in search of a new playplace

Yeah, so I lost my wallet the other day.  Remember that?

One of the few things in there I cared about (right after house keys and credit cards!) were my membership cards to three different indoor playgrounds in our city.  

Fortunately, the newest and closest one was able to let me continue my membership without having the physical card.   Score!  I guess when people know I'm a white foreigner, it's hard to impersonate me.  =)

I recently braved the unheated playground when a friend and I brought our kiddos to play together one morning.  Emma and Samantha had heard Abby telling how fun the playground was, so they'd been begging me for a chance to go. 

This particular place is pretty small, but they only have imported toys:  Little Tikes, Step2, Peg Perego. That stuff is expensive over here!

Silas has this little car he likes to drive. He's made a beeline for it the last two times we've been there.  If anyone else dares act like they're going to play with it, he gets his little pouty face on.

Abby and the older girls loved the little "MarioKart" set up; I think it brings back happy memories of playing Wii with josh.  {My girls are actually finishing races now when they play wii....which is more than I can say for myself!}

Emma made it her mission to try out every toy in the place - even the ones that are obviously meant for younger children!

Abby wanted to introduce Emma to this swing she really enjoyed last time.  Emma was glad to introduce Abby to the delights of swinging as high as you can possibly go.

 Samantha camped out on a little ride-on train...

 ....with a doll that she actually asked if she could take home with her.  The attendant was like, "Ummmmm, no."

There were oversized blocks that could be built as a house...

...which Emma and her friend enjoyed playing with together!

 Abby continuously threatened the safety of the general public as she zoomed past on the Radio Flyer car:

 It brought her such great delight!

Josh's parents had one of these Little Tikes bouncers in their backyard that my kids loved playing with! I kept hoping Silas would follow the trend...

 ...but what he really wanted was to get that train!

All the kids had a fun time playing together, and of course - we busted out the hot cocoa when we got home to help us thaw out!

Why God Created the Family

alternately titled:  How Do Mothers Manage When Their Husbands are Away?

Setting:  After dinner a few weeks ago when Josh was away.

I'm in the kitchen, rinsing off the dinner dishes.  Abby had just finished an unusually large dinner and was sent to the bathroom to wash her hands while Emma and Samantha finished cleaning off the table.

More than four minutes could not have passed from the moment I got her out of her chair until the moment I heard a loud "thud" from the bathroom.  

Trying to use an extra can of paint as a stepstool to reach the sink, it must have knocked over as she got off.

Oh - and blue paint went everywhere.  Loads of it.

And did I mention that I had the ladies from my ladies group coming over in 15 minutes?

I had no idea how to handle this mess.  I ended up trying to hook up a water hose to our water connection, but that only resulted in water spraying everywhere.

I squeegeed some of it back towards the drain, until I googled "how to clean up spilled paint" and learned that you should not rinse paint down the drain.

Good to know.  

I dumped a bucket of water with dishwashing soap in it all over the floor, just to keep the paint wet for the next few hours.  I figured I'd deal with it after my ladies left later on that evening.

During the course of our great conversation, they suggested to me that I buy this "blahblah" from a store just outside.  I wasn't sure what a "blahblah" was, but they assured me it would get all the paint out and would solve all my problems quickly.  Phew- problem solved!

We continued the rest of our discussion and as they prepared to leave - around 10:30 - one of them said, "Oh, and don't forget - when you use the "blahblah" make sure you wear gloves, a face mask, air out your house and make sure none of your kids are home!"

Ohhhhkay.  

I realized then that they must have been talking about paint thinner.  Yucky, stinky, make-your-head-hurt-all-day-and-possibly-scar-your-lungs-and-braincells-for-life paint thinner.  If there was any way to avoid using paint thinner, I'd try it.

So I spent the next hour, until almost midnight, flooding my bathroom floor with water and suds; squeegeeing and scrubbing over and over until the last bit of blue paint was gone.  And yeah....sorry about the drain business.  I just really didn't want to bring paint thinner into my home!

So the floor got clean.  The husband came home.  And my paint disaster wasn't as bad as this.

But if I ever have the honor of hosting you in my home, don't dare comment on the blue tint on the bathroom floor...

When the Bible meets real life

It was a wild and crazy morning a few weeks ago when Josh was gone.

We'd all woken up late, eaten breakfast late, and were just playing around in the mid-morning.  

The big girls were loving their break from local school, and Abby was loving having them around to play with.  

