BLINDED BY THE LIGHT

Christmas season is here! yipee! It's our favorite time of year here in the Huffman House! The tree is up, the garland is on the banister and the house smells of cinnamon. We made sausage balls as our first holiday treat! This year we will be doing an advent wreath as a family for the first time. We are looking forward to anticipating Christ's coming by starting this tradition in our home. My dear husband was educated in the "Kathi Huffman school of Christmas tree lighting" (well, maybe I should say indoctrinated-it's a stronger word and much more aptly describes my husband's level of commitment to proper Christmas tree lighting) As some of you may know, Kathi Huffman has by far the most beautiful trees outside of those Christmas stores at the beach. Well, actually more beautiful if you ask me-some of those can be a little tacky. Well anyway, Andy gets his passion for a blindingly beautiful tree naturally-he is truly Kathi's son. So per usual, our tree is gorgeous. But this comes at a price here in good ole Asia. You see, our power in our house is limited. We can only have about 2-3 appliances going at one time without tripping the breaker. It's part of our daily routine to flip the breaker back on at least once while I am drying my hair. We have learned though that the dryer is the power hoarder and if we turn it off I can successfully dry my entire head of hair without losing power.

Needless to say, our dryer has found it's rival in our tree which is home to about 1500 Christmas lights. It's so beautiful but we can do no laundry and have to sit in the cold (the heaters take the precious power too!) in order to enjoy our tree. Ok, well, I am exaggerating a little...I can turn on a couple heaters with the tree on. But anyway, you get the picture. Our tree, lovely as it is, is causing our laundry pile to get bigger and bigger! We are planning to get our breaker box "upgraded" so it will allow more power to flow into our house. Now I am sure anyone who knows anything about power (like my dad who is an electrician) knows its way more complicated than that...but that's all my brain can comprehend. All I know is that we are getting something changed that will allow me to wash the clothes and play Christmas music and gaze at my tree and be warm and update my blog and...well, maybe that's a lofty goal. I'll be happy with the dryer and the tree on at the same time. But bravo to Mr. Huffman for once again outdoing himself on the lighting! It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

here is a pic of EG in front of the tree!

Fun Family Pic

Thanksgiving with American Pals

Yummy Yummy Yummy! That was our Thanksgiving meal on Thursday with our American freinds who also attend our international Fellowship! We had it all! Turkey, Stuffing, Gravy, Potatoes, Brocoli Casserole, Green Bean Casserole, Sweet Potato Casserole and on and on and on! It was delicious. Just made a toasted Turkey and swiss sandwich with spicy ranch dressing with the leftovers! YUM YUM YUM! Thanks for great food!
I LOVE THIS LITTLE GUY! This is Brayden. He's a twin and one of four Shickley children. Steve and Marlene are our good friends and have been such a blessing to us. When we first got back to China, she would show up at my house (which is about half and hour from hers) with tons of meals for us. We didn't starve during that transition period because of these meals! She is also one of those people who just thinks to bring everything from america. (part of that might be because with 4 kids she gets a total of 12 bags at 70 lbs each! that's a lot of luggage space to fill) She has got me hooked on putting craisins on my salads-which you can't get here!

Here we are hanging out at the Shickleys...Emma Grace is making a grunting face. (you can imagine what she was trying to do!)

Here's Laura and I standing outside watching the kids and Dads play football. Lydia is catching up to Emma Grace is size! They are gonna be great freinds!

The whole crew: LOTS OF KIDS! (maybe we should add a few more to this mix?!)

thanksgiving with our friends

We had a wonderful thanksgiving meal with our friends. The locals really enjoyoed all the yummy american food and we did the "thanksgiving tree" with them as well. We had a lot to be thankful for! Here I am hanging a leaf on the tree at Matt and Laura's house!


We also carved pumpkins with them. One of the great things about living in a foreign country is that you don't have to do things as we do in America. Normally carving pumpkins goes along with Halloween, but they have no idea so carving pumpkins on Thanksgiving makes just as little sense as it does on Halloween. Each foreigner was paired with a local freind. they were very creative in their carving, adding ears and hair! We decided Andy's looks like an evil priest-got the evil face but has the big cross on top. We could only find really tall skinny pumpkins. (how appropriate to have skinny pumpkins in this country, as about 99 percent of this population is thinner than my left arm!)

WHAT AM I THANKFUL FOR?

