Peace and Construction

I saw this quote on pintrest today, and re-pinned it.  Then I thought about it a bit more, and thought about how all I seem to want each day is a little more 'peace'.  But maybe I have the definition of 'peace' wrong in my head.  When I am at the end of my patience and things are crazy with the kids, dogs, work, schedule, I tend to think 'I need more time, space, quiet...you know, peace."  But the reality is:  a) I have three kids...one of whom has some complicated needs.  b) I have two dogs, beloved by our children and although they are a mess sometimes, they meet a lot of needs and teach our girls so much. c) my husband and I have chosen work that allows us to live cross-culturally...daily living using another language outside the home in a developing country has it's challenges, and we did choose to live and work here. d.)  we also chose to be involved in a massive school start up...we knew it would be stress and hard work...and I am pretty sure if we knew just how much, we would choose it again (I think!).

So that being the reality of my life right now, 'peace' and quiet style peace may not be coming my way anytime soon.  And I need to learn to be ok with that.  I need to redefine what 'peace' will look like.  As a family we have made choices that we are happy with...we have birthed two kids, we've adopted one, and we want more...we let our kids sleep with us,  we demand fed our babies, we got two dogs, we chose jobs that don't exactly go 9-5.  But we are happy we made those choices and I need to remember when on those days when I just want to go hide and it's only 6:30 am, that the choices we made were prayerfully and consciously made.  I'm still learning that when we follow the Lord, it doesn't always mean 'peace and quiet' style 'peace.'  What it does mean is that I don't have to face things alone.  When the behavior issues have me at my wit's end, when the stress of getting our school registered keeps me up at night, and when all three girls end up in our bed when the subway - construction noise (the joys of living in a big city) wakes them up in the middle of the night, I need to remember that we are not alone.  Christ is there in the middle of all of it with us.  He sees our children's hearts, He knows the path ahead of the school project, and He finds joy in the closeness of our family and the peace that our children feel when they are comforted in middle of the night.  And I need that peace too...I need to let go and be filled with the peace of the presence of Christ in the midst of all this family - construction noise.

Now that we've been back 6 weeks, here's what we've been up to.

School, school, and more school!  We returned on a Tuesday night about six weeks ago and Wednesday morning after an early morning jetlag wake up, it was right back to work for us getting ready for the Guang Qi Academy school year to begin.  We are VERY thankful to be starting our second year with the school...we've nearly doubled our student enrollment, and doubled our teaching staff, which has been a very great help.  Two of the new teachers came over from the US to be English teachers for our pre-K, K, and Grade 1 students.  A huge blessing for me because it means I only need to be teaching the Grade 2/3 students in the afternoons, for which Geneva and I are both thankful.  There are still a lot of stressful things with trying to still get legally registered with the education bureau (imagine bureaucracy in the US and then multiply it by 100!), however, the day in and day out issues of the school seem to be minimal so far.  Here are a few first week of school photos:

Wendy, ready to go!

Here she is with her classmates, Cassie and KeKe.  It's a small class, but super sweet.  I love teaching these girls!  I still help out with the Grade 1 students, doing reading as well as special projects, but most of my afternoons are spent with these sweet girls!

Vera, now in Kindergarten (Da Ban)!  I can't find the photo of her class.  It's a bigger group...she's the only non-chinese in the class, and she is doing great at learning Chinese characters already this year!

I don't have a photo of Geneva at school yet (she still comes in with me in the afternoons...but isn't officially in a class...she's kind of like my sidekick...a great benefit of a small parent-driven school), so I'll just include this one from a friend's birthday party.  The kids playland at the mall nearby just added a new animal to their little merry-go-round.  Geneva was, of course, thrilled.  Our little girl still LOVES elephants.  You can probably guess the theme she is already requesting for her 3rd birthday next month! 

We're back!

Hi friends!  Not sure anyone out there still checks this blog...it's been too long!
We've been back a bit over a a month now.  We had a wonderful trip to the US this summer.  Lots and lots of time with family and friends and an amazing trip to the South Carolina beaches...I hope to do a big photo drop soon.  For now, I'll just post a few fun ones...not necessarily the ones that make it up on the wall (with the exception of the group shot of all the Beahm cousins...that's going up in the playroom!):

Fourth of July - jetlagged, but still had fun with Mimi!  

