One year ago

One year ago today we were saying goodbye to our family and heading across the globe! Can you believe it's already been a year? It is so crazy that it is already here. So much has happened and who would have guessed we would be in a different country waiting for our second child to get here! God is good and we are so thankful that He has brought us here. I wonder where we will be one year from now.... :)

update...

Hello my fellow blogging friends! I just wanted to update you all and let you know that Jackson should be here on January 3rd! :) They decided to move the date up a few days and so...we should be seeing this sweet baby boy in just a few days. I was anticipating a few more days of sleeping at least 8 hours a night but oh no, Sadie has changed all of that. For some reason she has decided that sleeping in her bed wasn't really an option. There has been so much change for her in the past few weeks that maybe that is the cause, but how can she sleep in her bed during nap time but yet not bed time?? That is our question that we have no answer to! And two nights ago, we tried to let her cry it out only to go in and find a goose egg on her forehead and scratches on her face where she was hitting the pac and play with her head. We just can't let her hurt her self so we put her in bed with us :( So...I know I am really in for it once Jack comes....I don't know exactly what we will do. Does any of my great mom friends have any advice this time? You all have always come through for me everytime... :) I am just counting on the fact that once we get back to China and she is in her own bed everything will be okay but that isn't for another month...it could be a long month.
Anyway, other than that, things are going well. My mom arrives tomorrow night. We have been keeping ourselves busy, I got my hair cut and new glasses! :) That always makes me happy.
Well, I should go for now, just wanted to keep you guys in the loop!

"ish"

Well, today is another day in Bangkok!! We ventured out to the aquarium today and had a great time. Sadie loved seeing the "ish". She squealed and waved at them and even blew them kisses. It was precious! It was actually a pretty nice place, not too crowded and Sadie got to run around. And the best part...they had a play ground!!! YAY for a play ground that Sadie could actually play on! We used our Christmas money from my grandmother to go, I sure wish that we could go to that play area everyday, Sadie loved it. We might just have to go at least one more time while we are here. Enjoy a few pictures below: Oh and yes, I am sad that we have no family pictures together, there just never seemed to a person who could take our picture :(





This is Sadie's very first Burger King crown! There were dogs on the crown itself so she was a little too distracted with the dogs to wear the crown! Oh her love of cats and dogs...its crazy!

I hope that you all are having a great Christmas holiday...we are planning a small feast for our little family of three on Saturday. Did I tell you what we were having? You know, I can't remember, if I did, I am sorry, but I will repeat it again :) We are having a small turkey, stuffing, green bean casserole and strawberry salad. We are super excited and I can't wait to eat and then have left overs :)

Oh yeah, my doctor appointment went fine yesterday. I am having contractions but nothing has gotten worse so we are still on stand still. Next week he will check to see if there is any progress. And if that little booger decides to stay in, we are still planning on January 5th!

Have a wonderful Christmas and may you truly focus on the reason and not get caught up in all the busyness of the season!

How we spend our days...

I am sure you are wondering how we are spending our days here in Bangkok (and even if you aren't really wondering...I am going to tell you anyway, ha ha!) We are trying to fill our days with small activities for Sadie's sake and small for my sake. I can't do a whole lot but we try to do at least one thing in the morning or afternoon. Poor Sadie hates being cooped up inside so we try to take her out and about. We have been to the mall several times (and boy I wish I had a ton energy because there are places to shop everywhere, it's probably better that I don't have the energy anyway!) But we found this fantastic toy area, they have all kinds of toys! I bought Sadie a Mr. Potato Head (to be from her great grandmother) the other day and then a Leap Frog that can go on the fridge (from her grandparents) thanks to the recommendation of my friend Erica. She said that her kids would play with this Leap Frog thing and it teaches them the ABC's and she is able to cook dinner. What could be better?? :) Now to teach Sadie to keep it on the fridge and not take it off to play with it, there always seems to be something. Anyway...back to the original reason for the post...taking Sadie to the play area. We took her there thinking that it would be great fun, turns out she is too young. So we settled for letting her ride a few rides. To her, it was just as much fun, she knew no different! So, here is a few pictures of her riding some fun rides....




To update you on me and baby Jack...we are still doing pretty good! :) I go tomorrow for my 37 week check up. I have been having a lot of Braxton Hicks contractions this week but they aren't getting harder or worse. Just having a lot of them. I am keeping my eye on them and will talk to the doctor tomorrow. I will keep you guys updated! I am hoping that this little one will keep cooking till January 5th but as I said with Sadie, God already knows his birthday so if he comes early, it is all in His Timing!

