Jet Lag

Well, the picture says it all, doesn't it? This has been the worst period of jet lag we have ever experienced. I think jet lag with two kids, including a nursing-through-the-night infant is a whole new realm of jet lag altogether. We have now been here a week and Chris and I are still waking up at 2, 4, 5,6 am. And just when you get to sleep, one child wakes up and just when he falls asleep, the next one wakes up and then...its morning. Austin is finally doing better, though waking at 5 am this morning. Bennett also has a cold, which makes sleep difficult. So, here's night seven of hoping for more sleep...but I'm not counting on it. :)

Gran

My Nana (my mother's mother, not to be confused with my mom, whom Austin also calls Nana) came for the week of Thanksgiving, which is a rare treat as she does not usually travel. She wants to be called Gran by her great-grandchildren and Austin is the first. Gran just celebrated her 88th birthday and she still lives alone and is in relatively good health.

Austin immediately warmed up to Gran, who read him books and played endless games of "boo". She also was great at rocking Bennett and is excited to have two blue-eyed great-grandsons like herself, after having mostly brown-eyed grandchildren. We treasure all the times we have together, since they are hard to come by these days.

Back in America

Well, we are now back in the US for the next 6 weeks. It is now 6 am and I have been up for two hours with Austin and Bennett, but I am really thankful Austin slept from 8 pm till 4 am- not bad for our second night here. The flight with two kids went really well- we got bulkhead seats together, which we didn't have all together before getting on the plane. Austin slept the first 5 hours and was awake the rest of the time, but did well. Bennett slept a lot of the flight and we arrived in Richmond on time.

Not much else to report, other than Chris and Bennett are still fighting colds and Austin has already been treated to the much anticipated donuts from both Bop and Nana AND Aunt Char, Aunt Em and Uncle Mark. The spoiling is just beginning. :)

Birthday party

Here are some pictures of the birthday party, which was Sunday afternoon. We had two friends from playgroup (Bree was sick and had to miss it) and our two neighbor families, McDonalds for the kids and of course, the cake.

Here was my attempt to make a (Thomas) train cake - it wasn't all that hard actually.

I think he liked the cake a lot more this year than last year!

Eating lunch- McDonald's chicken nuggets and fries for the kids.

Here are all the kids at the party (except for Bennett, who was sleeping in his bed).

Opening presents - a very fun construction set from Aunt Emmy and Uncle Mark and Legos from Aunt Char and Uncle John. All the kids were excited about it.

Well, this is the second time I attempted to upload a big video and when it was almost uploaded, it quit (after like 2 hours). So, I don't have time to do it again now, but maybe tomorrow.

Birthday #1

We had a lot of birthday celebration this weekend. Here are some pictures from November 14, the actual birthday. More to come from the party.

We started the day with two presents before breakfast...a bike from Mom and Dad and a Thomas train set from Nana and Bop. When he first got up, he went straight for the Thomas gift bag and only quite a few minutes later noticed the tricycle.





We ended the day at- where else- McDonalds. I think Austin enjoyed it, but he was actually SO tired at that point. He had gone several days not napping (even after staying in bed for two hours) and was almost falling asleep at McDonalds at 5:00. We had some cake (he got two cakes- it was what he was most excited about for his birthday) and he was in bed by 6:30. He slept till almost 8 the next day and took a three hour nap Saturday, making up for lost sleep.

Smile

Nothing is more precious than a baby's smile. Bennett has started to smile this week- he will lock in with eye contact a little more now and is just starting to have these cute little smiles. We still at first were wondering- is he really smiling? But now I am pretty sure he is. We have not gotten a full smile on the camera yet, but this is the start of one.



We also put Bennett in the big bathtub with Austin and Chris for the first time the other night. Bennett loved it - he was so content, but Austin was not so sure he wanted to share his special bath/Daddy time with Bennett. Fortunately for Austin, Bennett doesn't need too many baths at this point but I sure hope one day they love playing in the bath together.

Almost two

Austin's birthday is in less than two weeks and boy is he excited. Today at church we moved him up into the two year old class. I was a little nervous, because he has a very bad association with the nursery and usually is crying when we are still blocks away from the church building. But we had not been in a month since Bennett's birth and he didn't get as upset on the way. We talked up the "big kids class"- you get a snack, get to color and sing songs! He did really well- he cried just a little as a left but the teachers said he did fine after that. I think he is ready for the structure in the class. He seemed so big picking him up from class with the picture he drew...like he had been to school.

Austin knows his birthday is coming and almost every day asks for cake and candles...and gets the same answer, "when it's your birthday you can have cake". If you ask him how old he is now he will say "almost two". He also can understand and respond to that question in Chinese. He also knows that his birthday is in November, though I am sure he has no idea what November means, or month or any real concept of a year. But in our Richard Scarry book, Lowly Worm's birthday is in November too, so it was made memorable. It is hard to believe he is almost two.

