Me, age 17, preforming YangGui Fei Zui Jiu in TianJin, China.
Basically, I'm one of the hottest consorts of Chinese history,
but I have recently lost favor with the Emperor, and am debating suicide.
LOL! So not me in real life.
Take down Christmas decor, put up Chinese New Year decor.
Keep the festivities rolling, that's what I say.
Keep the festivities rolling, that's what I say.
So, what's an extra mom like me to do in the year of the rat? Well ... let me tell you!
First, let's talk about recycling. For 2020, I once again sent a kid friendly book to school about the New Year that my son's teachers could read in class:
A book about traditional celebration practices by Grace Lin
But since he's getting old enough now to follow longer story lines, I also sent this to read as well:
FYI, this also has the origin story as to why cats hate mice - LOL!
And recycling ideas from previous years, I found a new coloring sheet and finger puppet gift for his classmates to take home as well:
I opted to go a little different for the kids this year, and purchased zippered coin pouches to put the mice in ... more or less, an upscale gift bag without the cinch string. Since I bought these at bargain bin costs (Chinese factory direct), quality wasn't great, but the presentation was cute at least.
And of course, a tag applied outside each of the gifts:
The end result for the kids:
As always, for the teachers, I found an assortment of adult appropriate goodies - one each of a gold flower (I think it's meant to be a ring dish), a novelty Year of the Rat charm, and a larger version of the kid's zippered bag:
The adult gift came together to look like this:
In addition to sending gifts to school, this year my son was old enough to attend a Chinese New Year celebration, so we made an effort to find a family friendly event ... and drove to it the weekend prior to Lunar New Year, despite the previous night's major snow storm and extremely icy roads. This was no small undertaking from the South West suburbs to downtown Minneapolis, let me tell you.
By the way - Midtown Global Market's Chinese New Year celebration is great! My son will be four in April, and I saw kids up through late grade school there (all of which seemed to be enjoying the event). I highly recommend the celebration for anyone with kids in that age range.
Activities in 2020 included: making a dragon out of a paper plate and egg cartons, coloring sheets, Chinese fortune telling, getting a Chinese name, making a "porcelain" necklace (unfortunately ours broke on the way home, darn), learning proper dumpling technique, and lots of other fun booths. We didn't partake in everything due to the fact that my son is still technically three and he's not quite developed enough to be able to do some things ... like intricate paper cutting ... but again, it was all very fun. Over the course of the afternoon, my son even ended up with two "hong bao" (red envelopes, which are traditionally given to children with cash inside ... but these included a golden foiled chocolate coin and a $1 coupon to buy a snack at the food stands).
Plus of course, there were performers:
My son was adamant that he was "not afraid" of the lions because they were "just a costume" ... all said while he very "confidently" stood ... behind me and stuck his head around to take a peek, or stood next to me with a death grip on my hand. LOL! To be fair, they are a little different than anything in standard American culture, and when you factor in the extremely loud percussion music that accompanies the performance, it's understandable that a kid would be overwhelmed. After all, he's only three ... and some his age were actually crying at the performance.
To quote "Bringing in the New Year" ...
"Don't cry, Mei-Mei!" That was a favorite quote at our house well before Chinese New Year season even began! LOL! I think every house needs this board book. Hahahaha!
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So there you have it. Another year of Lunar celebrations on the books. Gong Xi Fa Cai!!!
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