Christmas Decorations

This Christmas looks so different than others in the past. In fact, last year, I thought was hard enough, not having a home and not being able to really have those Christmas traditions that I desired. We were in between homes and packing for China, visiting family one last time. Packing was in full swing and Christmas decorations were already put in storage. Last year, I kept saying, next year, it will be different. We will be settled into our home in China and we will begin to make those traditions as a family together and truly be able to focus on Jesus' birth. Well...who knew that we wouldn't be in China, we wouldn't have those traditions, but we would be in Bangkok where it is 95 degrees outside and truly doesn't even feel like the Christmas season at all. I honestly wouldn't even realize it was Christmas if it weren't for Facebook statuses :) So, today, Clark went and bought us a tree. We decorated it with lights and tinsel and put it on the desk here in the main room and now as I look it, I realize that Christmas isn't about decorations but about focusing on Him. But yet, I will admit, this 36 week pregnant, hormonal woman wishes that we could have a "normal" Christmas. Well..there is always next year! :) Enjoy a few pictures that I took of us putting our tree up! Notice the last picture with palm trees in the background...something is just wrong with that, we need the snow that we had in China! :)





Merry Christmas from our family to yours!

Update on Baby Jackson

I went to the doctor today for my first visit here in Bangkok. I really like the doctor, he is nice and was very informative and answered all my questions. Things seem to be looking good for Jackson and the hospital is super nice! Right now we have a scheduled c-section for January 5th. We actually got to choose the day, so weird that we got to choose Jackson's birthday. We are excited about it though because it's Clark's mom's birthday. So, we know that it will be a special day for them both now! Of course all of this to say, Jackson must stay inside and not decide to come out early! So...three weeks from today our newest little one will be here!! AAHH...trying to get all my sleep now and relish sleeping 8 hours in a row...

Our Computer

I am not sure how many of you know but we have been having computer problems since September. We finally took it to a place in Bangkok today and the bad news is our hard drive is fried :( Good News is they are going to replace it, so hopefully in a week or so we will have a computer that is like new!

What I need from you is your email address! I lost my address book so I am not able to send out our family updates about our life in Asia. If you will leave me a comment (I won't post it) with your email address, I can update our address book and start sending out updates again!

Thanks so much!

Hong Kong

We had a great week in Hong Kong. We had to head down to get our Thai Visas so that we could stay in Thailand more than 30 days. We figured while we were there we would relax and enjoy the city. I have been there many times and it is one of my favorite cities and because I talked about it so much, Clark wanted to see Hong Kong too. And his conclusion is the same as mine..he loved it too! While we were there we went to Hong Kong Disney Land. Sadie is a little too young for it but we thought we just couldn't pass up the opportunity because we didn't know when we would get back to Hong Kong again. Sadie did enjoy her time there and even got to ride two rides. We wanted to take some pictures with Disney characters while we were there and chose the "gou gou" (dog) because we knew that Sadie would like them even better than Mickey and Minnie (and it helped that the line was shorter!) and she did love it until she got close up then she held on to me tight!
Here Sadie is on her very first amusement park ride. I got to ride this one with Clark and Sadie and then the second ride they got to ride without me. It was a small car and Clark said Sadie loved it! We then went to see the Lion King show and Sadie loved it even though she fell asleep close to the end. We stayed about 4 hours and had a good time, we are so glad we went!

Here we are in Tarazan's Tree House

We went to the Peak one night. The Peak is a famous place in Hong Kong where you can see the whole city. We were a bit disappointed because it was cloudy but we still had a good time riding the tram up to the top and eating dinner at Bubba Gumps and at least being able to take a few pictures.

We took Sadie to the park one day to let her play because she never really gets to play on playgrounds in China. The one in our apartment complex is just so dirty and really not toddler friendly. She had a great time and even made new friends!

And here we are standing in Kowloon looking back over Hong Kong Island.
Overall, we had a wonderful time! It was hard on all of us because Sadie's schedule was so off. But worth it :) Sadie is used to going down at 6:15 each night and sleeping until 7:30 the next morning. It was near impossible to do that while we were doing so much. And then she had to be in the same room with us and that was so hard on her because if she woke up she would see us. Anyway, I digress, she is off on her schedule! Pray that after a few days here in Bangkok, she will be back to normal. Poor child has slept in so many different places, it gets hard!