 The Beahm cousins visiting the first weekend back...

 Fun at the beach...our kids LOVED the beach.  I have a thousand photos...for now I'll just post this one of Vera and Lucy 'surfing'!

The group shot.  The kiddos did so well for the photo.

 Lisa and I celebrated our 35th birthday together!  The last one together was our 30th.  I hope we don't have to wait another 5 years to be together on our birthday again!

Out to dinner and the kids found a mini-Statue of Liberty.  

 Another birthday cake with the Fishers and Swems!

I love a good quote...

especially one from Martin Luther...on mothering, no less!  I've been mildly obsessed with a fabulous blog called MamaMonk, and read her daily.  This was a quote she posted last week.

“When . . . our natural reason . . . takes a look at married life, she turns up her nose and says, ‘Alas, must I rock the baby, wash its diapers, make its bed, smell its stench, sty up nights with it, take care of it when it cries, heal its rashes and sores? . . . What then does the Christian faith say to this? It opens its eyes, looks upon all these insignificant, distasteful, and despised duties in the Spirit, and is aware that they are all adorned with divine approval as with the costliest gold and jewels . . . I confess to thee that I am not worthy to rock the little babe or wash its diapers, or to be entrusted with the care of the child and its mother . . . Neither frost nor heat, neither drudgery nor labor, will distress or dissuade me, for I am certain that it is thus pleasing in [God's] sight.”

-Martin Luther, Luther on the Christian Home: An Application of the Social Ethics of the Reformation

I'm finding myself in a very pensive stage of my parenting.   Trying to find ways to reclaim joy in my mothering, balancing my part-time work with my kids, learning to focus more on the real needs of my kids, and figure out how to love them in ways they can feel.   I want to hold my daughters and feel the weight of  the burden of being entrusted by God to be their Mother.   Like everyone, our family has it's challenges.  We have a daughter who defines the words 'intense' , 'energetic', and 'strong'.  All fabulous descriptive words, I've been told,  for adults.  And my baby, well she's not really a baby, my toddler, is about as attached as it gets these days.  She is glued to my leg or lap all day long.   It makes parenting most days an exhausting marathon.  On days where there are wet beds, major spills, issues with the dogs, a day where I have to pull our daughter out of school early for behavior problems, or apartment repairs (which in China are always happening), I just want to turn  and run into a selfish abyss of 'woe is me, aren't I great for putting up with all this, I deserve a break.'      But recently I've found a few 'mom' blogs that I like, a few books that I'm inching my way through, and a few friends who I can be honest with my thoughts, my failures, and so on.  And then tonight this quote really struck me.  It's such a good reminder that this parenting thing isn't all about me at all.  It's about God and his love for me and Alex and our kids.    It's easy to read this at 10pm when my three little ones are sleeping peacefully.  When chaos arrives at 6:30am tomorrow, my prayer is going to be 'Lord, help me remember, it's not about me today.'

Today I read an article about China's One-Child Policy...

Today I read an article that I linked to through several old articles on Yahoo.  I often click on those Yahoo headlines I see on the main page when I'm getting ready to check my email.  I admit I click on the goofy ones about Angelina Jolie and other movie stars.  Alex always makes fun of me for wasting time on those kind of links.  And yes, it is a waste of time.  But from time to time there will be a really good link tucked away among the various links on relationship advice, movie star sightings, and repetitive US news tidbits. Today there was an article about how China's one-child policy isn't going away anytime soon.  Of course, I clicked on it.  The longer I live in China, the more friends I make whose lives have been changed for the worse by this policy, put into place in the late 1970's.  So I've started reading more on the policy, and trying to understand how it possibly could have stuck around for so long.

Anyway, I came across an old article from about two years ago (2010), and the title is :  "This Woman Was Forced to be Sterilized...What Would You Do?"  I'll add the link below so you can read the whole article.  It is a sad article, so be prepared.  I think most westerners are a little bit shocked by it.  Especially since China has been trying so hard to put their international, first-world-country game-face on.  But I'd guess that most of my chinese friends wouldn't be surprised at all when reading it.  In fact, I'd guess that nearly all of my married chinese friends would have a story of their own.  

