easily entertained

Sometimes the simplest things provide the best entertainment. Our Juniper Tree bungalow had several fans (it was HOT and electricity is expensive) - Julianna loved to stand in front of the fan and brush her hair :) We spent most of the day outside playing, and when we returned to the bungalow she'd run over and stand in front of the fan - the breeze felt so good on her sweaty head!


Not to be outdone, Lydia likes to use the brush too. If you ask her, "Lydia, is it time to brush your hair?" she'll pick up the brush and rub it on her head! Never mind that all 65 strands of hair hardly need brushing, she wants to be just like her big sister!



After three full days at home, we're definitely starting to get settled in. A few big trips to the local market, plus one in-town shopping trip, and the fridge/pantry situation is vastly improved! It's so nice to eat home-cooked meals again - I really miss cooking when we're on the road.

Matt in Thailand

Matt doesn't seem to get a lot of space on the blog. The girls and their adventures tend to dominate, and since I am the one who writes the posts, they all come from my point-of-view. [Matt actually doesn't even READ our blog, maybe if I wrote more about him, he would read it :)]

But, please don't conclude that Matt lives a boring, mundane life and doesn't do anything "blog-worthy"! He has tons of fun hobbies, and lives at a pretty fast pace to fit it all in! This trip to Thailand we were (again) traveling with my favorite piece of luggage - a boxed up mountain bike. Matt rode many mornings (leaving at VERY early hours to be home before the girls were awake!). He and a few buddies created a little challenge - a paved 8 mile ascent up a nearby mountain in under an hour. Here's our friend Josh at the temple near the top of the mountain (Matt took the photo, so that will have to serve as "proof" that he made it!)


He also went dirt biking....


In case you are wondering, we also traveled with the dirt biking helmet he's sporting in the photo - when I married Matt I never imagined I would one day travel with a mountain bike, bike helmet, bike shoes, bike tools, and a large, heavy dirt biking helmet. Fully 80% of what Matt packs falls into the "toy" category, the remaining 20% is filled with "essentials", like clothing and toiletries. But, I will have to say this, we both tend to be conservative packers, and even with all Matt's toys, and the girls stuff, we don't go overweight on our luggage allowance.


He also played paintball with friends from the conference ....


Just thought it might be fun for you to know a bit more about how Matt spends his time!

I'm glad we're home

It's so good to be back in our own apartment after almost a month away. The girls are excited to be back with their books and toys and in their own beds! We woke Lydia this morning at 7:30, she had been sleeping for 13 hours :) [Of course, she slept very very little during our flights yesterday, so she had some lost sleep time to make up for!]

This morning we went outside for breakfast at the food stalls across from our apartment complex (nothing much to eat in the house, but we're working on restocking!). As soon as we got outside Julianna said, "I'm glad we're home" - it just feels good to be in familiar territory again!

Our kitchen pipes are fixed and it seems like the repairmen did a great job - they had to take out some of the kitchen wall tiles to fix the pipes, but I can hardly tell where they replaced tiles. So, we'll need a day or two, but pretty soon we'll be "up and running" around here again. Matt is back to work tomorrow, but it should be a few pretty light weeks from now until mid- August.

ready for takeoff

We spend a lot of time on airplanes. Julianna's age on her inaugural flight? 10 days! And she hasn't slowed down since. Like most kids her age, she is fascinated with airplanes. So today when we headed out to the Chiang Mai airport museum, we knew we were in for a treat.

The airport museum is basically a few hangars with old Royal Thai Air Force planes. The cool thing is, the hangars are on the runway. The same runway that the commercial flights use. A few minutes after we arrived, a 747 headed our way, ready for takeoff. Check out this photo of Julianna and her buddy Wendy Jane.



We were SO CLOSE to the planes - a pilot even WAVED at us!

We also wandered around the old Air Force planes...



