the girls at local school

We don't plan for our girls to attend local school here, however, with the parenting classes our business is offering, we have partnered with a school that offers weekend/evening classes to kids. James is doing the parenting class there on Saturday afternoons.
He has taken Catherine with him before to let her sit in a kids class while he teaches.
The owner of FEAT (the school) told us he would have a program everyday for kids when their regular schools are off for winter break. He generously said our girls could attend for free.
We're still not willing for them to be out of our care from 8-5 everyday, but we have allowed them to go on Monday mornings.

You can use this link to see what they've been up to if the pictures don't display below:

Catherine, the ballet dancer

I've been trying desperately to find a gymnastics class for Catherine. But, all my locals friends tell me that they are non-existent. I feel like what she needs is a giant padded room she can run and jump and flip and play and tumble in for a few hours a week.

I was successful in finding one place, but it's about three times what a class in the US would cost and it's at the complete opposite side of town which makes it not worth it.

But, we found out there's a Russian dance teacher who teaches at a studio in the same building as our office! It's very affordable, but the times don't work well. Also, Catherine doesn't have much experience with any kind of classroom setting so "do what the other kinds are doing" is somewhat of a new concept. Also, I personally don't feel like her personality (or movements) are very well-suited to graceful, smooth ballet, but she was willing to give it a try and they let us try a class for free.

You can see how that went below:

Top News Stories from China in 2015

This was a pretty good list of the top news stories from China. How many did you already know about?




 If content doesn't display correctly, use this link.

Highlights of 2015

Here is the Judd family year in review. James and I sorted through all our photos and chose the best of 2015. Here they are in a slideshow for your viewing pleasure.


If the slideshow doesn't display correctly, view it here.

 And the here's the written version of our highlights of 2015

• no major medical emergencies!
• our return to China! Even though our return happened about 7 months later than our original plan, we are so glad to again have the opportunity to live here!
• birth of Abigial Joy. And what a joy she has been! We are so thankful she's in our family. 
• business registration complete. I mean, sort of. It's complete enough to do business. We're still figuring out the tax system and the banking, so "complete" isn't entirely accurate. 
• Ann and Catherine growing into such sweet friends
• Catherine's phenomenal language progress
• hosting a fantastic group of locals each Thursday evening and getting to watch the grow in their faith
• Grandma and Grandpa Judd getting to visit us here
• getting to attend two Christian weddings here (a rare event for both bride and groom to be followers of Jesus)
• a long time local friend conceiving a child after many years of infertility
• an unexpected trip home meant Abigail got to meet Mimi and Grandpa and cousins and friends