A Day Without Ayi!!

I decided that my Ayi has been working too hard lately so I gave her the day off today. She typically works from 10:00 until 7:00 or 7:30 five days a week. When I told her she didn't need to come in, at first she thought maybe I was upset with her, after she figured out that I was not, she was very concerned about what we would do for dinner! I thought it was pretty entertaining that she doesn't think I know how to cook! She knows that we go out to eat all weekend when she is not here, so she just assumed I didn't know what I was doing! She will be proud tomorrow when she sees that I made a big pot of my friend Nik's yummy chicken chili!!

I also decided that today would be a good day to do some Christmas baking. My friend Naoko came over and we baked sugar cookies while the kids were at school so that when they got home, they would be ready to icing! Ellie and Minori were experts at icing and Eens was an expert at licking all of the knives!! Coop ate two cookies and then had better things to do (he was engrossed in watching the Beauty and the Beast Christmas DVD!!).

It was a fun day and I proved to myself that I can make it through a day here without help!! I even did a few loads of laundry!!! Don't get me wrong, I know I can function fine here or anywhere without help, but if you only knew how hard it is to find all of the ingredients to make a simple meal. I have to go to several import stores and I'm still not guaranteed to find what I need. Finding meat at the grocery store is also difficult because I can't read the Chinese writing and I'm pretty particular about the meat we eat!! I am very grateful for the help we have, but I will look forward to more days on my own!!!

This is completely off the subject, but if you could please say a prayer for my grandma (my mom's mom). She has been in a nursing home for several years suffering from alzheimers disease and recently her health has been declining. Please pray that she is pain free. Please also pray for my mom and aunts, they mean so much to me and I wish I were closer to give them all big hugs and support them as they have always supported me.