No Chinese Name?

There is so much to say yet, so little time! I'm watching Winter Wipeout (Thanks to Jenn Chini I am ADDICTED!!!!) as I write this post wishing that Jeffrey was home. He has had to travel a lot lately and will be gone again next week. It's tougher being in another country and having him travel, but doable. Granted…I really wish he was able to be around all the time, but I know with his job that is not likely. So we make the best of it. That does make me EXTREMELY grateful for the friends we have made here. Always something to do or a place to go or even…floors to clean!

Aiden checking out the goodness of Dunkin Donuts!

This week has been interesting, as most of them are. I have found the Dunkin Donuts!!!!!!!!!!!! And the coffee was AMAZING!!!!! I can survive here now! HA! Its pretty sad that it takes good coffee to make me feel more at home, but man it does! I had brought a bag of my DD coffee with me, but it was starting to run out! They had some of their coffee there at the store so I was saved!!!!! At first the thought of making coffee at home was a little daunting since, if you know me well, I use a TON of flavored creamer in my coffee and that does not exist here. But I have found a few things that work to make an amazing cup of coffee. Starbucks here had the other day Vanilla Syrup that they use in their stores so I had to invest and it is so good! Along with that you add some regular creamer, some sugar and a little bit of cinnamon and you have a great cup of coffee! YUM!!!!!!! 

A Pork and Seaweed Donut...any takers on trying it?

Yummy donuts...and most are not too strange!

That same day I went with a friend to check out the Toys R Us and Babies R Us here. It wasn't much, but good to know where to buy toys as Aiden gets older. My goal over the next few months is to find something that will work as a kiddie pool to put in our garden (backyard). Aiden loves playing in the bathtub so I know he will absolutely enjoy the pool. The Babies R Us there consisted of two aisles so not much there. I've been SO GRATEFUL to my amazing mother who has been willing to ship things for us that Aiden will need. Baby food is definitely an interesting thing here and not much variety. THANK YOU MOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is the Chinese version of a Snuggie! Made me laugh!

Jeffrey and I went to the local electronics store this weekend to buy a home phone and a second water cooler for the basement. It totally made me laugh at how many people it took to figure out my name. One girl had asked me to sign a paper (through "sign language") and then looked at me very funny and started laughing. I started to feel a little odd…then she took it over to a few other people and they started busting out laughing. Now I was feeling very uncomfortable…but what do you do? Finally another girl came up and asked "Chinese name?" Quite a few sarcastic responses came to my mind…but alas I was able to hold off and just say "Bu" (meaning no). At this they all gathered around again and you could tell that they had no idea what to do. I'm guessing that they had to enter my name into the computer or something like that. Finally I took out my driver's license and gave that to her. It still took them a long time, but they finally got it figured out! HA!

All the employees that it took to figure out my name! Hilarious!

Aiden has been growing and changing like crazy! This past weekend he was playing with Jeffrey and while holding his hands, he took two steps! Now granted, he hasn't done it since but it made my heart stop! He has just started rolling all over the place and looks like he is about to start crawling so I know my world is getting ready to get a little crazier! He is doing fabulous with his cereal and would rather have that than a bottle so I have to limit him on the cereal. In another week we will be starting veggies so we are excited to see how that goes and all the funny faces I know will come with that! Hopefully he is not like his mom and will enjoy vegetables. 


So I confess. I am really missing my dishwasher! Maybe that just makes me lazy, but whew…it seems like my sink is always full of dishes and there are only 3 of us in the house. I've already made Jeffrey promise that when we move back home that we will get a nice big dishwasher in our new house! He has already agreed to that! I don't think he likes constantly washing dishes any more than I do. One thing we are on the hunt for that I know is here but we just haven't found yet is aluminum foil! That will make things much easier. The hunt is on….! 


Our apartment is fully livable now and the only thing we have left to do is hang pictures and all the décor that we brought with us. We have found a furniture factory in Changzhou that makes amazing furniture for great prices. The daughter of the owner works with Jeffrey. We bought two leather chairs and ottomans to put in the basement for a reading area. They are amazing and so nice, but alas again, they wouldn't fit down the stairs! O goodness! So Aiden now has a new chair in his room and we are going to put one in our room, at least until we figure out if there is anything else we can do with them. But this did make us think that if there is any other furniture we want to bring back with us, we will wait and purchase it all right before the movers come to back us back up. Who knows what all we will come back with! 


Stay tuned as the journey continues.Its a daily adventure!

