21 months, a 2nd Christmas, a New Year Approaching

It's been a good month for us. We've seen our fourth month come and go, spent a Christmas in Taipei, and wrapped up some work, with much more remaining.

I always struggle with the work load at this time of year. I finished one paper based on a lecture, delivered a sermon, and have much of another paper done. I've had other things crop up--grading papers for a student who never finished them last semester. We've tried to stay on top of newsletters and the like for back in the States. But it's hard to stay on top of it. In brighter news, Emily now has a dissertation committee and a paper she proposed was accepted for a conference in the summer.

Sam's enjoyed a great month. He often says "xie xie" (thank you) with great gusto. He smiles and giggles, he kisses and hugs, he's developing a little jog, and he's just a lot of fun. He sleeps fairly well. We're not sure when weaning will happen, and he's still on the binky, but all things being equal, we can't complain. For Christmas, he got a variety of presents: clothes, toys (beloved cars, ducks, puppets, a push teddy on a tricycle, Rupert the Bear DVDSs, the movie "Up," etc.). He can't really open presents yet, and is not speaking as much as we would like, but actually he communicates a fair amount and is very expressive. We're hoping that the next six months will bring some more fluency, mainly in English, but also in Mandarin.

Our overall attitude is fairly good. There are several crunch times living abroad. One at the first month, another about three months in, etc. So far we are feeling pretty upbeat about Taipei. The weather in winter is colder than we remember, but we can always enjoy walking around during the daytime, which is pretty nice. This is just a very beautiful place, and we enjoy the food, the kindness of people, the work we have to do. It helps that in another month and a half we'll get a Chinese New Year's break. I only had Friday off and there's been a crush of work this last week.

We both skyped a lot with family. I feel caught up on the goings on back home. Dad retires at the end of this week, which is a big step. Emily's little brother finishes high school this year. Cousin seems pretty happy with DC life and has gotten into a new program. Everyone seemed to be getting a long well. We miss home, but it was nice to have a break from long car trips through the midwest. We really don't miss that.

I'll get more Sam pictures up soon. He's very cute lately. He wakes up ready to go. He has entirely reoriented our lives, but happily so. Here's wishing you all (you few?) a very merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

20 months and going strong...

We actually passed the 20 month milestone without much excitement, but it's been some nice weeks.

Our main excitement was our retreat/day off / meeting in a week ago. It was a lot of fun and we were both fairly cranky in coming back. It was just really nice to have a few days all together, with no cooking or cleaning, in places that were new to us. The Nantou pictures are up, and I will try to do Taizhong this week.

Sam is really a charmer. We stopped by the Taizhong library and he made friends, we went to the park and he made friends, we walked through the hotel lounge... He's a very charming guy. His newest trick is kiss-blowing, which he does whenever saying goodbye. Whenever we go to dinner at the cafeteria, he talks someone into playing with him. He enjoys turning the lights on and off, walking up and down ramps, and playing the piano. If you try to play with him, he will move your hands away.

He stills says "car" a lot and seems to be adding other words, especially "go!" We've heard "yellow" at least once and we think he's said some Chinese words: xie[xie] (thanks), kai (open), etc. His Chinese teacher wrote that he allowed her to feed him this week, which made her ecstatic ("this is progress!") but just made us giggle. I know Sam's behavior is often culturally transgressive (eating with your hands, crawling on the floor, etc.), and yet he is such a happy kid.

I know I need to get back into the blogging groove. Hopefully I'll do so here soon...

A Healthy Sam is a Happy Sam

Now that we are cold free and Sam's been at daycare every day this week, our life is looking up. We had a really fun day on Saturday, visiting the local library, shopping, and spending some time together. Sam was excited to get a "car" book. Don't ask how us he became enthralled with cars--it just seemed to happen along the way. The library was fun for Emily also and we both have cards now.

This week Sam has been really giggly and happy. He's say more words. In addition to his Chinese words last week, this week he is saying "rock" more clearly and has also added "up" and "down" and probably a few other words. We're excited about what the next months will bring.

There's not much news on the two of us. I'm now maxed out on technology we got an LG tv this (a Taiwanese brand) and I've been able to take more spontaneous pictures on the iphone. I've downloaded some flashcard programs and hope they'll help me with a Chinese test I'm taking in a few weeks. It's still a big adjustment, but little victories help to give us that sense of momentum. I met with another teacher this morning, and then a student/classmate who I really admire later in the morning. It's fun to have these chances for collaboration and shared work.

