It's Gray Outside

and so is my heart. Jackie, my best friend for the past 8 years moved away this morning! By away, I mean as far as one can, to the other side of this planet! I knew her plan for a while, but still kind of in shock when it's actually happening. We went to the same school, worked at the same place (not the same department), had our first babies around the same time, had lunches together all the time, countless playdates, and her boy was little caterpillar's first kiss! We still remember that was at Chinese New Year time, big ZZ was 10 month old, little caterpillar was only 5 month. He surprised us by pulling little caterpillar closer on both arms, and kissed and licked her face for more than 5 minutes! We couldn't stop laughing. It was the funniest and most innocent thing we ever seen. Yesterday, they kissed again! Nice loud kiss, right on the mouth! How cute!! Too bad, her little boyfriend is moving away, and they probably won't see each other for a very long time.

Jackie sold most of her stuffs on craigslist. But saved some stuffs she thought I might need, like a lovely toddler bed. Since little caterpillar is almost too tall for her crib, we have been thinking about moving her to a big girl bed. This is perfect timing. And it's white! Little caterpillar loves it too! I was disassembling it in their living room last night, she just climbed right in and sat in it. And when we got home, she jumped on the mattress right after I put it on our living room floor. She laid face down, kept saying she was going to bed, and even pretended to snore. I played this game with her before, but never thought she could remember it. She got more than that to remember about big ZZ. Jackie also gave me lots of big ZZ's books and toys, highchair, and even a pair of house shoes (brand new).

But last night was not all smooth. Before we took them to dinner, we move the toddler bed into the living room, so we will have more room to disassemble it later. Jackie's dad left the mattress right in the foyer. Guess when we closed the door, somehow the mattress got shaked and fell right there, blocking the front door. So, when we came back from the restaurant, we couldn't open the door. All the windows were locked, the back door was locked and chained! There we were 8 adults (us, Jackie's family, and two young people from craigslist there for pick up) and 3 babies, one is less than 3 month old, crying for milk. We were desperate. We didn't have any tools either, after some forcing, we realized bottom of the mattress (some strong framing material) is locked underneath the door, and the corner of it is jammed against the other door frame! I tried to use a branch to push the mattress to turn a little bit, but unseccessful. Only left a hole right on the side of it. Then Jackie remembered they have a small window shield scraper might be thin enough to get in there. Both of our husbands tried with no success. Then out of desperation, I tried again, and with some wiggling and twisting and lifting, miraculously I got the mattress to move and finally opened the front door! Whew! Cannot imagine what we have to do if we couldn't get the foor to open, all their stuffs are inside, and they supposed to leave for the airport early next morning. Thank goodness we did it! I joked that their trip will be nice and smooth because of this, all the bad luck happened before they even left the house.

They are on the plane right now, on their way to Beijing, their new home for the next few years. I really wish them all the luck, from the bottom of my heart. Thank you Jackie for your friendship for all these years! We are really going to miss you and your cute cute boys!