Merry Christmas!!

Merry Christmas!!

Cookies for Santa

We don't make a big deal about Santa at our hosue, but we usually leave cookies. Because he definitely needs a snack after putting all the toys together.

The boys wrote the sweetest notes this year.

Reid made sure to include that he knows that Christmas is really about Jesus--love it!!

Here are the cookies with the notes (notice the forementioned pink and purple sprinkles--Santa didn't seem to mind)

Here is E's note. Kind of hard to read but he wanted to make sure that Santa got home safely and his sleigh didn't crash.

The key we left on the outside of our door so that Santa could get in. We live in an apartment with no chimmney. It is a special key that only Santa can use.

It was a wonderful Christmas Eve!!

Christmas Eve Nativity play

On Christmas Eve the Todds had a really fun party with lots of YUMMY food and the kids put on a sweet little play.

Everett was Joseph alongside Kate as Mary.



And here is our super happy innkeeper.

Joseph hanging out while baby Jesus sleeps. This was right before Rylie (who didn't make the audition cuts this year--mostly because of age) ran up yelling "my baby Jesus" and tried to take him from the basket.



These are the three wise(wo)men. There is a shortage of boys around here and you have to work with what you got people. But aren't they so cute??

Making Cookies

Here is a picture of Rylie helping me make cookies. Our Christmas cookies were decorated with pink and purple Barbie sprinkles that someone left here. Christmas sprinkes are on the list to bring back next year!
But they still tasted yummy!

Christmas Lights

On Friday night before Christmas we piled in our friends minivan (there were 4 adults and 7 children) and drove around looking for Christmas lights. Notice I said "for" not "at". Living in a country that does not celebrate Christmas, makes for very few Christmas lights.

Our first stop was a hotel that had some lights outside and a big Christmas tree inside. We got out, let the kids run around like crazy look at the lights and took some pictures. We then all piled back in the van and set off. After a bit of traffic the littles got hungry so we decided to head to Tony Romas (YUMMO) for a special dinner.

After dinner we walked out the back door into a Christmas Parade! It was so fun!

There was fake snow, people dressed up as presents, trees, cows, and santa handing out candy canes (which we can't buy here, so our kids were stocking up!). What? Your Christmas parade didn't have cows? That's weird.

They had a winter wonderland set-up and the kids loved it! They had a stage where the kids watched a magic show, and then a lady wearing a mrs.clause outfit that could have had more material walked up on stage. with a chair.  then the music started. and then they dancing started. mrs. clause and the chair. we were scrambling to pull the kids away from the front row seat they had for the magic show. After several--"what is she doing?" and "why is she dancing like that?" comments, we quickly distracted the kids with more candy canes. And thankfully, it hasn't been brought up again! Things here are always full of surprises!!

It was such a fun night and the kids asked if we could do it every year!!!

School Christmas Parties

The boys both had Christmas parties in their classrooms this year and I was able to go and help with both!

It was fun to get to be at school with them and meet their friends. I don't get to go out there very much, as it is about a 35 minute cab ride.



                                   

 Here is Everett with his classmates Aiyaka and Gracelynn



In each class we did a craft (made an ornament) and made a sweet treat to eat. Here is E with his Christmas tree cupcake.

Everett and Shawn, the boy he sits next to at school.



This is Reid's best friend at school Canyon.



Reid with his snowman cupcake

Reid and Mommy rocking her sequin red reindeer antlers.......the teacher made me wear them :)



Littles Christmas Party

Rylie, Abby, and Laura Cate

Shannon had such a fun Christmas Party for the littles in our neighborhood! They made a sweet craft--

Here is Rylie working on her craft. We traced their hands and feet and then put them together to make a sweet angel ornament for the tree. And then they decorated them with glitter glue.

They then had some yummy hot chocolate with marshmellows!



Can you tell Rylie enjoyed it??

Rylie and Laura Cate

Happy 35th!!

