Moving Right Along!

As of Monday, we are officially "country folk" in Tianjin! We had our belongings packed up and moved to our new home close to school. I have been unpacking box after box after box this week and I still have two rooms left to unpack! I honestly cannot believe all of the things we have accumulated in just 18 months of being here. Danny giggles because I had an estimate for the movers to pack us up and the guy thought we had almost 19 square meters, he was a bit off, we ended up with almost 36 square meters! He was 50% off - I must be very organized or as Danny says I am really good at "hiding" things!!

This is the current state of the toy room...obviously I have a long way to go! I am hoping to be pretty much unpacked before the kids and I come back to the states in a week!

And here is our new friend, the penguin! The owners gave it to the boys and they think it is the greatest...Danny and I are a bit scared!!
I'll post some more pictures as we get "organized" and "hide" all of our things!!

Singing Sensations!

Last Saturday night we had an extremely enjoyable time with good friends and good fun singing away! I got my first opportunity to go to a KTV here in China! These are very popular with the locals and I have been curious since I arrived and saw these huge buildings with KTV on them! Danny has been a couple of times for work functions and that just made me want to go more!

We went to a KTV that was located on the upper level of one of the department stores I like to frequent! The place was made up of a maze of rooms that could be rented out. We rented out a large room that held 30 people. It was a great room with a stage, seating and then a bar area at the back. The karoake equipment seemed very modern, but I don't really know much about it! There was not a huge selection of songs in English, but we found enough to keep us going for over 3 hours!! Some of the songs we hadn't heard in ages and honestly some of the songs I had never heard at all!! But it didn't matter, I found my next calling - karoake singing!!

It's amazing how these places function, I'm just not sure it would work in the US. The only employees we saw were a couple who brought in drinks and then the ones stationed in the hallways that helped me several times find my way back to the room after a quick trip to the potty! They knew exactly which room we were in because we were the only foreigners there!! A lot of the Chinese rent single rooms and go in and practice singing - obviously they take it much more seriously than a bunch of crazy laowai (foreigners!)!

Obviously, we still only have eyes for each other!! Hehe!!

A "Proper" Thanksgiving!!

Unfortunately, as much as we would have loved too, we could not spend Thanksgiving with our families due to that silly ocean seperating us! Instead, we were able to celebrate our American holiday with our extended British family! Danny and I decided to go all out and put on a "proper" spread so they could get a real sense of what we do on Thanksgiving. There were no parades or football (unless you count soccer!) on the tv, so we put all of our efforts into the food! I prepared some of my favorite family dishes and then I even tried a few new things!!

I had to order my turkey a few weeks ago so I could guarantee I would get it from Beijing. I could only get a 16 1/2 pound bird due to oven space!! That sweet bird cost me almost $65, but it was worth every penny! It was imported straight from the good ole USA! My ayi thought it was the funniest thing that I was going to cook this huge bird. Remember, most locals don't have ovens and if they do, they are more like toaster ovens, so they would only eat turkey at a restaurant and that is even very difficult to find! In the end, the bird was lovely and moist - even though Danny is trying to tell me that I cooked it upside down!!

This is the inside of my tiny oven!! Obviously, I had to plan the other dishes carefully because the bird took up the entire space!! Happily, carving the turkey!

I also attempted my first pumpkin pie, which was shockingly easy and very tasty!! The kids loved it, probably because of the whip cream on top, but they ate it all!!

The kids watched movies and played the Wii while the adults ate until we could not move and then proceeded to "teach" each other about our countries!! This was after a few bottles of wine had been consumed so you can only imagine the ideas that were being thrown around!! It must have gotten intense because I ended up with two huge British books the next day!! Hehe!!

There was tons of food, but more than that, there was tons of love and thankfulness in our house just as if we were back in the US! We have so much to be thankful for this year and many days go by when I feel I am undeserving of the many blessings in my life!!

Happy Thanksgiving to you all!!

Our Five Senses

Danny and I were delighted that we could both go to spend Thursday morning with Eensie at school! The kindergarteners were celebrating the end of their five senses unit of inquiry and boy were all of the parents in for a treat! I think I say this everytime I write about Eens's teachers, but once again they completely outdid themselves!!

