We spent the week before Christmas in Ohio, which largely went undocumented by photos since we were too busy shopping, relaxing, and eating.  As always it was wonderful to see my parents, my grandmother, and other relatives, although it was not the same this year without a visit with Aunt Sue. Aunt Sue, who was actually my grandmother’s other sister and therefore my great aunt, passed away on Thanksgiving at the wonderful age of 94. There never was a nicer, kinder person than Aunt Sue, and I miss her everyday.  When we returned to Mongolia we received a fruitcake in the mail from her which she had sent in early November. It was the best cake from heaven we have ever gotten.

Here is Brian with a gift he didn’t get for Christmas (my mom’s cat Ginger)

My grandmother and mother opening grandma’s new television. Mom bought it for her to replace the black and white television in her kitchen that was so old that it still had dials to turn.

We were unable to find our stockings so I made us some out of unused wallpaper. When we got to my Dad’s house we found our real stockings hanging on his mantel. I have absolutely no recollection of giving them to him. Very strange.

My most wonderful gift-a two sided mini-quilt made by my mom of Nigel and Santiago. The Nigel side is proudly displayed in our ger since we can still gaze lovingly at the real Santi.

We also got to visit my Dad and his partner Libby near Cincinnati which was wonderful. We took their dog Rusty to a nearby state park and collected fossils along the river bed. Brian has worked on his rock skipping skills and impressed us all.

Having spent enough time in cold slow vans and buses in Mongolia to last our entire lives, we decided to fly to Ulaanbaatar from Dalanzadgad. There is a very nice airline that serves countryside locations in Mongolia, but no matter how good their inflight snacks are Mongolian weather still is a wildcard.  We were supposed to leave at 9 A.M. but didn’t leave until around noon. (One exciting discovery that we made when we were delayed was that there was high speed wireless internet at the airport!) About half way through our 1 hour 20 minute flight an announcement came over the intercom that made it sound like we were landing in Khentii, the province east of Ulaanbaatar, instead of Ulaanbaatar. Brian had been asleep during the announcement and didn’t believe me until our plane banked to the right.  We landed on a dirt, snow, and ice runway at one of the least inspiring airports in the world-here:

Here is our cute little plane:

After an hour in the drafty and entirely unsecured airport, (people were walking freely in and out of the airport and the airline never did a second security check when we got back on) we re-boarded and flew over beautiful snow covered hills