That Great City: December 2009

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Making Merry

We did our tree decorating last week, and it was big fun. I'm a terrible idealist, and my ideals were blissfully fulfilled this particular evening. Tim was pleased, as he often finds himself caught in the crossfire between my ideals and reality, poor thing. We decorated, had yummy tomato soup for dinner (your recipe, Kim- I love it!), watched Rudolph, then had sugar cookies and hot chocolate with mini marshmallows (a luxury courtesy of our dear Christy). Our two 'big kids' decorated the tree almost entirely, with a bit of art direction from me and my hanging of the high, most breakable ornaments. Tim was standing by with the super glue to repair ornaments as they were unpacked :). The fly in the ointment is that we can't locate Asa's stocking, which is, I think, an unfortunate consequence of carting things across the world and back. Hoping we locate it soon, but if not, Tim has volunteered his, and Asa is laid back enough to be okay with that, thank goodness.

I know you're all wishing you had orange curtains right about now. If you come to Thailand, perhaps we can find you another set.

Our tree is really a bit on the Charlie Brown-ish side, but once we get the lights and ornaments on it looks homey and sweet. Tim was able to capture it at its best with his artsy perspective.

Little brother enjoyed the evening tremendously, too, and is now having a big time yanking the lowest ornaments off the tree and banging them around mercilessly. I should pause and say some words about his newly turned 11 month old-ness...he is, truly, super cute, with his big grin and 4 teeth coming in. One of our favorite family dinner time activities is to all begin laughing at once, then watching as Julian looks around at all of us and break into giggles himself. He is saying 'uh oh' and 'peekaboo' (although that one would not be recognizable to anyone but us!), and doing his 'more' sign at meals when prompted. He continues to be extremely attached to me, and experiences distress when I leave the room or hand him off to anyone (although he will not say "mama", and consistently says "dada" when asked to say my name!) Actually, we think he's pretty sensitive and he tends to get overwhelmed when a lot of activity happens at once around him or during transitions, like people coming or going. He's still not doing much moving, just scooting a bit, turning around in circles, and standing while holding on to us,mostly. I keep telling myself to enjoy it while it lasts and that he'll get going in his own time. We shall see.

Our first grader had her school Christmas program last night, in which she gave an inspired performance as a feline in the story of creation, and sang two great songs. Here she is with two friends that went to the show with us:

And preparing to go on stage:

The program was based on the Jesse Tree advent devotion, which traces history from the creation of the world until the coming of Christ. It was extremely well done, and obviously the little ones were cute, cute, cute. We're doing the Jesse Tree devotions for our family advent celebration, as well, using ornaments that were made in Thailand by a ministry that helps Thai Christians get seminary training.

And, just for fun, here's my favorite family interaction from yesterday:

Emmy: Mommy, I love you more than anyone else in the whole world!
Asa: I like Daddy better than Mommy.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

26 Countries, One Community

Have I mentioned how really, really neat Emmy's school is? We're so grateful that God has given her the opportunity to go to an international school, and one that is a Christian missional school at that. International school in Israel is one of Tim's fondest memories of his growing up years, and we have likewise enjoyed the community here at ICS tremendously. Emmy's best friends in her class are from Australia, India, Korea and Thailand, and it's been fun to see God's provision of dear friends for her and the way they show their affection for one another: drawing pictures and sending 'friend love notes' back and forth. I've saved several "I love you, Emmy" notes to go in her baby book. The picture above is with one of her sweet Indian friends, all dressed in her beautiful sari for the recent International Festival...

An annual tradition for ICS is "International Night", which was altered slightly to become an International Festival this year. The tag line for the festival was "26 Countries, One Community", and it was a fantastic celebration of the diversity at the school. There was a stage show, in which students and others in the community represented their cultures with singing, dancing, etc. Then we adjourned outside, where different countries had set up booths with food, games and activities representing their cultures. It was pretty amazing. America had hot dogs (ball park, Chicago, or New York style!), patriotic tattoos, pinwheel making, cowboy/Native American and football dress-up, live music, and a fun game called 'corn hole'. Here are some pictures from the day...

From the stage show...