Photos of our flat

Here are some photos of our new flat. I am kind of proud of how different this place looks after we moved in! ;) The landlord came yesterday to collect the rent and it appeared as though he was surprisingly pleased with how it looked by his comments. It's cozy but we like it.

Check it out

Our friend, Jeff Liu spent a Saturday morning a few weeks ago taking photos of Elijah and us. We really love his style and it was fun having a friend take photos of us. Jeff definitely has a gift! He posted some of the photos along with some of our thoughts and reflections on becoming parents on his blog. If you want to check it out, you could go to this link:

http://kairosphotographs.blogspot.com/2009/03/eiljah-paul-graf.html

Some Fun Photos

Two weeks ago, my brother and sister-in-law who are also expecting a baby boy a few weeks after me, came for a visit. Here's a photo of the cousins meeting for the first time belly to belly. Last week, I visited with my sister and her family up north. It was a lot of fun, although the three kiddos got sick and eventually got their auntie sick too. I loved their superhero costumes! Look at the expressions on their faces!! I am also including two photos of my growing belly below. The one with the pumpkin is at week 29. The other one is at week 30, which I am in now. If you click on the link to my "belly flation" you will definitely see a huge progression on the size of my belly.

A Photo Collage of My Pregnant Belly

I've been taking weekly photo of my growing belly. Here's a collage that I made using picasa. I couldn't figure out how to get rid of the last few photos, so there are duplicates. The weekly photo shots start from week 14 until week 20 (minus week 19). I can't wait until it gets big and round! ;)

Our Charlie Brown Christmas Tree

This may sound kind of horrible to some folks, but when we were living in the States, there were times when we didn't put up a Christmas tree. I guess in general, Paul and I are not the "sentimental" and into "traditions" kind of people. I am no Ms. Martha Stewart and I am not that into holiday decoration and stuff, although I can get into it. We dread going Christmas shopping. Unfortunately, many times it meant that we would wait until the last minute to do our shopping, which would end up being even more hectic! I remember once going to some department store the day after Christmas to exchange something and I saw incredible sale prices. I told Paul that we should just shop for each other the day after Christmas and get a small token just to open on Christmas day with everyone. Whooo... STOP. I am finding myself starting to go off on tangent from what I was originally intending to write about, so I'm going to stop. Back to my original purpose....

We inherited a Christmas tree from one of our ex-pat friends who were leaving for the States. Anyway, since there is no visual sign of Christmas anywhere in Siliguri, we decided to decorate our home a little bit this year. It is nice to have something visible to remind us of the Advent season and the reason behind our celebration.

I thought putting up the Christmas tree and displaying the nativity set (which I love looking at) would help us in feeling more at home, but it made me homesick! I think it was the first time that I felt it intensely... I don't miss over commercialized Christmas, (although since there is nothing here, sometimes I feel like it would be nice to have a little) but, I miss times with family. For now, our Charlie Brown Christmas tree and our nativity scene will help us in remembering the true Christmas spirit.

FECAI Annual Retreat

I want to try to capture what the FECA India's annual retreat was like so I created a photo album for you. I didn't have the time to write the captions for each photo, but some of the photos in the album will be obvious. The retreat was a lot of fun with good teachings, fellowship, and good food. Every year, there is the Bible Quiz (by region) and the Skit competition. The region of Assam won the Bible Quiz competition and the region of Kalimpong won the skit competion. Too bad I didn't take a photo of the trophies! They were huge! There is much more to say about the retreat, but I think I will end here. Maybe another time... For photos, you can go to: http://picasaweb.google.com/grafsbiz/200711FECAIRetreat?authkey=VKHMe8t9JB8

Here is a video from the retreat. We haven't quite learned all the words to this song, but we will soon! :) It is so nice to be able to sing Nepali worship songs and understand what we are singing!

I'm completely biased...

and I can't help it. I think they are the best!! I just love my nephews and I can't get enough of them. I tried to post their photos on the sidebar of the blog, but for whatever reason, the blogger site is not cooperating. So, I'm posting them here. If you had nephews like mine, you would be posting their photos too! ;) I just adore them! Lots of kissies and huggies from yee-mo, Jeshua & Seth!

A new photo album

I decided that shutterfly takes too long to upload photos and etc. So, I switched to Picasa. Hopefully, I will update it more frequently. Picasa seems much more user friendly. You can view our photos by clicking where it says, "click here" under Picasa Web Album. Or your can go to this website. http://picasaweb.google.com/grafsbiz/October2007?authkey=GY98elR3SwU

Enjoy!