One of my dearest chinese friends here has a similar story.  She has three children.  Yes, three.  I knew the minute I met her that I was going to like her.  Her kids are the same age as mine, and the older two are girls, so our girls have become fast friends.  We talk about parenting, sibling rivalry, managing and caring for three kids in tiny apartments in the city.  And she frequently tells me how nice it is to talk to someone who understands.  Nearly all of her friends have only one child.  After getting to know her, I asked the obvious question "Tell me about how you have three kids?"  I don't think anyone has ever asked me that question in America.  It would be, well, unnecessary.  In America we have the number of kids we want to.  I have three beautiful daughters, and Alex and I would love to have one or two more.  And we probably will, via adoption and/or good old fashioned biology.  So there we are.  But in China, it is just not that simple.  My friend and her husband were married around the same time as Alex and I.  A year later, they gave birth to their first daughter.   About a year later, she became pregnant with her second child.  She and her husband were willing to pay whatever fine would be incurred.    The fine to have a second child can often be 1-2 years salary...not a small amount of money.  Unfortunately, where they were living the population control folks weren't  happy about them being pregnant again.  House visits began to happen.  Threats.  More threats.  There was concern that she would be forced to have an abortion or that her husband's job was in danger.  So they decided she would move back to her hometown where her mother was to have the baby. So she went into hiding, had the baby, and then came back to the city.  A lot of money was paid, and things settled down.  Two years later, she became pregnant again.  They planned ahead this time, did some research, and knew what they needed to do to have their third child.  The threats came, the home visits from the population bureau happened, but this time my friends had found an agency that helps families give birth to second and third, etc. children in Hong Kong and other countries.  Their third child, a son, was born in Hong Kong, and holds a Hong Kong residence card (something that will end this year now that China-Hong Kong has a new policy that will prosecute and fine hospitals that allow mainland Chinese ladies to give birth in Hong Kong...last year there were 40,000 births that fit into that category).  

My friend frequently hears negative comments about her choosing to have three kids.  "How can you afford them?" and my personal favorite (sarcasm intended here) "Can you really love that many kids?"  Oh yes, the propaganda runs deep within people's souls here.

What do I see when I see my friend?  A tired mom of three small children like me?  Yes.  But I also see one of the bravest women I know.  What would I have done?   My reproductive freedom has never been questioned.  My choice in how many children I have is not threatened.  When I became pregnant with my kids (or adopted) nobody asked if I was crazy.  Nobody asked 'well, are you going to keep the baby?'  There was joy and congratulations.  Not for my friend.  Is she happy with her choice?  Absolutely.  Instead of a bigger apartment or a car, their money went to having more children, and they don't regret it.  And when we are together with other friends, I know they look up to her, admire her, and are inspired by her.  She is a normal woman, living an extraordinary and inspiring life...because she and her husband decided to take a stand for their family.

And for my friend, living in a big city, she feels lucky...things could have been worse.  Another friend was home for Chinese New Year last year and her neighbor, a high-school classmate, who was pregnant with her second child, was taken by police in the middle of the night and forced to have an abortion at 8 months pregnant with her second child.  She was three weeks from her due date.  The reason?   There had already been the allotted amount of births for their county that year, and there could be no more.  This isn't a story from backwards, old 1980's China.  This happened last year.

I can't tell you how often I hear people from the west say things like 'Well, China is overpopulated...they have to do something'...or 'I'm sure it's not as bad as they say, most people don't mind having one kid...it is expensive to raise a child.'  It's the kind of thing I maybe would have said back in college...when the world's problems were in a textbook or on the TV news.  Not anymore.  

China is an complex country, and there's so much to learn by living here.  But the thing I'm learning now that I'm a mother and am deeply involved in the lives of other chinese mothers, is that behind most every mother of one child that I see, is a broken heart for the children she wishes she could have.  

