Fun with Aunt Char and Uncle John

 Charlotte and John earned lots of aunt and uncle points with these 3 kiddos during our two weeks together.  They took the boys (and Lucy, who technically slept the whole time) out to a fun breakfast one morning while I went and grocery shopped...so nice for all of us.

 Thanks to Mom and Dad who gave us all a nice dinner out for Christmas.  We went to The Courtyard, a super fancy restaurant that overlooks the Forbidden City.  We had a great time and some fun without kids. 

 There was lots of wrestling and game playing with the boys and John.  Their favorite game was called "seats"...John would put Bennett on one couch and Austin on the other and yell "You better stay in your seat!" Then one of them would get up and run to him and squeal as he put him back in his "seat" while the other one got up and did the same thing.  It often involved being tossed in the air and thrown on pillows.  I have some video but tonight internet is too slow.

And sweet Lucy loved being held by her Aunt Char (and Uncle John, though John was often on wrestle duty).

All right, I am fighting a cold and off to bed. 

Merry Christmas

We just put Charlotte and John on a plane tonight.  We are sad to see them go but so thankful for the wonderful gift of getting to be with them and spend Christmas together.  I just downloaded over 1,000 pictures from their camera of the past two weeks.  Where to begin?  I think I will start with Christmas and update backwards in time over the next week.

Anxiously awaiting the time they could come out of their room for the big day...thankfully they did not wake up too early.

The obligatory pajama picture by the tree.

Lucy wearing a fun headband from Nai Nai...we decided it made her look like little Cindy Loo Hoo of the Grinch.

Breakfast Haney-style...as in, we opened stockings and then had breakfast before opening other presents.  We took our time opening and enjoyed it the whole morning.  We had cinnamon rolls made by Charlotte and I made an egg-sausage bake.

Lucy and her stocking...about the same size.

Sorry Charlotte but I couldn't help it...funny China gifts we put in their stocking. Sponge Bob and Cheetah print facemasks. and John...I just found the light-up ear cleaner you got in your stocking.  You must have accidently left it here...what a shame :).

Reminds me of a picture of have of Bennett's first Christmas in the Bumbo seat.

The boys have more presents than they know what to do with...cloth African animals from Charlotte and John (as well as ebony animal set and drums for the boys).

Austin and Bennett picked out presents for each other...Austin gave Bennett this bullet train, being set up by Uncle John.

Austin "helped" Lucy open a Veggie Tales doll from Nai Nai and Grandpa.

Sweet smile for Aunt Char...again uncannily like a picture I have of Austin.  I will have to post them together some day.

Bennett was SO excited after opening Cars 2 from Nana and Bop.

Austin opened these great books from Great Grandma and Great Grandaddy Haney and immediately sat and read through them.

She was awake almost all day until we got ready to go out to the Staeges for dinner.  This dress was a hand-me-down from the Staeges, with the booties from Nai Nai.  So precious.

Family shot- taken at the Staeges where we ate dinner with 3 other families.  It was delicious and fun...but definite kid pandemonium.  10 kids ages five and under after a day of opening presents and candy= chaos.  Charlotte and John were good sports about hanging out in the craziness.

So glad to all be together!

When we left the house it was FREEZING and so windy...not looking good. After some terrible directions from Google and an extra hour in the car, we arrived.  But once we got to the Wall, it was great weather. Still cold for sure, but no wind and the sun made is bearable.  Austin was a trouper, walking the whole way.  We did ride a cable car up and took the slide down.  Lots of fun together!

Ropes course

The first important news to report is that Charlotte and John are here!  They made is safely yesterday afternoon and we are SO enjoying having them here.  The boys are having tons of fun playing with them.  I will post some pictures soon, but have not been able to download them yet. Tomorrow we are all going to the Great Wall...praying for sunshine and no wind. 

Last week our neighbor's son Clark turned four and had a very fun birthday party.  At this new mall in our area there is a kids' climbing wall and ropes course.  Don't worry grandmas...he had a harness on the whole time.  I was not sure how my cautious Austin would do, but he loved it and even did the very high set of ropes.  He had a guide to help, but he had fun and was really brave!  Here are a few pictures.

