The Next Lil Bit

We are on the plane from Minnesota to New York as I write this:

Our time in Minnesota was really great. We are going to miss all you Minnesotans while we’re away!

New York has many treats for us. We are going to be able to meet with many wonderful people, many of whom will be at the TWO family reunions we’ll be attending. We’ll also have some great opportunities to spread some information about what we’re doing in China.

Until next time,
Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam

Back in America

Really, we’ve been back for a couple weeks now. Things have been great so far!

Our flight from China went off without a hitch (it was our best/easiest international travel so far) and we arrived in New York. Our short time with Jenny’s family was wonderful. We got to catch up with her family there and we got to remind ourselves just how delicious Taco Bell really was.

We’re going back to New York, but for now we are in Minnesota, and will be until the 27th. We got to go to a 4th of July carnival (the kids loved it!) and we have been spending great time with family and friends.

Until next time,
Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam

Liam’s 1st Birthday (part 2)

Our day with Liam was so good! Our little man seems to have grown up so fast! We spent some nice family time together this morning then had Liam’s first birthday party at 3pm. We had a great time with our friends and family here in Xi’an. Liam loved his cake, by the way. He dug right in! We have the two greatest little boys.

Until next time,
Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam 

A Visit from Papa

No, not the guy from The Shack.

We had a visit from Jenny’s dad, Jay. He was doing business in Shanghai so he was able to stop over real quick during the weekend.

We played at the park, went to the play place, and before we knew it, he already had to go! Even though this post and our time was so brief, it meant so much to us and we THOROUGHLY enjoyed it. :)

We’re looking forward to the next time he comes, which will be in less than two months. What’s even more nice is that he’s bringing Jenny’s MOM then too! Woo hoo!

 

Until next time,

Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam

Levi’s Birthday

Okay I’m going to post about Jenny’s birthday tomorrow, but for today, I’m going to talk about Levi’s. Mainly because we have a video we’re releasing and I’m very excited about it. More on that in a bit.

This will be a multimedia post today. I hope you enjoy it :)

Last night, we decorated our apartment for Levi. When Levi woke up, he saw the decorations and loved it! We hung paper chains, had Thomas the Train decorations, we made signs, we hung a banner… It was all so great. Check out the pictures below.

Here you can see our lil’ banner for our big 3 year old!

We hung a chain here and put up four pictures.

Thomas the Train.

Lightning McQueen. (?)

Percy (from Thomas the Train)

Happy 3rd Birthday Levi!

Jenny made some Mickey Mouse pancakes for breakfast.

After breakfast, we went to the biggest, best play-place in the city. It is awesome!

After the play-place, we had naps and when we woke up, we had our friends over for a party! Stylin’.

We finished the night watching some Charlie & Lola ‘til Levi went to sleep. It was an awesome day! Very eventful, very energetic, very exciting, very… successful.

I want to leave you with a new video, but first: a little backdrop. In late October of last year, we made a video called “Levi Says” (You can watch it by clicking here). It was a short video of all the cute things Levi says every day that most people miss. We heard a lot of people really enjoyed it, so I’ve made another. Levi Says 2.0. You can see it below. For those of you on Facebook or reading this in email, come to our site and see it by clicking here.

Until next time,

Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam

Jenny at the village

There is a famous restaurant in the area called “The Village”. It’s famous because it serves decent western food; our dining there is not rare. :)

However, this is not the village Jenny went to. She went to an actual village. This was a little while back while I was out of town working at a camp for two weeks. She was crazy/incredible enough to take our two small boys there! It’s an hour-long bus ride each way.

You can see a video of it here! If you are not on our site, you can come watch the video by clicking here.

Hope you got a good idea of what a village looks like here in the Xi’An, China region!

Until next time,

Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam

New Pictures!

Hey everyone! We have some pictures up of our family. You can see some pictures with Jenny, Levi, & Liam as well as some pictures with Liam eating and Levi hanging out. You can find them by clicking here, which will direct you to our online photo album.

 

 

Until next time,

Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam

ABCs on the Bus

On the second of May we went to the visa office to apply for the visa swap to a Z visa. We started the day with some cereal in a cup (see pictures here) and then we went back home for naps via a double-decker bus.

Levi started singing some songs. We managed to get the ABC song on there, as well as a "We're going to Hong Kong" song which was slightly altered from a Ni Hao, Kai Lan song.





If you are viewing this on Facebook or email, click here to go to our website to watch it.

Until next time,
Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam

Liam's Big Head

Hey Everyone! We have a new video up of Liam! Here it is!



If you are seeing this via email or Facebook, click here to go to our site.

Until next time,
Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam

Da Da Da

Liam has been babbling so much lately! Sometimes, he'll just lay on the carpet and say "da-da-da-da-da"

It's really cute. He's working so hard on rolling over some more as well, but he hasn't done since he was three weeks old. (Click HERE to watch the video)

Levi and his friends love Liam a lot. Just today, Sydney was petting his hair and loving on him. It's adorable to watch and I'm happy that Liam has such great friends and family around him.

Until next time,
Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam

Old Friends and an English Tutor

We had a great meal with some friends we made from our last trip here to China.

They took us out to a nice restaurant which serves strictly local dishes. It was pretty good! We had a spicy fish soup as well as some garlic cucumber, some pumpkin strips with a sweet breading (Levi ate a TON of those) and some shrimp and octopus soup. We caught up and discussed what's been going on with our families since we've been away.

Their daughter is in her teens and has been learning English since she was five or six years old. She has been doing especially well on her written tests, but not so well on her speaking tests. It just so happens that I specialize in speaking English! :) I offered to tutor her, to which they were wondering how much I charge. Thinking back on our relationship, Jenny and I thought it'd be best to tutor her for one hour per week, free of charge. The father said 我非常感谢 which means, "I'm so incredibly grateful." I was so happy that by helping out some friends for one hour of my week, I was able to bless them in that way.

They'll be stopping by starting this Saturday the 6th, which also happens to be my (Jeremy) birthday :) We'll be keeping you posted on her progress and how that all goes. I'd like to tutor a few more people if I can, but we'll just see which opportunities present themselves.

Until next time,
Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam

Learning 汉语

Jenny and I have our tutoring schedules set up!

At this point, Jenny is going to be tutored four times per week with two hours per session. (Don't get a calculator, that's eight hours!) Jeremy will be tutored one day per week with three hours for that session. He's still waiting on another tutor to get back from being out of town. As soon as he gets back, we'll get that all solidified. The other tutor speaks no English whatsoever and Jeremy wants to be tutored by him two days per week with two hours per session. (Again, let me do the math for you....... (checking calculator...) Seven hours!

We are very excited! Our Chinese has surprisingly stayed with us for the most part. We need to once again get used to speaking Chinese all the time and hearing it all the time! It's quite a transition, but we are thriving on it! :)

Coming up this week: We have a large carpet to put in our living room for our boys to play on. (Tile isn't as fun!) That should be delivered within two to three days. Jeremy's birthday is this coming Saturday the 6th, and our tutoring begins.

Until next time,
Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam

Ai Yi

We hired someone to come and hang out and play with our kids every week. We are very excited. She's a great person to have around.

She's forty years old and was a preschool teacher for quite a while. She's a perfect fit for our family. She comes over for a few hours during the afternoon on Tuesday and Thursday and speaks only Chinese to Levi, so that should be good for his comprehension! We feel very comfortable and trusting with her, which is important. At the same time, we get to give out a job to someone, which makes us happy.

Until next time,
Jeremy, Jenny, Levi, & Liam