Last Thursday, Stacia and Lucas hosted a Christmas party for 20 of their closest friends from school. They were all in a party mood as semester exams had just ended for the week. The party included LOTS of food contributed by all, a white elephant gift exchange with lots of stealing going on, cookie decorating, ping pong and a Christmas movie. It was a great way to begin the Christmas season before most of the kids took off to their various travel destinations.
Yes indeed it snowed today in Shanghai! It flurries once or twice a year, usually without any accumulation but today it stuck around long enough for some fun. Our poor pansies that were planted a short while ago were weighted down with the white stuff. The snow is great for adding to the holiday spirit.
The boys had to get out and throw snowballs and Wade helped to build his first snowman. It was good packing snow and everyone came in soaked! 
Watching the drivers was another interesting experience today as most of them didn't clear off their windows or side view mirrors. It probably didn't matter as they seem to drive without looking most of the time anyway! Luckily the snow did not stick to the roads or Shanghai would have been an absolute disaster. It sure was a beautiful sight though!
The neighborhood gardeners were out in full force over the past weekend planting pansies all throughout the compound. This gardener was busy out in front of our house. It was about 70 degrees that day. It is just beautiful as the winter grass seed has come in and the grass is very green. This tree where the flowers are being planted is chock full of ripe pomelos, a local citrus fruit which is like a gigantic grapefruit. Rich, Wade and I enjoyed a lovely walk throughout the garden marveling that it was December. We do at times miss the snow of Michigan especially at Christmas time but the milder temperatures of Shanghai have grown on us. I guess this is the payback for enduring the scorching, humid summers we have here.
By Sunday after we had digested the Thanksgiving feast we cranked up the Christmas music and got out the tree and all the trimmings. What fun to have Wade experience this custom with us. He seemed to join right in without hesitation and with a smile on his face - especially after I got out the antlers and Rudolph nose. With all of the help, the tree was up in no time!
Wade had no problem loving this particular American feast, especially the turkey - Two thumbs up!
Here we go again! Another school year begins. It is hard to believe that one of my first blog entries was a first day of school picture 3 years ago. Stacia is a senior and Lucas a junior. There is a lot of talk around here about colleges! Elise begins 6th grade and Lance starts 8th. Wade will continue at Yew Chung where they offer a dual language instruction in Mandarin and English. He is grade 5 this year. He actually started yesterday and the Concordia kids started today. I walked to the bus with them this morning with camera in hand and it seems they have gotten over the embarrasement of mom taking pictures of them on the first day. Lots of moms and dads were putting their little ones on the bus and I thought back to when Stacia started preschool at PCA. My how that seems like yesterday as I stood outside taking pictures in front of the tree in the front yard. 
They brought Lance's computer out there and watched a movie and had popcorn. It was fun until about the 30th mosquito bite and then they gave up and went to sleep in the family room with their sleeping bags. Unfortunately, too many bugs had gotten into the tent and Wade and Lance didn't want to share their space!
Wade and Lance get along so well and act like typical brothers rough housing, teasing and giggling. Lance is such a great big brother to Wade and is teaching him so many things. Wade has been wanting to learn how to skate board like Lance so yesterday Lance took him out and starting teaching him some tricks. Wade was actually able to do a trick. That was after Lance had taught Wade how to make crepes for breakfast that morning. We are thankful for their great relationship which takes place mainly in Chinese since Lance is so good at speaking to Wade in his mother tongue. Wade gets to practice English with the rest of us!
The rest of the day was pretty low key since all of his friends have gone back to the States for their summer visits. I did prepare one of his favorites for dinner (Burgundy beef over noodles) and then we went out for Cold Stone ice cream after dinner. Since Stacia is in India this week, he wanted to wait for her to return to celebrate with a dinner out at Peter's Tex Mex. What a sweet brother!
On the last day of school last week (half day), Lucas and his friend Ben celebrated their birthdays with some friends after school by going out to lunch and then heading to a bowling alley to play pool (?). They had a nice time before heading out to the next party which was a going away party for a friend moving back to the States. Now its on to enjoying summer break!
He also made several "Public Service Announcements", where they learn about putting a positive message out for people using video, with unique camera angles, sound effects, music, etc. He has done several awesome ones, getting outstanding marks for use of media to get his point across. The one that is about procrastination won a second place award at the Shanghai Film Festival!
I think when I was in 7th grade, we were still dipping film paper in these strange chemicals, and it took about 5 minutes to make one photo! Neat to see how new technology can be used -- for the better.
This is our first time uploading video to this blog, you will have to tell us if it works or not.
We have a wonderful picnic pavillion in our neighborhood with a small soccer field, basketball court and skate park. There was plenty of activity going on with bball, soccer, baseball, frisbee, badminton and more. Everyone worked up a good appetite.
Life 4 Him Small Group
We ended our evening with prayer for our dear friends the Thompson's (Austin, TX), the Hyde family (Rochester, MI) and the Kleimeyer's (Jupiter, FL). We love you all and you will be greatly missed!
Lance and his buddy Jack joined in to celebrate their birthdays together again this year. Ten of their friends joined in for a party at a local sports complex for two hours of fun.
The Chinese have a thing about Disney characters and cartoons in general. They put up this lovely sign for the guests of honor to wish Jaky and Lancie a Happy Birthday - how appropriate!
Lance was wowed by the skateboard deck that two of his friends got for him and had signed by a couple of famous skateboarding dudes. The question is, will Lance actually have the nerve to use this board? They get pretty beat up in a hurry once you start doing your tricks on them.
They had two hours of basketball and ping pong fun. It was a nice group of kids. They enjoyed a nutricious meal of pizza (the sauce was ketchup-yuk!), french fries and pop. It was all topped off with Creme de Mente cake, one of Lance's favorites.
Wade is trying it out and he can't control the smiles on his face. It suits him just right since he spends half his day jumping around the house anyway. After everyone finished putting up the sides and the net, they spent the rest of the day jumping. They must have jumped for hours on end. The weather was beautiful for trying it out.
A few pictures from a great family outing. We went 70km west of home to an ancient watertown, where all of the buildings and town are connected by small canals rather than streets. There are a surprising number of these towns around, I suppose since Shanghai is actually part of a giant river delta and much of it used to be under water anyway. And we rode from there out into the surrounding countryside on a beautiful, perfect day.
After wandering through villages on our bikes for most of the morning, we came upon a yacht club! It was a very nice lake, but what a yacht club is doing here this far inland I have no idea. Anyway, we decided this would be a good place for lunch.
You can see in this next picture, Wade has not yet picked up on the American culture of smiling for every picture. Funny, these little things that we just take for granted as being routine are not routine for someone from a different culture!
We cooled off with ice creams or smoothies walking the village. We skipped the local munchie that was sold in practically every third shop - which is a barbequed pig's foot. 
It was a great family day.
Wade is giving it his all during the obstacle course and drop kick competitions. He had never kicked a rugby ball or an American football for that matter. His first try was a bust. Luckily, he had three chances and the last two were quite respectable.
Check out that shot put form! He did quite well in this competition. There is some hidden power packed in that little guy.
Wade had to run the 400M race right after lunch. He was not too optimistic about his ability to do well in that race. He kept patting his stomach and saying "bu hao" (not good) before the start of the race. I was so proud of him all day. He was so easy going and never showed a bad attitude about anything. He gave it all he had and didn't seem to be bothered when he didn't do well up against the other kids. He was a big winner in my book!
