what else did we do in hk?

Besides Disney and eating, there were a few other memorable events:

1. I took a trip to Toys-r-Us (gasp!) by myself.  The girls stayed home.  I discovered that I bought better things when I was by myself.  Case in point: a new dollhouse on the clearance rack.  Don't you love Samantha's reaction when we showed it to them?

2.  Emma and Samantha got to play with Elizabeth, Anna, and Nate - friends of ours who we don't get to see nearly enough.  Emma and Elizabeth (and their mommies) went out for a big-girl date and had a great time playing together.  They don't always come as often as we'd like, but it's such a blessing to have these opportunities to play with other kids!

3. Sleeping in!  No preschool to go to, not a lot on our schedule.  We made cinnamon rolls, ate fun cereals...and one morning, I got a surprise when I woke up.  All the girls were crammed into Abby's travel tent! (She didn't seem to mind, though!)
4.  I bought 20 pounds of chocolate chips.  They weren't all for me, but still...that's a lot of pounds!

5. Took pictures.  Remember that new lens I was telling you about?  It's a Canon 50mm f/1.4.  If you're like me and have no idea what all those numbers are supposed to mean, it's the kind of lens that makes your pictures have the blurry background.  It has no zoom, which has taken some getting used to, but it gets great pictures with nice soft background when you get up close.  I bought this lens mostly because Elizabeth, Anna and Nate's dad told me to, and he usually knows what's what.  I really like it when I use it at the right times.  Note: this is NOT the lens to take to Disney Land.  =)
6. We got to see some friends.  Good friends.  Friends from the past that your heart sees and then kind of has a contended little sigh.  If hearts could sigh, I mean.  We ate together, played Rummikub, went to the pool, talked late into the night, and then, just 30 hours later, it was over.  But we were still thankful.  
7.  We must have done more than this, but this is all I have pictures for.  So my list is over.  

I gave in

The girls, especially emma, have been asking for a dog for a very, very long time.  We have responded with all the reasons we can't buy a dog and won't buy a dog.  

The girl is persistent, though.  I thought it might be a phase.  Give it a few weeks, and it will be over.  Not so.  It's been over a year now.  

Josh and I had been mulling the idea over, though they didn't know it.  I had big plans for this morning, but after a huge downpour, all our plans got cancelled.  After the rain, I took them outside to play in the puddles.  And mud.  Can you believe that? My kids were wet and muddy.  (If you know me, this is a major achievement!)

Anyway, we left to go play outside, and came back with a pet.  

My girls could not believe it.  

Truly.  They could not believe it.

Samantha kept saying, "Mommy always said we couldn't have a pet, but she changed her mind!  We have a pet now! We have a pet now!"

They named her Rosebud.  (This was no surprise to us.)

I know your curiosity is killing you.  I've included pictures, too.  

Here it is.  A picture of our very own Rosebud:

What?! I forgot to mention that she was a snail? Oh, yes.  She  is a snail.  We found her out behind our building.  In that picture, she's actually crawling on top of the saran-wrap roof.  

My kids are so excited.  They're actually in their bedroom at this very moment pretending to be snails.  

Welcome, Rosebud.  We don't know how long you will live, but we are happy you are in our home.  For now.  

Hong Kong Disney: The Sequel

While on our visa run to Hong Kong, you can bet that we stopped at HKDisney.  It's great.  Really and wonderfully great.  Why, you may ask?

1. It's cheaper than Disney Parks in America.

2. The park is smaller and lines are shorter.  (I have three young children.  I really love reason #2)

3. People line up, put their trash in the receptacles, don't spit, and are generally more glad to be at Disney Land than to look at the foreigners kids. 

4. I love Disney.  I always have.  I see the little fairy dust and the mouse ears and hear the music being piped over the park loudspeakers and get I start getting emotional. I wish I were kidding.

So.  We made the trip again this year.  I love the subway line that takes you to disney.  The details are so thorough, it amazes me.  Do you not love this subway handle?

Yes, it was hot.  We sweated off about 23 pounds between the five of us.  We wore hats, sunglasses, and sunscreen.  Yes, I am overprotective.  
I've given up on saying anything to them about the glasses.  They've become a staple of daily outdoor life.  

Just after entering the park, a helpful attendant noticed our girls and told them: "Hurry over that way; all the princesses just arrived!"  

