Once they found the fuse, they lit this thing and almost didn't run fast enough. It was just a big fire cracker that explodes all of the different shells almost at once. For 2 dollars I guess you gotta try it at least once. 

Fountains of youth. 

Here we are watching our home fire works show. I took this in the dark... the only reason you can see anything is because of the flash. 

You know how excited a kid is when he gets the bike he has always wanted...or that star wars action figure... that is James and fire works. 

Marlo's camera that she received for Christmas has given her a reason to want to go adventuring with us. Teac and Zoe stayed in the car asleep, but Marlo wanted to climb the stairs and get the "perfect shot". 

Old 

This is the entrance to a place where Buddah statues were carved into the mountain about 1000 years ago. They have since had some touch-up work done, and some of them lost their heads in the cultural revolution... but still cool. 

After lunch we walked past a place where you can let the kids ride. Marlo and Zoe each took a turn riding in the little red car that drove in circles. In China the moto seems to be if you aren't smart enough to get out of the way, then you deserve to get hurt... and amazingly enough you don't see safety ropes anywhere, telephone poles exist in the middle of the road painted black and yellow.... people just drive around them. 

Here we are at lunch. This is only 1 of 3 tables of people, and way too much food. Our teacher is the lady with the scarf an her son is two people to the left. He is 35, sucessful, and single. Just a symptom of the lack of available women and that like in the US, those on the career track tend to marry later. 

On Monday our Chinese teacher took us with her son to visit PuJiang, a "suburb" of Chengdu. This is the town square. While there we visited a family that she knows and they invited us to their family lunch at a local resturaunt. 

This is one of the medium sized boxes of mortars that you can buy on the street. You light the fuse on the bottom and then run for it as the 3o different morters shoot up into the air and explode like a professional show on the 4th of July... almost. 

So you get an idea of what it was like to be there with all the popping, the smoke, and 15 kids running around with popping sparkler ropes dangling behind them like tigers with their tails on fire. 

Definately difficult to take pictures with a kid on your lap. 

This is the begining of the home fire works display. Just imagine this going on all around you... for over an hour straight. The kids at first were a little scared, then after 5-10 min. were fascinated, then bored and they stopped watching and started playing... I wonder if that is how children in a war zone deal with it. 

This is the patio area of the home/resturaunt where the party was held for CNew Years Eve. It is within the "model village" and they run it like a bed and breakfast/resturaunt/weekend get away. They roasted 3 goats, had tables full of chinese food, breads, and fruits- oh and a ton of fire works. 

This is a home just outside the "model village" boundaries. 

This village is aparently know for the flowers it grows. Many of the homes and buildings were painted with these huge flower murals. We weren't sure if we were in Mexico or where we were.... 

For Chinese New Years Eve (the most important night) we went with a group of other foreigners in Chengdu to a "model village" just on the outskirts of the city. All of the villager's homes are new and built in a very traditional style, nothing like the real farming villages we have seen. 

Happy Valentine's Day!! Zoe helped me make these very yummy cookies. 

Here they are on stage getting ready to perform. 

Marlo in her elegant Korean gown that she wore for a dance her class performed. Before the performance she was interviewed by the local TV news station about living in Chengdu etc. You would think for as much as she likes to chat she would be happy to tell them many stories but she mostly gave one-word answers and tried to not be too nervous. We are very proud of her. 

Here is a picture of the Chinese students preparing to play the violin together. 

Marlo's school put on a joint performance with a Chinese private school. It was held here at these gardens. 

Marlo really wanted to do the race and these were her partners. They are holding up the pictures they were given as a prize. 

Can you tell which team is going to win? 

At parties they like to have a good time and we played games like musical chairs, a 4-legged race, untie the human knot, and some people even performed. 

Fancy Zoe dancing at the work Chinese New Year Party. If you have not experienced Chinese New Year before, it is over the top. Imagine all of the fuss around Christmas, and then put a Chinese spin on it and you will be close. Businesses are closed for like 2 weeks. Cabs are almost impossible to get, because everyone that was out of town comes in, and everyone from in-town leaves. Hotels in all the favorite vacation spots are booked. Children are given red envelopes with outrageous sums of money and new clothes to wear. People buy fireworks and every night since Sat. (New Years Eve) they have been setting them off. It is a war zone designed to scare off any evil spirits and impress your neighbor next door. The decorations of red lanterns and special red-rope knots for luck are every where. 

test

Test. This is a test post. Hopefully things are being posted again. It looks like the quake damage has been repaired. Finally.

--James

Just behind this beautifully re-done shoping strip (it looks like something out of Westlake Village) with resturaunts built into the old French Quarter buildings in Shanghai, is the spot of the "first meeting of the Communist Party". We had to document our visit. 

Everyone likes a hot bath after being out in the rain and cold all day. Do you think they're getting too old for naked bathtub pictures? nah. 

Really dark- but here we are touching the sharks. Some of the other visitors didn't quite understand that the sharks needed to stay in the water to live even if their grandson can't reach very well. China is an interesting place. 

Shanghai has a fabulous aquarium. Tunnels to walk under the sharks, turtles, fish, not only from China, but from all over the world. They even had a shark touch tank. It was nice to be in out of the cold and we all had a good time- even Teac. 

When we go places with the kids, every available young girl/woman in the place will flock to them. We came to this place to get ice cream and they immediately had 3 new friends who wanted to take their picture with their phones. I must say they all handle it very well. 

This is standing on the Wai Tan in Shanghai looking accross the river at the new city, Pu Dong that has all been built since 1990. Some of you may recognize the buildings in the background. Many of which have been used in recent movies.... Yes, it was very cold. 

In Shanghai we visited a Chinese arts and crafts museum. It is housed in an old house that was built by one of the French aristocrats that lived there. For every craft on display they have people demonstrating how they are done. This woman went to classes in the Emperial city in Beiging when she was a little girl to learn how to make dough sculptures. Some of them are phenomenal. She taught the kids how to make small roses. 

Wonder Twins activate....hooray for new clothes and presents that come in the mail!! 

So the week after Christmas we went with some friends to Xi Lin Xue Shan. The local snow Mt. All the way up we kept seeing signs for skiing, sledding etc. I kept thinking, any minute now, we are going to see some snow. We arrived only to find out you have to pay 120 RMB per person (kids included) to take a tram up to the base of the mountain and play in the man made snow. Since all of us spent last winter in VA, UT, or CO- we decided to pass and went on a mud hike instead. We did eventually feel some snow flakes at the top of the hill... melt in your hand kind. The boys all had a very fun time getting muddy. 

While we were in Shanghai we got to attend the baptism of our friend from VA. Very fun to be around a lot of church members again. 

We love our brother. 

Turning 1 must be a big deal because they give you a pitchfork and fire.... hmmm While we were singing he some how managed to blow out the candle. Maybe we caught it with the video camera. 

Happy Birthday to mom... 32? I mean 25.. The kids made this cake for me while we were out to dinner... I was sick as usual over the hollidays. 

I think he looks just a little too chipper for 5:30- oh it could have been 6 a.m. by then. Daughter #1 woke us up so early that even T was too tired to enjoy all of the presents. 

Merry Christmas morning!! Yes, Santa did find his way to China. Zoe got a beautiful new bike and Marlo got her own camera to help her document her friends and her travels. 

See how big I am! I can climb up on the step in my sister's bathroom and eat the toothpaste all by myself!