More of the Bobbsy Twins

There was some mighty impressive sharing between the two girls.

Followed by some more spinning of the heads.

Luckily, though both girls had consumed at least 10 cookies a piece by the time these photos were taken, the head twirling only led to more giggles.

Matched set

Tovina renewed an aquaintance at a Christmas Eve party we went to in State College. These little blond twins were quite the pair.

And they quickly bonded over some heartfelt spinning and fistfuls of cookies.

Luckily the children found themselves almost as amusing as the adults found them.

Sounding the Shofar

When we were in synagogue for Rosh Hashanah (a couple weeks back), I was with Tovina in the way back corner of the sanctuary while she was playing with some toys when the shofar (ram's horn) was blown. (Blowing the shofar is one of the big events at Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur.) Tovina has heard a shofar before, but since she was only 1 year old at the time, apparently she didn't remember.

Her head whipped around as she tried to figure out what that noise was and where it might be coming from. She excitedly pulled me to the center aisle so she could have a good view and then pointed and stared very intently. Her eyes got big and she had a big smile. The shofar was blown a few times, when it was time, I'd pick her up so she could see better. Such an enraptured expression! Since the shofar is suppose to be a joyous sound we considered this a BIG SUCCESS!

Tovina also started imitating a shofar noise and pretended to keep blowing it as she walked around for a bit. It seemed most appropriate.

Happy Father's Day!

We didn't manage to celebrate Father's Day back in June, so we decided to celebrate yesterday!
We started with a trip to Cincinnati Science Museum. Tovina's favorite part? The DINOSAURS!! (See the dinosaur in the background? She pointed it out at least 15 times as we walked from the parking lot to the entrance.)

Then we went for some Dewey's pizza. (Tovina is explaining the importance of croutons.)

And then we got a malt for Dad.

Or maybe it was Tovina's. Sometimes its hard to tell.

Don't worry, there was one for Mom too.

Shabbat in the park

Today we took advantage of a simply gorgeous day to walk over to a park near our house. Having done it once, we may now be addicted and plan on coming back many, many, many more times. Today we also learned that Tovina LOVES swinging.


Turns out Daddy is a pretty big fan too.

We also got to throw a disk around some which made me happy - so you could say it was a good day for the family all around.
We topped off the time at the park with a lovely stroll home.

Enjoying Purim

Tonight we listened to the Megillah being read at synagogue. This was particularly interesting to us because
1) I had to sing some of it (not nearly as straight forward as chanting regular Torah)
2) Tovina seemed to sort of get into shaking the grogger


Here is another video of her testing this noisy thing


and a little bit of levity to finish it up.
Does this count as cannibalism?

Home again , home again

We had a great time in St. Louis, heard some incredible singing, and made a bunch of new friends.
There are many stories to tell including the peep show we took Tovina to, the camera that I set free, dancing in windows, and the Maslenitsa party that T and I crashed. But those stories will have to wait cause I'm tired and I have a 7:45am meeting tomorrow.

Happy International Ice Cream for Breakfast Day

Saturday was International for Ice Cream for Breakfast Day. Unfortunately we were unable to celebrate on that exact day, but this is a pretty forgiving holiday so we celebrated it today! We actually had a pretty tame time of it and only offered 2 flavors of ice cream and 8 or so toppings. We did learn that cinnamon is quite good on vanilla (we will be trying this again) and garam masala is okay but has a slightly odd after taste if you add too much. We will be going back to curry powder and ice cream which was a delicious combination we picked up last year.

We were able to round up all the local Sullivans for todays extravaganza which definitely created a festive mood! Thank you folks for being willing to come over so early and share your morning!

ps. For those of you in State College who may feel left out, Tovina and I plan to help you celebrate this coming Saturday so don't worry!

Enjoying Hanukkah

One of the things that Tovina received for Hanukkah was this personal fan that spells out different messages as it spins. This one spells out a few different messages including 'Happy Hanukkah' as seen here.

Tovina's favorite part of this toy was sticking her finger into the fan blades to make them stop spinning. Then removing her finger and watching them start up again. Not to worry though, the fans blades are very soft plastic and the motor is weak so no fears here. I tested it as soon as we realized what she was going to be doing... repeatedly.

Chicken Dance

Before we went trick-or-treating last week, we went over to our neighbor's house for some chili to fortify us for the night to come. While we were in the kitchen, Tovina was shown a toy on the fridge that would play music.
How exciting!