We arrived here yesterday and spent today settling in. We are staying in a guest house facility where others are staying. It has been nice to meet new people. We have a 2 bedroom, 2 bath apartment. It's nice and big and it has been fun for Sadie to run around. Today we went over to the hospital to check it out and it is super nice! Way nicer than our hospital in America. I head to the doc on Tuesday, so I will give you an update on baby Jackson then. I am 36 weeks now, so we should be meeting him pretty soon!!

Sorry this post is random, just wanted to catch you guys up on our travels and add a few pictures for the family!!

We love you!

The Past Month

The past month has become one big blur...hence the reason that you all haven't heard from me! We found a new apartment, had it re done, packed up our old house, moved in, and now we are packing for Thailand. (We leave on Sunday). Not to mention in the midst of this I came down with a really bad cold and the whole diabetes issue...wow, stressful to say the least. You might be asking, why in the world are you going to Thailand? Well...that will be the birth place of baby Jackson. (And yes, he will be a U.S. citizen!) We leave on Sunday to go to Hong Kong for a week and then to Thailand to wait and best of all relax before his birth. We aren't sure at this point when he will be born, I do know that I will have a c-section and will know the date of that once we get there. We will have computer access and I will be keeping you guys updated and adding pictures once he gets here. I just wanted to send this out really quick to let you know that yes, we are alive and yes, we are stressed. But, it's almost over and we will have a new little one very soon!!

Let it Snow...Let it Snow!

I can't believe that I am writing those words in NOVEMBER! Where I come from in Alabama, you don't see snow in November (now granted, we have seen snow in April...gotta wonder!) but hardly ever in November. We sometimes are wearing shorts at Thanksgiving. Not our heaviest jacket, long johns, scarves, hats and mittens. But that is life here in our part of the world! Yesterday I was enjoying a little peace and quiet while Sadie was sleeping and I look out the window as I ponder a thought (don't ask me what thought, who knows!) and I see white on the roof tops, I thought what in the world?? I had no idea it might snow! And so I quickly went to weather.com and there you have it, snow fall for the next 2 days! We accumulated 3 inches, which isn't very much around here but for us Alabama folks it would have made the whole city shut down :) It was beautiful to look at but honestly I am not a fan of having to get out in it. Give me some hot chocolate and a warm home and dreamily looking out the window. But such is life, can't always have what you would like, especially dreamily looking out the window when your 17 month old is vying for your attention.

Oh and I wanted to add, I wanted to take pictures for you all of Sadie bundled up ready to head out with Clark, but for some reason she is at this stage when she sees the camera come out she only wants to see her picture on the other side..the joys of a digital camera! She won't stand still and let me take a picture of her cute little self...so for now I will have to leave that to your imaginations.....

Update...

Here is our girl, not on Halloween albeit, but a picture of her dressed up all the same! We didn't really celebrate Halloween this year, Sadie is still too young to know how much fun it is to get dressed up and receive candy :) And of course there is no Fall Festivals to go to around these parts. So, my friend and I decided that we would at least put some sort of costume on our girls and at least take a few pictures to document the occasion :) So, my mom sent this to Sadie back in the summer and I figured it could serve the purpose of a costume! And so here you have it, Sadie..all dressed up :)
I went to the doctor today and got all of the information on how to control this gestational diabetes. I even got my glucometer so I can now have the pleasure of sticking myself 4 times a day! ;) I think once I get it down it shouldn't be that hard. I just don't know if I can eat as much as I am supposed to. We shall see...Jackson is starting to measure a little bigger than what he should be at 30 weeks, so it will be interesting to see if that continues to creep up. But other than that, I had a good visit, but I am tired tonight. It was a 2 hour ride up there and a 2 hour ride back. I sure miss the days when it only took 15 minutes to go and see my OB.
Clark had a good time with Sadie while I was gone though. I am glad that they could have that time together. Sadie loves her daddy! The first thing she said this morning when she woke up, "Daddy??" It was precious!
Well...that's all from me tonight, just wanted to put this picture on, she is precious, don't you think?

