January 7th...

So, here we are, in Chiang Mai, Thailand.  We've been here a little over a week now, all for the purpose of giving birth to Baby J #3. We come to CM, because the healthcare where we live is not that great.  Just looking at the hospitals where we live, kinda creep me out.  They are old, dirty, not sanitary by any means (well, to my standards anyway), sometimes you see blood stains on the floor, and the thing that makes me the most angry - is people smoking!!!  YES, inside the hospital!!!  And no one says anything to them!  I mean really???  Also, I've talked to moms who have delivered in our city and they said you're usually in a room with about 3 other laboring moms.  Can you imagine?  You're going through labor yourself and then you hear another woman yelling in the same room trying to give birth too?  I think it would be pretty hard to relax!  She also said that the nurses are mean!  (And I've heard that from more than one person.)  From my experiences, nurses are the AMAZING people who really help you get through the toughest parts.  I can not even begin to imagine them yelling at me and being rude - this is obviously a big cultural difference.  So all that to say, thankfully because of the wonderful company we work for and the amazing people who support us, we are able to come here.  Boy am I thankful.  


Another cool thing we get to do here is celebrate our first born's 5th Birthday!!!     I CANNOT believe Braidynn is about to be 5 years old!  She is the most fun-filled full of joy little girl I know.  She loves to talk, started at 6 months old and still is never at a loss for words.  She loves to sing and dance -and this is one of my favorite things - listening to my baby girl belt out her favorite songs and dancing with everything she has!  She loves all things pink & sweet.  I decided to do an "ALL ABOUT BRAIDYNN" section where I asked her some fun questions.  :)  So enjoy!  

 ALL ABOUT BRAIDYNN

Braidynn's BIRTHday ~ January 13, 2008 3:30 p.m.
8 lbs. 2oz.  20 inches

What is your favorite color?  PINK

What is your favorite food?  SPAGHETTI

What is your favorite toy?  BABY SARAH (The baby doll she got when she turned 1 yr. old)

What is your favorite thing to do?  DO CRAFTS & PAINT

Who are your best friends?  YAN ZHOU KE YUN & ABEN & MOMMY & DADDY & THE BABY & MIMI, POP, MATT, & RUSTY & GAMMY & PAPPY, & POPPA & MIMI SHARON

What is your favorite thing to do at school?  DOING CRAFTS

What is the best thing about having a brother?  I DON'T KNOW

How are you different from your brother(s)?  OUR FACES ARE DIFFERENT

What's your favorite thing to play with your brother?  PRETEND SNEEZING & LAUGHING

What does your brother do that makes you mad?  WHEN HE MESSES UP MY ROOM

If you had a lot of money, what do you think you would buy?  RED & PINK HIGH HEELS - 2 PAIRS (Yeah... we're in trouble!)

What is your favorite thing to do with daddy?  PLAY BATTLESHIP & MOMMY/DADDY

What is your favorite thing to do with mommy?  GO DRINK WATERMELON SHAKES & GET OUR NAILS DONE & HAIR DONE

Tell me something that is really funny.   JOKES.  HAHA

What is your favorite thing to wear?  LONG PINK DRESS WITH POLKA DOTS & LONG PURPLE DRESS & A DRESS OF ALL DIFFERENT COLORS

Braidynn's 1st Birthday!

What is your dessert food?  CHOCOLATE CAKE & CHOCOLATE ICE CREAM & CUPCAKES

Favorite animal?  CHEETAH & GIRAFFE

What is your favorite TV show?  STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE

What kind of music do you like?   GANGNAM STYLE

What are you really good at?  COLORING & BEING NICE & KIND

What are you not so good at? BAKING THINGS & PLANTING FLOWERS - BECAUSE I'M NOT A MOMMY YET

What do you want to do when you grow up?  A BALLERINA & A PRINCESS & A FAIRY

(January 6, 2013)


So my baby girl is about turn 5.  I'm still trying to grasp this myself.   But I do know one thing, I love her more and more everyday.  <3 

Challenged...

So, I read an article yesterday, I'm sure many of you have also read , you can read it here.  But beware if you are an iPhone, iPad, or any smart phone owner for that matter.  It's a brutal honest child's point of view of parents and their neglect of their kids.  


