Happy New Year! Hope you all had a great holiday season and a wonderful start to 2015. Here is an Alessi update from the last few months. Big announcement at the end... (feel free to skip ahead...)
Parents Visit:
My parents (Bob and Stevie) visited at the end of November and were here for Thanksgiving. It was great to have my dad's famous turkey and stuffing on Thanksgiving day. My parents did have to bring some ingridents with them and we had to visit 3 grocery stores before we found corn bread mix, but we did it! It was nice having the apartment smell like Cherry Tree Lane (the house I grew up in) on Thanksgiving Day in Asia. We are still talking about the yummy food. However, we missed the 'Giel' side Thanksgiving (which has been held at the Reust house the last few years) in South Bend. There are already emails planning next year's Thanksgiving. It's going to be epic. (Can you tell Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday). One bummer about Thanksgiving this year is that we missed the Malozi Saturday Thanksgiving held in Bamboo Grove floor 6. We were away that weekend. We may need to do the Giel Thanksgiving next year than fly back to HK for the Malozi one on Satruday.
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| The feast |
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| Thanksgiving 2014 |
Enough about turkey - the Friday after Thanksgiving - we flew to Singapore with my parents for a get-away long weekend. We had great food and saw some of Singapore's main sites. We saw Zheng (cousin Eli's wife) telecast the news in Mandarin on one of Singapore's TV channels and met up with her one night for hawker street food. Another night we met up with Kathy (Norlie's daughter) and her friend for dinner on the water. The botanical gardens, Gardens by the Bay, and the different ethnic neighborhoods (Little India, China Town, Muslim Town) were spots that we visited.
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| Zheng on TV!! She talked fast and we had no idea what she was saying! |
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| Me and my mom :) Garden by the Bay - the 'cloud forest' dome |
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| Eating in Little India |
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| My dad getting some BBQ chicken wings to compare with BW3s. They were good, but not as good as the chili crab |
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| Norlie's daughter (Kathy) works in Singapore |
Upon returning to Hong Kong my parents revisited some of HK tourist spots and participated in our day to day activities.... bus stops, boys' activities, grocery shopping, market shopping, Disneyland, playing trains and cars, reading stories, Patrick's school Christmas program, church, dinners out, dinners in, etc.
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| ipad with Papa |
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| Mom and Dad over in Kowloon looking out to Victoria Harbor to HK Island |
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| HK DisneyLand |
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| Excited for the daytime parade to begin |
At the end of their visit, my little baby - Evan - turned 2 years old. We had a birthday party for him and his friends and he was spoiled with presents and cake. It was fun to see him acknowledge that the party was for him - it's like he knew he was the 'star' that day!
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| Birthday parties - It's all about cake! |
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| New scooter that is all his! |
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| Handsome - Age 2 |
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| Mom, Dad, and Kathleen |
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| Family - mom and dad with, Tom, Kathleen, Patrick, Evan, Norlie, and NJ |
December:
After Evan's birthday on December 9th, everyday till Christmas was preparation for the holidays. It is kind of blur now. We visited Santa at the mall - it is quite an event here with ridiculous waiting times.... but we went on a weekday so it wasn't so bad. Evan was beyond excited about the event, until he came face to face with Santa - then he just turned into terror. Patrick loved every minute of it and had no problem telling Santa that he wanted a big rocket ship.
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| Visiting Santa - beautiful and tragic at the same time |
The two weeks prior Christmas we had children Christmas parties, adult Christmas parties, tree decorating, and wrapping/baking/Christmas prep. In addition, Sparkie the Elf on the Shelf, returned and needed moving every evening. Fastest month ever. I think since Thanksgiving was so late this year, it completely made the season fly faster.
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| Some of my bamboo ladies.... we are trouble! |
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| HK Island - Christmas time |
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| Adult Christmas parties |
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| Cookie decorating Christmas party! |
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| Relaxing after the decorating |
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| Eli and his boys on a typical Sunday evening |
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| A Sunday afternoon hike that landed us on the beach |
On December 18 - we flew to Kota Kinabula, Malysia. We had friends from Bamboo Grove (our complex) that were vacationing in the same spot and hotel - so it was perfect (Gus and parents, Mac/Whit and parents, & Blake and parents) The kids were entertained with each other and the adults could actually conversate while the kids played in the pool and beach. It was spectacular and the Shangri La resort there was terrific with service and so child-friendly. You know it's a good resort when your children are begging to go to Kids Club for time away from mom and dad! Tom and I now realize that vacationing with other families is the way to go - so any friends and family that want to vacation with us when we get back, let us know. However, there will be an application process - no pressure.
