Sam and his pants

Nothing will hold Sam's pants up!

Must be in the genes!

I see a future for Gavin and the rings at the Santa Monica Peer!

Trying to hire a second full-time teacher

The boys no longer want to go to school, and we had been having a hard time with our current teacher thinking that she could come to work when she wanted to so we went on the hunt for a new teacher.  I interviewed about 20 women. Most were qualified to do the job, but it was so hard to hire any of them.  I do not know the full extent of the issues, but I was told my a Chinese friend who tried to hire a teacher herself that any work done inside of a home is perceived as nanny work - which is considered one of the lowest/degrading professions in China.  So people do not want to work. 

Chinese people are so worried about their image/reputation that they won't even take it as a Summer job.  It is just really bizzare to me that child care is so degrading. 

Playing Turtle

Gavin is growing up, and he is big for his age. It is so cute to still watch him play using so much of his imagination - even though physically he looks like he should have outgrown it!

Front View

Back View

Sleeping View

Two Months Left and Counting Down

We have been here almost 10 months, and we have 2 months left. Time has really flown by.  What is that they say about the longest days make the shortest years??? Yet 2 months seems so long to me right now. Maybe it is because so many people leave around Summer time either to visit or move back to the United States permanently.  I am regretting not leaving earlier.  At the time we bought the plane tickets and extended our visas we thought we would have to be in school through the end of August.

I am starting to think about the differences between our lifestyle here and in the United States.  This is probably not a good activity!  Here is my list...


Hello granite countertops and oven, good bye coackroaches.
Hello clean air, good bye pollution.
Hello husband.....good bye nanny/cook/cleaning lady and full time teacher.
Good bye bike.....hello mini van.
Good bye tasty vegetables....hello variety.
Good bye mosquitos hello bugless, scentless world.
Good bye native speakers....hello scrambling to keep Mandarin up and paying high prices for tutors.
Good bye exotic animals.....hello no pets.
Good bye toxic chemicals everywhere.....hello genetically modified foods (70% what Americans eat have at least traces of GM organisms.....most countries around the world - including China outlaw/requiring labeling because they feel they are so bad for their health).
Good bye small butt...hello big butt (American diet is fattening, and I won't be walking/riding a bike everywhere)
Good bye Chinese public schools....hopefully an enthusiastic hello for American public school (hope we got a good teacher!)
Good bye to the struggles with language/culture....hello being able to read, write and communicate with everyone!
Hello modern life....good bye camping.
Good bye cheap books ($1-$2)...hello expensive books!

Gavin Reading Chinese

If the world ended today - would I regret having brought the boys to China???  Probably not, but I would regret spending so much time and energy helping Gavin read Chinese! My feeling is that if Gavin can read - language retention will be much, much easier.

Gavin has been a Rock Star at learning to read Chinese. Right now he recognizes 450 characters (seen in the shape of a dinosaur behind him)....we are hoping to get to 800 before we get home.  Chinese children are required to know 870 characters by the end of the first grade, 1500 by the end of second grade (that represents 90% of what is written), 2000 by the end of 3rd grade, and 2500 for their lifetime. 

Learning the Chinese characters has been a lot of work for Gavin too. The other day on the way home I was asking Gavin what things in his life make him the happiest.  One of the first things he said was learning to read Chinese makes him happy....this beyond shocked me. So I asked him why, and he told me that it makes him a little bit sad, but them it makes him really happy.

Chinese People/Glasses

Chinese people wear glasses.  I do not know one person over 10 that does not wear glasses.  Her Gavin and Sam are trying on someone's glasses....hopefully they won't need these at 10!

Baby Wear

It has been really hot here (80-100 degrees)....This is a common baby outfit seen around the Chinese parts of town.

Never Expected This....

I walked out my front door (2nd floor) the othe day to see that the elevator was broken.....but there was a really weird smell and they floor was oily..... I turned to corner to find....

A guy in the stair well with a bazooka sized blow torch melting metal to make parts to repair the elevator....This is so wrong on so many levels...

Here are the fire extinguishers on the 1st floor....not very helpful from here!

Lego robot class and the cost of kids activities

This couldn't be better for Gavin! How much is it??? $1,000 USD for a group of classes - that are about $20 each.  You have to pay for the who set of classes and promise to refund the difference of what you do not use (....which you will never be able to trust in China).  Soccer - $15 per class....for group lessons of 14 kids.  Really???? In a country where professors, doctors, and working professionals make $1000-1500 per month - how can businesses like this exist...yet these classes are packed. The only thing that I can think is that you have the finanical resources of 12 great grandparents, 4 grandparents, and 2 parents all being channeled down to just one child.

Chinese people have extremely strong family relationships, but their community relations aren't fantastic.  If it were a group of Americans you would get all the neighborhood kids together, hire a coach/recruit a parent, and you would move forward paying .50-$1 for classes instead of $15 for a group lesson of 14. Chinese people just don't act that way....it isn't common/acceptable so they just do not do it. Any work inside the home is degraded to the point where it brings shame on the family - even if it is with your own children.  

A friend tried to organize a handful of her friends this Summer to do something, and at first her Chinese friends committed, but once they started thinking about guiding all of the activities they all backed out.

