Monkeying around

We had a great week! We went on a new short adventure. The boys had NO IDEA what we had planned. We gave them 5 minutes, told them what to bring and we were off! We took a 2 hour us ride up to Lianyungang,  Huaguoshan Mountain also known as Monkey Mountain. This is where the novel a Journey West was based off of and where the author is from.

From the bus station we took a tuktuk ride to the hotel, the whole family fit inside. The boys were loving it. 

We all fit in...thank goodness we had no luggage

Snug and cozy for our family ride to the hotel

Of course, we started out with exploring the city on foot. Outside one of the malls they had a purple Eiffel tower decorated for Christmas. We had to get a picture of it. At night it looked great all lit up.

The Eiffel Tower in China!

The next day, after arriving to Lianyungang, we went to Monkey Mountain. Once you get a ways up on the mountain the Monkeys come out and they are everywhere. They were pretty fun to see, feed and take pictures of. Jami had the food and they knew it! She had one jump on her and she threw up the oranges we had and ran.

Looks like Jami is teasing but she's not...this one was aggressive and wanted more!

Me feeding a monkey

Ethan getting in on the action

This was a sweet sight. The baby was so cute and the mom took some food from us as well.

Everest chatting with one

Elijah handing an orange to a monkey

How many Monkeys do you see? 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6! SIX!

This was the only sign and it was WAY after the fact that you ran into Monkeys. See below...

I thought this was a perfect picture! Sign reads "Wild Monkeys are not pets. They are naughty and shor-tempered. Please keep away from them for safety"

This is the mountain that we went up and found all the Monkeys. In all we walked/hiked about 10 miles (half of that was UPstairs). We had a good family time!

Some other things that happened this week. I,Jared, was asked to go teach 5 more classes every Friday in the morning. They are only 20 min long and they flew by! They are kindergarten (3-6 year olds) classes with anywhere from 20-30 students in each and they were all very well behaved. I enjoyed teaching and singing with them. I don't have pictures of the classes but as time goes on I'm sure I will get some to post.

Bruce has some potential new students coming into the school and asked Jami to help Lilly (his wife) teach some cooking classes and so we spent a night doing that as well. Elijah met and re-met some girls and they talked his ear off. We all had a good time.

Group photo with the kids that were there.

Jami and I read stories to the kids before the baking began

Elijah not doing much baking with Alison and Roxanne.

Jami helping some of the potential students

Also, this week we taught some tradition of Christmas in preparation for this up coming week. Due to China Law we really can't expound on the REAL Reason for the Season. But we were able to get a bunch of the traditions in there including writing Letters to Santa!

One of Jami's classes writing letters to good 'ol St Nick

My class excited for the chance to tell the "big man" what they want for Christmas!