The airport museum is the only excursion we've made away from the Juniper Tree (aka family camp!). We love it! Here are a few photos from the pool....





Only one more day :( We head home on Sunday morning.

The Juniper Tree

Why so long with no posts? Here's my excuse: I've been sick. Yuck. I've spent most of the last few days somewhere near a bed - usually laying on it! Thankfully, I'm much better (though still not 100%). Julianna has been fighting something similar, but Matt and Lydia seem to have been spared, so we are thankful for that.

The conference ended and yesterday we moved to the Juniper Tree, a guest house for expatriate workers in Asia. It is a wonderful retreat - playgrounds with slides and swing sets (this is a BIG deal, a playground is a rare thing in Asia), a beautiful pool, three meals a day in a dining room and laundry service! Matt says it's a bit like family camp. I think there are about 20 units here, of varying sizes. Kids practically outnumber the adults.

The girls are having a blast. Lydia (a pure mommy's girl) is a bit on the clingy side, thanks to the days I spent in bed when she was cared for by a number of very gracious friends. I think she's nervous that anytime she's not in my arms I might disappear for hours at a time, so she usually chooses to stick close to me.

We didn't know I would be sick at the end of the conference when we made plans to spend our last few days in Thailand here at the Juniper Tree, but it is the perfect way to end our almost-month-long Thailand excursion. Matt has NO MEETINGS!!! Meals are so much less stressful than at the conference center! The grounds here are a little girl's delight - so many places to play and explore - not at all like the boring hotel with a cavernous lobby that echoed when you squealed (the squeal + echo was thrilling for the girls, not so much for the hotel staff and other guests).

The girls and Matt are napping - this is vacation!

eatin' donuts

Many western chain stores and restaurants are very popular here in Thailand - everything from fast food (Burger King and Subway) to convenience stores (there must be a 7-Eleven on every city block)! There is a Dunkin' Donuts a short walk from our hotel and we strolled over for a little dessert yesterday evening.

Julianna picked out this pink-icing covered donut....


And managed to consume all but the last few bites!

Matt and I dug in too, and even Lydia had a few little tastes of donut. It was a fun way to end the evening :)

hitting the wall

Yesterday I "hit the wall" - called Matt and told him, "I just can't do it anymore! It's too hard, I am tired of doing the living-away-from-home thing with two little girls and all the needs and demands they bring, and the complications of hotel living are going to put me over the top. I just want to go home!"

But, I am doing better this morning. And feeling a bit more like I have things kind of under control. We're here through Wednesday morning, so I better pull my act together for these last few days! I sure can't quit now :)

On Wednesday we are moving to a local guest house and I can't wait - it'll be four days of no meetings for Matt, no expectations on our time, just enjoying some much needed down time before we head home on Sunday the 27th. Other good news is that Matt gets this Sunday off, so I am looking forward to that! (I am going to celebrate with a trip to the doctor and dentist - great western health care in Thailand and I've been to the doc with the girls, but just haven't had a chance to go myself.)

That's pretty much the update from here. And don't get me wrong, it's not all terrible. I am loving being with friends, Matt is enjoying the content of the meetings, our family has great buddies here. But it isn't a walk in the park.

because I want to

Meals are not the most stellar moments of our day. We eat breakfast and lunch in a big dining room, buffet-style, on tablecloth covered tables, with real (breakable) plates and glasses. I've mentioned in an earlier post that my current "survive mealtime strategy" involves taking the tablecloth off the table... if I don't, I spend most of the meal trying to prevent Lydia from dragging the tablecloth to the floor. Despite my attempts at keeping our damage to a minimum, we've already broken two glasses.

To add to the fun, Matt's morning meetings get out at about 12:30, at which point a BIG line forms for the buffet. So, the girls and I (and all the other moms and kiddos at the conference) hit the lunch room about noon, to reduce chaos. I get the kids seated, run to the food line and load up the plates with all kinds of goodies. Then, back to the table to feed kids. Lydia eats 100% table food, but it does need to be cut in small pieces. That's a LOT of cutting. So, I sit at the table, cutting Thai-style-cooked veggies into into bite sized bits and trying to re-direct Julianna's attention back to her plate. With about 30 kids in the room, there is LOTS to distract her.

