It is that time of the quarter (can you tell I am an accountant ;)) again to record a day in our life! If you are brand new here, we are an expat family from the Dallas/Fort Worth area currently living in Chengdu, China for a couple of years. We arrived on March 24th of this year and have been settling in quite nicely. If you want to read more about our big announcement, you can check it out here, I answered some of the most frequently asked questions that we received here and if you want to see what a day in our life looked like right after we moved here you can check it out here. Also, I try to keep a record of the little things that make each week unique in my weekly Friday Favorite's posts (here are a few of my favorites: week 4, week 14)
This time I thought I would show you what a day without our car looks like. We are not allowed to drive in China (nor would we want too!) and adjusting to having a car and driver has honestly been one of our biggest challenges. I know, woe is me, I have someone who drives me around all the time, but really there are a lot of time restrictions and such (we have our car 10 hours a day, 6 days a week and that includes when the car just sits at work waiting for me to finish working - not active driving time). We are used to being able to hop in one of our vehicles and drive whenever we want, wherever we want -so enough whining, but it has taken us awhile to get used to this concept.
So enough introduction - here is what our July 3rd looked like.
6:55am: The girls are awake (they are currently sharing a bed - which I love, the only downside is they wake each other up). I notice that Ev's is particularly grumpy and make a mental note that she could have used more sleep possibly because we skipped naps yesterday because we went to the waterpark and she is probably still running on a deficit. We notice that it is raining quite hard outside and opt to snuggle on our couch as we slowly wake up. Wes makes coffee, the TV goes out (a huge downside of China satellite) and we all try to wake up.
This time I thought I would show you what a day without our car looks like. We are not allowed to drive in China (nor would we want too!) and adjusting to having a car and driver has honestly been one of our biggest challenges. I know, woe is me, I have someone who drives me around all the time, but really there are a lot of time restrictions and such (we have our car 10 hours a day, 6 days a week and that includes when the car just sits at work waiting for me to finish working - not active driving time). We are used to being able to hop in one of our vehicles and drive whenever we want, wherever we want -so enough whining, but it has taken us awhile to get used to this concept.
So enough introduction - here is what our July 3rd looked like.
6:55am: The girls are awake (they are currently sharing a bed - which I love, the only downside is they wake each other up). I notice that Ev's is particularly grumpy and make a mental note that she could have used more sleep possibly because we skipped naps yesterday because we went to the waterpark and she is probably still running on a deficit. We notice that it is raining quite hard outside and opt to snuggle on our couch as we slowly wake up. Wes makes coffee, the TV goes out (a huge downside of China satellite) and we all try to wake up.
8:05am: We turn on a movie for the girls - Christmas Peppa Pig and the girls much on some goldfish - breakfast of champions. Ev's asks when is it
going to be Christmas? Not for a long time baby girl. I debate whether to do a
day in the life post (I decide it is now or never) as Wes shows us Ev's baby picture - she was in my belly just three
years ago about to miss her due date!
Emma digs up her camera once she notices me taking pictures and wants to get some pictures of her own- she takes a few pictures of Everly and they laugh hysterically at the results (I believe that Emma got a picture of just Everly's eyes).
We decide to make muffins - with extra chocolate chips. I silently wish my kitchen was bigger because both girls want to help and there is very little counter space. I also rethink my decision to rip out our island the minute we move back home to Texas. They are not impressed when I ask for a picture ;).
A little bit better :).
Followed by a few unprompted kisses.
And a few sillies ;).
Wes made us a Celsius - Fahrenheit conversion table which helps me immediately know what temperature to set my oven too :).
Their tootsie toes get me every time! I think there is little cuter (except maybe holding hands and sister kisses) than pictures of their little toes!
After we put the muffins in the oven - we had our first success of the day in the potty training department. Everly exclaimed 'me need to go pee pee!', and took off towards the bathroom. I send out a mental thank you to Nonni for giving me the tools I needed to get her potty trained (we just told her they don't make diapers in China and that we needed her to be a big girl and go potty - which was Nonni's genius idea!).
** just in case you are new here, I definitely believe in letting the girls do things in their own time and when they are good and ready, but Everly can't start school here in China in August if she is not potty trained - so we really needed her to get going so she can go to school with Emma (she turns three in just a few weeks) **
After she is done, she brings me a pull up (she wears them at night) and I told her no, she needed to wear her panties - pouting ensued. Side note - she has the cutest pouting face, wish I would have caught it on camera.
8:50am: The muffins are ready!! And slightly over cooked.
Oh well, they are delish and the extra chocolate chips we put in there were definitely a good idea. I sit down with my muffins and second cup of coffee while I check Instagram and then check the rain status - still raining. Boo!
She definitely didn't have the normal two year old moments - just a few for the most part - and after seeing this picture, I wonder if we are going to pay for it in her three's (just look at that smirk!).
Emma drinks her strawberry milkshake for breakfast (otherwise known as yogurt, but she calls it a milkshake so we just go with it).