Last year at Christmas, after all the gifts were opened, I had a shocking and embarassing reaction. I felt sad and disappointed and had this "is that all?" feeling. Now maybe this shouldn't be so shocking to me since I know in my heart that earthly things CANNOT satisfy my deepest longings but yet I so often look to them to do just that. They were never created to satisfy me fully...I am made to look to JC for that and he is more than able to abundantly fill my heart. So after last Christmas, I really began a process of thinking about the way Andy and I celebrate holidays. We have decided to TRY and get back to the real meaning of these celebrations. Now this does not mean there won't be a turkey at Thanksgiving and presents at Christmas or lots of christmas music and movies (which andy and I both love and have already started listening to) It's just that we want to "redeem the traditions" in our house. As Andy says, we want to inject meaning back into the fun things we alreay do in order to celebrate. Like, remembering WHY we decorate...whose arrival are we so excited about? We feel like so often we are just going through the motions during holidays and not really remembering the true meaning. We are currently working on a plan for Christmas, which may or may not include the old fat man. (this comes to the disappointment of most if not all in our family-sorry guys! Actually Aunt Marv is boycotting us because of this, hehe) But all in all we plan to continue many of our fun and meaningful family traditions and add some new ones too. (I have great memories of my mom getting our whole family to say things we were thankful for on Thanksgiving and remembering the pilgrim's story by making a cornicopia with her-mom those things were awesome! And I know Andy has several with his family that help him focus on the meaning behind the holiday too)

The main thing is that we want our hearts and our childrens hearts to long and love the Savior more through these sacred celebrations. That was there original intent. So, here is my FIRST attempt at injecting meaning into the "overstuff yourself and spend 26 dollars on making Kathy Huffman's mac and cheese" holiday we all know and love, Thanksgiving....it's a thanksgiving tree. Now, i must admit I really felt like I was stealing when I cut this branch off the tree in my complex...so maybe my attempts at redemption are only leading me down a darker road. hehe. But anyway, I got this idea out of a magazine. (not the stealing part just the idea for the tree) Every night at dinner (for the week leading up to thanksgiving and the day of) Andy and I write things we are thankful for on little paper leaves and then share them with each other, hang them and spend a little time thanking Dad for them. It's so good for the heart to remember all we have to be thankful for. So often all I can think of is all the stuff in my life I have to complain about. So here's to "redeeming tradition" from our culture and from my own heart that says, "this holiday is all about YOU, ERIN ASHLEY HUFFMAN"

When it's all said and done, I'll let you know what ended up making the tree!

PS....that 26 dollar mac and cheese is awesome...but unfortunately I added too much nutmeg and ruined it. I will leave the mac and cheese making to Kathy Huffman

Oh how far I've come

This blog entry is really written for my grandfather, who has always been very concerned about my abilities (or lack there of )to cook. Others are welcome to read it, hehe...just not sure you'll really be that interested in the progress I've made in the kitchen. You may be wondering what in the world is in the container. Well, it's ricotta cheese. But the amazing thing about this ricotta is that I MADE IT! I needed it for lasagne and can't get it here so I made it myself. The process is actually fairly simple. I just wanted my grandfather, who I love and adore to know that your "little buddy, Lucy" is making progress in the kitchen. It's amazing how much I have learned by living here, where most things have to be made from scratch. We make our own sausage, sour cream, ricotta cheese, and breads. But let me be totally honest, I have yet to ARRIVE in terms of cooking. In the last two months I have managed to explode eggs TWICE. Once in the microwave (never try to boil and egg in the microwave) and once on the stove (never get into a deep conversation with your hubby and forget you have eggs boiling.) Both times I heard a LOUD boom, and went to find (first time) the microwave door blown open and egg all over the inside and the kitchen and (second time) a burnt pot, burnt egg shells in the pot and egg ALL over the place. It wouldn't be right for me to tell you about my successes and not tell you about my failures. But all in all, I am moving forward in the culinary world. yipee. love you paw paw.

Mrs Wen

you may remember us writting about Mrs Wen, our chinese teacher. She is a sweet "chinese mom" to me and a dear sister as well. this weekend we took EG to see her. She was so kind to me when little huffy was making me so sick. She would let me fall asleep on the couch and she and andy woudl contine to have class. She of course loved meeting little huffy in person! She cooked lunch for us and we hung out for a couple hours! It's neat to see her continuing to grow. Dad is good.

5 MONTHS!!!

HAPPY FIVE MONTH BIRTHDAY EMMA GRACE HUFFMAN...ok I gotta run-that's all the posting I can do today! I just heard the Bean waking from her nap.

COKE OR RICE CEREAL?

