a lovely birthday evening.

papa john's pizza (with garlic butter) + american chocolate cake + rum & cokes + games afterwards = a fun birthday night.

november 30th marks the birth of aaron, my fellow foc teacher at the wuhan foreign language school. several members of our wuhan team enjoyed a lovely night of feasting, bonding, and celebrating our dear friend.

monte cristo.

julie and i were invited to watch our former students from our old school perform 'the count of monte cristo'. the performance (which was also somehow a competition) was scheduled to begin at 6:30pm, but was suddenly bumped up to 5:30pm at the very last minute; thus, all our hopes of catching up with our past students were crushed. nonetheless, we sat in our plushy chairs watching the show occasionally catching what was being spoken only in chinese. we stayed for about two of the fours hours, but it was definitely worth it ... especially since we stopped for some amazing american food on our way home.

soli deo gloria.

a wuhan thanksgiving.

so, after all the pie making and 'thanksgiving celebrations' in class (i never got any of the pie ...), i was quite ready for a true thanksgiving feast/gathering. the post-thanksgiving sunday was certainly worth waiting for. our wuhan group put together a potluck-style meal of tasty, tasty thanksgiving goodness. i hope and pray your thanksgiving was as wonderful.

soli deo gloria.

sharing the joy.

i love thanksgiving.

i love everything about thanksgiving. i love the excuse to eat too much, to gather with the whole family, to thank god for all the blessings in my life, and so on. i just absolutely love it. however, i felt like i missed so much of the thanksgiving cheer last year. although our foc group all got together, eating foods like spaghetti and tacos just didn't cut it for me. this year, i took active steps to avoid missing the wonderfulness of thanksgiving. how did i do that? well, i baked and baked and baked for an entire week. why did i do this? because my students have never eaten apple pie; because no other teacher would have done something like this. i baked three apple pies for each and every one of my 17 classes. although the baking part wasn't extremely fun, seeing their faces after telling them about the pie and seeing their reactions after eating it made it completely worth every 'mao'/penny. the students were so surprised and so, so thankful. students even asked to come over to learn how to do it. i told them that i needed all the help i could get, so several groups of girls came over to assist in the pie making. i must admit, i was quite touched by this. i'm so thankful for the students i have this year; they make my job so much easier.

pie count: 47 down; at least 9 more to go.

soli deo gloria.

garden outing.

i love finishing school early. on wednesdays and thursdays, i'm finished before noon. pretty awesome. i love the opportunities this gives me - to go back to sleep, to get stuff done around the house, to have lunch with friends, to watch a movie in the afternoon. endless possibilities.^^

well, on this particular thursday, a group of us went to a garden/park and then to a museum. all in all, a lovely early afternoon adventure.

soli deo gloria.

the man of the house.

meet my little man, romulus.

he comes from a dingy, dirty alley market about ten minutes from my home.
the pet allies here are really quite sad. so many animals (fish, turtles, birds, chipmunks, squirrels, mice, hamsters, bunnies, kittens, puppies) are locked up in the tiniest of cages. people just poke and prod these little creatures; the allies are full of their cries and yelps. i knew that walking down this alley would make me depressed, but i was set on coming out with a pet.

but, anyways, that's where i found my little rom. i had looked at twenty-some cages full of little bunnies, but none stood out to me. finally, i saw the only one of a different color. when i asked the seller about the gender, he grabbed the bunny by the head and viciously flipped over his flailing body. i knew that i had found my bunny.

(bunny + cage + food + toys = $10)

once i got him home and settled in, he was terrified of me. when i would reach out to touch him or when i would even walk into the room, he would fall over on his side. i began to tell friends and students about my new pet. almost all of them responded with, 'i had a bunny once, but it died after [insert a short amount of time].' only a couple days in and i was already beginning to doubt my purchase.

but, as time went on, he got better. now, he's friendly, he's curious, he's bursting with energy, and he's potty-trained.

so, that is the story of my rommy.

english name: romulus
chinese name: 小狮子 ('xiǎo shīzi = 'little lion.')
current age: about 3 months
nicknames: rom, rommy, scrom, scromatron, romen noodle, romadan ... and so, so many more.

soli deo gloria.

a month gone by.

wow, i'm a terrible blogger.
depending on the day or the week, i have a large amount of free time. (it helps that i live at my job.) it seems like i would be better at keeping the world up to date on my little life events, but, no, somehow that always seems to get pushed to the end of the to-do list. well, i'll just give you some october/early november highlights in no particular order.

- i traveled. (see previous posts.)
- i ate a rather large amount of pizza this month. no complaints.
- i've met a lot of new study friends.
- i was asked to 'wash' my friend sometime in the future.
- i carved a small pumpkin. (i only gave it eyes.)
- i got a wonderful little bunny, romulus.
- i introduced 450 chinese students to 'hocus pocus.'
- i celebrated halloween at ktv with 40 friends and costumes.
- i went to an amazing university talent show.
- i had a few days of no school. days to relax = needed.
- i bought an ipad2.

... and that about sums it up. soli deo gloria.