(the feathers normally covered chicken little's entire back, but some of them had come loose and that stubborn child did not want me fixing anything)

Happy Halloween!

Halloween is an important holiday on our road. Many families have a portable fire pit that they drag out to their front yard and around which they set up lawn chairs from which to hand out candy. Tovina wasn't so sure about all these fires that she was not allowed to touch, but she was very excited about meeting all the new people.
Here is ms T aka, chicken little, and some of the kids from our road.
Tovina did like getting wrappers with candy in them. We even let her try a chocolate covered bar which she thought was quite good. One of our neighbors even lent us a little pumpkin like bag in which we could put Tovina's stash. At the first few houses, we showed her how to put the wrapper (which happened to contain candy) in the bag. By the 4th house, not only was she carrying the bag, she was also running up to the bowls of candy and eagerly picking an item out and then putting it in her bag.
and then picking another item out and putting it in her bag.
and then picking another item out and putting it in her bag.

We usually intervened after the 2nd piece.

Sometimes she would offer the homeowner a candy from her bag as trade for whatever she was taking, though eventually she got over that habit.

There was a hat too, but she was never willing to wear it.

Here is chicken little eating some cow.
mmmm.... chili.....

Enjoying chocolate on her birthday

First some background:
The night of Tovina's birthday the family was sitting around enjoying some ice cream bars. As it was her birthday, Tovina got to try some too. Her opinion? The results were surprisingly mixed. Other than one confusing piece of evidence, I would have said she clearly liked the ice cream and chocolate because she kept coming back for more. In fact, the video shows Tovina's 5th and 6th tastes of the ice cream bar. It was the same reaction each time. For the 3rd and 4th taste she did the closest she comes to running, tongue hanging out and mouth wide to get to the ice cream as fast as possible.
So what was the verdict?
Well, you be the judge.

I’ve been told that it is hard to understand what we are saying during the videos, so I have transcribed the text for you
Tovina’s Mom: I think it is her first chocolate
Zaida (grandfather): I think she might like it
Baba (grandmother): Did she stick her tongue out again like last time?
Zaida: Oooo. What's the matter?
Mom: Is that cold sweetie?
All: Heartless laughter

Did you catch her expression after each taste? Oh, you missed it because it went too fast? Well here, let me help you.

Chag sameach!

Tovina celebrated her first Passover this past weekend. So far this has mostly meant that she has gone to bed really late. (She made it almost to the 4th cup of wine at 10:45pm on Saturday. If you check out this Passover sedar (order) you can see that the 4th and last cup of wine is drunk way at the end of the evening.)

Tovina did get to try some traditional Jewish foods like tzimmis made by one of our non-Jewish friends. She gave it 2 teeth up!

Tovina also has a new frog mobile in honor of her incredible assistance in locating the afikomen on the first night of Passover. The frog motif was in honor of the 10 plagues and today she was commenting extensively on their appropriateness. One could argue that this early bent on deeper interpretation that she is displaying indicates her penchant towards being a Torah scholar.

Another possibility is that she was giving a discourse on the fact that the frogs are green.

In keeping with most great Jewish debates, its open to interpretation.

All in all, I’d say her first brush with Passover has been a success.

*Chag Sameach = Happy festival

Tomb Sweeping Day

Today is tomb sweeping day. a federal holiday. We are about to leave on a weekend retreat so I just copied the following from the embassy newsletter to give you something to read while we are gone.

On each Qing Ming Festival, all cemeteries are crowded with people who came to sweep tombs and offer sacrifices. Traffic on the way to the cemeteries becomes extremely jammed. The customs have been greatly simplified today. After slightly sweeping the tombs, people offer food, flowers and favorites of the dead, then burn incense and paper money and bow before
the memorial tablet.

In contrast to the sadness of the tomb sweepers, people also enjoy hope of Spring on this day. The Qing Ming Festival is a time when the sun shines brightly, the trees and grass become green and nature is again lively. Since ancient times, people have followed the custom of Spring outings. At this time tourists are everywhere.

People love to fly kites during the Qing Ming Festival. Kite flying is actually not limited to the Qing Ming Festival. Its uniqueness lies in that people fly kites not during the day, but also at night. A string of little lanterns tied onto the kite or the thread look like shining stars, and therefore, are called "god's lanterns."