 Last week Matt turned 35!! Closer to 40 than 30 now :)

We had a fun day celebrating! He went to class in the morning--where he didn't tell them it was his birthday--BOO!! and then we went to a fun family dinner!
One of Matt's favorite foods is pizza, so we headed down to Pizza Hut! We hadn't eaten there yet, and all were excited.

 

Here we are waiting for the bus to go to dinner.

Not sure what Rylie is doing.....

 

Daddy and his girl

  

at Pizza Hut waiting for pizza....again, not sure about Ry.....

 

After dinner we headed home to do cake and presents. The kids had worked all afternoon on their cards and they were so excited to give them to him! While we were gone, a friend brought Matt's big, heavy gift to the house, so it would be waiting when we got here! Here are the kids leading him down to his present!

(rylie is looking and smiling, but there is a toilet in the background...can't win them all)

Here are the kids with Matt and his cake. His homemade chocolate cake with homemade caramel icing. and i know i made it, but I still mourned the washing of the empty cake plate. we had some good, yummy times. sweets are a rarity over here.

There is no picture of the present, but he got an ice maker! He was very excited and the whole family has been enjoying icy drinks!!

I loved celebrating the wonderful man that God has given me! He is an amazing husband, dad, leader, and friend, and I am so thankful that I get to do life with him!

Happy Birthday Matt!!!

Turkey Bowl

There is a super-fun tradition here called the Turkey Bowl. They have been doing it since we were here years ago, and it is so much fun. 

The Saturday after Thanksgiving people from all over our region come to our city to play a little game of football. They usually play SEC vs ACC (with some borrowed people filling in).  Everyone goes out and either plays or cheers the players on....or chases children around. I only have a couple pictures, because I was in the latter group. But it was fun anyway :) 

here they are in action.....matt is in the royal blue shirt

and here is the whole group after the game.

and yes, this is what our city looks like most of the time.

Rylie insisted on wearing her brothers thug hat with the bow sticking out......and it wasn't even really cold.

The kids had a GREAT time running around and playing with each other. 

And the football game was a tie if you were wondering. kind of lame I think :)

Thankful Tree

This is a picture of our Thankful Tree this year. I FINALLY finished it about a week before Thanksgiving---better late than never I suppose!

But it was a fun project! I went to the fabric market with my new, fun crafting buddy Lori! I am so thankful she is here! We got the fabric and cut it to size, and then did a little sewing (on her machine---oh how I miss mine!) and a little painting, and volia!

Ok--well, we cut a lot some leaves too!

But we really enjoyed having the tree this year. Everyday the kids got to write on one (or 3 if you are trying to fill the tree fast) leaves what they are thankful for. They got to pick their leaf from the ones at the bottom and then put it on the tree when they were finished writing.  It was neat to see what each of the kids said...here are a couple....

ry--"that God made me" "my new friends"

everett--"the world", "God"

reid--"clean water", "Jesus"

and in honor of full disclosure they were also thankful for their DS, food, clothes,candy, and toys, least you think I have totally grounded kids :)

So glad we made this and can't wait to use it for years to come!

Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving last week, even though we missed our family and friends at home a lot! We started the morning out skyping with some of our family/cooking the dishes we were bringing to our meal at noon. We went to our sweet friends house for lunch. The Todd's were so gracious to open their home to 9 adults and 13 kids---wowsers! But we all had a wonderful time and enjoyed good food and wonderful fellowship! I didn't get a lot of pics from the day but here are a couple.

Sweet Ry with her turkey dress and big smile. Clearly we had already eaten---stains all over her dress. that girl is a mess!

 

Rylie and Mommy 

Reid and his fun Indian feather hat from school

And this is what the kids did ALL day! Which is why I don't have any pictures of the boys---they couldn't be distracted from their games for pictures!

These are the big set of kids......

They played Monopoly, Bang, Jenga, and played outside.

The littles took out a lot of games............and enjoyed the pieces :)

We had a great day and are so thankful for friends who become family when you are so far away!

