Christmas

We had a fun and busy Christmas this year. Gabe didn't get up early on Christmas morning. We figure this is the last year he'll sleep in. He very much enjoyed opening the gifts that you all sent to him. Thanks very much. We had church on Christmas morning as well. It was a very small casual service. People sang songs and told stories. It felt more intimate than our church ever has. On our way to church we dropped off one of the teachers from Grace at the hospital. This teacher has had a recurrence of cancer recently and I've been going with her to her appointments. The teacher had made Christmas plans but felt ill on Christmas morning. After church we picked her up from the hospital again and she was well enough to join us for Christmas lunch which was just leftovers from our Christmas Eve dinner. I don't know what tastes better. The original meal or the leftovers. During the afternoon we prepared the gifts for the kids at Baan Burt Faa orphanage. Since this is the second year we've done it I guess it's now our Christmas tradition. You can see from the picture why Gabe loves going there so much. He's like a little celebrity there. They follow him like a king, give him whatever he wants, do whatever he wants and he just soaks up the attention. Anyway, thanks so much for all the money you sent for their Christmas. We bought sports equipment and art equipment for the kids in addition to some food and the usual school supplies. We spent more than we had intended so the money you gave helped out a lot. Pradip (the orphanage father) tells me that they have enjoyed the gifts a lot.

The day after Christmas we went down to Bangkok for a little break. It's been ages since we had a vacation by ourselves. This entry is already too long so I'm writing more and putting more pictures on my own blog. The picture above is a sign that we ran across in Bangkok.

By the way, it's good to hear from you all again.