Congrats, Master Woo!

April, 2013-
Charles graduated with his Masters in Accountancy from BYU!
Hoooray! Charles parents flew in all the way from Singapore, and Nat (Charles' older brother) surprised us with flying in from Minnesota for the graduation celebrations. Kim's parents drove in from Orange County, California as well.

Thursday's Commencement Ceremony had Elder Richard G. Scott, from the Quorum the 12 Apostles, as the keynote speaker. He spoke on keeping things in proper balance and having an eternal perspective. He told the story of having 4 items in front of their kids when they were babies and seeing which of the items they would choose. If they chose the bottle, the baby would grow up valuing physical and emotional health, would eat right, exercise, pray daily and keep covenants. If the baby picked the toy, he/she would take time to recognize their personal worth. He/she would schedule time wisely, make time for family and relaxation, leave time for self, but most importantly give time to Christ. If the baby picked the piggy bank, he/she would grow up to understand the need for financial independence and know that security and means come from living within our means. Elder Scott quoted, "Too many people are spending money they don't have to buy things they don't want, to impress those they don't like." Well said, if I say so myself. And lastly, if the baby chose the bible, they would come to value individual spiritual strength, attending the temple, studying scriptures, and prayer. Elder Scott said we need to make the gospel a valuable part in our lives.

Some pictures after the ceremony...

Charles with our friends Ryan and Sarah King. Congrats, Sarah!

Charles' Singaporean buddies, Chrystal and John

Charles' second home, the MAcc Lounge. He'll miss this place!

Singaporean pride :)

Friday's Convocation ceremony was when Charles actually received his diploma, hooray! We are so proud of him! He finished a program in 4 years that people normally do in 5 years.

Master Woo's cheer squad

The WOO boys

Charles and his classmate Tanner, who will also be working at the same firm in Orange County

Long time friends Jaylin and Cheryl

The building Charles had all his classes

Charles with Brad, who will also be working at KPMG in OC

Even though it was a super busy weekend, Charles made time to go cycling with the Woo clan. It was quite a sight to see Charles with his brothers, Nat and Keith, and their Dad, all wearing matching Lifetime jerseys.

So hardcore! 

It was quite the weekend! Thanks to Charles' parents for flying all the way from Singapore to support! Thanks Kim's parents for driving long hours to support, and for helping us take back a bunch of our things before we moved. And thanks to Charles' brothers Keith and Nat for being great siblings. Thanks to Nat for flying out (even though Charles and Kim had suspicions he was going to come to surprise Charles). We are so grateful for family!

Happy Easter from the Woo's!

Hooray for Easter! The holiday that we get to contemplate our Savior's willing sacrifice and his glorious resurrection 3 days later. I'm grateful for all that He has done for me and for his unconditional love.

I also love Easter because it gives me an excuse to try new baking projects. I teach the CTR 6 kids (6 year olds going on 7) at church and get to teach them every Sunday. They are so fun to teach! They are also happy recipients to my treats and goodies. Easter, after all, is a very special occasion, so I made goodie bags with these little chick cupcakes and some candies.

So fun to make and super easy! I added food coloring to coconut in a ziploc baggie, and shook it around until it was the yellow I wanted. I used chocolate chips (put them in upside down) for the eyes and cut up little orange slice gummies for the beaks.

We also had Charles' brother and a couple friends over for Easter dinner. Charles didn't know what an "Easter Dinner" was, so I got a ham and showed him. It was a yummy dinner with ham, mashed potatoes, salad, rolls, corn, and cheesecake.

We also became one with our inner child-like selves and dyed eggs! Except this wasn't the egg decorating that I always did as a kid when I just dumped the egg in the cup, pulled it out, and giggled with glee... No, we are more legit than that.

Check out our egg-cellent collection! (haha.. yes, pun intended)

Charles made the super cute minion in the middle, and I made the Gastly and 3 eyed monster dude from Toy Story. I was very impressed how they all turned out!

John was very meticulous with his Spiderman egg. 

Keith's special rainbow egg, and Ariel's adorable Pikachu! There's a tail on the back, too...

Hooray for Easter egg decorating! Our Minion and Gastly.

Chocolate Eclairs

I had made a Boston Creme Pie for our friend John's birthday and had some extra creme filling that I didn't know what to do with. Yes, I could have eaten it and it would have been delicious, but why not experiment with a classic dessert?