China Moments

Well so much has occurred in our world over here since my last post.  First and most important in my mind is….wait for it…WE ARE IN OUR APARTMENT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This is one excited girl here! I’m finally getting to sit on my own couch after a long 2.5 months! GLORIOUS!!!! Jeffrey did an amazing job picking out our apartment and it is so very cozy. We moved in on Friday, May 13^th 2011 and even though it has only been a week or so, we are very settled and have 99% of the boxes unpacked and furniture arranged. Pictures will be posted as soon as it is fully finished! We have one main floor and a basement in our apartment. The one very odd  thing is that the laundry room is out on the back porch so I have to walk outside to do my laundry. O well...at least I have both a washer and a dryer!!! 

Shopping for food has been interesting as our fridge is so much smaller than ours in America. I have to be very careful of what I buy so that I always have room. We bought some meat the other day and had it in the fridge for two days and when I went to cook it, it was already bad. The lesson here is to ALWAYS put it in the freezer until I am SURE that I am ready to thaw it and cook it. My first “real” meal cooking here in China was spaghetti, but we had some friends over this past weekend and grilled out hamburgers. A little taste of home in a land so far away! My next step is to learn how to cook Chinese food as well as how to substitute ingredients for things that they do not have here. Stay tuned as I’m sure that will be a very interesting adventure!

I finally took a Taxi this week and totally feared for my life. One thing that I struggle with here but know that I am going to have to get used to is the fact that it is ok to NOT put your child in a car seat.  Most taxis do not have seatbelts or room for a stroller so that makes taking one a little tricky. This makes me very grateful to AGCO for is having a driver. That way I can always put Aiden in his car seat for car trips and then decide if I want to put him in the stroller or his carrier. But for short trips, we love to walk. Its great exercise and Aiden loves being outside. He sleeps and I have my iPod going and we just go. Its actually very relaxing as long as it isn’t raining!

We celebrated Aiden turning 5 months old on May 18^th. I can’t believe that my son is already 5 months! He has changed so much, even since we’ve been here. This week he has figured out how to roll over constantly and just keeps rolling back and forth. That is definitely making nap time and night time sleeping interesting since he keeps waking himself up my ending up on his tummy. Quite amusing though! I have had to pack away the last of the 3 month clothes and he is fully fitting into his 6 mo clothes now. Getting to be a big boy! In our air shipment we had his exersaucer and now that he has it, he loves to play with it. Just the fact that he can stand up in it on his own and play keeps him occupied. We have started feeding him cereal twice a day. Some times he does great with it and eats the entire bowl...other days it is like pulling teeth to get him to even take a bite. Our child though apparently LOVES the camera and likes to make fun faces as evident in the pictures below. He has a new friend named Joy who is not quite two months old. They are adorable today and Aiden loves to try and calm her when she cries...way to sweet!

This week holds many things for us. Lots of new things to explore. For those who know me well, you know my love of Dunkin Donuts…they have one here in Wuxi!!!! Thursday morning will be an adventure to test their coffee here and then off to find the ToysRUs and BabiesRUs! I must find a vacuum cleaner as well that day so I can keep my rugs clean and fuzz free. So much to do and explore, yet so little time!

We hope to find a good weekend soon to go tour some sights around Wuxi and then plan some big trips in and around China as well. Suggestions are VERY WELCOME!

Well, that is all for the moment my friends. As time marches on I’ll keep you with us on our journey and continue to share all of our very interesting CHINA MOMENTS!

Chinese Wedding

We experienced our first Chinese wedding yesterday. It was definitely an experience but a whole lot of fun! Judy, the bride, works with Jeffrey and there was a whole crowd of AGCO employees from all over the world. She had told me when I met her a few weeks ago that this was going to be a small affair and that they weren't doing anything fancy. Needless to say, if that is considered a "small affair" I would love to see what a big wedding is like here. It was a huge hotel ball room that was filled to the brim with decorations!!! Much bigger than our wedding.

We walked in and the room was decorating entirely in red and gold. On the tables were large clear lazy susans with lots of different kinds of "drinks" on them. Thank goodness they had juice!!! J There were also 6 red packs of cigarettes on each table which we knew meant the room was going to get smoky and fast! YIKES! That is something that I always took for granted in Georgia but am so thankful for…no smoking!!!!!