Try doing that meal scene, twice a day, 23 days in a row! We're all getting a little weary of the meal-time chaos. This morning looked over at Julianna at the end of breakfast and she was crying.

"Julianna, why are you crying?" I asked.

"Because I want to" she answered.

Well, sweetie, I can't help you if you are crying because you want to. But, to be completely honest, I sometimes feel a bit like crying during meals too, so I understand.

Thankfully, dinner provides a much needed respite from the breakfast/lunch scene. I love having Matt around to help, and the girls enjoy eating somewhere a little quieter and less chaotic. Tonight we are ordering pizza to eat at the hotel pool. Now, that sounds like a much better option! But, with lunch on the horizon, we've got one more dose of chaos to endure before our pool-side pizza.

living the hotel life

There are definitely some tougher things about living in a hotel. I miss the routine of life at home. I miss having a place where the girls can play on their own. I miss my own cooking. I miss my own bed. I miss having easy internet access!

But, there are some perks too - like I haven't washed laundry in two weeks! (I take it to a local lady near the hotel who does a great job for a great price - can't get much better than that!) And, every time we finish a meal and walk away from the table I look back at our mess (crumbs on the table, food spilled on the floor) and think: "Hey, that's not my problem!"

Here's Lydia getting ready to create some crumb-covered laundry and a mess for the hotel housekeepers - Ritz crackers for snack!


Another great thing is that we are living with tons of good friends here. They surround us on all floors of the hotel. There is always someone to hold your baby monitor while you and your husband go out for a later dinner!

On those nights, we do "K family cafe" in the hotel room - in other words, the girls get pb&j with a little fruit while sitting at the table in our room. One night our little friend Kayleigh joined us for baths and dinner. Here they are eating (we did dinner after baths and before pjs for the bigger girls - who wants to get clean pjs covered with peanut butter and grapes?)

After dinner, there was lots of laughter and giggles from the little girls!


Tonight we went out for dinner to a little restaurant nearby. After dinner Julianna lined up her toy animals in the 'play area' section of one of our hotel rooms....


And this is the scene Matt and I were watching as she played (Lydia conks out about 30 minutes before Julianna so she missed the whole thing) - unfortunately, I didn't catch the prettiest minutes, but here's the few final seconds of tonight's sunset.

Matt and I are headed out for dessert and a cup of coffee while friends hold our baby monitors. Gotta run!

Be careful, my elephant is in there….

Well, it’s been a while since I’ve updated the blog and I am also way behind on email. At one point we had internet access in our hotel rooms, but not anymore, and I just can’t seem to find the time to get to the computer lab. Plus, Matt has been working a lot, which means I don’t get much computer time anyways. Thankfully, Matt’s work load peaked today, and the remainder of our time here shouldn’t be quite so busy for him. This morning he spoke during the morning session and I managed to be there for most of it, so that was pretty fun for me. He’s also doing a little translating during the main sessions (there are three major language groups of folks attending the conference).

The girls and I are doing great. Julianna spent a significant chunk of today caring for her “pet elephant” – an invisible, imaginary elephant friend who she can hold in the palm of her hand. Her elephant has all kinds of opinions and she is quite offended if I forget about his presence (considering he’s invisible, and small enough to fit in her palm, he’s a pretty easy guy to forget about!). This morning I picked up Lydia, grabbed my bag, and reached for Julianna’s hand. “Let’s go girls”, I said. “Mommy, be careful, my elephant is in there”, Julianna said while pointing at my bag. I had to stop and let her get her elephant out before we could continue. It’s pretty fun to watch her imagination work J

Lydia turns 11 months old tomorrow – wow! She is very entertaining and loves Thai people – during meals I frequently catch her smiling at and talking to the Thai restaurant staff. When she isn’t charming the wait staff, she’s pulling the tablecloth of the table. We’ve had more than a few narrowly-escaped “baby yanks table cloth and entire contents of table onto the floor” disasters. Now, the first thing I do when we get to our table is remove the table cloth and hand it to the waiters.

