November 4th

So... our November 4th, aka Election Day, has been pretty good . . . better than some of yours will be, I am sure! We'll wake up on the 5th to the mid-election drama . . .

Happy Election Day!

Seriously? November already??

Okay, so we know we've been horrid bloggers . . . it's been mentioned more than a few times by more than a few of you :)

Here's a bit of September/October in review thru the world of pictures . . . they're still worth a thousand words, right?!

Our trip to Bulgaria and Greece for a conference
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=44272&id=578683772

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=44272&id=578683772#/album.php?aid=44330&id=578683772

Ra's 5th Birthday party
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=44272&id=578683772#/album.php?aid=44435&id=578683772

A trip to visit friends in sunny Qingdao
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=44272&id=578683772#/album.php?aid=45050&id=578683772

September 11

Just because I don't think it's good to forget . . . many are hurting today and we never know who they might be . . .

The Big #5

So . . . the bithday party is coming up. I've decided (unintentionally at first) that we have one child . . .I love to host a good party . . . so, birthday parties are gonna be a big deal around here, well, because they can be and it makes us happy. :) Birthday themes are discussed around June (giving enough time to see if its doable or not so much) and it started as a "underwater theme" moving to a "sea creature theme" to "nemo" to a "Beibei theme" to finally, an all around Olympic birthday. Rachel is so excited about "doing the olympics" with her friends! There will be torch making/relay running (no worries, tissuepaper fire!) beachball baseball with a huge blowup bat, some kind of ring toss/shotput and a barbell pinata (if all goes well...if not, we'll see).

In China's traditional culture and art, the fish and water designs are symbols of prosperity and harvest. And so Beibei carries the blessing of prosperity. A fish is also a symbol of surplus in Chinese culture, another measure of a good year and a good life.The ornamental lines of the water-wave designs are taken from well-known Chinese paintings of the past. Among Fuwa, Beibei is known to be gentle and pure. Strong in water sports, she reflects the blue Olympic ring.

As many of you know, we are big Olympic fans . . . and what luck for us to be moving to the host country two years before the Great Games when the gearing up and excitement was just beginning to be aroused! From day one in Changsha we were introduced on a daily basis to the FUWA. I don't know how much those of you in the States got to see of them, but here they were literally on every city block, in every store, on TV commercials and cartoons, yogurt packaging, key chains, bicycles, sunglasses . . . EVERYWHERE. So we got to know them quite well. Well, actually, Rachel got to know them quite well. We were often (until about three months ago) asking her which color was which name and what animal the yellow one or green one was. She knew them all . . . but she had a favorite . . . Beibei.

We thought this was pretty fitting for her for many reasons: Beibei is called (surprise!) Beibei -- we have called Rachel "Beibei" (From Rachel to Ra, to RaRa to Rabei to Beibei . . . apparently we are big on nicknames) since we brought her home. Beibei is a one of two Fuwa females -- Rachel, contrary to her insistence at times, is also a girl, one of two females in our family. Beibei is blue -- Rachel's favorite color. Beibei is a fish -- Rachel has been in love with fish and all sea creatures since she was one and love love loves the water. Beibei symbolizes blessing -- Rachel (our little lamb) Charis (a gracious gift) her name's meaning is very clearly "blessing" (and if yo just want to add the prosperity part...hey, who can stop ya?) And finally, Beibei is known to be gentle and pure -- our deepest, most earnest prayer for our little girl.

I don't claim to know how involved God is in our world...its something I have wrestled well with over the past two years, however I can imagine him, if not directly involved perse, recieving great joy in our finding Him seemingly at work in an somewhat insignificant, obviously un-God related part of our world. Ither way, Beibei being a "God-ordained Fuwa" :) or just a really great symbol that happens to line up amazingly well with our daughter and her personality . . . we think she's a pretty cool little fish!

So, on September 27 (the Saturday before her birthday) we will be celebrating our own Beibei and the blessing that she brings to our lives and many of yours! We remind her often of how many people joined what God was doing in making us a family . . . our deepest thanks to you all!

USA v New Zealand--Shenyang, China--2008 Olympics!

after this wonderful experience, Jerry has decided that we will save our change for FOUR years, and we will forevermore make the Olympic games our family vacation wherever they take us. THAT is a lot of mao . . . London 2012, here we come!

