China McDonald's...

Angel slept in this morning, till about 7am - yay. Now if she can continue that when we get home, that would be great!

Today we took a group tour to a Fold Art Museum and a Tea House. The museum was amazing. The artwork, woodwork, and carvings were beautiful. The warriors painted on the doors to the museum are the largest in China, they keep out evil. The large doorknobs show the wealth of the family. I loved all the carvings in the wooden screens. The details are astounding. The Chinese Government pays to have the outside artwork/carvings repainted every 4 years. That is all the longer it withstands the heat and rain. They are currently in the process of repainting; you'll see the difference in the pictures.

After the museum we went to a Tea House where we were told how to distinguish a good teapot from a not so good teapot. The critical focus is on if the pot dribbles as you stop pooring, if it stops pooring when you plug the hole on the lid handle (many teapots don't even have this hole) and if you plug the pour hole with your finger and flip the pot upside down, the lid should remain sealed on the pot. It was very facinanting. Needless to say we were drawn to purchase one of these beautiful pots that have a dragon on one side and a sphynx on the other. We were then got to sample four different teas - Jasmine, Ginsing, Rose hips and one other I'm unsure how to spell. Here in China they believe the tea bag teas we commonly use in the states is unhealthy, they brew their tea directly from the leaves. The Rose hip tea is actually brewed from rose buds, it smelled wonderful, was not our favorite as far as flavor. We ended up purchasing some Jasmine tea leaves to brew in our new tea pot.

The rest of the day was "free" time for us, nothing else on the agenda. Upon returning to the hotel we ate lunch in the room, our usual instant noodles, protein bars, and dried fruits. Then put Angel down for a nap, she actually did this on schedule today. The past few days she has taken a short morning and then another afternoon nap. We managed to keep her up through this morning’s events.

Following her nap we went ventured back down to the 4th level and walked around the beautiful "court yard" that is located in the center of the hotel - see the photos. They have a few small areas for sitting and having tea. There is also a basketball/tennis court out there; you can see our room view of this in the photos as well. Then we headed to the kids play room to kill some time till dinner. While there 3 other families ventured in so Angel had some playmates and we were able to chit chat. It was so fun to see the girls interact a little, they are all so cute.

Of the 13 families here, there is a 10 year old and two 4 1/2 year old girls adopted and then 8 toddler girls - Angel the oldest of them(22 months) down to about 16 months and then two toddler boys. All fabulously, beautiful kids.

For dinner we decided we had better have China's McDonald's since we only have a few days left. It doesn't taste exactly like home but it wasn't bad. It was very cheap, Jason and I both had meals, plus we got a side order of nuggets for Angel and it cost us less than 6 US dollars. I wasn't sure Angel would eat the nuggets or french fries from our past experience with her but she gobbled them up. (Tried to upload a video but not working for some reason)