Bennett is doing well, other than really not liking the Indian food I had for lunch. He has been fussy all afternoon and evening. I guess I should have known better, but I avoided the spicy dishes. Austin on the other hand loved it and ate a ton.

Sorry for the slow blog week. I had a pretty tired week and Chris has been gone long days with the computer lately, so my blog times are few and far between.

A,B,C

Austin has suddenly started singing songs...songs that we have been singing to him for months, but suddenly he comes out singing the whole thing. One of his current favorites is the ABC song. He has it down completely and sings it a lot. Of course, whenever I turn the camera on he refuses to sing it...so I had to sneak it and missed the beginning (but I assure you he knows it all). Other favorites that have yet to captured on camera are "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" "The Itsy Bitsy Spider" "Jesus Loves Me" and "This is the day" ( this one he can sing most of it in English and Chinese).

Week in review

Well, my blogging is getting slower, so I will just do a week in review. It was my first full week as a "real" Mom of two by myself...Chris had a super busy week back at work. But we survived all right, with a few tantrums and crying spells in between (mostly from Austin, but he is adjusting ok overall I think. He is also almost two.)

Here is Bennett, in all his ten pound glory. Doesn't his face look round? I must admit

I am proud of his weight gain. :)

We received a package this week with lots of fun goodies in it...however Austin loved the box best. Here he is " swimming in the pool" with his two favorite doggies. I love a toddler's creativity. He also has wanted to wear Bennett's bibs all week- don't know why but it didn't seem like something worth fighting, so he has been wearing this UNC bib around the house all week.

The backpack. I had found this little Thomas the train backpack and was waiting for an opportune time to give it to Austin. Last Sunday night we had an overnight away with friends here - a perfect time I decided to let Austin bring his own bag. He loved it and still carries it around the house. I think he looks so old with a little backpack on.

Our overnight was nearby at the mountains, which were just starting to turn colors. Here are the four of us. It was fun to see, but the reality was...1) The time to walk outside hit right near nap time, so it was a very quick trip for me and the two boys 2) the mountain park was FULL of people as only a Chinese park can be at peak leaves season 3) there was a constant murmuring following us which went something like this
" Oh, how cute (usually referring to Austin) she is (they usually think he is a girl)"

"whoa they have TWO yang wawas ( a term which means "foreign doll" which is often what they call white children) "

"Whoa whoa, look how small that one is (Bennett obviously) - is he a month yet?" or something to that effect.

In other news, today is Chris and my seventh anniversary! That is hard to believe. We actually have a babysitter for both boys- I will try to leave Bennett for a few hours while we go to dinner. We hope to do an overnight when we are back in the US at Christmas, but we will see.

Check ups

I have spent the last two afternoons at two different hospitals getting check ups- one for me and one for Bennett. The exciting news from Bennett's one month check up is that he weighs 10 lbs 1 ounce at one month! After Austin was so slow to put on weight gain, I have been nervous about Bennett's weight gain, wondering if my milk was enough etc. So I was very glad to hear he has gained 1 kilo (2.2 pounds) in a month - the doctor usually would like to see them gain at least a little over one pound. I can relax more now when he has a bad feeding or two.

My visit to the hospital (here all doctor visits are done at the hospital, so when you say you went to the hospital it usually means for a doctor visit, not being admitted) was to check my pacemaker. While Bennett went to the western-style international hospital for his check up, I went to a local Chinese hospital to get my pacemaker checked. It is always an experience visiting a Chinese hospital. Mostly, you wait in a lot of lines. And I had to take Bennett with me, because we also had to get Bennett's visa by today so Chris took Austin and took care of that.

So first you wait in a line on the first floor to register. Then I proceeded up to the third floor to the pacemaker room, but was told I needed to go to patient room #5 to check in. When I found that room, there were about 20 other elderly Chinese people (plus someone to accompany them) waiting. Sigh. Finally the guy checking people in noticed me and told me I had not registered correctly ( I had registered for a "regular" visit but needed to specifically register for pacemaker check). So he sent me downstairs with a little piece of paper to re-register. After doing that I headed back upstairs, waited a little while and was finally told I could go get my pacemaker checked.

I went to that room, gave them my name and information and waited again behind several gray-haired patients. Meanwhile, everyone is amazed that I had brought my (one-month, I mean almost one-month old) child with me. Fortunately, Bennett again slept the entire time. Finally it is my turn. I had been wondering what I would do with Bennett (I had brought him in the sling), but that proved to be easy. A girl ( I never figured out if she worked there or was waiting for someone) immediately offered to hold him. I go lay down on the table and wait for them to check me. While I am waiting the pacemaker technician ( and about everyone else in the room) are over looking at Bennett. So here I am laying on the table and the technician pulls out his cell phone and asks if he can take a picture of Bennett with it. Well, why not? I have already waited this long. It was comical really. Finally he comes over and checks me- everything looked fine. They estimate I have another 18 months on this battery.