The Qing Ming Festival is also a time to plant trees, for the survival rate of saplings is high and trees grow fast later. In the past, the Qing Ming Festival was called "Arbor Day". But since 1979, "Arbor Day" was settled as March 12 according to the Gregorian calendar.

International Ice Cream for Breakfast Day

Today we helped our friend Bec celebrate International Ice Cream for Breakfast Day.
That is Bec on the left.
Her Grandmother started this holiday a few decades ago and it has since been taken to many corners of the earth. Bec even created a little red book to share the accurate history. You can check out the official site regarding this official holiday or you could also check out this http://icecreamforbreakfastday.blogspot.com blog which references Bec in this entry.

This shot was of Tovina listening to Bec and her boyfriend (the nice young man standing on her right) explain the history of this mighty fine holiday and the various prizes that were going to be awarded. Tovina won a spoon for being the youngest participant... er... make that attendant since she hasn't really figured out that whole swallowing of food thing yet.

One of the fun things about having this holiday in China are all the... we'll go with odd..toppings that are available for trial.
Michael and I both agreed that the hua jiao powder, otherwise known as really hot pepper, on the left were TERRIBLE although I tried some pickled vegetables on vanilla ice cream and it was okay. More surprising (more surprising than pickled vegetables in your ice cream?!? Yes!) was how much Michael liked curry powder (which can be seen on the last plate in the bottom right) on vanilla ice cream. He says its tastes like eggnog. I actually enjoyed the beer flavored ice cream with fermented bean curds. The fermented bean curds were in the brown/yellow looking box between the red jam and the spicy nut/chili sauce mix in a jar.) The fact that I thought that combo good leaves me almost as shocked as you probably are.

Holiday pic

This photo was taken of Tovina and one of the women who work at the US Embassy during the Chinese New Year's party a few weeks ago. You may notice that Tovina is wearing her red shirt in honor of the holiday.

The picture made the front page of the Embassy weekly newletter.

501

This is our 501st post. Wow. I really wasn't sure if we would keep this up after our first few months in China but apparently we are.
Thanks for visiting out site and reading about our family and China and all the various things we are learning and seeing. As I've mentioned, its new years here in China so this blog seems very well timed. Now if I could just capture the sight, sounds, and feelings of all the fireworks being set off in the surrounding neighborhoods, this post would be really spectacular.

Since I've had no luck capturing that on video, we will simply have to celebrate the passing of the year by sharing a video that is now 1 year old.

Here is one from last February of the kitties.

Assisted steps

Tovina is doing her best to become extremely mobile.
In this clip she was all dressed in red for the Embassy New Years Party. As it so happens, her red turtleneck is also her dock worker/money collector/general thug shirt but that really had nothing to do with the holiday.

Zhao ayi is the person holding Tovina up.



You may also notice in this piece that the kitties and Tovina now interact. It is hard to see her expression here, but usually when a kitty walks into her line of sight Tovina becomes VERY excited. She also tries to pet the cats now. So far, they have not minded... or at least we thought they hadn't. But we now fear that Roxanne's actions at the end of this video may in fact be a sign of protest. Throwing her body down in front of the path of destruction as it were.

Or she is asking for belly rubs.

You decide.

Happy New Years!

Chinese new years has started, or at least the fire crackers have made their loud appearance. What I remember most from this holiday last year was being woken up at night by all the noise. Now that Tovina occasionally sleeps 6 hours at night, all I can think of is that if someone wakes her at 1 in the morning with some fireworks... well, its not going to be a good start to their year if I get a hold of them.

And to add to the fun, I believe that the blur of fur that just ran by was meant to demonstrate that the cats don't particularly care for loud exploding noises either. This is also their first time with this holiday.

To make it even worse, the new buildings going up next to us now block most of our view, so we don't even get to see the fireworks that we hear.

Swam in the Ocean

Well, maybe swam is a bit of an overstatement, but Tovina definitely got in the ocean today. She was not sure what she thought of it. I thought she might find it too cold, but when she did complain - which was really not that much - her complaints mostly centered on the fact that I had allowed some gap between her body and mine which was completely unacceptable. Other than that, the ocean spray, the startling water, the wind, and the immediately soaked diaper did not really seem to bother her. In fact, it was hard to tell if she noticed that we were even in the ocean.
I thought she handled herself quite well and plan to continue the experiment tomorrow.