Silas’s First Months

We welcomed Silas Daniel Peet into our family on August 3, 2011 at 9:51pm. Since that time we’ve been a little busy and I didn’t make blog updating a priority. I’ll attempt to make up for this lapse with what I have to share today. It’s Silas’s 5 month birthday and this video, put together by Corey, covers some of the highlights and adventures from our little boy’s first 5 months.

Only You

After starting off our trip in Nusa Lembongan with much fun and relaxation, we made our way to the Eastern coast of Bali hoping that our stay there would be equally successful. We were not disappointed. We stayed at a small resort in Amed that really only had the two of us staying there so everything felt really private. The place was called “Onlyou” after all, so I suppose the name was quite appropriate.

Every morning we just had to roll out of bed to eat the delicious breakfast that was delivered to our bungalow’s front porch. Then we would spend a good chunk of the day swimming and lounging by our private pool. We went snorkeling once, but the site was not as nice as that of our previous experience in Nusa Lembongan and the water was not as clear, so….. back to the pool and our books. Although Amed is absolutely stunning and there are indeed other things to do there, we were content not to do much beyond lounging, swimming, and going out for dinner. We were incredibly lazy and it was fabulous! Apparently we didn’t even take very many pictures during our stay here since there were slim pickings when it came to choosing photos to share.

Our fancy villa

The breakfast that magically appeared for us every morning!

Our host and her adorable daughter

Want to know one of the main perks of having a private pool at your disposal? Nobody else is watching, so there’s no need for shame…  no matter what you may be doing.

Corey doing an inspiring water ballet performance in our pool.

Hello, third trimester!

I’m interrupting the Bali posts to do a bambino update since we had our last appointment with our fantastic doctor in Bangkok yesterday morning.

I had another ultrasound, which confirmed that our little dude is indeed a bit above average in size, however, not as gigantic as I thought he might be. Since my last appointment, where I was measuring a little large for 28 weeks, my subconscious has clearly been concerned about this since I’ve had more than a couple of dreams that he was born at 10+ lbs. I also had a nagging and, yes, slightly irrational concern that somehow during the previous 2 ultrasounds and numerous regular appointments they may have missed that another baby was in there or that my due date was off by a few weeks. Whew! Neither is the case. He’s measuring more in the late 32 week averages rather than early 31, but my doctor assured me that all is well and since Corey and I are giants (especially on Thai standards), he’s growing as he should be.

Our little guy's profile

We also did another photo shoot of me this past week to document the progress of my increasing waistline. In order of increasing body exposure:

Two Weeks of Vacation!

We used some of our frequent flyer miles to get from Bangkok to Bali for a full two weeks of vacation. It was our first getaway in two years during which Corey did not have to do any work and was even able to leave his laptop at home. It was great to unplug and fully relax together, kicking back and reading when we weren’t swimming or snorkeling.

To keep the traveling to a minimum and the relaxation to a maximum, we decided to limit our destinations to 3 places. This made it possible to settle into each place for 4 or 5 nights before moving on to our next spot. We started our holiday on an island off of the southern end of Bali called Nusa Lembongan. We stayed in Mushroom Bay, which proved to be a great choice due to its gorgeous beach and quieter atmosphere than some of the other places we saw.

The low-key resort where we stayed created the perfect start to our holiday. With no internet access to tempt us into checking our email and all the fresh coconut and fruit juice we could handle, what more did we need to unwind? We decided to treat ourselves by staying in one of their cute little honeymoon bungalows. As completely dorky and vomit inducing as the pregnancy magazine term is, I suppose this was our “babymoon” after all….

My favorite features were its private outdoor shower and the gorgeous ocean view from our front porch, where we spent much of our time enjoying drinks over a game of Scrabble. Of course, swimming also took up a big part of the day. The waves were really strong at our end of the beach, so Corey had fun battling them on the hotel’s flimsy boogie board. The only small downfall of our stay was  the slightly dysfunctional mosquito net over our bed, but that was only a minor blip in our otherwise fabulous stay and we still managed to remain relatively un-eaten.

We went snorkeling near a mangrove forest and saw some of the most amazing reefs either of us have ever seen. As is often the case with such things, the photos and videos we attempted to take with our camera don’t even come close to doing it justice. The number and diversity of fish and coral was really impressive and the colors were amazing! It was by far the best place I’ve been snorkeling so far.

Feeding the fish to get a closer look

The tasty coconut we bought off of a guy that passed by our boat

On our way to dinner

At the end of our stay here, we headed back to Bali and made our way to Amed, another coastal paradise. More on that to come….

