things I've learned...well knew but needed reminding of.

so I've learned a few new things so far this weekend...and past week as well I guess.

1) just when you think you've remembered everything...there's always something you surely forgot.
2) co-workers and customers really do get freaked out when you tell them you're going to be away for awhile.
3) it's easy to spend alot of money
4) you might think you're ready...but you never are.

okay, so alot of this I already knew...but it always helps to have it re-inforced. LOL

we went out Saturday during the morning and before the Ohio State/Michigan game (which OSU WON!!!! woohoo!) and got some things that we felt we needed to have for when we got home with Autumn...and of course some things that we need to have with us on the trip over to get her. later in the evening, after we had been in Autumn's room, the bathroom, the family room, and kitchen putting things away, G and I looked at each other and said..."we're as ready as we're going to be for the moment." Obviously there's still things we need to do and schedule and make sure is done before we travel, but we feel like we've gotten as prepared as we can be as first time parents. and I feel good about that.

another thing I learned today was that Autumn's given name Chun is not pronounced "choon" as I was led to believe by one of the pinyin pronounciation guides. Nope...after listening to one of my Chinesepod.com lessons again I got the real pronounciation. well, at least the standard Mandarin version. The Chinesepod.com broadcasts are out of Shanghai. The chinese girl doing the lesson pronounced chun juan (which with the proper tones means "spring roll") as "chuwen juahn". actually the 'chuwen' actually sounded more like 'chwen' but you could hear just a bit of an 'oo' right before the 'wen'. One of the families in our travel group says according to a 'mate' from Chongqing, Chun is pronounced as 'chuwahn'. Knowing that the dialect of Mandarin in the Sichuan/CQ area is alittle different than Standard Mandarin, I would believe that. well and the guy IS from Chongqing. LOL so our little Autumn's name ChunLan now actually sounds much more lovely than "choonlan". ha! :)

and finally for this post at least, another thing I learned..um er..had re-inforced: timing is everything. we were at BabiesRUs talking about whether or not we needed to buy a toothbrush and toothpaste for Autumn. As I was telling G about how I read in this book that toddlers start cutting their molars at around 16 months, a woman came by the aisle pushing her little girl in a stroller. She asked me 'they start cutting them around 16months?' and I replied. "yeah, that's what I had read." Come to find out, her daughter was 15months old and she had been really drooling and getting alittle fussy and the mom had been trying to pin down why. She suspected it had something to do with her teething. Anyways, we told her about Autumn and that she'd be going on 16months when we bring her home. Turns out Autumn's 8 days older than this woman's girl so we ended up asking her some things and kind of took notice of how big this girl was (obviously Autumn will be a little smaller) and her demeanour. It really was very helpful overall. And in the end the very nice woman/mom suggested we get a toothbrush/toothpaste which we started off figuring we didn't need to.

It definitely helps talking with people who are either going through or have done this parenting thing when you haven't yet. :)