The Bill....

My mind is definitely made up about the ER. We got the bill today only 1 week after the incident with Bridgers head...$618! So not only did we have a rough weekend, it was an expensive weekend as well. It makes me so thankful for Jeremy's job and health insurance! Sorry Bridger, next time we will use a $2 bottle of superglue!

Our Weekend!

Thursday night Bridger woke up at midnight screaming his head off. He was extremely hot and kept saying "ouchie," so I put him in bed with me. That was a huge mistake, for the next 6 hours he was rubbing my arm and face and kept saying "hi mommy" every time I opened my eyes to look at him. Finally at 6 a.m. ( I only slept for about 1 hour) I had to get ready for work so I put him back into his crib and left for work. Oh by the way, Jeremy was working nights so he missed out. About 10 a.m. Jeremy calls and tells me Bridger has 104* fever. I get off work and come home and put him down for a nap. Friday night we have our first softball game and Bridger cried the entire time and had the chills even though it was 75 out. Jeremy decides to slide into 2nd and realizes that was a HUGE (#1) mistake. This is what happened....

Saturday was sunny and 80 degrees so Jeremy and I decided to do some yard work. Ok, I would be lying if I said I helped with the yard. I sunbathed redneck style, I sat in a lawn chair in the driveway because we don't have a yard yet and read a magazine with Max and Bridger hanging out with me. 2 hours later I looked like this (mistake #2).....

The carnival happened to be in town this weekend so Shayla and I decided we would take Bridger and Max and walk around. 5:15 Saturday night we are preparing to leave and Bridger trips over a strap on a bag and bashes his head into the dresser drawer! Blood instantly rushes all over his face and I wake Jeremy up who is sleeping on the couch and decide we better take him to the emergency room (mistake #3). We arrive at approx. 5:35 and sit in the waiting room until 6:15. At this point Bridger is happy and wants to run around but we didn't grab his shoes so we wouldn't let him down. 6:50 they finally call us and we go back into the room where their are 6 hospital beds seperated by curtains. The dr. walks up and looks at Bridgers head. I tell him about the blood loss and about how I am worried that it wont heal properly. He tells me that it needs to be glued shut and that I need to make sure and put sunscreen on it anytime he is out in the sun. He than follows with "and apparently you don't know what sunscreen is." Ok so I am a little annoyed but whatever. The nurse than walks over and squirts local gel anesthetic on a 2X2 and tells us we need to hold it on his head for 15 minutes. What a Joke! Jeremy and I attempt to hold Bridger down and he screams his head off. Remember there are 5 other "injured" people in this room. He eventually screams so hard that he throws up. At this point I am irrate that we are paying to make our own kid even more miserable than he already is. Finally the dr. decides he has heard enough, I am sure everyone else in the room had too. Next, 2 nurses and the dr. wrap Bridger in a blanket so he can't move his arms or legs. He is still screaming his head off and in about 4 minutes they have him all fixed up. The Dr. than states "don't worry about the paperwork just take this kid home." So Jeremy and I did just that and we learned our lesson also. Next time we will save ourselves the stress and superglue it at home! Here is what it looked like before the ER....

The carnival!

Since Bridger had been such a trooper, we decided to take him to the carnival a few hours late. I live in this town and still can't figure out why a carnival brings out some of the finest folks here in Gillette! We ate dinner and it cost us close to 20 bucks for a corndog, french fries, polish sausage, and a funnel cake. That was my favorite part, the greasy food! We than people watched and saw a man with a pink mullet to go with his pink suit coat. Shayla, Josie and I had a good time laughing our heads off at theses people. We even saw a lady with a sunburn much worse than mine and I cannot imagine what the ER doctor would tell her! (No worries I got the approval to take her picture) Bridger loved the "horsies" on the merry-go-round and even won a hammer at the pick a duck out of the nasty funk water game! This was a much better way to end our lovely weekend...

The China Kuehnes!

Here is the dang cutest family in China! Adayla and Tally love their little sister Ryann! As you can see they snuggle up with her as though she is their doll. Adayla loves to dress up, look pretty for the camera, and do tricky poses! Tally is busy and reminds me of Bridger. She likes to mother Ryann and makes sure she goes and comes with the family! Ryann sleeps mostly and wakes up to eat and poop, although I was there for 10 days and she only pooped twice, she must be a true Skinner!

The best part...

