Party games

One of the party games was to go fishing! They put goldfish in the bathtub and the kids would scoop them up and they could take them home as a pet. Since we didn't have too much luck last time, we passed on catching any for home. Lilia did spend almost the whole time watching the fish. She just loves fish!

Here is Lilia with all her friends at the party! She had a great time.

I present you with...Tinkerbell...

Dave celebrating with other Phillies Phans!

Halloween

Even though I'm still bummed about my bike, I'm super excited for a Halloween party tonight for the kids and families we know. Yesterday Lilia and I went to this one tourist mall and we bought her a costume. She picked it out. She's Tinkerbell! No pictures yet, you'll have to wait till I post them from the party tonight.
Also, super cool find yesterday at the same mall place...they sell lots of Christmas stuff. Lights, cards, ornaments, Santa's and it's not gaudy, ugly stuff, but nice stuff! I was so excited. One store even had a snow globe, the ones that are about 3 feet big in the middle of the store. I imagine it's expensive, but it was fun to see. It's nice to know we can decorate for Christmas like we would at home!

Bummer of a story

Last night my bike got stolen. I went to Ikea with my friend to get a couple of things. We met at 6:30 at the train station. I rode my bike there and parked it out of the rain. It rained all day yesterday and was only sprinkling that night. I locked it up as usual and we headed out. Well around 9pm or so we left the train station and I went out to look for my bike. There were hardly any bikes parked, but it didn't seem to be where I left it. So we searched around the "bike lot" and looked for my bike with a kids seat attached. Nothing! It was raining steadily now and we were getting wet. As I was walking away I found my lock. It was cut straight through. Gone, stolen. Walking home with no umbrella I was fuming mad. How could someone steal a mom's bike with a kids seat on the back and a basket on the front! I was super pissed. When I got home Dave reminded me that kind of thing happens often here, unfortunately! Also, it's the result of living in a fallen world. It sure does suck though! I guess we'll go Saturday morning and buy a new one.

Phillie's Fans do travel

On Tuesday morning, I (Dave) begrudgingly went to class. The Phillies were about to start game 5. Though as student's filed into our class, the teacher was no where to be seen. After 20 minutes of increasing becoming hopeful that I would get to watch the big game and devistated if the teacher would come I made a run for it. Taking the back stairwell I escaped from school. As I made my way towards my bike, I received a text message that the Phils were up 2-0.

On my $60 bike that is made for a man with would be perfect for a 5'6" 150 lbs I sprinted towards downtown. Often forgetting that the right handle bar controls the front break, I made record time to a bar that specializing in showing western sports.

I plopped myself down on a stoll next to a 30 something guy from South Philly. He teaches businessmen English at night. After a short commercial break, I saw what looked what appeared to be a monsoon drenching the ball park. I made it just in time to watch Bud Selligs press conference. Ugh.

This is a bike that Lilia loves. She doesn't have one herself, but any time there is one that a kid isn't riding, she's in it. It's really nice here because people share and are happy to share. So this Winnie the Pooh bear plays a funny song. He says in a deep voice, "Ho Ho Ho, Merry Christmas." Then he sings just this line, "You better watch out, you better not cry, you not pout I'm telling you why. Santa Claus is coming to town." It was fun to hear it and sing along!

Lilia's favorite pass time

This is one of Lilia's favorite things to do. In our complex is a fish pond with some big gold fish. There are always lots of kids with their grandmoms. Lilia loves to go and watch them. That day we brought some food to give them.

I didn't mean to put 2 pics up, but I couldn't delete the one of the 2 of us. One night Dave and I turned on The Office - we bought season 4 here on DVD for about $4.50 - and Lilia wanted to watch it too. She plopped down into her papason chair and watched with us!

One more thing...

Lilia is also Asian because she can flag a taxi. We taught her how to wave your hand to get a taxi. When she sees them now she waves her hand and says, "Taxi."

Oh, and I swear this girl is super smart. (Doesn't everyone think their kid is though!) Ok, so tonight we were headed out the door to dinner and we put on her green rain coat. She pointed to it and said "green." We haven't gone over colors with her really much at all. Dave and I looked at each other totally shocked!

Oh, and Dave just had a killer cheese steak at a western restaurant called Munchies. Lilia spilled half her smoothie and they brought her out a new one on the house! If you come visit we'll take you there!

