Step 2: Complete!

That didn't take long! Less than a week after receiving the approval letter, we were sent an email for how to complete the 2nd step for Jeremy's visa process.

For this step, we had to fill out an online form and then submit the confirmation page, along with a cover letter, 2 passport-size photos of Jeremy and a photocopy of his passport to a nearby bank that the US Embassy requested us to use.

It's a seemingly easy step. But we found it was much more complicated than that. The form is not hard to fill out but requiresSO much information. It's all in English, which is Jeremy's 3rd language. Still, he filled it out like a champ. I sat nearby in case he had any questions about what he was being asked. By far, the most tedious part was the previous address portion. Jeremy had to list every single address he has ever lived at since he was 16. Yes, really. As he filled this out, I hoped that no one would ask me all the places I've lived since 16. There were SO many dorm addresses and apartments during my college years that I'm sure I'd miss something.

It took him a very long time to complete the form. By the end, we were laughing though. They ask some interesting questions, like if you plan on partaking in polygamy and stuff like that. Once he finished the form, we were relieved. Now he's sending the documents through the bank the embassy requested us to use and when he gets back, we can celebrate Step 2 being behind us.

What's next? Step 3, which will involve us rounding up a lot of documents and scheduling Jeremy's visa interview. Please keep sending good vibes our way and stay tuned for our visa progress.

My Parents Are More Awesome Than Yours

Whoever said that the best things come in small packages obviously never received a package from my folks.

It wasn't too long ago that we had the lazy postal worker that complained about having to deliver the package to our home. And then thankfully before my husband could pick it up, a non-lazy postal worker didn't balk at doing his job.

Mom is amazing and yet again went to all this trouble to send us yummy treats from America. You can't fully understand how special it is to get care packages until you move abroad. I can't even begin to thank my parents for being so totally awesome.

Before Jeremy left for Guangzhou to go get Seoul's US passport, he called around the area post offices, trying to track down the package. My mom had said it had been 3 weeks. Surely it must be here by now. Mail here is insanely slow but I still hoped it would be here. Next week is China's National Holiday and the post office is closed all week. I was worried I would have to wait until after the holiday.

A few phone calls later, Jeremy finds out that the package is down in Shanghai, clearing Customs. There are no direct flights from the US to Qingdao so this makes sense. It probably flew on the same route my parents take when they come to China for visits. Anyway, they tell him they will let him know when it's here.

Very late last night, Jeremy came back from Guangzhou. He successfully picked up Seoul's passport and her CRBA (Consular Report of a Birth Abroad) certificate. He also picked me out a new coat, scarf and a shirt-dress that by the grace of God mostly fit. It's my boobs. I'm a breastfeeding mommy and I can't help it. A pair of leggings and a tank top underneath should help do the trick though.

I couldn't sleep until I knew he was home safe. Once he was, it was Snoozeville for me. But around 4am, I had some difficulties with Seoul going back to sleep. And by 7am, I was still not very well-rested. At 9am though, I got a break. Seoul was ready for a morning nap. When I put her to sleep, I went to sleep myself.

Apparently, during this time, I slept so soundly that I didn't even hear Jeremy leave. Or come back for that matter. I awoke an hour later feeling as though just 5 minutes had passed. Jeremy sat at his desk working. Seoul had woken up and I was nursing her. As I lay there with the baby, I told Jeremy how I wished they would deliver our package. "Mmm hmm," he says, not looking up from his work. When Seoul is done, I get up and it honestly takes me a while to register that there is a very large box in our living room. THE PACKAGE!

"When did this get here?!?" I shout excitedly. Jeremy's busy laughing his ass off. He can't believe I didn't notice the package for a good 10 minutes while I'd stood there talking to him.

Of course, I'm sure it didn't look like this when Mom sent it off...

 I hope nothing fell out. The package was filled to the brim with stuff though so I think everything was in there. I wonder if Customs ripped this open. That would explain some of the mess.