Happenings in our House

So, it's been a while...things have been busy around here! Last week we went to the capitol city to go to the doctor. It was time for me to have my glucose test. I pretty much knew that I wouldn't pass the one hour test because I didn't pass it with Sadie. And of course, I didn't. But this time it was higher, much higher than last time. So, I had to come back the next morning for the 3 hour test. Did I mention how much I hate drinking the glucose stuff? Well, I do. I almost gagged..I have to get it down fast enough without thinking about it..well, anyway, I took the 3 hour test and didn't pass it either..wasn't expecting that one! So..gestational diabetes it is...no fun at all! I am headed back to the doctor on Thursday and get my glucometer and see exactly what I can eat. I have already been trying to stay strictly to a diet and boy is it hard! I LOVE sweets so this is a new adjustment for me, but I am thankful that Father is giving me will power to get through it because I hardly ever have will power at all! So. keep praying...for the health of me and sweet little Jackson!
Clark had to head to the capitol city of our country last week. It's crazy that he had to fly somewhere just to see a dentist :) But he did, and PTL all is well with his 4 teeth (his fillings had popped out) and he is doing great!! Sadie and I had some good girl time and we were both so ready for daddy to be home.
So, we are getting down to the wire, only 4 1/2 weeks left until we head out of country. I can not believe how quickly this pregnancy is going, I am already 30 weeks pregnant and we leave in a month to prepare for Jackson's birth. It seems like yesterday I was announcing the newest family member.
Well, I should go for now, Sadie is down for the night and Clark and I are going to relax and spend time together...gotta get all of this time in before the little bit makes his way into the world ...

Just a small little hike...

Last week, Clark was out of school, the country was celebrating National Day...and so they gave him the week off! We were very grateful and enjoyed many days outdoors. We have enjoyed going to the park and exploring the woods around the park, felt like we were back in Alabama walking through the park (minus all the Chinese people stopping to stare at us!) One day while we were out exploring, we started walking up this paved road wondering where it might lead. There were many people coming down the hill and many people going up. And, that began the hike that we didn't plan on! We started walking up and had a lot of energy and were enjoying the day. Sadie was seeing many "gou gou" (dogs!) along the way. We got to the top of this small mountain and thought, do we keep going or do we go back down? The explorer in me wanted to keep going and so we did...not having any idea what we were in for. As we peeked through the trees looking down over the city, we realized we were looking over the south side, then, we came to our side (the east side) and then the north side...we hiked for almost FIVE miles!! Me, my pregnant self, Clark and Sadie...it was crazy!! I normally don't have huge burst of energy but that da, I had a huge burst of energy and the day was beautiful and it was just fun! Thankfully Sadie slept on Clark for 45 minutes of it. The picture above is looking over our side of the city...it was one of the only pictures I got on the hike...the pictures below are just a few when we were walking around during the week.







And of course couldn't resist putting a picture of little bit..if she could only talk, I know she would be saying..."Mom, I need that camera!"

Well, I am finally getting around to downloading pictures to the blog! I have quite a few that I want to put on here, so I will be doing it at different times. I don't want to overload you all at once. It's late tonight and I at least wanted to leave you with some pictures of the cutest little girl in the world :)



This last picture is of Sadie sleeping with her babies. She got in the box all by herself and I just covered her up...precious I tell you.

A Crash

and no I don't mean a crash by Sadie or any things similiar, but it is the crash of our computer...yes, our life line to people back in the states. Last Thursday, I had no idea how that day could be so very emotional! I woke up from a nap to check my email before Sadie woke up and when I turned on the computer, I got a gray screen with a flashing file folder with a question mark in the center. Never a good sign...I thought, hmm, let me turn it off and turn it back on and see what happens. Same results, I knew this was a very bad thing. There was really nothing we could do until that evening when calling the Support Center to get them to talk us through this thing. I started off that afternoon, tears of course, but being okay with this. You see, we had no external hard drive and ALL of Sadie's pictures from the first year of her life were on there. Yes, I am still mourning the loss and hopeful we can still retrieve them. The past week, I had been reading and studying a lot about trials and how we need to have JOY when we are enduring them. As I was reading and spending time with Father, I thought, okay, good stuff to remember but here again, I am not going through any trials right now...wrong, a few days later bam! a trial! I began that day with joy, thinking okay, I still have the health of me and Jackson, Sadie, and my husband. My family is safe and we are doing great. Computers are replaceable. I kept thinking how Father could turn this out for his good. Well, evening came, and more of my flesh came out. I was so upset I couldn't even talk. All I could do was lay around and think, what will we do??? We called the support people and to no avail, nothing worked. Nothing. The only thing left to do was go to Hong Kong, the nearest store, to get our computer looked at. We live about 5 hours away by plane so the tickets were super expensive, almost the price of a computer. There is an upcoming holiday in China and so getting tickets was really hard, we could get there, but couldn't gt back. Providence, I tell you. We weren't supposed to go. We slept that night and I just knew that Father was telling us that we weren't supposed to go right now. And so the next morning Clark and I talked through it and we didn't go. We thought, maybe Father wants us to be without a computer for this time to learn something. We knew that when we go to Thailand for Jackson's birth that we could get it fixed then. Well, that day, we had made our decision and I shared it with our friends here in our city. Our sweet friends then so graciously offered to let us use one of their computers until we leave for Thailand so that we will have access to the states. AMAZING or what?? Father answers our prayers when we ask!! So, we are able to have this connection and I was able to use this testimony of Father's faithfulness and also of my weakness of flesh to share with friends here. Please continue to pray for our computer situation, we still have no idea if we will be able to retrieve the information or what. But something that I do know...God is faithful even when we are not!

