Spirit Day

So Friday was Spirit day at the kids school (SAS). The children were all placed in houses (think Harry Potter) and given t-shirts with their house animals on them. Thankfully all three of our kids were placed in the same house (the dolphins). Thomas painted his face blue! He was hoping to put himself in a bathtub filled with food coloring to dye himself blue but I nixed that plan. He had to settle for face paint. The kids all paraded around the school showing school spirit by yelling and cheering. The winning team got to put their house jersery on the school mascot (an eagle) for the school year. The dolphins won! I am sure it was directly related to Thomas's blue face!


Sophie and Noah enjoying Spirit day as well.


Sophie with her friend Jessica

The other exciting thing we has this week was a typoon day on Wednesday. Typoon Wipha was supposed to make landfall in Shanghai. The school closed because the Chinese government closed all local schools so they followed suit. Jin Mao Tower where Jon works was also closed so everybody was home for the day. Wipha changed her plans last minute and made landfall south of us so all we had was a bit of rain. Here is a photo of Jon and Noah both hard at work!

finally an update!

This is the Jin Mao Tower office building where Jon spends most of his time.


Sweeping the grass! (This one's for you Dad!)



This is Peabody's forbidden swimming spot.


This is our house.

I can't believe that Aug. 28th was my last posting. Sorry! (For those of you who are checking regularly). Thomas was sent on a mission over the weekend to take some pictures of where we live. These are the results. The pond is just outside the compound but is where Peabody is quite deperate to swim. There is a family (gaggle?) of 6 white geese that swim there and then wander around nibbling on the strange grass.

Things in Shanghai are great. The kids have all settled into a nice school routine. They are all very happy. Thomas is loving touch rugby and can even explain the rules to his mother. Not so hard to understand except you have to throw the ball backwards or sideways while running forward and looking up so you don't crash! I haven't quite mastered the scoring of it but the kids all look like they are having fun so that is what counts!

We are coming up on our first Chinese holiday. The mid autumn festival (even though the weather still feels like mid summer)! As far as I can tell the holiday involves lots mooncakes and not much else. A mooncake is a tasty little flat cupcake that is fill with yummy taste treats like lotus leaves, red bean paste and if you are really lucky salted egg yolk! Where are the chocolate creme filled ones! Dunkin donuts is mising a huge market in China! The compound is holding a BBQ for all the "guests" as we are called, next Sat so we will see if there is more to the holiday that mooncakes.

I had an interesting experience in the grocery store. I was standing in line with my very full cart and a lady came up and started pawing through my stuff, smiling at me the entire time. I guess she was interested in what a westerner was eating for dinner. They are also stunned at how much food I buy at one trip. Families of five are a rarity!

We are enjoying trying out new food. The kids are doing very well, trying food they know prepared differently. They are game for new veggies and fruits as well. Less excited to try eel and jellyfish. Although so was their mother so who can really blame them.

I promise it won't be so long till the next post! Hopefully some of you are still checking!