leaving memories…
Hello world outside China! After a long travel we really made it to Beijing. The last days were a haze of of packing, cleaning (I forgot to book cleaners for the house!), kids birthday and leaving parties at school, a walkathon, last minute shopping for more suitcases, doctor’s visit, you name it!
But I did manage to sneak in a couple of moments of relaxation in a Chinese food massage place with miss A. (that girl loves going there!!), a pedicure and a facial and happy moments with friends. I have to admit though that everything ran to a schedule where every minute was counted about 19 hours a day! So glad we can relax for a moment or two now…
Twins had their combined leaving & Birthday party at school and I got my mother’s day present then too. How appropriately they both features airplanes in their frame of the picture itself…
We got some leaving presents for the teachers: flowers with cute hears where we wrote leaving messages, cards and gift cards to the teachers
We enjoyed our last chilled drinks for a while – China has McDonald’s and coffee houses, but we are trying to enjoy the country the local way. Even in the US the kids already ate rice for breakfast at the hotel and enjoyed little cups of green tea with dinner when we had Chinese food, so we are well on our target
The moving day was hot, but luckily I still had a spot in the shade to sit on and enjoy a morning paper and a bottle of chilled water
It’s looking empty in the house and the driveway is filling up!
Miss A. was lapping a lot in the 90 F (32c) heat, while the house was being emptied
For Miss A’s class party I got lots of different cupcakes and some Chinese snacks, suitably for the leaving party theme!
We really were utilising our luggage allowance to the max – meaning 10 checked-in bags, 5 carry-ons and some “handbags” too. Miss C. got some oh-so-cute Hello Kitty gear for the travel! As the current luggage weights are so carefully checked and have gone done, the hard-case suitcases are becoming history at least in our household, and I opted for some new large wheelie bag. I picked a couple Sketchers ones as they were light-weigh, lhooked great, were well-priced, and had tons of storage and good closing mechanisms. I hope they last for a long time (or that the 5-year warranty is upheld if they break…)!
We got two new 30-inch Sketchers travel bags
Our mountain trip had so conveniently outlet malls on the way, so I got a real steal with these white linen pants from GAP, just $12 or so! I was so happy as my old white linen pants broke, and white linen is so summer clothing that makes you feel cooler and fresher! Note to the hot nail colour after the pedicure and my new flip-flops. Love that delicious fuchsia flower!
All cleaned up in the house! Note my new “travel” handbag in the lower corner. One needs a large bag for all the travel and emergency supplies, and they all end up weighting so much that all my bags broke. Got to get my old LV travel knapsack fixes as it has served me for over 10 years will all travels, in that case the annual cost of the bag was really low and worth the LV price tag!