Mary and Joseph go to Thailand

Julianna’s language ability continues to explode. It’s amazing what she can express now that she couldn’t say just one week ago when we arrived in Thailand. The funny quotes continue, of course…. My favorite so far this week: “Mary and Joseph take a trip, go to Thailand”. Seems she just got her own trip to Thailand mixed in with the details of the story, and, before you know it, Mary and Joseph are headed to Thailand for the birth of baby Jesus!

She’s a very protective big sister too. “Don’t be sad Lydia. It’s ok. Ju-nanna’s here.” Matt laughs and wonders how Lydia can possibly be comforted by the presence of a big sister who can’t even pronounce her own name!

Lydia is a gem. She spends most of her day either sleeping or smiling. I haven’t taken her in the pool yet – the water temp is a little chilly, even though the air temperature is quite warm. She sits poolside in the stroller while Julianna wades and I chat with other moms. I’ll wait until we get down to the islands to take Lydia for her first dip.

immunizations and olympic tickets

Well, yesterday was a not so great day for the girls (they both got shots). Julianna started her Japanese encephalitis series, and Lydia got a a total of 7 immunizations (but only two total shots, thank goodness!)

But, Matt and I got great news!! We entered the Chinese lottery for Olympic tickets (open to Chinese citizens and foreigners in certain visa situations) - we had three total entries (Matt's, mine and Julianna's - each entrant could apply for a pair of tickets to two events). Julianna snagged us a daytime trip to track and field. Mine was the most successful, with a big night track and field finals tickets, and water polo. Haven't heard anything from Matt's entry yet. There is one more ticket lottery later this spring, and we'll try again. Of course, you can pay BIG money for tickets from various internet distributors, but if we get them through the Chinese government lottery, they are pretty cheap, so we're trying that first.

ok, gotta run. You know the morning routine with little girls... and it's even more complex living in a hotel!

a few elephant photos

Playing around at the hotel before leaving... these are little bicycle rickshaws - a neat way to travel around the city (as long as you aren't the one pedaling!)


The elephants did a little show - Julianna was so animated as she told me all about the elephants. They took a bath, drew a picture, played soccer, played the harmonica, etc. And, on top of all that, they were LOUD and BIG and SILLY (she mentioned those qualities a few times)!





at the entrance to the elephant camp.... it was a half hour drive from the city


The elephant riding photos are on a friend's camera (you can't really take a photo of yourself riding an elephant, you know?), so I'll have to post them later.

Both girls napping now, and Matt had to cancel the bike outing, so we're thinking of going downtown for dinner and to look around some after nap time is over.

week one ends, week two begins...

Last night the conference portion of our time in Thailand came to a close. Today is a free day, and tomorrow Matt starts classes. Yesterday morning during the main session the childcare kids did a little performance. Childcare is divided by language – Julianna, obviously, goes to English-speaking. (The other big group is Korean-speaking.) I think there were about 200 in English-speaking. They mostly sang songs and looked cute.

This morning after breakfast Matt and Julianna left for the big elephant-ride. It’s actually more of an elephant park, I think. Matt took the camera, so I’ll post some photos when he gets back. Julianna was pretty excited… we talked elephants all morning long. She wanted to wear her little white sandals and I convinced her to wear tennis shoes only after calling them her “elephant riding shoes”.

I am still enjoying the change of pace. No laundry, no cooking, no cleaning, no dishes. Well, of course, we do have laundry – but we dropped it off at a laundry service for someone else to wash and fold! And, we eat in the room for some meals (I grocery shopped earlier this week), but its paper plates and stuff – very few dishes to wash! We always eat breakfast at the hotel, and usually eat dinner out with friends.

Matt and Julianna should be back around lunchtime. Then, he’s heading out on a bike adventure. He tried to rent a dirt bike yesterday and came up empty-handed. So, unless something changes this morning, he’s going pedal-biking. Regardless, his afternoon is full of bikes and mountains, so he’s pretty excited. I’m not sure what the girls and I will do.

Wednesday...

Here are a few photos from the past couple of days. Matt’s schedule varies… sometimes he is home (i.e. in the hotel room) in the early afternoon for a bit, usually we eat lunch together, and some afternoons are totally free. There are night meetings about 50% of the time. Today is a long-ish day though, so it’s just me and the girls til dinner time.