Some Cuteness for the Grandparents . . . sorry everybody else :)

More pictures for Grandparents . . .

Ten Things That Still Surprise Me About China

That I never seem to see the same article of clothing being worn by different people (except the really cool "I (heart) China" t-shirts, I wish I knew where to get one!)
come on, seriously? with nearly 1.5 billion people in China you would think that you would see at least the same shirt a couple of times... like in the States at the mall... "yep, thats an Old Navy shirt" or "hey, I got that same shirt at the xyz Wal-mart, where'd you get yours?"


That wherever I look, in any direction, there are bound to be no less than 5 huge cranes at work around me
from our back gate we can see six... walk a block and there are at least four more that we know of, and in one section of road we were driving on the other day in less than a miles distance I counted, no kidding 24 of them!


That you can go a couple blocks in any direction and seemingly be in a completely different place.
There is so much growth happening in so many different aspects of life here. There are parts of the city that remain genuinely full of history, there are parts that seem so sleek and fancy they may have been in the Matrix movies, there are tons of places without a bit of green for blocks and blocks (actually, our city is now trying to become a forestry city and there are trees and plants and flowers going in everywhere you look, pretty awesome!) and then there are parks here at the river's edge that lead you into the countryside and they are lush and beautiful...we pretended we're in Hawaii last weekend!


That we can feed our family a great meal for about 5USD and still have leftovers!
meat skewers, flat bread, steamed veggies, fresh veggies and fruit . . . OR . . . two kinds of noodles, meat skewers, grilled mantou bread (so yummy!!!) and fruit . . . delicious!


That at almost any store (excluding Walmart and Carefour) I can ask for a cheaper price and get it . . . with some fun bargaining in the process!
It can almost make shopping an addiction when you add the challenge of getting the cheapest price :)


That Rachel is so safe when we go out that often when I am shopping I have to check and see if she is with me before moving on.
Chinese people, as a general rule, love love love children! They dote on them, they spoil them, they feed them and play with them . . . that's why when we go to the vegetable market I no longer assume that Rachel has picked up a tomato or grape to eat of her own accord . . . some sweet shop owner down the line has enjoyed watching her as she plays and talks to herself and has offered her some fruit as a snack. The other day she was two shops down munching on a tomato . . . the lady told me she looked hungry (possibly a polite way of saying she was too thin??? but she's soooo not) which leads me to . . .


That we now live in a society where everything is everybody's business . . . what you are wearing, what you are letting your children wear, where you are going and how you'll get there, where you work and how much money you make, how old you are, how you parent and how you became parents (adoption) and whether or not you can have your own children since you did adopt, and whether or not your adopted Chinese daughter is getting enough Chinese food to eat.
These are seriously the questions we get nearly every time we go out. You would think that once we had heard them over and over for two years that we would get used to it and not find it so surprising . . . and yes, there are days that this is true. And then there are days when the lady you want to buy eggs from asks you if you can have children "of your own" and if not, what the problem is . . . those are the days that still surprise me.


That many people are so anxious to be kind and helpful to foreigners they are unable to communicate with.
I'm not sure why this still surprises me, except that I come from a culture where you are taught NOT to yell "help" when you need help, but to yell "Fire!" so that people will actually pay attention to you . . . I guess that could have something to do with it.


That they can eat rice three meals a day and still be thin as rails and healthy as horses, but when we eat rice at each meal we gain tons of weight and feel like crud!
My Chinese teacher actually cleared this up for me one day. He said its because we don't drink hot tea or have hot soup after each meal. If we would do this, we would feel better. You know, he's right. I began doing it and I don't feel as icky after a big meal with lots of rice! Which leads me to . . .


That the Chinese people have a cure for everything and that it sounds absurd to me most of the time, but it works!
Just like the tea drinking after meals, there seems to be an easy solution to almost every problem we have come across. Its amazing . . . and when we actually get past the disbelief that it will help and try it, it nearly always works . . . and we are surprised. Our general "stereotype" of Chinese people is that they are smart and healthy. Well, that's because in general that is true! They study very hard, thus they are smart. They eat very well and know how to eat well (even if they don't know that they know how to, they just do) and so they are healthy. We have much to learn from our host country.

Sweet Sweet Corn!

