We made it safely back to Shenzhen last Thursday afternoon after a 2 week (well, really it was just 10 days) visit to the U.S. It was so wonderful to see friends and family. We wish we'd had more time!
Dean enjoyed playing with his cousins and he learned a few new words such as hi, uh-oh, and (according to our nephew Will), ogre. It sounds like "oh guh" when he says it and we think it might mean something, but we're not sure yet. We don't think he's asking for Shrek.
We celebrated his first birthday with a party on the 11th. He wasn't as excited about eating his cake as I thought he would be, but he did seem to enjoy mashing his fingers in and watching the icing ooze through.
We had a small disaster the morning of the party when I dropped the cupcake "cake" sideways on the floor after walking into the house. It looked totally ruined, but fortunately there was enough time for Matt to run it back to the store for a do-over. Thank you SO much to the wonderful women at the Publix bakery at Eagle's Landing who dropped everything to make the cupcakes look beautiful again. A huge thanks to Matt's parents, too, who let us host the party at their house.
We've been back in China almost a week, and I'm happy to say I think we're adjusted now once again to the 12 hour time difference between here and Atlanta. The first couple of nights were rough, and we all three spent most of Saturday in bed (we slept from 10 am to 4 pm). The journey itself to get here is exhausting. I had forgotten how sore and achy I was afterwards from the first trip over in April. Dean sat on my lap, slept on my chest, or beside me in the seat when he wasn't wiggling or fighting to crawl away down the aisle of the plane.
We flew the same route as before - ATL to LA to Taipei to Hong Kong, then an hour ride to Shenzhen. All together the travel time was about 30 hours counting layovers. We don't plan to be in the U.S. again until February 2011, so we have a long stretch of China time ahead of us.
Today at lunch I was already craving comfort foods from home, especially cheese. I spent the day at a printing factory reviewing boxes for a new product for Plaid. We went to lunch at a restaurant with a wide variety of foods to choose from, and I was excited to see the menu included English descriptions. One page had a list of personal size pan pizzas. I wasn't feeling adventurous enough to try "countryside" style or the "bonus meat" version, so I settled on "Hawaiian".
Instead of a hot steaming pie filled with pineapple and ham, I ended up with a super lumpy seafood pizza. When I started to pick and pull the white cheese away, I uncovered chunks of crab meat, a few purple pieces of squid, several shrimp, and something white that looked like a small soft spiral seashell. The real kicker though was the set of bright red tentacles curling over the side, as if a mini octopus with a bad sunburn had tucked himself into bed with a soft fuzzy blanket of mozzarella. Unfortunately for him - but thank goodness for me - he was headless when I pulled him out and set him to the side.
Ahhh China. How I missed your unpredictability while we were away.
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