I started reading it thinking it would give me insite as it's titled "How to miss a Childhood."  I mean that's exactly what we don't want to do right?!  I think everyone should read this article and be challenged.  I like to think that I'm pretty good about not always picking up my phone when my kids around.  (iPhones make this kinda hard to do, as they are the coolest things ever!)  So yesterday after I read the article, I tried to notice how many times I wanted to pick up my phone.  The results were not desirable.  I noticed that almost anytime there was some down time, I wanted to pick up my phone!  I mean, really....  Can I not just appreciate some quiet or just some down time???  


The two times most likely for me to pick up my phone:

1. Nursing my 10 month old.  I've done this for probably about the whole 10 months.  I mean, it's quiet, down time right.  He's nursing and I have nothing to do. Why not pick up my phone and catch up on twitter, instagram, FB, emails, etc?  
2. When my 4 year old wants to watch a movie.  Let's face it, I don't really want to watch the movie too, so why not surf the web and appear to be watching it with her...

Why should I NOT do this:

1. Nursing is a PRECIOUS time between a mom & her baby.  The time will be gone WAY too fast.  I should treasure this time for the sweet moments that they are.  I could use this time to speak truth into his life, pray for him, and just stare at his gorgeous face.  I am committing to you and myself that I will NO longer get on my iPhone will nursing.  For real.
2. She knows.  She knows I'm not REALLY watching the movie with her.  She knows I'm not snuggled up next her, focused on her and the movie.  This time I should choose to let it be her time, whether it be watching a movie together, doing a craft, or just free play.  No matter what it is, I should let it be HER time only.  So, I'm also committing this time to no longer getting on my phone!

And if you know me well, I'm not good at giving quick responses to email.  And do you know why???  Because I've been checking my mail on my phone while I'm nursing or "watching a movie."  How can write an adequate response while doing those things?  Yeah, the same way I'm neglecting my kids in these moments, I'm also neglecting my emailers.  And to you I am sorry!

I know some of this can be a bit extreme.  I mean, I know sometimes while my kids are around I might need to check something on my phone.  No big deal.  I was just challenged by this article and hope you are or will be too.  How to miss a childhood

How in the world could I ever want to miss these children's childhood?!

Always learning.  Always growing.  Thank you Lord!

xoxo,

hannah

Happy New Year!

So, I'm a lil late.  What else is new right?!   Anyways, sorry I'm so horrible with blogging!  Thank you so those who kindly nudge me to continue, you know who you are!  :)

After the 1.1.2012 new year we celebrated Braidynn's 4th birthday, then went to Thailand for meetings during the Chinese new year and stayed a week after for a lil fam vaca - which was awesome!  Then the day after we got back Margaret came to live with us for almost 3 months!    Mid March my parents came to visit for the first time and that was pretty much awesome.

So I'm basically gonna give you picture updates!  The pics today will be some Christmas thru Braidynn's birthday party.  I'll post more later, i promise!

my sweet boy

Thanks Slushers for the awesome recorder!  :)

milk mustache

Aben's 1st Christmas

sweet siblings

real life :o  ha!

sweet princess

birthday morning - skyping with Mimi & Pop

Braidynn requested biscuits on birthday morning... I'm still in training on homemade biscuits.

birthday party at school

Braidynn's teachers made her a lil birthday poster using playdough

Braidynn passing out cupcakes to her classmates

The teacher told the students - "Foreigners' cake tastes different than ours, taste it!  it's good & VERY sweet!"

Braidynn with all three of her teachers

Braidynn's buddy

Braidynn's class

Happy 4th Birthday Braidynn!!!

cute lil boy

party at our house

Ben & the dads

Me & the moms 

birthday girl

yummi cake!

pin the tail

YAY!

me & the birthday girl 

party games

just love this action pic!

my cuties

i <3 them sooooo much

I'm into everything!

me, too!

mommy & her boy

is Christmas REALLY in 10 days?!?

"Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord."  Luke 2:11

Merry Christmas!

