Valentine's Day and more

Friday we celebrated Valentine's Day at school. This is a much different experience in a school where many of the students have never celebrated Valentines day before, and you don't just run to the store and buy a box of valentines. Eventually, thanks to the book A Zillion Valentines I managed to convince even the boys that it was fun and wasn't all about boys and girls. They had a great time delivering their cards and opening them, frosting and eating heart shaped cookies and watching a movie about the history of the day.

Chat, on the far right, is obviously a bit of a clown, and just couldn't resist hamming it up for a picture.


There are many advantages to having your whole family involved at the same school. Friday was one of those. The student council sold roses, chocolates and songs to raise money for the prom. Our girls were two of the four singers, and Dan and I gave songs and chocolates to each other and the girls.

Zion looks a little demonic in this picture, sorry, he's actually a very nice young man, I'm not quite sure what Kenny's doing!


The day ended with a dance, themed cosplay, which means the kids could dress up as any fictional character. Megan was Pippi Longstockings, Lindsey and some of her friends dressed up as Alice in Wonderland characters. Lindsey is the Queen of Hearts.



The dances at FLC are for all ages, including parents and teachers. It really is fun to see the teenagers dance with the little kids, parents dancing with their children, and everyone just having fun. The teens all have a great time just dancing in big groups for the most part, and if they do partner up, it's so they can use some of the dance moves they've learned in their ballroom classes. It really is all the joy of music and movement that dances should be, without any of the heaviness that pervades high school dances in the States.

Today Megan turned 17. She's now too grown up to want to do much to celebrate, but she did reach a milestone last night. She stayed overnight at a friend's house for the first time while her friend's parents were out of town. Knowing Megan and Grace, I'm not even worried. We're looking forward to going out for great big hamburgers and yummy fries later for her birthday dinner. There aren't many places to get those in Chiang Rai. I can hardly wait!

These pictures are from our only other trip to Barry's Restaurant. I could barely eat my much smaller burger.