Water Park

On Saturday, the day before Father's day, Isabella and I went to a water park in Bangkok with our friends Paul and Cha and their 2 girls. Liza and Zach were still feeling sick, so they stayed at home. Here are a few pictures from our adventure...

The slides were big, but Isabella couldn't ride them. She was just over the 100cm limit so we had to pay for her to get in, but about 11cm under the 120cm height required to ride the slides. Go figure.
This was the small children's section. She had fun playing with Caina (3 1/2) and Connie (2)
Isabella before getting in to her suit.
We found the "mini slide" after we found out we couldn't ride the big one. Caina is in pink at the bottom of the slide. Isabella had fun riding the small slides.

In addition to the water park, there were also lots of rides. This was in the "kids world" part of the park. Isabella and Caina enjoyed the boats.

If you ask me, the "Peter Pan" on the boat ride looks a little possessed. Scary.

30 baht (about a dollar) got Isabella in to the ball pit ride. She had a lot of fun.
Here was one of the bigger rides. Looks like fun if you are in America- but I wouldn't venture on to it here. :-)
This was a double decker merry go round. Pretty cool.

Temple visiting

Last weekend we went to visit a couple of temples (Wats) in Bangkok. I'm pretty sure it was the hottest day of the whole time we've been here, but we still had fun. I have lots of pictures.

Here we are waiting at the train station for the sky train to pick us up. The kids love to ride the sky train. Isabella likes to swing around the pole in the middle of the isle while it is moving, as longs as there are not too many people on board. I figure she can do this now, but not later in life. ;-)
Next we got on to a water taxi that took us 9 stops up the river to the Grand Palace. Zach really loved the boat, and hanging on the rings.

As usual, some random stranger wanted to pick him up and hold him. This time he didn't mind and it was a huge help when it came time to get off the boat.

Liza bargained a guy down from 200 baht to 100 for this umbrella. It came in handy for the whole "hottest day that we've been here" thing as the day wore on. 

This is one of the statues inside the Grand Palace, which is the main temple in Thailand and where the King used to live.

A self portrait by Isabella.

This was a cool picture of Zach looking at his reflection on one of the buildings.

Isabella takes a sit down break while we were touring the temple.

We didn't tell Zach to pose like the monkey behind him, but he did it anyway. I always knew he was a monkey...

After the first temple, we stopped to eat at a little restaurant right on the water. 

Next we went to "Wat Arun" across the river. A line of buddhas were outside the temple.

This temple has lots of very steep steps. Liza and Zach stayed in the shade, but Isabella and I decided to climb up.

Isabella did a great job climbing. The first steps were easy... and she counted each one. You can see the even steeper stairs that we had to climb next.

Here we are at the top of the first flight of stairs.

The view from the top.

Isabella with her back to the city. We had a lot of fun looking down on the city.

The entire temple is made of tea saucers and ceramics.

This flower was on a tree just outside of the temple and it looked like it may have inspired some of the tea cup flowers.

Here is our new family picture taken at the Grand Palace. 

Paparatzi

Today we were at the Grand Palace in Bangkok. A Thai student came up and asked if she could take a picture of the kids who were in their double stroller. See the video to see what ensued...

On another note...

Tonight we were in Matt and Andrew's room comforting Zach by looking over their balcony.  At one point, Andrew, Isabella and I were in the room while Zach, Matt, and Chris were on the balcony.  The following conversation ensued...

Isabella:  I like Matt.

Mommy:  Why?

Isabella:  Because he has a beautiful face.

A couple of minutes later...

Isabella:  I like Andrew.

Mommy:  Why?

Isabella:  Because of his blue shirt.

Andrew and I laughed and asked what would happen if he changed his shirt.  Her first crush, and she didn't seem too embarrassed about it.  But she also wasn't going to recount the conversation for Matt.  

My first crush wasn't too much later--all of Dad's students were pretty cute, especially one from down the road names Mark.  But when he came over to the house, I wouldn't even come down the stairs.  Please no teasing--I think it's cute, and don't want her to be self-conscious about it.  

Zach BooBoo

This afternoon Isabella, Zach, and I went downstairs to fill water bottles for the weekend.  Then we don't have to buy as much water from the store (no one drinks tap water--avoiding typhoid, I think it's a good idea!).  Each of us carried two empty bottles, and Isabella was very excited about filling hers from the filtered water station herself.  These stations have a "cold" spicket (sp?) and a "hot" (read:  boiling) one.  Isabella started filling her first one, but it was evident that she needed to take care of some other business first (filling water bottles can do that to you, you know :)  Zach stepped right up to fill his water bottle, and disregarded my warnings to not touch the "hot" spicket.  As soon as the water came out, it spilled on his hand, he dropped the bottle and started screaming.  First degree burn--treated with a cold washrag, aloe vera, bunny and blankie, lots of love, and McD's french fries and ice cream.  Maybe he will start listening to my warnings.  I hope so.  And am thankful this wasn't worse.

Market

After we had dinner last night and had a visit from our large friend, we went over to a local fruit market. It was pretty amazing. A huge array of fruits, some familiar and some not, that was fun to look at and walk through. We went for mango and sticky rice, a great dessert food, but had fun looking and taking pictures.

A view down the stalls of the market.
I like to call this "fuzzy fruit" because I can't remember the real name. It is white inside and kink of like a grape if you peel the skin. I don't love it, but I did think it made a cool picture.

A very friendly little poodle was licking Isabella's hands. She thought he was really cute.

I gave Isabella the camera because she wanted to take some pictures. You can tell that the angle is a little lower than when I take the pictures. I think she took about 10 pictures, but here are 2 of them.

Elephant

Last night we went out to eat about 30 min north of where we are staying in Bangkok where Rocky and Sunee used to live. We sat down at a resturant that was literally on the street. It was not a place I would have ever picked by looking at it, but Din, a Thai staff, took us there because it is one of his favorite places. It was really good. We had a great time eating. Then, as we were about to finish, an elephant walked up! Yes, really. His owner was selling bags of sugar cane for 20 baht (about 60 cents) so you could feed it. The kids were really excited to see it, but not so much to touch it. Zach was fine until we got close enough for its trunk to reach up to him and then he was shaking in my arms. He did still like it, just at a distance.

Isabella tries to work up the nerve to give it some sugar cane.

Here it is up close.
He was reaching out for some more sugar cane from Rocky. I never realized that they have things like fingers on the end of the trunk.

Here we are next to it. Zach really didn't want to get any closer. Below is a video that Liza took.

Fun with paper dolls

Aunt Nancy gave Isabella this wonderful set of paper dolls for her birthday.  Isabella loves them, but they are not great when Zach is around.  So we went down to the office where Isabella and Cana created dolls at the table while Chaa and I supervised Connie and Zach.

Fish are friends

Yesterday we all went to the pool that is right across the street from the guest house we are staying in. The kids love the pool and we were all having a great time. At one point, Isabella was working her way across the pool (they both have suits that let them float) and I swam over to her. I said, in an Aussie accent like on "Finding Nemo", "I'm a great white shark and you look like a tasty little morsel." She replied, "Fish are friends, not food!" which is what the sharks say on the movie. For the rest of the time Isabella was chanting that slogan, while Zach would say "Fish not food!" Today he's kept it up with variations like "Fish on food" or "Fish friend on food!" It's very cute.

Bangkok Movies

Here are a couple of videos from Thailand. The first is Isabella's birthday party...

This one is from Saturday at the children's museum...