Lilia is becoming totally Asian and we've only been here 2 months! So far she's got down some of the language. She can say the words for younger sister, older sister, younger brother & older brother. We also taught her the phrase "bu yao" (pronounced boo yow). It's funny because it the phrase that you use to all of the annoying people that want to sell you bags, watches, DVD's, IP cards...it basically means I don't want it and literally means "no want". You use it a lot, especailly in the touristy areas. Another thing that makes her a little more Asian is that she loves this mascot for an upcoming event that is all over our city. The mascots are these huge stautes and she always wants to stand on them. One time she made Dave give the mascot a drink from her water bottle. We got her a doll yesterday and it's her favorite. She also answers the play cell phone with "hi" and recently she says it the Asian way, which is "wei" (pronounced way). It's so cute.

Lilia update

Lilia is doing really well. She is sleeping great, which makes everyone happy! She is enjoying all of our adventures and the friends she's made here. Her vocabulary is continuing to expand. She still says at least a new word a day. Then she also has some jibberish that usually goes along with pointing. It's so darn cute! She has learned 4 Asian words. The language is tough, but we're aren't expecting a lot. She loves playing with the other kids at parks. People here are so willing to share toys, which is really cool because Lilia walks up and takes them anyway!

What I'm learning

Maybe this is true for some of you, but marriage really shows you just how screwed up you are. It brings out the sin in me such as how selfish I am and how I feel as though I'm entitled to certain things. Having a child does the same thing, it just brings out new crap about who you really are. Well living overseas does it again!!! I'm realizing some ugly things about my character. It's great living here in this city and we have an awesome community of friends, but it's just not the same as America (obviously). I am really learning a lot about myself by being here and I know I will grow a lot because of it.

The weather

Some of you may be curious about the weather right now. Well for the last 2-3 weeks it's been blue skies, sunny and in the 70's. It's been perfect. Considering when we got here it was 100% humidity and in the 90's! I really didn't think it could get this nice. The last two days have warmed up and we are even wearing shorts. I have a feeling though that one day we'll wake up and it will be cold! I'll let you know!

This is a picture from a beautiful park we found in the middle of the city. I'll tell you, this country knows how to do parks. There's no hiking nor picnic tables, but they have flowers, trees, open grass areas, areas for dancing (older couples just dance to music) and places to sit in the shade. It's so cool because during the week the parks are filled with older people, retired or whatever. They are exercising, fishing, doing tai chi, playing badminton, etc. During the weekends the families come. The park is the place to hang out. It's packed on the weekends. It's really neat. There aren't many places like that in America.

Lilia eating one of her favorite snacks.

This is our apartment building. We are on the 9th floor. Our window looks out to where we are.

Bottleneck!

This was funny. There was this one bridge you go under, but then you have to turn around in like 50-100 feet. (Total guesstimate.) So there was a huge bottleneck of boats under the bridge. It was so funny cause these boats aren't that easy to steer and everyone was crashing into everyone else! It was a lot of families out on the water and lots of kids were driving so they can't steer well and they would run right into other boats. We eventually got caught in the bottle neck and we were laughing. I think even Lilia thought it was funny.

Boating on the Lake

Saturday morning we went to the park near our house, and mind you this is a huge park! It has a really big lake where you can rent motorized boats and cruise around the lake. So that's what we did because Lilia LOVES boats and water. (Did you catch that dad!) We had a great time. It was a gorgeous day; sunny and high 70's. Lilia did a little driving too!

Our weekend

So it's been awhile since I wrote, but I'll tell you about our weekend. Friday night Dave and I had a date! It was so nice to be out, just the two of us with no little girl to carry around. So we have this card that gets us discounts at certain restaurants. It's kind of like the entertainment book that you can get in the states. So I wanted to go to this one place called Esy Cafe. We walked to the train and took that for a bit. Then we walked to get a taxi to take us to the restaurant. We walked for a while because we couldn't get a taxi. Finally we did and we told him the address. Well the restaurant was no where to be found. He let us out and we walked around a bit but had no luck. Finally after an hour and a half we got another taxi to take us to California Pizza Kitchen. Dave got a yummy pizza. I got a...I don't know what you'd call it. It was a pizza crust with a cold greek salad on top. It wasn't that good. I did order an amazing dessert which made up for the bad pizza. It wasn't the night I planned nor pictured, but it was at least a night out with my husband!

Fireworks

One thing I hate about China is the almost daily fireworks. People set them off around 1pm most afternoons. They do such a thing to celebrate a birth, declare a death or even celebrate the opening of a store. Well today I was napping on my couch. It's a lovely fall day. The windows are open and a cool breeze is flowing through the apartment. I'm deeply sleeping and I am awakened by BOOM just outside my balcony. This wasn't just a distant loud bang. It was outright fire crackers just below my window. I jumped up off the couch faster than I ever have in my life. By some miracle, Lilia is still sleeping, but I hate those fireworks!

