Smiles

My shoes?

She put on these shoes with no help!!

Monday morning school

Madeleine was so ready for school this morning she ran all the way down the hall to the classroom.

Dancing in the morning!

That is a snake wrapped around her waist.

Action shot!!

Lazy Saturday

We didn't so to much this weekend. Lee will be traveling this entire week, so we kept it low key. We went to the piano room at the club house and played for a while. I cooked spaghetti and we all turned in early. I can't wait to get home and cook for real!

Itsy Bitsy Spider

Madeleine and I were having lunch the other day at a tea room and she wanted me to sing Itsy Bitsy Spider. These are some shots of her doing the hand motions. Cute!

Madeleine in school

Madeleine has had her first school class last week. She has needed more interaction but I have been reluctant to leave her for any length of time, I just miss her too much and I don't want to miss anything. Our compound has a Montessori type school in the clubhouse. We did a try out and decided to start her this past Monday. The ladies are very nice that speak to all of the kids in Chinese. There are about 5 western kids and 3 Chinese kids. Madeleine is really enjoying it and a nice benefit is she is taking one nap a day and it is three hours, the downside of which is I have NOTHING to do!! The class is two hours and on her third class I managed to leave the room for 45 minutes. Progress people, progress!! I will have to get her H1N1 shot before we do anything like this at home.

Halloween Part Three

Our compound held a Halloween party in the clubhouse and we really were not interested but one of Madeleine's teachers(see next post) persuaded us to go. It started at 7pm, which is pretty late for Madeleine. We did have a good time, lots of balloons and lots of people taking pictures of Madeleine. I know she is beautiful and one of a kind but come on!!! She needs her own bodyguard to protect her from the baby paparazzi!! Thankfully Halloween is pretty low key here, I was worried about things being scary but that wasn't the case at all. Another bonus, no trick or treating!! No candy!! Daddy was sad though!

On our way!
First face painting

Balloons make me smile!

Baby paparazzi

Halloween Part Two

We planned to go to an Anglo-Sino school for a Halloween festival but it was cancelled. At the last minute we decided to go to an Irish bar called O'Malleys that was having a Halloween party. This is a family pub with a large playground inside their compound. Madeleine fell asleep in the cab on the way so when we got there Lee and I had lunch and by the time she woke up, all the fun stuff was over. That's OK, never wake a sleeping baby. I still got a few cute pictures.

Halloween Part One

These are some shots before we set out on our very long Halloween day. Let me start by saying the original costume, concept by House Of Mommy, consisted of bee costume, black long sleeve onesie, black leggings, black hair bow, yellow socks and black shoes. This configuration never left the apartment as it was much too hot for all of those clothes.

A few cute shots

Here are a few pictures of us around Shanghai.

This was a very good Italian restaurant that for some reason had a putting green in it. This was also a Saturday night at 8 pm and we were the only ones in the place.

Daddy and Madeleine walking through our compound probably going to the grocery store


Helping Mommy at the grocery store.

This was today. We went to our little patch of green grass to blow bubbles. It was pretty cold!

I love bubbles!!

Wearing mommys shoes

Taipei 2008 and 2009

Noodles for dinner

One evening in Taipei we had dinner at a noodle shop. Madeleine had fun trying to eat with the chopsticks. The food was very good.

Taiwan Yu Kids Island

They have a really neat indoor playground at one of the malls in Taipei called Yu Kids Island. The balloon room has a bunch of balloons blown around by four large fans. Madeleine loved it. She squealed and laughed and had a great time.

Shanghai Circus

All right. Here you go. I do not like the circus. I mean I really do not like the circus. It's a good thing Madeleine has two parents because this one was NEVER going to take her!! EVER!! Aside from the whole clown thing I just don't like the animals running around and the trapeze swinging and all of that. Well, wouldn't you know, we get to Shanghai and Simon, who works for Lee, invites us to the circus. Not only that but he is bringing his wife and son whom I hadn't met yet so I agreed to go. We went to the Shanghai Circus World which is a permanent circus in the heart of Shanghai. It had two tiers and twenty rows. They had the requisite acrobats and clowns as well as performing dogs and horses. So I'm feeling pretty OK at this point and Madeleine is really engrossed in the action when I start hearing roars. Now at first I think they must be coming from the speakers but then they begin to install and lift a net around the circus ring. Holy Cow!! I can't believe they are going to bring lions and tigers in here!! We are only 10 rows back and I am a slow runner!!
I am so going to be on CNN. Texas resident mauled to death by pissed off lion at the stupid Shanghai Circus!!!
All I can think about is where am I going to take Madeleine when these cats tear down this net. Up, up onto the roof through that little window there... good..Ok...I'm set. The good news is we escaped unharmed the bad news is the cats really were mad and angry and probably are not well treated.
No more circus!!

The Dumpling Princess returns

We headed back recently to Din Tai Fung for some yummy dumplings. We tried to get Madeleine to eat some of the pork ones but she was all about the veggies.

Shanghai Zoo

One day we went to the Shanghai Zoo. The nice thing I can say about the zoo is that it was large with more of a park feeling than a zoo feeling. Unfortunately there is a fair amount of animal taunting and throwing of food into the enclosures. From what I read after the fact, the zoo has done a good job of creating enclosures more like the animals natural habitats and educating the visitors about correct zoo behavior. Well, I don't think we will be going back but Madeleine did enjoy the animals especially the elephants, giraffes and lions.