Videos of Our Girls

Bella really loves putting things into and taking things out of her backpack. She is still learning to take the backpack its self off without help. She was walking around the house with her backpack open, so I stuck some diapers in there. She couldn't see what I put in and couldn't get the backpack off....  she started "chasing her tail".  It went on for a pretty good while. We laughed so hard and had to catch it on tape.

Bella is adding new words into her vocabulary every day - but not fast enough somedays. She is so eager to communicate. She does a really good job expressing what she wants though. For example, today she wanted something. I'll let you guess what it is. She took my hand and dragged me to her room. Held up her finger and said her version of, "just a minute." Then she came and got Daddy and brought him into the room. Then she did this ...

Any guesses? She wanted to play Ring Around the Rosie.


Okay I have tried and tried to upload the latest of Emma. Maybe its that I'm trying to post too many videos? Rather than delay any longer I will post Bella for now and I will try to post Emma videos in a separate post.

If you give a kid a french fry...

Last night, we decided go to Burger King.  To put this into context, Burger King is new to our city and one of the limited American food options. Going to BK is a treat for our family.

After we got settled, Philip took Emma back up to the counter to get something. While they were away, there was a group of children (that were not customers eating at the restaurant) that came over to say hi to Bella and began sharing their local snacks with her. Strangers (or new friends as we like to call them) are always sharing food and treats with Bella.

Being a mother, I have recently began to worry (its in the job description) that Bella is going to grow up with expectations of people giving her things. As much as possible, I want to foster in her a heart of gratefulness. I want her to understand that some of the people who have been kind enough to share with her aren't sharing out of excess but rather they are sacrificing to show her kindness. While so far Bella is a great sharer, I also really want to encourage that spirit of giving in her. That can be a very difficult thing to do in a culture where your children are given special treatment for being a foreigner.

I know thats a lot of deep thinking for the topic of sharing food! The point here is that I have really been encouraging Bella to share her treats with new friends. I asked Bella if she wanted to share a french fry with the girl who had just shared an identifiable piece of dried fruit (maybe a prune) with her. Bella smiled and held out one of her french fries to the little girl.

 I was pleased that Bella decided to share. I could tell the other kids also wanted one, so I gave them each a french fry and thought that would be the end of things......Oh boy was I wrong! The children jumped into our booth and began helping themselves to the food on our tray! :) I could tell the the situation was quickly slipping away from me. I couldn't think of how to tell them to stop in Chinese. Not because I didn't know the vocab but partly because I was still processing what was happening and partly because I didn't know the right way to say it culturally.

A couple minutes later, Philip returned to see our booth  (and the top of our table) filled with a group of children finishing up the last few bites of our food. "What is going on!?" he asked me. "I really don't know, but I think we are going to need more food....."

We laughed a lot about what happened. It was certainly not the night we expected. I guess when praying for my child to have a generous heart, I need to be ready to share my fries too.

Split Pants

Wondering Wednesday's Question of the Day:

Can you buy diapers in China?

During the packing process of coming to China, many concerned mothers asked me, "Can you buy diapers there?" Yes! Thankfully we can buy diapers in China. They are however, a little bit more expensive than they are in the states. I know, right? Diapers are already so expensive. And even though you can easily find brands like huggies and pampers, diaper technology doesn't seem to have caught up just yet - the quality isn't quite up to snuff, but they work just fine.  The use of diapers is a newer option here and many people still choose to use "split pants"

Split pants, as you can probably imagine from the name, are pants that have a big opening, a split right down the seam.

The question that naturally follows is, "where do they go to the bathroom?" Older children (Bella size) will squat to use the bathroom on the side of the road, in the pond, or anywhere else that looks appealing.

With smaller babies, you will often see parents holding them over plants, trash cans, or on the street. Sometimes parents or grandparents will whistle to signal them to use the bathroom. After coming to China in college I wondered how on earth they potty split pant train such small babies. Now coming to China and forming deeper relationships with other mommies, I have realized that it is not so easy. They have to hold their babies out every hour in case they need to go and they have lots of accidents.

