Riding Lessons!

Riding lessons with Audrey.  I was learning balance...

And then I slid off Ebony's bum!

Silk Day

In Beijing, we went to a silk factory.  The factory was filled with silk almost everywhere we looked.  We learned how silk gets from the cocoon to things made of silk.

Silk starts with silk worms.  Here they are eating mulberry leaves.  That's their favorite thing to eat!

    This is a picture of silk cocoons that the worms spin to become moths.  The worms spin a cocoon just like other caterpillars when they get ready to turn into butterflies or moths, except these cocoons are silk!

When the people want to make silk fabric, they put the cocoons in some liquid and stir it around with a brush until they're soaked and soggy.

This is what they look like after you dunk them in liquid and stir them around.

Next, they stretch the silk out over a frame to dry.

Then you can take the silk strands and spin it into thread on a loom.  This is a loom we saw at the silk factory.

You can also stretch the silk to make things like quilts or cushions for chairs and couches.  They let us stretch many layers of silk to make a quilt for a bed.  It is small here.

As we all started pulling at the same time, it got bigger and fit with the rest so it made a puffy quilt that would be comfortable to sleep on.

Can you imagine how many cocoons it would take to make a quilt like that?!

The silk factory was one of the most interesting places I can remember on our trip to China.

Catching Kapoks

As the stars dance around, little children come out to catch kapok flowers.  One of my favorite nights in China was when we went to a restaurant named Lucy's.  Since it was a nice evening, we sat outside on a patio.  When we got there, there were children looking up at the big kapok trees and rushing to grab blossoms when they fell down.  We asked Jordon why so many people collected kapok flowers, and he said that they were dried and made into tea to help your sore throat. 

After dinner, one of my friends and I went out and tried to gather the flowers as they fell.  Even though it was dark, twinkle lights were stringing from the trees and on the roof of the restaurant.  It felt peaceful.

Once I was looking up at the sky and all of a sudden a kapok just landed right behind me.  It seemed like if I stepped back, it would have landed right on top of me!

 The kapok flower is a very large flower.  We don't have any that are so big here.  You can tell how big they are by comparing it to the fork.

Whenever I found a kapok flower, I put it on the table to see what a big stack I could make.

As the night went on, my stack grew bigger by the minute.  Soon I had a large pile on the table.

When it was time to walk back to our hotel, I gathered up all my flowers and gave them to a lady who was gathering them to make tea.  She was really happy because she didn't have to wait for them to fall, and I had a whole armful for her.

Catching kapoks felt magical that night because it's almost like catching falling stars!

A Traveling Day!

Hi, this is Annika and Cayanna's mom.  We're traveling to Beijing today, so we won't update the blog other than this post today.  We'll go sightseeing tomorrow, and we'll give you an update then.  Hope you're enjoying spring break!

Seeing Asa's Orphanage

Hi, this is Annika, and I'm telling you about our adventure at Asa's orphanage.  The drive was kind of long, and I got kind of tired of driving by the time we got there.  The place where the orphanage is isn't as crowded as it is at the hotel.  It looks like it is in the forest a little bit.  When we were walking down the path, we walked by a place that looked like a big pasture.

Along the way, we saw trees with green bananas that weren't yellow yet.  We were pretending to try to get to them.

This is us standing by the gate to enter the orphanage.

This is a picture of the map of the orphanage.  You would think that an orphanage would be only one building, but Asa's orphanage is lots of buildings close together.  There was a hospital and different buildings for different ages of kids.  About one thousand kids are still at Asa's orphanage.

 This is the play room that Asa used to play in with the other kids.

 This one is the dance and music room.  We met Asa's teacher for his preschool and his nanny.

 The lady in the middle is the nanny, and the one on the right side is our guide named Kathy.  Asa got a little nervous when he saw the orphanage because he didn't want to stay there any more.  He hung onto Mom the whole time and wouldn't get down from her arms.

The orphanage people didn't let us take pictures of the kids, so that's why they aren't in any of the pictures.  We did take pictures of the rooms though.  Here is a picture of a bedroom.  Each bedroom had many beds very close together.  Cayanna is standing next to Asa's bed where he used to sleep.

 I'm glad I could tell you about our trip to the orphanage, and I'm glad we went.  I hope you're enjoying your spring break.  We are flying to Beijing tomorrow.  Zai Jian for now!

Here is a short video of a panda at the safari park chewing bamboo.  I think they have strong teeth, and they are not quiet about eating.

Birthday and Safari Park!

Hello, this is Cayanna!  I had a tremendous birthday!  My cake that I already showed you was delicious.  My mom's friend, who is also here adopting, came over with her children, and shared the birthday cake with us.  After I had birthday cake, I opened presents.  I received two Chinese zodiac wall hangings, a jade bracelet, a huge scroll that you hang on your wall, my name painted with animal letters.  It's a kind of Chinese folk art.  My new friend, Leila, got me a red dragon.  I also went out to dinner at a place called Lucy's.  It was a birthday that I'll remember forever.

Today we went to a place called the Safari Park.  It's a sort of zoo, except you get to ride in a little train and ride through where the animals live.  They are behind electric fences, so they can't get out.  It was very interesting.  Two of my favorite animals were the pandas and the giraffes.  There were so many of them!  Here are some pictures of the pandas we saw and also some red pandas.  I felt really lucky to see real live pandas up close!

 This panda was eating a stick of bamboo.  He was really loud when he crunched down on it.  I imagine that his teeth could really hurt if he bit you!

 

This red panda was up in a tree.  Red pandas are really cool.  They look like a mix of a panda, a raccoon and a fox.  They look cute and cuddly, but I bet they're not!

This one was washing himself.  I love his tongue!  I also love his long bushy tail!  Don't you think it looks kind of like a raccoon?

Probably my favorite thing to do was feed the giraffes.  They were in a big sort of pasture thing, and you could buy branches of a certain tree that they liked to eat.  The branches were 15 yuan each.  Then you held them over the fence, and the giraffes would come right up to you and eat the leaves off the branches.  If you weren't careful, they'd pull the branches right out of your hand.  They're very strong!

 The giraffes were also pretty gentle.  When they were bending over to get the leaves, you could pet them.  Here are pictures of my sister and me petting the giraffe's nose.  It felt kind of like a horse's nose.

You can see my little brother in the corner of this picture.  He laughed and laughed at the giraffes.  He fed them a branch too.  It was a fun day at the safari.

I hope you are enjoying your spring break, Classmates.  We have been really busy the last two days, but we will blog as often as we can.  Annika will blog tomorrow morning for us, so it will be tonight for you (Sunday.)  This time thing is confusing!  Zai Jian for now!