Ann's Third Birthday!

Pin the own in the nest was a FLOP! Ann refused to wear a blindfold, Michael refused to play at all, and Tiny insisted on a second turn when her owl wasn't exactly in the nest. 

Isn't he the cutest? This is one of the girls' best palymates. His mom is local and dad is British.

Chinese New Year Fireworks

CNY 2016 3 from Jill Judd on Vimeo.

Hong Kong 2016, part one

the view from our guest house balcony

Ann was so excited to sleep in a very big bed (double size). Catherine was even more excited to sleep on the top bunk

We made a crib for Abigail with our suitcase

free playgrounds and warm weather!

touring our neighborhood

everything is built so close together in the world's most crowded city

We took the girls to the Science Museum

And the Zoological and Botanical Gardens. Some friends who live in southern China, not far from Hong Kong, came to visit us while we were there

How Abigail enjoyed the zoo and gardens

That's all I have time for today, but there are more Hong Kong photos coming later.

more pictures of our house

This post is written specifically for some folks who will be joining us here shortly (woo-hoo!) to see what accommodations are like, but the rest of you are welcome to see too :)

Here is the first post I made with pictures when we first moved in, but I didn't have all the rooms photographed and we weren't really settled.

And here are a few more pictures that have been taken since then.

"My room"  We have a balcony area off the living room and our spare dining room table (we had one, the landlord one) is there for my sewing and projects and homeschool planning. This picture was taken before we left for Chengdu. It was this tidy for exactly the duration of the time we were gone; It doesn't look like this today.

The master bedroom. 

It too has a balcony, but the balcony is about 16 inches wide so we're not really sure what to do with that space. Right now, we store our suitcases out there. 

Ah, the closet space. This house is such a step up from our old house and storage space is one of the biggest improvements. 

The grounds outside the front side of our house.

more of the grounds

The guest room/James office

The dining room and looking into the kitchen

Well, that's our house. We look forward to those of you have actual plans to come see us and we look forward to convincing more of you to come see our home in person. :)

girls at local school, part two

Here's round two of pictures from the vacation program the girls are attending on Mondays. We missed this week because Ann was sick. Next week is Chinese New Year so no classes. Maybe the next week they can make it again.

Use this link if the pictures below don't display correctly.

 

Coldest Winter in 30 years

It has been COLD here this winter. Many people are saying it's the coldest in 30 years. I'm not sure I believe that, but it has been cold.
We just got an email this morning form some friends in southern China who said the local news reported that their city's recent snow was the first time it had snowed in 124 years!!!!

Below are a few interesting links about the cold, cold winter.


Also check out my facebook page for a video made by a news reporter in northern China.

Pictures from this year's winter


six survival items

buildings covered in ice


As you can imagine, the girls haven't gotten much outside play time for a few months. We are ready for spring!