This was basically how the inside looked. Gobs and gobs of things from candy bars to spices to taco kits to fruit snacks for Raelynn. My Swiss Cake Rolls! And donuts. TONS of donuts. There were also those cocktails in a bag that you freeze to get an alcohol slushie. Yes please!

I'm so excited about the spices. Non-Chinese spices are really expensive here. I'm equally as stoked about the parmesan cheese. They sell it here but in a teeny-tiny container for 35 rmb. That's pretty expensive for such a small amount. I would have taken more care with taking photos of everything if not for my worry that if I didn't clean this up before Raelynn came back from playing with her grandparents, I'd never be able to get her away from the candies and sweets. That's all I need is for her to eat ALL the Milky Ways!

One bag of donuts had exploded on the voyage. Or when Customs attacked it. Not sure which but we were able to salvage some of it.

There was also one of those boxes of Entenmann's donuts that had taken a beating on the journey. One side of the box was torn. So we've started with the opened donuts and have made eating them a priority. Ok, I'm trying not to eat too many donut bits because I don't want to look like a cow when I go back to work soon. But man are they good! Still, I don't want the school children asking me if there's another baby in there. No, no there isn't. But hey, now you get this extra pile of homework. Bwahahahahahaha! Thankfully, I don't look pregnant at all anymore but if I eat all the donuts myself, I definitely will.

For this fabulous package, and making me feel less homesick, and for everything they do for me, that is exactly why my parents are way awesomer than yours. Thanks Mom and Daddy! We love you!

My Powdered Husband

This morning after Raelynn left for the park with MIL (who has gotten over being angry at her son for no reason), Jeremy and I enjoyed a leisurely breakfast. He'll be hanging around the house today because he's leaving for Guangzhou tomorrow. While he's still home and before I am stuck with 2 children under the age of 5 all by myself (with some cooking interruptions from MIL of course), I thought I'd ask him to help me with a few things.

One of those things was refilling the baby powder bottle.

See, here in China, they mostly sell baby powder in tubs, like this:

Do they do this in the US? Or in any other Western country? Please, tell me if they do because when I left America, I did not have kids and therefore was not purchasing baby powder.

I hate these tubs because they come with a little powder puff, like the kind you'd get when you buy face powder make-up. You're supposed to use the puff and dab it into a big bowl of powder, which you hope you don't tip over and spill everywhere while you try to powder up your wriggling baby's buns. It's really the stupidest product design I've ever seen. I'm astonished this exists.

This bottle design makes much more sense. These are much harder to find over here. In fact, we were overjoyed to find it because we'd been stuck buying the tubs of powder for a while.

But now it was empty and we of course couldn't find another bottle. So, we kept this one and bought a tub of powder. The idea was to pour the powder from the tub into the bottle. The twist top is difficult to remove so I asked Jeremy if he'd mind helping me.

He set right to work and I lay on our bed nursing a very sleepy Seoul who ate and slept through this whole thing.

Suddenly, I hear a muffled pop. And then a cascade of powder rains down upon our room. Most of it on my husband.

Hahaha! Oh my poor sweet Jeremy! At least he was just as amused as I was. And now he smells lovely. Hey, it's better than baby spit-up, right?

What's extra funny about this is that while he was working on this little project, I was telling him an interesting anecdote from my childhood. When I was a little girl around Raelynn's age or perhaps just a wee bit older, I woke in the middle of the night and took the baby powder and powdered my whole room. I remember doing it too. I don't know what possessed me to do it. I just clearly remember waking up, taking the powder and dousing my whole room with it.

What I did not know at the time of the powdering was that my older brother, Phillip, had apparently done the very same thing when he was little. Except he also powdered our dachshund, Snoopy. Poor Snoopy.

Raelynn's only taken the tubs of powder and powdered her hands and face, like a Chinese opera star. I should have photographed that but I was more concerned that she'd taken a chair and used it to climb up to the shelf that the powder had been on. Oh they grow up way too fast!

It's Beginning...

