Prayer Requests

Hi all,

Just a few things that really appreciate prayer for.

1) For Health. Haven still has a bit of a cold. Shae's has been getting worse. Also, Shae's been having tummy trouble the past few days and it keeps getting worse...just what we need when embarking on a 30+ hour journey.

2) It's been pouring here for days. The water stands 6+ in the streets in most places. Please pray that doesn't delay our flight out tonight. We can't afford to be late into Hong Kong as we only have 50 minutes as it is.

3) That we make all our connections especially the international flight out of Hong Kong.

4) For safe and easy travel.

5) That we do indeed get home Sunday AM. Eric's 3rd birthday is Monday.

6) That Haven does really well with all the flights and travel. Even a good baby has their limits. We're also worried about being able to have enough clean outfits for her fit in the carry-on. She is a little laundry producer.

Love to all,
Shae

Haven in her Panda Costume for Halloween. We went Trick or Treating with a bunch of other families amongst the rooms organized by the Hotel.

Miss Haven.

The One Pillar Pagoda. Today was our last day of sightseeing but it rained hard all morning. Once it stopped we ventured out, only to get caught in a downpour here on a no cars allowed area. So we hoofed it to the nearest taxi. Haven stayed pretty dry, but not so for the rest of us.

Hmmm...one of the other pictures might have shown it better. This was taken out our hotel room window. The water is standing at least 6" deep in the street making it kind of hard to maneuver or stay dry.

Alexa and Haven. We said goodbye to our friends Leanne, Nic, and Alexa on Wednesday night as they took off for home. We've missed them a lot these last few days.


The Hanoi Opera House, which was supposedly modeled after the Opera Garnier in Paris. Mike and I have seen both, but couldn't tell you if it's a good likeness.

All of us ate at the Chocolate Buffet at the historic Metripole Hotel on Tuesday afternoon. At the beginning we girls were sure we were in heaven, by the end we were groaning and didn't want to hear the word chocolate.

Another view of a house of a ethnic group.


One of the houses of the different ethnic groups of Vietnam at the Ethnology Museum we saw on Tuesday.

We leave tomorrow evening, Saturday at 8pm, and are getting excited and trying to finish up the laundry. I think Haven sees each finished load as a challenge to make more. Hee, hee. We've been very grateful to have an all in one washer/dryer in the apartment which we've used a lot. We're hoping the American diapers do a better job as right now Haven needs a new outfit several times a day. What her soiled diapers don't get, her spit up does. Keeping Mommy busy. We're trying to break the news gently to her that she's not an only child even though it appears that way and when we get home...things might be a little different. LOL See you Sunday AM.

Love to all,
Shae

Pumpkin Carving

This sure made for a fun day with the kids. We will bring down Ethan and Eric's pumpkins if they still look good tomorrow. We heard a lot of "eeaaww" while making these, but I think they enjoyed it...for a minute or so.

Trying to get 5 kids to look a camera and smile is nearly impossible. But we tried very hard, and lucked out a couple of times.

Ethan had the most difficult time with this. He would not put his hands in to feel the pumpkin innards. But Ethan did finally put his hand in to feel the cool, squishy substance. The most fun was listening to him in the bathroom trying to wash his hands. Chef school is probably not in his future.

Eric didn't mind it as much, but some of his expressions were good. Most kids don't like to be bothered with washing their hands. But Ethan and Eric weren't really sure why a parent would encourage them to get their hands dirty in the first place.

Mike and Shae, it's something to build on for fall in 2009.

Well, it's been just over 2 weeks now, having the boys with us. Now they are spending two nights with Grandpa and Grandma Dalke. Our family of 5 wondered why the house was so quiet last night. It's only been one day removed from the chaos, but I miss them already. Can't imagine how their parents are feeling. But Sunday morning will be a great reunion. Haven doesn't know what she is in for. I'm sure these two energetic, silence challenged, glow-in-the dark companions will quickly introduce her to the good life. They may have picked up a few new words, but I can't take all the blame for that. However, they do know Ephesians 6:13-18 quite well now. And that we will take credit for, they had Ben and Drew to help teach them those verses.

