available. The food looked delicious and cute.
The following two days were combined with a lot of eating, drinking (pearl milk tea), and board games. We walked around The Grove and Farmers Market on Saturday and also enjoyed Will’s home-made popcorn chicken. It was just like what you can buy in the store. Very yummy and tasty and you must have the pearl milk tea to go with it. We went back to one of my favorite restaurant, 老夫子 and also tried out a couple new ones like The Open Door and 印地安. Harrison and I missed Japan and Taiwan…
Yup! And many rounds of board games. Harrison got us into this German board game called Catan and has introduced this game to our friends and relatives. No one does not fall in love with it so far.
Anders was pretty behaved on the road and only fussed a couple times. It boosted our confidence for the next road trip. Maybe we will be able to take Arden along then.
Harrison got a new nickname, Caveman. He absolutely loved his polarized sunglasses. You know how harsh the sun is in Southern California. He did not even remember that he was wearing it while taking pictures and going inside the house since it just made his eyes feel very comfortable. He was yelling that the camera was broken since all of a sudden he could not see the screen after he turn the camera 90 degrees (remeber?! the sunglass is polarized). He cannot go out without putting on his sunglasses so we all laughed at him calling him the Caveman.
Oh yeah! Anders also had a big surprising jump on his “language” skills. He started being able to speak many two to three words together during this trip.