I can't contain my excitement so I simply must post about this. Today, when we came home from church, there was a letter addressed to Jeremy on the door. His name and address were all written in Chinese but the envelope had some English printed on it at the bottom that said U.S. Consulate General along with the Guangzhou address.

We just went to Guangzhou a few weeks ago and filed for Seoul's US Citizenship along with Jeremy's immigrant visa. They had emailed us late last week to tell us Seoul's passport was now ready for pickup, and Jeremy's booked a flight out on Tuesday night so he can go pick it up on Wednesday. It's just easier for him to go solo as one of us parents must pick up her passport. We could have a third party do it but we don't know anyone in Guangzhou and we fear if we hire someone, they could be shifty and steal it or lose it. Or charge even more than the flight there and back costs. A train ride takes 30 hours one way and costs only a little less, so my husband decided flying was the easiest. Will he enjoy the peace and quiet of being away from his 2 noisy children? I'll let you know. In the meantime, send some good vibes for his safe trip there and back home to us, won't you?

Ok, I'll quit stalling. I know you're wondering what was inside the envelope, aren't you? It was a letter. More specifically, THIS letter...

Did you see that? We've been approved! APPROVED! They approved us just the day after we filed! We are so happy right now. We cried because we were so happy. Of course, this doesn't mean we get to pack up all our shit and move out of this place right now. No, no, no. This just means we're approved to begin the immigrant visa process for Jeremy. Thankfully, I have a good friend at work who is also currently processing his wife's immigrant visa and he's just a step ahead of me so having someone I can talk to about what's happening and what forms and documents are needed is a huge help. It makes it seem less of a daunting task.

But this will all be worth it soon enough if we can make it through the whole process and get approved. Every day I'm praying for it. I just want to take my girls and my husband home to the most beautiful land I know...America!

Oh Please!

 One of my best friends/former co-workers always said this and I think it applies perfectly to MIL. And FIL too.

This morning, I officially had it. And I think my husband has too.

Last night after dinner, while I was busy nursing Seoul and putting her to bed, Jeremy was cleaning up in the kitchen with his mother. As they cleaned, he spoke to her about doing a better job cleaning up and not leaving such a mess. He also asked her to not make so much food and to please use the meats and vegetables we have in our kitchen instead of bringing all of her stuff. It was Thursday night and on Fridays, she doesn't come to cook her barfy slop for us. My husband said he was simply speaking to her and not yelling about this. She brings over all this food we never asked her to bring and he likes to keep his promise to me about us eating my kinds of foods on the weekend.

You'd think in a mixed family like ours, his parents would at least try to eat some Western food or learn some American customs and traditions. But no. It all has to be me trying to fit into their culture. And my husband now sees how terribly unfair it is to me, and our children who are now both US citizens as well. He sees that I'm always the one to make a compromise while his parents push and push and push, crossing over any line of boundaries we ever set. 

MIL must be forgetting that if she fucks with us, she won't see her grandkids because she pulled some big bullshit today after my husband had spoken to her about his concerns. Instead of listening to him, you know what she does? She refuses to come up in the morning to get Raelynn for the mountain park and instead, sends FIL. Oh goodie.

That's how I found out about Jeremy's conversation with his mother. Because as I lay there nursing Seoul at about 8:30 this morning, Jeremy comes into our bedroom and sits down in my desk chair with a huff. He looks annoyed and very sad. After 4 years of marriage, I know his faces. All of them. And I hate to see this one.

He doesn't even want to leave for work yet because he doesn't want to speak to his father anymore. Apparently, FIL came in and instantly gave Jeremy a hard time about his talk with his mother. Let me clarify that he TALKED to her. There was no shouting. I would have certainly heard that in our bedroom while I got the baby to go to sleep. Yes, he talked to her about not making so much food, please use our meats and vegetables and to help clean up better and she got upset about THAT. She chooses THAT to flip out about instead of when I shrieked at her the other day.

