CNY with Pixie & Papa John and a trip to Toroko

 My parents came for a visit over Chinese New Year! What a way to welcome in the year of the Snake!  It was the perfect time because our kids were out of school for a week and ready to play.
First we went shrimping! We did it once before two years ago but with Gma and Gpa we had much better luck. Kennedy was our shrimp whisperer this day, catching 6 or 7 shrimp!

 But everyone had some luck which makes for a better time.

 The chinese guy running the place turned on the basketball game for Ander and stood him up there. Ander wasn't at all excited when he made a basket...

 Papa John with one of his shrimp.

 My parents have come over several times but hadn't yet made the trek down to Toroko gorge. So this was the trip to make it happen. Traveling with all of us is always an ordeal but they didn't seem too much worse for the wear. We grabbed some food in Hualien before heading towards the gorge.

 My dad loved this guy, mobile produce section all on one scooter!

 The silt in the water makes for this beautiful color, we all just stood there looking at it in awe. Beautiful.

Kennedy was excited because she finally got to stay up to see the traditional dancers with Papa John. She even got to get up and dance at one point, and she was thrilled about it. 

Kennedy also had a memorable sleep walking episode one night where she jumped out of bed and ran out the door of the hotel room before my parents could catch her. They immediately looked for her but she was gone. 

After chasing Ander through the halls in her dream, Kennedy finally came to, after running a full lap around to the lobby (it would take several minutes to do if running). Confused, she went back to the room and reported she thought she had just been sleep walking... technically it would have to be classified as sleep running I think! Needless to say, my poor, freaked out parents bolted the door after that!

 This picture is to show you some perspective of how giant the marble boulders are everywhere in the gorge. Incredible, right? We went on a little hike in a dark and drippy tunnel through a mountain, that opened up into a beautiful area.

 It didn't take but a minute before Ander was getting ready to go swimming!

 Grandma Pixie and Papa John

 Our Traveling Circus

 The gorge from above

 This is the Martyr's shrine, but there are 3 temples as part of it, you can barely see the third at the top left of the picture. So, we figured out how to hike up there...

 Pixie stayed in the car with Scarlett (thank you mom!) but the rest of us climbed a bunch of stairs and were rewarded with quite the view.

You could see the middle temple below

A different crazy suspension bridge then we've been on before, makes me nervous just looking at it!

 Remember how giant the boulders are? The ones above are the size of a small house. Such a gorgeous gorge!

Back at Silks they had a bunch of free activities set up for the kids to do for CNY. They were awesome, lanterns that work, leather working, clay making, traditional Taiwanese candy making (not sure what it means that I am starting to kind of like the taste of that stuff...).

Not sure what was with Kohen's side ways hat wearing but my hope was that if I ignored it, it would go away, I think my plan might've worked.

 When the kids went swimming Papa John tried to keep Scarlett distracted from the pool by taking her on little walks, but eventually...

 She won.

 We survived the trip and when we got home it was Papa John's birthday. Scarlett thought we were noisy so she was experimenting with covering her ears... if only that actually helped.

 I made a cake but I am seriously only now realizing that we didn't even have one gift for him to open... that's lame of us! Ah well. The cake was delish which helps everything right? Happy Birthday to my dear Dad who is a really good sport about coming a long way to roughhouse with his grandkids! Thanks for coming Mom and Dad, it was so wonderful to have you!!!

Thailand with my Girls

Though we talked about it sometimes, I never thought a girls trip to Thailand would really happen. But by January we needed to provide our friend Lori, currently living in China, with a brief escape. And after discovering Matina missed her calling as a travel agent, we were booked for a long weekend in Thailand before we knew it. 

 Because we were kidless we were able to enjoy this gorgeous view and scenery without worrying about things like children falling over the balcony. So nice! Our temporary digs totally exceeded our expectations, since by now all of us have lived in Asia long enough to know to keep them low.