Matt is getting ready to go up to the computer lab, so I am hoping he’ll post this to the blog. I do hope to get a little better at updating more frequently. Maybe tomorrow I’ll be able to get a photo of Julianna with the elephant in her hand.

this is not a home, this is a Thailand

For days leading up to our departure Julianna was excited about our trip to Thailand and asked, "oh, is the airplane ready? are we going to Thailand now?" almost every time we put on our shoes. Then, the day finally came, and we boarded the airplane for Thailand.

Now that we are here, she's a little confused about what exactly constitutes this concept of "Thailand". We'll put on our swimsuits and head to the pool and she asks, "are we going to Thailand to go swimming?" Or we're walking to breakfast and she says, "is breakfast downstairs in Thailand?"

A few minutes ago we were reading books before nap time. Her current favorite is "Corduroy" and we got to the final page when Corduroy says "oh, this must be a home. I know I've always wanted a home." Julianna looked up at me from her hotel room bed and said, "I want a home too, but this is not a home, this is a Thailand" :)

It might not be home, but we are pretty well settled into our hotel living routine. After lunch we enjoyed a little time playing in the room - Julianna "washed dishes" in the bathroom sink (she stands on the desk chair) and Lydia chewed on books and toys (her favorite pastime).

The best part of the day is probably late afternoon - after naps we change into swimsuits and head down to the pool. Matt joins us as soon as his meetings are finished and we play at the pool until dinner.

pigtails and (almost-here) new teeth

Both of the girls have something new to announce to the blog community!

I'll let the photo do the "talking" here for Julianna....



Julianna is super-proud of her new ponytails. I finally found some little hair bands small enough to hold her hair and she's hooked! The first day she wanted to take photos so she could really see them well. Thailand's hot temperatures are perfect ponytail weather :)

Lydia's announcement is not quite as joyful -what she'd like to say is that she's the proud owner of some new teeth. But, they seem to be making a painfully slow appearance and my normally happy, easy-going little girl is not having the best week of her life. She's sleeping now, thanks in part to some good 'ole infant tylenol and a lot of snuggles from mommy.

Maybe those teeth will finally make their appearance in the next few days, I sure hope so and I know she does too!

the zoo

Yesterday afternoon we went to the Chiang Mai zoo. We had a wonderful time with three other families. I'll have to post more photos later, but I wanted to go ahead and get these online.

This is one of my favorites - Matt holding the two girls and watching the giraffes. Julianna and Matt even got to feed the giraffe a big leafy branch. She loved it!

Here we are with the hippos. When Julianna was younger she loved the book, "but not the hippopotamus" and can pretty much recite it from memory. It was fun for her to see a real hippo!

I was expecting Lydia to just be "along for the ride" but she had a great time too, pointing and "talking" to each animal. She even roared at the lion :) It's amazing how much she comprehends (I tend to under-estimate my girls comprehension, and they continually amaze me). Lydia has added one more word to her growing vocab - ball. She sees them everywhere and is happiest when there is one in her hand!


Dinnertime at the stroller cafe!


Today Matt is back in meetings, so it's me and the girls doing life in the hotel. Once we get into a good groove, it's actually pretty easy, but I do miss the routine of being at home. Of course, I don't miss doing my own laundry - so it's a pretty fair trade!

foil on the windows??

It’s funny what you’ll do when you “move in” to a hotel room for 3 weeks. In many ways, I am setting up house here in rooms 630 & 632, so today I went shopping at Tesco Lotus (think, “the British version of Target”) and bought the bare essentials.

