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This year as we sit down to write our annual letter, “we” is one more than we was last year. As we're sure you know Megan Sheng-Nian Wang was born on May 23rd at 2:57 am CDT. She weighed 6lb 11.9oz, and was 19” long at birth. At the time of this writing, she is 15 lb 5 oz, and 25.25” in length. She can sit and can crawl a little bit, but she doesn't have that much desire unless she really sees something she wants. However, she is more eager about standing and is standing supported for the time being. We've just started her on her cereals after exclusively being breastfed for the first 6 months. We've posted frequent photo galleries on our web page of her development. Megan is happy, healthy and spoiled with toys and attention. We've included with this letter a photo of her from when she turned six months old. |
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| Birth Weight | 6th Month Portrait | ||
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The cats remain well. Basil and Joules have continued their diet to keep the pounds off. They're mostly successful and remain young at heart. Hunter also maintains his active profile, and he has forsaken his name (Silent Hunter) and can often be heard barking at squirrels and opossum. He also makes sure that our fence is in good repair by testing it for weakness on a routine basis. Though to be fair, he hasn't gotten out in the last 3-4 days. We've included a photo of the pets resting. Julie is taking the semester off from classes and substitute teaching so that she can nurse and bond with Megan. And Winston has been working less overtime so he can spend more time at home. |
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| Our garden didn't do so well this year as weeding was a very low priority chore. Though given the very wet summer we had this year in Houston, we only had to water it about 10 times total, rather than every other day. We did harvest grape tomatoes, and some herbs, basil, dill, parsley and garlic chives. But the Eggplant and Okra were overrun. Surprisingly the Brussels sprouts and garlic we planted last year are still alive, and coming in their prime season, so we keep our fingers crossed. Our worms are certainly earning their keep. Winston recently took 3 large buckets of worm castings out of the bin, and look forward to using that to fertilize the veggie garden. The fruit trees and bushes continue to grow, but a lot of the fruit blossoms this year were taken out by a windstorm in spring, what blueberries that did grow were cleverly harvested by birds when we weren't looking. This fall was the first time that we've seen fruit blossoms on our Asian pear tree as you can see in the included photo. |
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| Blueberry Bushes | Asian Pear Tree | ||
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We spent a week around Christmas on South Padre Island in a rented Vacation home with Winston's parents. We had a great time, being able to go for multiple walks on the beach per day with Hunter was a treat especially since it wasn't crowded. We also visited the Laguna Atacosa National Wildlife Refuge and were able to see a lot of birds. February was Julie's birthday and our 5th wedding anniversary. We had dinner at Olive Garden, again (that would be the third Valentine's dinner for us at an Olive Garden). We exchanged wooden gifts this year. (A carved turtle for wooden roses in a wooden vase) Near the end of February, Winston had a business trip to Langley Research Center near Hampton Virginia. Julie was still able to travel, and used this opportunity to spend some time with her brother Joseph who lives nearby in Virginia Beach, this included time with our nieces Jessica and Erica and nephews Scotty and Joshua. We forgot our camera so there aren't any photos. :( |
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| March and April were “get ready for Baby” months. Winston's co-worker Samantha gave Julie a Baby Shower, and Winston made a quilt rack, and assembled the crib and the glider/rocker chair. | |||
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In May we attended our first Apple Store opening. It was in the Baybrook Mall, which is about 5 minutes from where we live; we waited in line, got our t-shirts, and bought some software. (Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy if you must know) | |
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As mentioned above, May was when Megan was born, and so Winston's mother came down to help for two weeks as we started to adjust to our new addition. For the whole summer, we were consumed by attention for Megan. | ||
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| Tour Map | Megan on Tour | Jerry and Kelly and Family | Joe, Kat and Family (-Joe) |
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At the end of August and beginning of September, we embarked on a 2-week road trip to visit family and friends from Atlanta, Georgia, to Ellicott City, Maryland. We drove over 3500 miles, though 11 states, viewed 6 state capitol houses (exteriors), 3 National Parks (Shenandoah, Great Smoky Mountains, Hot Springs), 1 national parkway (Blue Ridge), 1 ocean (Atlantic), saw 30+ relatives, countless friends and 3 other babies. We had a great time seeing everyone, and really enjoyed the hospitality afforded us. It was on this trip that Megan met for the first time her grandfathers, and great-grandparents. We've included a family picture from the Shenandoah National Park with this letter. We posted Travel Thoughts and more photos online. |