Emma was on a mission:
Oh, the princesses!  It was like last year all over again (except with different young ladies under all the makeup, we noticed).  They were so kind to my children.  They asked questions, gasped in delight, listened to long and rambling stories my kids wanted to tell.  Don't make fun of me forever, but truly...I was misty eyed by the time the family photo op came around.  Like, I actually had to wipe my eyes.  

In ten years, my kids will roll their eyes at me and shudder in embarrassment.  But for now, they didn't notice.  They were too busy doing other things, like...

hugging Belle...
...filling in Belle on how cool the fireman glasses were.  Belle was truly impressed.
...Emma was telling Snow White who-knows-what...
All four of them together, with both my big girls, and I couldn't get them all to look at me.  What a bummer.  But they were SO delighted to see them all four together, and right away too!
We moved on to the usuals - Winnie the Pooh, Dumbo, and the Spinning Teacups. I waited this one out and chilled with Abby.
Next, we needed an indoor ride because we were so. very. hot.  

Small world was close by, and you know what, I really really like Small World.  

Sure, the tune is annoying, but the little people?  Dancing?  Kicking? Spinning?  Flying?  All the glitter?  All use of light, sound, effects?

It amazes me.  We rode it three times.  
Then, we headed over to the Starliner Diner, the only place in the park that serves Western Food. (Everything else is stir-fry and other...interesting, um...I mean, exotic fare.)  As we ate, I looked out the window and noticed Buzz Lightyear over in the corner.

Buzz has been a recent hero in our house after watching Toy Story2.  (We haven't actually watched the first one yet, because I was told it was a little scary.  We have girls, and they don't do scary.  Not at all.)

Anyway, several weeks ago after watching the movie, we were all talking together and I noticed  Samantha called him "Buzz Lightbee."  I didn't want to correct her;  it was the sweetest name I'd ever heard and I thought she was adorable when she said it.  But I didn't want anyone else to tease her about it, so I gently said, "Oh mantha, his name is Buzz Lightyear."

"Oh," she replied, very matter-of-factly.  Then, several minutes later when she and emma were playing, I overheard her correcting herself:  "Buzz Lightyear Bee to the rescue!"

Needless to say, they were happy to meet Buzz in person.  
Emma got over her fear of toy guns and rode the Buzz Lightyear Space Blasters thing five times.  (I told you there were no lines!)  Plus, it was an indoor ride with nice, cold, air-conditioning, so I'm up for that.  

Here's most of us (minus Abby, who was screaming bloody murder in her stroller just out of the camera frame) in front of the castle:
And Mickey, apparently sporting his "summer" outfit:
We did get this one good picture with all of us in it.  Well, Goofy's in there too, but that's ok.  The girls really liked his whiskers.  (Hey, btw, isn't hubs lookin' skinny? He's lost a gob of weight recently!)
So there you have it.  It's probably our last Disney trip for a long while, but it was a fun one.

current cuteness

Sometime, at an undisclosed time in the future, I will post about our trip to Hong Kong and all those activities.

But, I will say this - in Hong Kong, I bought a new lens for our camera.  And I really like it.  And I'll like it even more when I actually know how and when to use it best.  

It did come in handy though, after my parents sent me a box with tie-dyed clothes for my kids.  How did my mom know I was planning on getting a tie-dye kit from America? How did she know that I've been totally digging tie-dye lately?  (Why I've been digging tie-dye lately, I do not know...)

So, all the girls got on their tie dye dresses, my camera got on its new lens, and this came out:

first bites

Abby is quickly hitting the milestones toward becoming a full-fledged member of the human race.  

Shortly after we came back from hong kong (about 2 weeks ago), she started her first bites of rice cereal.  We bought an ultra-expensive box of rice cereal there in HK, just to get started.  (All the local stuff has added sugars and other things).  Then, we ran home and jumped on the computer to find that taobao dot com has the full line of Gerber products - from rice cereal, to finger foods, the puffs, wagon wheels, fruit snacks, etc.  All for pretty close to American prices, too!

Anyway, so back to the story. We were ready for the first foray into texture.  Emma and Samantha were lined up in their little plastic chairs, cheering abby on from the sidelines.  They were both expecting her to eat "smushed up carrots" this day, but were happy enough with the rice cereal choice.  

