The Summer Palace Garden

Yesterday, which is your today's now, we visited the Summer Palace Garden.  We learned a bit about the Dragon Lady.  Not a very nice operation, but very smart.  The Garden is amazing. 

Now I need to figure out how to attach a couple photos with this app!

Photos are courtesy of Linda, except with her attempting calligraphy. 

We also visited a Hutong and had an awesome lunch with a family.  Finished the day with a show.  Congress Acrobats!  They finished the show with 8 motorcycles in a steel ball!  This team hills the world`s record with 11.  Kids thought it was awesome!  And it was.

Today we see some of the Great Wall.

Arrived in China!

What an adventurous flight!  All in San Francisco! 

Flight from San Diego to San Fran was totally uneventful.    Event the layover.  Then came time to load up the 747-400 to Beijing.  We all got on board and settled down.  Just  bit late when they closed the door.  Then the wait.  No one really noticed, but soon an announcement stating "we are having a mechanical discrepancy with one of the engines."  OK, what the hell is a "mechanical discrepancy?"  We were scheduled to depart 1:08pm and they said a decision would be made by 2pm. 

Next announcement:  "We will de-plane and get another one!"  Yup, we all had to get off and head for another gate, wait for a new 747, load up, and split.  All the people were all cooperative and the 3 hour delay was not too bad.  All I can say is at least they found an issue BEFORE we even moved.  The flight itself was LONG as you can imagine.

We arrived all tired and a bit after 8pm Beijing time.  The immigration line was long.  We met our guide and piled on the bus to the hotel.  Traffic?  San Diego you have NOTHING to complain about.  Sunday night 9pm and it was stop and go!  Crazy. 

Well, we are up.  We are getting ready for our day.  Today we visit the Imperial Summer Garden and some other things.  This trip is going to be very touristy, so be prepared for all the touristy posting. The Great Wall is tomorrow!

Oh, if you are reading this post, I am through the GFW.

Nerves

<b>Trying out the Blogger app.</b>
I want to see if html code works. 
<p>So we have a little case of the nerves.  Yeah, it happens every time I travel, but this is a big trip.  Looking forward to it.  <br>
Unfortunately one family has to drop out of the trip.  I've sad about it.  Let's just say a "family life change" has occurred.  I wish them the best. <br>
</p>
<p>Next is our flight.  All packed except those things we need.  This is going to be great! </p>

<b>Cheers!</b>

Our Journey Back

The last few months have been hectic.  We are going back!  We are going on a heritage tour to visit the land where Linda was born.  It will be an adventure and a thrill.  We get to retrace some of our steps before receiving Linda so she can see what we have seen.  We are going to see places and things we all have never seen before.  And we get to go to where she was "found". 

We look forward to a safe trip.  A fun trip.  And to cap it off we get to travel with seven of the original families we traveled with 8 years ago.  :-)

I cannot wait to update this for you all!

Wow! Has it been 8 Years?

Gotcha Day is coming.  A revelation hit me.  8 years!  Our "little" girl has been with us for 8 years!  How they have grown.

We plan on a heritage tour coming up next year.  I want to record our travels.  Most will be a vacation and fun.  We will visit Suichuan, Jiangxi.  How cool this will be.

What does Linda do now?  Just started 3rd grade!  She loves school.  She loves to swim!  This is a capture from a video of her in last month's swim meet doing the butterfly during her IM, or Individual Medley.  The Summer Championships are coming up this weekend. Go Tiger Sharks!

RIP Amber

I am very sad to blog this but I know we have friends that new Amber very well. Today we had to put Amber to sleep. Since April she has gone blind, lost her sense of smell and starting to loose her hearing. She was often confused about where she was and how to get to places. But even through that she would still wag her tail when we pet her and would eat like a pig.

Amber was a great dog. She loved to go to Lake Havasu and chase bunnies. She caught a bird once. That was not pretty. Bill lost a toe nail over that.

Bill took her this morning. When he came home he told Linda and I that she was at peace. He could tell that Amber knew what was going on and was very relaxed in his arms.

We miss her so much already. But I know she is in a good place with her dog friends, Princess and Annie and she is looking over us and still barking at strangers from up above.

God bless Amber!

5 Years!

Five years ago today we had a wonderful addition to our family.  It is still emotional to think about it, and I am not one for emotions.  ;-)  How time flies.  How fast our little ones grow up.  Five years!  Let's compare:

Taken yesterday, 9/17/11 at baseball game

Padre Family Day, 2007

We love Linda so much.  She is fun, intelligent, and very sweet.  She started Kindergarten this fall.  She loves school.  And, she loves to swim. 

