Baby's First Picture with... um... Santa?

At our annual Christmas banquet for foreign workers in our province we had the opportunity to take our little girl's picture with Santa, the Chinese version. This "Teenage Chinese Santa" was super excited to have his photo taken with our family. He is also proudly displaying our little girl's Christmas gift, a stuffed dragon in honor of the Chinese New Year on January 23, 2012. Happy Year of the Dragon!

Christmas in China

Christmas is always a very busy time for us. We keep our schedules full of parties with students, the annual provincial banquet and final exams. Below are some photos from this very exciting time.

One of the traditional Hui People dancers at our annual banquet. Our province is the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, a special province for the Hui ethnicity. They are descendants of the Middle Eastern traders along the Silk Road, so Middle Eastern styles influence their traditions. Click here to watch a short video of this performance.

Ladies performing a traditional Chinese dance at the provincial banquet honoring "foreign experts" who work in Ningxia.

One of 45 students who came to our apartment for one of four Christmas parties. One activity was helping us decorate our Christmas tree. Students made some very creative ornaments. One even made an ornament with a special message for Brian, "Dear Teacher, I want to pass my exam."

We also had visits from some of our former students. These three were Annie's students last year. They were very excited to visit and meet our little girl for the first time.

Of course, this was also our little girl's first Christmas. We think we were more excited about it than she was. We excitedly helped her open some presents. We want to thank everyone who sent us care packages and gifts for our little one this semester. We feel very loved by your kindness and generosity.

4 Month Milestone

We admit that being new parents we are super excited by every small thing our little girl does. So, to share this excitement, here's another video. This was taken this morning. She is 4 months old today! As you will see and hear, we are quite excited! Click here to see our newest video of our little girl.

New Parents

As we are learning so many new things about our little girl we are often amazed at what she can do. Click here to see some of her first giggles. On some of our more difficult days we can just watch this and it makes us smile.