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| Tired parents - kids still playing |
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| Family |
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| Jungle walk - it was hot! |
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| happy hour |
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| Evan loving the sunset, grass, beach, open space - his face says it all! |
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| Sunset hour |
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| Exhausted kids... finally |
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| Visiting the orangutans at the resort |
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| Malysia - The Shangri La Rasa Ria... paradise |
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| Christmas Morning - upon arriving home we realized Santa remembered us! |
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| Whoa - this garbage truck is terrific! |
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| Another popular gift Santa gave - the rocket ship! |
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| Patrick's favorite - astronaut - He wants to go to the moon! |
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| New Years Eve - kids up past 7:00 - they can hardly contain themselves |
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| Our fifth family member - Valerie |
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| Adam arrives in HK |
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| Ice skating in Central - Patrick loved being scooted around by Uncle Adam |
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| Tom and Adam go to Bangkok for a few days away |
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| Tom teaches Adam how to shop in HK - with a shopping cart, or stroller |
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| Katherine and Nick arrive for a HK visit |
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| More dim sum please! |
Compact Nail Polish Storage System
It was great visiting them and catching up. Once the new year was underway, we quickly got back into normal life routine... Patrick started back up at school. Evan got his very own scooter for his birthday and has been scooting on the podium and to his friends houses for playdates. Norlie returned from her Christmas vacation - she was in the Philippines visiting her family and returned January 8th. About two weeks after normalcy returned - we took off again for a long weekend...we took a family long weekend holiday to Phuket, Thailand. It was our first vacation with Norlie - we loved it! Norlie isn't quite the beach person, but she still had a great time getting the beach side massages with me. She would watch the kids during their nap so Tom and I had some quality pool time and managed to even get out on the sailboat together.
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| Heading to Phuket for a long weekend - past our bedtimes! |
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| searching for seashells |
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| Evan on the beach |
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| Patrick sailing |
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| Mom and Patrick enjoying the sailboat ride |
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| Evan loves a good holiday! |
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| Celebrating daddy's birthday at the Malozi's house |
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| Norlie and the boys waiting for the bus! |
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| Evan and his buddy Whit at Ocean Park. |
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| Patrick and Mac at swimming lessons |
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| A typical taxi ride in HK - no car seats in this part of Asia |
In Phuket, the five of us had a great time together. And it came at the perfect time because we learned a week prior that we will be heading back to Arkansas sooner than expected. Tom is going to be on a project that is starting in February (yah, I know - he will be there Feb. 16th - yikes). We are still working out when the kids and I will move back. Tom has been in Japan the past two weeks and has two more weeks there before the big flight back to Arkansas. He will visit here about once a month until our move is finalized. Tough months ahead.
How do we feel about moving back? We are excited to be returning home, but of course, very sad to be ending our Asia Adventure. The expereiences we've had and frineds we've made are unforgettable. As Val noted on my Instagram account, I'm already feeling pre-departure nostalgia. I'm sure my phone will be taking pictures of everything in the next few months. I took a picture of our elevator's buttons yesterday - than I erased it thinking it was ridiculous. So yah, I'm borderline crazy right now. Ha! I need to devise a few lists: 'Things I will miss about HK' and 'Things I am looking forward to in America'. I'm sure the audience would enjoy both! The part that I try to avoid thinking about is saying goodbye to Norlie. She helped me raise my boys. I can't even begin to imagine saying goodbye to her, and thinking of the boys giving her their last hug... gulp. Can't do it. So, yes, it is going to be hard. She will be part of our family forever.... but across the ocean is hard.
Thank you everyone for following along and keeping in touch. It means so much when I get a note, email, or facebook message from someone that they are thinking of us and enjoy reading the blog. I will keep you updated soon on what is happening. I'm not discontinuing the blog quite yet... we have some last bucket list items to check off yet before our move, including a visit from Mirella and Giuseppe from Milan, Italy in March and a trip to Australia in early April!! AND...once we are back state-side.... I know my HK friends want some pictures of my life in Arkansas before they book their trips to visit :)
Love you all,
The Alessi Family
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