Two children stood outside the door with old coats. “Any old papers, Lady?” asked one of them.

I was busy. I wanted to say no, but I saw that their shoes were broken and wet. “Come in and I'll make you a cup of hot tea.” They came in, saying nothing. Their shoes left snow on the floor.

      I gave them tea and bread to protect them against the cold outside. Then I went back to the kitchen and started my housework again.

      The silence in the front room surprised me. I looked in.

      The girl held the empty cup in her hands, looking at it. The boy asked me in a low voice, “Lady, are you rich?”

      Am I rich? Oh, no! I looked at my old things in my room.

      The girl put her cup back in its saucer(茶碟) carefully. “Your cups match your saucers.”

They left then, holding their papers against the wind. They hadn't said thank you. They didn't need to. They had done more than that. The blue cups and saucers were simple. But they said that they matched. The potatoes and meat before me, a roof over our hands, my husband with a job—these things matched, too.

      I moved the chairs back from the fire and cleaned the living room. The prints of their small shoes were still wet on my floor. I let them be. I wanted them there to remind (提醒) me how rich I was.

    I was feeling really down because my long-time friend had died. Then I started a six-week volunteering at a nursing home all day even Saturday. My duty was to serve the meal and clean up. One day I was told to go to Room 117 to make sure the patient was all right. I found a boy of eight sitting in bis bed watching a movie. I was shocked to see a child in this seemingly forgotten nursing home for the old. He was so small and weak that you had to look closely to find him. I grabbed his medical chart and found out :he had a terminal（绝症的) illness.

    We started to talk, and I found out that his family rarely visited, and all he did every day was watching TV I wanted to cry for him, and for my lost friend. As we talked, he had a smile on his face, and I asked him why and how he still managed to stay happy.

    He thought for a moment, and then said that too many people were dead even before they died. They walked around feeling that God had cursed(诅咒) them and they had nothing to live for.

    The boy said that he would not be like that. He woke 'every morning thankful to see another sunrise. He kept his window open so that he could smell the flowers and feel the heat of the sun. He also said that he had hope.

    "Too many people haven't seen much of that around here." He said, "Life is full of hope and we need to live life before it is gone."

    I don't know what happened to him. I guess he passed away, but his lesson lives on. I now wake up and live each day to the fullest. The key to life is not money or fame, but the lesson we learned from it.

    I'm Yu Fei. I come from No. 1 Junior High School in Ji'nan. It is {#blank#}1{#/blank#} beautiful. My friend Xiaoli is in this school Xiaoli is of medium {#blank#}2{#/blank#}. She has {#blank#}3{#/blank#} hair, a long face, a small mouth and big {#blank#}4{#/blank#}. She is thirteen. She is in Class Five, Grade Seven. She is a good student, and she is good at painting pictures. She hopes to be an {#blank#}5{#/blank#} when she grows up. She has two good {#blank#}6{#/blank#} in her school. They are Lucy and Lily. They are {#blank#}7{#/blank#}. They are twins. They are fourteen They have big noses and big eyes, and they are very {#blank#}8{#/blank#} and thin. Lucy, Lily and Xiaoli are in the {#blank#}9{#/blank#} class. Mrs. Smith is {#blank#}10{#/blank#} English teacher. She is friendly to them and often helps them.

There are some computer programs outthere for creating art, such as Photoshop or Microsoft Paint. But you probablywouldn't guess that Microsoft Excel is one of them.

For many of us, Excel is just a type ofoffice software. But for Tatsuo Horiuchi, an 80 year –old Japanese, it is hispaints, his water colours and his canvas (画布)。About 20 years ago, shortly before retiring (退休), the artist thought that he needed a new challenge in his life. Sohe bought a computer and began making beautiful works of art with Excel.

"I didn't use Excel at work before, butI saw other people using Excel to draw pretty graphs (图表). So I thought, I could probably draw with that," Horiuchisays, "Graphics software is expensive but Excel can store on most computers.Besides, it has more functions and is easier to use than Microsoft Paint."

Horiuchi also tried using Word but waslimited (限制) to the paper sizing. Thereis far more freedom for the artist to produce his painting in Excel. Horiuchi'scolourful Excel art deeply describes the richness of traditional Japanesepaintings. It often shows highly- detailed sights, along with people, plantsand animals.

"I set a goal(目标), "Horiuchi says, "that is, in 10 years, I would be ableto paint something excellent enough to show to people. "And he hascertainly achieved that goal.

Since his discovery of Excel's artisticfunctions and his ability. to use. them, Horiuchi has got worldwide praise. He hasgone on to win competitions with his works. Not surprisingly, he took firstprize at the Excel Auto shape Art Contest in 2006. Having made quite a name forhimself, the elderly Japanese artist was given a new name-"the Michelangeloof Excel".

John is a student in a middle school. He likes hamburgers best. He doesn't want to eat fruit or vegetables. So he is very fat. His mother always says to him, "John, you can't be so fat. It's not healthy." But John says, "I'm fine, Mom. I want to eat my favorite hamburgers every day. At school, John doesn't like P.E. and he doesn't want to do sports. Every time he has P.E., he says to his teacher, "I don't feel(感觉) well and I can't have P.E." Then he goes to his classroom and eats food. 

Today John goes shopping with his mother. He wants to buy new clothes, but he is not happy____this time. He finds a nice T-shirt, but he can't wear the T-shirt in a big size. John says to his parents, "I don't want to be fat! And I want to be healthy." His father says he can take him to do sports. His mother says it's useful to eat healthy food. John thanks them for their help.

 The winter holiday is coming. If you are interested in making a website. Xinhua Community will have classes about that.

How to make a website

 First, make a good plan after learning about who will use the website and what they want. The second step is to design. We can use Photoshop to design the color, the style of the website. The third step is to develop, by writing the code (编程) to make the website into what people see. After that, test the website, making sure that people can visit the website on different devices (设备). The final step is to check the website to keep it up-to-date.

What to pay attention to

 Sometimes coding cannot always work the way you want it to. Then, we can use AI for help. AI can help write or rewrite new texts for some website pages. But it is not a good idea to depend on it. A good website designer needs to be creative and explore new skills.

 Teenagers in our community between 10 to 15 can come. Our classes can let you learn more skills on the computer. You will have an interesting life during the holiday.