A Chocolate Massage to Cure Jet Lag...

or, unbeknownst to the recipients a bit of detox!! Yes, I traumatized my mom on her third full day in China!! I decided that she should be treated to a nice massage and facial at the Sheraton, so we signed up for one of the specials of the month, chocolate massage and wrap with a chocolate facial!! How much harm can a little chocolate do??? We started out enjoying a nice relaxing massage and then they did a scrub, which was interesting and smelled of chocolate. After that they put what looked like chocolate pudding on us and wrapped us up like little babies for 20 minutes!! The entire time, my mom kept asking, "When are we getting a facial?". I kept giggling until I heard one of the ladies saying that the wrap was good for a bit of detox, surely she wasn't serious!!

Unfortunately, she was right!! My mom and I began feeling the effects the next day of our lovely detox that we had unknowingly signed up for!! I must make it clear that China is really not the place you want to be detoxing while sightseeing!! It's been a bit of a challenge, but one of those experiences we will never forget!! And, mom did eventually enjoy her facial!!

Looking for Pandas!

On Sunday we woke up to sunny skies, so off to the zoo we headed!! I've written before that the zoos we have visited in China do not meet the Western standards that we are fortunate to have in the US, but the Beijing Zoo is huge and it definitely has potential!! The zoo has many, many animals and we easily spent the entire day there before we got in the vans and drove to Tianjin to introduce mom and dad to "our life"!! Enjoy the pictures!!

Poor horsey was having a haircut by the bird!!Eens was happy to feed the animals as long as they were behind bars!!

Relax, You're in China!

One cannot visit China without experimenting with some of the relaxation techniques! They typically do a great job (if you don't feel beat up after the experience!) and it is extremely cheap compared to US prices! We hired masseuses to come up to our room for foot massages while we were in Beijing! We each got an hour foot massage, which also included a bit of head and shoulders, for about $13!! Mom giggled her way through hers and dad is still complaining that one of his feet hurts!!

A Rainy Day Exploring

"It never rains in Beijing!" I have constantly told my mom this, so of course, on their first full day in Beijing, it downpoured!! Of course, with my optimistic attitude, I told everyone that it would surely not rain all morning, so we should go ahead and go to the Summer Palace! After sitting in a bit of traffic and constant rain, we made it to the Summer Palace. Danny continued to say that maybe we should skip it, but I forged ahead and we got our umbrellas. We lasted for about 30 minutes, enough to get a few pictures!!

After our short stay, I finally gave up on my "schedule" for the day, and we decided to go to McDonald's and Silk Street for a little afternoon entertainment! My mom and dad were completely overwhelmed by the grabbing and "hey lady" going ons that always accompany a trip to the Silk Market! It was a good preview for our "big" shop on Tuesday!!

The rain finally stopped in the late afternoon! We took my parents to a highly recomended restaurant, The Tree. They learned first hand how frustrating it is to find places the first time! Now granted, this place was literally hidden in a dark alley!! Dan finally found it by wandering through the alley. Upon first glance, we all thought we should probably turn around and find someplace else, but since it took so much effort to find it, we decided to try it! They served woodfired pizza, which I thought were very good!! It was definitely a great place to freak first time visitors out!!

On our way to the restaurant!!
Has jet lag hit???

After finishing our yummy pizzas, we wandered to The Village shopping area to have a look around before heading to the Acrobatic show!

Hungry Anyone?

Right away we had to feed my starving parents! Apparently, on the plane they ran out of turkey sandwiches for the second meal, so instead of eating the noodles that were offered (they are not very tasty), they ended up starving before arriving!! We took up suitcases to the room and then headed out to Wanfujing Street for dinner! We decided to start them out easy and went to Outback Steakhouse for some American cooking!

After that we wandered down the walking street to people watch and see some of the local foods available! At the very end of the "crazy" food street, my dad shocked us all by saying that he would really like to try some fried starfish. He kept talking about Samantha Brown on the Discovery Channel trying it and it couldn't be that bad!! Whatever it takes, I was proud of him for totally stepping out of his comfort zone!! I was also propositioned with some, "testicles", which I passed on! The kids loved their fruit soaked in sugar!

They've Arrived!!

On Friday, after months of planning and waiting, my mom and dad arrived in Beijing! Ellie and I went to the airport to meet them. It seemed like we were waiting forever for them to finally come through the arrival gates! We were extremely worried because the quarantine policy right now is if anyone 3 rows in front or 3 rows behind you has a fever or flu like symptoms, eveyone in those rows has to be quarantined! My mom said that at O'hare, they continued to come over the speakers and warn everyone that if they were sick, they should reschedule!

Seeing my parents for the first time in 5 1/2 months brought tears to my eyes!! I was so happy to hug them and excited to show them how we live our life here in China!! I hope they can understand, in this short amount of time, why we find it so fascinating and frustrating all at the same time living far away from home!

We had a surprise waiting for them after we picked them up, we had been upgraded to the penthouse apartment at the hotel!! It was perfect because mom and dad had their own private suite on the first floor close to the living room and kitchen, and then the rest of us all had rooms upstairs with another family room!! Thank goodness for the quiet so they could actually sleep! Jet lag is not fun!!

Parties Galore!

We celebrated Eensie's 5th birthday with his class on Sunday! He decided that he wanted to invite his whole class a couple of months ago, so I reluctantly agreed (5 is a pretty significant age!!), not having a clue where I would have the party. It's not like in the states where you can rent bounce houses or go to Chuck E Cheese, I had to put my creativity hat on to come up with some ideas! Finally what emerged was a water party...we had water guns, water balloons, and water games (fill the bucket with a hole in the cup relay, toss the ball into the water, fishing in a baby pool!). Thankfully it was a beautiful 90 degree day, so the water felt fantastic and the kids dried quickly!!

Danny also had to put on his creativity hat to decorate the cakes! Ethan and him finally decided on monster cakes! On Sunday morning Eensie helped his daddy perfect the cakes! He loved putting candies on for the face - he is quite the creative little boy and my dear husband cook probably go into decorating cakes for a living!!

Eensie received some great gifts from his friends, including burst a balls, transformers, Ben 10 figures, Legos, and remote control cars, but I think his favorite was his backpack on wheels!! He has stored all of his treasures in there and keeps telling me he is ready for the airport!! The only thing is, he keeps putting a water bottle on the side and I keep telling him security won't let him through with that (hehe)!!

After Eensie's friend party I decided that one party just wasn't enough for the day, I mean, I had the tables all set up and it is easy enough to double recipes, so I invited all of the families in our compound for dinner. I'm not superwoman, so I have to admit that I did have the main dishes catered, and everyone brought a little something to add to the spread! The kids in the compound had more water gun fights and the water balloons were gone in a matter of minutes! It was a great opportunity to relax with all of our lovely friends before we all fly off to our home countries for the summer. I am very grateful that this was not a good-bye party - amazingly, all of the families will be here for at least another year!

After entertaining about 70 people over the course of 7 hours, I was completely exhausted, but also, once again overwhelmed by the many blessings we have in our lives!! I am very, very thankful!!