Horizon Park

Acacia and Anna running through a hedge maze at Horizon Park. This place is a nice tranquil respite from the city of Chiang Mai. The park is filled with beautifully sculpted bushes and trees. Gardens, animals, waterfalls and a small manmade lake are all surround by tree lined shady paths. We've only come here 3 times so far, but I think we should make it a regular thing. You can rent bikes and leisurely ride all around the park.

This is the lake with dolphin sculpted trees. They also have paddle boats to rent and putt around the lake. We didn't do that on this outing, maybe next time.

I think the sign says it all! Acacia and Anna's combined age is 12, so I think they will be ok

Anna showing her prowess as a monkey bar specialist. You go honey! You've got mad skills sweetie!

Acacia showing off her monkey skills. She was able to traverse these bars several times without seeming to tire.

Where do they get all their energy?


Back and forth, back and forth. I was getting tired just watching them. Acacia kept egging me on to do it too.



I couldn't even make it all the way to the end. I told Acacia you try lugging around 190 lbs and see if you can do it! She didn't seem too impressed.



One of the many sculpted garden areas. This one was sporting a dragon. Cool huh!
They even have camels and deer on the other side of the park. The girls love going over there to feed them.




We all worked ourselves into a frenzy and then finally had to break for lunch. This is a silhouette shot of Mommy and Anna enjoying the scenery while eating lunch.

I slowed down the shutter speed to get that blurred effect in the waterfall.

Acacia riding her bike on her way to the playground area.

Anna coming back from the snack shop with Mommy and our visitors from the States. The Wallihans joined us over the Christmas holiday season.

Mommy riding a rental bike. Show em how it's done honey! We love coming here and the kids can't get enough of it.

History in the making!!!!!

I came so close to calling in hopeful this morning to work. I had a serious case of Obama fever. My symptoms were uncontrolled giddiness, uncharacteristic hopefulness. I also had reduced amount of saracsm. What is going on with me? Maybe it is also because I was up so late watching history unfold before my eyes. The Presidential Inaugural speech did not start until midnight here in Thailand. But, that didn't stop anyone from celebrating. This is a picture of my friend Greg sporting an Obama tee shirt written in Thai. We had a gathering at the U.N. Irish pub in the heart of downtown Chiang Mai.
Greg his wife Liz and I showed up early to get a good location. Today was also Liz's birthday. What a memorable birthday for her.
Liz intently watching CNN among the expats of Chiang Mai.

That is me giving a thumbs up to my peeps.

Anytime Obama was shown on TV the crowd would erupt in cheers. I felt like I was watching the superbowl.

This is the moment when Barak Obama took the oath of office. We were all like a bunch of giddy school girls. What a memorable night. Some of my friends were crying and we were all hugging. I will never forget it.

It really felt good to be an American again!

New Years 2009 with friends

The night started out with a friendly game of "Texas Hold em" with our good friends the Wallihans and Matt and Melody. The Wallihans are visiting us from America. Matt and Melody are teachers at Acacia's school. No money was involved so there was no breaking of legs or anything. We purchased this game quite some time ago for the outrageous amount of $1 and this was the first time we played it. It was a lot of fun.

We accidentally set the clock ahead to convince the little ones that it was already midnight. They were completely fooled and were bamboozled into giving each other a hug and then departing for their rooms for a night of slumber. Man, they are so gullable.


Here it is hugfest 2009!!!! Acacia, Anna, Jessica and Jacob you ROCK!

However, prior to all this time deception was the fireworks display. We lit this paper air lantern and watched it float up in the night sky.


The kids holding the lantern while it fills up with hot air. They are very excited to see it float away. It also can get a little hot holding it that is why they are kind of turning away.


We hired a pyrotechnics expert to launch all our fireworks, oh wait just a second, that is Shelly. Be careful Shelly!!! That stuff is hot!

Annapurna showing off her sparkler. Happy New Year sweetie!

More pyrotechnic wizardry in action. You can't see it, but there were lots of ooohhhs and aaahhhhs. Still shots just can't capture that.

Brett Wallihan helping the little ones to light their sparklers. After they were lit they ran around the street waving their sparkler all around. It brings back memories when I was a little kid during the New Year. I loved running around the streets with a piece of metal on fire.

Acacia striking a New Years pose. You look beautiful honey. Happy New Year to everyone. Thank you Wallihans for coming to visit us and help us ring in the new year. Thanks Matt and Melody for joining us to celebrate 2009.
Best wishes to everyone in 2009 Love the Faucett family

A little Christmas cheer

Merry "shiner" Christmas !!! Now if she only had a few teeth knocked out too. I think it would tie the whole ensemble together. This is the gift that just keeps giving. This is what happens when you try to play soccer with the big boys. Poor Acacia has had two black eyes since coming to Thailand.


This was the day after Thanksgiving. We wanted to get in the Christmas spirit early this year. There are not that many reminders that it is Christmas around here. I don't think there is any snow in the forecast either.