Once the ceremony got started (if it was a ceremony…have no idea what was being said!) the MC started talking very fast and with lots of emotion as spotlights starting going all over the place. They played a mixture of Chinese and American music all the way through the entire day. There was even one "praise" song in English that I wonder if they really understood what the song meant. Finally the bride, Judy, walked in with who I'm assuming was her Father. They stood under a trellis at the back of the room and the groom walked up in front of them and bowed. Judy moved to stand with him and then they turned around and walked together up to the stage. There I guess they said their vows and then moved over to what looked like an ice sculpture that said "LOVE" in English and they each had a bottle of something that they poured into the letters together. The liquid mixed together and turned blue and it filled up the entire wording. Once everything was completed in the "ceremony" part, the couple left the room.

When they came back in a short time later, Judy had changed into a red Chinese style dress (I really want one of those…so beautiful!!!) and had her head covered with a large red scarf like thing. Her hands were bound with ribbon and her husband had the other end of the ribbon rope and was leading her blind up to the stage. Now I have NO IDEA what this was for, but it was extremely interesting to watch. Once they were on stage the MC had the groom dancing and he kept making him do it bigger and better so he could "uncover" Judy's head. There was lots of this going on.

During the entire ceremony and events the waitresses kept bringing more and more food for our round table. I thought I was stuffed at one point and that we were finished, but they brought at least 2 more rounds. If you just try a bite or two of everything it fills you up. I was sitting next to one of Jeffrey's German co-workers who has been in China for a good while and seemed to know quite a bit of what was going on. He asked if I wanted to know what I was eating before or after I tried it. I definitely said after…made it at least a touch easier to try! There was a lot that he still didn't know but I know I ate Jellyfish…and it was GROSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Very chewy and just icky! LOL!!! There was also fish soup, steamed buns, some sort of green veggie that actually wasn't bad (if you know me well you know I HATE veggies!!!!!!) so I found that very surprising. The list of food went on and on, but the pork was fabulous and so was the rice. They brought out a whole fish and though it was hard to get to the meat it was pretty good. My favorite out of the new food I tried was Peeking Duck. The sauce that you dip it in was Incredible!!!!!!

The bride and groom went table by table toasting with the guests and thanking them for coming. I don't know how they could stand up at the end of the evening!!!!!! Craziness!!!

As always, Aiden was a hit! As soon as he woke up and we took him out of his car seat people swarmed him. He did very well, but Mama's heart still skips a beat when they walk off with him. They really do love kids here and love to give them gifts. One teenager who was sitting at the table next to us gave Aiden a little stuffed bear keychain…it was too cute. They all wanted to take pictures of him and with him. Our little movie star! J

All in all it was quite an interesting event!

We are still waiting on our sea shipment to arrive and the hotel tired has moved to hotel exhausted! It can't arrive fast enough in our minds. But it will be here soon…at least that is what I keep telling myself. We are just taking it one day at a time. Hopefully by the next post we will have good news that we are finally there! J

More Pictures from the Journey

Aiden's new glasses!

Rickshaw driver passing us

Don't look too close, but this is an example of the "potty pants!"

Part of our "Scenic Route" on the way to Metro

Crazy drivers

Our driver, Joe!

Rednecks have made it to China!!!!

Such a happy boy! Starting to sit on my own.

Examples of apartment buildings

Taking in all the sights!

Chilling at the new apartment while Mama and Daddy clean

Our sweet new friend Ashley Jane or "AJ" :)

Aiden and Aaron...the manager of the hotel restaurant. He wanted to hold Aiden so bad but apparently was timid about asking for awhile. Now they are buds!

Shopping at Carrefore

Strange fruit we were brought the other night at dinner...not sure what it was but it was good!

Driving School and Scenic Routes

I'm pretty sure that if we were to attend a driving class here in China this would be how it would go…

Instructor: Hello Class

Class: HONK!!!!!!!

Instructor: Well, I see that you have already learned the first major lesson in driving.

Class: HONK! HONK!!!!!!!!

Instructor: There are many different ways to use your horn but the first thing you need to know is that you must ALWAYS blow your horn constantly or else you may die.

Class: HONK HONK HONK HONK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Instructor: You can send many different messages with your horn. 1. GET OUT OF MY WAY! 2. I'm coming through whether you want me to or not. 3. I said GET OUT OF MY WAY. 4. A friendly hello honk. 5. GET OUT OF MY WAY!!!! 6. I'm right behind you and am trying to make you pee your pants by scaring you to death. And finally…7. GET OUT OF MY WAY!

CLASS: HONK!!!!!!!!!!!!!

INSTRUCTOR: Very good…you all passed the driving class. Now go and honk your horns!

