It was Saturday and I was feeling a bit down, knowing that Valentine’s Day was approaching and that I couldn’t just go down to my favorite Target Store to buy my “Sweetheart” a nice card or my little Valentines some chocolate treats and goodies. Besides, Megan’s class is scheduled to have a  Valentine’s Day party this week, so another pressure…how to make cards for her 17 classmates? It’s not like the local markets here in Tianjin will have pre-made Valentine’s Day cards for kids.

The Lord was so good to me. I opened Megan’s backpack to find that her teacher had already prepared Valentine’s Day cards that just needed to be colored and addressed. WoW! Then I came up with the idea of putting a little Chupa Chups lollipop on each one, by cutting small slits in the cards. Megan did the coloring and I did the cutting!

Here’s our creations…

The year Sean is teaching three classes in our high school: Computer Animation, Digital Citizenship and two sections of AP Computer Science. Rachel and Jessie are both taking Computer Science. Although it’s challenging for them, I think they are doing well in his class. This is actually the first time Rachel has had Sean as a teacher. She’s enjoying it. All our other kids have had Sean in previous years. Sean will also be leading the Senior Class spring trip coming up in May. Now that our school has moved into its new campus, Sean has his own classroom. Picture above Sean is teaching AP Comp Sci., Rachel is in the foreground.

The spring semester brings more changes for Megan. We moved her back into our school’s ECC (Early Childhood Center) for the remainder of her kindergarten year. She had an amazing experience in Chinese kindergarten last fall, and it was a bittersweet decision to make. Megan adjusted very well to her Chinese classmates and learned much more of the Mandarin language, which we are so thankful for. However, with the move to our new campus, commuting time has gone from 10 minutes to 45 minutes; so the logistics of getting Megan to and from the Chinese kindergarten, did not work. On Megan’s last day of school before the break for Chinese New Year, the class had a little time to say goodbye. Megan’s big sisters were out of school for their break, so they all came along. We were almost all in tears as we listened to various children say how much they will miss having Megan in their class. Here, Megan’s classmate comes to say goodbye.

Megan’s Kindergarten Class (she has learned early the Asian peace sign)

Megan’s teachers

School gate guard

Rachel sees her little friend from this past summer, when she volunteered as a helper in the class.

Lunch with friends after school dismissed for half-day

Sean was cleaning up his flash drive and asked me if I had copied an album of pictures from last summer. I was so surprised to find this photo of us, taken at the hostel in Beijing where we stayed while site-seeing with Sean’s parents who visited from Sioux Falls, SD. I love my husband! (Thank you, Gail for such a great photo).

Construction makes a lot of mess!! Sean drafted Jessie and Maddie to help clean the high school stair well.

Outing to enjoy some of the festivities on the streets in our neighborhood. Behind us fruit and alcohol sellers which line most street corners. Fruit is the best gift to bring when invited to a friend’s home. See the red lantern and Chinese flag hanging behind us. People also hang red paper cut banners from their windows with good luck blessings. I bought Megan a balloon…this character is named Mei Yang Yang from the popular Chinese children’s show. (The equivalent to our American Sesame Street show with favorite character, Elmo).

Hours of fireworks leave a mess.

Here’s what our courtyard looked like on Monday morning. Paper and Box residue. Each of the large boxes below shoot off enormous fireworks with loud booms. One box can put on its own 1-2 minute show.

Workers Clean up the Mess

Sunday night at midnight marked the beginning of the Chinese New Year — The Year of the Dragon. We enjoyed a fantastic display of fireworks right outside out 8th floor kitchen and bedroom windows. Fireworks go off all evening and culminate in the midnight hour from 12 AM to 1 AM.

From our kitchen window

Across the courtyard

See courtyard below with fireworks exploding

The girls helped to unpack books in our new school library. They also spent two nights sleeping over in the new building with Sean. Teachers and staff were asked to volunteer to stay to prevent theft, since construction workers were still present round the clock.

Girls pushed couches together to make a bed to sleep on.

Maddie had an ambitious new years goal for 2011. She wanted to read the entire Bible. She decided to use the internet to help her stay on track. Go to http://www.youversion.com/ and you can set up your own Bible reading plan. One reason she chose youversion.com is because she could sync it with her iTouch so she could read on the go!

Hugs to Maddie!