Seriously?  I feel like December just began, and here it is 10 days out from Christmas!  WE have been SOOOO busy and it's really not gonna slow down until after the holidays.  So, sorry I haven't been able to blog recently!  So I'll just give you a quick update on what's going on right now:

1.  Poppa came to visit us!  I mean WOW!  How excited were we?!  We're still on a high from his visit.  It was too short, but thankful beyond measure that he was able to come.  He was the first, of our parents, that has been able to come see us over here!  So yeah, you can just imagine how unbelievably ecstatic we were!    Here's some pics:

Ben & Poppa on The Great Wall

Aben pullin Poppa's hair

Poppa with the grandkids :)

Junior with the IV

Our ride around the Minority Village

Braidynn (at Minority Village)

The boys

on the Gondola, riding up the mountain

Poppa and his lil man

Junior, the III, and the IV

My lil sunshine

Beautiful Pagoda in our city

Poppa feeding the elephants!

wearing a Minority headdress

2.  We've been FREEZING.  So, the city we live in is actually called "The Eternal Spring City."  And for the most part, it truly is Spring year round.  But, because of this, no homes/apartments have central heating or air conditioning.  It didn't bother us at all this summer (we have fans), but the winter has just begun and it's BBBRRRRRR!  We purchased some space heaters, but come on now.  When you leave the apartment and go out, you will never get warm until you come home and get under some blankies by the heater.  Except, Ben has found out that McDonald's has HEAT! Real heat!  So, he frequents Mickey D's, or at least now he has a better excuse for always wanting to go.  :)

3.  Aben has bronchitis and a pretty bad ear infection.  :(  So not fun.  And actually even a little scary, since we don't have the best meds at our reach.  I took Aben to the doctor today, because he's had this bad cough for about a week and started to get a little fever.  He's been so lethargic, and not himself at all.  Anyways, I'm used to ear infections, because Braidynn was one away from needing to get tubes.  But it's just a total different ballgame here.  The doctor gave me a nebulizer with saline to use 2 times a day and then some asthma medicine (expired in 2008, but it's the best we have here) to use with the nebulizer also, twice a day.  Then here comes the fun part, for his antibiotic for his ear infection, I was given adult capsules and told to break one up and put in his food twice a day.  Yeah, for my 5 month old, who has yet to eat ANY solids.  I'm scared and not looking forward to giving my 5 month the same medicine an adult would take!  I don't even know what the antibiotic is, because the name is in Chinese!  Now, don't get me wrong, I completely trust our pediatrician here and am SO thankful for him.  (He actually just called a lil bit ago at 9:30pm to check on Aben.)  So, I'm thinking what food do I want to introduce to Aben? And do I just go ahead and put the yucky pill powder in the food immediately so he doesn't even know I've changed it?  Should I put it in a food that I don't care that he will like later in life?!  ha. 

When we get home, I feed Aben, change his diaper and think to myself, I should see if my friends here have any infant antibiotics.  As I'm typing out the text I realize something.  When we were in Thailand, having Aben, I asked the doctor for Amoxicillin to bring back in country! Yes, that's right!  For such a time as this!  PTL.  Wow.  I've NEVER been so thankful for Amoxicillin in my life.  So YAY!  I don't have to introduce foods yet AND I don't have to give Aben adult meds!  God is so good.  He is my provider.  

So today I started him on the antibiotic - which he is not too fond of, but that's ok!  Now just praying for a quick recovery.  My doctor friend said the reason, he's having so much treatment - the nebulizer with 2 different breathing treatments and antibiotics, is we don't have a fall back plan here.  There is no, lets just ride this out and see how he does.  If a sickness gets worse here we have to fly out of the country for good treatment.  So please pray for my baby for fast healing!  :)  Thank you!

my lil sick man

I want him to be like this again!  Smiling & happy!

 4.  We've also been crazy busy preparing for a Christmas team to be here!  We are SO excited and want to make sure they are being used to their full extent.  We want them meeting students, PR walking, and sharing the Christmas story with those who have never heard.    They are making a huge sacrifice celebrating Christmas with us, students, strangers, without their families.  We are overwhelmed by their commitment to spreading the LOVE of our Father and so thankful we get to hang out with some totally awesome cool people.  :)

Here's where I leave you for now.  Hope you and yours have the most and best Christmas ever!  

 Merry Merry Christmas 

love, Ben & Hannah

Braidynn & Aben