Merry Christmas!

We had a wonderful Christmas! It was really fun watching the kids open their new presents. Zeb received several trains which he loved! Kayleigh received a pink dress for her doll which she also loves. She claims that the baby doll will be a part of my sister's wedding in the spring. We will see if Holly goes for that! We had everyone over for brunch and then opening gifts. We did secret Santa. John and I both agreed that this was one of the best Christmas seasons we have had since we have been here. I think having so many kids around made it a lot of fun for us. Plus our Hong Kong trip was icing on the cake!

Kayleigh received a princess themed gift from her friend Brennan which included the Cinderella movie. She was really excited!

Zeb received this awesome truck to ride around on outside from his friends Bright and Zion.

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve was really fun. We basically did a repeat dinner of all the amazing food we had for Thanksgiving but we switched up the desserts a little bit. I was assigned to making a pumpkin pie. I wasn't really nervous about making the inside part but I was extremely nervous about making the pie crust. I couldn't just run to my local grocery store and pick up a frozen pie crust. I had to make one from scratch. It turned out just fine. I was pretty excited. We had a great time of eating, fellowship ,and singing some Christmas carols. Then everyone left to put kids to bed and to rest up for Christmas day.



It didn't come out perfect but close of enough for me to feel like it was a success.

Hong Kong

Hong Kong was amazing! We had such a wonderful time while we were there. I think my favorite part of all was that most everywhere we went was decorated for Christmas. Since we live in a country that doesn't really celebrate Christmas and we haven't been in the States for Christmas in 6 years I was just in awe of all the beautiful decorations. We went non-stop for two days to try and see as much as possible. We rode up the peak tram to one of the highest peaks in Hong Kong to overlook the amazing city. We even rode an old Chinese ship ( a Junk) on a cruise around Victoria Harbour at night. It was beautiful. We definitely want to go back sometime and explore more of the city. All in all it was an amazing weekend.

One of the hotels that was decorated for Christmas.

Victoria Harbour at night.

The ship we took the cruise in around the harbour.

At the top of the peak.

The most interesting streets of Hong Kong.

Victoria Harbour during the day.

Once in a lifetime...

Today was the start of a trip Alisa surprised me with for my birthday.
We are going to Hong Kong!!! We were all ready for our 7:45am flight
and when we arrived at the airport, we found out our flight has been
delayed until 1pm! We were a little sad.

We went to the airline desk an asked if we could change our flight to
an earlier one and they did. We did not know we would be put on another
flight in first class! What a blessing and a huge surprise.

We are both very thankful for this opportunity. We'll let you know
more soon.

Treasured items

The two outfits below that Zeb has on may seem pretty normal to you but they are very special to us. John's mom made those outfits when John was a baby. It is hard to believe that John wore them when he was Zeb's age. I think that it is so special that his family saved them for us. I never got to meet John's mom but to be able to hold something that she made warms my heart. I plan to save them for Zeb in case his has a son some day.

Sunday Icecream

Today we tried out the new TCBY after church with all of our friends.
It was a disappointment to Alisa but I thought it was not bad. The
atmosphere was really cool and it had an outside option for seating.
Thank you God for blessing us with another western option!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas....

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas in the Greene home. I spent most of the afternoon on Saturday trying to get the Christmas tree up and the lights on the tree. Having two little ones it takes longer than you think to put up a Christmas tree. So by Saturday night all I had accomplished was putting up the tree and putting on the lights. The next day I decided to wait until Zeb went to bed and decorate the tree with Kayleigh. I attempted to decorate while Zeb was awake but he thought the ornaments in the shape of a ball where toys that he could throw across the room! Needless to say I didn't get much decorating done during his waking hours. So after Zeb man was fast asleep Kayleigh and I finished decorating the tree. We have been listening to Christmas music everyday here. Kayleigh's favorite song is "Oh Come, Oh Come Emmanuel". She calls it "Rejoice". She actually knows a lot of the words!

Alisa and Kay

Alisa and Kayleigh looking at past pictures of the family on the
computer. Both Zeb and Kayleigh love to look at past pictures of
anything. After dinner tonight we all had a chance to reminisce about
this past summer with the Grandparents.

A Die Hard Sports Fan

Below is a picture of Zeb watching an NFL game at John's computer. Every time John watches sports on his computer Zeb yells "games"! He loves to watch sports with his dad. I am pretty sure he will become a huge sports fan just like his daddy. John and I hope of course that he will become a big fan of the Tarheels. One of the biggest die hard Carolina fans I have ever met was my great uncle. My family used to own a pig farm and when we had power outages they had to run generators for the pigs. One time during a power outage a Carolina game was on. My uncle packed up his t.v. and went down to the farm to watch the Carolina game with the pigs! Now that is some true dedication. If I remember correctly he even won tickets to a Carolina game when there was a contest on the radio for naming the strangest place you had ever watched a game. I'm pretty sure that ranks pretty high up there. Well, little Zeb I know your daddy's heart is so proud that you already love "games" and will probably sit and watch them with him in the future.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! We certainly did. We hosted 10 adults and 9 children at our house for Thanksgiving. It was a little crazy to say the least but we wouldn't have had it any other way. Everyone came over for lunch around 11am and we started in on the first round of our feast. Since everyone has children they all left to take naps and returned again around 4pm for some more fun, fellowship, and food. We had a 23 pound turkey that was almost completely devoured and surprisingly not that many leftovers. We are already planning on how we will have this exact meal again at Christmas! We have so much to give thanks for this year. We praise God for all his blessings.