And now to have more fun with my little one! 

Birthday Boy Zadie

Hello Everyone:

This weekend we were up in L.A. celebrating Zadie's birthday. It was a very nice weekend. Bubbe hung out with Linda Saturday night while Bill and I went to see Source Code at Century City. Do you know that you can actually reserve a seat now when you purchase your movie tickets? Then we had a nice Italian dinner at Tuscana in Century City. It was very nice. Linda had a great time with her Bubbe and she went to sleep pretty quickly.

Sunday was Zadie's birthday brunch. It was a beautiful day so we ate outside. Zadie made some great lox.. ah heck he made a great meal with it too. :-)

My mom bought a wonderful cake. The "note" part of it was made with marzipan.

Bill and Linda decided to take a little walk around the neighborhood and Linda took some great pictures. Check them out.

It was nice to come back to warm weather. We can now eat dinner outside.

Have a great week.

A Great Busy Weekend

We had a great weekend. Saturday we were at Legoland with our friends the Clancys. Caitlin and Linda had a great time. We even went through the aquarium. They have updated it since we were last there and it was fun to see the sharks and the octopus.

Legoland also has a new Star Wars exhibit. I really enjoyed it but I thought they would have more from the older movies than the newer ones.

Sunday was the Padres vs. Phillies game. As soon as I heard the starting line-up and that Holaday was pitching for the Phillies I knew it was going to be a bad day for the Pads. I was right. Although the pitcher for the Pads did pretty well until about the six inning. It was a pitchers duel for awhile and the first six innings were done in about an hour... not bad.

I'm looking forward to some more games in our future this season.

That's it for now.

Hello Out There!

I know it's been waaaaaaaaaaaay too long since we posted. Time goes by and the blog has been the last thing on our minds.

It's still fun to read other people's blogs, we just haven't made an effort to update ours. So here I am to update y'all.

Linda is now 5-years old. She is starting kindergarten in the Fall. I can't believe the time is almost here. She is definitely ready for it. I'm not sure I am.

Linda's favorite extra-curricular activity is swimming. She's pretty good at it too. Let's see if it sticks and she joins a swim team.

Things are pretty much still the same for Bill and myself. Bill is still working hard and I'm in my third year of being President of Families with Children from China - San Diego.

Our dog Amber is now 13-years old and blind. She's learning to adjust.

Other than that we have our annual trip to spring training in Phoenix, visits to grandparents in Lake Havasu City and Los Angeles.

So please enjoy these pictures and we will try to post more often.

Fair Day

There is only one place you will see Swifty the Swimming Pig! Yessiree, we went to the Fair on Tuesday!

Linda and Mel taking a break not more than 1/2 hour into the Fair. Why? It took that long just to get in! We arrived at opening and sure enough 1/4 of San Diego showed, too.

We had a good time. We watched a couple of horsed do their thing during a horse jumping event. We saw the goats and cows. We walked the main drag and saw everything fried on a stick. We wandered the wares warehouses. Linda got a new toy and Mel a new duster. We all will benefit form the food screen when we do our backyard BBQs. Funnel cake and hot dogs. We did good. Then we ran out of time and energy, so we split.

Happy summer! (When will it warm up?)

Holt Family Picnic

We had a real fun Saturday. First was Linda's second swim lesson in the morning and then in the car to Irvine for the Holt Family picnic! Linda loves the swim class and was up and ready to go. She was all ready for the change and drive to Irvine.

We had a great time at the picnic meeting up with friends and acquaintances who used Holt as their adoption agency. Jinji was so excited to see Linda. She dumped all the contents out of her little backpack to show Linda. So cute! It was great to see Molly and Haley again. They were awesome sitting with Jinji and Linda while us adults finished up our lunch. After lunch began the fun. To the playground!

The girls were having such a good time, and Daddy being Daddy, decided to stir it up a bit more. I began to catch and release the little ones. They were running all over the place. While we were having a ball a couple of other kids showed interest, as so we met Joy and Priscilla. They are sisters and had a great time, too. It is fun to make new friends and have such a good time.

By the end of the day we were all tired. From reports all the children fell asleep on the way home. We hope to hear from our new friends, and we can't wait to meet up with everyone again.

Where's the pictures? I was too busy playing with the children that I did not take any! I hope someone took pictures because we were having so much fun!