Our room is fantastic… lots of space, and a cool “porch-like area” at the end with floor to ceiling windows. An added perk is that sometimes we can see flights taking off and landing – the airplanes fly right across our entire view. Julianna loves airplanes these days, so that’s fun for her. But, it must be a secondary landing pattern or something, because the airplanes aren’t consistently appearing… we go hours without seeing any at all. Just makes the occasional sightings that much more fun. Chiang Mai is a huge tourist destination, so the planes are big ones – Thai Air has a nonstop flight to Paris, among other fun places!

Julianna is really into stacking things and putting things in rows. Here she is with some toy cars ...


Matt and Lydia discussing the conference schedule:

Our room (the girls room is on the right and links with ours via a door on the porch):

update from later on Tuesday...

Well, this is a new way to do the blog… I write an update, but then don’t post it immediately. The internet café with wireless is close to our room though, so we got the radios out and tested the range this afternoon. Now I know I can go while the girls are asleep and still be in radio range, so that’s great news! Maybe I’ll even be able to post some photos.

We’re settled in to the rooms and so grateful for our adjoining room set-up. It works great. Matt is plotting and planning his mountain bike rides and his motorcycle rides. He brought his bike with him (Have you ever traveled with a boxed-up mountain bike, 60 lbs of luggage, and two little girls?? If the answer is NO, I’m telling you, you haven’t really experienced the art of complicated travel!) Northern Thailand is beautiful – lots of great mountains for mountain biking and dirt biking for Matt. He leaves tomorrow morning for his first early morning ride (he promises me he’ll be back in time to take Julianna down to breakfast!)

Julianna is doing GREAT at childcare! I am so thankful. But, it’s a little weird to not have her underfoot in the mornings. She’s there from 8:30 to 12 ish. It’s fun to have a short season of life with her in childcare, but I’m not sure I could do it every day (yet!). I have nice relaxing mornings in the room while Lydia sleeps. I can’t remember the last time I sat on a couch at 10 am and thought… “hmm, what shall I do next? Maybe I’ll read another chapter!” My goal is to start attending some meetings once Lydia gets back into a groove, I can take her with me (if I sit in the back) or she can go to childcare too.

Written at 10:30 am, Monday morning (Jan 21^st).

I’m not sure when I’ll get to post this, but I thought I would take advantage of a few quiet moments and write a quick update….

We’re here in Chiang Mai. One flight journeys seem SO EASY!! Our total travel time was about 6 hours. 6 hours!! We have a 6 hour lay-over in Chicago almost every trip back to the US. The only very minor snag was that the airline had an infant meal for Julianna, not a child’s meal. I saved the baby food jars for Emma Grace, and Julianna ate the rice from my meal. A few granola bars supplemented her fare. Not the healthiest meal she’s ever eaten, but hey... she wasn’t hungry when she finished, so it was a success in my book.

But, once we got to the hotel, things got a bit complicated. [side note here… we took an open back pick up truck taxi type thing from the airport – they are super popular and convenient modes of transportation in Thailand. We got all settled in the truck (did I mention that we are traveling with Matt’s mountain bike? more on that later..) and Julianna looked up at me and said, “Ju-nanna in Thailand, go ride ELEPHANT!!” ]

Anyways, back to the hotel. We had requested two adjoining rooms, but knew that our chances were slim – there are a LOT of families here, so there weren’t enough adjoining rooms to go around. We brought the monitors, and figured we’d settle for two side-by-side rooms. Our two rooms?? 4027 and 2015. Hmmm. Now, that’s not going to work quite like we were expecting.

Seeing as how it was almost 10pm and the girls were ready to crash, Matt dropped me and the girls off in 4027 and went to see what he could do. Made a pallet for Julianna on the floor (with the extra bedding from room 2015), and set up the little tent that Lydia sleeps in. Julianna was disappointed she wasn’t going to sleep on the big king bed, but was too tired to argue. Lydia slept (initially, but had a rough night).

We did notice that 4027 was capable of connecting to either neighboring room, so I fell asleep praying that God would work a miracle and one of our neighboring rooms would open up. Well, our neighbors in 4025 left early this morning. Julianna went to childcare, Matt to the meeting, and Lydia has slept for the past 90 minutes while I’ve unpacked (we’re here for two weeks!). We’ve got a great set-up and praise God for the adjoining room!!

Lydia’s waking up now, so I gotta run. I’ll be back later to fill you in on details re: traveling with a mountain bike.

Ok, so it's later... a lot later. Tuesday afternoon. No time now, but i did get a chance to post once. I'll be back soon.

Laura

Thailand memories

When I was little, my family always vacationed at my GrandDaddy's beach house on Oak Island, in NC. I loved going to the same place every year - in fact, my parents vacationed there before I was even born, and my most recent trip was in July of this past year, a few short weeks before Lydia was born. You could say, we've got a bit of history there.

