The Joseph family had another fun-filled weekend, focused on celebrating Eli's 5th birthday--his second bday to celebrate in China! After taking cupcakes to his classmates at school (there are 10 of them total, all super-cute, and I totally forgot to take a picture when I was there!) and enjoying time with him during his school snack time, I had a whole new appreciation for his teacher and her immeasurable amount of patience. I think all 10 voices were going at once during most of the half-hour I was there--all with their own thoughts, ideas, and topics. It was so fun to see and be a part of that aspect of his world for just a brief time, and I couldn't be more thrilled with the educational environment that he is getting to be a part of!
Friday evening, Eli chose to invite two of his best friends here and their families (one from his class at school and one from his home school co-op group he was a part of this past year) to meet us at the Trash Mountain park and have a pizza picnic dinner. There were 17 of us there (who were invited, and countless other curious Chinese families wanting to participate as much as we'd let them!), so the party was great and the playtime really fun for the kids. We used one of our favorite Chinese bday tricks--the exploding/singing flower candle--on Eli's cake (you can see it in the photo).
The weather this past week has been a lot cooler, and we are loving it! I hate to sound pessimistic, but the one bummer is that with this change in seasons, I am reminded that winter is right around the corner. And that fact honestly makes my stomach drop a bit! As much as we had to be thankful for this past year, Kevin and I both agree that the winter time was by far the hardest season for us, being so unaccustomed to the extreme cold and how difficult it made getting out of the apartment. I was thinking of how different my 30 minute walk to take Hudson to his pre-school will be while wearing Noah on my back in the Ergo carrier about a month (or less!) from now. We're trying to soak as much outside bike riding and exploring time as we can before the real cold sets in!
I know we're not the only ones thinking of the weather change. I noticed two different people out yesterday (both Chinese) who had similar circular marks on their bodies (one on their back and the other on her neck). I thought they might be some sort of tattoo, but then realized they were the marks left from "cupping"--a typical Chinese practice here when the weather starts getting colder. It's been explained to me that in order to rid your body of the cold air (which is thought to cause a huge number of health issues), you somehow heat up and put cups with steam in them all over the back side of your body. This supposedly works to suction out the bad, cold air. I don't totally understand the process, but it is apparently being widely practiced as many of our friends are fairly regular "cuppers"!
On Saturday, we had about 12 friends over (Chinese) for a dinner and movie night. We watched "Chariots of Fire" with Chinese subtitles, then had a great time of discussion afterward. Oh, and Kevin had arranged for us to have our own mini-Olympics before the movie time! We took turns shooting at targets (using one of the kids nurf guns), shooting baskets, and trying to roll a beach ball into a certain taped-off area (the hardest of the games!). Our friends LOVE playing games, so they all had a great time interacting before we sat for the movie. The discussion turned to more serious topics: life and it's purpose, what our motivation is for things we do, etc. At the end of the evening we felt like the night was a success in that everyone had had a great time and we are hoping to do a repeat again soon.
Sunday afternoon was spent having lunch with friends after church then heading home for Kevin to write a paper for school and me to prepare for the week. We had agreed that Karis and Eli could go outside for a "playdate" with some of our neighbors who we have just met. They are Korean twin sisters (the moms) who both have 8 year old daughters. Karis and Eli had a great time playing with the girls (who spoke a little bit of English and Chinese, too) and I had a fun hour and a half of language practice trying to communicate (in Chinese) with their parents! One of the things I've struggled with a little is how much time to invest in new friendships with neighbors, especially Korean ones. It seems that they are super eager to spend time with westerners (I think I had at least 4 or more invitations to do things with these two families just in our hour and a half of talk time yesterday!), but our time is so limited as it is! Also, there are still quite a few days I feel overwhelmed trying to figure out Chinese culture, and even with all they have in common, there are still a ton of differences in the Korean culture. All that to say, thinking of trying to dive in to learning and investing in yet another culture right now just kind of overwhelms me! And yet, how to have a balance of not wanting to be cold or disengaged with those who are brought around us. Hmmmm..... Sure there will be more on this dilemma in the future!
