Es Car Go!

Kate had her first snail!  Her friend showed her how it was done first.  14 times.  

I had to try one too, of course. The texture was firmer than I had anticipated. Unfortunately, this did not help the tastiness factor. 

Another young and naive friend decided he would hide a snail in Mike's burrito (Yes, he ordered a burrito) while he was away from his plate. I was able to avert this suicidal disaster just in time.  Or maybe it was homocidal, because if Mike found out he had accidentally eaten snail, I honestly believe he might have died. 

Welcome Year of the Goat!

So Chinese New Year happened.  It's a big deal here that lasts 2 weeks.  This year's mascot is a goat/ram, which just happens to be my Chinese zodiac sign!  I thought this was pretty cool until I found out that every year your animal comes up will be an unlucky year.  However, one can stave off this unluckiness by wearing something red that was given to you by an elder.  So feel free to hook me up, older friends and relatives!

I took the kids to China town to see all the decorations and hopefully catch a lion dance.  It was a mad house.  They closed several streets to accommodate the masses, but many cars didn't like it, so the tried to drive down the streets anyway.  Usually in "man vs. car" the car wins, but "car vs. hoards of people" results in a stalemate with a lot of honking and yelling but no movement.

So I took some pictures and got out of there. Behold:

 

Kate and Faith's Chinese teacher helped them make some New Year decorations.

 

 

 

 

 

 

For CNY day, we went to the zoo and watched a lion dance:

 

Probably the kids' favorite part of CNY is that adults hand out little red envelopes filled with money to kids.  :)

Crime and punishment

Jace disapproves of kissing.  Whenever he sees Mike kiss me, he threatens to tell our parents so they'll spank us.  We make a point to kiss in front of him often, and he makes a point to cover his eyes and make gagging noises. 

Just now in the car, the loathsome topic of kissing came up, and Jace said, 

"If you guys kiss, I'm going to punch you in the face!"

We all laughed, then I told Jace he really shouldn't say things like that, even if he's joking.  He replied:

"I'm not joking. I'm really going to do it."