Talking & Playing

This was taken Oct. 13th a little before bed time. (This is her bed. The pillows are to guard her from falling in between the bed rails and the bed.)

Grocery shopping

So I go major grocery shopping once a week to Carrfore. That's the foreign grocery store. I get cheese, butter, and cereals. Things like that. Well there's always more to get than just that. Since we have no car I bike there with Lilia in the seat on the back. I take my empty school bag and that's used as a grocery bag. I also bring one other bag that will hold food. So to get home with all this stuff I have to wear the school bag on the front of me like pictured left. Then the other bag sits in my front basket. I ride the bike and Lilia sits on the back in her seat. It's quite a scene, but not unusual. I don't get strange looks or anything, which is nice! It's a good exercise in balance, strength and patience! Now do you know why I miss the trunk of my car!!!

"Owie"

So Lilia and Dave were playing in the middle of the fountain. The surface is still very wet because the water had just stopped about a minute before. About a minute after I (Katie) took this picture, Lilia stood up and started to run. Well she got about 2 steps and slipped and fell back and hit her head. The entire crowd ( a lot of people because it's a Saturday) all gasped at the same time. All eyes were on Lilia. Dave picked her up and walked her over to me. I held her and some asian women came over and toweled off her head to see if it was ok. They really are so thoughtful in that way. People came over to us to see if Lilia was ok. She was still crying very hard. We taxied home. Once we got home she was fine and running around like her playful self! It scared us for a minute though!

This is a fountain near the museum. It sprays water for a while then it turns off and everyone starts walking on the area. Dave and I were thinking, 'What are they doing?' 'They must know something that we don't.' So Dave and Lilia ventured on as well.

Lilia and Daddy.

Lilia is picking flowers.

At the Park

It's cool because at parks they have some amusement rides. You just buy a ticket and go on a ride. This one was about 50 cents. Lilia was dying to go on this ride. There are ducks in the water that go one way, and birds that go in the air the other way. Once the ride started she got a little upset and wanted to get off. We evtually got through it, but we were done with rides!

Another interesting picture. Yes, it is a Bentley.

I (Dave here) found this clothing shop one day. I think the owner's idea was to shorten the phrase Homo sapien.

Yesterday I had to get a few things at my local small grocery store. We've been here for about 7 weeks and ever since then the women that work there have been trying to get Lilia's attention. They want to hold her and entertain her, but she wants no part. Finally yesterday one women caught her attention and Lilia willingly went to her. The worker just walked away with her and I went shopping. After about 5 minutes I was ready to check out. It's a small store, about 20x20, maybe a bit bigger, but I didn't see Lilia nor did I hear her. I knew there was a back room where the door is always open. I peeked in and saw Lilia was sitting on the lap of one of the women and Lilia was typing on the computer. There were about 3 women gathered around that. When she saw me she looked over and gave me a big smile! Other patrons would walk by, see a white face (me) in the back room and would peer in as well. They would smile at Lilia and say something I couldn't understand. It was pretty funny!

My mom just sent us a package and in it were a pair on hand-me-down winter boots. Lilia was excited to put them on. In the package was also bubble wrap and so we introduced it to her. She loves stomping on it in her big boots. It was so cute!!!

At the playground in our development is also a giant sand box. Lots of parents bring their kids' sand toys for them to play. Lilia uses other kids toys since we have none of our own. She loves it though. She'll sit and dig and pour sand for a long while. At least I can sit and relax!

The fish are dead! I came out this morning to find them belly up! They were our first family pet. Luckily we only paid $2 for them. They lasted 2 days! I don't know if it was the trauma of Lilia shaking them and hitting the glass or they were bound to die in a couple of days, but they're gone. Farewell my fish friends, I'm sure you're in a better place than our home.

Lilia's New Pet

These are Lilia's new fish! We got them right near our apartment complex yesterday. She loves them and watches them often. Actually, she's like the dentist's neice on Finding Nemo. She shakes the fish and hits the plastic. I feel kind of bad for them. They don't need food for 6 months; we'll see if they last that long!

Ultimate Frisbee

Dave got to play his favorite sport, Ultimate Frisbee on Monday night. He biked over to a field of all foreigners. There is a team of people who play very serious with team work outs and traveling around the country to play other teams. There were two games going on that night. Since Dave's a newbie he played with the people who knew how to play, but weren't super serious. He said he was one of the better players on this team. They played on astroturf. He had a great time and plans to go back and play again when ever he can!