Trip to the Gardens 2

It was really an interesting place to visit--one we'll always remember. The gardens were beautiful, if a bit cold. We'll try to go back again another time when the kids are a little older. Sam had fun trying out rides, watching a band, playing with the DIY grasshopper. Emily, Eva, and I took a walk through the back half of the gardens. Good memories!

Trip to the Gardens

Year of the Dragon

We're officially half-way through our break. I think today pulled us into the overall-positive range, after a rocky day yesterday. I feel like we've planned this year better and are having a good time and will carry some real memories from it. However, it is also just hard to stay positive going morning to night with all three. Coordinating naps and travel and feeding and sleep are not easy. I don't know how people do this plus one or two full-times jobs all at the same time!

Sunday we did the New Year's meal with some foreigners, a retired pastor who lives on campus, and a few other guests. Eli loved the stairs and spent a lot of time practicing moving up and down them (he did this today at a playground we visited). Sam hadn't slept and seemed under the weather. He was "ok," but not very friendly. At this age, if they want to be done and go home, it's hard to keep them from telling everyone. The meal itself was great. Eva is doing more across-the-room walking. She's really getting her legs. They both seem to be saying a little more.

Monday we stayed close to home. We saw coworker John in the morning and two Americans in the afternoon (husband is retired and was guest teaching this last semester). They were pretty interesting--I really wish we'd met them earlier.

Tuesday a rough day. We got out the door late and the place we went was packed. Everyone wanted to stop and say hello to the twins. I don't know what would have made it better, but we were all in a funk by the time we got home.

Today was really a good day. We saw our adoptive aunt here. We went to visit her at a set of gardens and a tea house. The drive was smooth (after we had the address inserted into gps). The tea house was remarkably child-friendly. We could sort of barricade the twins away from the food (important because of hot tea, etc.). There was an awesome indoor playground (helpful for a cold, rainy day), and the gardens were absolutely beautiful.

Sam got a DIY grasshopper, which made him very happy, and he napped all the way home. We had a good evening together. We did ten minutes of piano. I think he doesn't yet really hear tone differences. The "doh-doh-soh-soh" of twinkle-twinkle is hard for him to hear, so he's tempted to just bang on keys and sing. But he enjoys playing with it and I think in time he'll develop and ear. It's at least a fun hobby for dad.

Tomorrow the plan is to have international students over. Friday we are going to drive to a school about fifty miles away (a big drive for us). Sunday is church. That's our week.

Otherwise, things are coming along. I've had a little bit of the "things are harder cross-culturally than I would like them to be" feeling. It's helpful for me to remember that neither P-Town nor H-Town were super easy either. I'm probably idealizing our trip home a bit. I think I tend to overthink things, which is not always helpful. At the same time, overthinking has helped me stay sane in some kind of crazy situations and we have done a really good job with several big adjustments (geographic, occupational, kids).

That's our news! Just four more days of all-family fun...

Black Stallion

Sam is really into the Black Stallion lately, which is one of Emily's favorites (key scenes are the horse on the boat, the horse killing a snake, and the final race). Below is Sam's drawing from tonight of "Boy with Helmet on Black Stallion" (SPS 1/17/2012) And when Emily told Samuel that horses eat carrots, he asked for a carrot to eat tonight.

Sam's teacher wrote in his book recently that he's coming along his drawing, and Sam really does draw at home a lot now. It's funny how the motor skills seem to click into place at certain points.

Eli can now almost say "all done" or something like it, and Eva says "night night" (pronounced "nai nai"). Eva can climb up on the couch on her own, although she's not as graceful getting down. Eli can climb up on the table from a chair! Obviously, this is something we discourage. Since our own changes often seem so small, it's fun to watch the kids making such obvious advances and so many new discoveries.

Sam, a Sunday Evening

Today was a tiring day--basically everyone but Sam has a cold. Still, there were some really funny moments. Tonight Sam and I were watching "Megamind"--a father/son favorite, and there's a scene with a skeleton. I started explaining to him what a skeleton is. It was one of those conversations where you realize that what you are saying sounds crazy, but luckily toddlers are pretty believable. So we spent some time googling images of skeletons, muscles, organs, etc. We felt elbows, jaw bones, clavicles, and other bones. I showed him how muscles get harder and softer. He listened to my heart for a few seconds. I forget sometimes how much of the toddler mind is white spaces or fantastical images, which are slowly (but never completely) replaced with new expanses of knowledge.

We read "Where the Wild Things Are" tonight, which is a favorite. Eva, Sam, and I went to the student center on campus and played on the piano for a few minutes. Sam's learning to identify the sets of black keys (just to note where there are two and where there are three) and he can say the "do, ray, mi..." set of words. He's still pretty much tone-deaf. Curiously, we were signing in the car today and Eva started making noises. I didn't even notice it, but Emily said she wanted us to sing more.

Sundays are a day of "running out the clock." We came home from church early, which was a mistake. Sam also fell asleep in the car. He took a longish nap, but instead of sleeping 4-6 (as he often does on the weekend) it was more like 1:30-3. It's funny how small differences still throw us off. I spent some time talking to the neighbors, which was fun. She said we're probably still several years from being able to have one parent take out all three kids without going nuts. However, she did say that 1-2 is a rough age, and that we can be hopeful about improvements in our future.

I think we're feeling generally better about life. There are lots of small logistics for this week: car registration, trip to Costco, grading, etc. I'm hoping things will be smooth on those fronts. It is amazing how the week can just evaporate.

Nothing else new here. The presidential elections were Saturday, with undesired results :( Week after next is off. We're trying to plan some fun things for the week and hope we can focus on the fun side of things.

That's what we are up to!