 The first day three of us headed out to the Phi Phi Islands on a speed boat tour. The sea was angry that day my friends! We were violently tossed around and my recently whiplashed neck and shoulders did not appreciate that. But we got to our destinations, spent some time laughing at two random girls trying to take provocative pictures of each other in the rough surf, then moved on to some islands where the scenery was truly breathtaking.

 At Koh Phi Phi Leh we all took turns jumping off the front of the boat. The pictures were shot in sports mode and our resulting gracelessness provided us with lot's of laughter when we went through them later.

Next we stopped at the beach where apparently Leonardo DeCaprio filmed the creatively named movie The Beach. It was the most crowded beach I've ever been to and I didn't see Leo any where, so.... 

This is probably my favorite picture of the trip; me and my chicas relaxing on our own little spot of beach, reading our books and enjoying each others company.

So maybe this picture needs a little explaining...

 My friend Lori is deceptively hilarious. Meaning, you think she is quiet and a little shy, then at some point she will say something so funny and unexpected that you laugh until you snort. Having said that, she brought us all a little present from the Peeps Repub, it's truly all the rage there on the beaches filled with skin-conscious Asians.
I give you, the FACEKINI!
We had 700 some odd pictures from our trip and 90% of them are us goofing off in our Facekini's. Everything becomes hilarious when someone dons the freakish thing. Our abs were so sore from laughing! The most repeated phrase of the trip was "That'd be funny with a facekini!" followed closely by, "Our husbands are not gonna think this is as funny as we do!"

But seriously, what's not funnier with a facekini? 

Our long boat driver actually wanted to know where we got it, and wished he had one because he's on his boat all day. But I'm too genteel and couldn't part with mine as I need it to protect me from the harsh rays of the sun... and to wear it at obnoxious times to make my friends laugh.

 The best thing about a trip to Thailand is the FOOD!

 And FRIENDS!  (Me and Brandie, Matina & Lori above)

 We rode this little scooter and side car around town and it fit the four of us perfectly! Ok, well, no. We were just trying it on for size to see if we could roll like the locals.
On second thought though, that would be a lot funnier if we were wearing our facekinis....

I Don't Do Resolutions

Why? Because that is the quickest way for me NOT to accomplish something. So normally I don't even bother making New Year's Resolutions. But this year in my head I thought, "It's not even a "real" resolution, I will just work on not always being a month behind on blog posts this year." Thus the NYE post that has stood as sentinel of this blog for the last 2 months.
What can be said for a blog unkempt is behind every 2 month gap is a very full and busy life. If you want to use the "treading water" analogy, I'd describe us as trudging up the steep stairs to the water slide, brief moments of happiness and fun as we slide down the water slides of life, and before we know it, we are back to treading water again, doing our best to just keep our heads up. But at least we got to ride the slide, right?
So, after flirting with the idea of letting my blog go, or just keeping it up privately, I realized that this system has worked for me for 6 years, and if I try a little harder maybe I can keep on top of things... Or not. Whatever I decide though, it will NOT be a resolution!

New Years Eve 2012

This NYE we decided to risk going down to the base of Taipei 101 and watch the fireworks from there. It's a risk because we've heard horror stories of not getting home until 4am, and this is all for a fireworks show that lasts 3 minutes. Not 30, three.
We doubled with Brandie and Jeremiah and our guys did some serious research into the situation so that we knew the exact streets that would be closed off and at what time. They wouldn't be reopened until 3am so we wanted to park close but not too close.
We drove downtown and spent some time finding the perfect spot, hoping enough cars would join us so that we wouldn't be towed, risked it and parked. We walked a few blocks in to dinner.

We couldn't have picked a better spot to have dinner than basically at the foot of 101. We were just across the street. We had a late dinner at a delicious sushi place and took our sweet time eating, not wanting to wait out in the cold for too long.

At 11:55 we walked out into the streets that had been slowly filling with thousands of people. It was strange to see these streets -always swarming with scooters, buses and cars- only full of people. We didn't have to wait long for the show to begin:

After the brief but awesome show we walked several blocks back to our car, waited in minimal traffic due to our guys' superior navigational skills, and were home before 1:30am. We've seen it from afar every year but it was definitely worth the effort to see it up close. What an amazing way to ring in the 2013 with my baby!

