My 3 year old little Dumpling announced yesterday that he can speak Chinese!  Yeah!  So I asked what he can say.  He proudly said, “去” (meaning go to) McDonald’s!

Right, his Chinese is excellent, and so as my son’s diet.

Yes, you read it right, potato chips in one of the most popular Chinese food flavors.  I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw them, and I can’t wait to try it.

I actually never had General Tso’s Chicken until our family moved to the States, and until I was old enough to eat out with my friends by myself.  You see, we never had this dish in Hong Kong.  Then my parents would never order this dish because they think it is for non-Chinese people.  I love them.  Very much like all the other dishes I would order at Chinese take-outs, and that my parents would totally disapprove.  Egg drop soup, Beef fried rice, Egg rolls, to name a few.

Anyhow, this maybe worth a try.  Available at Amazon.

Portable Kites!  How fun!  It’s getting to be that time, the sun is out, and you are at the park enjoying the beautiful weather.  The wind is strong, and it’s a perfect time to fly a kite.  Of course, you will remember to pack a kite every time right?  NOT.  This portable kite measures 3″ in diameter, with a keychain to attach to your bag or jeans!  Available in 6 vibrant colors, and you can find them at Plasitca.

Spring – 春天 – chūn tiān

The temperature is rising, and Spring is finally here!

For those of you who have boys ages 5 and up, then I am sure you are experiencing the Star Wars craziness with your kids and all of his friends.  (If your boys are not into Star Wars yet, enjoy!)  Think Geek is selling these Lightsaber chopsticks.  They come in 3 different styles: Red for Darth Vadar, Green for Master Yoda, and Blue for Luke Skywalker.  They are imported from Japan.

Most importantly, I definitely think they will make the dinner experience less stressful and more enjoyable.  But of course, make sure you tell them these Lightsabers do not cook or cut any food for them.

Enjoy!

So now that Chinese New Year is over, my Chinese friends and I have been exchanging ideas about what we did for the kids’ classroom presentations for the New Year.  A friend told me a really cute idea, that I am definitely stealing for next year.  She got some of the calligraphy brushes, ink, and some rice paper at a local Pearl River in New York.  She demonstrated how to write a few simple Chinese words to 20 first graders!  I thought that was such a wonderful idea!

I learned the Chinese calligraphy when I was little, but I haven’t touched a Calligraphy brush for a very very long time.  I had pretty good hand writing too!  There is something really relaxing about holding a brush, and drawing these characters.  There are 2 types of ink you can use, inkstick, or pre-mixed bottle.  The pre-mixed bottles are the most convenient, but I really enjoyed using the inkstick.  The ink from the inkstick is made from lampblack (soot) and binders, and must be rubbed with water on an inkstone until the right consistency is achieved.  It takes a lot of patience to get the right consistency, but there’s something really soothing about it.

When the kids are a little bit older, I am definitely going to introduce this to them.

I am looking for yummy, comfort food recipes, and stumbled across with this recipe blog, called Christine’s Recipes.  The author lives in Australia currently, and loves to cook.  She offers Chinese, Asian, and other western recipes.  I found quite a bit of my familiar food here, and will definitely try them some day.  What I also love is that she offers these recipes in both Chinese and English.  It is very helpful for me, because I don’t necessarily understand all of the ingredient names in Chinese sometimes.

Anyway, there’s an Egg Tart recipe in here.  Egg tarts are one of my all time favorite food.  I especially love it when it is fresh, and still warm.  The smell of egg tarts often reminds me of my childhood in Hong Kong.  Most bakeries sell egg tarts in Hong Kong, so you can always smell the fresh egg tarts every time you pass by a bakery.  This recipe really doesn’t look that complicated.  I am very tempted to try it, maybe I will talk my husband into it.

My older son is showing a lot of  interest in learning Chinese, and that’s music to my ears.  I would like him to learn Mandarin.  Our family speaks Cantonese, but Mandarin is the official language which I would definitely want him to learn.  I started researching in Chinese school, and my husband is definitely against sending the kids to Saturdays/Sundays Chinese school.  He is a Chinese school drop out, and had bad memories of giving up play time to go to Chinese school.  Weekends are always packed with activities: sports, birthday parties, grandparents visits, social events; so I don’t necessarily disagree with him.

My other idea is to find a Chinese tutor.  I really want this to be an interesting and fun experience for the kids.  My ideal situation is to team up with another family so it’s a few kids together to learn Chinese, they can even play a little after the tutoring session.  I would definitely want this tutor to have experience with kids, and to want to make this learning experience an interesting one.  I started asking around.  I posted a request on one of the yahoo moms group around where I live to see if anyone has any recommendations.  I got some pretty interesting results!  I got ONE recommendation, and I got like TEN responses asking me to share my findings as they are all looking for the same thing.

This reminded me of something.  This is exactly why Debbie and I started My Panda Paws – make learning Chinese fun and educational for the kids.  There’s a pretty good candidates that I am going to call tomorrow, let’s see how it works out.