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http://shine.yahoo.com/parenting/this-woman-was-forced-to-be-sterilized-what-would-you-do-2413398.html

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Photos!

Just a quick update!  It's a rainy afternoon and we are indoors for the afternoon.  It was a long morning at school this morning with 'indoor recess'... which the students love, but teachers do not (at least I don't!).  So after lunch we came home and I'm enjoying some peace and quiet while V and G watch a movie and I finally have a few minutes to update the blog!  Although they are both 'touch' kids and so Vera is laying across the back of my chair and Geneva is standing next to me holding my arm.  But they aren't talking, so I am at least getting some quiet! 

I'll let this post be a photo update with a few photos from the past month or so...

This past weekend I helped take care of several friends' kids while their parents were at a marriage conference.  We spent all day Saturday at the house (it unfortunately was rainy) and one of the little friends spent the night!  

Here's the group doing a sticker craft:

And the dress code was strictly princess...(Geneva is an elephant princess)...

We've been working in the yard a lot, and the girls have enjoyed gardening!  Here they are up on the deck.  The trees blossomed just in time for Easter and stayed in bloom for nearly three weeks!

A group photo for our Easter Egg hunt.  We hid about 400 eggs in the 'natural space' behind our apartment.  We've been slowly working to reclaim the space, which previously was just overgrown and a dumping place for some old construction material in the neighborhood.  It's looking great now, and the girls are able to play back there almost everyday!

Geneva loved hunting eggs!

A great family shot with Alex's parents.

My sweet girls!

City girls

A month since my last post. Yikes, I'm getting lazy about this blog! I blame it on Facebook! I either Facebook or Blog, but find it hard to do both! I'm due for a serious update on birthdays, birthday parties, Guang Qi Academy, and everything else that has happened since the Chinese New Year Holiday. But I'll take a little break and give you a word-y post instead.

Last week I read aloud to my first and second graders from Edith Nesbit's "The Five Children and It." I picked it up because a portion of the text was used in a writing exercise in the Grammar and Writing curriculum I am using. Well, it took one paragraph for us all to be hooked, and I brought the book home to finish reading aloud with the girls. It's a great book about five children spending the summer in the country at the turn of the last century, and they uncover a sand-fairy in a gravel pit near their cottage. But this sand fairy is a hairy-little-monkey-snail-like creature whose magic is a little bit tired. He grants wishes, but none of them turn out as the children hope they will.

The first chapter opens with a family, heading to a summer home their family is renting...

"...and so the house seemed to them a sort of fairy palace set down in an earthly paradise. For London is like a prison for children...and London has none of those nice things that children may play with without hurting the things or themselves - such as trees and sand and woods and waters. And nearly everything in London is the wrong sort of shape - all straight lines and flat streets, instead of being all sorts of odd shapes, like things are in the country Trees are all different, as you know, and I am sure some tiresome person must have told you that there are no two blades of grass exactly alike. But in streets where the blades of grass don't grow, everything is like everything else. This is why so many children who live in towns are so extremely naughty. They do not know what is the matter with them, and no more do their fathers and mothers....but I know. And so do you now. Children in the country are naughty sometimes, too, but that is for quite different reasons."

As soon as I read it I laughed. So just insert 'Shanghai' where you read 'London' and there is a quote I can identify with. On top of that add 30 plus days of rainy weather and no sun and you can imagine the naughtiness level at our house the past couple weeks!

But the sun came out today and we've been celebrating birthdays like crazy...so lots of joy with the tiresome days of a rainy winter.

I'll leave you with an early morning photo of my lovely little ladies and their puppy dogs ....

Natural Science Museum

The 5th day of the Chinese New Year is a day that is highly celebrated here in Shanghai. It is a day honoring the god of wealth. It mainly involves fire-crackers. Not fireworks...but firecrackers. The kind that has a string down the middle that you light and then pop-pop-pop-pop-pop....sounds kind of like a machine gun. Quite loud and not very fun for the kids. It starts the evening of the fourth day of the chinese new year and lasts about 36 hours. People set them off in front of their homes and places of business. Since our building has 32 floors and three apartments per floor, that would be a lot of firecrackers if even just half of the residents set them off at some point during those 36 hours.

