Elephants, stingrays and crabs, oh my!

Big news in the Haney household...I am an aunt!  Harrison Price Davis was born to Emily and Mark right on his due date February 3.  It is hard to be far away, but we have skyped with him once and I am sure will do it more.  We are excited and send our biggest congratulations to the Davis family.

We have had lots of opportunities to experience God's creation on this trip and are enjoying all that we see.  This beach is full of tiny and not-so-tiny hermit crabs.  Several days there were so many starfish that were in the tide pools.  And no trip here is complete without an elephant ride. Only two more days and we are not ready to go.  The other day Bree and Austin were talking and Bree said she wished she could stay here 100 more days and Austin said he wished we could stay in Thailand for one year.  I suppose it is possible to have too much vacation, but it is hard to imagine going back to the cold in two days.  However we are very thankful for this time.

 A day's collection- a big hermit crab in the pink shell, 3 starfish and a few tiny hermit crabs.

 This stingray was washed up on the beach, right near our resort.

 We started out watching the elephant show...we saw elephants paint, ride a bike, play soccer and basketball and swirl hula hoops on their trunks.  Lucy was pretty excited. Here she is making the elephant noise and swinging her "trunk".

 Then we took our ride.  Bennett was especially happy to redeem himself since two years ago he was too scared and refused to ride.  Austin got to climb on the head and ride that way for a few minutes...but he was a little scared and was back on the seat in a minute or two.

 Daddy and Lucy's elephant.

 And finally, we paid about $3 for a basket of bananas to feed this cute little baby elephant.

 At first Lucy was not so sure about this trunk grabbing bananas (maybe she also thought the banana was for her to eat???) but soon she wanted to feed it and was clambering for more as she held out her banana willingly to the little guy.

Shakes, splashes and monkeys

Hmm, what do those three things have in common?  The things we are doing these days.  See for yourself.

So we took this boat to Monkey Island...a 15 minute boat ride right across the bay where we are staying.  It is indeed full of monkeys, eagerly awaiting our bananas.  We decided not to get off the boat (you could and possibly have monkeys climbing on you) but were close enough to successfully throw bananas and watch them scamper for them. The boys thought it was pretty awesome.  

Lucy was pretty excited too and kept saying "ee ee ooh ooh".

Austin discovered today he loves to be thrown in the pool.  "Throw me a mile Daddy!"

Back to the monkeys...if you can't tell, the two on the left were mommies holding their (dark looking) babies.  Super cute.

Bathing beauty.

Bennett's version of being "thrown" in...much tamer and more to his liking.

"Look Mommy I'm floating!"

In other news, I am about to be an aunt!  Emily is in labor as I write this and I am praying it will speed up for her.  Very suited to Emily's style, this little man decided to arrive right on time- on his due date.  Hopefully will have news on that soon.  So hard to be far away right now.  But if I have to be far away, I would pick Thailand as the place to do it. :)

Thailand, Thailand

We are so happy to have had a break from our regular routine, the cold and the SMOG (have you read the news?) and be in Thailand!  We are going on our third week here.  The first week was in Bangkok and was very busy (Chris led music, did a great job but was very busy).  The kids had childcare classes they enjoyed and we got to see lots of old friends.  Our second week was an opportunity to develop ourselves and Chris and I really enjoyed learning more about parenting from a couple we greatly respect.  While we went to Thailand with Lucy sick- she threw up on the plane and five more days and ended up on antibiotics- but now are all relatively healthy.

Now we are on vacation and really enjoying the pool, the beach, the lack of schedule and hanging out with good friends.

 Two years ago Austin sat at the top of this slide for about 2 hours, trying to get up the nerve to go down (which he finally did with the promise of ice cream).  This year he has already been done it about 25 times and loves it!  He is becoming a water lover, though still needs help with the skills of swimming.

 And Bennett buddy likes the water, but usually wants to be in his ring.  He even went down the slide a couple of times if Chris would catch him, but has decided he had enough.

 Lucy bug likes the water too, but is content often to sit on the top step with a cup and dump it over and over.  She has accidentally gone under a couple of times and has been pretty unphased by it.

 Chris is continuing his tradition of find and opening coconuts...pretty yummy.

 Friends and next door neighbors again...the hotel "randomly" put us next door to these guys.  Just like old times!

Our hotel is right across the street from the beach...it is a great set up.

Not today!

