Quinn:

First of all, Quinn, the beautiful little baby girl I introduced you to a few weeks ago is in the hospital. Here is the post her mom posted updating every one. Please send them all your love and prayers right now.

Thank you:

Also, thank you all so, so much for voting for us for the travel blog award. The voting is over now, so I just went over there to check the comments and my heart grew 3 sizes. It was so touching to read the notes you had about us, thank you for the support.

Shannon:

And Shannon, Wylder’s mama (another NPA baby) is up for a very special MASK award. It will give her the opportunity to share Wylder’s message of hope for cures of rare diseases, and the amazing children’s book she published to share that message. You can help her win the honor by voting here. It only takes 10 seconds, you just enter in your name and email and you are done:) Thank you so much!

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the market

Every Monday and Friday night there is an amazing night market by our house. I wrote about it a couple months ago here.

trying a grasshopper, my first insect to ingest. I have ingested a goldfish, but that is for another day.

It is so fun, so every Monday and Friday night we walk over there. Lately though we have been kind of getting a little grossed out. It’s not the most sanitary place, after weeks of going we have seen way too many people wipe their nose and noticed that the food has been out in the sun way past the danger zone. Plus, one of the main reasons that we go is for the boys to play in the super cool jumpy castle. But every single time they get totally beat up. It’s usually not on purpose, but they are really popular being the only white kids, so they get chased around and roughed up in the process, especially by the older kids. So Jarrett was about to pull the plug on the whole thing, until one day we went over there in the afternoon.

The sun was still out and bright, and booths were still getting set up. It was so peaceful and clean. The food was still hot or being cooked right in front of us, and there were not that many people. And to top it all off, the jumpy castle was full of preschoolers since the older children were not out of school yet. The boys had so much fun getting to play in peace. They still got chased by a few of the little kids, but no pain was involved.

 Normally the walkway in the middle is packed and we have to push our way through

vendors getting set up

my favorite egg rolls. I get them every time, they are 3 for a $1

I think that if you have been reading here for very long, you have figured out that I am a Coca-Cola addict (I was going to put Coke addict, but I did not want to confuse you). I know about the nutrition facts, shame, shame on me, but seriously I don’t care, it is a highlight of my life. So that being said, I start off every market night at this lady’s drink cart. She would not let me take her picture, which is sad because she is really cute. But anyways, she opens up a glass bottled Coca-Cola and then pours it into a ginormous plastic cup full of ice, a lid and then a colorful straw. Thais love straws and you get one with every drink, even a bottle of water. Delicious and nutricious (for my soul).

here is a picture of me and the delicious Coke from another night:)

We always head straight to the jumpy castle. It costs 75 cents for 1 hour.

Jarrett and I take turns watching the boys while the other one walks around and gets food. Oh look you can see my coke in this picture too! hehe. Jarrett has one too, but he gets his from across the street from 7-11 before we walk in, he prefers the fountain ones. See, we have this Coca-Cola addiction down to a science.

and the boys are off

There are so many cheap clothing options, and there is some really good stuff in there

the clothes booths were the last ones to get set up

Conner’s favorite booth-the fried chicken lady

I asked her if I could take her picture and she said yes. This cute old lady was so funny and trying to make sure she was in the picture too:)

Peyton’s favorite meal. $2 for a whole fried fish

the first time we got it, we were a little confused how to eat it. Now he just jumps right in and picks every bit of meat off of the bones. (he does not eat the brains, as he calls it)

the corn guy

he has an easy way he salts the corn, he dips it in a bowl of salt water before he wraps it up for you, the boys love these corn on the cobs

at every Thai market we have been to there is always a sushi stand. Even though we love sushi we never get it because it is warm from being out in the sun, and we like our sushi cold.

sometimes I get fruit here, but I mainly get it from the men that bicycle around with a fruit cart

this super sweet lady makes homemade rice cakes. They are AMAZING, after she fries them up she drizzles caramel on top. i always laugh because there are dead bees all mixed in the caramel sauce.

If you are friends with me on facebook (which if you are not, then you are welcome to friend me if you want to:), then you might have seen that I had some delicious insect snacks at the market. I have been seeing these fried crickets, grasshoppers, worms, caterpillars for a while now, and knew that one day I would try them, and that was the day.

I was just going to go with the grasshoppers since they looked the most appetizing, but the nice man insisted I try them all.

the worms/caterpillars (?) above he told me live in bamboo, they were pretty gross

these fat worms/grubs were just nasty with too much mooshy stuff inside

the grasshoppers were ok. If I am surviving in the wilderness they are the first insect I am hunting. They were cooked and crunchy and he sprayed soy sauce on them which really helped.

proof I ate that bad boy

Jarrett actually liked them and was snacking on them like they were chips!

all the while as I am shopping and eating eggrolls and grasshoppers, the boys are still happily jumping

Peyton the blur jumping to the bottom of the slide

Conner thinking about trying the grasshopper

Peyton totally went for it

not a good look, he was gagging

Dad, you are so wrong, these are not good

my favorite dinner after my snack of eggrolls:)

These greens are fried together, it kind of tastes like fried okra, and it comes with a seafood mixture of shrimp and squid mixed in some kind of yummy sauce in a separate bag. The seafood mix tastes like a seafood ceviche. I take it home and put the cold soup in a bowl, and the fried greens on top. This is sounding really gross as I write this-hehe, I have been here too long, I think I need a hamburger.

When we got home late that evening, everyone went inside, and as I passed the tree outside our house I saw this butterfly. Anything like this makes me think of Trek and it made me smile. It let me get right up to it and take a picture.

I loved the market during the day because they all had cloth up flowing in the wind to block out the sun. It was a fun reminder of the culture that surrounds us every day here in Thailand.