They really weren't as hard as I thought they would be. Just needed to make the pastry and then form the eclair shape. I put the pastry dough in a plastic baggie, snipped off a corner, and squeezed it onto parchment paper to resemble a hot dog like shape. After doing that a few times and putting the egg wash over them, I popped them in the oven. After I took them out and let them cool, I used scissors to open them up and put a glob or two of the creme filling inside. Then I made my chocolate glaze topping and poured it on top. Yum! Chocolate eclairs, Kim's homemade version.

They aren't as pretty as the bakery ones, but at least I can say I can make chocolate eclairs! I got the recipe from here, if you were interested.

Pineapple Tart Experimenting

So I have Fridays off from work, and sometimes I like to work on a baking/food project to keep me busy. It was a couple months ago, a little bit after Chinese New Year, that I decided to embark on the journey of attempting to bake Singaporean style pineapple tarts. Being ABC (American Born Chinese), and my husband being from Singapore, I am learning more and more about the Singaporean culture. I guess you could say making pineapple tarts was my way of trying to be more Singaporean. First off, was the jam. I thought this would be easy-peasy and done in a jiffy, but I was wrong. It took a long time for the water to cook off and for the jam to form. I ended up putting a stool in the kitchen, reading a novel, as I periodically stirred and watched the jam. But finally, voila! Homemade pineapple jam- a couple hours later, haha.

I put the jam in the fridge overnight and did the rest the next day. I made the pastry dough and then when I felt like the end was almost near, I realized that this was no easy project. But I trucked my way through and rolled up the jam from the fridge into little balls.

The next step was rolling out the pastry dough and using a nifty pineapple tart cutter to cut out cute shapes to hold the pineapple jam. This was fun at first.. then I wished I had more arms and hands so I could get it done that much faster.

Then I used a paintbrush (yes, a paintbrush because I didn't have a basting brush) to put on the egg glaze on the pastry tarts. Next step was for me to put the little rolled up balls onto the tarts. After I filled up the cookie sheet, I stuck it in the oven, and then several minutes later, finished pineapple tarts!

Hurray, I had done it! Yeah, I know they weren't very pretty, but they were tasty, and that's the most important part. Let's see if I actually have the patience to make these for next year's Chinese New Year!

What life looks like for us...

An average day in our life kind of looks like this.
Charles gets up, eats his big bowl of cereal, showers and gets ready for school. He heads out to take the 15 minute walk to school to take classes to finish his Masters of Accounting degree. He's been anxiously waiting to finish off this semester so we can get out of the frigid cold and migrate to our natural habitat of warmer weather. He's also taking his first Biology class ever, BIO 100, that GE class that he's left til his last semester at BYU. He's busy with projects and cases and homework assignments, but comes home in time to play some PS3 games before dinner is ready.

 Kim gets up, puts in her contacts cause otherwise she'd be blind, showers and gets ready for the day. Instead of putting on dress pants and heels, she wears Nike shoes, sweat pants, and a hoodie to go to work. She makes sure not to forget her watch and whistle, and she drives to Wasatch Elementary to work as a PE teacher. She teaches rambunctious 1st through 4th graders PE in Chinese for the Chinese immersion program. So while most people are working on their computers at work, Kim is playing volleyball and hockey games with these little ones. She comes home, tired and sometimes with a raspy voice from so much yelling, to relax a bit and think about what to whip up for dinner.

 The after dinner routine consists of Kim packing food for the next day lunch and cleaning the table while Charles dutifully washes the dishes. The rest of the night consists of Charles completing homework assignments and watching YouTube videos like Ryan Higa and WongFu Productions. Kim will read a book (some recent ones have been The Help, The Time Traveler's Wife, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan..) or watch an episode or two of the current TV show she has been following (ie, Once Upon a Time, Downton Abbey, Modern Family..) Sometimes they will end the night with a few games of Super Smash Bros before getting ready for bed and getting ready for another day. Our lives are simple. But things will change soon! Stay tuned...

So it begins.

yep, that's us :)

It seems like a mandatory thing that as soon as you get married, as the wife, it's your responsibility to start a blog.June 2, 2012 was the day we tied the knot, so today is the day I grow up, and start a blog.