Then I had to go back to the check in room with the results so the doctor could look at them and make any recommendations- which was - come back in 6 months. Finally, three hours later I was free to go. The upside of Chinese hospitals? The entire thing cost about $6. Yes, six U.S. dollars ( no Blue Cross used here, that is the full price). While it was time consuming and not efficient, it is still decent care (they use the same machine as MCV in Richmond) at a very affordable price. Also, the doctor had textbooks on his shelf written by Dr. Ken Ellenbogen- my cardiologist in Richmond.

So, that has been the past two days. Hopefully no more hospitals for awhile.

Underwear head and other things

Here are some random pictures from the last few days. The underwear one is my favorite- I was literally out of control laughing when I took that picture- his eyes looked so funny and he was having such a good time.

Mom brought "big boy" underwear for Austin, even though he isn't quite ready for it. But I had washed the new pairs of underwear and they were hanging up to dry when Austin got a hold of them. They are Thomas the train ones, so they were automatically very interesting. I explained what it was to him and somehow he decided it would be fun to wear it on his head. But the elastic was so tight it would slip down from his (very large) forehead and squeeze his eyes shut. He kept walking around with them like that even though he couldn't see and it was SO funny to watch his face. The picture doesn't quite capture it but you can get the idea.

Bree ( and Angie of course) was the only one to make it to playgroup this week, but she and Austin had fun riding his bike and hamming it up for the camera.

Bennett had fallen asleep on our bed this evening and Chris decided to lay down with him. So sweet. Bennett still sleeps a lot, though he has a few awake periods every day. Today I took him outside so Austin could play. I got many questions from curious neighbors about him and took the liberty to say he was basically one month old (about a week away from it still). Why did I round up? Well, to avoid being thought of as a child-abuser. Well, maybe not quite that extreme, but here neither mother nor child leaves the house (or opens the windows, washes their hair or many other interesting things) until the baby is one month old. This is called "man yue" literally a full month, and is a very important tradition in China. If those little grandmas knew I was out before a month had passed (or that i went outside the first week!) they would have given me some serious disapproving advice, which I was happy to avoid. Thus, he is close enough to a month in my book to give that as his age.

Aquarium

Today we took advantage of Chris' time off to have a family outing. We went to the Beijing Aquarium, which is located inside the zoo. We had a fun time watching the dolphin and seal show, seeing lots of fish and sea animals and ended with a lunch at...where else, Austin's favorite restuarant- McDonalds ( this will be the last trip there for awhile, we went there a couple times with Nana too). Bennett slept the whole time and woke up to eat just as we got home...he made it easy.

Touching a star fish. The whole time Austin kept wanting to find star fish...fortunately we finally did.

In front of the shark tank. Austin was a little afraid of it, but managed to smile for a picture.

At the show- Austin liked it, though it was a little loud, which always makes him a bit timid.

Austin and Bennett hanging out before bedtime the other night. Bennett spends a lot of time in this play gym- which Austin calls the "tent".

Bye, Bye Nana

Well, the day I have been dreading is here...my Mom left this afternoon. We had a great three weeks together and it was SO helpful and fun to have her here. I don't quite know what Austin will do now that she is gone- no more Nana's fun bag or automatic person to distract him while I am nursing Bennett, no more yummy Nana cooking etc. But we are all thankful she had the chance to come and looking forward to being back for Christmas, so the goodbye is not that long this time.

Chris and Austin took mom to the airport and have not returned yet, so I am taking advantage of a quiet moment while Bennett sleeps to get back to blogging. Chris has several days off of work this week, so I will still have a lot of help this week. Next week I will get to really try out being "Mom of two" for real.

Opening Nana's Fun Bag- last night it was crayons for the bath from Aunt Emily. They were a big hit.

Austin showing off his new excavator pajamas that Aunt Char found. Its amazing how many excavator products are out there once you know to look for them.

Nana with her two grandsons. She doesn't look old enough to be a grandmother of two, does she?

Austin and Nana at the park across the street from our apartment.

Mom with Bennett. We have a similar picture of her with Austin when he was a newborn. Bennett still looks a lot like Austin, but is starting to get a double chin - we hope he puts on weight faster than his brother did.

Today Austin said he was going to read to Bennett. His new favorite books are this set of Thomas the Tank books that Nana brought. He has already memorized a few of the words or lines from the book. Notice at the end Bennett swinging at that hanging, purple hippo. He already loves the hippo and will purposefully swing at it and watch it move.

"What's God doing?"