Elephant at dinner

While in Hat Yai we went out for dinner with some of Corey’s colleagues and shrimp farm operators. One of the farmers was an ethnically Chinese formerly Catholic but now a fairly spiritual Buddhist. Got all that? He was a delightful guy to spend an evening with, even though we couldn’t directly communicate due to the language barrier (Corey’s colleague was kind enough to act as translator for the evening). He was taking great pleasure in making all kinds of predictions about our little dude’s upcoming birth and what type of demeanor he would have based on mine and Corey’s Chinese birth year animals (apparently I’m a dog and Corey’s a tiger) over the bottle of whiskey he brought to share with the table. Throughout the evening various people kept stopping by our table to sell us one thing or another. All offers were declined until, at one point, a man came over with a bag of what looked like it might have been bamboo and asked us if we wanted to buy some to feed to his elephant – a bit of a gimmick that I wouldn’t normally support due to my concerns over the lifestyle and welfare of such animals. However, our friendly shrimp farmer friend felt that this was very important for me to do based on some tradition that I didn’t quite understand… something about pregnant women needing to give to others as much as possible and elephants being good luck. I think the whiskey might have been doing most of the talking at this point. Nevertheless, we paid the elephant’s owner and I wandered over to the street to have my face-to-trunk encounter.

Looking a little apprehensive

After I fed the elephant, our shrimp farmer friend informed me that in the old days pregnant Thai women would walk under the belly of an elephant for good luck and to ensure an easy delivery. He laughed and said I was lucky he didn’t inform me of this before I was sent over to feed the elephant. Lucky indeed….

Easter on Koh Ngai

Last weekend we flew down to Krabi and made our way to Koh Ngai, a small  island off the southwestern coast of Thailand in the Andaman Sea. We stayed in a bungalow on the beach and spent the holiday weekend swimming and lounging under an umbrella. The sun was intense and our white bodies turned a bit pink despite having constantly slathered ourselves with sunscreen. I’m pretty sure we will need to invest in superior sunscreen before returning to the beach in a couple of weeks. That, or I’m going to start sporting a WholesomeWear swimsuit (thanks to my sister for discovering this due to her perhaps unhealthy fascination with the Duggar Family)…. or not. I’ll try my luck with a sarong.

Me, my stomach, mismatched bikini, sunburn, and the view.

We went snorkeling in the afternoon on Easter and nibbled on some peanut M&Ms that Corey was able to locate to partake in the age old tradition of promoting rapid tooth decay and diabetes for the holiday. That evening we ate some tasty seafood barbecue for dinner and called it a day.

The long tail boat that we hired to take us out snorkeling

Fish!

Pretties. (Corey has a shirt tied around his head in an attempt to protect his neck from the sun)

One of the sites where we snorkeled.

Après-snorkel

On Tuesday morning we left our little beach paradise to make our way to the southern city of Hat Yai, where Corey met up with colleagues to begin their crazy week of shrimp farm visits. I stayed in the city for a day before flying back home to Bangkok.

Corey enjoying a Thai massage before getting back to the grind.

24 Weeks

I’ve officially put my regular clothes on temporary leave in favor of stretchy-waisted maternity bottoms and tent-like shirts. My belly button is slowly disappearing and the postures in my yoga classes have become a bit more of a chore, so I find myself lying on my mat a lot more (and going less!). Some of you have been prodding me for photos of my increasing dimensions and today you’re in luck! Since I’m now into my 24th week, we decided to have a little photo shoot. Some dancing was involved… and Corey joined in at the end.

Visa Run to Singapore

This past weekend we packed our bags and hopped on a plane to Singapore for a few days. While Corey’s company continues to wade through the seemingly endless bureaucracy involved with legally setting up an office in Thailand, we do not have visas that allow us to stay in Thailand indefinitely. Instead, we have the run of the mill tourist visas that require us to leave the country every 30 days. Although this is somewhat of a nuisance, it does provide us with a convenient excuse to go on mini trips to nearby countries. So far we’ve been to Vietnam, Malaysia, and now Singapore.

My first impression of Singapore was that it felt completely unlike any other Southeast Asian city I’ve ever been to, mainly in that it was very clear that money was abundant and thus the city was tidy and very well planned. On the taxi ride from the airport to our hotel I was impressed with the carefully maintained gardens lining the highway, which I soon discovered are prevalent everywhere in the city. Overall, Singapore is impeccably clean and attractive. Some argue that it feels sterile, an opinion which I completely understand, although I found myself very much enjoying it since it was a departure from the everyday chaos of traffic, street vendors, and the fairly dirty and treacherous sidewalks that I navigate daily in Bangkok. To me Singapore felt like a quiet yet urban retreat.