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| Angelina and Joe with Megan | 4 Generations of Wangs | ||
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| the Brubakers | Shenandoah National Park Thorton Gap Overlook | ||
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| Shenandoah National Park entrance (composited picture) | Blue Ridge Parkway Sign | Great Smoky Mountains National Park Entrance sign (composited picture) | Hot Springs National Park Sign |
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Winston's poured a lot of creative energies into Megan related projects. Not simply content with taking approximately 5000 photos of her, he has assembled 2 photo books, made photo-mosaic posters, posted numerous web photo galleries, and perhaps most impressively carved a Megan-o-Lantern for her first Halloween. The pumpkin portrait bore a not-too-bad resemblance to Megan. Meanwhile Megan was dressed-up as an adorable cow for trick-or-treating. However, most of her loot was redistributed as we had a higher than anticipated number of trick-or-treaters this year. Fortunately she was more entertained by the Halloween lights and decorations than the candy she's not allowed to eat anyway. Instructions for the Pumpkin Carving and Software for the PhotoMosaics : MacOSaiX |
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| Megan-O-Lantern interntally lit with the lights on | Megan's Cow/Dalmation costume | ||
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| 4 month old Megan smiling (Dress from Lisa) | |||
| Also in October we visited the Armand Bayou Nature Center, where in addition to swarms of mosquitoes, huge (but harmless to humans) golden orb web spiders, 2 raptors, and nature trails, they have 1 bison. Unfortunately the bison was not in a visible from public part of its pen when we visited. |
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Our friend from graduate school, Rahila visited us in October, and we went to the Kemah boardwalk, and Winston's college roommate Brendan visited us in November. It has been a while since we've seen either of them, and it was good to catch up. This December we are dovetailing a business trip to Huntington Beach, California with pleasure by extending our stay, so that we can visit Joshua Tree National Park, and Christmas with Winston's Xiao Shu Shu's family (Uncle Jeff, Aunt Stacy, James, Sharon, and Nathan) and visit with more friends and family in the Los Angles area. (If you can't wait for next years letter, here is are the links to the photo galleries from the trip: Scenery, Megan related. |
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| Megan and Rahila in front of the Kemah Boardwalk sign | Brendan and Megan | ||
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Professionally Winston received a couple of prestigious accolades this year. He was nominated for a RNASA Stellar Award (Early Career). He didn't win, but it was nice just to be nominated. The nomination included a tour of Johnson Space Center, a luncheon, a black-tie awards dinner, a photo-op with an astronaut, an autographed copy of Gene Krantz's book, Failure is Not an Option, and a small US flag that was flown on the Space Shuttle mission STS-116. Winston also received a Silver Snoopy award. The Silver Snoopy is the highest award that is given by the NASA Astronaut office. An astronaut came Winston's office to present it to him. Julie and Megan were there also present. The award is given to those who significantly contribute two or more ways that affect the quality and safety of human spaceflight. The award itself was a sterling silver Snoopy lapel pin that was flown aboard STS-114. You're only allowed to get 1 silver snoopy award in your lifetime. Winston was being recognized for his role in developing the probabilistic debris transport assessment tool (PREDICT) and running over 70 CFD cases in support of the IH-108 wind tunnel test. |
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| Winston receiving Silver Snoopy award from Astronaut Rich Arnold | Winston and Megan cutting the cake | ||
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Peggy is finishing up her year in Beijing on her Fulbright-Hays scholarship, and Billie continues to work on his doctorate in Material Science at Ohio University. They plan to visit us next February and we look forward to seeing them again. To those wondering about our pending adoption, we've decided to stop the process at this time. We decided that we'd really like to try to have another baby biologically and then adopt a baby after 3-4 years, and the China adoption process doesn't allow for holds that long. When the time is right we plan on starting the process all over again. And so passes another year here in Texas, where we're thankful for our new addition. We look forward to next year, and wish you and yours the very best. With Love, Winston & Julie Below are collection of Family Portraits taken this year, and below that is a sequence of Megan in her Car Seat. My how fast she grows. |
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| 1 Day Family Portrait | 2 Week Family Portrait | 50 Day Family Portrait | 2 Month Family Portrait |
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| 3 Month Family Portrait | 4 Month Family Portrait | 5 Month Family Portrait | 6 Month Family Portrait |
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