I told you she's a manipulative cow. She's sulking until she gets her way and my husband now sees it all very clearly. Instead of having the effect she wants it to have, he just can't wait for us to move away. You know, those 2 idiots better be nicer to Jeremy. He doesn't have to take care of them as they age even further. In fact, after this, I hope he lets them rot. I hate when they treat him badly. My husband somehow turned out well despite having them as parents. Perhaps because he spent 10 years of his life living away from them, between going to college in China and traveling around on his soccer team to living in Korea. He always tells me he was so happy during that time because he was away from them. Jeremy is a smart and wonderful person but his parents never see this. Maybe it's the Asian way, but they are constantly pushing him down even when he has success. His insurance job? Oh that's worse than being a beggar, they tell him. They never praise him for the things he's accomplished in his life. And of course, when he has a failure, as all of us do from time to time, they shove that right in his face.

Now my husband feels bad about himself and is sitting in my chair, staring out the window. He needs to get going and start his day but he doesn't want to encounter his father again, who is inexplicably taking his sweet fucking time getting Raelynn off to the park. I tell Jeremy I'll shoo him away. FIL doesn't like to talk to me too much.

When I emerge from our room, I see he's already taken out ALL of her toys and now we've got blocks all over the fucking living room floor like some sort of obstacle course. He knows I hate this so I bet he's done this on purpose. Asshole. I see Raelynn's got her shoes on so I try to focus on getting her excited to leave so he'll follow suit. But he keeps insisting she needs to drink tea. She has a thermos full of water. Give that to her. No, no. He treats me like I'm some horrible mother because I won't give my daughter tea to drink. He then takes forever to make tea and pour it into 2 different metal rice bowls. Because why give her a cup to drink out of like a person? No, let's drink out of bowls like dogs. How Chinese. He then decides she needs to eat another egg. OH. MY. GOD. Just take my kid out to the park and go. We agreed on this arrangement so you could spend time with Raelynn and so that I could have a break in the morning and now I have to clean up after this jackass instead of relax. I'm ready to kill him. Finally, he leaves and Jeremy is happy again. He can leave without having to endure more bullshit from his dad.

I'm seriously sick of these 2 idiots. Some might argue they help us. Yes, they do. But then they jump in and help with things we didn't ask them to help with and then they try to control everything and yell at my husband when he nicely asks them to please stop. It's insane. I would love it if they never came over anymore. Seriously. LOVE IT. Hire a nanny to watch Seoul and take Raelynn to school with me and watch her behavior problems that they caused disappear again. It would be so lovely.

But of course, we're stuck enduring these nimrods for a little while longer at least. Hopefully not too much longer. My husband will forgive this incident but he won't forget it. He's got one foot out the door with me and our 2 beautiful daughters on his arm.

Oh, The Irony!

As a wife and mother, I absolutely adore watching my husband interact with our children.

Like today for example. While I was hanging up our laundry to dry, Jeremy was laying on the bed with a cooing Seoul sitting on his chest. I smiled as I hung up our freshly-washed clothes, watching Jeremy play with our 2nd daughter, and watching him fall more and more in love with her. It was a very sweet sight.

And a sweet sound. He was talking to her as she cooed at him.
"P.U.! You're so chou!" he said.

"Chou" is Chinese for "smell" by the way. In case you were wondering. We often mix our languages in the sentences we speak. It's just how we roll.

Anyway, he continues gabbing away:
"You smell like milk. No, more like cheese. You know, I love dairy products."

My back was turned toward them at this time, so imagine my surprise and amusement when I hear a vurp-like sound of regurgitation, followed by an "Aughhhhhhhhhhhh!" I drop the clothes I was about the hang up and whirl around to discover that Seoul, who is a most kind, sweet and apparently generous baby, has decided to share her dairy products with her daddy who has just proclaimed his love for them by spitting up some of it. It almost landed in his mouth. Almost.

Isn't it ironic? Dontcha think? Ha!

I hurry and grab wet wipes from the counter so I can mop up the curdled milk globs from Jeremy's chin. And of course, I'm laughing away, pointing out the irony of the situation to him. "I love dairy products," I mimic and even he can't stop laughing.

Though I can't help but wonder how my husband feels about dairy products now.