And Ev's decides that one strand of pearls is not enough and she needs two strands.
I text my sister to see how her weekend is going.
9:34am: I am ready to start laundry but Ev's stops me and wants to read a book
first.
The girls start imaginative play where Everly pretends to be a friend that has come over to play. I pause and listen to their commentary as Emma states, 'hi sister's mom (as she holds us a pretend phone), do you want her to sleep over or do you want to come pick her up tonight?'. Then, Everly pleads, 'no no, don't call my mom, me wants to stay at your house, Emma.'. Their creative play is definitely a favorite.
10:11am: I finally start the laundry. Our washer and dryer is outside (I thought this would really bother me, but actually it doesn't). As I put the clothes in, I notice
it stopped raining outside.
Pause to take a picture of this view, still one of my favorite things about the house.
10:36am: Ev's announces she needs to go p**p! We send her
to the bathroom- give her a minute and go into check. Yay! Second success of
the day. Try to count how many times we have asked her if she goes to the
bathroom and we already can't count. Potty training is exhausting.
10:55am: I had to put Ev's in timeout for throwing toilet
paper (not used) on the ground and not picking it up (she is seriously the worst when it comes to picking anything up!) After a brief moment in timeout, we have some recovery time in mom's
lap. Think to myself- gosh, I love this snuggle bug.
We head outside to play hula hoops! We are all terrible at hula hooping, but the girls are thrilled when they realize I can make the hoop spin on my arm - we try to get the hula hoops to spin on their arms, but the hoops are just too big.
12:22pm: I flip over the laundry to the dryer and then sit down for lunch (Wes had made some guacamole to go with our leftover fajita chicken pasta). Right in the middle of eating, Ev's
announces she needs to go to the bathroom - so we are at it again! I have I mentioned yet that potty training is exhausting ;).
12:44pm: I start getting the girls ready for naps. We all could use a mood
reset as I still feel like they are tired from the day before. We say 'nap nap alligator' and 'night night daddy bear' to Wes as we head to take naps. As we settle down Emma exclaims, 'I just love you, Mommy!' which of course makes my heart swell. We read our favorite books - Barnyard Dance and Snuggle Puppy and then sing lots of songs - Away in the Manger, Jingle Bells (we clearly have Christmas on the brain), and Mr Golden Sun before the girls finally settle down and fall asleep.
3:37pm: I was unable to sleep, too many thoughts going
through my mind, but the girls are still going strong. I decide to google not only best places to travel in China (we
are trying to plan a Beijing trip), but also best places to visit in Asia-
surprised to see Bali as number one. Ponder if we need to plan a trip there-
note that Hong Kong is on the list and get excited for our upcoming trip there in a couple of weeks.
4:00pm: The girls wake up! They clocked a three hour nap!!
The sun is out and so we decide to go swimming. Wes has a few things to get done around the house (that will be easier for him when the girls aren't there) so we decide that I will take the girls and Wes will meet us there when he is done.
4:37pm: We make it to the swimming pool! Emma arrived in style ;).
As did Ev's :).
And before we knew it, we were swimming! Swimming makes life seem a bit more normal - this is something that we all enjoyed together at home and nothing has changed since we moved to China, the girls still jump at any chance to go swimming!
We really had the best time together!!
7:00pm: I finally make the girls get out of the swimming pool - they could have stayed for another hour until it closes. But, I want to get us a shower and eat dinner, so we head into the clubhouse to get cleaned up. Showering with two littles is not easy, I forgot the baby shampoo so we try to be very careful not to get anything in their eyes. After we finish showering, we head down to eat dinner. Wes came back with the other stroller (so we all walked together).
7:45pm(ish): We sit down to dinner at our favorite Chinese food place. We show them pictures of what we want to order (we quickly learned that this is the easiest way to communicate) and within a few minutes our food arrives and we scarf it down. There is just something about the pool that makes everyone hungry. Oh, except Ev's. She doesn't touch Chinese food - she mainly plays with her rice.
I comment on how good Emma is getting with her chopsticks! She really is better than me at eating with them :).
8:09pm: We leave the restaurant to head to playground (Emma's bestie's dad had called earlier to see when we were going to be ready to meet up or else we would have skipped this altogether since we went swimming).
8:15pm: The girls are reunited with Emma's bestie from school. Emma's friend had lipstick candy for the girls which of course made their evening. We chatted with the parents for a bit while the girls played. It started to get late and I could tell the girls were getting tired, so after about half an hour we packed up to head home.
8:40pm: Before heading home, we stop at our neighborhood store to pick up blueberries, oranges and a package of Popsicles. We are super thankful for this store - it makes not having a car some days bearable.
9:07pm: We finally made it home. We settle the girls in, change them into their jammies, etc. It was Wes's night to put the girls to bed, I overhear dad and the girls singing snuggle puppy together and it warms my heart as I settle in on the couch with some Food Network (one of the only channels we get!) before heading to bed myself.
Whew! If you made it to the end of this - you are a champ!
Whew! If you made it to the end of this - you are a champ!