Daddy's attempt to get a family Christmas picture. We tried to hold two of the cats on our laps, but they kept fighting so we opted for Tiger Lily.

Two of Santa's helpers showing off their nutcracker moves.

Ok, I lied about the snow forecast. We were able to take advantage of this small snow storm and plastered it against our sliding glass doors. I think the girls did a commendable job of making it look Christmassy.

Acacia showing off her favorite Christmas present the siamese webkins kitty on the right. She got her first webkins which she is carrying in her right hand from her good friend Brooklyn. Acacia loves her webkins more than anything in the world. In fact she has to go to a webkins anonymous meeting soon for her addiction. Thanks Karen!!

Shelly is supervising the girls with cracking their walnuts and almonds that they found in their stockings. The girls middle names are Fearless and Danger and they are interchangable for both girls. Hence the need for close supervision!

This is Christmas Eve night with all the Christmas lights on in the house. Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.

Acacia making the black eye look vogue. Christmas style

Acacia and her friend Yurina at her school Christmas program.

Acacia and her class playing Christmas songs on the recorder. They did a great job.
Proud of you honey!

Anna at her school Christmas program sporting the traditional Christmas grass skirt. I think Anna is going to be in the theater someday. She loves being on stage. You go girl!!

Merry Christmas everybody!!!!!
Love Brett, Shelly, Acacia and Annapurna

Magha Puja Day

Magha puja day is considered one of the most important Buddhist celebrations. It refers to the worship that takes place on the full moon of the third lunar month (about the last week of February or early March) to commemorate the day on which Lord Buddha recited the "Ovadha Patimokkha" (the Fundamental Teaching) to his disciples.

This day marks the great four events that took place during Lord Buddha's lifetime, namely;



The time of the full moon in the third lunar month,

1,250 Buddhist monks from differents places came to pay homage to the Lord Buddha at Veluwan Temple in Rajgaha City of Magaha State, without any appointment,

all of them were Arahants (enlightened monks) who had attained the Apinyas (Six Higher Knowledges),

all of them had been individually ordained by Lord Buddha himself (Ehi Bhikkhu).

Later, the Magha Puja ceremony was widely accepted and performed throughout the country.

The evening of that day, Lord Buddha gave the assembly a discourse "Ovadha Patimokkha",laying down the principles of His Teachings to be followed by all Buddhists, summarized into three acts, i.e. to do good, to abstain from bad action and to purify the mind.

Magha Puja Day was never celebrated in Thai kingdom. King Chulalongkorn (Rama V) explained that "..the Magha Puja was never performed, the ceremony has just been practised during the reign of King Mongkrut (Rama IV) of the Chakri Dynasty". Having realized the importance of this day, King Rama IV ordered the royal Magha Puja Ceremony to be performed in the Emerald Buddha Temple in 1851 and to celebrate it yearly.

Later the ceremony was widely accepted and performed throughout the kingdom. It was declared to be a public holiday back then so everybody could go to the temple to merit and perform other religious activities in the morning and to take part in the candlelit procession or"Wien Tien" in the evening.






I set my alarm for 5am to drive out to witness this spectacular site of Buddhism. There were actually about 10,000+ Buddhist monks participating in this yearly ceremony. The first picture on this post was taken at 5:30am


I've never seen so many saffron robes in my life. It was amazing how quiet this place was despite the enormous amount of people here.


These are alms bowls that the Buddhist monks fill daily with food solely from the generosity of the Thai people. The Thai people in turn gain merit by giving food to the monks.



People came out in throngs, some of the little ones were a little tired but awfully cute!


The Thai people praying and paying their respects during the ceremony. The monks recited a chant for about 20 minutes and then they formed long lines to receive food from the observers



It was an incredible site to see so many people fill the streets.

I liked this shot for its surreal ghost like appearance. These two shots were taken earlier in the morning. Everywhere I looked I kept seeing monks coming from the side streets to take their place. It felt like they were never going to stop coming.

It was interesting to see the wide age ranges of the monks. Some of the monks looked like they were around 8 or 9 years old and some were obviously pretty old.



There was a stage set up in the middle of the street with monks sitting in chairs on each side of the stage. 5,000+ on one side and another 5,000+ monks on the other. They had 4 senior monks on stage performing the ceremony

This is my good friend Rachel who lives on this street and was not originally intending to watch this ceremony, but she had no choice because the whole street was blocked off and she couldn't really go anywhere. She lives on the 2nd floor of this building and I wanted to get some overhead shots. I asked if I could go up to her apartment to get some good shots. We were standing next to her landlord who has an apartment on the 6th floor and he offered his place to take pictures. What a great guy!


This picture is looking in the other direction. All that orange is the thousands of monks. AMAZING!!!!


This is the last shot I took before leaving. I had to go because I am the under 11 year old girls basketball coach and we had a practice that morning.

I'm so glad that I had the opportunity to witness such a spectacular display of the Buddhist religion in action. Something I would never see in America.