A Bunch of Burts

My friend Shelley tagged me this meme, What is the fourth picture of your fourth folder on your computer?

Tada!:

This is a not -so-clear picture of one of the day trips we took when our friends were here for Christmas. It is not so easy to take a picture on top of an elephant while it is walking. The roll of their huge shoulders makes for a rather bumpy ride. It moves you around too much.
We discussed how we would NOT like to travel by elephant. Romantic sounding, but not terribly comfortable.

Although this is not the fourth picture, it is a better one of the day.

This is a fun place to go, so if anyone shows up to visit us, hint, hint, hint, we would take you too!

Kathy do you want to play too?

I know, I am terribly pitiful that I did not post anything inbetween WFMW editions, but that is just how it is right now.
As I just recently told someone else, blogging is not one of my spiritual gifts. hahaha.

Each Sunday night, we have an easy dinner and watch a movie together. I am sure this never happens at your house, but between the three kids, and yes the two adults too, we find it difficult to all agree on what movie to watch.

We have come up with a system that works for us.

Each person gets to put their choice into a hat (or other fun receptacle), and then Mom or Dad will reach in and blindly choose the movie for the night.
To keep things fair, whomever had their movie picked must abstain from putting one in the hat the next week until everyone has had their choice.
The person who was chosen from the previous week get to be the ‘puller’ for the next week.

Of course, we as parents, reserve the right to veto choices (before they are put in the hat), based on appropriateness for the whole audience or if we as parents just could not bear to watch a particular movie yet again.

This works for us, now I want to know what works for you! I am heading over to Shannon’s, see you there!

Yes, I have a couple of extra W’s in my title. This week I am posting about What Would Work For Me!

This year, we entered the homeschooling arena. For the past two years our kids attended an international school here in Chiang Mai and we all enjoyed the experience. We pulled them out for this year to become comfortable with the process, before we moved out to a more remote location and helps were less readily available. We have learned many things that do not work for us, and are still ‘getting comfortable’ with the rest of it.

I have discovered what would help.

We have met recently, no less than two–count them two– homeschool helpers/assistants/tutors. (The precise title is fluid depending on the day. )
These intrepid young ladies have left their home countries to live with missionary families to lend a hand with the homeschooling process and help the mom have more opportunities with language and culture learning and involvement with the work of getting the Gospel to those who need to hear.

What a great idea! I want to know where I sign up! Is there some kind of list I can put my name on? Just tell me where, and my name is there.

Do you know Christian young person who would be interested in such an valuable life experience that would give them a look at life overseas, at mission work and perhaps even be able to help them make a decision about their future as well? We would feed them well!
Hey, it does not have to be a young person either, experienced teachers can come too! Wow, wouldn’t that be great!

That would definitely work for me.

Now I am heading to Shannon’s site to see if anyone posted that they know of a bulletin board to find homeschool helpers.

December is always a busy month for us, with both our daughters having birthdays, and of course Christmas!
We were blessed to have guests visiting us this year for Christmas, so we were out and about doing touristy things as well over the week of Christmas.
Here we go, a look at Christmas 2008 in Chiang Mai.

The final touch– Greg placing the angel on top of the Christmas tree.

For our church Christmas party, I was in charge of the treats and sweets making group. Which is pretty funny, because the first year we attended, and I asked if I could bring treats, I was told they eat “food” at their Christmas party, not kanom (sweets), and this year it was an official group! These are just some of the cookies we made, and frosted, and yes, devoured!

A couple of my decorating crew, So-paa and Pilene

Christmas dinner at church, all sorts of tasty curries and stir-frys and other wonderful treats, in addition to the cookies of course!

Sopaa and I getting ready to help serve food, with her darling son, Fineek

Ema had a dancing role in the Christmas program at church, she did great! It is hard to learn the routine when you are not sure what the directions being told to you mean.

This year the Christmas play was an adaptation of “The Three Trees” Zach even had a speaking part. He was a carpenter turning the trees into the manger and boat.

We had good friends come to visit, and so of course did some touristy things as well. An elephant ride is always fun!

Nothing says Christmas like a great big snake draped across your shoulders, right Zach?

Zach is always up early on Christmas morning to dig into that stocking. Our friend Abby is right there with him.

Thanks for the fun gingerbread house Casey! The kids did a great job on it, and enjoyed eating it afterwards as well.

Our kids and the Olson’s, a fun combination!

The church carolers came by on the Friday night after Christmas. They go to everyone’s house in the church and don’t stop until they are done. This year they finished around 5 am. Thankfully, they got to our house just past 11pm.

Of course we had more treats for them.

Hope you had a very Merry Christmas and found Joy in celebrating that Christ has come!