Linda Takes Swimming Lessons

It is official. Linda had her first swimming lesson yesterday. She had a blast. It is a small class and they spend a little bit of time with the instructor. What made it more fun is Linda is in the class with one of her school friends.

Linda kickin' it up! (click on the photo for the big picture)

Linda "jumps" in. Actually, she slid in. (click on photo for big picture)

We actually had a good time watching, too. Go Linda, Go!

Warm Apple Cup

Okay a quick post while I still have tears in my eyes from laughter.

We were trying to figure out if we were going to the Cracker Barrel for lunch or not. Well on my diet I can really only have one meal outside of the Medifast meals and we have a lot of stuff in our fridge that I thought I was going to eat since tonight is a night game.

Well we made our decision to eat in and I say to Linda, "Do you want your spaghetti for lunch?"

She nods her head no and says, "Remember the warm apple cups?". Obviously she remembers the Cracker Barrel very well.

We were in tears. I think we are going to the Cracker Barrel.

Spring Training 2010: Part II

We had a great day today, but before we get to that, I've added a picture from yesterday that Mel took. As mentioned we enjoyed a game and dinner with Mai and Mark. Becky, unfortunately, could not join us. Here is a picture of the gang. Linda and Mai had such a great time. It was awesome.


Today we went to Goodyear Ballpark in Goodyear, AZ. The Dodgers v. the Reds. What a game. Linda was shoot pictures all over. Check this one out of the field.
Here is a shot by me using Linda's camera. She must really like the game as we had to return to our seats after a brief walk. "Daddy, I want to go back to the seats. I miss them."


As we watched the game, Linda was shooting pictures everywhere. I even watched as she attempted a number of self portraits. This one came out good.

We started the day with some swimming. It was tough to get Linda out of the water to get ready for the game. A car nap and she was having fun at the stadium. Afterward, another car nap, a trip to the grocery store, and more swimming. We grilled with some friends and had a great time. Oh, and the Dodgers did win, 2-1. A great game for a Spring Training game.

Tomorrow brings a day of swimming and a night game. Padres v. Diamondbacks in Peoria. Yes, that will be 3 days, 3 different stadiums. If Tuesday works out it will be 4 days and 4 different stadiums, but we are not sure what game we will see.

Yes, Linda does miss home. She told me this evening. Yet, she says she is having a lot of fun here. Overall we are seeing all the "right" emotions from our little angel. Good night! Sleep well!

Spring Training 2010 Part I

Today was our first full day on our Spring Training Trip and did we have some fun! We arrived yesterday afternoon and settled down. Today we hit our first ball game at Surprise Stadium in Surprise, AZ. This is the home of the Texas Rangers and Kansas City Royals. Our fun began before we got to the stadium. We were about a mile or so, sitting in traffic, from the stadium.

Me: "We are so close I can taste it."
Linda: "We are so close I can smell my hot dog!"
We all busted down laughing.
Linda did end up eating 2 hot dogs!

Today's game was the Royals v. the Oakland A's. 26 runs on 29 hits, the Royals pulled it off with a 14-12 win.


This is Mel and Linda enjoying the game. (remember to click on the picture for the whole view).This is the view from our seats. Surprise stadium is a very nice facility. It's one of our favorites.
We met our friends Mark and Mai who are part of our travel group when we picked up our daughters. Linda and Mai played and had a great time. The ate everything: hot dogs, popcorn, dried cranberries, peanuts.... After the game we went to dinner together. Parting was a bit sad, but hopefully we will see them again before we leave.

Tonight our friends Mark, Laurie, Chloe, and Will should be arriving. We head out to see the Dodgers and Reds tomorrow. They play in Goodyear, AZ, a new stadium which we visited last year. Nice facility, too. We'll see if it makes our list of the best.

Various Linda Photos w/ Sophia, Too!

Click on the photos to see the whole picture!

Back a While: Wild Animal Park

Hey look! What the ....? (click on photo to view whole picture)

Linda, Sophia, and Bird. Oh, don't forget the belly button! (click to view whole picture)
Cory, stop flippin' the bird!!! There are kids around!

Oh So Long.......

So, what does Linda look like today. Gosh, when was the last time a picture was posted?

Enjoy this one, it is an awesome shot!

Whose Who?

I was in the kitchen cleaning up after dinner. I see the dog standing there with the inquisitive look.
I said, "Linda, what are you doing there?"
Linda replies, "That's not me, daddy! That's Amber!"
Me, "Oh, I was wondering when you got so much hair!"

You must love these little moments in life!