This was a cool experience for the kids. Another place we didn’t know about until close to the end of our time in Guilin. A friend told us about it, and we went with his family. The kids got to make magnets starting from a block of wood, tracing their design, cutting, shaving, sanding, and finally painting. Pretty cool.

This was a neat place that was developed and opened for climbing by a friend of ours during our last year or so in Guilin. He asked David to help do some rock climbing coaching for him, and we were able to spend many a hours here with locals – spending time with them, encouraging them, and that’s how relationships begin!

Another cool thing that the kids were able to do in Guilin was study watercolor painting in a beautiful setting with a wonderful teacher! She lived in a beautifully renovated village home near our apartment and the kids loved the animals that came with the territory. They usually did class the first hour and played the second hour. She would always have them write a story behind their painting and then make a keepsake like the three at the bottom. Pretty cool.

This last picture is a testimony of God’s protection, ONCE AGAIN, over Caden. The kids were sitting outside drawing and Caden fell off the bench backwards onto the concrete below. It was about 5 feet! It’s miraculous that he didn’t land on his head. He came away without a scratch.

One cool thing the kids learned in their Chinese school was how to make stuff with their hands. Their craft teacher from school resigned this past year though, and the kids all really missed her. She was super great and willing to come to our house and keep teaching the kids though. This was something we looked forward to each week. And who knew you could make such cool stuff with wool? You would start with the loose wool and use a needle to shape it – making shallow pricks and stabs in the wool causing it to stick together and take shape. Really neat!

Colt had expressed interest in paragliding, so a friend asked if we wanted to go watch. I didn’t even know this existed within 30 minutes of our home in Guilin?! It was a super cool experience (we only watched), but it also was pretty amazing to see the power of the wind on the tip top of that mountain. We did see a guy catch a bad wind on his takeoff and crash into the trees. That was enough for me to never want to try it. Colt didn’t seem deterred though.

Just walking home and pass someone “walking their llama.” Oh the things you will see in China.

The translation of signs in China always cracked me up. . . sometimes I couldn’t resist taking a picture!

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Well it has been ENTIRELY too long since I posted on here. . . not even sure if anyone will still check it! But, for our memories sake I think the most doable option at this time is to post the past few months as “monthly recaps.” Ain’t nobody got time to sit down and do 500 different blog posts! haha

February was when this country officially went on lockdown because of Covid-19. Even though it was probably already all of the world by that point, all of the focus of the news was here. . . Honestly, I think it was handled really well here. The govt. required everyone to wear masks when going out (and everyone did). There were mask shortages everywhere so I posted some pics of peoples’ ingenuity You were to avoid going out for risk of exposure unless it was an emergency. Everything was shut down and NO ONE was out (for 3 months it was a ghost town) – – this was so strange since we are used to crowds everywhere in a country with such a large population. There was no chaos. No shortages of items in the stores. . . Even though our initial decision to stay carried a tad bit of fear from the unknown of how people would react during an epidemic and possible food shortages, we didn’t experience any of that. Very VERY thankful we stayed put or we would be uprooted from our life and routine for an unspecified amount of time since the borders are now closed for foreigners to come in.

We did a lot of homeschool, got super creative (since we decided a while ago not to have a TV or let our kids play with devices – I always tell my kids, “It’s good to be bored – being bored brings creativity!”), planted a garden, raised some new pets (3 hamsters and 5 ducks), and went to some remote mountains (in our city of course or we would have to quarantine) for fresh air and exercise. Covid-19 forced extended quality family time, and we met so many neighbors playing outside – with our masks of course (all being home all the time). So, while it has wreaked fear and havoc all over the world. . . it has also brought some good. I hope you have experienced some of the good too!

(This first pic of kids back at school was actually from April after 3 months of strict lockdown and no new cases in our city for over month)

We were able to spend Chinese New Year with Liu De Hai and his family this year thanks to a new fast train line being opened from our city directly to theirs. It only took about 4.5 hours! Previously, it would have taken a regular train and then a bus with a total trip time of 14-16 hours. . . so we hadn’t ventured to do that. It has been a couple of years since we have seen them, and it was so good to be together!

The kids had a blast and didn’t want to leave! However, the Coronavirus scare started while we were there and public transportation started to get shut down, so we were thankful to be able to make it home!