Oh Christmas.

Well, Christmas has come and gone. It was quite an experience here in China. Michael and I were invited to Christmas parties that our students were throwing. We thought it was all one big party but turns out we were invited to 8 parties, all at 6PM Thursday and we had already promised to attend them all. Thankfully, they were all on the same floor of the same building - so we got to make an appearance at all of them. Many of my sweet students gave me gifts. I must say that my favorite was a set (his&hers) of cell phone holders. They are plush heads (one male one female) with a slit in the top of the head for your cell phone. Genius. We use them every night.

Also, our school administration invited us to a "party." When we arrived we found that it was a large student production in an auditorium. I was a little peeved at having to sit and wait for 2 hours for the thing to start but found it to be well worth it. I can only compare it to a bad high school talent show. I have included a video of my favorite act below.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lgdzdqfij10

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and a very happy New Year!!

A Changed Perspective

Several things have happened over the past couple of days that have changed my perspective on life. I thought about blogging about them. Telling you how I feel my life has changed by what I have seen and heard. But that's not really what I want to do. I don't want you to see how my life has changed; I want YOUR life to change. So instead of reading my blog today, I want you to read something else. At first glance, you may think it is a little long. But keep reading. I promise you won't regret it. Let the Father speak to you today. Are you listening to Him? Are you fulfilling His purpose for you?

kissesfromkatie.blogspot.com

PS - this will also explain the new button (Amazima) that I have added to the page.

Finally Settling In

After being in China for over 3 months, I finally feel like I'm starting to settle in. I have been getting to know my students better and really enjoy being with them. And now that I'm not as homesick as before, I have been able to start having some fun. Here's a glimpse of the last couple of weeks:

I thought I would be excited when No-Shave November ended, but little did I know...

These Boys are crazy.

I was getting down about not being home for Christmas, so Michael and I went on a hunt for Christmas decorations. They are few and far between here in Hangzhou, but we did manage to find a few things. Just imagine buying all of your decorations from the Dollar store and you'll get a pretty good picture of our selection. However, we had a good time and have added a little Christmas cheer to our apartment.

It's about a foot tall and took all of about 5 minutes to decorate. Hey, I'm just excited we have a tree! It'll be our very own Charlie Brown Christmas.

Last weekend we went on a short overnight trip to Shanghai. We're only about an hour and a half away. We thought it was neat to be able to say that we were going to Shanghai for the weekend! We've got some friends that live there. So, we visited with them some. We also got to go to a real mall and got to eat at a hamburger & milkshake joint. On Sunday, we met with some Chinese family there and had a wonderful time! It was a great weekend!

The Pearl Tower

The one in the middle is the building Tom Cruise jumps on in Mission Impossible 3.

Our dinner in Shanghai. Curly fries and sweet tea!!!

One of the attendees at our Sunday morning meeting. I hope to have a baby girl that looks just like this one day!!

A Chinese Thanksgiving

Here's a little glimpse of the "Family" Thanksgiving we had here in China:

The boys' kitchen

The women's kitchen :)

the turkey

The rest of the spread

Loading our plates!

We were so blessed to have a wonderful Thanksgiving. Even though we are far away from our blood family we were still able to enjoy this tradition - even without an oven! This was also a great reminder that the Big Man Upstairs is taking care of us constantly!