It was a once-in-a-lifetime adventure which we followed with great interest. It's not everyday that you get an email "From the Yangtzee River in China". They took thousands of photographs (on digital cards), and hours of video footage.
Along with their having seen amazing sights and touring silk and cloissone factories, as well as seeing the Great Wall of China...they got to take an all-night sleeper train across the country! Amazing memories, for sure.
When they returned home, my sister sent out care packages.
Inside mine was this gorgeous serving bowl.
One time since moving into this house did I ever remember mentioning to her the color of our kitchen tile, and somehow she managed to find a serving bowl that matched it perfectly.
Jami has our grandma's infamous knack for finding the absolute perfect gift for someone.
The picture doesn't do it justice, but the match is dead on.
See how sparkly and pretty the glaze is on this bowl? I plan to just admire it for a few days before actually using it.
Meanwhile, they also picked out a bunch of cool loot for the boys, too, including money from that country which is always interesting to see. And this was after the goods had been pawed through by the boys.
The blue and white rectangles on the bottom left were nougat candies that taste a lot like a Big Hunk candy bar, except that they're wrapped with rice paper in addition to the outer wrapper. Just above the brightly colored candies in the bottom right are two packs of Extra gum, which in China come with some kind of little collectible prize.
The metallic foil wrapped confections tasted a bit like a long, tubular cheerio, filled with some type of pasty filling. Couldn't quite figure it out, but it was fun to get a feel for the 'flavors' of China. Jericho has enjoyed sampling all the goodies.
By far, Judah's favorite part of the care package were these hats.
Judah proudly wore his all over town the other day. Jericho prefers to display his. He's rather touchy about messing up the 'do' these days.
In any case, we were thrilled to get the packages, and just wanted to send a Thank You shoutout to aunt Jami & Family.