Not a whole lot else to say. I will update as possible.

19 month update

Here we are at the park. Self portrait of father and son.

He looks like he's disco-dancing here

Here's a brother-sister combo that enjoyed meeting Sam and wanted their picture taken with him.

Today was a notable day so it seemed worthy of a post. I realize I am slowing down lately on the blogging, and I think the challenge is that I am now putting my time more directly into family, Chinese, school, church, etc. The blog is a good way for me to think things through and file away memories, but I have trouble keeping it up when time is flowing more quickly.

Yesterday was our two month anniversary of life in Taiwan. We are still going strong. We should be out of or moving out of the honeymoon stage, but I don’t think we’re feeling any strong negativity. The next few weeks will bring more showers and cooler weathers and the transition to fall or winter. It helps that the sun still shines here and we can spend time outdoors and explore and enjoy new things.

We still have a visible sense of progress in our lives. Today Sam turned 19 months and his teachers report that he said two Chinese words “open” (kai) for some food he wanted to eat and “come here” (lai / laile) to a teacher or classmate. These are probably words he hears a lot. It was an encouragement to us. Sam’s very verbal, but even in English he has a few words he says a lot (momma, dada, car, no, again, all done), some sounds he’s made regularly (for pigs, dogs, and dinosaurs) and other words he’s said only a handful of times (water). We’ve never really worried about him, but it’s a relief to know that his brain has been working hard on Chinese also. We feel lucky to have brought him to Taiwan at this age: he doesn’t fear anyone, he isn’t frustrated by the language gap because he doesn’t know it exists, and he’s not alienated by new tastes and experiences since they are pretty much all new to him anyways. He loves fish, which kind of baffles us, and will eat pretty much anything. He is through his first few colds, which were a challenge this last month. I think Emily has also stayed pretty happy. I can tell her Chinese is really improving rapidly and she’s managed to stay on top of all of the transitions and challenges (including periods of sick husband/kid).

All in all Sam seems happy and that means that our life is generally happy also. I feel like we’re holding our own on language, acclimation, and set up, and that we need some more work on communication with folks back home (especially churches), doing our own academic work, and buying the things we’d like to keep us organized the next few years. It’s still all peaks and valleys, so it can sometimes be hard to get objectivity about how we are doing.

Many new pictures are posted online here. I’ll try to be a better correspondent.

Sam updates

• I’ve been AWOL on this blog. Chock it up to the new move and a fair amount of transition. Here are some Sam updates:
  He’s still his normal charming self.
  He loves reading. Some favorites are Baby Baluga, Baby Toes to Baby Nose, etc.
  He’s made friends at church and GA, on campus, and elsewhere.
  He’s loving nursery school (“Three Jade Nursery School”), which is part of a local community center close to our language school. He has three or four classmates and three teachers. He’s pretty excited to be there.
  He’s been home with a cold the last few days. We both had the same thing. He’s been sleeping odd hours, however, and we wanted to give him time to adjust before we send him back.
  He gets fussy when: anyone leaves and he doesn’t get to go along, when he’s tired, when he’s sleepy
  When he’s sick he prefers to sleep on top of one of us.
  He can made some new noises now. He has a “pig” sound, a lip buzzing sound, and an artificial sneeze and cough (which make him laugh).
  He doesn’t say a lot of actual words but is throwing in some new ones now and again (“juice,” “again”). Pretty much fun to watch. We’re curious how Chinese learning will interact with this. We keep hearing that initially language learning can slow things down, but that in the long run the kid will learn both.
  He makes some pretty fun movements. He dances, stands up and down, stomps, walks backwards, and can turn in a circle.

Bubbles

I keep meaning to post, and actually started writing a week ago, but it didn't take. We've been through a LOT of changes. We've done the 24 hour trip, the arrival, car trips and walks in the city. I think that we are slowly finding our way.

I'm a little slow on the pictures. Here are some pictures I took on our last day in Cinci:

Visiting Family

Fun times in our last weeks in Ohio. Sam has been bonding with his first pet. We've had lots of walks and play and hanging out. He was especially enamored with some colored eggs my mom had around. Great times...