More Birthday Pics

I realized that I made a mistake on my last entry. I originally meant to put up more pictures and never did, so what I said doesn't make much sense. I said I was going to put up some birthday pictures from the parties I had and I only put up pictures from one of them. So here is a picture from another party and some pictures of the presents and cakes.Some of my friends/students (the ones from the last post) made these for me. I'm not sure what you call these exactly, but they are little plastic stars (in Chinese, it's xing xing) and they are very difficult to make, so it was extremely nice of them to give them to me. I can't imagine how long it must have taken to make so many! Many students are very impressed when they see them on my table. The picture below is also from the same students. They are those paper swans or cranes...we call it origami, in Chinese its called zhi he.

These are from two Chinese sisters. They are really cool girls - Star and Linda. They made these for me out of leaves! Unfortunately they've dried up rather quickly, but it was a neat idea.

Birthday Parties

Here are some pictures from some of the birthday parties that I had with different students. It was really special to me. Almost all of the gifts that I received from students this year were homemade, which was really cool, because I knew they spent a lot of time making them. As you can see, it turned into a traditional Chinese party - what with all the icing on the face and such. Typically not the kind of thing I dig...but with these guys, I didn't mind at all. I was glad they felt comfortable enough with me to let loose and be crazy.