They had drug out all the pop-up tents we own and placed them in the living room.  Then, Emma loudly declared:

"This is so fun!  Let's make three tents! We can make one for you, one for me and one for Abby!"

And I laughed because the first thing I thought of was this:

Mark 9:5
Peter said to Jesus, "Rabbi, it is good for us to be here; let us make three tabernacles, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah."

Moses and Elijah were conspicuously missing from our playdate.

Dumplings: It's What's for Dinner

When we lived up north, we had chinese food for lunch every day and western food for dinner.  It was an especially great arrangement because my house helper was completely responsible for lunch and did the bulk of the prep for dinner.  

Our current house helper is night-and-day different in the personality department than our previous house helper.  

Where #1 was boisterous and always had something to talk about, #2 is quiet and reserved.  Getting information out of her is like a careful operation, with skillfully asked questions.  

#1 loved all sorts of western food; #2 hates milk, cheese, and sugar.  

One common trait they share though, is their willingness to learn new things. Our current house helper keeps adding lots of western snacks and dishes to her cooking repertoire!  She even baked a cake at home for a relative's birthday!

Ok - off the personality tangent, back to the lunch/dinner discussion.  

One surprising change from our life up north is the amount of Chinese food we eat on the weekends and evenings.  A big reason for this is that our current house helper used to work in a Dumpling shop.  That girl can make some mean dumplings!  Their filling usually is a salty ground pork with cabbage and green onion.

And really - she does all the work.  She makes them, freezes them, and leaves them in a ziploc baggie for me to boil on my own.  It's like the asian version of a Tony's Pizza.  

        

We eat dumplings once a week for dinner.  That's one less dinner I have to make each week.  

Amen.

The other interesting fact about her dumplings is that my kids love them.  Even Abby, our resident meat-hater, gobbles them up.  Tonight for dinner, she ate 16 dumplings.

I ate 12.

I'm glad she's getting her meat in some form at least!

Our house helper is becoming more and more indispensable to us.  I can't imagine what my family would do without her dumplings (and the many other ways she blesses us each day)!

anatomy of a school room

I wrote recently about how blessed we are to have a dedicated school room.  Today I looked around and it was amazingly - and strangely - sparkling clean.  We did happen to have 30 people here yesterday for a homeschool co-op we're a part of, so that might have had something to do with it, but still...

I thought it was a great time for a little tour of our school room!

Let me repeat:  It is not normally this clean.  It might have never been this clean.   What you are about to see is not normal!!


The school room opens to the living room, so you're seeing the school room door there with some of our christmas projects still hanging.  I might take them down when Valentine's day projects start to take over - it's so hard to part with christmasy stuf!

 Just behind the door of the school room is a little nook that Josh uses as an "office".  We could really do more to make it functional, just haven't made it that far yet!  We also have a chalkboard wall that Emma and I often use for her math classes and other things.

Here's a look at the newly-repainted walls!  I had chosen a color I thought I liked, but after I got home I really didn't like at all....so in protest, I only painted one wall.

I realized that I was the only one being affected by my protest, so this week I gave in and painted the other two.  I also added more chalkboard paper for the area just in front of the girls desks.  Step #3 brought in the clothespin/ribbon thing to display work and projects in a more orderly fashion than the assortment of pictures that had been lovingly double-sided-taped all over the walls.   I have grand plans for some of that melted crayon art to fill the empty space at the top...but we'll see about that.

I've been so indecisive about how I wanted to use the space, and I made a few blunders before I finally decided what I liked.  Every time I look at the ribbon display, I feel a wave of satisfaction.  I think it's one of my favorite parts of the room.  One added feature of the chalkboard paper in this spot is that it will hide the rub from the girls desks that always dirties up the wall.  

Thanks to this window, this is the most natural-lit rooms of all the bedrooms.  You can also still see remnants of my paint protest along the upper right portion of the wall.  That wall got painted before we had a ladder...

 If you look straight behind you from the last picture, this is what you see - white boards, maps, more chalkboard walls.

 On the little drawer set by the window is "mama's table".  The rule in the school room is, "If you have to open a drawer, you have to ask."  Most of the drawer contents are not for little fingers!  The two stacks on top of the drawers are what I plan to do with each girl that day.  I put all my teachers guides and any other supplies or notes I might need that day.  [I'm not doing that much stuff today!  I started looking through next year's stuff to figure out what I need to order, so there's more books than usual on that table!]

