And Again

Once again I sit in the Admirals Club in the O'Hare airport, waiting for the flight to Shanghai. We've just finished our third summer of visiting the US for the hot weeks of Shanghai summer. Now the kids and I head back to our home away from home for the fourth year of our sojourn in China. Scott has been back there for several weeks already. It's wearying in some ways, this being away from our own space and having our family separated for some of the summer weeks. But its also wonderful to have this kind of time that is so very different than our other life in Shanghai, with our extended families in the green of the Midwest.

We think we have two more school years in China, so that means next summer will be our last of this kind, where we leave our home for the summer and travel around the world to be with our extended family. I made a comment in a post a few months ago about how sad it will be to be on that final flight coming home from Shanghai someday, knowing that we wouldn't be returning there in the fall. I'm glad that final flight is still a couple of years away, as we still have lots to look forward to in our "China life," but this morning, on the early flight from Cleveland to Chicago, I had an inkling of the relief we might feel to no longer be doing this back and forth. Someday. :-)

So in a few hours we'll head out for the long flight, the fourteen hour one, to go home to Scott and China. I am still incredibly grateful for this whole experience of living on the other side of the world, and although it will be good to have it end in a couple of years, I'm glad it's not over yet.

Garden Pics and a Few Blogging Thoughts

I mentioned the Cleveland Botanical Gardens in the last post, and I wanted to share these couple pictures I took the day we visited there last week that I am especially pleased with! This one below features Gwen running across the little footbridge, but its the amazing lushness of this part of the garden that I feel like I captured in this photo. Doesn't it look so cool and inviting? Looks like a place fairies might live, I think. :-) Click on it to enlarge, and you might find that you want to step into the photo yourself!
For the thoughts... I feel like I am in a bit of a blogging rut. Lots of photos but not anything unique to say about them, I guess! Summer in the US is a wonderful time for our family, but it has us out of our regular life. Perhaps that is part of my blogging block. Scott's gone back to Shanghai now and so I'm looking that direction myself.

Also, I've been hungrily reading the blog of college friends who are in China adopting right now and it has me thinking back to those days when we were waiting for Gwen and then traveling to get her. She was the reason I started this blog, wanting to keep people in the loop with what was happening in our adoption process. Then it was to chronicle our life in China. Now that Shanghai has been our home for three years, it seems I have less to write about daily life there. Not saying I am hanging it up, but I wonder if my blog outlived itself. Thinking about it tonight.

Gwen On Her Own

With all her siblings at camp in Michigan this week, Gwen has had to adjust to a quieter routine. We've learned a new board game, read books, strung beads, practiced jump rope tricks, and done puzzles. She's also asked every night when Madelyn will be home!

Tonight we have her 18 month old cousin Isaac with us, whom she delighted to feed at dinner and carry around afterwords. I think she looks so funny holding him since their size difference isn't too great, but they both seem to enjoy it!

With less distractions than usual, we've managed to practice reading and writing fairly consistently this week... six Reese's Pieces after 20 minutes of hard work has been a great reward.

We spent a day earlier this week with Aunt Mindy and Isaac... one of Uncle Mark's many horns was fun to try to blow!
Gwen molded and decorated a mud pie at the children's garden at the Cleveland Botanical Garden on Wednesday. The finished product was so pretty we took this picture and then left it at the garden on a log for other visitors to enjoy. :-)
Gwen also had one-on-one time this week with both Nannie and Grandma. What went on those days are their secrets!

Did It!

 

I've made a couple of attempts at concocting sushi this week. We're at the beach in NC with Scott's family, so I've had lots of eager tasters. Yesterday's batch, pictured, was a bit better than my first one a few days earlier. This one had avacado, cucumber, and imitation crab, finely chopped and mixed with a bit of mayo. It is suprisingly easy to roll, and I'm looking forward to trying other fillings.

Seth's Adventure with Grandpa and Grandma

Last week while the other kids and I were at my sister's, my parents took Seth on an adventure in California, to San Francisco and Yosemite National Park. These pictures are just a taste of some of the things they saw and did together. So grateful for this time for the three of them!

