Mid-Autumn Moon Festival

First, a little Chinese History Lesson:

On the fifteenth day of the eighth moon, the Chinese people celebrate the Mid-Autumn Moon Festival. On this day, the moon appears to be perfectly round and bright. This festival honors the goddess of the moon.

In preparation for this day, houses are cleaned and moon papers are hung near the door. Moon papers are posters which are divided into three parts. The top has a picture of Chang E, the Moon Goddess. The middle has a picture of the moon. The bottom picture is the Jade Rabbit who is said to live in the moon.

Apples, persimmons, grapes and melons are arranged on platters. All of the foods are round like the moon. When the moon is full, candles and incense are lit, moon papers are burned, and women and girls bow to the moon. At the end of the ceremony, tea and moon cakes are served.

I would like to say that I am the perfect mom and that we spent our Saturday following all of the above traditions. But sadly I'm not and we didn't.

We did do the next best thing. We attended our local Families with Children from China (FCC) Autumn Moon Celebration. They always do such a nice job, and it's fun to celebrate this traditional holiday with friends. Here's a glimpse of our evening:

Molly making her lantern for the lantern parade.

Spending time creating chalk drawings with buddy Mia.

Listening to the traditional Autumn Moon story.

Eating moon cakes.

Well, these weren't the actual moon cakes that we ate.

I forgot to take a picture of those.

But I did find this nifty picture on the web,

and ours looked exactly like these.

Except for the lily. No lily with our moon cakes.

Meeting up with our new friend Mattie.

Molly, Mia and Megan (Mia's big sister-whom Molly idolizes) line up for the lantern parade.

Mom and Molly at the end of an enjoyable evening!

Totally random observation...Gee, there are a lot of M names in this post: Molly, Mia, Megan, Mattie, Mom. Told ya-random!