As predicted, December is shaping up to be a busy month. We like this time of year, of course, but it takes some planning and organization to keep from becoming too overloaded. Things at work are starting to slow down as we are emerging from a really busy period in the year during our planning of the budget for 2015, so that helps. But we had a lot of other things going on this week - here are a few of the highlights.
Luke has been participating in the Men's Chorus at school - they practice every Wednesday morning at 7 AM, right before school.
On Thursday night there was a choir concert in school, and Luke's group performed two numbers...
...and then joined all the choirs and the orchestra in a performance of the Hallelujah Chorus at the end.
On Saturday Grant and Luke participated with their team in the Santa Splash swim meet at another international school here in Shanghai.
Both Grant and Luke did well, improving their times in most events. Grant even beat his school's record in the 400M Freestyle.
On Saturday evening Heidi and I went to a Christmas party with some people from our church. During the white elephant gift exchange I had to give up this adorable hat when someone stole it from me....
...but I was thrilled when I was able to come home with this gift - matching his and hers tooth/claw necklaces.
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We got out the Christmas decorations on Monday night.
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It took a while to figure out where all the Christmas decorations should go in our new house.
Everyone enjoyed finding their favorite Christmas decorations.
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The honor of topping the Christmas tree off went to Luke this year.
The boys had a youth activity at church, which also included a white elephant gift exchange. Luke was happy with his cloth toilet seat cover.
Grant liked his Potty Putter golf set.
On Saturday morning (Dec 6th), Samichlaus came and filled our shoes with candy and presents.
Luke....likes taking pictures of himself.
Mallory has been taking piano lessons every Thursday morning before school, from a teacher at the school. She had her first recital this afternoon.
She played the Pink Panther theme and Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy.
A few of Luke's antics this week.