Tomorrow we'll pick them up and take them to Omaha for the weekend. They'll get to dress up one more time tomorrow. And we will have all 8 Dalke cousins together for a couple days until we get to welcome the 9th cousin. We are all excited for Sunday morning. We pray for safe travel. The Lord is good!

Have Visa, Will Travel

Hi all,

We have Haven's visa!!! So we are free to leave and will keep to the pre arranged schedule leaving Saturday night at 8pm Hanoi time, so 8am your time. Currently, we're supposed to land in Omaha at 10:30am Sunday morning.

Woo! Hoo!! Very excited and can't wait to come home and most of all see our boys. We've missed them a ton. Free video conferencing through Skype has been great, but I can't wait to give them a real hug.

Keep us in your prayers for the flights home. We have 4--Hanoi to Hong Kong, Hong Kong to Los Angeles, LA to Dallas, Dallas to Omaha. We only have 50 minutes in Hong Kong so I'm kind of worried about making our connections as it is a huge and very long airport. Also of course the 14 hour plus flight to LA will be challenging so we'd appreciate all your prayers.

Love to all,
Shae

October 30th

Having lunch at KOTO-Know One Teach One, a training restaurant for under privileged kids after the Temple of Literature.

Temple of Literature.

The mandarins or doctorate degrees names were written on these stone turtles.

At the Temple of Literature.


At the Temple of Literature. There was a series of courtyards.
She didn't do too, bad, but has some great faces. Since that first day eating it twice, she's kind of boycotted though.

Haven's 1st Rice Cereal.

Hence, the name Church Street. This is the Hanoi Cathedral, in the flavor of Notre Dame under the French influence.

Dinner at Mediterano on Church Street.

Sorry we haven't posted in a couple of days. We've been really busy. Tuesday we were out seeing the Temple of Literature, Hanoi's oldest university, and the Ethnology Museum with lunch at KOTO.

On Wednesday, we had 3 different official appts. We had to pick up Haven's Vietnamese passport, go the International Medical Clinic for visa check-up, and then go file all her paperwork at the Embassy. Today, Thursday at 2pm we go back to the Embassy for our interview. Hopefully we'll be picking up her visa by 5pm tonight. Then we'll be done with all the official stuff. Please say a prayer for us when you read this that everything went well.

Love to all,
Shae

October 27

The Peanut Princess, aka Haven, in her "ride".

More from inside the market.

Inside the market.

Today we all went to the Don Xuan market, a 3 story indoor market.



Mike's dessert, the namesake of the restaurant, gelato ice cream in a frozen green tangerine.

Another picture of the inside of the Green Tangerine Restaurant.

Yesterday we had lunch at the Green Tangerine.

Friday night we all went to the Big C across town. It's like Super Wal-Mart on steroids. It's 3 levels with the Wal-Mart like store on the middle level. On the 1st level was individual shops and a Pizza Hut where we had dinner. The funny thing was it was almost like upscale dining. The pizza was pretty close to the same though.