We have very high hopes of having genuine Missouri sweet corn late this summer or early fall! I can't wait to invite friends over for a "corn party"! yay!

Earthquake

Thank you all so much for your prayers and concern for us! We are all safe and sound up here in the northeast . . . however, our friends in Changsha have not yet replied to our attempts at reaching them, there has been no company wide alert, so we must assume they are OK, but still reeling a bit from the quake. (they are in the next province over from the epicenter, about a 1 hour flight)

Please continue to pray for this country and the many many families who are suffering such loss.

Thanks!

thoughts from a friend . . . & me

Ok, fact: we are about 20 months into our first "making life work in another culture" phase of life and well, as you may have noticed (and I am not asking for confessions of this!) we have been less than exciting bloggers . . . less than informative regarding our new home, surroundings & friends over the past 8 months or so.

I have several excuses to give, but to save you the boredom of reading them, suffice it to say that we have been in survival mode for some time. There have been many adjustments mentally, spiritually and physically and some days it is all we (read "really it's just me, but sounds better to speak for our whole family" . . . you know, when mama aint right, aint nobody right!) can do to make it to dinnertime in one piece.

So, to remedy this, I have pirated our friend's blog. (when in Rome . . . )

but first, some thoughts from me . . .

My friend Tash (who's husband wrote this entry) and I were taking a girl day while her family was out of town and we walked the WHOLE day. It was refreshing...the weather was clear, sunny and surprisingly clean after a nice spring rain, so we walked . . . from 10:30 am through lunch on to about 5 in the evening. As we walked in one particular part of the city, we realized that there were tons of people alongside the rode with items for sale laid out on large blankets or tarps. At first I was excited . . . it was like a huge garage sale and there were tons of old, very interesting looking items. What a find! But my excitement quickly turned to sadness as it became harder and harder for Tash and I to hear one another . . . over the blaring loud speakers overhead shouting out "NOW is a good time to move" over and over and over again. It struck me that where I come from, those loud speakers would have been shot down after the first hour, or at the very least, the first time I was trying to get some sleep and couldn't! But these people were sitting quietly at the edge of the street, many of their belongings strewn about on a blanket, some playing cards, enjoying the weather, some napping, some eying the two foreigners strolling the street . . . but all seemingly oblivious to the blaring voice overhead telling them that it was time to move . . .

here is our friend's thoughts on it . . .

In a previous post I wrote of my unhealthy obsession with demolition. Around these parts there’s plenty of it going down and the character/word chai, as pictured below, is plastered over every part of the building within reach of the aerosol wielding “artist”. Chai means demolish.

For me the word chai has begun to symbolize my city as I see it multiple times every day. I’d become a little too fascinated with it. I had plans to turn it into art. “Chai art”. And then of course plaster it on T-shirts, coffee mugs, hats, and anything else that might sell. So I set out to make myself into the famous and rich artist I deserved to be.

I started by photographing every chai (demolish) I saw on a local six storey building only to discover that the neighbouring building was also covered in demolish and the next and the next… two entire city blocks. In all about 15 buildings each containing at least 48 homes and multiple small businesses. That’s about 720 homes. The ground floors of these six storey buildings were tagged with demolish and professionally painted propaganda slogans stating, “Leave early and stay safe” and “Live peacefully move soon”.

Demolition companies are contracted to flatten the old buildings and encourage the locals to move soon, stay safe and live peacefully. They achieve this by first knocking down community facilities like bicycle sheds, add-on storage rooms and small private markets that are out of “building code”. Once flattened the rubble from these illegal annexes is left awkwardly strewn across the common space. Then to make the environment more peaceful, loud speakers are strung up high and turned on full with a polite reassuring voice firmly reminding the locals from early in the day until late into the evening that, “NOW would be the best time to move”.

These looped announcements are so loud that it’s difficult to hold a conversation. I had some friendly yellversations with a few of the locals who explained there’s nothing they can do stop all this. They thought my country must be better than theirs… I felt sad, and they humiliated. They were losing their home.

To begin to understand, imagine a developer sending in some slack-jaw-yokel to tag demolish all over your house because they planned to buy it off you. Then to help you "understand" signs are placed all over your front yard explaining why it’s best to take the money and leave now. And then your house is blasted with a friendly looped message that reminds you to move before they cut off your water, gas, electricity, telephone and public heating pipes before the sub-zero winter sets in.