Abby wasn't quite sure what all the hoopla was about (ie, cameras set up, girls watching, daddy closeby, even our house helper crowded around to see what the first reaction would be), but she was happy, as usual.  

She got the hang of it pretty quickly...
...especially when little hands give her extra guidance!  What would she do without those sisters?
Sure, it's a little messy...
But she was happy!  She's now settled into a nice routine of eating quasi-normal stuff, and Emma and Samantha are delighted that the smushed up carrots have been added now.  
Intro to crawling and first teeth have also been recent additions, but more on that later...

winners!!!

I'm such a slacker on the contest-thing.  

That's why I was paranoid in the first place about even having a contest at all.

But, only two weeks late, here are the correct answers:

Set One-

Abby

Samantha 

Emma

Set Two - 

Samantha

Abby

Emma

And our two winners are...drumroll please...

Debbie C - aka Gigi

Brigitte

Yay!!  So you two, send me any picture or pictures (for a collage or something) and I will get them cranked out for you!

I promise, promise -- if I do another contest, it won't involve baby pictures!  haha!

fun with books: fast food

One of my most favorite kids books is called "Fast Food" by Saxton Freyman.

It rocks.

I love reading it.  

Even for the seven millionth time.

The concept of the book involves various modes of transportation created from vegetables.  Now, even though I don't particularly like eating vegetables, I sure like looking at them.  Especially when they look like "mushroom man", one of our favorite dudes in the book.  

One morning several weeks ago, we decided to try to replicate one of the vehicles in the book.  I chose a particular one that sounded great and fun to say in asianese (cucumber-car...those of you that speak asianese, doesn't is just sound so fun to say?!).   I chose one that involved common vegetables that we usually have around the house, not weird things like rutabagas or baby corn.  Actually, I don't even know what a rutabaga is; it just sounded really fun to say.  

And yes, I chose the easiest one.  We go for easy in this house.  

We bought some baby cucumbers.  Emma and Samantha each got their own one, then I chopped another one into slices that would serve as the wheels.  I carved out a little driver seat in the middle of the cucumber.  

We were hard at work, I tell you.  

It was all I could do to keep the cucumber cars from being ingested:
Cherry tomatoes manned the wheel, and black eyed peas were glued on as eyes.  
Samantha and I chose black Sharpie for the mouth, but Emma wanted to use a macaroni noodle.  It's her car, I didn't care.  
We also made a bell-pepper fire truck, but he was a little lopsided.  Anyway, if you're looking to add to your children's library, I wholeheartedly recommend this book!

one of those people

The truth is, there aren't many people that you could say "Knowing them has radically changed my life" about.  

But today, one of those people in my life is having a birthday.

This person has loved me since the day we met.  (I've looked back at pictures of me when I was young, and believe me, it couldn't have been easy!)

He has given his time and energy and ideas and support to anything I've ever wanted to try.

He has gone out of his way to love my kids.  He makes silly faces at them and talks in silly voices even when everyone is looking.  He shops for them in ways that were previously thought impossible.

Why has knowing him radically changed my life?

Because he's my dad.  And I have known more of God because of him.  

He was hand-picked to be my dad.  Set aside just for me.  (ok, and my brothers and sisters too.) I'm thankful for the chance to be his daughter. 

There's so much more I could say, so many ways I could elaborate; but in the interest of brevity and privacy, I will leave those things unspoken.   My heart knows them through and through.  I can marvel at God's amazing and surprising love because I have been so securely blessed with the love of an earthly father.  

I love you, dad.  Happy birthday.

abby's 100 days pictures

Now that the cat is out of the bag, I finally get to post these pictures from Abby's 100-day photo shoot!  (Reading our blog may cause you to think we are unnaturally obsessed with 100...100 reading lessons, 100 characters, 100 day pictures...but really we're not...I don't think...)

Here they are:

the picture people like to pose your kids with little toys and stuffed animals and such.  They're getting more and more used to the idea that the weird foreigners don't like all the extra "stuff"...but they snuck those two little bears under my nose!  I didn't even notice them until I got the pictures back!

...yes, she's laying on a rug.  If you were wondering.  

...but it's a very interesting rug, she tells me. 










ready for it all to be over:
which one is your favorite?