Quick update...today was not the day I would pick for Lucy to start having diarrhea and throwing up!  She has only thrown up once and it was 4 hours ago, so hoping maybe there won't be too much more tonight.  But she also had a fever.  Our flight takes off in less than 8 hours...would LOVE prayers that she recovers completely and no one else comes down with this bug while we are traveling.  Thank you.

Winter goodbye, hello sunshine!

They say this has been the coldest winter here in 30 years. I believe it.  We have had stretches of weeks on end where it did get above freezing.  Weeks!  I am from the south and this cold cold winter is not my thing.  Mostly, I have been staying inside. But staying inside with 3 small children has other issues that come with it.  So, despite the fact that traveling for almost a month with 3 small children is not small feat, I am excited.  Excited to be warm, to be able to go out, to not have to spend 30 minutes getting everyone bundled up to go anywhere.  Excited to drink mango smoothies and eat red curry.  Even though my husband has some big responsibilities and will not be around much for the next 10 days, I am excited.   Do pray for safe travel on Friday (Thursday night USA time...5:50 pm..yes it is an early flight!) and for good transition for the kids.

 Chris has been giving final exams in his English classes...as well as having end of the semester parties. The boys went to one and were very popular, as you might imagine.

Bennett...is a nut.  So many times lately Chris and I have just shaken our heads and laughed at this guy.   The things he says and does are just hilarious and funny and sometimes really rebellious and not so funny.  He mis-hears things and mis-prounouces them many times a day.  He comes up with the funniest things too. Last night he slept in his underwear and pretty much wore that all day today. Despite the aforementioned record cold weather we have been having. Not really sure what he is doing in this picture.

 Some friends' of ours spent the week at Jason and Angie's place...so we got to see them a good bit too. They were here for pizza night...Jaden is about 6 months older than Lucy and they actually played together.

 And all the kids LOVED to play and wrestle with Bryan Shu Shu.  Guess who's pigu is the one showing at the top of the pile? I just bought him a one piece...shorts and shirt connected...bathing suit so we would not look at his rear for the next month.  Just cannot keep his pants up...for lack of a bottom.

 A and B have been home from school and actually been playing together rather well, despite the bickering that erupts every 30 minutes (or sometimes 3 minutes) or so.  Here they were playing "butterflies".  They started as caterpillars, emerged from their cocoons as butterflies and then flew the world.  Literally, this is Bennett butterfly on an airplane (guess his wings couldn't carry him that far) watching his personal video screen while traveling from America to China.  And then on to Thailand.  Yep, these boys have traveled!

Austin Butterfly on his seat on the plane.

The oldest 4 in our family all got haircuts this week, Taobao summer clothes and suits have all arrived, poor Chris has exams to grade and music to prep but we are getting ready.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas ...a bit belatedly. Again the internet has not been our friend but is finally letting me upload some pictures today.  The week before Christmas was a bit busy but Christmas Day was relaxing and fun together.  Sunday the 23rd Austin got a migraine at church, threw up in his Sunday School room and came home, missing his school performance.  When I arrived there with Bennett, they said "Oh no, Austin was supposed to sing a solo.  The first verse of Joy to the World, in Chinese.  Then we waited through 2 hours of performance and Bennett did not ever go up to sing.  I never fully understood but apparently he did not always want to practice during school so they did not force him.  But he obviously thought he was and was a little sad.  

 Christmas morning by the tree...everyone is excited.  Bennett was so cute.  I think he did not remember  much about the present aspect of Christmas morning.  He was most excited for Austin to open his gift from him and to eat cinnamon rolls and breakfast casserole.

 Notice the scary looking man in the center.  Chris decided to tease me and scare children with that mustache.  It did not last into the evening however.

 Lucy's gift...a little pink stroller.  We are hoping this will encourage her to walk.  It has not yet, but she does like pushing it around and putting her doll and animals in it.

 Lucy opening a gift from Great Grandma...a musical one which she loves!

 The very scary man again...he shaved part of it off into this look for about 10 minutes, when I told him I could not look at him anymore. :)

This is what Chris calls her sassy look...a new sweater from Nai Nai with her mini-skirt from Nana and leggings to boot.

Now all I can think about is warm weather and Thailand...still a couple of weeks away but not that far. The kids will finish out school on Monday and then we will not send them the rest of January...they would have only gone 5 days because of the New Year's break (January 1 break) but we will save the tuition and stay home.  With the cold weather, now driving our friends' car which is stick shift and new to me....I am ready for a break in carpooling.  Happy New Year!