After a little research, Alex found a great deal on a hotel downtown near People's Square. And so we had a two day 'refuge' from the firecrackers and got some good rest time and swimming time in for the girls in the indoor pool at the hotel.

As we were driving down Yan An Xi Lu in a taxi to our hotel, Alex noticed a sign around People's Square that said "Natural Science Museum" 800 Meters ahead. It has a large picture of a dinosaur on it. It was one of those brown, public-type signs, not an advertisement. We were intrigued, so did a little research online once we arrived at the hotel. There weren't very many reviews. We did find this review from a local blogger that explained why we hadn't ever heard about it before:

"The paint was crumbling, the stuffed animals were near the point of disintegration, and most of displays look like they were taken straight out of a 1950s science-fiction novel. We didn't get too close to the dinosaurs out of fear that they might collapse at any moment. That being said, there's something about this museum, schadenfreude perhaps, that made the whole 5 RMB visit worth it.".

Yes, that's right 5 RMB. For adults. Kids are free. That would be about $1.50 for our whole family to go to the museum. Despite the review, it seemed like it would be worth it to check it out and at least let the girls see some dinosaur bones.

Apparently, many of the exhibits were donations from a museum in London back in 1956. I would guess there have been very few updates since then. The bottom floor held the dinosaur bones, a small room with two chinese mummies (Wendy thought they were very cool), and the upper floors held exhibits of vertebrates and invertebrates. The invertebrates floor smelled like formaldehyde and the vertebrates floor smelled like moth balls. But despite the smell and the obvious lack of upkeep, I would say our visit was a big success. The girls LOVED it and want to go back.

Here we are, just arrived, and checking out the dinosaurs. Geneva and Vera were a little nervous at first. Most likely because the lighting was unbearably dim. They adjusted quickly and really enjoyed it, though.

A stegosaurus.

Alex talking to the girls about the skeletal structure of fish.

A few good friends joined us!

There was a modest little gift shop on the first floor, mostly filled with random plastic dinosaurs, plastic sea shells, and silk fans. But Wendy managed to find a gem of a souvenir... it was a little 'fossil kit'. A chunk of grey plaster with a tool and a brush for chipping away the 'rock' to find a fossil inside. Our very serious little archaeologist spent about 2 hours that evening working on it!

Her sisters missed out on the fun, and crashed early after a morning out followed by 3 hours at the swimming pool.

And, one more set of photos I just have to post. This is Wendy and a 'Nian'. They are dragon-dog statues that often flank the entrances of restaurants, hotels, etc. One is depicted as male (you can tell because there is a ball under one of his paws) and the other is female (she has a baby nian under her paw).

This is the traditional pose of the female nian: baby nian under her paw (sorry a little hard to tell in this photo...feel free to look it up on Wikipedia if you are really interested):

As we were walking back to our hotel, we spotted this Nian. Quite different than any I had seen before:

Yes, it appears to be nursing it's baby. A very sweet Nian, and my girls all were so happy to see it. We must have walked past a dozen or more of those statues on our walk, and I'm pretty sure my girls, like most little kids have a gut feeling that it just seems weird for the mommy to look like she is stepping on her baby. So we just had to get a photo of this one!

And our holiday continues. Since we only got two days off of school for Christmas, it has been amazing to have this two week holiday to recoup and rest up as a family before we head into another semester at Guang Qi Academy. Another exciting, but most likely challenging semester I'm sure.

Chinese New Year

We celebrated Chinese New Year in a BIG way this year. Regular New Year (as in January 1st)? Not so much. It was an early to bed kind of night. Chinese New Year? Fireworks, Jiaozi, post-midnight bedtimes, the works. Here are some photos from those day(s).

(Chinese) New Year's Eve...

We hosted a little get together for some neighborhood families, mostly expats, since chinese generally spend that night with family. With kids outnumbering adults at most of our gatherings these days, it was a little wild, but very fun!

- Alex took the big girls out to pick out some fireworks. The boxes on their right are the ones they wanted to purchase. They cost about 1000rmb ($150) and in the United States would require some sort of license to use.