The wonderful feast!

The kiddos ready for some food!

This was supposed to be our Christmas card this year until we decided to scrap it since Zeb looks like he is zoning out. He was actually pretty sick with what we think is an ear infection.

The boys and the destruction zone!

The girls are taking a rest from the action.

My Sweet Zeb is 18 months!

My sweet Zeb is 18 months and has been for a while but I am just now getting around to writing this post. He will be 19 months on Sunday. I just love this age. He is so sweet and fun and brings so much joy to my day. He is learning new things everyday. One day about a week or so ago he woke up and started trying to repeat words that we say. He even has a certain "language" he uses when he tries to speak like the locals. It is so funny! He loves to laugh when we are laughing even if he has no idea what we are laughing about. He just wants to join in on the fun. At the same time, he loves to cuddle and is very affectionate. When I ask him to say I love you he just gives me a kiss. He is all boy in so many ways. Zeb, this post is for you little man. I love you so much!

Train rides and other things.

I realized that my last couple of posts have been about sickness so I plan to write one more post about sickness and then move on with another topic. Since my last post Kayleigh has thrown up again! Really?! I am starting to expect to clean up throw up once a week now. John and I are starting to think that it might be a food allergy and not just virus after virus. We are going to make a food diary to figure this whole thing out. I am praying that she will not get sick this week because I am hosting a ton of people at my house on Thursday for Thanksgiving.

While I was sick a couple of weeks ago Kayleigh and Zeb spent the afternoon riding the train. Their little friend Brennen had a success party for potty training and invited them to come along. I wish I could have been there to see Zeb's reaction. We haven't ridden the train since he was little. He loves trains now and talks about them often. John said that he had the most fun playing with the rocks in the train yard while they waited on the train to arrive. Looking at these pictures I am reminded of the warm weather. We have been freezing this past week but it is looking like we might have a nice warm Thanksgiving.

If you look closely you can see the drool coming out of Zeb's mouth. Maybe it was due to pure excitement!

Brennen the guest of honor.

On the upward slope!

Well, I am feeling much better now however right when I started feeling better Kayleigh and Zeb got the stomach virus AGAIN! I am pretty sure this is the third time they have gotten it since September. I have decided that all the sickness is due to Kayleigh going to pre-school. She is bringing home all these new germs we have never been exposed to before. The good news is that when Zeb starts school he will hardly ever get sick since Kayleigh has been kind enough to share all the germs with him. In other news winter arrived today without any warning. Yesterday, John and I were talking about how beautiful the weather was and how nice fall as been here this year. John and I both miss the fall in America out of all the other seasons. It has been a nice blessing to have such a beautiful fall. Today it was freezing and the high was 60 degrees. Tonight the low is going to be 45 degrees. Where did the fall go? I guess it is time to get out the layers and tell Kayleigh that she can not wear her flip flops any more. She was still wearing them in the afternoons when it was warm. She would wear flip flops everyday of the year if I let her. Today she told me that it was not too cold to wear her flip flops. I politely disagreed!

Sickness Abounds!

This past weekend I went a way for a mom's conference. It was wonderful and a much needed break for me. I enjoyed tons of fellowship with some very treasured friends. John, Kayleigh and Zeb survived without me and were all very happy to see me on Sunday afternoon. I was also very happy to see them. Just when I felt like I was getting back into the groove of things I woke up yesterday morning feeling a little achy and tired. I didn't get a lot of sleep during the mom's conference because I chose to talk instead of sleep so I just thought it was the fact that I needed to catch up on some much needed sleep. Oh no, yesterday evening I started running a high fever and felt like I was dying. I think that I have the flu! To make things worse we had already planned for John's teacher and her family to come over for dinner. I barely made it through dinner and putting the kids to bed. I basically sat on the couch and tried to look like I had it together. John and his teacher washed the dishes! I couldn't believe my guest was washing the dishes but inside I was SO thankful. As soon as they left at 8pm I went straight to bed. I have spent most of the day in the bed or on the couch. I feel good when I am full of Tylenol but as soon as it wears off I feel like death again. I am praying that this will not last long and praying more that my kids don't get it.
In the last month or two I feel like all we have been doing is battling sickness. We will have one good week and one bad. We have battled two rounds of the throw up virus. One of those rounds was topped with Zeb having a really bad cough and cold. The cough he still has and it has been a month! So if you can't tell I'm done with sickness in my house. I am ready for us all to be well for a long period of time. I am praying for that anyways!