 And the crowning jewel of the schoolroom?  This fabulous wall of bookshelves that was left here by the previous tenants.  Yes, thank you!!

 The only complaint - and I'm not complaining! - is that I wish there were a few more higher shelves.  There doesn't seem to be enough high space for things Emma and Samantha are allowed to use, but Abby is not.

Because of that, the top two shelves are a little chaotic.  Anything that shouldn't be played with regularly or needs supervision goes up there.  And also I need to paint that wall too.

Does anyone else out there love Scotch Blue?

 I do like the smaller shelves that allow for specific sectioning.  I've been trying to build up my General Information books a bit earlier than when we might actually need them.

This shelf comes courtesy of my friend Amy, who temporarily bequeathed stacks of reading material to my girls.  They blew through A-Z mysteries, and are now totally into Magic Tree House.  So far they haven't gotten into Boxcar Kids yet, but we still have a few months before we need to return them!

 The large amount of low shelving is perfect for stashing toys the little ones can play with when they are in here.

Every week, my girls put their homework and other projects in their Homework Folder.  Every other week or so, they get to trade all their homework for a special sticker to put inside.  Trading homework means that mom is in charge of it now, not them.  This has been a good solution for 1) showing my kids that their diligence in homework can be rewarded, and 2) not hurting their feelings when I dump it in the trash.  My girls would save EVERYTHING if I'd let them.  Do you see how full Emma's folder is?! (She also quirkily folds all her homework, so it looks extra bulky.)

                                      

The funny thing about having a dedicated school room is that even with all this great space, we still end up doing school on the rug - just like we used to do before we had a school room!  But having the extra space for books, desks, and storage and display is such a blessing!

let it snow!

Three days after New Year's, a blustery wind blew in and snow started falling everywhere.  Large and beautiful flakes covered everything. 

Aaaaaand, then they melted right away.

I was sure the snow was going to be for watching only.  The ground was still so warm, I couldn't image it would stick; much less have any sort of accumulation.  

But I was wrong!  Being wrong about snow is always fun!

The first thing I noticed about our first snow in this city is how strange this looks:

 Big fat palm trees with snow?  Just seems weird.

Our courtyard was turning into a beautiful winter wonderland.

 I did what any self-respecting mother would do: I bundled all my kids up, grabbed my camera and ran out the door.  (I don't mean to imply that if you wouldn't take your kids out, that you're a bad mama!  You're probably just a cozy and smart mama!)

Silas was really hesitant about both his bundles and the flying flakes.

Abby had zero reservations.  She was ready, with all her Abby spirit, to conquer the snow.

 Samantha surprised me on this snow outing.  If you couldn't find her, it was probably because she had snuck up behind you and was about to SMACK you with a snowball!  Her inner trickster was revealed during our snow play.

Silas saw Emma and Samantha making snow angels and started giggling.  Fat, gurgly little giggles.  It was so cute!

Well, they tried to make snow angels.  There wasn't quite enough snow to make lovely ones...

 I asked them all to huddle together for a group picture - Samantha with her snowball, Abby with her arms flailing, Emma pointing out where everyone needs to be standing, and Silas trying to see if he can escape.

Yep.  That's my life.  (and isn't it grand?!)

 They've recently gotten into "silly pictures", so of course, they requested one after mommy's "real" picture.  I love the silly faces on each of them.  I think Silas's reaction shows his true feelings after he realized he had to stay for more pictures.

 Emma and Samantha went from bush to bush, knocking off the snow from all the branches and leaves.

Who knows when the next snow will come?!  I'm glad we had a fun time outside - and glad we had a handful of mini-marshmallows left for our hot cocoa when it was time to come in.

ToyStory Land!

If I said that it was mostly only my girls that were excited about ToyStory land, I'd be lying.  I was super excited about going!  I was really curious to see how the HK Disney park was going to pull it off; it's the smallest Disney theme park, but that's one of the reasons why it works so well for our family.  

For all the other asia expats who are interested, here's my thoughts and opinions on the new addition:

Larger-than-life Woody greets you as you walk in, and from there you can wait in a forever long line to take pics with Woody and Jessie.  I appreciate that they have their own little area, since in the past it's been a little hard to find them.  When your kids like Woody and Jessie as much as mine do, you must.find.them.

End of Story.

And even though we've taken countless pics with everyone's favorite western heroes, the girls wanted to wait in the 45-minute long line for yet another shot with them.