This retreat does however come with a hefty price tag. In a city that well maintained it is not surprising that most things come at a higher and more Western cost. The main activities in the city are eating and shopping, neither of which are particularly inexpensive. One of the main touristy things to do is ride the Singapore Flyer, apparently the tallest ferris wheel in the world, but with a single ticket costing somewhere around $30 we decided to forgo that attraction in favor of exploring the riverside quays, beautiful botanical garden, ethnic neighborhoods, and the many delicious food options. The food in Singapore was indeed fantastic. You can’t go wrong eating out when the city is mainly populated with a mix of Indian, Chinese, and Malaysian ethnic groups. I tend to go for Indian food, which I may have eaten sometimes multiple times a day.

Day 1 involved Indian for breakfast and lunch, while on Day 2 I had it for lunch only. It's a good thing we were only there for a few days, as my arteries are now only partially blocked.

Despite everything else being a bit pricey, electronics are a slightly better deal there than they are in Bangkok. We did, therefore, take advantage of this by buying me a new little camera that I can more easily carry around with me to ensure I actually document a bit of our lives here. Our digital SLR is great but large and therefore often gets left at home unless we’re doing something that we foresee as being particularly photo worthy. I am now a proud new owner of a cute little Canon Ixus that’s small and light enough to fit in any purse. It’s also Barbie pink – a color that Corey found to be more appropriate for me than the silver option.

Here are the rest of the photos from my camera’s virgin run:

Chinatown

Tea time in Chinatown to get off our feet for a bit

Little India was full of tasty food and fun colors

Images from our stroll through the botanical garden

Eating our way down the river walk.

Big news

Corey and I are beginning a new kind of adventure by becoming parents in late July! I was waiting to share this big announcement more broadly until after we had our 20 week appointment. We went to the doctor yesterday and everything looks great!

I don’t exactly know what I was expecting, but the ultrasound was very cool and much more detailed than I thought it would be. We were guided through all of the bambino’s anatomy from head to toe, brain to kidneys. My favorite parts were seeing blood flow through the heart and other organs, the baby’s cute little limbs and face and, of course, finding out our baby’s sex.

It’s a….

I found this picture from the ultrasound to be particularly entertaining.

The fact that there is another human entering our lives is still rather surreal to me, but to see him live on the screen kicking his little legs and arms definitely helped this feel much more real for both of us.

I couldn’t continue updating to the present without making an official announcement since this has impacted so much of what has taken place during and after our time in Vietnam.

Here’s to our new exciting adventure!

A cessation of laziness

Sorry about that “stay tuned” bit in my previous post. Typically when one says such a thing it would indicate that another post should be coming in less time than the 3 and 1/2 months it has taken me to get organized enough to put pictures onto my computer. Admittedly, I’m a procrastinator when it comes to things like this so I thought that statement might hold me accountable to actually follow through. Clearly that tactic has proven ineffective….

So anyway, a lot has happened since Thanksgiving, but I’ll do some quick recaps to bring us up to the present. Today I will begin where I left off – Vietnam.

We braved a torrential downpour on the evening of Thanksgiving to eat at a hotel that catered to the various American tourists that couldn’t let the day go by without a little turkey and pumpkin pie in their bellies (myself included). The rain was coming down so hard that the storm drains couldn’t keep up. In order to even get to the main street from the Blueyou apartment to hail a cab we had to wade through knee high water (“We” meaning “Corey” as I rode on his back and held an umbrella over us in a futile attempt to keep us dry). We eventually arrived at the hotel, drenched but undeterred from piling our plates high with what was the Vietnamese interpretation of an American turkey dinner. Not bad and the noodles were a delightful perk!

After leaving Ho Chi Minh City, we enjoyed a mini vacation lounging and snorkeling in Phu Quoc, Vietnam. We managed to overlook the nightly burning of garbage on the beach (seriously. plastic and all!) and enjoyed our short time on the island nonetheless. At the risk of sounding like a total brat, I will confess that Phu Quoc was pleasant enough but not my favorite beach location I’ve been to thus far in Southeast Asia. I fully intend, however, to give other parts of Vietnam a try.

Corey snorkeling

Me fishing very unsuccessfully

These are never a good idea...

Corey appreciating our dessert's adornment on our last night