B is for Bus

Lately, I have been trying to teach Kayleigh the letters of the alphabet. We usually do a letter or two a week. Along with talking about the letters I try to come up with some activity or fun thing to do that starts with that letter. A couple of weeks ago we were studying the letter B and I thought it would be fun to ride the double decker bus with her. Kayleigh and Zeb had a blast. We rode on the top right in front so they could see everything. I actually enjoyed it to because for the first part of the ride it wasn't too crowded and it was nice to see a different view of the city. Zeb goes crazy over buses when we see them on the street so he was especially excited to ride.

Our New Ride!

We decided about two months ago that it was time to purchase an electric bike. The traffic in our city has become increasingly worse over the years so it takes twice as long to get any where in our city now. We can ride in the bike lane with our electric bike which means that we can get places a lot faster and we also feel the freedom to go more as a family. So to be honest this ride isn't as new to us but it has taken me a long time to get a picture of us on the bike. Kayleigh and Zeb love riding! A note for the grandparents, Zeb is actually strapped to me with a baby carrier so he is safe and secure!

Happy Halloween!!!

We had a really fun Halloween. On Friday night we took the kids to a Harvest Festival where they could play games like bean bag toss, throw a football through a hoop, and fishing to win candy. Kayleigh dressed up a like a princess and Zeb was Super Man. Kayleigh always wants to wear her dress up clothes outside and I always say "no" because I don't want them to get dirty. She thought it was a big deal to get to wear her princess dress out on the town. We had a wonderful time and I am pretty sure the kids are still on a sugar high from all the candy!

Check out their hair. John put enough gel in Zeb's hair that on the way to the festival a bug got stuck in there!

Kayleigh and Zeb have been....

Kayleigh and Zeb have been busy having lots of fun this month doing things like.....

Building a fort with their Dad.

Hanging out with their friends.

Getting swaddled in a blanket by their dad.

Building another fort out of pillows all by themselves.

Banging some pots and pans!

Playing in a new kids play area with flying balloons!

A Day of Survival

A couple of weeks ago I promised my friend Kelli that I would watch two of her children for the whole day so she could go to some meetings. What I did not realize or know at the time was that this would also be the same time that John would leave town for two days and my helper would take a week of vacation! So I have been mentally preparing all week about how I would take care of 4 children by myself. This morning started out really well when I read in my devotional about the fruits of the spirit. I'm telling you God has a really good sense of humor. He knew what I needed to hear to prepare me for this day. Kate (age 4), Kayleigh (age 3), John David ( age 2), and Zeb ( age 1) were my companions today.

The morning was going well until I tried to come up with a quiet activity they could do while Zeb was napping. I had a temporary mind block and suggested they work with stamps. Although, I am pretty confident that Kate and Kayleigh can handle a ink pad I wasn't sure how things would go with John David. I left the room for only a few minutes and when I returned all three of them were covered in red ink all over their hands and Kate even had it on her eyes. I quickly decided that my idea was terrible and changed the activity to coloring. Meanwhile I realized that for some reason our power was off. After further investigation I realized we had forgotten to pay our power bill! After Zeb woke up I managed to get all of them downstairs and out the door to pay the bill. I looked at the lady and asked her to please turn it on right away. I seriously think she felt really sorry for me and quickly radioed the maintenance man to turn on our power.

The afternoon went really well. They wore each other out so much that they all slept really long naps. It gave me a chance to breath before they all woke up again. After we said our goodbyes to Kate and John David I decided to be super mom and try to give Kayleigh and Zeb a bath before bed. Zeb quickly reminded me that I am NOT super mom when he decided to poop in the bath tub! I quickly evacuated everyone and disinfected the tub and toys so they could reenter the bathtub and actually get clean.

The first person I thought of today as I was taking care of all four of them was my mom. I am one of four children. I was 4 when my twin sisters where born and 18 months later my brother joined our family. My mom had 4 children 5 years old and under. After today I have a bigger appreciation for her and think that she should have won some major award for raising all of us for 20 some years. Thanks Mom for all the patience you showed with us. I'm pretty sure you are the most patient person in the world at least in my book!

Craft Day

Once a week we go over to my VERY creative friend Brooke's house and do a craft. She has a three year old little boy named Nathan and Kayleigh loves to play with him. A couple of weeks ago they did some finger painting with flour, water, and food coloring. I tried my best to keep Zeb occupied with Nathan's toys but he was dying to join his sister. So I decided to let him give it a try. He LOVED it and decided that he should sit right in the blob of paint. His white cloth diaper became a different color very quickly. I ended up having to give him a bath at their house before we could go home. Since then they have done some bubble painting and built a miniature log cabin with pretzels, a milk carton and icing. I am so thankful for my friend and her willingness to include me in the craft activities.