Autumn Jade Book 4 is at the printers!

Steve Whan has announced that "Sisters of Shanghai" the fourth Autumn Jade Mystery is now at the printers. They expect to have the latest novel back by September 24th, 2006 (and are presently taking advance orders through their web site: http://www.autumnjade.com/ ).

The story...

Autumn Jade returns to Shanghai with her parents to complete the adoption of her little sister, Lucie. During a site-seeing trip to Old Shanghai, her parents are kidnapped. It's up to Autumn and Lucie to find their parents, uncover the treasure hidden in the Shanghai Museum and for Autumn to confront her nemesis.

We like this series. The main character is a girl adopted from China who solves a mystery a book. The reading level is probably "ages 8 - 12". Since the book is coming from Canada, the postage is a bit higher than you might expect but we think it is worthwhile.

Steve Whan creates the (weekly?) collection of China news that is appropriate for children - Focus On China - that I have mentioned before.

Dumpling Photo Recipe

Someone just told me about a fun site that has "photo recipes". Their favorite was for dumplings and dipping sauce. The site has the recipe - and step-by-step photos of Jen, a self-described "foodie" making her grandmother's recipe.

Luckily for us, she also has five other Chinese recipes - although you will have to go most of the way down her page (and pass some beautiful desserts) to get there.

Ready for the school year?

I have found myself sorting papers and marking up my calendar, and I assume I am not the only one doing this right now!

Mid-Autumn Festival is October 6, 2006 this year. While you do want to tell your child's teacher if you are interested in going into class, this year you can let class get organized a bit before you have to say that. For a basic description, see my Mid-Autumn Festival blog. Resources can be found there too.

Chinese New Year is February 18, 2007. If you plan to do something with this, you may want to also discuss Valentine's Day plans with your child's teacher. While it is nice that the room will already be red, it could be alot of celebrating in one week. For a basic description, see my Chinese New Year blog. There are lots of classroom ideas and resources listed on the site. As soem of our chlidren are getting older, more information can be provided. There are things for the upper elementary crowd there too.

Local Chinese schools should have their schedules available soon - although they probably start classes a couple of weeks after public school does in your area.