Christmas Eve Update

Merry Christmas Eve!
Sorry these are all out of order again. We are in a huge rush and are going to be late for Christmas Eve dinner over at Katie's place. We still need to stop and buy each other stocking stuffers. But it was worth it to take the time to upload some photos so our families can see what we have been up to.
Our mountain retreat was half great and half kinda of silly and bad. We will write more about it after Christmas.
Tanner didn't blog today but he chose these photos out of the ton we have already taken.
I'll get him to blog soon.

We love you all and miss everyone very much.



Outside the temple we went to was a farmers market. Tanner took some photos. In the center two bins are rabbit's head, a delicacy here in Sichuan.


More shots of the farmers market thingy.



Inside Wenshu Temple, a Buddhist Temple. It's very well kept, and right inside the city.


Outside the library of the temple was a new wall. They are currently carving something into it, probably Buddhist literature. It was great to watch the men at work carving the characters. A monk stopped to watch with us.


Outside the temple in the neighborhood were huge inflatables, I couldn't figure out what was going on. Some kind of small celebration?

Sorry these are out of order again. This a shot of the scenery surrounding the lodge we went to for our retreat. It was beautiful. Both Tanner and I felt very lucky to experience some countryside in Sichuan while he is here.



There was a big going away part for Ben, who is leaving for the States tomorrow. Katie and I both looked nice. Tanner chose all these photos, I guess he didn't want to pick some from the end of the party when things had gotten really out of hand. It was a ton of fun.


Lisa and two of her Chinese friends went out with us to a Hot Pot restaraunt. It was actually okay. Lisa didn't complain about the meat flavor. It wasn't too hot. Tanner didn't get sick. It was mostly vegetables and seafood, so very different from what I am used to. Tanner wants to go again and have the kind I have had before.


Lisa, my roommate, and her friend Kevin at hot pot.


We went to a temple, see above, and outside was a sort of farmers market. This guy was very excited that Tanner stopped to look and was displaying his lovely preserved pig faces for us. Tanner wants you to note the whole chickens hanging from their heads on the right.


This is a shot of the lodge from up the hill a little ways.


Here I am in our room. It was very nice. They were clean and very cute. They had western toilets and fancy sinks. It felt like summer camp for adults to me. It had no heat, like most places here. But it did have a very effective electric blanket.


The dining room was dark. But they provided very good food. Tanner's comments...he doesn't know either. Yeah, good food, good price. Nice lodge.


This is the first photo of the lodge, everyone else is standing out front. We did hike around the lodge the next morning, up the road. It is surrounded by homes and gardens, it's on the outside of a small village. It had nice roads and the houses had scooters, I kept telling Tanner how the living conditions were so much better then Yangjuan, he kept thinking they seemed poor. He did also tell me that the scenery was incredibly beautiful. The hills are covered in a light mist or fog and the gardens are very black with bright green vegetables.






This was taken in People's Park, in front of the pond. It was a beautiful sunny morning and we had a nice walk. We accidentally got off the bus too late, and didn't intend on going here this morning, but I am glad we did.

After the park, in front of Tianfu Square.


Snoopy is all around, and Tanner thinks it's funny. He also wants to comment that there is a lot of Disney stuff, some of it obviously ripped off, and a lot of Pooh Bear. Right after this photo was taken I noticed some girls taking photos of me and Tanner with their camera phones, I guess we are just too good looking.


Jiaozi for lunch the next day. Very good. Tanner liked them. I am trying to get him to blog more. Today we are running out of time and he can reach higher in the closet so he is getting hangers down to hang up our clean clothes.



We went to Peter's Tex Mex for dinner already. I loved it, I ate so much American food. Tanner is fascinated and likes very much my longer hair. So I was shaking out my pony tail to redo it and he wanted to take a photo first.