My 600th post! and Happy New Year

Sadly, this year has only contained a small fraction of my 600 total blog postings.  Alas.  I am hoping to do better, if the internet in China cooperates.

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas.  We had a great five days in Yunnan province--that deserves its own post, and soon, before I forget all the amazingness of it.  Of course, Monday is New Years Eve, and we're planning to celebrate at home this year, hopefully avoiding any recurrence of somewhat bad ideas, like ringing in the new year at a place called Club Bling (that was last year's brilliant move).  Then I am heading to Hong Kong in just over two weeks to hang out with my parents, which should be fun (and bonus if I catch Les Miserables while it's playing there!).

We did have our annual holiday party a couple weeks ago... I love the Christmas season so much.  Here are my pride and joy, homemade smorrebrod:

And our apartment looking festive:

This weekend has been quiet-ish--last night it was snowing in Beijing (something that always seems to confuse and disorient the population at large), so we stayed in, made burritos, and watched a movie.  Today we grocery-shopped up a storm in preparation for big winter meals the next two nights--I am so in the mood to cook lately.  Maybe it has something to do with getting the Smitten Kitchen Cookbook and another volume of Canal House Cooking for Christmas.  Yum.  Of course, the Canal House books are all like, now take a torchon of foie gras, or an entire goose, or lobsters, or whatever else may be available somewhere in Beijing (this isn't Dhaka, after all), but certainly not at my local grocery store and certainly not easily.

But availability of ingredients is certainly not terrible here, so I shouldn't complain.  It's not like I was always picking up torchons of foie gras in the US, either!  Plus, the dumplings are better in Beijing :)