Indoctrination

We admit it; we are shameless. For those of you not raised in the Great State of Michigan (MEEEeee - Shi - Gan), there is THE University of Michigan and there is the rest. : ) Actually, we are fortunate to have many great public institutions of higher learning so put your heckles down, foks. However, Jim and I went to U of M as did some other members of Marie's family. So, this house bleeds Maize and Blue and, conveniently, we do not care for basketball!

For indoctrination or motivation to work, we think it must be applied consistently and early. Here are our first attempts to sway Marie to the Maize and Blue.

Big Bird Has Competition

I always wondered what the excitement was over Thomas the Train. It's a TRAIN. How not exciting is that? But I get it now. It's not the toy; it's the Daddy. Daddy loves Thomas and is into trains. He is great at playing choo-choo. Daddy makes Thomas exciting. Today Daddy brought home some Valentines for his little girl. Guess what it was? Not Princess Disney/Dora/Barbie...rather it was coloforms of Thomas and My First Story Reader Thomas books.



She thought she was in H-e-a-v-e-n.



If you have 2 minutes, enjoy it with her.

Fab in Feb

Chinese New Year

Marie celebrates Happy New Year with her friends!

Our Ancestor Table. The Blank Frame is for the ancestors we do not know.

Spicy Shrimp Noodles and General Tso's Chicken. Traditional gifts for the children in the blue bowl.

Marie enjoying herself at China Fair restaurant. She was the hit of the place in her outfit!

Wow...I can tell you why almost every Chinese person is thin... they expend more energy cooking the meal than eating it. After our Chinese New Year celebration tonight, our friend Scott was generously doing the dishes and he commented, "HOW did you use so many dishes in making this?" Referencing the PILES of bowls and pans that were in the sink. We tried to explain that there were the dishes for the peanut sauce, for the shrimp marinade, for cooking the shrimp, for the shrimp noodle salad and then for the General Tso's chicken....we won't go into all that. AND I made the rice beforehand and the egg rolls were from a box! It takes a lot to make a chinese dish from scratch. Fortunately, our friend Pete is a chef and helped quite a bit in getting everything cooked. I can't imagine how things would have turned out with out him!
Anyways, we had a great time. We had some nice decorations and our ancestor table. We talked about how we honor our ancestors during this time and the blank frame represents Marie's ancestors who we do not know. We gave our friends gifts of chocolate money to bring them good luck this year and had sparklers to end the night. Marie had an absolute blast! She had a difficult time falling asleep because she was so worked up. Marie would like to wish you all a Happy New Year!!!