China, Here We Come...

 On March 31, 2016, Aaron and Tanner left in the early morning hours to meet us at the SL airport.  However the flight was delayed so they arrived at our place just in time to load up and head out to the airport.  As we approached Seattle, Tanner checked the view from his window and saw this amazingly clear view of Mt. Rainer and Mt. St Helens.  What a rarity in Seattle and a great start to our trip!

 Here is a view of Seattle from his window.

 We had lunch in Seattle (Steve and I really like the clam chowder there), and then boarded our big plane for the long flight to Shanghai.  Steve's movie monitor didn't work right so he ended up with some mileage credit and a nice ice cream sundae from the purser of the crew.  It was unfortunate that he couldn't enjoy his movies very well.
We were met by Taylor's driver Friday night and arrived at Taylor's in time to visit with some well wishing friends and then settle down for the night.

 On Saturday morning, Taylor and Jen left early for a long bike ride with their group.  We played with the kids and Steve and Tanner walked down to the local bread store.  In the afternoon while Jen went swimming and the kids went to their friends, we went to the underground market where Tanner and Taylor were measured for suits and Steve was measured for a pair of dress slacks.  We also had lunch at Friday's in an upscale mall not too far away. Later that evening, we had Taylor's friends over for birthday cake.

 Sunday we attended church at 8:30 a.m.  Dan, a former roommate and missionary buddy was in the city for work and attended church so he was invited for dinner after church.  He is a military intelligence officer so he couldn't say much about his work, but was nonetheless entertaining.

 We were pretty much housebound for the rest of the day as it continued to rain buckets of water.  We celebrated Taylor's birthday again with homemade cinnamon rolls.  Everyone laughed that I brought cream cheese with me in my suitcase but I wanted to make truly awesome rolls without worrying about finding the ingredients in China.  I was prepared.