My People Come to the Orient! {and some fun snapshots of life here}

6ish weeks ago {i know i'm kind of a slacker}, the orient was blessed with my sweet mama & bestest's presence! 

 I had been pretty pumped for a while.....

so excited!

Here she comes! 

Fresh off of 30 hours of travel...

Yay! 

AND..... here comes the bestest...

 followed closely by Hannah's sweet Mama and Aunt! 

Such a sweet moment. I almost cried the day before thinking about Hannah and her mom seeing each other. Somehow my own life doesn't make me cry like others' do. 

 Reunited with 2 of my favorite people on the planet! 

I see 2 sets of wet eyes- I think I was too excited to get emotional... and hadn't been traveling for 30 hours. 

The next day we went out for some exploring.

Sunday afternoon in our "little village"

I couldn't not share this with you.....

This poor- I don't know maybe 8??? year old kid- in an all pink pair of fluffy pajamas, going totally power rangers for an audience with his blue triton sword. We chuckled for a good 15 minutes watching his sweet moves. 

There was a big minority performance in the park this day, and behind the stage this beautiful little girl was all dressed up. I couldn't get over how precious she was. 

I love this picture- 

It gives me a view into my own life- surrounded by people who don't look like me, finding such great delight in each and every one of them. 

This melts my heart

This sweet grandfather carrying his little granddaughter across the stone bridge- with his cane and all- because she was afraid. So precious. 

And this sweet little thing! Her grandmother asked Jamie and I if we were twins- which is kind of funny... and then asked if my mom was my sister! {That definitely happened more than once during her time here. Flattering I'm sure}

Turns out she has a little twin herself. And cute strawberry pants too. 

We climbed a little mountain in the middle of the park that overlooks where we live- I love living right at the foot of these mountains. 

This is going to be Jamie and I someday...

The next day, we went to the ancient city outside of town, where we were greeted by this little cutie pie...

So cute. 

Then we found this little sweet one....

We treated them to a tasty dinner over my favorite meal....

Potato cakes, ErKuaiBa {my VERY fave}, and fried zucchini! Yum. 

Followed my my other favorite... GuoTie {fried dumplings}

A trip to snack street wouldn't be complete without some ShaoKao either. 

We took a little trip into the city and went to a traditional team demonstration.

Which clearly was pretty fascinating.

They wouldn't be good tourists if they didn't go to that really big city to do really touristy things.

....and see that really big wall... that I have now seen 4 times. 

Riding the chair lift up

It was a lovely day on the large wall.

More fun sights to see....

It was a wonderful week, and these pictures captured just a little bit of how wonderful our time together was.

And before we knew it, the week was over and they were headed back across the pond on their way home.  

I was so blessed by their time here! 

Joyfully Blessed by their Presence,