Home Again Home Again, Jiggity Jig

He is home!!!!!  After 6 1/2 months of illness, 2 medevacs, losing the ability to walk, double vision and blindness in one eye, (lost count) doctor appointments, (again too many to count) blood pulls and IVs, 1 IVIG, 6+ MRIs, 2 spinal taps, 3 Physical Therapy sessions, 15 days in 2 different hospitals, in 2 different countries, 4 months of medication, 3 months living with Grandma, 1 month waiting for clearance, 6 flights (2 of which he flew solo, including the one back home). and millions of prayers and fasts he has made it home!!!!

The official diagnosis. . . unknown.  

We made it through this time due to our HUGE support system!  Friends, family, acquaintances, and even perfect strangers went out of their way to provide help, information, doughnuts, moral support, places to stay, food to eat, love, hugs, phone calls, blessings, rides, cars, visits (I even had a cousin who flew in from Australia to visit for a few hours before flying back home again!) and gifts.  If you are reading this I am talking about you!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ were aware of us and sent angels our way.  It is due to their mercy and love that Duncan has been able to fully recover.

The other boys find it hard to be sympathetic as they were stuck here at home going to school.  We tell them if they are willing to go through the same treatment then maybe we'll consider letting them have the same experience.

Thank you!!!  Thank you!!! Thank you!!!

Christmas Is A Coming . . .

Thanksgiving in China was spent like any other day.  Lane had work off, but the boys went to school like any other day.  We had a nice dinner Thanksgiving style, although with chicken instead of turkey.  We usually have ham but since we had plenty of chicken on hand . . .

Our Christmas parties have already come and gone.  Due to heavy travel plans, parties are scheduled early.  Which also means they hit the same day.  No complaining was heard for the back to back holiday celebrations.

Out And About

Often we finding our selves jumping on a bike or going for a walk, often last minute to see tucked away corners of Beijing.  Drake in front of the Bell Tower. 

Zoo

Temple of Heaven

Forbidden City

Qianmen Street

One day while biking to a new found market we passed this guy and asked Drake, "what is that?"  Fully expecting him to say Shi zi or lion we were surprised by his "reindeer" answer.  Can't blame him with at least five different animals represented.

Mr. President

President Trump recently toured through Asia making time to speak with the families of those who work at the Embassy here in Beijing.  Guy and Grahm took the day off of school for this once-in-a-lifetime experience.  Children were seated on bleachers and were photographed with the President and First Lady after the speech.  Guy was in the perfect spot to be able to shake his hand.  Both boys were surprised by the fact that, "he looks just like he does on TV!"  Both boys are directly behind the President and First Lady.

Great Grahm

 The Great Wall

My dad and a co-worker of my dad's + I took a hike at the Great Wall.

We went from number 6 tower to number 13-14.  On the way back a mad swarm of yellow jackets came madly after me and I killed some too. This picture below is me in a toboggan.  We took it because it is extremely fun.

This is when we met U.S Marines for scouts. Everyone who wanted to got to handcuff someone.  We even put on bags.  And they were pretty heavy trust me. 

 

  These three pictures are all about my field trip to Day Star Academy, to play "Football" against other schools.  Team A lost two matches and won three so we got the silver cup for our school.  There were two teams from my school, one that was team A, that was my team, we had very good players on our team. 

FYI

More back story of our pathway to China.

Years ago Lane and I ended up going to London on a trip.  Although we were dating others at the time, this trip became a bench mark for us.  A few months later we began dating again (as we dated years earlier in High School).  London was a blast, and as the trip drew to a close we talked about the possibility of another trip.  Winner was China!  Of course life, college, marriage, kids, jobs and other trips distracted us.  Fourteen short years later we finally made it! 

I thought some of you might like to know that Guy (the one family member most against us living here) has signed himself up for multiple after school activities, including orchestra, a play, ping pong, kickboxing, volleyball and cross country (not all at the same time).  

 

For Chinese class he had to do a video of himself giving a tour of our apartment (in Chinese of course!)  It was voted overall best by both the teachers and students.  It may have helped that Drake popped up in the middle and asked, "Guy what are you doing?"  

One last funny story about Guy.  A month back the school had a day honoring itself.  Various activities were planned, and Guy kept me abreast of the preparations.  The day of, he came home to tell me what a waste it had been and how it wasn't fun at all.  Just a week or two ago the school sent a link with photos of the day.  I found a whole series of Guy and his good friend fully participating in cheering on other house members.  They were standing above the crowd with the biggest smiles I have ever seen.  Hmmm.  I had to verify with him again just how much he hated that day.  Every picture of him showed him sporting a smile.  Here is one with him smack dab in the center.

 

Boo To You

Happy Halloween

Drake-Scooby Doo

Grahm-Fred

Amber-Velma

Duncan-Shaggy 

Guy-with his Mexican skeleton mask he made at Young Mens.

Although Halloween isn't an official Chinese holiday we were still able to get in three parties/trick-or-treating events.  Here is our apartment ready to receive ghosts and goblins.

All Guy

At the beginning of the Exploring China school Trip to Moganshan, everybody in year 9 met at the school campus at 6:00 am for check in, loaded the buses and left for the train station. It was a 5 hour train ride to Shanghai, and a 2 hour bus ride to arrive at our destination.

When we arrived to our final destination, we unpacked and did a little compass orientation activity around the little village we were in. We listened to speeches by our trip leaders of schedules and upcoming activities after dinner and then went to bed. The next morning mostly everybody was up early.

After some pictures and breakfast, we separated into permanent groups and separated to do different activities. The first two activities that my group did were cooking and basket weaving, in the Moganshan way.

The next day, the day before we left, we hiked the whole day, it was fun. We hiked up two mountains, and hiked on the road for 1 hour.

The next set of pictures were a recent Young Mens camp out in a village near the Great Wall. It was very cold and beautiful with all the trees changing to autumn colors.

We had a half hour hike up to the wall from our camping spot, we had to carry everything during the long hike, so we tried to eat most of the food for dinner the night before.

Point 14 was the first tower we reached. On the top there were a lot of camera people taking shots of the beauty around us. Our five person group had two young men, and three leaders, one of the young men leaders did a similar camp/hike trip at the wall 3 years earlier. Point 14 was were they slept. If you faced the little village we stayed at on top of 14, on the left, the mountains were filled with low clouds and pollution. On the right it was the exact opposite. It was clean and had fresh air.

                                                       
                                                        

This was the steepest section of the wall we hiked. Slippery stone on a steep angle. We almost pulled out a tarp to sit on to slide down the wall. You had to hug the wall with all your might and edge slowly down.

We hiked all the day from our camping spot all the way to the restored part of the wall. We took the famous toboggan slide down after a desperate bathroom break at the wall. Before we left in the didi, we had several hamburgers or chicken sandwiches at Burger King.

By, Guy