Gawkers, food and language

Ahh.  Somedays just feel a bit long.  Lately the novelty of having about 20 people standing around my DS, telling me how cute he is, pointing at him and gawking is wearing a bit thin.  I still find it amusing, but I also just want to get on with things sometimes.  He is hilarious though; it's like he chooses the most stoic people to look at and just starts smiling at them.  They're just looking straight ahead, but he ignores the people right next to him making faces and just smiles at them until, sure enough, they break into a smile.  I think God uses his joy to warm people's hearts.  People always say, "he's so happy."  We continue to pray each day that God's presence would be around him.  I think that's what people see.

My DH told me a funny story during dinner about how he was surrounded on the train by people getting off and as they were waiting, they were telling him how cute my little man is.  One woman said, "he's very beautiful."  Another woman corrected the first and said, "that's not right.  It's, 'he's very nice.'"  He didn't want to tell them that actually, probably neither are really the thing you'd say.  

I cooked dinner tonight with our rice cooker.  I tried to use the "stew option" and I tried to make stew.. but somehow it came out as thin soup.  Our Chinese friend said, "I've never tried anything like this."  Then my husband replied, "I haven't either."  Yah, not really the response I was looking for!  Even though we've been craving western food, I can't think of what to make without an oven.  My mother-in-law is bringing me a miracle oven and someday we'll get one of those electric toaster-type ovens.  Until then, I'm using this rice-cooker thing and of course the regular pans and cooking minus ingredients such as corn-starch, spaghetti sauce, etc.  The bright side of things is that we have a fantastic local market across the street and can get fresh fuit, veg and meat.  I buy from certain vendors and practice my Chinese out on them and they're very friendly and lovely.

Language study is slowly progressing.  My DH's doing well.  I keep hearing people say, "wow, you have great pronunciation!"  I can hear more about what's correct and what's not and my little dude.  He's starting to understand his Chinese name.  We're both finding our feet and well, learning that it's a long road ahead!

The other kids love him.  This little boy was trying to pick him up.  Froze a bit when I took my camera out.

Pretty funny.. he realized that behind him is a mirror and he just stopped eating so that he could turn around and smile at himself.. seriously.

Enough for tonight.. lots of love!