Another Year

Another year has come and gone and I have celebrated my 31st birthday! So strange to be in my 30's. I don't feel like it at all, I don't feel like I have one child and am pregnant with another. I still feel like I am in my early 20's, enjoying life without a care in the world. It is amazing that the older I get the faster time seems to go. Anyway...we celebrated my birthday with our friends here in the city. We had pulled pork sandwiches for lunch and cupcakes. Yummy!! Then Sadie helped me open up my presents.
The night before I had a party with some of my friends. They didn't realize it was for my birthday because I didn't want them to spend their money on gifts. I didn't tell them until the end of the night! We had so much fun eating snacks and playing UNO for 2 hours!! I love these precious girls and am so thankful they have come into our lives.
That's about it for this year's celebration...oh, I have to tell you, Sadie can now say the word "cookie". I came home one day last week and Clark had taught her how to say it. I can't wait to get it on video, it is so funny. I can't believe my girl can say "cookie" and boy does she know when to say it!!
Happy Wednesday Folks!

Just Another Day....

Just another day in our life....enjoy a few pictures from the last few weeks....
Sadie's grandmama and grandaddy (clark's parents) got her full auburn attire for football season this year! So, each Saturday, she must sport her gear with pride! We have taught her to say "War Eagle" and she can now say Eagle...still working on the War part :) `

Right now Sadie is loving to wear my shoes, she is all the time trying on shoes and walking around the house, it is so funny!!

I wanted to finish off the post with this beautiful picture that Clark took one morning when he was getting ready for school. And yes, he does get up early enough to see the sun rise!

First Week of School

well, the first week of school for Clark that is. I thought I would post a few pictures of life for Clark on a school day. (**I might have posted these same pictures last spring and if so, super sorry, my pregnancy brain has forgotten!)
Clark wakes up at 5:20 each morning in order to be out the door by 6:45. He has a 30 minute walk to school and likes to get there earlier to prepare before his 8:00 class. This is one picture of his walk to school. I love how the sun is coming up and how it shines over the sidewalk.
Here is Clark's school. It's the school of science and technology and has a international students department.
And here is Clark's name tag from last semester. He now has a different name, this was only his name translated from English.
This is where Clark spends every morning, Monday through Friday. He has classes from 8-12 including: Speaking, Listening, Oral and Grammar. He is progressing very nicely and before you know it we will have one fluent chinese speaking man in our family!! :)
Here is Clark with his classmates from last semester. They are from Russia and Korea. This semester his classes have changed and he has new classmates. They are from Russia, Korea, Ukraine, Iran, and him-America. He said it is quite the challenge trying to teach Chinese to so many different nationalities at once because everyone has different pronunciation problems.

Anyway...I just thought I would share a few pictures of life for Clark right now! :) During this time, Sadie and I are at home doing home things, you know how that is with a one year old :) In fact, I am proud to say, I am typing this blogpost as my daughter is playing BY HERSELF...now that is an accomplishment...

3 years and counting....

Tomorrow Clark and I will celebrate 3 years of marriage! Has it really gone by that fast? In the past three years, we have lived in 2 different countries, had a baby and the second one is in progress! :) I wonder what the next 3 years or 30 years in fact will hold? All I know is that I am thankful to Father that He has given me someone as wonderful and understanding as my husband to share it with. Just today I was sharing our story with a friend. I was telling her that my prayer was that Father would be glorified through our story of meeting, engaged, etc. My prayer was that she saw that God was real through our story. And my prayer now is that people will continue to see that God is real in our everyday lives as we continue to live this story that He is writing.
Happy Anniversary Sweetie!!!

This is how we do it...

In our apartment, we have no hot water in the kitchen. Why you might ask? We have no idea, except to say that our landlord says we can't get it. Probably not true, but none the less, that is what he says. So, when we have a tough dish washing task ahead we resort to using the bathroom sink. Clark is the master washer when it comes to getting grease off of dishes, pots, strainers etc. So, today, I decided to catch him in all of is glory doing what he does best... :)


And there you have it folks, how we wash dishes in China.