My tomb-sweeping Monday

(Making Rice Krispy treats in Jodi's apartment with my student and two of Jodi's students).

Hooray for little random holidays! Apparently tomb-sweeping holiday was a holiday a long time ago, but the communists got rid of it because it was "too feudalist." Now it's back! The holiday is sort of like Memorial Day in the States. People go to their relatives' or ancestors' tombs to clean them and pay respects. The government has reinstated this special little holiday, because they are afraid now that Chinese society is going to the other extreme of not being traditional enough. Thus, we have tomb-sweeping holiday this weekend.

The past couple of days I just hung out with a special student, went to fellowship, played many games of speed Scrabble to ward off my deteriorating vocabulary skills, and went on little errands.

Today it is actually sunny and warm outside without too much pollution. So it's a good day! This morning I just called a lot of people on Skype to chat. Later today I'll probably go skating. Oh, and I should finish those lesson plans... :)

In other news, I found out today that I can stay at Blue Sky next year, if everything works out! I was going to transfer into another program with our organization, but it just didn't feel like a good fit right now. Somehow everything is fitting together, though, so that Jodi and I can stay for another year at our university. That's amazing news, because we can continue many of our carefully-built relationships. We can also have maybe three more weeks at home this summer, too, which would be great!

So right now I'm just very excited about lots of things happening. He is in control, and it amazes me how He is in both the details and the big things in life. So I hope you are encouraged!!

I'm leaving you with a strange little video Jodi took of me when we were walking to dinner the other night. There's always crazy music blasting on the streets around here, and you can't help but dance to it. And note the Chinese girls in the background who steer clear of this scene.