Well, that may not be EXACTLY how the class would go…but that's what my mind tends to think. Goodness knows that horns are being blown every second and from all directions. Craziness. I think though that they love noise here. They will shoot off fireworks at all times of the day and I haven't fully figured out why. Now, you are talking to a girl who LOVES fireworks with everything in me! Maybe that's why I'm a July 5^th baby…I love celebrating July 4^th with LOTS OF FIREWORKSJ!!!! But here there is no real purpose, especially when they shoot them off in the middle of the day… you can't see them! So all it does is just make really loud noise…maybe to cover up the sound of the honking horns, who knows! Maybe that will be my job here…teach them what good fireworks are and when to shoot them off. If any of my followers live in South Carolina, you may be called upon to ship some over here for training purposes. J

Well…our air shipment finally arrived on Friday so we have at least a few more of our things! YEA!!!!!! So we spent most of the day on Friday and Saturday cleaning the apartment and getting that stuff organized. Then we also learned that the slow boat to China containing our Sea Shipment has docked!! WHOO HOO!!!! And that was at least 5 days ahead of schedule…now just waiting for customs to clear it so we can move on it and finally be settled. I told Jeffrey as we were walking the apartment trying to envision where to put our stuff that I honestly couldn't remember what all we brought since its been almost 2 months since I've seen our furniture…well it may not be that bad, but in my hotel tired mind it is!

Our wonderful driver here, Joe, is so sweet and a very safe driver…but he has no idea where anything is. That has been an interesting challenge and has really made Jeffrey and I want to learn Chinese much faster so we don't always have to call someone to ask them to translate for us! Aren't we just a sorry pair! But we finally did order Rosetta Stone to work on and then beginning in the summer we will have an instructor come out to the house for some one on one training.

As Joe was taking us to Metro (a big store like Sams or Costco) on Friday we started to get a little worried on our way back. We were definitely taking the "scenic route" and were on a road that I don't think many cars travel down. He stopped to ask directions of a lady carrying a basket down the road. Even though I couldn't understand what they were saying her message was clearly that she thought we were idiots for being where we were! But hey…he got us back to the apartment in half the time it took to get there…so bring on the scenic route! Pictures will follow later.

Aiden is starting to get better about sleeping, but he still has those wonderful screaming moments. Mostly they are when he doesn't get his proper naps in a day…so we are working on that slowly but surely. I just think he is about as hotel tired as we are and ready for a real home with his own room.

Time marches on and we are slowly getting accustomed to life here. We bought ourselves our house shoes this week and now we just have to remember to always take them with us when we go to visit our friends in the area. Mine are bright yellow Crocs that Jeffrey laughs at but says that it is totally my personality…not sure what he means by that but…J!

Excited to see what fun this week brings. Our plans are to go visit one of our new friends who just had a baby and keep her company as her husband goes back to work for a day or two, get together with Julie and her precious 3 girls and Aiden's new friend Noah for lunch and shop at the furniture mall for some rugs for our apartment. Then, if the men will keep the kids, Julie and I need to go to the mall downtown and check out their baby store there to see what all kind of goodies we can find!

Until next time…thanks for joining us in our journey. We are excited to have you along the way!