Two Months

 Lucy is two months old (more like 10 weeks actually).  Each child seems to grow faster than the one before.  She had her check up yesterday and had a great report.  She is 4.8 kilos or 10 and 1/2 pounds, 56 cm or 22.2 inches and growing well.  She got extra credit points for her ability to lift her head and was definitely sad after her shots. But she is doing great and talking up a storm - cooing in seeming sentences suddenly the past few days.  We sure do love our Lucybug (my newest name for her).

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

OK, so I am now confessing I bought all these stockings last year on Taobao, before I was pregnant and definitely before I knew I was having a girl. I figured if I never had a girl it would make a good gift someday...but am so glad I get to use it this year! Then I bought the plain ones for Chris and I off the real pottery barn website AFTER Christmas for very cheap last year too, so now we all have matching stockings.  I am hoping to find a monogrammer somewhere here too at some point and get our names on them.

We decorated the Saturday after Thanksgiving, but somehow I did not get any pictures of the event.  Chris and Austin spent a lot of the day out looking for white lights, which apparently are not "in" this year because they did not find any.  But Jason next door found some for us a few days later.

This year we are doing something new for Advent that I am excited about- a Jesse Tree.  The idea is to follow "the shoot" of Jesse (Jesus) from Creation to his birth  Every day we have a short devotional with an ornament the boys color depicting that story or lesson.  It starts with Creation, goes through the fall, Noah, Moses, David etc until the CHristmas story.  It combines with an Advent wreath, so on Sundays we light a candle correlating to the story.  The boys are liking it so far.  Some people have very elaborate crafts that go along with each day, but printable coloring circles seemed like enough of a challenge for me this year.

We have even had snow around here- today was the third day this week.  They have all only been an inch or two, but we did go play in it the first day.  I had no camera but a neighbor did so I am hoping to get those pictures soon. 

Can you say Oh?

Here is a clip mostly for the people related to me...Lucy's first gibberish talk.  It is really cute we think and she is starting to "talk" more and more.  Austin loves to get up in the morning and can really get her to talk. She often makes an "oh" sound, so I will hear him repeating over and over "Hi Mei Mei.  Can you say oh? Can you say oh?"  Here she is talking to Chris.  I think she smiles the most for her daddy so far.

Lucy meets Langdon...We had an unexpected visitor this weekend- my friend Ashlei.  She had to come up here to the doctor, but it was fun to see her and Langdon.  Not long ago both these babes were in our tummies together, so it was fun for them to meet! Here we are this summer (with dear friend Laura, who now has #4 in her tummy though she didn't then) and here they are now.

Can I hold your hand?  Please? She was a bit resistant...it starts early :).  We hope Langdon and Lucy will grow up to be friends or even more ...you never know so we thought we had better snap a picture.

Miss Smiley

 It seems whenever Lucy is smiling I often refer to her as "miss smiley"...I was somewhat aware of this, but became more aware of it because of Austin. He often calls her this now, but also he and Bree have some game where they talk about "Miss Smiley" and laugh and make funny faces.  I heard them doing it for several days before I connected..."oh, you got that from me I guess".

At any right, she has been smiling a lot lately and is so cute!  I feel like I am really getting to enjoy her a lot at this stage...maybe more than before.  Perhaps it is the fact that she is sleeping well at night, or that she is the third and I am more relaxed..but we are all having lots of fun. Austin talks to her and gets her to smile all the time and Bennett showers her with lots of kisses.

The Gift

Last Sunday was The Gift, a charity shopping bazaar that Chris is part of organizing.  It brings together local artists and artisans selling unique gifts and all or a portion of the proceeds go to benefit 8 different charities, helping local orphans, migrants, exploited women and so on.  It is a very fun event with live music (Chris is in charge of that part), good food (including a new southern barbeque restaurant), great shopping.  Chris performed several times and here is a clip of the boys (with Bree and Jesh) dancing...they were a bit crazy with the dancing.  Jason (Bree and Jesh's dad) also joined Chris on guitar for several songs and did a great job.

We joke that Bennett was more "moshing" than dancing.  He was his recent-intense self at this event, and had been a little sad that Austin was more interested in dancing with Bree than with him...so I think he was letting some emotion out with that dancing.

 I think Austin and Bree never let go of each others' hands while dancing.

 Bennett spent a lot of time playing with this car that a friend gave him.

At the end of the day Chris was part of a jazz trio...they sounded great.