Well, your little Emma Grace has been eyeing our food as of late so we decided to give her a try at table food. Our first attempt went surprisingly well. she seemed to really like it. However, subsequent tries have not been so successful. She seems NOT AT ALL interested in the cereal (maybe that's because she is more interested in the good stuff-andy gave her a little taste of his coke -so now she is on a cereal strike until we give her more coke!) But oh well, I tried for several days and it all ended up on her instead of in her mouth so I have decided to wait a few more weeks and try again. I figure she doesn't really need it now anyway. She is growing FAST FAST and sleeping great so she seems to be fine without it. Who wouldn't hold out for coke over rice cereal? I know I sure would.

Sorry it's been so long since you've heard from us. We are doing well....just a little busy these days. Andy and I just hosted a murder mystery party. It was a blast but for the past week I have been pretty busy cutting out fake money, decorating our house and nailing down all the details for the night. A murder msytery party is a game in which everyone invited plays a role in a story. Our story was as follows: Don and Meme Wannabe (Andy and I) were hosting the grand opening of the FOUR DUCES, a night club in 1920's chicago. We invited all the mafia bosses and their families to attend. However, at the beginning of the evening, Don "Big Jim" Ravioli" was murdered. We spent the night tyring to figure out who did it! The inspector came and presented evidence. Over a night of cards, yummy food (spinach and bacon stuffed mushrooms, Balsamic and blue cheese salad, lemon chicken and pasta, and chocolate cheesecake) and games, we interroagted each other to find possible motives. in the end we all cast votes for best costume, best performer and who we thought was the murderer. Turns out it was Big Jim's daughter who killed her pappa because she was secretly married to sly sleeze and didn't want to be forced to marry her Dad's boss, the Capo, from the NY mafia. Although we were faking murders, it was a silly and really fun night. Everyone got really into the game and the costumes were awesome. We bought them at this "everything under the sun" market here in our city. There is no way we could've afforded this party in america. That's a small benefit of living in china. Where in the world besides here can you find a white tie like the one andy has on and only pay a dollar fifty for it?!


MURDER AT THE FOUR DUCES-The whole crew! Rebecca Ravioli (marlene, a friend from our fellowship) was the murder! She is wearing the white boa.

Big Jim and Vicky Ravioli, The Capo Tequilla, Vanessa Crooner, The Baroness Ravioli
John and Alisa Greene, David Dean, Ellie Wilson, Marianne Dean

Don and MeMe Wannabe-owners of the Four Duces! Loving that stache Don (it's acutally andy's real hair-he shaved his beard and colored his moustache with mascara-he told me, "for my first time using mascara I think I did pretty good!) I got my hair done at a chinese place nearby. they did a really good job. I was going for the fingerwave look.


Emma Grace is doing great. She is sleeping like a champion. I decided to wean her. Here she is holding her own bottle. doesn't she think she is a big girl now!

Home...Finally!

Well we've had quite a busy week! Emma Grace and I left last Friday for a quick trip to Bangkok for her 4 month shots. We went with Laura and Lydia. We 4 girls had a GREAT time...the shots went as well as shots can go and the food and sunshine were fantastic. It was 90 degrees there! We returned late Sunday night and then left again on Tuesday for a group retreat. Also fun! We went to a hotel that is near some hot springs (fairly common in this part of the country) There were several pools which were filled with hot springs water-which is really comfy when its 50 degrees outside! We went swimming several times. Andy braved the outdoor pool when it was sunny but I stuck to the indoor pool. Strong man Andy in the pool....

The big news for us is Emma Grace's 12 hour nights. She has been going to bed about 7 and getting up at 7! WOOHOO! It's awesome. She only eats four times a day now. At 7, 11, 3 and 7 (I am sure no one but the grandparents will care about these details) It's amazing how far we've come in the last four months. She has changed so much...going from eating 8 times a day to now only 4 times! Here she is bundled up for an afternoon nap. She fell asleep on my shoulder at lunch and we put her down in her hat, bib and all!

My life is a LOT easier these days. Our helper, precious precious Xiao Li also started working for us today. It was sooo nice to have her around and she is amazing with kids. She will indeed be a HUGE blessing for us. I am praising God for her! He knew exactly what we needed and she was so worth the wait. I can't wait for you guys to meet her when you come over! I got my hair cut pretty short today. will try to post a pic soon. I was really tired of it and decided to get it chopped. I think I like it but you can't really ever tell if you like it until you wash it and fix it yourself. Currently it looks pretty bad as she did not style it after she cut it. Unfortunately, my hairdresser is leaving for a year so I am not sure what I'm gonna do from now on...Andy, get those scissors ready! HEHE.

Here are the Huffmans on our retreat, all bundled up!