I'm a bloggin' slacker :)

Nihao friends and fam!!!
I have been living in China for a MONTH!!! Man, time really flies!

I know I am slacking on my blog...as a few friends were kind enough to point out this week! So heres whats happened in the last couple of weeks in the crazy life of China!

We celebrated my friend, Dawn's birthday. She is the very first Chinese friend I made when I moved here!! And she is one of the sweetest, most helpful, Father loving girls I have ever met! Seriously, Dawn is our go-to native to help us with things like ordering food and getting us gym memberships. She rocks and we were so excited to celebrate her! 

This is Dawn at her birthday party at the Randall's apartment! The Randall's are a foreign couple that live in Huangshi with three of their daughters! They are awesome also! Dawn did all the cooking for her own party because she is quite the amazing chef!! She even made pizza for us!

Oh yea!!!! Homemade birthday cake (decorated with fruit rollups and m&ms) and banana bread! so yummy!

Birthday girl in the princess crown opening all of her gifts! What a fun party! We sang happy birthday in English and then again in Chinese. Well, I just listened for the Chinese part!

WUHAN FRIENDS ACTUALLY CAME TO HUANGSHI! SCORE!

These are some fellow ZR teachers who live in Wuhan that came to visit us during National Holiday. Mandi, who is also from Baton Rouge, Nathan M., Melodie, from Texas (we really love having some southern girls on the team with us...we have a whole different lifestyle than other people!), Rebecca, who teaches with some of the ZR teachers at the university in Wuhan. She is from England/France, and Nathan T. 

While they were here we went to KTV for the first time!!!! This is karaoke and it was a blast! This is a shot of the girls being silly right before we went in to sing our hearts out! You get your own room and you can control the music yourself so we had a ton of backstreet boys, spice girls, katy perry....all the good stuff!

The boys being silly before karaoke time!

Chelsie belting it out all night! She was fabulous!

Camille and Melodie singing!! These girls were so entertaining!

Nathan M. and Aaron singing Backstreet Boys!! This was priceless! Tell me why......

Dawn and Kevin singing to High School Musical!

Paul actually singing! This was a once in a lifetime moment for us! Kevin wasn't really diggin all the loud poppy music! I think his face says it all!

We found a delicious waffle place close to our apartment for breakfast! After this, we had to take pictures with some of the workers!

Delicious food and strange toilets to sit on! What a great breakfast!

Rebecca, Chelsie, and Camille enjoying their waffles and toilet time!

Me, Melodie and Mandi! I don't even know!

Kevin and Aaron being silly!

CHINESE WEDDING!

The traditional wedding color in China is red. After the ceremony, when the bride and groom toast everyone, the bride changes into a red dress.

Chelsie, Camille and I got to attend a wedding last week for one of the teacher's at Chelsie's  school. It was quite an interesting experience and we were happy to be invited! Their weddings take place in the middle of the week because it only lasted and hour and a half and they served dinner. From what I understand, the couple gets married before and this ceremony is for friends and family to come together and celebrate the marriage. The wedding was more like a show than the kind of ceremonies we are used to with loud music, a host/mc/ ryan seacrest wannabe, bubbles, sparklers, and so many more crazy things! The videographer made us stop as we were walking in so that she could run up in front of us and film the foreigners' grand entrance. Then she proceeded to follow us to our table and get individual close ups of each of our faces! Those poor people don't even know me and I'm all over their wedding video! The music also switched to English when we walked in...how convenient! It was fun to see some of their traditions such as having their parents come up to the stage at the end and giving them tea. In return, the parents give them a whole bunch of money!! As everyone eats dinner, the couple goes to each table and toasts them, about 30 tables of toasts!