randoms

i was trying to think of a title to summarize this post.. but the fact is that it is just going to be a bunch of random pictures with descriptions.

but that is what my life is like here in china...random.

 this is my chinese boyfriend at one of the salons here. we are pretty much regulars... 

more than regulars. we are celebrities to them! they take out their phones and take a bajillion pictures with us every time we come in. we enjoy it... to a certain extent. then it's just excessive.

 oh how i love freda!!!! her hair is sooooo stinkin long. 

 do you notice how i am pretty much bent over at a 90 degree angle?? 

 this is tony!!! 

we were on our way to the Sun Yat Sen Park with our kids for a little day field trip. 

The kids were SO excited. They were all told to bring hats because it was sunny outside. chinese people are so funny.  tony is such an angel. i love him to death.

he is also a baller. nuff said.

 these are most of our ilp students!

 we were missing max and william. man they are cute.

 this was a little pond at the park. there were HUGE fishies swimmin around in it.

 i am obsessed with our kids.

mandys cuddle buddy on the bus ride home.

we had a little too much fun trying on different costumes at the supermarket. 

this makes me feel uncomfortable.

creeeeeepy

nope, i stand corrected, THIS ONE makes me feel way more uncomfortable... and quite scared.

be a bunny!

bumblebee!

i love him. all the workers at the salon all loved mandy's pirate costume hat a little too much though..no matter how many times she put it away in her bag they would take it back out when she wasn't looking.

NOMNOM NOODLES! only 5 yuan. a.k.a.  75 cents.

we went to go visit another ilp group in xioulan for the end of the weekend. 

this is a sweeeet elephant statue in the middle of their neighborhood.

all of us out to dinner!

at the top of a beautiful pagoda in xioulan. it was surrounded by beautiful scenery and a gorgeous pond! you can take out little boats and paddle around the lake for super cheap. just one of the many things i love about china.

this is our cozy, quaint little group!

this was an interesting motor bike ride... he took us to the wrong place twice. mandy looks like she might be enjoying this a litttttle bit too much... what do you say?

schleepy april on the bus ride home. the bus is a perfect place for naps! oh wait...

my most favorite picture of freda ever? yep, i think so.

recent outings&happenings

i feel like the days and weeks are passing by fast and faster as time goes on!!

we hit our halfway mark this week... it does not feel like i have been here for 2 months, not in the slightest. the days are starting to mush together.

if i didn't have pictures to look back on, i'm not sure i could tell you which day i did what.

i'll take it as a good sign that the time is going by fast.

but sad at the same time... 4 months is not long enough!

we got our hair washed again! shocker right? this is like our...6th time? 7th time?

it surely will not be our last. this salon was pretty good.. but the back massage killlled me.

i think my eyes started to tear up a bit...shh... the shampoo smelled super duper good tho.

on sunday after church we decided to try to go to wal mart to find some butter because we were unsuccessful the past 3 times :( we were waiting at the bus stop for about 30 min when this man came up to us and told us that it wasn't the correct bus stop for the wal mart bus! he was from Singapore and spoke english really well. he was actually getting a taxi to go there and offered us a ride! so nice. after we'd arrived to wal mart i realized how crazy it was that we so readily hopped in a taxi with a stranger we'd never met before trusting him with our lives... the people here are just super nice and helpful.

sometimes i feel tall here.

oh and that is my special dress that makes me look prego.

this bike taxi guy was waiting near where we were waiting for our van. his friend later joined him, and his friend asked me if i was pregnant... yep. that was great.

i gave him the stank eye tho, no worries.

aaaaalright. we might have the yellow fever a teeensy bit..

but we think one of our guards is super cuuuute! he has the smile of a champion.

i may or may not get nervous when we ride in the

gate and he says something chinese to us...

words can't really describe this picture. so i won't try.

i held up my camera in our elevator, said "smile!", and this is what came out.

on a recent episode of modern family, one of the girls wears these shoes...

her sister called them lesbian shoes. whatevz, me lovez dem.

this is the cuuute old man that lives in our complex!!! he likes to hang out at the convenience store right outside our gate. i simply adore him.

we made burritos!!!!!! april's mommy sent her refried beans and tortillas...pretty much one of the best things i have made...it was so good! we were all definitely in heaven. and we all may or may not have got the tootz...what?

not sure where we were going...

but we ride our bikes errrrywhere.

all tha time.

errday.

we found nomnom dumplings at a little tiny shop in our town!!!

you get 10 dumplings for 3 yuan.. a.k.a. a crate of goodness for 50 cents.

oh man, such a good find!! they are delicious, as you can see from the joy on my face.

p.s. only one of those crates is mine. although i could have eaten 500 dumplings.

we started decorating for halloween!!!

the kids were SUPER excited when they saw us putting everything up.

it makes me think back to when i was a kid and how the little things would get me so excited... we definitely want to make halloween the very best it can be for them :)

this is the lollipop ghost that represents me... catbuhoe.

this is the only scary ghost lollipop that i made.

pretty terrifying right?

most of the week goes by without us doing anything special,

but somehow each day passes and i am grateful for the extraordinary day i had.

not one day passes that i am not thankful and excited to be here.

day at the temple!

we went to a local temple here in nanlang today. we took motor bikes there and it was a beautiful drive! the temples aren't the most beautiful buildings you've ever seen, but inside was way cool. all old and historic and such. there were in scents and candles lit everywhere. it was quite a peaceful place, if you ignored all the firecrackers going off that is.

this is an old man that lives in our apartment complex. i've seen him a couple times sitting outside the convenience store outside our apartment. he was very interested in us taking pictures... so we had fun with him taking pictures. he is one of the cutest old men everrrr!

this was one of our taxi drivers. they were way cool!

just a random old guy chillin outside the temple. he told me i was beautiful!

what a sweetheart.

the only thing this guy knew how to say was "how old are you?" he asked each of us.

this place seemed so out of our element.. our town seemed so ghetto. then we came to this beautiful place! we loved it so much. the water was pretty nasty nast tho..

>>

mandy and april were pretty sure they saw this monk smoking weed... eh, it's okay. he was a nice guy.

there were these hanging wick-type things allll over the temple. they were the coolest things i've ever seen. they just hang everywhere and burn slowly in a circle. so tight.

the lighting in this room(lower left) was absolutely stunning... the light was pouring in from the ceiling directly on this pot of burning incense. it was pretty angelic to me.

freakin awesome hanging wick incense.

i may or may not have been creepin on this lady praying. it was a cool experience. i was trying to picture in my head the people she was praying for.

i could feel the sincerity of her prayers.

the beautiful lighted room(left)

more awesome hanging candles(right)

the cute lady praying that i was stalking. she was so into her prayers, she didn't even notice me snapping these photos.

mandy hates this picture. but i love it... i think it's adorable.

bridget's awesomely beautiful bulging eyes (left)

a serene garden/forest/chill area near the temples(right)

the pretty garden place. that was also inhabited by a ba jillion mosquitos.

bittersweet.

i LOVE these flowers. i plucked one up and wore it in my hair :) it reminded me of a flower that i picked in sanya.