Aunt Cole's house

The kids stayed at Nicole's house for the week while I worked in Troy. They had lots of people to watch over them including GiGi and Jacob. No major fights over the cozy coupe this year. They had a great time going to the park, the pool, and a local church festival. Unfortunately we got rained out, but not before they had a chance for a couple rides. We ended that day at Dave and Busters. Alex loved the Nascar games.

Delphi Friends

After my work conference, there was a gathering at one of my boss's houses. Here are a few pictures of some of my coworkers from China, Australia, and India.

Pelton & Kids

I was able to meet up with the Harris's for dinner one night. See Pelton, Ryan and Rachel.

US stories

We made it to the US with only a slight delay at O'Hare. The kids did really well. The great thing about flying into Chicago....the Hot Dogs! Yes, we had them for a snack. I swear the minute I step off of the plane, I gain 15 lbs.

The kids are having a great time so far. First visit was with Ethan and Nolan. Then they went on to Aunt Nicole's house and hung out with Olivia, Buddy, Jake and GiGi.

We are now at the farm. Nothing like the clean, fresh air. Hope to have a run tomorrow morning. Will load pictures tomorrow.

Marathon Blog Session and Trip to US

Okay, Kirk has been asking me to update the blog for weeks now and I have just gotten around to it! Don't ask me what I've been doing, I can't figure out where my time goes. So I pulled a Kirk and have stayed up way too late the night before I'm flying to finish it. Hope you enjoy.

The kids and I are coming into Michigan tomorrow on Thursday. We are looking forward to the visit, but not to the flight! Hopefully the kids are more mature now and will be really good. Hopefully.......

I hope to see all of you when we are in the US. We've got a packed schedule but should be able to have time to visit everyone.

Alex Takes a Fall

The reason why I don't want to have anymore kids is that there is a 50/50 chance of a new one being a boy. I can't handle another boy. This guy doesn't know how to walk.....he runs. On this particular day, he was being chased and teased by his sister and tripped over my computer bag and fell into the corner of the wall. No stitches or hospital trip this time and I'm sure it's not his last fall either.

Elizabeth's Last Day of Pre-School

Sniff, Sniff....Elizabeth is not a preschooler anymore. This was her last day as a Ladybug. She moves on to Concordia's Kindergarten class in the fall. She had the same teacher, Mrs. Alexandra Chiu, for both years. What an amazing lady Mrs Chiu is. She has an incredible amount of patience and really loves her kids. Elizabeth just adores her and will miss her next year. But she isn't leaving Shanghai yet, so we'll see her at church and at school.

Her other teacher, Miss Alforte, also was a great teacher this year. She really taught Elizabeth a lot on how to prepare her for kindergarten.

Her buddies Clare Y and Crystal will be in kindergarten with her, but probably not in the same class.

Elizabeth & Alex Studio Pictures

I am so far behind in blogging that I am starting from the end and working my way through the past! We had the kids pictures taken at a studio in Puxi. You see that they do very professional pictures. They provide the clothes, hairdos, toys, etc.... They turned out really nice.

Sad Day, Grammy Goes Home

After what I'm sure to PopPop and Sophie seemed a life time, we let Grammy come back. She was a great help to us and the kids loved having her here for so long. It was hard on the kids for her to leave, but we were able to make one last stop to the Bund (Pudong) side and get a picture in front of her favorite view.

Concordia Book Parade

To celebrate the end of book week at school, Concordia has a character book parade where kids dress up as their favorite book character. Last year, Elizabeth went as Fern from Charlotte's web. This year she wanted to be Charlotte. She talked about this everyday for a week up until the parade. She had her mind set on being Charlotte so I couldn't let her down. I was able to concoct a costume from some old tights, fish wire and pillow stuffing! I recieved many complements. Not quite Gigi quality sewing, but it worked!

Elizabeth's Chapel Concert

Elizabeth's class hosted chapel this day. She and Ben Pigott had to say one line together and they did a great job - N is for Nazareth where Jesus would play.

Macau 10th Anniversary Trip

Almost caught up on the blogs!

Kirk did his usual, wonderful job of surprising me on our anniversary with a trip to Macau. Macau is the Las Vegas of Asia. Not quite yet, but will be very soon.

We stayed at the MGM which was very nice. We also visited the Wynn's, Venetian, Star World, and Grand Lisboa. Our room was amazing. It was a 2 bedroom suite that we were upgraded to. How come that doesn't happen when we have our kids with us!

Macau was a Portugese colony so there is so much influence from the architecture to food to religion here. We did a walking tour of the city on Friday and saw some amazing churches. The streets reminded us so much of our trip to Lisbon.

Grammy watched the kids for us in Shanghai and we truly had a relaxing, 2nd honeymoon weekend!

Playdate with Lauren

Lauren, a classmate of Elizabeth's came over. They had fun playing. She stayed for dinner and there is a difference between a 3rd born of 4 (Lauren) then a first born of two (Eliz) with regards to eating habits. Lauren was a champ eating her dinner, Elizabeth took her standard one hour!

Chris Botti Shanghai Concert

My favorite - Chris Botti - came to Shanghai. Oh my, I was so excited when I saw that he was coming! He did not disappoint. He played some songs from his new CD, Italia and his band was awesome. We waited in line to get an autograph and got a picture too!

Check out his music sometime, great jazz. www.chrisbotti.com

Lucy & Allie Stay the Weekend

Our friends Luke and Missy were brave enough to run in the Beijing Great Wall 1/2 marathon. We offered for their kids to stay with us so that they could enjoy their time there. Lucy and Allie are great friends of Elizabeth and Alex's so everyone was looking forward to it.