As I continued on from the demolition site a young guy handed me a flyer encouraging me buy a beautiful new apartment to be built in the same location. It was full of thesaurus English in fancy script font, which made little sense, “Harmonic living style”, “Passivity abode”, “Jubilant exist delight”.

I’m not so chai any more.

so, an interesting, albeit not so uplifting, look into our world . . .

But as I thought about it while writing (pirating) this entry, I remember a time in Decatur when the Swendsen's Florist on Water St. would not sell their property. Everyone around them had sold and had been knocked down, ready to begin the building of a strip mall that now houses my beloved Panara Bread, I thought how different it was. Then we often thought: "oh you silly people! sell it! they are already getting ready to build . . . you're not going to really stay, just sell already!" but now I see it quite differently, I suppose. I know the circumstances are not the same, and no, Swendsen's was not being threatened with loss of power/water/heat . . . but when you have settled your life in a place for years, who wants to be "bought out" so that all your memories can be concreted over to make yummy lunches for the likes of me?

It may sound, smell and taste different, but it's all still life, isn't it?

A hobby for mommy . . .

Ok, so . . . I've decided that I need a hobby. Not that sweeping gads of dust from the construction site right outside our back door twice daily from our faux wood floors isn't exciting enough, but I've found myself lacking GOALS (well, attainable goals . . . the dust just will not go away!)

I used to love to go to the scrapbook store, what was that called? Some last name or something . . . anyway, I loved to go there for a day and scrap away, and coming home with so much accomplished . . . GREAT feeling. It was so therapeutic for me, and if I needed a therapeutic hobby in Decatur, IL . . . then I would say it'd be a good idea to have one here too. . . but I don't.

Scraping here is just too much drama. I have all my stuff, but I can't get more if I run out, so I don't even want to start a project . . . I've tried figuring out the digital scrapbook thing, but so far, have had no luck with being patient enough to learn photoshop and then all that other stuff that goes into it . . . so I have decided that I will start with learning more about photography with a really cool website that has like 11 lessons for beginners and then maybe I will be motivated enough to really learn the photoshop stuff.

There are assignments at the end of each lesson . . . my first one was "take really close up pictures of something around the house" . . . here's what I came up with. . . it made us laugh.






Well, at least it is keeping my mind occupied and is giving me some attainable goals amongst the harried pace of life . . . and it's good for laugh . . . bonus!

April Showers . . . bring new rain gear and lots of puddles!

I've been so excited for the rain to come simply because I found the cutest new rain boots for Ra at zhan lan guan (john lawn gwan, like swan, but with a g:) I was seriously torn as to weather to buy the plain pink and green ones or the cute pink ones with white polka dots . . . and I couldn't believe that I had such a choice! Usually the choice is something more along these lines . . . "do I buy the pink ones with the strange japanese anime cartoon shooting guns on it or the blue ones with a goofy frog and horrid English on it?" but this time, oh THIS time it was an amazingly wonderfully hard choice to make for real! At 35 yuan (about $5 US) I should have just bought both, one a size up for next year so I can avoid the cartoons and bad English for another year. . . hmmm, not a bad idea, there may be a quick trip back to the store scheduled soon!

Anyway, she had tons of fun when she got off the school bus and there had been a whole day of rain for puddle-making in our courtyard . . . so we took the long way home and hit all the good puddles. When we got home and took off her boots, about 2 quarts of water poured out of each one! EEK! But it was fun!



What a fun day!

Field trip to Ocean World

So we had our first field trip. Rachel was SOOO excited for the entire week before the trip. Finally, like two days before, I realized she thought they were going to the OCEAN . . . ah, a little different, sweet girl, but still pretty cool... she wasn't too disappointed, at least when she found out she would be able to see lots and lots of sea animals we'd never see at the ocean. It made up for the loss of beaches and sandcastles I guess :)



Ra posing with the giant penguin outside the entrance. Really great, except she was quite disappointed when we saw the actual penguins inside . . . she thought they were baby penguins.

Not a great shot, but she was being enchanted by the walrus doing "nose stands" for all the folks.


I remember seeing my first seahorse and being amazed at how small they are! Loved it!

