"Oh no! No small change!"

I am still laughing out loud as I write this post since this just happened about 5 minutes ago. You gotta love when embarrassing moments happen in China. The language barrier helps to act like a sugar coating to fill the awkward air with laughing instead of recognizable sarcasm.

After a concert night from 4-8 with no dinner in between, we were pretty hungry. Our food that we ordered from McDonald's had come (yes, they deliver in China), but there was one problem...we had no small change. Usually we have some 10 or 5 kuai bills laying around, but tonight all we had were the 1 kuai coins. As Dave painstakingly counted our 47 kuai bill with coins, I just had to document this hysterical situation.

Christmas shopping!

Out for another weekend adventure in search of classroom decorations, family gifts, and a good time! It is always such an experience to step out of our gated community and into the realms of the good ol' market. Jaywalking through oncoming traffic, dodging spitballs from the mouths of store owners (who are talking to you), and the frequent "Hello....Look.....You buy?!?" This market feels like the aisles of any busy story on black friday. The only thing is that it is just another normal Saturday afternoon.

Would you like a bouquet of stuffed animals?

This is how you shop for nail polish in China....just sort through the piles.

Life-sized stuffed animals. You can find these EVERYWHERE!

This Santa not only is as tall as me, but he dances and sings! He is worth the picture for the "creepy" factor.

The catch all store for wrapping and decorating gifts. In China, you just buy sheets of wrapping paper instead of the rolls...different, but usually more sturdy!

Lunch time! Good ol' street food :) Yum...

Time to rest up a bit and then get ready for the school's Christmas concert this evening! What a fun-filled day.

"It's the MOST wonderful time of the year"

It was Sunday night around 8:30. Wrapping up the last bit of lesson plans for the week, I made a quick remark "I need a break.....want to start taking out the Christmas decorations?" (Mind you, we normally go to bed around 9:00...what was I thinking?). All I needed was the go ahead from Dave and we were off! What seemed like a quick project of "laying out" the preparations for a later day, my heart quickly welled up with joyous memories from our first Christmas together. "Look honey! The dried dates and popcorn string is still perfectly together!" We had such momentum going, we kept the ball rolling until we looked up at the clock (tree, garland, wreath, nativity, and snowmen later....) and it reads 10:30! While we felt a bit saddened by how rough our Monday morning was going to be, we both went to bed with smiles on our faces. When good memories are imprinted in your brain, they stay there forever. Praise Him that our first Christmas was so magical. And hey....now we get to come home to our warm, Christmas tree lit humble abode...how cozy.

We are so blessed to have awesome storage in our apartment....we can hide stuff everywhere! (That can be both a good and bad thing)

The popcorn and date string that we made LAST YEAR was still good as new! (Aside from a slight date-ish fragrance)

Only two and a half more weeks of school until our Christmas break...where has the time gone?!? Looking forward to taking some holiday adventures together :)

Biking through a Shenyang Winter Wonderland

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow! That's at least what I was singing until I started biking in it. It is one thing to look out the window at the falling snow and notice it's pure, simplistic beauty, and entirely another to actually be outside in it. For the first 5 minutes, I was tempted to just stand there and stick my tongue out like a child. Yet on the busy city streets where the snow on the ground has already frozen, the snow coming down is sticking to my eyelashes, and people are randomly walking in front of us as we try to gain some sort of momentum is an entirely different thing.

The reason why we were even on this little biking outing was actually a pretty sad one. My USB (which by the way, holds my life on - foolish I know), broke the other night. Devastated, I was immediately in search for another one, hoping to transfer my files before they were completely gone. Our trip was a successful one - we were able to spend some quality time together, transfer my files (yay!), and then plant ourselves at our favorite coffee shop for a few hours. NOW I get to actually enjoy the falling snow as it masquerades the city streets below (at least for today).

Attempting to take a picture while riding my bike...risky, I know....

Their infamous Caramel Macchiato...isn't it pretty?

Hopefully more fresh snow falls tonight so the kids can have fun playing tomorrow!

Silicon bread pans are not my friend.

As I glanced at our fruit basket and saw the brown and mushy bananas, I couldn't help but think "OOOhhhh! Let's make banana bread!" I thought it would be such an effective way to make them worth more than in the trashcan, yet didn't even realize that I didn't have all the ingredients. Let's hope that honey can substitute for sugar.....

The real crash and burn was when I went to put the banana bread into the oven and the silicon bread pan gave out on me!

A day of blessing...food, friends, love and laughter.

It is around this time of year when I feel the most homesick. Especially when I skype call with my loving, cuddly, affectionate family to find them all in a ball of laughter on the floor tickling each other! I could not contain my emotions as I welled up with tears just watching and/or hearing the joy....without me. That is just what I love about my family though....we are all either in college or out, yet we still love to be with (let alone cuddle!) each other. Yes, even my 20 year old brother Ethan with his sisters. Yet while I sit here briefly reminiscing on the blessing of my tight knit family, I can't leave out the blessing of what He has given me right now....in THIS season of my life.

There is nothing better than to have a husband who not only loves me and helps around the house, but actually knows more than I do about cooking/baking! Thank you Becky Evans for all of your many years with your son....he definitely benefits from it (and so do I). Below I have documented a bit of our Thanksgiving preparations before we headed off to join our side dishes with many others!

Remember my post about making jaozi at our landlords house? Well we were finally able to use that idea! We had left over apple filling and pie crust from the apple pie, so we decided to turn them into little jaozi's (dumplings)! We simply whipped out our little jaozi-making tool and began!

Does this table setting not look amazing?!? Thanks Amber and Rachael for all of your hard work in preparing & hosting for us. This was such a fun time of fellowship, laughter, and constantly doing the whole "'excuse me pardon me" when we were slipping by for 2nd and 3rd helpings. Good thing I was thinking ahead and wore a baggy sweater....saving room for dessert.

After we finished eating, we all sat around to watch Charlie Brown Thanksgiving and then Home Alone! Such a relaxing night.

Seeing this little guy at our Thanksgiving meal made me want to just burst out into tears. Two weeks ago this Monday he had heart surgery. Praise Him that he recovered quickly and is back to his normal giggly self. And he is even saying "Mama" now! So adorable!

Now it's time to start putting away the fall decorations and getting the garland, tree, and lights all around. Crank up that Christmas music!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!

A few "snips" too short

So I went to go get my hair "trimmed" the other night...

This being my third time in China to get my hair cut, I should not have been so naive to the predictable pattern that would play out (as it does for every haircut). In my butchered vocabulary of hair salon terms, I hand gestured my way through saying "I want it cut.....but not too short.....longer in the front, and a little bit shorter in the back." Then I just sat there crossing my fingers trying to focus on other things until he tapped on my shoulder and asked me a question. There is one thing though, that I noticed about this "inverted bob" kind of hair style. The back is always going to be altered by how short you cut the front piece....pretty common right? But then that means your whole hair cut is based off of just ONE snip! And that one snip was what made this whole haircut the way it is....

(SNIP) "Oh.....uhh.....actually.....I didn't want it.....that.......short........nevermind...."

It's in those moments that you take a big swallow and start envisioning what you can do to "make this work". I guess for this winter season I will be in scarf heaven since my neck is now completely bare. Oh well...it will grow.

Nervously ready for him to start and make the first cut...little do I know...

So far so good....he hasn't taken that neck thing off yet, so I can't really see how far my hair is from my shoulders.

Oh dear!!!!! All I could think of was ("My neck!!!")

I guess I can work with this.....maybe.

Good thing is that hair always will grow back.....phew!