On Saturday, we went to Century Park to the amusement park area. Alex went on his first ride by himself in the cars. He was so proud. It was a really hot day, so we didn't stay long. Also the Steven's girls are blond so everywhere we went, people were gathering!

The girls slept in Alex's room, but there was not much sleeping going on. I think they were all worn out by the time they went home. Great time!

Elizabeth's School Music Program

Elizabeth had her spring music concert in the new theatre. They all sang nice and loud! It was a great concert and we were really proud of how well Elizabeth did on stage.

Major Earthquake in China

A major earthquake hit China Monday the 12th at 2:28pm local time. The center of the earthquake was in Wenchaun which is in the Sichuan province. This is about 1800km (11oo miles) from Shanghai. The earthquake registered 7.9 on the Richter Scale. This earthquake was 10 times stronger than the one that hit San Francisco and toppled the Bay Bridge in 1989 (6.9). Estimates are that maybe 50,000 people lost there lives with tens of thousands still missing. Kirk was at his office when the earthquake hit and did not feel anything, but Kath and Grammy felt the apartment shake. The earthquake was felt all across China and many buildings in Shanghai evacuated.

There was a moment of silence at 2:28 on Monday the 19th to honor the victims. Many organizations are collecting donations to send to Sichuan. Many countries have sent rescue teams. Our church's offerings this week are being sent directly to Sichuan through the Caritas program. It's difficult to read the papers or watch the news because there are more sad stories than great ones. Although they did find a lady 150 hours after the quake happened. I think that is God showing that miracles do happen.

Mother's Day

Mother's Day was a great celebration. We went to church, then we went to an awesome brunch at the Westin. Free flow champagne! The kids had a playroom that they could go to. Even decorate their own cake to give to Mom.

The afternoon was filled with a birthday celebration. Alex's friend, Chloe Eng, turned 3. They had a bounce house and that is all you need to fill up an afternoon of fun for 3,4, and 5 year olds! You can see a picture of my friend Kim Young with their new baby, Cormac who was born in Shanghai.

Thanks to the kids and Kirk for making our day so special.

Visit to SheShan Park & Cathedral

Since the kids and I enjoyed SheShan so much, we went back with Kirk, Grammy, and our friend Romo for a day. It was a nice sunny day and we packed a picnic. Once again, we had a fabulous time except for this day, there was hardly anyone at the park so it was even more enjoyable.

Last time, we didn't make it much past the beach. This time we got Alex to walk on and we discovered many other fun places. The most fun was the bounce area. You can see from the pictures and videos that the adults had just as much if not more fun than the kids.

After the park, we drove up the hill to where the Cathedral is. I stayed in the car with the sleeping kids while the others walked the remainder of the way.

The She Shan Cathedral stands on the hill named She Shan which lies to the north of the Songjiang county. This construction was built during 1925-35. The design of the cathedral is under a Roman style influenced by eclecticism. The Baroque domes and Gothic inner ornamentations get in harmony with each other. Along the zigzaging path leading up to the Cathedral, there 14 'hard-walking pavilions' at all the corner-turnings which portray what Jesus had suffered during his life time.

Kath Work Trip to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

After Australia, I made a stop in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to visit a customer and look at a potential warehouse. I was only there for one day, but between the meetings and my plane, my co-worker Sunther took me to a couple places. This is a picture of the largest Hindu statue in Malaysia. This temple is an area that people to give thanks when something good has happened. There were a lot of stairs to get into the temple which are in caves. This temple is called the Batu Caves. See explanation of caves below:

http://tamilelibrary.org/teli/malaysia03.html
Batu Caves, as it is popularly known, is located about 12 km north of Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia. It is nestled close to the main highways leading to the northern parts and the eastern coast of Peninsular Malaysia.When the caves were in a pristine state before 1860, several of the 18 cave mouths were used by the indigenous Besisi people as transit shelters when they went out hunting from their jungle hamlets.As early as 1860, Chinese settlers began excavating guano for fertilising their vegetable patches. It was only in 1878 that British Europeans came upon the complex of hills while on a hunting trip.Behind the cupolas on the zigzag bridge (foreground) is the staircase leading up to the Temple Cave. The landings are designed for viewing the scenery from different heights and for the aged and infirm to rest before continuing on the next flight. The landings offer a grand view of the lush scenery from various heights. On a clear sunny day, the topmost landing offers a view of the fortress-walled range of hills enclosing suburban Kuala Lumpur townships sprawling over the fertile floor of the valley. The western coast of the Peninsular where the emerald sea rolls into the Bay of Bengal lies beyond the green, f orest clad range of hills.A flight of 272 steps leads up to the temple. The stairway is divided into steps which each lead to a landing. Along the balustrade of the staircase and at some of the landings that offer the least competition from their fellows, the resident long-tailed macaques hang around unceremoniously for treats from visitors.The generously fed flocks of pigeons swamp the courtyard before the ground level portal of the temple. The pigeons are tame and they give way to passing visitors graciously.Apart from the annual Thaipusam festival, tourist and devotees visit Batu Caves regularly. Throughout the year, the Temple Caves attract between 3,000 to 5,000 people daily.At the base of the hill, at the ground level, there are three caves with statuary and mural depictions of scenes from the Ramayana, Mahabharat and the lives of renowned Tamil poets.The three caves are known as the Valluvar Kottam, Art Gallery and the Ramayana Cave. The depictions are spectacularly graphic. The Ramayana Cave presents a concise but comprehensive narration of Lord Rama's history.

Afterwards, we drove into the city and did some shopping at Petronas Towers. These towers used to be the biggest in the world at one point and time.