Piano Man

Today Sam had his second audition--okay audition is too strong a word--for his Suzuki class.

[To recap, a few weeks ago I got it in my head that Sam could do with some sort of activity, now that he is almost four years old. Northern City is not big on your traditional American activities--nary a t-ball league or junior soccer group around. However, what Northern City does have is a boatload of little educational schools. Want to take English or Japanese? You're in! Ditto for "mental math," nearly any musical instrument, dance, etc.]

Anyway, he's tried two teachers, which is their system. The first one, Teacher Tall, was very friendly. She put a sticker on each of his fingers and had him work on playing Twinkle, Twinkle, finger by finger. She was fairly friendly, and had some puppets she used also. The second teacher, Teacher Ball, did a little more. She showed Sam middle C, had him look at the black keys ("chopsticks" for double keys and "forks" for triple keys). Sam is supposed to pick one of the teachers, but I will probably just let them know we're flexible. He may start with just fifteen minute classes at first.

A funny thing was how Sam reacted. To put this in context, Sam talked pretty much continuously from the time I picked him up at preschool this afternoon until the lesson, and the from the lesson until we got home. But at the lesson, he acted almost autistic. I don't mean this to mock. He has a funny thing he does sometimes where he won't make eye contact and will only answer questions in a really quiet voice. I think he was just distracted by the environment (two baby grands in a room; a funny chair; etc.). Anyway, it was a funny meeting.

I also have been getting some piano advice. When I went the first time, one of the parents told me that it's important for parents to be energetic and not hands off. She said the great thing about Suzuki is that you can make "twice as much progress." When I talked to the first teacher, she asked me why we were doing this system now and I said something about like that Suzuki was more relaxed. She said that it's not relaxed and that study is very important. Today I found out that my language teacher's kid did two years of music classes followed by eight years of piano lessons. She said the important thing is that "you can't take any breaks." It's a lot more pushy than the "find your passion"/"follow the kid's interest" I grew up with.

Lest any of my few readers are excited at the prospect of a musical kid, I should really try to dampen your expectations now. Sam has trouble remember "Twinkle, Twinkle," and doesn't have such great pitch. But the hope is that maybe if he gets some exposure now he could the kids' choirs at our church in a couple of years, and I think this is our chance to get a feel for what's out there. There's a Yamaha school right near by also (they do the classes with keyboards). If I'd known they were around, I might have gone with them. On the other hand, I think Sam really thrives with some one on one, and he might do better with one regular teacher and some time just for him. The hope is that I can shift some of our evening time towards a little bit of practice. In the background I probably need to remember my non-success as a soccer/tball/baseball/kiddy French class/guitar/piano player, and just treat this as a fun experience. It's funny: I didn't take piano lessons for long, but I do remember some of the very simple songs I learned, and the class introduced me to the staff, treble, bass, etc. We'll see how this all turns out...

Saturday

Today was actually very good for a Saturday. We skyped with my parents and had a slow morning. Around noon we headed down the mountain, parked, then walked to a pizza place we know. After that was a park and then some more walking. Emily had a cup of coffee and I drank some tea while the babies napped. Sam got to to go to two different playgrounds. All in all, a very nice day. The group bath went well (although I think our tub has a small crack) and the babies went to bed comparatively peacefully. There were some small frustrations (Sam wouldn't go to bed without one of us in the bed, and it took him forever to fall asleep), but all things being equal, it was a nice day. Last Saturday was sort of the opposite extreme (sick kid, rainy day, exhausted Emily) whereas today we all seemed on top of things.

I think I've had just a touch of homesickness lately. It coincided with the end of the semester, Christmas, etc. Some of it is also that January is one of the months where people start asking me to do things for the coming semester, and I always feel like getting out of these things takes more energy and work than I'd like. I try to keep repeating that my goals now are language study and teaching. I can do worship services, some student advising, the occasional sermon, help with a thesis, etc., but there's a limit to what I can do well.

The babies are very entertaining right now. They were both very smiley today. I had fun pulling Eva around the apartment (her pajama feet make it like skates for her). She can blow kisses and say bye-bye. Her talking sounds like, "hsieh, hsieh" or "nyiah, nyiah." Eli's is more of a barking "Gba!" They both have molars through. I think Eli must be up to 10 or 12 teeth and Eva's at 8. They're really coming along.

Sam loves drawing. His beloved Crayola 64 pack has really come in handy. We're trying to figure out whether to try him on piano lessons. There's a Suzuki school near his preschool. My thought is that trying him now could be a low pressure way to encourage music and he could play at it for the next year. I don't remember loving piano lessons, but I also don't remember really disliking them, and they at least helped me to think about music. I think I was nearly tone deaf as a child, and I can't tell with kids what the balance is between nature and environment. I've always been more visual than aural, but maybe this is just because I come from a family that was more focused on the visual/reading (although big brother was musically gifted). It's another place where there's a cultural difference. Here kids start on music early, but by junior high most of them stop their studies because the academics take over and the tests are the most important thing. With us, we seem to focus more on sports and clubs early and then music begins around fifth or sixth grade and really only gets serious in high school. Anyway, these are my cultural thoughts today.

We're trying out more different tv shows too. We have sesame street, leap frog, and wiggles. I'm not sure what they'll like the most. We have a really dumb phonics video, but Sam likes it.

I think Emily is coming along. The spreadsheet she needs to put together for her dissertation will be fairly massive, so she's trying to figure out how to move to the next stage. I don't know if she needs info on all 400 sites, or if she can do a faster initial read and more focused depth later. I feel like for the semester we're at an in between point. We have New Year coming up, which will throw us off our stride. In the meantime, we have two weeks to get caught up, for me to do grading, for kids to do their thing, etc.

Baptism Pictures