Watch, Read, Listen

24 – 25 May 2014 – Ever since moving to China I've missed one thing.  Well, if I'm with myself there are many things that I miss BUT let's get back to THAT one thing, shall we? What is that one thing??? Hiking and camping. Oops. So, technically that's TWO things.  Not one. Anyway… I…

4 June 2014- Beauty… it's all around us. Sometimes you just have to open your eyes and REALLY look at the world around you.   Hollyhocks …not only growing but appearing to be thriving…in the sliver of dirt between a parking lot and a tall fence. Amazing, no?? Aren't they beautiful? (I pass by these…

1 June 2014 – a Mercedes a golf cart??? ummm…. Yeah. You suppose it's real??? (not!) [Perhaps I shouldn't be watching "Wayne's World" while writing this post.  Wait. I didn't admit to watching that movie, did I???? I'm not laughing or anything.  {giggle, snort}]

12 June 2014- So…technically it's NOT the last day of school today.  What would you call it??? The penultimate day????  We won't be here tomorrow (which IS the last day of school) as we're traveling to Lijiang with the Stader family.  So it's the last day of school for us! Lots happening today!  The Stader…

12 June 2014- Oh my. That "oh my" is for so many different reasons… 1) I'm waaaaaay behind on posting photos.  Whoops. 2) I forgot to tell you that we had our friends, the Stader Family from Wisconsin, visiting us. 3) The end of the school year- so many good byes.  I hate them!  Good…

4 April 2014 – You might have heard me mention that IST has four houses- red, black, white, and yellow.  We're in the Yellow House …. aka The Wind Dragons. Oh, and Annika is one of the Yellow House Leaders for the Elementary School. Today the ENTIRE school (elementary AND secondary) got together had loads…

1 April 2014 – Some of the ladies (Jen, Sam, Petra and Jen's in-laws) and I did a little window shopping at TaoBaoJie.  What is TaoBaoJie?  Hmmmm….it's an indoor market of sorts- most of the vendors in there sell either clothing, bags or shoes but you'll find pottery and miscellaneous home goods as well (I…

4 May 2014 – After breakfast and a little bit of souvenir shopping and one last look at the beautiful prayer wheels it's time to head back to the Lanzhou airport and fly back home!   Okay..in regards to souvenirs – we have to remember we've got space constraints! We're only doing carry-on (no checked…

3 May 2014 -  Well, it appears that I missed posting a small collection of photos from the day we visited the "black hat" monastery.  I use the quotation marks to emphasize the fact that I saw no black hats at that particular monastery.  Actually, I didn't see any hats there whatsoever. Hmmm…maybe they should…

19 & 20 April 2014 – While I LOVE being an expat and learning more about the Chinese culture, traditions and holidays I also miss celebrating our "normal" holidays….like Easter. Sadly the big holidays just don't feel the same without all the anticipation and…surprisingly enough…some of the uber commericialization (yes, those holidays seem to be…