Happy Chinese new year!  What?  So perhaps you didn't know it's Chinese new year this weekend.  Apparently it's a pretty big deal here in Indonesia!  On the calendar here it is a "Tanggal Merah" or red letter day, meaning that many people here get the day off of work/school.  That includes us!  So plenty of time to put something on the blog!

We've noticed Indonesia has some amazing insects.  Many of them are not so fun to encounter, like the giant scorpion I came upon in the middle of the street while I jogged Ian down the road in the jogging stroller the other day.  Or the giant colorful centipedes....or even (gulp) spiders that are quite larger than any spider I've seen back home.  If you really want to see how big those spiders are, check out my friend Ben's blog post about the one that used to live in their back yard (scroll down a little bit).  Thankfully those things for the most part are quite happy outside and don't try to "masuk" or come in and hang out with us.  That doesn't apply to the ants, who love to come in and hang out with us.  We have learned to live with them a little bit, and we've also learned to not leave food sitting around for them.

We saw this little guy a couple days ago.  What an amazing little beetle.

Amazing.

Shifting gears, the bulk of the excitement around our house lately has centered around Ian's new found mobility.  He is really enjoying no longer being stuck in one spot.

Caught red handed!  Ian loves to explore anywhere he can fit his little body!  Toys are now chopped liver (well maybe that's exaggerating) but he sure loves to explore!  Elise said it well the other day "He's everywhere!"

Checking out the shoes.

Even crawls under mommy's legs!

Ian turned nine months old today.  Where does the time go?  Before we know it he will be pigging out on his first birthday cake!

So Ian is getting pretty good at...well I can't say crawling. He has been dragging himself around the house. He gets his eyes set on something he wants to go get, and he gets so excited as he begins to make his way over there! Here's a look....

A quick post.......a little video of Elise and Ian today...

And we managed to get the kids pictures taken with Santa! We tried to put just the kids in there, but Elise was not having that! So we all joined in. We went with Grandma and Grandpa Ellen and Dave while they were in town....

We can't believe we found a place to take pictures with Santa here in Indonesia! Who would have known!

Safe arrival...

Heather's mom Ellen and stepdad Dave arrived here two nights ago without any problems! We are so thankful! I (Ricky) went to meet them with our friend/driver Pak Ashadi (he's the guy who picked us up when we moved here) They flew into Semarang, a big city about an hour and a half away. Ellen and Dave's trip was over forty hours, and I was amazed how good of spirits they were when I met them! I expected them to be exhausted and maybe a little bit like something the cat dragged in, but they were doing great (relatively speaking).  We got home around ten PM, and not too much later everyone was in bed. The next morning Elise and Ian were in for a surprise!!

The kids were so excited!  That's Elise playing Grandpa's new ipad app...a funny little bird that copies what you say in a funny voice...she thinks it's hilarious!

And of course some jumping on the bed!  Ellen and Dave seem to be handling the jet lag very well!  I guess it makes a big difference not having kids to help get adjusted too.  

Today (day 2) we took Ellen and Dave to see our language school.  Fortunately all our teachers were there on sort of  a teacher's only day, so they got to meet many of our teachers.    One of our teachers is a photographer on the side.  As we were talking to the teachers, he was testing out one of his lenses on Elise.  I just found this that he posted the following two pictures on Facebook....what a surprise!  

Again that was not me that took those photos!  Pak Jovan, one of our teachers.  Heather's mom managed to get a photo of him...here it is..

We headed downtown after the language school and checked out some shops.

Believe it or not, Elise and Ian got their pictures taken with Santa while we were downtown.  We get those photos back in a week.  I would say Santa had quite a tan this year!

When we got home our house helper had prepared us an awesome Indonesian lunch.  It is a typical Indonesian dish called "Soto Ayam" and it's a sourt of rice and chicken soup.

They've only been here two days so far and we've had lots of fun!  They're here until December 30th.