Its so cute and funny to see little babies all bundled up in their winter clothes with those bare buns hanging out! Its becoming more and more common to use diapers though, especially in the cities. Since many of the pants they sell in China have the split in them, its really common to see babies wearing split pants with diaper on.

I recently saw these adorable Elmo overalls on taobao (which is like a Chinese ebay).

I was so excited when they came. Although I was shocked to find that they were split pants!! I should have know or at least have thought to ask, but we brought all of her clothes from the states so the thought never crossed my mind. 

Bella's first pair of split pants. That's a milestone, right?

Flying Solo

Last week we had been back in China for 1 month. Whew that flew by! That unfortunately meant that it was time for Emma to leave and renew her visa. We decided to take Emma to the consulate in Thailand this time, but unfortunately Philip was unable to come. So, it was just me and nocturnal baby Emma flying alone to a foreign foreign country for 4 days.

 So many times, even doing something as simple as getting our passports out of purse while juggling the luggage and Emma with her unsteady head, I thought why are there not enough hands for this!?   Or when I was trying to think through the timing of pumping milk, feeding Emma and take off and landing I thought why is this so difficult to think through. I am now convinced more that ever that parenting is intended to be a job for four hands, two brains - two parents! 

I have been to Thailand once before, but it was with a group and we stayed in a resort in a totally different area of the country - so for all intensive purposes I really hadn't ever been to Thailand before. We have lived in china now long enough to feel comfortable. Traveling to Thailand was definitely a refresher course on what its like to feel completely foreign, lost, and confused. I was like the definition of an easy target. I basically should have worn a sign that said, "Foreign woman traveling alone with infant. Completely overwhelmed. Please take advantage"

Fortunately for me, the Thai people were very kind to me. I was having trouble getting transportation from the airport to where I was staying, and this sweet family offered to take me. We crammed 7 adults, 2 kids, and Emma into a 5 seater SUV and off we went. On the way, they even offered for me to stay with them. Another night, I stopped to ask for directions and another family offered for me to eat dinner with them at their home. The people were so very kind. And I was so very grateful.

Transportation was probably the biggest difference. At home, the most common types of transportation are a bus or a taxi.  In thailand, there were not any buses and taxis were uncommon. When I did see a taxi they did not use a meter, the fare was a negotiated price and they sometimes looked a little bit different than what I'm used to.

The main form of transportation is called a song tao (spelling?). Song tao's are trucks you wave down like taxis. If the driver is going in your direction you negotiate a price for him to take you to your destination or close to your destination. There are also different color trucks that signal different things like whether they will take you directly to your destination or if they follow certain routes. Having never been to Thailand on my own, this was a bit confusing. Not to mention I had no idea what on earth was reasonable pricing.

The back of a really nice song tao truck.

 By the end of the four days, I felt like I was getting the hand of things. And I think if I had to make this trip again (even by myself) I could do it with much more ease. I do hope I get to go back someday so that I can enjoy Thailand more. It was really beautiful and the people were so incredibly sweet! It was neat things in this new culture like fish massages (something I'd previously seen on the amazing race) where people put their feet into fish tanks and let the fish go to work on their feet and legs.

Above is a local market that I stopped at to pick up treats to bring home to hubby and Bella girl. Below is the local food. Yum!

The hardest part, was definitely being away from Philip and Bella. Philip and I have only been away from each other on a couple occasions for important reasons. We are one of those couples that would prefer to be with each other every minute of the day. I really wish he could have been there to enjoy the neat things about Thailand with me. And I really missed laying in his arms at the end of the day laughing about the disastrous things of the day. And of course I missed Bella. 4 days (3 sleeps) is a long time to be away from a one year old. When I got back she had accumulated 4 binkeys, one for each day that I was gone. But Philip took good care of her. He also sent me lots of pictures and videos while I was away.