China: Tim's Texas BBQ

When my friend, Keri, went to Beijing with her husband and posted pictures of a place called Tim's Texas BBQ, it immediately became a "must do" on our trip. It was, in a word, amazing.

Lilly, our tour guide, pointing out Dr. Pepper on the MENU! A very rare sighting outside of Texas:

There was Texas memorabilia everywhere. It was surreal. Like walking into a Texas BBQ joint or Texas Roadhouse, except in the middle of crazy busy China:

You can only imagine how happy this made me:

And this, of course, too:

No schools/teams in Texas were left out of the decor:

It tasted just as good as it looked. Incredible! (The brisket was the best...sausage and ribs not as good, FYI.)

It was a surreal, happy place for a few homesick Texans. (And, no, Justin, I'm not talking about you. I know you will always consider yourself a New Mexican.)

Pumpkin Patch 2011

I still have China pictures to post, but I figured I'd get these up here before it's Christmas! The Singapore American School has a pumpkin sale/patch every year. It's not the same as going into a big field in Texas and picking out pumpkins, but we're so thankful to have the opportunity to have a pumpkin patch in Singapore!

Levi showing off his tiny pumpkin:

My 6yo...how did he get so big?

All my handsome boys:

There was even hay!

Caleb and his friend, Pierce:

Happy Fall, Y'all! or, you know, whatever.

Taekwondo

Caleb has been taking Tawekwondo for a few months, and today had his first grading session, where he can earn his next belt. For the internal grading, we were allowed to watch, but for the grading tomorrow in front of the Singapore Taekwondo Federation, we will not be allowed to be with him.

Caleb has decided he no longer wants to continue with Taekwondo, but I hope he'll pick it up later in his life. I think the discipline and focus are such great lessons! For now he and Levi will be doing gymnastics and swimming lessons.

Here are some pictures from this morning. You can probably spot Caleb, the only light-headed child. :-)

Levi thought all the yelling was too loud. :-)

A-Z

My friend, Andrea, posted an A-Z Cyper Internet Alphabet, so I decided to copy her. She said, "by typing one letter in the URL box, it brings up the site or sites that you’ve visited the most.

One letter.

Give it a try. Open up a new tab. Type in the letter ‘a’. What comes up? Now try the letter ‘b’. “c”. And so on. It really is a good way to see where you spend your time on the computer. And kind of like what’s on your calendar or in your wallet, it can really tell alot about a person."

A--Amazon, allrecipes.com, A Holy Experience
B--Book Depository, Bible Gateway
C--CNN, Confessions of a Homeschooler
D--Domino's Singapore, Dave and Lisa's blog, Dentons' blog
E--Everyday Mommy, Expedia, Evite
F--Five In A Row curriculum, Fox News
G--Golden Village movie theater, Groupon
H--Homeschool Creations blog
I--IMDB, IBC Singapore
J--my blog, Johnson's blog
K--my sister's blog, Kohl's
L--Living Proof Ministries, Lisa Leonard Designs, Lakeshore Learning
M--McDonald's delivery :-)
N--National Library Board-Singapore
O--Oriental Trading
P--Plugged In movie reviews, Pastamania
Q--QB Food, QVC
R--Rainbow Resource
S--Singapore Air
T--Target, Twitter
U-- (none)
V--Vimeo, Victoria's blog
W--Words with Friends
X--(none)
Y--Youtube
Z--Zuji (the Travelocity Singapore site)

Pretty interesting. What's yours look like?

Oh Man, These Kids

I do love 'em.

A few days ago I put Levi to bed and at 9:10 he was still awake. He called me into his room, and when I got in there (not too happy that he was still awake at this hour) he wanted to say a prayer for my leg to get better. My two-year-old praying for me? I think my heart melted right there.

This morning Caleb came out of his room and the very first words out of his mouth were, "Momma, I want to go outside and find some big leaves. I want to put tape on both sides so I can fly." In his little 4-year-old mind he could strap some big leaves to his arms and fly. Oh to have such an imagination. This evening he went to the playground with his Daddy and came back with two leaves. Big ones in his mind, but nowhere near the size needed to lift a person off the ground. He wants to tape them to his arms and go to school tomorrow and show everyone how he can fly. I can hardly stop laughing about the absurdity of it. But I love that he thinks like that.

You know what's sad? I can't go check on my kids while they're sleeping anymore. I used to go in there every night after they were sleeping, before I went to bed, to look at them and cover them up. Now my crutches are so loud on our hard floors that it wakes them up. I hate that I can't go in their rooms. So ready to be crutch-free!

Here's a video that Caleb LOVES! He made us watch it twice in a row tonight. He's definitely our little engineer!



And here's a sweet video of Caleb talking about life stuff. :-) He sometimes talks like a baby because he wants to, just so you know.

Life According to Caleb from Jennifer ReflectingHim on Vimeo.

Sentosa!

Saturday we took the boys to Sentosa Island, just to the south of Singapore's main island. We did the luge ride, which was tons of fun, and then played on the beach. Here are a few pics, including some of me! My cousin, Kerri, emailed and asked for more pictures of me on the blog. I'm usually very happy being behind the camera, and usually I'm the only one around to take the pictures, but Justin was with us and was able to snap a few. Enjoy!

Caleb on the sky ride to the luge...

Haircuts

We took the boys to get haircuts last Saturday. They have a great children's style salon here (much like Cool Cuts for Kids in the States), and after they are done they let the boys pick a colored hairspray. Levi got red hair, and Caleb chose blue. It was fun, and they looked cute. Justin has the pictures of Caleb's blue hair on his phone, but he's not here, so I'll have to update his pics later.

Update on the Ice Cream Flavor

The real flavor is toffee and butterscotch. I assumed it would be a rainbow sherbet or cotton candy type thing. At least it wasn't Durian or Green Tea or Yam (all real flavors here).

Good guesses, though, people! :-)

Can You Guess The Flavor?

Caleb saw this rainbow ice cream at the store and wanted to get it. I bought it without looking at the flavor. Can you guess what it is?

Sling Contest

There are so many cool baby slings out there, and there's a contest here to win a $75 gift certificate to MamaKanga. I would love to have a stretchy pouch or a wrap for this next baby. I know he'll be carried much more than Caleb was since I have a little one to run after all day.

Check out the contest here and stop by MamaKanga to see all the beautiful baby gear.