Christmas 2012

Christmas Eve was spent with our friends on the lane. In sharp contrast to last year, I was much less stressed and had a great time with our friends and 16 kids. It was a wonderful evening. Instead of a pointless white elephant exchange for the kids we came up with a Service Exchange for them instead. More on that later maybe? 

It took about 15 tries but we got a picture with everyone at least looking at the camera on Christmas Eve, progress, one might say.
I was thankful Christmas Eve that Alyssa can't keep a secret yet. Kohen had been warning Nathan and I that he was planning something, a test, and he would know for sure if Santa was real by Christmas morning. His only mistake was confiding in both of his sisters. Aly sang like a bird.
Christmas morning the kids discovered the carrots they had left on the roof, all but eaten, and the reindeer had drunk the water they had left them and there was even a hoof print in the blob of playdough they had left to try and get an imprint. Faith in Santa was reconfirmed.

Christmas morning was wonderfully magical. The absolute favorite gift and biggest hit of Christmas was by far, the crutches that Kennedy got from Santa. They had a note on them that said something about how, I know your mom said No but I thought you should have them anyway. It's the strangest gift but she plays with them constantly. And all of her friends love them too, it's the most unexpectedly perfect gift Santa has ever given. Who knew?

Lastly is the pic of Scarlett hugging her new baby. My favorite of the morning. 

We spent Christmas playing with our little family and it was lovely.

Festivus 2012

Festivus was a success this year. I think I got pictures of most of the dioramas depicting most everyone's grievance for the Airing of Grievances. But what wasn't captured was the hilarious presentations given when everyone takes their turn explaining their grievance.

It's become the highlight of Festivus for sure. Nathan and I always end up having a conversation about how creative and hilarious our friends are.

Here everyone was hard at work on their Mental Feats of Strength...

Which had a finale of Minute to Win it games this year for the finalists.
It's always wonderful to be able to get together with friends and just laugh and enjoy each others company during the otherwise hectic holiday season.
Festivus for the rest of us!!!

Back to Bass

I never get to surprise Nathan. It is unreasonably difficult to surprise someone that you love. I almost did it though in early December. A friend arranged tickets to Sting's Back to Bass tour that was coming and I managed to keep our evening a secret until we were walking out the door and our sitter said, "You guys are going to the Sting concert, right?" Ahh! So close!

 It was fine though, Nathan was super excited and loving that I had planned something. 

We went to dinner by ourselves and then met up with 6 other friends for the concert.

Truth be told, I didn't really adore Sting or anything, neither did Nathan, but we liked his music fine and were looking forward to our first concert in Taipei. Well, we were totally blown away (with the exception of the crowd). Sting played an awesome set, never once missing a note, strumming away on his bass with only 5 other musicians on stage. His back up singer was amazing too. 

What was not amazing was the crowd. Everyone, literally everyone, sat politely and calmly in their seats. What? How?! It was the strangest way to enjoy a concert. So unnatural. They finally got on their feet when Sting left the stage for the first time, and that is when it really got fun for us. He encored 4 times, it was awesome. 

 Nathan and I are now proud Sting fans, and not afraid to admit it. It turned out to be one of our favorite concerts that we have seen. Sting and his music were just so much more.. I dunno the word, sexy? than I was expecting. He is a legend for a reason.
Awesome almost-surprise date night!

Ander's Eyes

It was a good 4 months of Ander's left eye turning in before Nathan and I decided that despite being told everything was fine, clearly, things were not. The problem then was that we didn't know where to take him. We weren't impressed with the first asian Dr. we'd seen so then who?

 A friend who used to live in Taiwan whose son also has an eye issue and had seen the same Asian dr., emailed me and said an American Dr. saw her son this summer and was not at all pleased with the Asian dr.'s approach. It was suggested we see someone else. This got us motivated to find a different dr.

