Thanksgiving Break with Renee Back

Renee is back from college for Thanksgiving break! We enjoyed our time together and visited The Land's End

Renee got some cool shots with her activitiy in the Rice dance team during the college sports events

We visited the Land's End, all wearin in purple.

After enjoying some clam chowder at the Fishermen's Wharf, we visted theme stores nearby, including this "It's Sugar" store, claiming to be the world's largest candy department store.

We visited this Christmas tree that we used to visit often when they were younger.

We had to stop on our way back to charge the car. While waiting, Renee and I went out for a walk, and found this cool playground with a toy surfbord.

Max saw the picture and immediately came over to try it out as well.

Visiting Rice

We actually had more pictures of Renee because of our visit to Rice' family event.

We visited Renee at where she works part time. This is a student-run coffee shop where apparently many people want to work. Renee applied and was only too happy to get in.

Renee still spends a lot of time with the dance team on training and cheering for events. We took lot of action shots and it was hard to decide which one to post on this blog post.

Max continues "enjoy" the full attention he has now as the only teeanager living in the house. One perk is to go to places where he wants to try out whenever he is ready.

The first full month with Renee in College and Max at Home

This is the first month that Renee is fully in College. Max is getting all the attentions!

Max has started his soccer coach high school job. It is from the community and interestingly enough pays well.

After the match, we dropped by this restaurant to pick up lunch.

Max also attended the performance from his Kungfu school in a community event.

Renee has spent lots of time with the school dance team.

 

From Home to College

Renee went to college in August! This marks a major mileston of this parenting blog, which was kicked off with her being born 18 years ago. My brain sometimes still does not register this fact.

Renee went to Wente scouting camp for the third year this summer. As she is 18 years ago, she worked as an adult and led the archery range. Max was out with his trip so he decided to join us on the trip to pick up Renee.

For three years, we always stop at this local library while charging my car and we took the same picture.

As celebration and send-off, we went to our favorite Koi Garden as the whole family.

This is the dorm in which Renee will spend at least her first year in college.

We attended the session where the new students are meeting their welcome team.

Back home, Max and I finally got our act together to build up this home gym.

Max went with his friends on a birthday trip to Lake Tahoe during the labor day weekend, pack full of activities.

Summer Treks

Renee is out working at Wente, a Scouting America camp, as the lead archery rangemaster. Max came back from Philmont backpacking trip, took a brife break, and went with me to Dominican Republic for the Wheelchair Foundation volunteer trip.

Here is Max with some of his crew mates on the backpacking trip.

We went up to Wente over a weekend to visit Renee. We took her out of the camp and went to a local Chinese restaurant.

The reason that we came back this year again on this Wheelchair Foundation trip is so that Max gets the opportunity to see how people live in some area.

Max got to assemble and put people into the wheelchairs.  Combined with seenig how people live and visiting new countries, we all think trips like this are really valuable.

Graduation and High Adventures!

June was kicked off with Renee's graduation from high school. After that, it was month packed with not just adventures, but high adventures.

 

Renee officially graduated! She will be off to college in August!

Max took off first to Florida for his third high adenture at Sea Base. He has been training for the scuba diving and finally is doing it at the sea where there is clear water!

Here is the group of scouts that he went together.

While Max was out at the sea, Renee and I flew to Lousiana and spent a week at the Swamp Base in Lafayette. This is the first night when we slep on this floating platform.

Before Renee and I came back, Max came home and went out again to New Mexico for the Philmont backpacking trip. As I am writing this blog, he is still out there until Monday evening.

Last Month in High School

 Renee is graduating at the beginning of June from high school!  This month, she is saying bye to her groups as she is preparing going to Rice University.

Max is preparing for his Philmont backpacking trip.

They climbed the mission peak and stayed overnight close to the top. He event got up early in the morning to watch the sunrise.

This is Renee's last rehearsal with her dance group.

It is amazing that she kept up with her dancing all these days and how many hours she has spent on it.

Max joined the national team and through this tournament he scored high enough to present the US team going forward.

College Visits

The last month's highlight was the college visits that Renee and I went on after she got the accentance letters.

With me taking a break from work, I got some time and energy to think about this patch of grass that was just not suitable for the California weather. Renee helped me with some reseach on what kind of native flower we can grow, and this is the first one. We later realized that that there is another spot that has more sun during the day, so we have moved it since this picture was taken.

Max went with his friends on the last snowboarding trip of the season. He enjoys hanging out with them independently, so I didn't go on this trip.

Renee and I spent less than 24 hours in Houston to visit Rice University. As I am writing this blog, she has decided to go to Rice. We are now making plans for her to start her next chapter in life. I have contacted two friends in Houston already.

We also visited UC San Diego. Because of the schedule, we had the full day next day to hang out. So we made trips to near by areas and relaxed for a day.

Dancing and Hiking

Max was going for another snowboarding trip but got sick, so no snow pictures this time.

Renee had more dancing activities.

Max joined his crew on the training hike, preparing for the Philmont trip this year.

Renee got to hang out with her dancing group.

Fresh Snow Powder

February turned out to be a cold month. Max and I continued out snowboarding trips.

Renee and her Song Team had a senior night where they were recognized as the outgoing seniors on the team. The school had their figure size posters and everything.

Max and I went for another trip to Boreal. We are now much comfortable going into fresh terrians and ride ourselves through it. We even went down the easy black slope a few times. Max is getting really really good at this.

Max also has been improving a lot on his Kungfu forms. He finally got a hang of the flips and jumps. His kungfu teacher and I agreed to get him engaged with some national team activities and set a challenging goal for him to push himself. This is just a standard tournament, though.

Renee contined with her dancing activities and goes to a lot of competitions for fun.

Top of the Mountain - Hiking and Snowboarding

Our big events of the month are the New Year climbing to the Mount Diablo, and the snowardboarding trip.

We revisited our old stomping ground: Rock City in Mount Diablo. We also went to the Sentenial Rock.

Max is getting really good at snowboarding. He can follow me closely. In some steep trails, he can even go faster.

Renee also joined us for this trip and improved her snowboarding skills!

Renee's China Trip and Max' snowboarding

This month shows their life outside home again. But I was able to join Max with his snowboarding trip.

 

Max went on the hike with his Philmont crew to climb the Mount Diablo from the bottom all the way up.

Renee took a trip with her orchestra on a culture exchange event in China.

While Renee was visiting China, Max and I went with his friends out to Boreal for three days. The weather was not helping though. We were rained on for the first two days. On the third day it was great snow but the wind was so strong such that only two lifts were open. We still got wet and decided to leave early. As I am writing this, we have booked another room to go up there this Friday!

Renee visited the Great Wall! I am so jealous because I have not been there myself.