Teac wasn't so sure that was a good idea. But you notice he isn't at all afraid of the strange man, only of the huge animal under his feet.

The second time we went down to bathe them both Zoe and Teac got lifted up onto their backs to scrub. The rest of us were a little jealous.

Sometimes it is a little scary to think we were this close to the elephants... and then it's just really cool.

This is what giving an elephant a bath looks like. The mahut gets the elephant to lay down in the water so that we could splash them and then scrub them... most of them seemed to enjoy it, and then get out and roll in the dust.

Opening up wide for a treat. The guy in front is a mahut, or elephant trainer. They stay with one elephant and train and take care of that elephant so that they learn their personality and the elephant learns to trust and obey them.
In the hill tribe people of Thailand, the villages still catch, break, and train elephants to be used for labor in the village. These Khmer people have a long history of working with elephants and are often the ones who bring the elephants into the cities to beg, or start ride camps etc. Not all of these elephants are mistreated but you can imagine that the farther they are from civilization the happier they are.

Our third and last day in Chaing Mai we spent the day at the Elephant Nature Park. There are a lot of things you can do with elephants in Chiang Mai- you can ride them, see them paint pictures, go on a jungle trek.... but the elephants and their habitat are dwindling. All of the elephants at this park have been rescued from one situation or another. Some were abused, injured, or abandoned. A woman has taken it up as her life work to rescue as many as she can. The park is supported through ecotourism and volunteers who can stay and work at the park for as many weeks as they like. We spent the day learning about the elephants, feeding them (this was Teac's favorite part), and giving them a bath. It was one of the highlights of our trip. We never did ride on an elephant- which I really wanted to do, but I think the experience was worth it.
This is a picture of one of the guides as he teaches us about the different elephants they have there at the park.

Grandma and I hung out at the Sunday market and watched them let these paper balloons go up. They just lit a round doughnut shaped thing suspended in the middle of the tube and waited for the air to get hot enough and then let it go.

At the night market there was a guy selling mounted insects etc... he also had vases and earings made from the irridescent wings of green beetles. The queen of Thailand has aparently encouraged them to be used in handicrafts and they are pretty pricey but very cool... as long as you don't think of them as beetle wings.

We went out to the night market and the square was covered with these really cool lanterns.

This is the inner court yard.... needs a touch of gold I think.

Grandma and the kidlets.... Thai temples seem to have an abundance of gold... it is everywhere and for such a sunny country it just reflects and adds to the light... they also use mirrors and other glistening tiles to cover everything.

Part of Thai Buddhism are bells. Just like wind and movement carries the prayers for Tibetan Buddhists, the bells, their movement and sound seem to send prayers to the gods.

Is there anything else you need me to pound?

The first day in Chiang Mai we visited some temples in town, had lunch and then went to several "craft" industries in town. We went to a teak wood factory, a silver jewelry factory, thai silk factory, lacqer ware factory, paper umbrella factory.... all with a handy dandy gift shop attached. The coolest part was seeing how they made things. At the teak wood place they let the kids try carving... banging things was just up Teac's alley.

Here we are with our guide/driver Preecha. He is helping us order some noodles for lunch.

This is us at our very first temple our very first morning in Thailand. The picture is bad but after leaving Chengdu, this is how we felt, like we had left the underworld and entered the land of light. Aparently, Chiang Mai is over 80% Buddhist.. this is not surprising after you drive around the city a little. There seems to be at least one or two temples per block.

Teac inherited a great LeapFrog train that he still loves to play with even two months later.

Looking sooo cute!

This is one of the outfits from the Christmas morning fashion show... she feels so grown up with a purse and everything.

Basking in the aftermath... we are so very blessed.

Christmas morning....the girls were warned that if they got us up before 7 they would have to wait until 10 to open gifts.... at 7 am on the dot they were in our room after sneaking around for at least an hour.

Here they are at church, in front of our Christmas tree, the Sunday before Christmas. I think I am going to have this one framed.

Teac and Santa. Unfortunately he went down for a nap about an hour before the party so to make sure he didn't totally miss it, I woke him up.... good job mom... as you can tell, the poor guy wasn't thrilled about being awake, let alone to be sitting on a stranger's lap. Papi missed the whole thing since someone had to stay behind and answer the phone so that everyone else could come to the party.

Marlo and Santa- she is still trying to decide if she wants to believe in Santa or not... every-once-in-a-while she will ask me, "mom, do you believe in Santa?" or "mom, what would you do if all of your friends were telling you that Santa wasn't real?...." I didn't realize how quickly we are forced to grow up.

Zoe and Santa at the work Christmas party. This Santa prided himself on having a real beard and a jolly personality to go with it. :)

We love our papi.

This is our little soccer team from last season. They were so much fun. [ Aside from James: Thanks to Michelle's excellent coaching they were great players too! I'm glad she lets me come to practices so I can learn with the kids. I'm getting better too.]

This is the work in progress. Some of the candy is less traditional but it still tastes ok.

The week before Christmas we made yummy IKEA gingerbread houses with our good friends. Teac took a nap through the entire experience... can't say I was too sad about it at the time.