We began the morning going to different stations that the students were manning. At each of the stations we had to use our different senses...Eens was at the tasting station and he had quite the giggles giving me seaweed while I was wearing a blindfold! Some of the other stations were, pin the tail on the donkey, figuring out numbers using touch with a blindfold on, using binoculars to see pictures students were holding up down the hallway, feeling inside a box to find specific items, listening to sounds with blindfolds on and trying to decipher what was making the sound, and figuring out different smells that were inside a bottle! I am positive a lot of work went into this by both teachers and students! After we went through the stations, Eens read us two books that he had completed and then we had a morning tea with the teachers while the students went and had snack. When they returned, we all went to the gym and continued using our senses!! We did an obstacle course blindfolded, climbed the rock wall, and did a bit of dancing, including the Hokey Pokey (speaking of this, I was told by our Brits that they call it the Hokey Cokey - what in the world is up with that??!!)!

This was much harder than it looked - it doesn't help that I'm afraid of heights!!I'm really only about one rock up off the floor - it's called creative photography by my dear husband!!

We had such a fun morning with Eens - it is very rare when both Danny and I can have one on one time with a child at the same time, so it is definitely time to be cherished!!

Happy 8th Birthday Sweet Ellie Bean!!

Yes, on Friday, my sweet, sweet daughter turned 8 years old! I cannot believe I am the mother to an 8 year old. Being Ellie's mom has made me a better person, she is very wise. She teaches me new things everyday and through her, I am constantly reminded of the true beauty that there is in this world. She reminds me to take time to play, even if it is just for 15 minutes - we all feel better after we have spent quality time together. She reminds me that cuddles are necessary everyday and the best cuddles are in the morning under a warm blanket!! She reminds me that being a child is exciting - the world is a playground and she loves to make new friends and soak up everything!! She reminds me to take risks, even though we may not like it, we won't know until we try! And, she reminds me to use my imagination and creativity to make everyday exciting!! The one thing she will never have to remind me to do is to love her unconditionally, with all of my heart!! I am so proud and honored to be her mommy!!

Happy birthday El!! I hope you enjoyed your turkey and pumpkin pie cake!! (According to Ellie, Thanksgiving dinner is the perfect birthday food - thank goodness her birthday is always close to Thanksgiving!!)

Life without an ayi!

Oh, I can imagine you all are laughing and thinking to yourselves, "welcome back to the real world!". And I can tell you right away that I am not ready for the real world just yet!! My ayi called on Monday morning saying she had a fever and couldn't come to work. I am very considerate so I told her that she should take Tuesday off too and rest. Well, by today (Tues.) at 3:00pm I had had enough and had our office manager call her and make sure she would be coming to work on Wednesday! I was pretty much begging and pleading!! She said she was much better and hadn't had a fever for 24 hours - I am so relieved!!

This all happened at a time when I was beginning to think that I don't need an ayi all the time. I had told both mom and T last week that I was tired of someone always being in my house. I was complaining to Danny that her cleaning was not great. And I was telling my friends that she was getting a bit fiesty. Yes, I take it all back now and I have learned a very valuable lesson - don't take these luxuries for granted!! One day I will be moving back to the US and I will have to do the laundry, cleaning, and cooking - after these two days of doing it ALL again, I'm going to enjoy my ayi and stop complaining!!

One funny story did come out of this little two day saga! Yesterday (yes, day 1) I decided that I should treat myself to a massage because I was working so hard! I tried a new one and was shocked when she started doing a body scrub after the massage (I didn't remember that part in the brochure). It was okay because I probably needed my skin refreshed due to the dry weather. After I was all scrubbed up she told me to take a shower, so I went into the room and was starting to wash all of the scrub off when the water turned cold. There was no way I was taking a cold shower so I did the best I could to wash the stuff off with my hands. I thought I did a pretty good job, but about an hour later I was talking to our office manager, and she looked at me oddly. I finally asked her what was wrong and she said I was yellow - I looked at my hands and screamed a bit because they were in fact yellow!! Apparently, because I didn't get all of the scrub off, I was turning yellow all over!! So much for trying to hide my "hard" day that included a massage from Danny!! I got no sympathy whatsoever!!

So cheap!!

I just had to share this picture of the fruit platter I bought today! I have been without my ayi for two days (yes, it has been difficult and my back is beginning to hurt, but I'm soldiering through it!) so I was out buying fruits and veggies at an upscale department store. I know they are more expensive, but I also know that they are eatable! Anyway, I was passing the cut up fruit section, which I usually ignore because ayi does that for me, and I spotted this...

This only cost 10 kuai, which is about $1.20. The kids were so excited to get fruit after their pancake and egg dinner and I was excited I didn't have to cut it all up!!