What you are about to read is not a figment of your imagination...the Berg's have indeed updated the blog

Hello everyone,
Yes,we know it has been a long time since we have updated the blog. My husband informed me that it was my turn to do this. So, here I am. Life has become very normal for us. We have fallen into a routine that seems to be working for all of us. We are all busy with just normal stuff. I told my sister that I don't blog anymore because I don't have anything funny to tell, but she assured me that you all just like to read about our "normal lives." So, here is normal:
December brought a whirlwind of activities. I did two different cookie exchanges with different groups of friends. My kids decided this was quite the deal for them. We put up our tree on the 1st and made grandma's cutout cookies. Mark didn't think it was a good idea for my first attempt at making these cookies to be in a foreign country using not quite the same ingredients. But rest assured they turned out just like Grandma's. In fact, they never really got frosted or decorated because all 6 dozen were gone within 24 hours. We celebrated Jacob's 13th birthday on the 8th. He was given the choice of a big party and a small gift or a big gift and a small party. So he chose the big gift, because afterall he is my child. He has been wanting an electric guitar and to take lessons. So that is what he got and he should be starting lessons on Friday. We took the neighbor boys and went to California pizza kitchen for dinner and then came home and had gooey cake. On the 15th of December we had a party with a bunch of other Dow Corning couples. It was a pajama party (easiest christmas party I've ever gotten dressed for). We played Christmas charades, had a white elephant gift exchange and played Christmas trivia. We also watched Christmas Vacation. A party that was right up my alley. We had a good time! On the 19th we boarded a plane for a week in sunny Bintan Island, Indonesia. We went with our friends the Whittaker's who have a daughter Elise's age and a son who is between our 3 boys. The highlight's of our vacation were: the gorgeous white sandy beaches, the warm South China Sea water, the lovely clear blue waters of two different pools, sleeping in until we wanted to, yummy seafood, massages in our room, the 30C weather we had every day, the beautiful flowers and palm trees everywhere and eating at Burger King for our Christmas lunch. The lowlight's of our trip were: our flight arrived late, there was a traffic jam and so our van that was supposed to pick us up was also late, so we missed our ferry over to the island. We had to wait at the Ferry terminal for 3 hours until the next one left. By then it was dark out and the sea had gotten really choppy. All 6 of us, tossed our cookies on the way to the island. When we went to eat our first meal we were a little astounded at the prices of everything. I guess since we were on a lovely island, we were at their mercy and they could charge us whatever they wanted to, and they did. So, we found out that we could eat off of the kids menu every day at lunch and that was good enough for all of us. So lunch only cost us a little over a $100 everyday! We flew home on Christmas day but spent the day in Singapore waiting for our flight. It was fun walking around but a little amazing because the stores all open and were super packed. We got home about 11:00 and had a mini Christmas. My parents arrived on the 29th and it was a whirlwind 10 days that they were here. We had a great time together. We saw the Pearl tower, Yuyuan Gardens, Shanghai Aquarium, the Era Acrobat show, Nanjing Rd. we went to Zhangjiagang to show my dad the plant that Dow Corning is building and to show them Mark's bachelor pad, we went to Xintindia, the pearl market and the fabric market. We had Korean food, Greek food, Thai food, Chinese food and lots of western food. We ate at Hooters which I have to say was a cultural experience all in itself. It's a riot to see these little Chinese girls do the YMCA, dance to cotton eye joe and do the hokie pokie. Then they were playing Christian song after Christian song. From Rebecca St. James to Switchfoot. Who would've thought at Hooters! On the first Sunday that they were here we went to a brunch at the Westin hotel which was two floors of food that was absolutely amazing. Then there was entertainment. There was chinese opera, face changing which is a chinese dance and the person has masks on and the masks turn colors throughout the routine, girls balancing plates on these sticks and more acrobats. We took them to our favorite spa for foot massages, manicures and body massages. We ended there last day here with a historical lane walk. We saw how most Chinese really live and it was very humbling, we had amazing dumplings at a local shack and went to a museum of where Mao Zedong lived.
Well it's back to the grind. The kids started back to school on the 7th and Mark went back to work. I am gearing up for a new bible study that starts on January 28th. A friend and I are starting a new womans mentoring ministry at church. Mark and I are taking our Waypoint groups to a local orphanage on Saturday. We will be playing with the kids and probably doing some sort of craft. I'll report more later. Chinese New Year is only a couple of weeks away and the kids will be off of school for 10 more days. Elise will be off to Egypt and Mark's parent's will be flying in on the 3rd of February. So this winter is shaping up to be a whirlwind also. I guess it doesn't matter where you live in the world, you can always find things to do to keep you busy.
Until next time....
Natalie for all of the Berg's