Unfortunately, I didn't get a photo of the incident but here's a couple of Jeremy and Seoul being cute together.

Get To Your Place

When I was a little girl, we had a dachshund named Snoopy. Actually, my dad will tell you his real name was Maximallian or some crap like that but my brother, Phillip, influenced the change to Snoopy. He was a great dog. He even saved me from the neighbor's evil doberman when it'd gotten loose. But even great dogs are sometimes naughty. And when Snoopy was a bad dog, we always told him to "get to your place!" Or "GET!" for short. I need to start saying this to MIL.

If you remember the giant blowout at the end of last week, then you'll know that to avoid any further altercations, I've been requested to pick out Raelynn's outfits the night before her outings with the invalids. Which I did. But of course, MIL went back on her word. Last night, it was muggy when I picked out the clothes. I picked a Hello Kitty t-shirt and pink shorts. Well, apparently this wasn't warm enough attire for this morning. She put her in a pink polo shirt and black polka dot pants. It actually looked okay enough, I suppose, though I have always kind of despised polka dots. But these pants I didn't mind because the dots are quite small and the style of the pants is actually more akin to leggings. In colder weather, I always pair them with a red, black and white ladybug dress that's become a bit too short but with these leggings-like pants, looks fabulous.

I'm not angry with MIL because the weather changed. I'm angry because that old bag, despite changing her into this other outfit, bought Raelynn even more pants. More polka dot pants! 2 of the same pair! And they're not any thicker or better than the 20 other pairs of fucking pants this child has.

Of course MIL thinks this shit will go with everyfuckingthing. She's ALWAYS wearing her vomitous polka dot pants. I have photos of her wearing them in this post, if you want to see.

Polka dots are not my style, but when done right, or paired with the right things, they can look really smart. MIL just throws polka dots with anything she sees. Or flowers.

I complained to Jeremy who was as aggravated as I was. He actually told someone at church yesterday that he couldn't wait to move away from his parents because they interfere in everything we ever do and contribute to Raelynn's bad behavior all the time. I hope we can escape before Seoul gets too big to be influenced by those neanderthals.

Speaking of Seoul, all her clothes are hand-me-downs (except for one thing my friend Natalie sent - thanks again, girl! xoxo) and all the pants she has available to her as the weather starts cooling down are bigger. Why didn't MIL buy her some pants? No, she HAS TO buy more pants for Raelynn because a closet full of them is just not enough. She has to constantly butt in and push our limits. You're not the boss of us, bitch. Watch your fat, old ass.

I'm angry that my husband specifically told his parents not to do something and they deliberately disregarded it. And that we came to an agreement about having me pick out Raelynn's outfits in advance and she just pushes and manipulates until she gets her way. I asked Jeremy if he could help me make a sign in Chinese that says "Get the fuck out of this closet and go fuck yourself," but he wouldn't let me. He didn't get mad like he usually does when I suggest these things though so I'm thinking he was quite tempted to put the sign up himself. He DID do that to a big refrigerator box someone left in our stairwell for a week though. Like the bike that took up space, it sat there on the landing between our floor (6th) and the 5th floor. A closer look at the box would reveal it had been for apartment 801. So those lazy assholes just dragged it down a few floors and left it. I can't be sure exactly what he wrote on there but I hope he dropped a few Chinese f-bombs in there. When the box still hadn't moved, he kicked the crap out of it and launched it down to the 5th floor landing, spilling out packing foam all over the stairs. That finally did the trick because when we came back, the box, the foam and the angry Chinese note from my husband were all gone.

I was really agitated by all this earlier this morning, but Jeremy reminded me that soon, Raelynn and I will go back to school and MIL won't be able to dress her like a street person anymore. We'll just have to worry about Seoul. And he's given his word that if his parents do not keep things sanitary and put her in any danger, that he will do something about it. I hope so because if not, I'll have to maim them with my bare hands. Or use these pants and the other fugly shit she's ever bought to tie them up and kick them down the stairs as I yell "GET!!!!"