Sorry!

Okay, okay, okay! I know many of you are waiting for pictures, unfortunately I don't think I'll be able to post any while in China. :( Sad, I know. I didn't bring my cord to download them and none of the computers here have the right slot for my memory card.

So if everyone will have a little patience..."have patience, have patience, don't be in such a hurry"...I will post them as soon as I can.

Been hanging out at the school. Visited the early years center and was able to observe a 4/5year old class. Very interesting time. What an amazing facility they have here!

Went out to dinner with some Chinese students last night, again ate with chopsticks. I'm getting better!

Tonight we are going out for 'hot pot' with some other Chinese friends. Get to practice my chopstick skills again!!

Bright and sunny day here today. Have a great day everyone!

China

Hi everyone! I have arrived in China to visit my Mom!

I arrived in Beijing on Friday - after all the Volcanic Ash Cloud fiasco!
I have seen some amazing things (THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA) and eaten some amazing things with chopsticks! I got off the plane and my mom and her friend met me, took me to the hotel to drop off my things, and then we headed straight for lunch - Peking Duck!

I am now in Tianjin where mom lives and works. I woke up at 5:30 this morning so that I could go in to work with her at Tianjin International School. It is an amazing school! It's also nice to be here because everyone here speaks English - after spending the last 3 days not understanding a word it is nice to hear my own language!!

I hope to post some pictures later today - back at Mom's apartment. Keep checking back!

Easter fun!

The Lord is Risen - Christ has risen indeed! We try and focus the children on the meaning and purpose of Easter, as well as have a little 'fun' on the side. Abigail made an Easter card for us encouraging us to remember the real reason for Easter - but as she stated in her card 'she likes to fill her gob with chocolate too!' Oh, the honesty of an 11yr old! After the events of the weekend we didn't have much time together as a family so we were quite happy to hang out together today. We had a good clearing out session of the kids rooms this morning. I had promised the kids an egg hunt so that's what we did. The kids hunted for boiled/dyed eggs, plastic eggs with coupons inside, and an Easter basket each. I was quite surprised when my chocoholic daughter said she thought the coupons were better than getting eggs with chocolate inside them. In case your wondering, I put slips of paper inside the eggs that read things like: -get out of one chore free -good for 1 glass of diet coke -my choice for dinner (from our kitchen) -breakfast in bed -good for a wrestling session with daddy (when he's available) -DVD watching of my choice -Game of my choice The kids all had a great time, and next year Levi will not be content to just observe!

Levi in hospital

Levi spent from Thursday - Sunday in the hospital. Doc's put it down to a viral induced wheeze. Started with a cold on Wednesday, saw our GP on Thursday morning and be was reluctant to give Antibiotics because Levi's had them just about every other week for 6 weeks. After his afternoon nap he woke coughing and his lips started turning blue - Dean took him straight away to A&E. There they discovered his SATS dangerously low and started treatment immediately. Was put on inhalers every 2 hours initially, and on Friday night they had to put him on Oxygen because his levels weren't staying high enough. By Sunday morning he was off Oxygen and down to 3 hourly inhalers. By about noon Sunday they stretched him to 4 hourly inhalers and we were finally allowed to go home about 4pm on Sunday.



These pictures were taken on Friday a few hours before he was put on Oxygen. The doctors had put a line in his hand when he arrived at the hospital - they thought they might need it for medication. Levi was very angry on Friday night and ripped it out himself in the middle of the night!



Apologies to friends and family that are just finding out about this now, as you can imagine balancing life with 1 child in the hospital and 3 at home is pretty tricky. We are so very thankful to our friends and family who provided all kinds of help during this time. We are also reminded of how blessed we are to have healthy children that do not require regular intensive medical attention.

Music Recital

The kid's school held a music recital for the upper classes. This includes Abigail and Sam. All the upper classes had prepared a musical piece or two to share with parents at the recital. I went in with quite a low expectation knowing that the school does not have a 'full-time' music teacher. I also knew that Sam's class had ALL been learning the clarinet! Sam isn't too bad on the clarinet but the thought of 30 children of mixed ability all playing the clarinet together somewhat scared me! I must say I was quite impressed.

The choir, directed by our Pastor (he kind of inherited the position from me) sang 2 songs from the musical 'My Fair Lady'. He did a great job leading them and getting them to sing with 'cockney' accents for 'Wouldn't it Be Lovely'. (for some reason the video wouldn't load so you'll have to wait until I can figure out what happened)

Sam's class was amazing! Who'd of thought that 30 - 8/9 year olds could sound like this on the clarinet!! (you might want to turn your speaker volume down a tad)

The first clip is a medley of 'Oh When the Saints' there are 3 different melodies being played together and although it's not perfect, it is pretty impressive. Keeping in mind some of these children have absolutely no music teaching outside of the classroom. (Sam is the second boy on the bottom row - sitting down)


The next clip is a little bluesy number that they played.


Abigail's class did a music/rythm and poetry number that was quite interesting as well as a jazzy number on recorders.

Breaking News!

There's a bunch of stuff that I could blog about, but I don't have time to do that right now. So here's the latest breaking news in our house... Levi has decided to walk!! He's been on his feet since he was about 6 months old so we thought he would be an early walker. He tricked us and has put it off until now! For the last few months he has been walking holding on to just a finger or two and refusing to let go, but on Thursday afternoon he decided enough was enough. After coming home from picking up the kids at school, I set him on his feet as we got in the front door and he took off on his own down the hallway in into the front room! Since then he's been walking everywhere! Here's a video to prove it! (Sorry I can't seem to rotate the video so you'll either have to turn your heads or you monitors!)




Also - I got my passport back on Thursday! Unfortunately it was too late to get to China for the concert that I wanted to go to, but I am now working on getting a Visa so that I can visit mom after the Easter holidays. I'll keep you all posted.

10 Minute Talk

Just thought I'd take 10 MINUTES and post some of the things that we are up to/ thinking about etc.

I am still waiting on my passport (hopefull it will come in the next few days) so that I can do more paperwork in order to finalize my trip to China to visit Mom.

Abigial (actually WE) have been given a wonderful news of a GREAT offer for her to go to a PRIVATE CHRISTIAN SECONDARY SCHOOL (Thames Christian College)! We are amazed at how God has worked in this situation.

Levi is still NOT walking.

Aleah is still loving school. As she goes to bed each night she say...'In the morning, wake up, have breakfast, what are we going to do?' We respond on weekdays of course - 'go to school'. She clasps her hands and shouts 'yes'!

Sam loves playing with transformers, and legos. (either physically or on the wii)

Dean is not preaching this week! Whew!(He's preached the last 2 Sundays - due to the new arrival in our Pastor's family)

That's my 10 Minute Talk for today. Thanks for listening!