I certainly didn't think it would take me a month to make my next post from China, but here we are exactly one month later, and I'm just now updating the blog.  Oh, well!  It's been a busy month, and we were without a stable or strong internet connection for most of that month.  We have a new router, and it's been re-programmed (twice) and now we are up and running!

We have been enjoying the beautiful countryside we live in.  We are very close (a few minutes away) to a large river, and at the edge of a small mountain range.  We do not live in the city proper, but on the side of a small mountain.  The view from the school is amazing!  The picture above was taken on the road going down into the city.  The next two pictures are some of the abandoned/unfinished buildings on that road.  Everywhere we go in China, we see literally hundreds of unfinished, abandoned construction projects.

It can be a little depressing, but we also daily see the beauty of God's handiwork around us- an immediate mood lifter!

Let me recap for you some of our activities in the last month:

We attract LOTS of attention wherever we go- foreign children are quite the novelty.  It certainly makes shopping interesting!  This is one of the smaller crowds wanting to see the "beautiful children with big eyes". 

July 1st was the 90th anniversary of Communism, and while we don't particularly care about that, we did enjoy all the festivities surrounding the celebration!  After church on Sunday night, we went down to the riverfront to see the river parade. There are dozens of floats on the river that are lit up at night, and it is beautiful!  It was very crowded, but it seemed to me that we were the only ones watching the parade- everyone else seemed to be watching us!  Rebekah gets completely overwhelmed with the crowding, and Eleanor turns into a little ham (most of the time).  When Anna has had enough, she goes to sleep :)  At one point, I think we had a crowd of over 50 people trying to talk to Eleanor and Rebekah.   I think the main reason the girls liked the parade was the giant balloons Daddy bought them- they still won't let me throw them away!

The girls are keeping busy with kindergarten, playing outside, playing dress-up and going to birthday parties.

James is keeping busy with his classes,

and I am keeping busy keeping up with all of them!

Two more random pictures:  Holiland Bakery - or as we call it- the Holy Land!  They have deeeeelicious pastries and coffee . . .

and the vehicle behind us in a traffic jam a few weeks ago . . . 

 . . . and last, but definitely not least, Anna got her first tooth!  (picture to come soon)