Here we are this past summer - I was 38 weeks pregnant, or something like that. Lydia was definitely THERE, but we didn't go back after she was born, so technically her "first trip" hasn't happened yet.


So, Thailand is becoming a similar location for our little family. Here's a little photo tour: (you can tell our internet is running fast this morning, normally I would never be able to upload this many photos, but the internet is flying this morning and I got a little carried away!)



January 2002 - Matt and I had been dating for about 6 weeks!


February 2003 - a few weeks before our wedding. We vacationed in Thailand, and also did a 4 day motorcycle trip and ventured into Laos... where this photo was taken.



Feb 2005 - Matt and a buddy rented bikes and tried to ride to Burma, but, alas, the border was inaccessible.



February 2006 - Julianna's first swim (she was 6 weeks old)



July 2006 - we were in Northern Thailand for a three week training. Julianna's tougher first 6 months of life were coming to a close - I was enjoying life with a baby who actually slept!!




February 2007 - a family of three, going on four!


Lydia and I actually took a quick trip this past October too - but it wasn't vacation! We both had medical check ups and she got lots of shots. Needless to say, I didn't take pictures!

Well, we leave this evening for Thailand 2008! I am so grateful to the Lord that, even in the somewhat "unsettled, highly transitional" life we lead overseas, he has provided this consistent place of vacation. We're off to make some more memories!

who gave you your hands??

Julianna has a hilarious "quote" at least once a day (sometimes once an hour). We just finished breakfast and I wiped off her hands. "Who gave you your hands?", I asked as I scrubbed her little fingers. "ummm, Krisanne and Paul", she answered. Her theology is a little off - Krisanne and Paul are a stellar aunt/uncle pair, but they aren't quite powerful enough to create hands. Now she's busy looking for the book Krisanne and Paul sent her for Christmas. I guess her hands reminded her of the other fun things her Aunt and Uncle have sent.

Another funny quote from breakfast. We had leftover pancakes warmed in the toaster. Julianna's favorite part of a pancake breakfast is, of course, the syrup. She's really getting into Winnie the Pooh these days and she called her syrup "the honey pot". It went a bit like this: "Ju-nanna want some mmmoooore honey pot". (accent on the "more")


This is a photo of Lydia from yesterday. Her afternoon nap was a bit of a flop, and she was really tired! She couldn't even sit up straight in the Bumbo chair. The big thing behind her that looks like a mattress is... a mattress. Long story, but we had to buy a new mattress Thursday, and it was delivered Friday afternoon. Can't tell you how convenient it is to go mattress shopping three days before departing for a three week international trip with two little girls whose COMBINED age is 30 months!

little girls and little feet

I just realized this afternoon that Julianna and Lydia are both obsessed with their own feet.

Lydia just located hers a few weeks ago - she can't get enough of those cute little things on the end of her legs. Fascinating...in the world of a 5 month old, that is.

Julianna is really into dressing herself - and her feet are a big obstacle. Getting her footed pajamas off is a big tricky, the ankles always seem to present a snare. And, of course, there's the "put on your own socks" challenge. So, yesterday afternoon she sat beside me on the living room floor and we practiced.

Step one - Julianna removes her socks. Step two - Mom slips the cuff of each sock barely over her toes. Step three - Julianna squirms and strains and finally manages to get each sock over the ankle and securely on her foot. Step four - delighted cheering (from Julianna, she loves to cheer for herself and from me, because I am thrilled that the current 15 minute "dress myself" routine of Julianna's might get cut down to about 5 minutes someday soon). Repeat.

I tried to get a photo of the girls and their feet-related tasks today, but missed my chance. I'll try again tomorrow.

bath time

Julianna is a big fan of bath time. Not just her own bath, but her little sister's as well. When dinner is coming to a close and I announce "time for a bath", Julianna just about jumps out of her skin. She can't wait to get out of her chair and run go get a washcloth for Lydia's bath.

Then, while Matt runs the water (yep, he does bath duty around here!!), Julianna stands beside him in the bathroom, hopping from one foot to the other, eager with anticipation. She stands eagerly and attentively at tub-side while Matt washes Lydia, and then follows the wet-and-clean Lydia back to the girls' bedroom for pjs.

After all the excitement, Matt leaves Lydia with me, and Julianna heads off to her own bath. Lydia's response to all this?? In the early months, Lydia was what you might call a "nervous bath-er". She teetered on the edge of tears for the entire experience. One delighted outburst from her big sister would scare her and the tears would flow. But, Lydia is much happier in the tub these days. I think she enjoys her audience.

