Summer Reflections

We are having some difficult times accessing our blog and thus the updates are much fewer and farther between then we'd like as we are blocked from this website at our home. This is very frustrating to us and we've heard from the "frequent visitors" to our site that you have missed the updates. Well I'm in Korea for the evening and I happen to have a few pics in my computer from this summer. I have a few not all of them... Having this in mind, I'm dropping in some of our favorite pics from the summer... Remember your first carnival ride? This one is at Lakeside Park in Fond du Lac, WI.

A picnic with the cousins is always fun...

The first trip to the dentist...

Brandon and I at the 4th of July Parade in Devils Lake, ND. It takes me about 3 days and I have a full out beard... this one was taken at 2 days... ;)

{yes, my 15 year old son is taller than I}

More time with more cousins...at the Wixo Lake Cabin...

One final pic from Hong Kong. This is taken near the bay at Stanley Market. Cool place...

Until next time...our next blog will be from Thailand. Taking some time off...

First Day of Preschool

It finally came...the first day of school! We were so excited to finally be able to put on our uniforms and pack all of our new school gear into our backpacks.

We are just like all the other big kids in our neighborhood now...except we don't get to ride the bus. Mommy and the driver take us to school with some of our friends.

Caden liked music class and the spaghetti for lunch. I liked the puzzles and apples and rice. We didn't have time to brush our teeth and it rained so we didn't get to go on the playground - maybe tomorrow. We liked our teacher Robin, but we didn't like the Chinese sticky rice cakes for snack. We both cried a little bit, but the teacher gave us ooh ahhs to make us feel better.

We were very tired when we got home and Mama said we were whiney the rest of the day. I will go to school tomorrow, but Mama needs to stay with me.

Day two of school... no pictures, too many tears.

Until next time...here's to hoping the" first day enthusiasm" comes back!

A Bit of Our Time at the Home of the Panda

This past June, Brandon and I took some time to visit Chengdu, China. Chengdu is the home of the panda. So I looked into the opportunity and happened upon..."feed the pandas". So we visited the National Panda Breeding Center high, high in the surrounding mountains... but before we could feed them we first had to put on these goofy coveralls.

On this day it was about 95 degrees with about 85% humidity. Needless to say they were not comfortable (nor stylish) but we did get to feed the pandas as you can see below.

The pandas native diet is one of bamboo. The bamboo, they told us, is only found high in the mountain tops in the surrounding area. We fed them panda "cookies" which is their main diet at this facility. The cookies are made from a combination of rice, sugar, wheat, and ground up bamboo. After we fed the pandas (about 6 of them), we then had to carry some bamboo into their roaming area.

The feeding experience was rather surreal. Though one must keep in mind - these are bears - they are very gentle animals. They would grab their cookie and sit on their rears with their hind feet out in front of them. These bears were in captivity obviously but I did not get the impression that they were aggressive. Having this said, we didn't take our chances and we were very cautious.

Until next time...a hard days work deserves a bowl of noodles (and a Coke).

We are back...

Sorry for the long time since we last wrote. It has been more than 2 months since our last post. The reason for this is delay is two fold. 1. We were in the US over the summer for only one month and this was an action packed month as Sabrina typically spends two months in the US. This didn't afford us any real time to sit down and pound out a blog. 2. We then left for China at the end of July and arrived August 1st. As noted in previous blogs our blog is still not accessible in China. This is rather frustrating, but it is what it is. We did find a secret way to get on so I think our blog posts should increase. I am also heading to Taiwan this next week so I'll take some time and provide an update. Taiwan does not have a block on any websites including Facebook or Blogger...

Until next time....

HK

We are in Hong Kong with the whole family...joined by Brandon, Sabrina's mom - Sandi, and Sabrina's sister - Heather.

In Hong Kong we can escape the censorship of the "Great Firewall" as HK is essentially its own country. We have not been able to access our blog while at our home in Shanghai for about a month and a half now.

Anyway, here is a quick video to show you that we are alive and well. This was taken on my camera while Brandon, Ava, Caden, and I took a double decker bus ride with an open top. This was taken on the Kowloon side of the HK and you'll see Victoria Harbor looking across to HK Island.

We'll be leaving for the US on the 26th of June and we hope to see many of our friends and family while we are back for a month.

Until next time....

Blocked Out

I'm currently in the country of Taiwan. This is important because in Taiwan, I can access our blog and in China I can not. Yes, we can not access our blog or view our blog from our home in Shanghai. For some reason the "Great Wall (firewall)" has been turned up. YouTube, Blogs-not just ours, and so on are all blocked. We are trying to figure out a way through proxy sites and so on to access. Stay tuned...but for now we are stuck. Sorry.
Until next time... "Big Brother"

A Happy Mother's Day

This past weekend was Mother's Day as we all know. While we truly missed our mothers back in the USA, we took some time to enjoy the May Shanghai weather and enjoy the outdoor pool area.Bellewood is our housing development and they threw a pool party for occasion. The weather could not have better as it was mid to high 80's for most of the afternoon.Caden and Ava have really taken to the pool this year as they have finally figured out what the benefits of "water wings" are. They can almost touch the bottom of the pool and seem quite at home just floating and "running in motion" as a form of swimming. Later that day after we went home, even mommy and daddy were able to enjoy a well deserved nap..Until next time....