Eric's Morning Ritual - Waiting for Coffee

Yup. It's that time of day again where I find myself waiting for the first cup of joe. Patiently waiting, watching every precious drip brewed just the way I like it. Sure you might think being 2 and 358 days old is a breeze, but lately I can hardly keep up with this crazy world. There is only so much fun a guy can have before he asks "When is this merry-go-round going to stop?!!" The parties, the games, the snacks, wrestling and playing and running and jumping and pretending to be a tiger, climbing in treehouses, picking apples from the neighbors tree, or off the ground, whichever is closer. I'M POOPED! I'm just not 2 and a half anymore. It's hard to know my own limits. Just last night I was at the zoo dressed as a tiger and growling at everybody. It was a gas! Me and the gang tromped around getting strange people to stuff goodies in our bags. It was like taking candy from a baby...well, a really large baby dressed up as one of the KISS members. I'm really not sure what that even is. But after that we met back at the shack and divided up the loot. It was one of my best nights yet. Then we were only allowed to devour a few items and store the rest... OUT OF MY REACH!! But you have to realize that at this age, I just don't see 9:30 pm very often anymore. I need to start taking it easy. Naps are getting longer, I eat more than I ever have. I think I even forgot to shave this week. I've really let myself go. Put on a couple pounds or so. You see, a lot changes when you aren't the baby of the family anymore, you gotta start taking responsibility for yourself. At least that's what Uncle Dave tells me. I tell myself it'll get better, yeah I'll start doing things different... but not yet. As long as I've got gas in my tank... or... well you know what I mean. Okay, coffee's on. I'll see you later.

More Halong Bay

Inside a dragon fruit.

This is a dragon fruit. Inside it looks like a white kiwi, but tastes pretty bland. Mike bought this one from a lady's small fruit boat that pulled up to our junk.

From the front of the boat.


We sailed down between the 2 outcroppings of rock to get to the cave.

Halong Bay Pics

This was our boat.

Exploring the cave. It was really large.

Taken at the cave with some of Halong Bay in the background.

This was our lunch on the boat. It was good, but neither Shae nor Leanne were crazy about the shrimp and fish being totally intact.


This is the main level of the boat we chartered.

Haven piloting the boat.

October 26, 2008

Today we went to the Green Tangerine a great Restaurant in a restored French colonial in the Old Quarter. We were supposed to pick up my Ao Dai, but it wasn't done yet. We did go to the Water Puppets this afternoon. It's a Hanoi tradition. The baby girls slept through most of it. We've got video tape for when Haven's older though.

Here's some pictures of yesterday. We had a 14 passenger van, a guide, driver, and the whole boat for just us and our friends all for only $75 a piece for the adults. Pretty sweet deal.

October 24

This is the restaurant where we had lunch today out under an umbrella.

Yesterday we got around the Old Quarter by Cyclo or bicycle cab.

It's amazing what they can carry on a bike or motor bike.

One of Hanoi's finer restaurants or "sidewalk cafes"

Ready to take on the world or just Hanoi.


Hi dear friends and family,

We've really been appreciating all of your comments and reading them so keep 'em coming.

Haven seems to be doing better on the new formula so we've held off going to the doctor for now. She spit up her whole first bottle of it, but at least it was just liquid still. Since then she's been doing much better so PTL! Thanks for all the prayers on that. We'd appreciate continued prayers for her to keep feeling better.

Today, we cooked our own breakfast and made use of having a kitchen. We have a small store just downstairs so that's handy. Then we headed off to the Old Quarter again. I was measured for an Ao Dai and should be able to pick it up in a day or 2. Then we did do some more shopping much to Mike's dismay. He says it feels pretty bad to leave with 2 million (dong) in your pocket and come home with only a few hundred (almost 17,000 dong=$1).

We had lunch at a nice restaurant on Hoan Kiem Lake, cheap too called the Little Kitchen. Then we all headed back since our friends had their medical appointment for their little girl this afternoon. Tonight we're going to check out the Big C across town, for diapers and formula, which is Vietnam's version of a Super Walmart.

Tomorrow we plan on doing a day trip to Halong Bay a geological wonder of giant rock outcroppings sticking up out of the bay. It takes 3 1/2 hours to get there so we're hoping the babies do okay. It will be a really long day for them. Halong Bay is on the must see list for Vietnam and some want it to be on the New Wonders of the World List so hopefully we'll enjoy our trip.

Currently all of our official appointments are scheduled for next Wednesday and Thursday. So hopefully we'll have Haven's visa in hand by Thursday night and have no problems with making our current flight schedule.