Coming full circle for The Choons!

Last Saturday was a special day for us – we were going out without our car, haha! Wayne had accidentally knocked into a barrier at his office car park on Wednesday, and had sent the cars for repairs, so we were basically car-less until Sunday. More significantly, we were going to meet the Choons for the first time since they’ve come back to Beijing, yaay! It has been a long while since we’ve met (though Wayne and his parents put up at their place in Shanghai, and Vanessa was in town recently for a quick stop-over to get things in place), so I was really looking forward.

Think our girl was also very keen to meet Rachel meimei (though for strange reasons Tim and Van don’t want us to call Rachel as meimei…hmmm…), and Aunty Vanessa as well as Uncle Timothy, since I was psyching her up the night before, and telling her that she has to help me give Rachel her birthday presents of the many books we’d bought for her.
I had her decked up in a sweet, tight sweater dress, courtesy of another Mummy whose daughter has since outgrown it, and she looks so cute in her tights, Grandma's sweater, and a little tummy. We headed to the Village first since the Choons could only make it past 12:30pm for lunch, and walked around, enjoying the great weather and sunshine, when we chanced upon this futuristic-looking three-wheeler that some old man had gotten off. Our girl was asking ‘这怎么进去的...', haha!
Then, as usual when Wayne’s around, she gets all clingy and wants him to carry (she knows it does not work with me, so thank goodness she does not try it on me…) – that’s her happy that Daddy has given in to her whining, haha!
We walked on round to Village South where she refused to run around on her own, so I took some shots of her as she ran after Papa, crying to be carried…cheh, so naughty!
We finally distracted her with the nice, curvy round benches, and she was happy to get down and walk on and around them as she strutted her stuff.
That’s us, looking totally fab and not out of place for the Emporio Armani shop opening that was going to take place in two hours just next to where this shot was taken – haha…
And then she started going for her stones again, picking them off the floor to stuff into this bunting hole in the bench…
That’s her taking sips from the new Tiger hot water flask I got for her from Taobao (at half the retail price of close to RMB400 – did I ever mention I love Taobao?!) – it’s pretty heavy when filled and the water inside was still warm even after about 6 hours.
And sitting on one of the lights she calls 小蘑菇…
Soon we had to make our way to Prima Kitchen and took a short cut through some dingy backlane/construction site area – as usual, the Choons were not on time, haha, but Wayne kept Rosabelle entertained with the free colour pencils and pictures they’d laid out on another table as I placed our orders. She was instructing Wayne to colour a boy skier in the colours she wanted…
Soon after, the Choons arrived! Rosabelle immediately asked me, ‘书呢?', not forgetting her responsibility of giving Rachel her birthday presents. However, Rachel was a tad shy, maybe because she had not seen us in awhile, or maybe she was tired from having woken up early that morning (and running a few errands to boot!), so she was sticking to Tim and wanting him to carry, refusing to sit in her high chair.
At least she had a balloon to distract her in the beginning, but the girls were not exchanging gifts, so the mummies had to keep them for them, heh! These were the sweet things that Vanessa got for Rosabelle…
Rosabelle took Rachel’s que and also put up a struggle getting into her high chair, but kept quiet after awhile when she started drinking her corn chowder, and had some Hokkien fried noodles and fish from the Fish & Chips set.

After lunch, we started the slow walk to their apartment at Lianbao, where our girl was so happy with Daddy carrying her that she did some arm exercises en route…
We reached their 227 square metres place (2.5 times ours!) – four rooms and three toilets, and loads of space for the little one to run about! Rosabelle was of course attracted to the toys/play area, but we did not hang around for long as it was way past the two girls’ nap times.
When we were about to leave, Rosabelle actually asked to bring along the magnetic alphabets playset belonging to Rachel, but when I told her no, it does not belong to her, she immediately put it back and ran back to me to wear her shoes. Such a good girl!

After that, we went to April Gourmet just outside and bumped into Tim’s parents – his poor Dad was having a case of the runs because of the cold weather, but thank goodness they will be hanging around awhile more so we can catch up with them properly. Just as well, as Vanessa starts work today, and if all goes well, Rachel is starting school soon, and they have yet to confirm the Ayi for domestic chores (one who came the other day declared she did not want in the next, sheesh!). Luckily they have a nanny who is able to take care of Rachel during the day – a retired nursery teacher who is supposedly very serious, haha, but so apt for the job!

Glad that things have come full circle for them and they are back in Beijing – can expect loads of fun playdates (if only the girls can coordinate their nap/sleep/meal times!) and weekends!