Chinese Wedding

A couple of weekends ago,we got to attend the wedding of a dear friend from college and our time here before. She got married in our city to a guy that she met over here. 

It was my first Chinese wedding and it was SO much fun!

This is Becca and Justin. As you can see she wore a traditional American dress, but the rest of the wedding was pretty traditional Chinese. The whole ceremony was in Chinese (Justin doesn't speak English), and I could actually understand more than I thought I would.

They did a sweet serving of the tea, where the bride served tea to the grooms parents and the groom served tea to the brides parents.

During the ceremony we all sat at tables in a ballroom and then when it was over, we stayed at the table for the reception.

And then came the food......

I was pretty excited about the dish on the left above--pesto pasta maybe? one of my favorites!

oh no. chicken feet in some sort of not pesto green sauce.

And the soup--meatball minestrone maybe? nikki--you know what I'm talking about! 

oh no. that's a turtle. a whole turtle.  

And because the chinese aren't big sweets eaters, they brought one piece of cake for the whole table to share. What? We asked for another one. Several times.

 Here is a pic of us after the wedding. We had such a wonderful time celebrating Becca and Justin. And it was so great to be out with some other couples without kids!

Thanks for letting us be a part of your special day Becca!

Lost Tooth

This happy boy has lost another tooth!! 

And he is also happy to report that the Tooth Fairy got word of our move and found him here!

Fall Fair

 This past weekend we went to the Fall Fair at the boys school. It was their first year putting it on and they did a fantastic job!

Here are Madison, Hailey, Reid, and Everett riding on the hayride. It was basically a motorcycle with a truck bed. They rode it around the track at the school. We don't have very many hayfields here, so you have to take what you can get :) 

But the kids really enjoyed it!

They had lots of fun games with fun prizes and the boys enjoyed them all!

They had a "jail" where you could pay 10 kuai to put a friend in jail. They could then either pay 15 kuai to not go,or stay in for 5 minutes. E got put in 3 times by his new friends at school, and although he acted like he didn't like it, I know he was secretly loving it :) He did decide to become a sheriff to help put people in jail, and it kept him safe from going back in!

(by the way--this was a great way for the school to make money! it cost them nothing and once it caught on, it was FULL!)

They also had a game where you raced to see who could eat a doughnut the fastest without your hands. Doughnuts are a rare treat over here, so E was super excited to play this game. And this picture was taken by his mean mom who was laughing, i mean encouraging him, as he played. E has no front teeth and is missing one on the bottom. He really didn't stand a chance :)

He did finish the doughnut, but did not win the race!

Overall the Fall Fair was really fun!! It was great to meet some of their classmates and see the kids interact with their friends.

Football in the Fall

We LOVE football. Watching it on TV, listening to shows with people talking about the games, and especially going to games. A little glimpse of heaven is a football Saturday in Athens, end of October/beginning of November.....ah, I can feel the crisp air, see all the red and black, taste the yummy tailgate food........

Well, we didn't get to the "perfect" game, but we were SO thankful to go to a game before we flew around the world. We went to the Georgia/South Carolina game in September, and although I would have liked a better outcome, the day was wonderful!

Aunt Andi and Uncle Scotty joined us, and Reid decided he wanted to play at Nai Nai's house with Rylie, as long as we promised to bring him some cotton candy :)

So, being half-way around the world during one of our favorite seasons has been a bit tough, but thanks to our dear friends Alan and Shannon, we have gotten to watch several games!! We have to be careful not to see scores and then we watch them on our Sunday afternoons.  It is such a fun time of fellowship with friends and fun football!!

Here are all the kids---our three and two of Alan and Shannon's--Cameron and Laura Cate

And here are the boys sporting their jerseys. As you can see this was from the game on Saturday against Auburn. Alan is an Auburn fan and his little boy Cameron has his AU jersey on and they were both good sports about the game, despite the outcome :)

Here are our little Bulldogs! We had such a fun time watching the game with good friends!