These are the kind of fireworks the girls ended up purchasing:

Along with tons of sparklers and fountains.

Then it was off to buy fruit.

These fruit stores were literally spilling out onto the streets. I've never seen so much fruit!

On their way into our apartment building they saw our neighbor burning money (a tradition...it is paper bills made to look like money)....

Wendy gasped and said 'Daddy, that lady is worshipping false gods'. One of the sad realities of the holiday is that it really has a lot of roots in ancestor worship.

Sorry no photos of Jiaozi Dinner. Between cooking it up and serving the dozen kids plus adults, I didn't have a whole lot of time to grab my camera. I did catch some pictures of the kids doing fireworks in the yard.

Some of the kids. Vera has a lit sparkler there in her hand. She made sure to keep a lit one in her hand all night.

Handing out more sparklers:

Wendy with hers...and yes, it really was that smoky outside from all the fireworks! The headline in the papers the next day was "Pollution soars after fireworks: Calls for greener celebrations as air pollutants 5 times safe level."

And finally, Geneva with her (unlit) sparklers.

Fountains:

Alex did purchase some bigger ones and set them off in the parking lot next to our apartment. I couldn't seem to get the camera to get a picture of the fireworks going off, but here is everyone watching him set them off from a safe distance in our yard!

After fireworks, we went inside and the guys played cards in the basement room while the kids watched the old Disney movie 'Pete's Dragon' in honor of this year, the Year of the Dragon!

Then the little one's headed to bed.

But here is the midnight crew, trying to stay awake!

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On New Year's Day we had more Jiaozi at a friend's home. Here are the girls and their little friend ZaiZai.

It was really a fun holiday. And the great news is that it lasts for 14 days! More photos to come of what else we've been up to on our long holiday here in Shanghai.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! (And a Christmas Summary)

This year's Christmas celebration was a much quieter one than last year. Last year we celebrated several time with all of our extended family while we were in the US. This year was a quiet morning at home (well, as quiet as three little girls and some puppies can be on Christmas!).

With Alex's parents living in China, it has been a few years since we have had a Christmas without grandparents. They are in the US for a month, so it was up to Alex and I to get everything ready for the girls.

Here's the night before...

My favorite little touch...we dressed up Geneva's elephant for a ride in her new shopping cart!

But nothing could compare to this little guy under the tree!

This is our new puppy! A neighbor of ours has a poodle who gave birth to 8 puppies in October. They were ready to leave their mommy at just the right time for Christmas. Alex popped over to pick up the puppy around 6am on Christmas morning and the puppy was waiting for the girls when they came out to open their stockings!

As you can see, the puppy was a big hit!

Tinkerbell wasn't very impressed, but in the past 10 days has really warmed up to him! We named him Tuppy. For any P.G. Wodehouse fans, Tuppy is one of our favorite characters in the Wooster and Jeeves series! For those of you not familiar with Wodehouse, we highly recommend all of his books...terrifically funny and light reading. There is also a BBC series (which unfortunately only ran for 4 seasons) that we enjoy watching by the same name.

Tinkerbell sitting in Tuppy's bed...looking a little confused.

The weather warmed up in the afternoon and the girls were able to get out in the yard with some of their new toys!

Vera trying out her new roller-blades, which has now become a daily activity for her after school!

Wendy got a dance ribbon for her dance class!

KeKe (who many of you might know from our newsletters) and Wendy in their matching sweaters. KeKe and her mom joined us for breakfast and some gifts late in the morning.

Our festive Cinnamon Rolls we had for breakfast.

Mimi (my mom) made these amazing map quilts for the girls.

Daddy and the girls enjoying Twister!

And we are now entering a whole new phase with Wendy's big gift...an American girl doll.

(if you, like me, are new to the whole American girl enterprise, this doll is Emily...the 1944 doll...she's a cutie and looks a bit like Wendy!).

These three girls had a wonderful Christmas! We were thankful for the gifts and thankful to be reminded of the greatest gift of all...the birth of God's only Son! Merry Christmas and may we all be reminded of the new life He offers to us as we enter into this New Year!