First on my list, a little potty! I’m a big fan of independent trips to the toilet, and Julianna still hasn’t mastered the art of getting on and off the big potty on her own. Three weeks of assisted trips to the potty? No thanks. 3 bucks and we’re the proud owners of a very pink little plastic toilet. Julianna loves it - apparently it’s much cooler than the green one she uses at home. After all, “pink is my favorite color” she reminded me.

Another interesting purchase? A large roll of heavy duty aluminum foil. The curtains in the girls’ room aren’t very thick, and the sun rises BRIGHT and EARLY here in beautiful Thailand. I was leaning towards a big stack of black construction paper and some scotch tape when Matt suggested the aluminum foil, a trick he learned from my dad at the beach last summer. Here’s hoping they sleep a little later tomorrow morning………

outta here

Matt just talked to the Thai Air office and our flight is "zheng chang" (that's "normal" in English)... so, we're outta here :) Two of my good friends from my first year here in China (Jenny and Leah) are also going to be at the same conference this summer. In fact, they are both flying through our city's airport to get there, so we're on the same flight to Thailand! We see each other less and less often these days, so I am really looking forward to hanging out with them :)

The leaky kitchen update? Had a little "mini-conference" in the kitchen earlier this morning. Attendees included the landlord and the apartment management folks. The pipe installation company was conspicuously absent. Never fear, our landlord got them on the phone line and laid down the facts. Another meeting is scheduled for later this afternoon and the pipe people are expected to be in attendance. Hopefully, the meeting will happen after we leave for the airport, otherwise, we'll be guaranteed a pretty crazy departure.

I hope my next leaky kitchen update reads a little like this: "well, we're home from Thailand and the kitchen doesn't leak. I can't even tell where the repair men cut into the wall. It's a perfect repair job." We've got three weeks to make it happen and thankfully Xiao Li is here to take care of details.

flooding? only in our kitchen

There was severe rain for most of yesterday and all through the night last night. It finally let up about lunchtime today, but not before wreaking havoc on roadways and at the airport. Our friend John who lives closer to downtown took this photo of one of the major north/south roadways.



Matt had to re-route and take a different road to campus after discovering his typical route was under 3 feet of water. This afternoon he went back to campus and the road was still blocked... and crowded with fisherman holding nets - they were catching fish that had escaped from fish farms the night before. One man encouraged Matt to join in the fun and take his fish home to his wife for dinner (the head and the tail make a great soup, he said).

But, I set the weekly menus around here, and fish head/tail soup was not on it tonight. We had pancakes, my favorite "night before we leave on a big trip" meal - it's easy to make with stuff on hand and leaves no leftovers - perfect!

Unfortunately, the airport was also closed for most of the day, part of the runway and departure hall flooded. A few smaller aircraft took off, but not large planes (that need more runway space). So, hoping that it all drains off tonight and we still get on our plane tomorrow.

In other news re: water and flooding - the pipes in our kitchen are still leaking (but I can shut of the main hot water valve and prevent flooding!) The good news from the company that originally installed the piping is that they have determined they aren't responsible :) The details on how they arrived at this conclusion are a little fuzzy, but one thing is clear: they are not coming to fix it.

So, earlier today I ventured out in the downpour to the apartment management office and told them my situation. They sent a fix-it man who took one look at the leak, assured me it was a big, messy, very involved repair job and declared the responsibility most definitely, without a doubt, belonged to the company that originally installed the piping.

That's when I decided to bow out of the debate and called our landlord (who, by the way, is a GREAT landlord). So, the ball is now being passed around between three parties: landlord, installation company, and apartment complex management. One thing is clear: it isn't going to get fixed before we leave tomorrow afternoon. But, Xiao Li will hopefully be able to let them into the apartment to get the repair work done while we are gone.

That's all the water-related news from around here!