The Disney people are so funny about getting everyone involved in the picture.  Silas was sleeping in the stroller over on the side.  Back in the days when he took two naps - *sigh*.

They had Green Army Men here, which was super cool.  They would imitate your actions, but not say anything.

 And if you didn't do anything, they didn't do anything either.  Seems no one told that to my girls...

 The entire area has all sorts of kids toys as backdrops, props, entrances and exits.  I love the creativity, but I have to admit, I think it made this ToyStory land look like a kid's room....and by that, I mean cluttered.  Plus, the actual area of the ToyStory land was very small - and it felt small.  The pathways at the rest of HK Disney and large and open; these were tight and cramped.  It felt like everything was on top of everything else.

 I love the creativity of Disney people.  I secretly think I should be one - not because I'm creative, but because I'd love seeing all their ideas turn into reality.

 ToyStory land has three new rides:  RC Racer (which looked super fun, but more of a big-kid ride, and no one was willing to ride with me), Parachute Drop, and Slinky Dog ride.

Slinky Dog ride was fun, but presented the other big downside to the TSLand - long lines.  I know, I know, spoiled mama that I am, not used to waiting more than 10 minutes for a ride, but this one was nearly 25 minutes.  Josh and I split up - he took the big girls while Abby, Silas and I had lunch, then I took Abby while Josh and the big girls had lunch.  [Note for summer travelers: There was one eating area in TS land, but it was not indoors and not air-conditioned!]

 I was really surprised that all three of my girls were willing to do the Parachute Drop with me - even after watching it drop from really high up!  Again, the line was super long - but we got two rides out of the deal!  The first go round, the ride got stuck as we were all up in the air.  Josh was down below waiting with Silas and recording the mechanical malfunction on video while we were enjoying great views of the rest of the park and the mountains surrounding it.  We stayed up there a good five minutes while they fixed whatever was wrong, and then resumed the "drop" part of the ride.

For all our trouble, they let everyone ride again - which was great! Saved me another 30 minutes in line!

As we left ToyStory land, Abby fell in love with the Mickey Mouse ice cream bars and I was a sucker for a good picture.

Overall, I liked TSland because it added three new rides that my kids would ride.  At the HK park, that's a pretty big improvement!  I loved the quality of all the props, decorations, and themed areas - again, the creativity was amazing.  But  - the cramped feeling was hard to shake.  The long lines were surprisingly irritating, and it just felt like it was an odd addition to the park.

But even with all that, you can bet we'll be going back again the next time we're in HK.

Maybe someone will ride RC Racer with me this time...

Hong Kong, then and now

A few weeks before Christmas, we made the trek to Hong Kong to get our visas renewed.  It really is a bear of a trip, but the bonus is that there's Outback Steakhouse and Disneyland on the other side.  

This was our first time in Hong Kong during the holidays since before we had kids!  We squeezed in a half-day trip to the cleverly-named House of Mouse and got to see the park decorated beautifully for Christmas!

 Just as we got there, the princesses were getting set up for their first session with visitors.  Abby, Silas and I hurried to the line with Snow White (Abby's been DYING to meet her!) and Josh took the older girls to see Belle and Sleeping Beauty.

Apparently, their line went faster because they were done and able to join in our line before it was even our turn to see Snow White.  I was a little sad that Abby didn't get a chance to talk to them herself, because when her older sisters around, she really defers to them and lets them do a lot of the talking.  She still managed to tell Snow White that she had her sticker at home - a very important message she'd been remembering to tell her ALL DAY.

Though this was probably our quickest Disney trip so far, it was still really fun.  It's kinda like seeing that friend that you love but don't get to see very often; it feels very familiar and comfortable, so there's no rush to get to all the topics right away. The big event for this trip, though was the opening of Toy Story Land - more on that in a separate post.  =)

As we were leaving the park, we asked our girls to sit up on the wall in front of the main railroad station for a picture.  It seems like almost every time we visit, we take a picture there - but we've got to make it snappy!  The park attendants do not like us doing this and they rush to the wall, yelling at us to get our children down....but usually by then, we've already snapped the picture.

So, do you want to see something interesting?  This picture is from our very first trip to HK Disney, July 2008:

Now - December, 2011:

 Then - August, 2009:

 Then - April 2010:

 April 2010:

And now - December 2011:

 I never thought I'd be someone who owned a Disney Season Pass.  Being from Oklahoma and faaaaar away from any disneypark, it just seemed impossible.  We've enjoyed our trips to the HK park and have made some really fun family memories.