The Adventure Continues

For those of you who know the story of Esther, you know who is and WHO isn’t mentioned in the story.
That is our life at the moment. If you watch closely then you will be able to see and feel the wind when
it is blowing strong, just a slight breeze or if it is indiscernible at that particular moment.
I’ve decided to use this blog as a journal of sorts. As you follow our journey you will see the good times,
the bad times and everything in between. A new friend that I met this week called the ups and down
the 2 week/20 year feeling. There are days living in China that you get very frustrated and homesick that
you don’t think would want to be here even 2 more weeks. Other times, life is so wonderful and you feel
totally at ease in the new environment that you want to be here for the next 20 years. We’ll see how
that goes.
Our second week in China began with a visit to the Chinese mall with one of the servers in the
restaurant here in the hotel named Beryl. She took pity on Aiden and me not knowing much and
decided to show us around. She showed up to the hotel wearing 3 inch heels and we were planning
to walk! I couldn’t believe it, but she asked me if I didn’t like to dress up. LOL! That was all I could
do…laugh! I love heels just as much as the next girl, but there is no way that I am going to walk around
China in tall heels! Just one of the many differences between our cultures. I feel so much more
comfortable with the area around us and how to get around after our outing. The fact that we can walk
to most places near us is a great feeling and it’s great to be able to get out and stretch our legs.
Friday afternoon took us to the International School here in Wuxi. Here we were able to meet some
other Americans and just touch base with them! So wonderful!!! We got together with an entire group
of them on Sunday for some good fellowship. (more to come on that…)
Jeffrey, Aiden and I went back on Saturday so we could have a chance to browse the grocery store at our
pace and see what all we could figure out. It was quite the morning. We started out by sleeping in more
than what we thought we could, but apparently all 3 of us needed the rest. Since we missed breakfast
here at the hotel we headed to Starbucks to get a pastry or the like. That was interesting. They have a
mashed potato and bacon pastry in there. It sounds extremely intriguing but I didn’t get up the courage
to try it yet…one day I will just to say that I did!
At Carrefore, the grocery store/department store, we browsed for hours. There is so much that we have
not a clue what it is, but I’m sure over time we’ll figure it out. If you noticed the picture I posted a few
days ago of the dried fish snacks…that just gives you a small taste of what we saw. They were little fish
that were of course dried, but it was the entire fish from head to tail. YUCK!!!!!!!!!!!
One of the things that I’m sad I can’t find is hairspray. I know that sounds totally vain, but my hair blows
around all over the place in the wind over here. O well…maybe that’s for the best, but I can tell you that
when we come back in December, I’m stocking up! Another thing that I really miss is my favored coffee
creamer! If I could figure out a way to bring that with me I totally would!
Sunday morning dawned bright and clear and we went to go introduce ourselves to some other
Americans. The great thing is they are like-minded. There is actually another family here in the same
boat we are that have only been here for 3 weeks. We hit it off immediately with Rob and Julie. Great
family! They have 4 kids…3 girls and a baby boy. Noah is exactly one month older than Aiden! They are
going to be great friends. We are excited to get to know them more as time goes on. Everyone we met
live within walking distance from our apartment and there are a lot of stay at home moms! We are so
excited about that! After our meeting we all headed out to Papa Johns for lunch. It was a beautiful walk.
I learned during this trip over that the Chinese will do anything for a baby. We needed to put air in the
tires of our stroller so we stopped at a local shop. The lady was so sweet and put the air in for us but
wouldn’t let us pay her no matter how hard we tried.
Once at the restaurant I had my eyes opened to another very different aspect of China. One of Rob
and Julie’s girls has to go to the bathroom so Jeffrey volunteered me to take her, which I totally didn’t
mind. These girls are PRECIOUS!!!! But once we made it there I knew J had to be laughing his head off
at me since he knew what we were going to run across and I was CLUELESS! There was only one stall in
the bathroom and in that stall was a rectangular shaped porcelain hole in the ground. This is what they
call a “squatty potty”! The two girls I was with were 5 and 3 respectively and have only been in China 2
weeks longer than I, but they were totally fine with the situation and were explaining to me how to use
it! It was quite comical and I fell soundly in love with these girls! They are true troopers!
Now if we can only get our Air shipment to clear that will be one thing checked off our list. It has arrived
but is still sitting in customs! This doesn’t bode well for our sea shipment!!! We love the hotel we are
staying in, but it is time to move on! I’m not a lover of cooking most of the time, but I’m so ready to get
into the kitchen and make home cooked meals again. We are debating now whether to buy a bed and
mattress and move on in or just wait it out. It will be really nice to have separate rooms for Aiden and us
to sleep in and hopefully that will help him sleep better.
Getting Aiden to take his naps properly at the moment is proving to be a struggle. I’m shocked no one
down the hall from us has called us in for child abuse! LOL The kid has some serious lungs on him and
loves to scream nonstop when he is really tired. Back at home he was great at taking naps and wouldn’t
really fuss so this is a huge adjustment for us all. I know the poor kid is really messed up on his time but
it makes things very tough. We are working through it though and I am learning to keep my seat while
he is crying and not to try and go calm him down every few seconds and he is learning to finally cry
himself to sleep. We’ll get there eventually (or so I hope!!!).
One thing that I really enjoy about living here so far that I didn’t think I would is walking everywhere.
That has been fabulous and great exercise. We went to a friend’s house for dinner last night and after
a wonderful evening of laughter, we walked the mile or so back to our hotel. It felt great and I slept
like a baby (well…except for the times that Aiden woke up!). Great exercise and makes it fun and very
different from living in America.
Well my friends…this is all for now. Continue to join us on our journey as we wait expectantly for our
stuff to arrive and Aiden to sleep properly!!!!!! It will all happen very soon…of that I am sure!

Pictures from our Journey



Aiden has no idea how blessed he is to ride in Business Class!



Play time on the plane

Daddy and Aiden



Aiden checking out his new home!



Interesting snacks!



The view from our hotel!




Aiden and Joy



Aiden and Sisley





Grandpa at the Airport



MiMi and Aiden









Momma and Aiden