Besides seeing Morgan, Tim, Adayla, Tally and Ryann, my favorite part about China was the shopping. Let me explain because it is not typical shopping. We go to what they call a market except it reminds me of a building with a bunch of "boothes" like you would see at a craft show or something. Anyways I will admit I was a little timid at first but eventually I had so much fun and got wrapped up at times. You walk by and the vendors get in your face and say things like "help me start my new business" and "this is all about quality." So of course you begin looking at all their Gucci, Prada, Abercrombie, Billabong, Calvin Klein, and Rolex products. They dont have price tags because you bargain for the price with a calculator although most of them speak enough english I understood. For example, I walked into one place looking at their Rolex and Gucci watches and asked the man how much. Right away he grabbed his calculator and said "because you are my friend, I give you good deal." He typed 1200 (about 175 U.S. Dollars) on his calculator and held it up and showed me. I dropped my jaw to the floor and he begins explaining that they are good quality and that if I wanted another two over here that they are cheaper. I grab the claculator and type 20 (about 3 USD). He of course laughs and says "that is your joking price," and I reply "you gave me your joking price." He waves his hands in the air and says "ok, this is my no joke price," and holds up the calculator with 400 (about 58 USD). I than say "no too much" and reply with 45 (about 6 USD). I tell him that is my final price and he says "that below wholesale and no deal." I begin to walk away and he follows close behind and says "100." I tell him my final price of 45 once again and walk away faster. I get about 20 feet and he yells "ok, ok, ok." Which means he agreed to my price of 45 (6USD) and I smiled as I turned around to pay him. He tells me "lady, you got good deal only because you my friend." Where in the U.S. can you get a Gucci and Rolex for under $7.00? What a bargain!!!!! So that was my China shopping experience and all in all I spent a good 12 hours bargaining my life away. I left China with lots of t-shirts (mostly names like Abercrombie, Quiksilver, and Hollister), 5 watches, about 30 ties, a pair of Nike shox, and a couple pairs of sunglasses. Notice I said I left China because unfortunately at the San Francisco Airport some smarty pants stole some of it out of my bag and not all my bargains made it back to Gillette! Oh well, I had so much fun doing it! Thanks Morgan for all the fun!!!!

The other side...

After we took the ferry ride we arrived in Puxi (pronounced Pushee), which is the other side of Shanghai across the river. Morgan and Tim live in the district known as Pudong. Along the river there is a massive sidewalk for people to stroll along. Of course there are people selling things to you like purses, watches, a dvd, etc ( I will get to the shopping later). It kinda of reminded me of RiverFest in Wichita except bigger and much more scenery! I thought it would be a very romantic place for a marriage proposal...too bad I am already married!

The last picture shows a boat carrying a huge screen that advertises for companies. I saw one advertising Sony. The picture of the red building is a fancy restaurant along the river!

The river

We took a ferry ride across the river. Their are 2 different ferry operators, one that cost a 1/2 yuan (about 7 cents), which you can ride your scooter, motorcycle, or bike on and the other one costs 2 yuan (about 30 cents) and is air conditioned and has comfortable movie-theatre-like seats. We of course took the luxurious one! The picture of the 1/2 yuan ferry looks a little run down but look closely and you can see a man on his scooter. Many of the boats were lit up like Christmas lights and yes that is a huge crane being carried down the water. Here are some of the things I saw...

The buildings...

Shanghai is crazy in that you dont just have a cluster of tall buildings. The massive buildings go on for miles and miles and I enjoyed getting my camera out while riding around in a taxi. They are all so unique and many of them have such amazing designs. Here are just a few of the thousands....

Pizza Hut in Shanghai

One afternoon Morgan, Tim, Grandma, the girls, and I walked to a 10 story mall about a 20 minute walk from their apartment. It looks kinda of small from their balcony on the 32nd floor but it was HUGE. Anyways their is a Pizza Hut on the 5th floor and it is amazing because you can see the water and all the buildings that line it. How in the world is this mall not the biggest mall in world? I dont understand. Of course I didnt shop there because thing were too expensive. Ok not really but why would I pay American prices when I am in China?? On the way there I was pushing the girls and I stopped to have Morgan take a picture of me and the soon-to-be Worlds tallest building( the one on the right). The building is 101 stories high and the building on the left is still in the list of the top 10 highest buildings in the world with 88 stories. Anyways we were interupted with some visitors, just random people that wanted their pictures with the cutest girls in China I suppose. They werent all in a group either! It is quite a funny sight.

Once in a lifetime...

What are the chances that while I am visiting China the same summer the olympics are going to be held there, the torch is passing through? Well apparently my chances are pretty dang good because I witnessed it and I was only about 50 ft from the actual torch. Morgan's friend called an invited us to go watch it with her even though it was coming by Morgan and Tim's apartment. We arrived on the right side of the street and only waited about 10 minutes before the torch ran right in front of us. There were thousands of people lined up on the opposite side of the street as us and they chanted......."Zhongguo, Jia You!" Translation China add gas? Anyways it was an amazing experience especially with all the controversy about the Olympics. While we were driving home, there was a group of men standing on a street corner. I am pretty sure they were randomly selected to be "guards" and given new shirts right out of the bag or something. Enjoy the pics and don't be too jealous...

These girls had some real Chinese spirit because they love China more than ever!

I waited too long...

Crap, I waited to long to post since I have been back in America and so my days ran together in China. I am going to finish blogging on my trip but not in days..