What will Lydia think when the two enter the tub together and the splashing really gets under way? Well, that remains to be seen!

Lydia celebrated her 5 month birthday yesterday :)

looking to spend itunes money??

If you got some itunes money for Christmas and can't figure out how to spend it, I've got your problem solved :) Erin Ashley and Andy introduced us to Sandra McCracken earlier this fall and I cannot get enough of her music! We bought the album "the builder and the architect" and I listen to it way too much. My current favorite song is, "the love of Christ is rich and free". Julianna knows how much I love it. When I say, "what do you think we should listen to?" she responds, "Sandra Cracking". So, there's my recommendation. Go spend your itunes money!!

My new favorite kids album was a gift from Krisanne and Paul - a Vineyard Music Kids collection that has a version of the Newsboys' "He Reigns". At the beginning of the song, kids are reading Scripture in different languages and one is Chinese - so cool! I listened to it tonight as I was feeding Lydia right before bed. It's a GREAT kids album.

Do you have itunes recommendations for us? We too have some itunes money that is just waiting to be spent. Post a comment and tell me what you think we should buy. [You don't have to log in to post a comment, just choose "anonymous" - but remember to sign your name at the end, or I won't know who to thank for the great idea!]

my big sister is funny!

Here's a little video from yesterday (yea, I know, I'm kind of on a video-posting streak these days, I'll get back to photos soon.... in fact, not sure how I'll be able to post photos at all while we are in Thailand, so there could be a 3 week photo gap - yikes!)

Lydia has a wonderful little laugh. Here's a video of Julianna and Lydia together -




Last night Erin Ashley and Andy came over for enchiladas. I baked my own tortilla chips (using hand-made tortillas, but don't worry, I didn't hand make the tortillas!! I bought them from a western bakery.) Anyways, they turned out really yummy. Certainly more work than store bought, but when you can't buy them, you make them! I still love Tostitos Taste of Lime chips, but these were a nice substitute :)

elephant riding

Matt is pretty excited about taking Julianna to ride an elephant while we are in Thailand this year. When he asks her if she wants to ride an elephant, she says YES.... but, of course, she has no idea what she is really agreeing to, so the verdict is out as to whether or not she will go through with it.

Here's a little video that shows the extent of Julianna's adventurous spirit so far. Elephant riding will be a big step!

Lydia, the mouth-stuffer

Lydia loves to put things in her mouth, in fact, if I were to claim that she had a hobby, "mouth-stuffing" would be it! She got a toy caterpillar from her cousins for Christmas. It's probably 15 inches long... and Lydia is determined to get the whole thing in her mouth. If she keeps working at it, she might just succeed.

The weather is bright and sunny again and we're loving it! Time to get ready for Thailand!! We leave next Sunday (ten days from now) and I've been pulling out little girl bathing suits, summer jumpers, and sun hats. We're actually spending two weeks (conference and development classes) in northern Thailand, and then a ten day vacation on an island. Northern Thailand will be more moderate, and the nights will be a little cool, but the island will be HOT!

Julianna is ready to go swimming. She talks about Thailand almost every day (this is her fourth trip).

a little time away

Matt and I took a little get-away yesterday afternoon and evening. We left right after the girls went to sleep for afternoon naps, and returned about 10pm. It was great to get some time to think and talk and pray and plan away from home. We love these times together, even though they are harder to make happen now that the girls are here. But , we manage to do it about twice a year - this was a "mini".... we're planning to go away for a night when my dad is here in March too.

The girls stayed with Xiao Li. I'm not sure who was more excited about the afternoon/evening - me, because I was leaving for a while, or Xiao Li, because she got to stay with the girls! It worked out great for everyone.

Julianna continues to talk and talk and talk. I am a very efficient translator, as her pronunciation is still a little off. [For instance, "lost" and "lots" sound pretty much like the same word... I rely on context clues!]

Lydia "talks" too, in her own little almost-5-months-old way. She has a terrific smile that will light up your heart. She can sit pretty well on the couch, but has a tendency to tip one way or the other after a few minutes. Julianna works well as a prop to keep her from falling to the side.

weekend photos

Matt got back last night a little after the girls went to bed. I was SO GLAD to have him home.

We did have a great weekend with our friends, Alisa and Kayleigh. Here are the two girls, modeling hats they got from Kathi (Andy's mom). Julianna refers to Kathi as "Emma Grace's grandma"!