A little summer snow fun!

The giant sequoias amaze me! Can you see my mom and Seth at the base of the tree above? They look like little insects next to it!

Yosemite Valley... surely one of God's jewels

Back in San Francisco with the famous sea lions...
...Alcatraz,
and the Golden Gate Bridge!

Thanks, Dad and Mom, for such an amazing adventure for Seth. I don't think he will ever forget the time just the three of you shared. :-)

Lunch, Anyone?

I've been pretty impressed with my boys this week. They made a flier that they passed out to the neighbors in my parents' housing development where we are staying this summer, advertising their services as "Odd Jobs Specialists". They have gotten a pretty good response, and so far this week have worked quite a few hours and made a good bit of cash. The physical labor has left them hungry, and after 3 and a half hours spreading mulch this morning, Caleb created this masterpiece of a sandwich. :-)

Sarah and Lynne

Most of the year my sister and I live far apart. Really far. But while I am here in the Cleveland area this summer, we are relatively close... only a seven hour drive apart. Not bad compared to 7000 miles. Last week I made the drive to her house. We had Monday afternoon through Friday morning together, and for those few days it was as if we lived next door. It was pretending, really, but it felt good.

We painted Sarah's kitchen, at least part of it. We took the kids to vacation Bible school. We picked blueberries, just the two of us. We painted our toenails, and Sarah fixed mine for me when I tried to get fancy and messed up my big toe. We watched a little HGTV. We shopped at Old Navy. We shopped at a resale store, one of our favorite things to do together. We took the kids to see Toy Story 3 and sniffled and wiped our eyes through the emotional ending together. We took Madelyn to get her ears pierced. We worked out (only once!). We tie-dyed t-shirts bright pink in the kitchen sink. We walked in the creek and caught skating bugs with the kids. We talked. We bathed children and folded laundry. We cooked and washed dishes. We drove to New Jersey to take the kids to a new aquarium one afternoon. We sneaked bites of cheesecake. We read books to the kids on a blanket under the willow tree to fill the time after dinner, before we put them to bed.

It's amazing, really, to look at the list of all the things we did in less than four full days. What would it be like if we lived near each other, maybe even on the same street? I can't even imagine. I've wondered before if time together would seem as special if we could make it happen just any old time. I wager that it wouldn't, but I don't know if I will ever know. I do know that last week, it sure felt good to spend time with my sister.

Ta-da!!

Madelyn has been waiting a long time for this day (and has been responsible for picking up her clothes for many, many months in order to be considered responsible enough to do this!), this day that she could get her ears pierced. We are visiting my sister and her family in the Philadelphia area this week, so it seemed a special time to make it happen. Here Alyssa and Gwen watch and wait in awe with Madelyn for the process to begin.
Madelyn really wanted to get her ears pierced at a place where both ears could be done at the same time. This Claire's store fit the bill. She chose pretty little light green (peridot) jewels.
First look at them...
She acted pretty cool about the whole process while we were in the store and in the photo above, but I think this picture we took with the Claire's bag after we got home tells the real story!

Back Home

We went to the beach tonight, the beach I played on as a child, the beach where Scott and I watched sunsets as teenagers, the beach where we've all collected rocks and watched seagulls and played in the tiny waves and had picnics and walked in the cool summer evenings. It's just a beach on Lake Erie, not an ocean. But it represents part of what is home to us all.

We're here again, and it sure feels good. Now we just need Scott to join us!

Ahhhh....

 

It's well after ten at night. We've just come home from a good-bye dinner for two families leaving Shanghai. We're rolling out dough for tomorrow morning's cinnamon rolls, a beginning of summer tradition. We're loading pictures and video from Gwen's kindergarten graduation this morning onto the laptop. A new suitcase sits back in the bedroom, waiting to be packed for the trip to the US that is only days away.

And this afternoon, before we went to the pool, Madelyn and Percy hung out in her hammock. It's summer in Shanghai.