Shaving Cream Art Project

The school requires a 2 hour nap in the middle of the day for all of the kids.  That makes no one happy so I pick them up in the middle of the day for a couple hours and they read in Chinese, practice Chinese pronunciation, do an errand in Chinese to build their vocabulary, and then we do an art or science project. This day we did an art project where we mixed shaving cream (very expensive in China, btw...they just do not use it much) and food coloring and then we paint.  The boys loved it. On this day I got the boys back super late (because of the bath), and Sam's class still hadn't waken up at 3pm (that means they had been asleep for over 3 hours).  I am so happy that Sam isn't being forced to stay in his bed for 3 hours in the middle of the day!

This is what his hands looked like after washing them!

Sam has always been super messy - this one required him to take a bath before I took him back to school.

Jack is All Grown Up!

We we arrived in China Jack was just 18 months old.  He has really closed the gap between himself and his older brothers this year. He is so cute with his bushy, curly hair.  His social/emotional growth in China has been amazing.  He is so fun loving, friendly, and snuggly.  Everyone here absolutely loves Jack.  I cannot go anywhere without everyone saying Jacke and having him giving them an excited "Ni Hao!" then running right past them. He speaks perfect Chinese (like any Chinese 2 year old), and people really get a kick out of it. So it makes him even more popular.  

Love the iPad.especially in China.

There are very, very few things to buy that I love much more than I could have ever imagined.  I really cannot live without the iPad. We use it to download 3D instructions for paper airplanes, translate for us, read books, have books read to us, build animated boats, watch movies, help practice our chinese, do puzzles, keep our to do lists, send emails we use it all day long!

Sam holding the paper airplane we made. 

Gavin's latest boat that he designed.

Last year at this time

I stumbled across some old photos of the boys from last year....they were so little.  I cannot believe I took them to China. In hindsight that was pretty crazy on my part, but I am glad we did it.  It has been an incredible year.

Taking the Turtles for a swim....and Gavin too

Gavin's last turtle wouldn't eat for us. So I pulled together a make shift harness and we went to a local pond hoping that he would eat some of the small fish/algae/etc. The boys had fun throwing the turtles as far as they could and watching them swim back.  Gavin was trying to grab his turtles and went for a little swim himself.....so gross!

Salamander, Frogs, and Turtles OH My!

We have been buying pet turtles for the boys. They are in heaven!  It is the perfect boy pet. It requires minimal care, and the boys really like that they get to experiment with the turtles hard shell. I watch as these turtle get thrown, dropped, shaken,and spun.  They also like to take the turtles in the bathtub with them and let them swim. Jack thinks it is the funnest thing ever. He gets to run it around like a car, but then he thinks it is so funny when the turtle tries to run away from him. It hurts me to watch it, but they think it is the coolest thing in the world.  So far we have had 6 turtles and only have 1 left.

Turtle 1 - got lost in the house and after a week we found a dead dusty ball

Turtle 2 - lasted a few hours. The boys put it in the bathtub and turned the water on hot. The poor turtle got cooked to death.

Turtle 3 starved to death because we didn't know what turtles ate.

Turtle 4 got left on a park bench

Turtle 5 also didn't eat at our house - we gave him everything the other turtles were eating, but he just wouldn't eat.

Turtle 6 - still alive...but is now the favorite toy of all 3 boys - so he probably won't last long.

We have also had a salamander (lost in the house) and a frog (accidently washed down the sink).

School Uniforms a Big Hit with the Boys

Tommy and I have been making fun of the boy's school uniforms for months now.....but much to our suprise when it was time for Sam's school picture day and it was required, Sam was so excited to wear his.  Gavin didn't have to wear his because his picture was done in a gown (he was graduating), but he really wanted to wear his too.  Sam asks to wear his almost every day now.  I have to admit that when he wears it he does look cute.

The Great Wall

When Tommy was here in May he took the boys to hike the Great Wall. Gavin had been asking me for a couple of months if we could go....but when the time came he had a very hard day.

Floating the Dragon Boats at Tshingua University

This is Gavin carrying all of the boats we made to celebrate the Dragon Boat Festival. 

Their maiden voyage!

Asia Fashion

If you look at Fu Laoshi you will see that she is wearing a pink sleeve/shawl...I don't know what it is called in English - but you see people wearing these all over Beijing to protect their arms from the sun....or to prevent tanning. I am not quit sure.

Catching Butterfiles

Gavin was trying to catch a butterfly with his hands, and it wasn't working. On the way into the apartment he noticed an old window screen, and asked me if I could do something with it to help him catch a butterfly. So I stiched it together and around an old hoop and wooden spoon.....30 minutes later we had both a buttefly net and a butterfly. Gavin was very, very happy.

Dragon Boat Festival Boats

This weekend was Dragon Boat Festival. The boys have been sick with Hand/Foot/Mouth so we haven't really been able to take them anywhere to celebrate. So instead they made their own little boats and we took them to a pond at one of the local universities.

 

Sam refusing to model with his boat...

Gavin's creation

Fu Laoshi's (our teacher) boat

It is 80-100 degrees outside every day and Jack wants to put on a hat....not just any old hat, but winter hats.  Where I used to get lectured about not keeping my kids bundled, I now here complaints about Jack being too hot.  I figure that if he gets too hot he'll sacrifice fashion for comfort.  I will let him make that decision. Stay tuned for his favorite hat - a Santa Clause hat that gets a lot of chuckles....

100 Days of visa checks

100 days of visa checks foreigners started Middle of May.  It is pretty easy - they just stop everyone that does not look Chinese....and I do not look Chinese.  I have been stopped once already and they asked to see my passport and residency card....both which were at the Public Security Bureau at the time.  They asked me a bunch of questions, tested to see if I knew any Chinese (I am here on a student visa),  checked me on the computer - then let me go.....it still makes me nervous.