Grant it, the office we found was in no way set up for a toddler, but they at least did an examination. The part where they put the capital E with the prongs facing different directions was probably the most frustrating. Really? A not very verbal 3 year old is gonna have the patience for that? But Ander did great considering. You could tell when he could no longer see clearly. He would try and cheat, or get down or out of the situation. Can't blame him. Kinda Chinese torture.

 After further testing all I understood was that Ander was farsighted and has Amblyopia where the muscle is pulling his eye in. I have no idea what the dr.'s plan of action is, there was very little productive communication. I did get that Ander needed glasses and that after a month he wanted to see if there was any change in his eye position. All other questions we have remain unanswered.
I couldn't imagine Ander keeping glasses on. Peer pressure didn't get the kid to wear a costume on Halloween, what would make him wear glasses? I may have even said a few prayers hoping for some inspiration on how to make it happen.
When we picked up his glasses I had an idea. He was intrigued with the case and shammy they gave him to go with his glasses. I told him it was the bed and blanket for his glasses and that he got to take his glasses off and tuck them into the case each night and wake them up each morning, he thought this sounded great.

He really does love tucking in and waking up his glasses. But here is the real genius, every time he would take his glasses off in those first few days when he was getting used to them, I would say, "Oh! You must be ready for bed, let's go tuck in your glasses!" and start steering him to his room. Those glasses would be back on his face in no time. He caught on quickly and has worn them so much better than I imagined he would. 

Of course when you can suddenly see things in detail it may encourage you to wear your glasses no matter what the age right? We noticed the difference right away and especially at church. He is terrible during Sacrament meeting. He won't read books or color, for example. His first Sunday with glasses? He didn't move for 45 minutes while pouring over a sticker book, seeing it for the first time. It was AMAZING.

 It hasn't all been perfect though. He chewed the nose pads off of his glasses not once but twice, in the first 72 hours. I used a less spiritually driven threat to change his behavior here, I told him if he did it again I was going to have to pinch his leg. Problem solved.
The other problem is that they have no decent kid glasses here. These ones are working, but they are a bit wide and ill-fitting. I think he needs something akin to goggles to make em stay on his face with his level activity though. But for now it'll do.

Obviously we are anxious to meet with Dr.'s this summer who we trust and can communicate. To be continued...

Thanksgiving in Taiwan 2012

(I know what you are thinking. That my eyes are closed. Ok, like you never blink! :)

This is my dear friend Allison. We have been friends since middle school in good ol' Omaha Nebraska, and she knows more about me than is advisable. We have kept in touch over the years and have both found ourselves living in Taiwan of all places.

 If you would have told these 2 girls they'd be celebrating Thanksgiving together in Taiwan someday, I don't know that they would've believed it.

Ken and Allison live about 1.5 hours away but made the trip in with their cute kiddos. We were so glad they came!

We had so much delicious food, Allison's cranberry sauce was divine, and my fresh cut green bean casserole with homemade shoe string onions was a hit, and I could go on and on. Suffice it to say, the dinner spread was scrumptious. (Check out that clutter monster at the end of the line, threatening to attack and fight us for the food. A good host probably would've made that all disappear right? So there you go.)

Our kids are pretty well matched up and have really enjoyed spending time together. Ashley and Kennedy were proud to be sitting at the big table.

 We've got Kohen, Kaylee, Alyssa, Nathan and Ander at the kiddo table.

 Sweet Emma entertained us all by trying her darndest to clean this goblet after Nathan dipped it in whipped cream for her.

 Can't talk now, it's time for PIE!

 It's fun to see our kids playing and laughing together, I'm so grateful they are getting to know each other.

 No special occasion photos are marked in this country without gratuitous peace signs.
Thank you friends, for sharing Thanksgiving with us and making it feel a little less far away from home!
(PS- how we missed getting a picture of our husbands I do not know. But just picture two handsome fellows doing the dishes while their wives chat. Good guys we have...)