Mexico

Over the winter break, K-bao & family made a trip down to Mexico to attend the wedding of K-Mum's cousin Uncle Stephen. Sister C-bao was also invited to be a flower girl. K-bao was not happy to learn that she had aged out of the program. However, the trip was so relaxing and full of sugar that she quickly forgot about the disappointment.

K-bao had a lot of fun hanging out with her cousins J-Cuz (cousin Justin) and K-K. Here she take K-K on a lap around the pool, and then comes down the water slide with J-Cuz.

The key attraction was, of course, the unlimited dessert buffet. No further explanation needed.

One of the nice highlights of the trip included an in-house performance of The Lion King at the resort.

Lucky 13

Over Christmas and New Year K-bao got to spend some time with K-Mum's side of the family. Indeed, with K-Great-Grandmum in the house, along with all the cousins, there were 13 happy campers in all. It was a festive gathering which extended over many days.

There was plenty of lounging time...

...but also some intense activities. In the below "friendly" Bocce ball match, the judge (Uncle Calvin) had to resort to taking off his shoelaces to measure the distance between the balls in order to resolve a dispute between the teams. (One can also see contestant Aunt Christina - clearly not fully trusting in the process - on the ground closely inspecting the measuring activity.)

"Pull that string tighter! Tighter!"

A highlight for K-bao was of course spending time with her cousins, particularly J-Cuz, i.e. Cousin Justin. The two built Magna Tile castles, read Bible stories aloud and even tested their arm strength against each other (refereed once again by Uncle Calvin). K-bao and sister C-bao also had fun playing with Justin's younger sister, Cousin Kaitlyn, who is a few days older than C-bao.

"Don't let my expression (or my 2 hands) fool you, J - I'm only using 30% of my strength"

"Don't try this at home, kids"

As usual, K-Grandmum, saint that she is, spent most of her personal time cooking up great heaps of delicious food to feed the hungry crowds.

Family time

K-bao got to catch up with quite a few family members in Singapore. Here she shares a laugh with K-Grandmum and some other women in the family. 

The group took a quick day trip to the wonderful Gardens by the Bay, which was not only beautiful, but beautifully air-conditioned.

Here are the various granddaughters on the same trip, huddled around K-Grandmum and having a good time.



One of the best meals of the trip for our little epicurean was the brunch buffet with K-Grandpop & K-Grandmum at the St. Regis. As usual, K-bao's eyes were several times bigger than her stomach, as she wandered around excitedly from station to station, collecting plate after plate.

Below is the last evening with the always-popular Shu-Shu (a.k.a. Uncle James). This expression on his face is pretty typical of his interactions with the little ones (see, for example, here), as he is usually fending off some overexpressive advances by his little nieces.

And of course, the star of the show, Xiao Goo-Goo (Aunt Catherine). Here K-bao and C-bao, along with cousin Elizabeth, are being hosted by WZ Shu-Shu's family on the eve of the big day.

She also saw Da Goo-Goo (Aunt Esther) just about every day, but didn't get as many pics with her.

Thanksgiving Tree

Over Thanksgiving K-bao engaged in an exercise with her extended family to encourage all to reflect on their blessings.

Predictably, K-bao's favorite part was not so much writing out her blessings, but handing out the activity pieces and instructing everyone else on what to do.

Each person was supposed to write out up to 3 things they were thankful for, on individual leaves, while putting prayer requests on pieces of red fruit.

K-bao's Thanksgiving Leaves were: "Family," "Friends" and "Food" - unclear what order those were supposed to be in, but everyone appreciated the alliteration - while her Fruit prayer requests were for "Uncle Calvin and Aunt Christina" as well as for "K-Great-Grandmum" (represented by a stick figure).

Here she is working on the project.

The finished tree after various family members wrote out their leaves and fruits.

K-bao's prayer request, and what she is thankful for: 

Reunion

A family reunion for the ages!

Looking at this picture it doesn't necessarily seem like it would be that difficult to get everybody together...yet given the geographic dispersion it is a rare occasion indeed when everyone across the 3 generations is in one place.