Light Tan

The ISB Spring Fair...

Face paint.

Face paint.

Dragon.  Not what he envisioned...

Black skeleton with red eyes.  Exactly what he asked for.

This was funny because they used real paint, not face paint.  So Mads had a hard time moving his face. 

Rhon and Dare played Rock Paper Scissors.  The winner got to pour flour on the loser.  So I paid money for them to throw flour on each other.  Weirdos.

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Later that night we attended a special concert...

Heheh.  So, Nate was in a band.  I say "was" because it just recently broke up because the bass player moved on to new adventures.  These 4 guys hung out and jammed, and then right before the W's moved, they gave us a concert.  They did good!  They played Song 2 and Buddy Holly.  They played Song 2 a second time and asked if I wanted to sing.  Yes!  But I blew it.  My one chance to live my dream of being a lead singer of a band.  There were too many kids pulling on the microphone wanting a turn too.  In fact, between the 4 guys in this band, there were 16 kids.  Go Dad band!

I didn't get Nate and all the bandmates, but here he is with Cory.  Now he's gone.  And his family!  That's the worst part.  He took Kelli with him!

The Motivation Shopping Requires

The girls and I wanted some art supplies, so after much preparation, we set out one morning to find the store.  That's not as easy as it sounds.  I don't speak or read or understand Chinese.  And there is no English here.  Driving is a challenge.  I had an address, and the GPS on my phone got us in the vicinity.  But we still couldn't find it.  I decided to park and walk around to find it.  We walked for quite a while and almost gave up, but we tried one more way and found it.

Beginning of the adventure.

So much paint!

They are showing me how happy they are with this store we found.

On the street with some of our loot.

We decided to get some "pancakes" to eat.

There was a old Chinese couple who stopped to talk to us.  They were so happy just to look at the girls and see their smiles.  The girls had good enough Chinese to have a little conversation with them.  It made them happy.  I like when we leave our little bubble and experience a bit of real China.  It makes me like it more.

Since I didn't know where I was going when I parked, I accidentally went down a road that had no exit.  And it was super narrow.  Cars were just parked on the sidewalk.  That's where I decided to park.  It wasn't my smartest move.  But luckily when we got back to the car, it was still there, no damage, and no one was blocking me in.  But I had to back out of the street.  The whole street.  It was probably 200 yards.  It was dumb, but things worked out.  Our car is safe, we are safe, and we have paint!

Before we went to the art store, we went to Yashow.  It is a market where you can buy brand name stuff at cheap prices.  It is up in the air still about whether these things are real or not.  Everyone says nothing is real in China, but I saw some pretty bad knock offs in Indonesia, and these are nothing like those.  It was my first time there.  You have to be a good bargainer, and I'm not.  But I usually do okay because I buy quantity.  We bought 4 pairs of Converse, and some purses and wallets.  I forgot to take pictures...

Look For Rainbows

Mads got baptized!

He lost his tooth the night before.  This is a picture of his gap!

It was a beautiful day.  I know I've said it before, but that is a big deal here.  It rained a bunch the night before, so everything was clean and bright.  Just like in the baptism song!

This picture makes me so happy.

We were able to have the baptism at a ward member's complex's pool.  The W's were so nice to let us use their house.  We have to have it early in the morning as to lessen the chance of people being at the pool.  Here we are walking over there after the song and talk.

Checking out the pool.

He got baptized the same day as his friend A.  We were happy to share the special day with our good friends the S's!

We were lucky no one was swimming laps that morning. :)

(Nate is on crutches, yes.  He tore some ligaments in his ankle.)

Walking back the house for confirmations.

Mads is the coolest.  He was so happy to get baptized.

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Later that day, we walked to Burger King for lunch.  It was an awesome day, we just had to take a walk.  Without Nate. :(

We are walking near Pinnacle Plaza.  We just passed Jenny's, the little grocery store I go to at least once a day.

It's a dangerous place to walk.  Something that is worthy of it's own post is the driving/road conditions here.  I always warn the kids by telling them the drivers WILL kill them.  They won't even look back.  There is so much craziness.

This is the road right in front of my complex.  I didn't take this picture, the kids were playing with the camera, but I thought it was cool.  It is pretty pleasant, but you have to dodge the dog poop.  No one picks up after their dog.  Or children for that matter.  Yes, children poop anywhere, but that is also worthy of it's own post.

And then we celebrated BA's birthday.  She's a teenager!

Taking Over

C.A.S.T.A Day!  It means Celebrate and Share the Arts.  And I love it.  The elementary kids made these tie dye shirts a week or so before hand, and then they wore them on CASTA day.

They did a good job!

Parents are invited to come to the school and see some of the things the kids have done in class.  There were art projects everywhere!  They had all the halls of the school set up like a museum.  It was so awesome.  And when I got to the middle school and high school section, I was seriously impressed.  It made me so happy my kids go to a school where the arts are important.  There were so many things on display, I couldn't find any of my kids' stuff.  Even so, the whole school had such a cool vibe, it was fun just walking around all the different floors.  Hopefully they bring their stuff home at the end of the year.

And then each of the elementary kids had a little music performance...

Easter

We painted eggs way over here in China!  They were brown eggs again.  It's okay.  Honestly, white eggs just look weird to us anyway. :)

Little carrot cakes!

All The Crazy

Got to go on a field trip with G!  We went to the arboretum.

It is a much different experience going with kindergartners rather than 2nd graders.  Another mom and I were in charge of 7 kids.  And they all seven went in different directions!  It was hard keeping track of them!  Plus, there were tons of people there, so they were weaving in and out of grown ups the whole time.  It was fun though.  I'm glad I got to go with him.