In the life of a toddler, there's nothing quite as fun as a bath with a buddy!



Here's one last picture - Julianna from this morning.... She almost got this outfit on by herself - still needs help at some critical junctures, but she's getting better!

friends coming to play

It's Saturday morning. Julianna is playing with her toys, Lydia is snoozing and I am taking advantage of the down time to check email. Matt is out of town for the weekend, and we are expecting frends!! Alisa and her little girl, Kayleigh, are coming to hang out today and spend the night! (Alisa's husband John is also gone this weekend).

Kayleigh is 6 months younger than Julianna and they are great friends. I am looking forward to having Alisa around to fellowship with - the apartment gets lonely when it's just me and the little girls.

We've been busy capturing video and burning it to CDs so I haven't used the camera in a few days. But, I'll be sure to get some photos this afternoon. Andy's parents leave on Tuesday, so we'll be sending out lots of mail (and the video) with them.

Fei Fei

Fei Fei is Julianna's new buddy. The two little girls met outside earlier this afternoon and are primarily linked by a love of chickens.

It's a good time of year to be a chicken-lover (but not a good time of year to be a chicken). With the lunar new year celebration just around the corner, many families purchase a chicken to fatten up for the big feast. A simple leash around leg binds many a chicken to the nearest telephone pole, tree, or bicycle stand. For two year olds, it translates into constant entertainment.

While Fei Fei and Julianna, hand in hand, chased chickens (who always seem to be a step ahead of the nearest toddler) Fei Fei's grandma and I had a nice little chat. (When they tired of chasing chickens, the girls moved on to pulling grass from a green area bordering the sidewalk.) Julianna kept asking if Fei Fei could come home with us and see her new kitchen (her birthday gift). Unfortunately, both grandma and I had to head home to start dinner. Maybe next time...

we need another tool

It's still cold. I mean, not North Dakota cold, but... well, in my book, this is cold. I'm telling you, you don't know what cold is like unless you live in a house with no heat!

This morning I finally managed to trip our breaker. In our old apartment, we went through a season where we tripped the breaker multiple times a week. Then, we managed to trip it one last time, caught the electrical box on fire and created a HUGE stir when the apartment complex guards came running with their fire extinguishers. That was a long time ago - I was newly pregnant with Julianna... Matt and I and the other inhabitants of our building were all safe, and we lived without power for one week. But, the silver lining to that whole cloud burst was that the power company rebuilt our breaker box and quadrupled the power allotment to our apartment. We had no problems with the breaker after that.

Anyways, our neighbors and buddies, the Huffmans are in a similar situation now - their breaker flips all the time. But, ours seemed impervious to all my efforts. I marveled at how many appliances I could run simultaneously. Then, this morning, it happened. For the record, I was running three space heaters, the clothes dryer, and had just turned the oven to broil. I went to check on Lydia during her nap, thought she might be a bit chilly and cranked her heater up a notch. Click. That did it. I turned off two of the heaters, flipped the switch in the breaker box and the apartment powered right up. No problem.

But, speaking of heaters, we've had a little trouble with the one in the girls' bedroom. My engineer husband decided he could probably just fix it himself, found a screwdriver, and opened the thing up. Julianna did her best as "electrician's assistant". At one point, Matt left the girls room and headed towards the toolbox. Julianna went running after him. As she passed me in the hallway she looked at me earnestly and said, "need 'nother tool", then scooted along to keep up with Matt.

As it turns out, Matt wasn't able to find the right tool, and the heater is still not-so-trusty. Matt took this photo of the "heater innards" and plans to find an electrician who can help. If you have any tips, I'm sure he'd be glad to hear them!


I'm actually kind of surprised he couldn't fix it. He's great with stuff like that.

Happy New Year

My mom always said that we should eat ham, collards (or some kind of greens) and black eyed peas on New Years Day. Sorry mom, but we didn't do it this year :) We did have BLTs for lunch and there are some similarities... ham = bacon, collards = lettuce?? But, there just aren't any parallels between black eyed peas and tomatoes. oh well.

Anyways, we're having company for dinner - our friends Allen and Stephany will be here in a few minutes. Hope they aren't expecting ham, collards and black eyed peas!

Matt took the day off and we got the tree moved out of the apartment and the furniture put back into the pre-Christmas arrangement. It's weird that when the tree comes in the apartment the living room looks so crowded and full. Then I get used to it. And now, with the tree gone, it looks empty. [Well, kind of empty.... with two little girls underfoot I am constantly picking up toys and other paraphernalia.]

Happy New Year to all of you!