Christmas in Chiayi

I thought I'd better post about our Christmas quickly before we reach the New Year!

I really missed being home for Christmas, but with my team had a special day here in Taiwan. Christmas Eve I went to the Dodds and participated in a short Christmas play and played my viola for some carols. It turned out to be a really nice evening with a great turnout of people - there were about 50 people there! Once we arrived back home, we opened all our Christmas gifts. Here are some pictures from our Eve:

Ruthie & me in front of our Christmas tree.

Presents!

Ruthie, Jessica & me with our stockings.

Sarah...

A new hot chocolate mug! Yummy!

Lauren & Sarah

Christmas Day I had to teach. An-Dung, my Monday morning school, let me bring my viola to play some Christmas songs for the students and they let me tell the real Christmas story to my Grade 6 classes! I knew that the Lord was at work as I told the story and had the attention of the students, my Chinese co-teacher, and the school's security guard. I told about the events surrounding Christ's birth, and then went on to say that although he was wonderful, some people did not like him and killed him. But Jesus is stronger than death! And Jesus is alive today. He lives in heaven! At this point I had to finish, so we all sang "Happy Birthday" because Christmas is the celebration of Christ's birth. I hope that some seeds were planted there.

In the evening, we prepared a sort of Christmas dinner, like our Thanksgiving dinner only this time we had cranberry sauce.

Ruthie testing gravy...

Merry Christmas, everyone!!

(and now it is Happy New Year!!)

Love,

Christy