Austin is in a very inquisitive phase right now, always asking what's _____(fill in the blank- Mommy, Daddy , Nana, ayi, shushu etc.) doing? Last night he was standing by the window as I was about to get his pajamas on and he asked "What's Jesus doing?" and then a few minutes later "What's God doing?". It is fun to see him already asking these questions and challenging to think- How do I answer these questions in a way he can understand? I am sure this is just the beginning.

Austin also has about mastered the alphabet and enjoys saying it through and then enthusiastically claps for himself afterwards.

Other news- Bennett was circumcized yesterday. In the moment I found myself asking "Why are we doing this again?" but he survived and seems fine today. Austin continues to try to interact with Bennett. He sometimes lays down next to him ( we have to keep him from rolling over Bennett or laying on him), yesterday he read him a book (its on Nana's camera, which we cannot upload on our computer unfortunately) and he is very interested in watching us change his diaper and looking at the umbilical cord.

Here are some more random pictures from the past week.

Austin attempting to "hug" Bennett (we managed to keep him from smothering Bennett)

Austin (and Chris) went to our friend Sydney's second birthday party- Austin loved eating cake.

At the party they went to a local park to ride these little rides with music. Austin continues to have a dread of loud noises and would only "ride" on the broken one.

Going fishing. One of Nana's Fun Bag items was to go fishing. Nana, being the creative person she is, had brought paper to cut out fish, paper clips to attach to the fish and a magnet on a string on the end of a "pole". Austin went fishing by letting the magnet "catch" the fish where the paper clip was. He had great fun, but unfortunately broke the magnet afterwards by slamming it against our tile floors...we are in search of another circle magnet with a hole in the middle.

Nana's Fun Bag

Nana is very creative and came fully prepared to entertain and teach Austin many things. Every day Nana has something new for Austin in "Nana's Fun Bag"- a gift bag that appears every morning with something in it for Austin- a book, a little toy, a craft, etc. Today the fun bag had finger paint - a new experience for Austin. He now asks for the fun bag every day and has learned many new things. Here is his first finger paint creation.


Speaking of creativity, Austin has been very creative absorbing new things he is learning about having a baby in the house. The other day he got this toy mouse and some wipes and said he was giving him a clean diaper. Today he put one of his trucks on the changing table, got a wipe and said the truck went poo poo and needed a diaper. I guess that's how boys play house? Then tonight, Austin grabbed two oranges from our fruit basket, put them on his chest and ran around saying "Austin pump milk!" Ummm, well you can guess where that came from. It was pretty hilarious, unfortunately we did not capture it on the camera.

Here are some more pictures of Bennett. He had a really good eating day, for which I was very thankful. He also had a big adventure- we had to go apply for his passport at the US Embassy. He slept in the sling the whole time except for eating and Chris and I got a lunch date out of it after wards. He continues to look so much like Austin did as a newborn, it sometimes is so strange. Enjoy these pictures.

More Bennett

Well, I am so behind in blogging and the pictures and videos are piling up. Bennett is doing pretty well, but still is not a great eater (like his brother before him) so nursing can be frustrating. His weight was ok at the one week check up though so that is good. Otherwise, we are all doing pretty well. Austin is getting more used to Mommy being busy nursing and gets very excited when Bennett is awake (which is not very often). We tried the paci out on Bennett yesterday, which Austin also got very excited about - he keeps trying to give it to Bennett whenever he doesn't have it or it falls out.

Giving Bennett a hug.

Austin's big brother present- an excavator!

Austin "baobao (hold)" Bennett (he is pretty gentle for the most part. So far).

That is actually a smile- this is Austin's new pose whenever he is on camera.

Giving Bennett his first bath. It was rather comical. First he had a blow-out poop the minute his diaper was off. Then he peed. Then he started crying. Once he started crying, Austin started crying too- I think Austin thought he was hurting. It was pretty cute and showed Austin's sensitive, compassionate side. If he thinks others are hurt, he will cry. But we all survived the bath experience unscathed I think.

Finally

I know I have a good excuse for my lack of posts, but I am glad to find the time this evening to put some pictures up. As many of you know, Bennett Price Gaertner was born September 25 at 10:54 am ( a 3.5 hour labor!). He weighed 8.1 pounds and was 19.3 inches in length.

We came home Sunday and have been so thankful that my Mom (Nana) has been here to help us through this transition. Austin has been great with "didi" overall and likes to "kiss" him (Austin's version of a kiss is really a head butt- he puts his head up next to Bennett's). He does get sad sometimes when I am nursing, but is adjusting pretty well.

Well, enjoy the pictures!

Glad its over so quickly!

Proud Nana the second time around.

Getting ready to leave the hospital. Bennett was unimpressed.

Sleeping with Daddy.

This was Austin's first sight of "Didi". He immediately knew that this baby was his new didi and focused on him before noticing Mommy. He kept asking "didi doing?" (as in, what is didi doing?).