She love, love, loved the tunnel! how exciting to see sharks, stingrays and seals swim overhead! We had an absolutely fabulous day. I love this part of being a mommy. . . she still wants me to come with her on field trips and hang out with me the whole time. Soon this will not be so and I will need to cling to these memories to get me through . . . She is such a blessing . . . such a joy.

Christmas . . . in April?

Yeah, well, yesterday morning it was cold enough to still be December here (OK, maybe not that cold, but it was stinking COLD for it to be April!) and that was kind of fitting as we just got a long-awaited, highly anticipated Christmas present...



We are excited to be able to 1) use fewer taxis, 2) stop on the way to a destination when we see something of interest, and 3) have a way for Jerry to process things! He really misses driving as it was his "down time" to process things that got stuck swimming around in his head...now if you've visited us here (mom), you may think "down time??? while in that traffic?" But in reality this is just a glorified bicycle with a battery attached. We ride in the bike lane most of the time, but we get there way faster than our biking friends, which is nice considering the air in the bike lane is often caked with exhaust and occasionally sand from the northern desert.

And I love the guiltlessness of requesting trips to the market while cooking something because I have forgotten an ingredient!

Merry Christmas!

eye check-up

Ra has been complaining lately of headaches (read: hedecks) so we decided to get her eyes checked to see if there were any problems. None were found, thank goodness...as cute as she would be in glasses, we weren't quite ready to deal with that at 4 years old. Although she could have been blind for all this "push your forehead against the bar and look at the little red house" test knew....she couldn't even push the bar forward, and when I asked if she was looking at the little red house? "there isn't any, mommy, just desert!" But when she read the eye chart from 5 meters away, she did great, even calling out the shapes in Chinese...so we're pretty sure they're right...no eye problems causing the hedecks. sigh.

a week of parcels!

I'm not usually one for rain, but they do say "when it rains, it pours" and this past week we found this to be quite true . . . three parcels arrived safe and sound after several failed attempts. Thanks to Grandma and Grandpa Hinten, Grandma Alice and Grandpa Gene and "my girls" . . . we had a GREAT week enjoying all the wonderful treats you sent our way!


Daddy showing Ra what googly eyes are for . . .

yummy yummy Fruity "Petals" . . .



Feety pajamas just in time for the heat to be turned off for the year! Yay! I can be warm all night long!

The Catepillar's Voice

The Kindergarten /JK and the first grade class worked for *weeks* learning this little play that they shared with all the parents and the rest of the elementary aged kids. Afterward we all went down to the cafeteria and had a little "Easter Tea". The whole rest of the day in my head I was singing "stomp, stomp, crush, crush, elephants and lions beware...stomp, stomp, crush, crush, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah" well, you know how it is, they're so darn cute you don't really listen to what they are saying/singing anyway...

This week, on Monday we will be going on a field trip to "Ocean World", which Rachel has very sadly misinterpreted as a field trip to the ocean... she was very sad when I explained to her that it would only be a place where you can see animals and creatures of the ocean...not the actual ocean. She's her mamma's girl...we love the ocean! Should be interesting!

Chinese New Year or Chun Jie (Spring Festival Holiday)

Since we are just trying to "catch up" with you here....i will not droan on and on about Chinese New Year and what an amazingly different and beautiful and culturally deep time of year this is for China . . . but I will share a couple of pictures from our hua yuan (apartment complex) and our cute darling of a girl dressed up in her Chinese New Year outfit for school. (It's kind of like the "easter dress" tradition we have in the States . . . kids get new Chun Jie clothes to wear on the first day of the new year.)

Enjoying family

In January we were able to make a trip back to the States for a week to attend Jerry's grandpa's funeral. Even though our hearts were filled with sadness, we were terribly blessed to be able to see so many friends and family in such a short time! And Ra was amazingingly enough, able to get completely spoiled in just 10 short days! :)

Ra with Grandpa Gene, Aunt Jo and new cousin Lycan

Ra with Grandma Alice and Grandma Hinten

and Grandpa Hinten

Strawberries the size of your HEAD

yeah, so strawberries have come into season... we'd had a few batches of them and like last year, we found that even though they were greenish looking, they were some of the sweetest strawberries we'd ever tasted. Well, then the other day at the market I saw these monsters! They were, no kidding, the size of a large plum or small necterine! HUGE . . . and they were RED! bright shiny red!

Ra loved 'em, as you can plainly see! yummy!