Broken Arm

I mentioned in my last post that Kenz fell and hurt her arm.  So I am just adding an update on here.  She fell in our apartment in China on Tuesday night.  We were scheduled to fly to America for the holidays on Saturday.  It was not an obvious break but we knew something was wrong with it.  She could make a fist and move her fingers but she was in a lot of pain.  I started doing some research online about arm injuries in children, specifically in the elbow since that seemed to be the main problem.  Everything I read made it sound like it was a pretty complicated area, especially in kids under 12 because they were growing so much.  We had our family and friends talk to some doctors in the states to see if we could wait until we got home to take her in and they thought if we could put it in a sling and keep it still it might be ok.  We discussed and debated on what to do.  We didn't want to take her anywhere in Huzhou because the healthcare there isn't very good and there isn't any English unless you are lucky enough to come across someone who can speak it.  We talked about taking her to Shanghai but it is a 2.5 hour drive and we weren't sure how good the doctor's are there.  We debated trying to fly back early, but there were only 2 seats available on Thursday so we would have to fly separate.  After a lot of discussion we decided to wait.  

After about 20 hours of travel we got into my parents around 12:30AM on Saturday.  Sunday morning we took her to Urgent Care and they did x-rays.  Honestly by that point we weren't sure there was anything serious wrong.  She wasn't in that much pain, she didn't need any medicine anymore, she was playing and running around and pretty much crazy but we wanted to be sure.  So we waited with the expectation that it wasn't going to amount to much.  The doctor came back in after looking at the pictures and said 'I've contacted the Orthopedic surgeon and she needs to go in for surgery at 8am tomorrow morning.'  Say what?  She broke her elbow and the part with the growth plate was in the wrong area so they needed to move it back into place.  

 Waiting to see the Orthopedic surgeon.  Kenz and Kyle playing tick tack toe.

Kenz lost 2x in a row so she took matters into her own hands.  She openly admitted she was cheating because she wanted to win!!  And she thought it was hilarious.

The doctor said that he would try to repair it by moving it with a wire.  But if he couldn't do it with the wire he would have to open her arm up, move it back into place and then run a wire through her bones to keep them together.  He wasn't sure what he would have to do until he got inside the OR and was able to see what was going on in her arm.  He ended up having to cut her open, because it had been 6 days since it happened the bone had already healed in the wrong place.  He said that it was the best decision to wait until we got back to fix it because it is so complicated and if the growth plate dies then her arm will not grow correctly.  If that was to happen, they would have to wait until she was done growing, then re-break it and set it in the correct position.  He said that doctors in China do not specialize in Orthopedics so it most likely would not have been set correctly.  

Kenz did well.  She was so scared and very emotional but we got through it.  She had to spend the night, but was discharged this morning and so far it is almost impossible to keep her on the couch.

 Pre-surgery.  She was pretty upset at the thought of being put to sleep, she couldn't wrap her mind around that idea.

After surgery. 

 This morning when we told her she was going home.

In the wheelchair.  She was was not thrilled at this point, she did not want anyone touching her! 

Thanks to everyone for your prayers and concerns.  It was a rough couple of days but I'm so grateful that she is ok and everything seems to be put back together correctly!

Home for the Holidays

We are within 24 hours of getting on a plane to come home.  We are super excited to see lots of friends and family!  Last year when we came home for the holidays the entire trip was pretty much a nightmare so we are hoping for the opposite tomorrow :)  

I decided to post one last time before we leave.  I have a bunch of random pictures to share...

 A friend of ours who works with Kyle wanted to go back to Mogan Mountain to do some hiking and wondered if we wanted to go along.  I'm pretty sure he later regretted that decision...  Needless to say we wanted to tag along.  We had a great time there when we went earlier this year.  So we loaded up the kids early on a Saturday morning and started out for an adventure.  First sign of a problem was when Kenz told us she wasn't feeling too good.  Our kids are notorious car pukers.  Unfortunately for everyone in the van I had switched bags that morning so their medicine was left at home.  I haven't been able to post about this trip mainly because the memories are a little too fresh.  Kyle and I tried to count later and we figured that at a minimum between Kenz and Kaylie they puked at least 8 times on the way up and down.  It is about a hour and a half each way.  Unpleasant.  But once we finally got there we had a nice hike :)

 Found some dirt.

 These signs are the BEST!

 They harvest a ton of bamboo up in the mountains.  Makes driving a little more tricky than normal.

 Rice fields ready for harvest.

These are the bamboo branches, pretty sure they use these for chop sticks.

 The girls wanted money to buy each other Christmas gifts so I taught them how to wash the dishes.  So far they love it, but I'm sure that will change soon.

 This is their favorite rock to play on, they are constantly stirring up some concoction.  Madi usually comes along every once in a while and tries to knock the whole thing off, which causes a riot.  I think that she is entertained my bothering her sisters as much as possible.

 We went walking one day and found this group of ducks that lived at the small house boat.  The girls were in heaven.  They wanted to stay and watch the ducks all day.

 The people on these little house boats usually do welding or some sort of repair for the big boats.  This guy was docked here for some sort of repair.

 Power lines to the house boat.

 They are expanding the river walk.  It was pretty interesting to watch these guys laying paver's this fall.

The little girl who lived there kept peeking out at us.

 When it gets cold here in Huzhou everyone, men, women and children change into this little number.  Couples often have matching sets.  It is fantastic.  Wildly popular.  This attire is acceptable in almost any situation, exercise, dinner, shopping, making out with your boyfriend.  All great activities in this version of what I like to call the Chinese Snuggy.  It really is hilarious to watch grown men walking around town in these things.  I thought they would make great gifts for our parents! :)

She was good at school that day, when a kid gets 10 stars in a row they get some nifty star thing made out of fuzzy wire.  They always put the stars on kids heads.  I guess so everyone knows who was good that day?

 Walking to the store

 On our way down into the store

 This my friends, is a plush toilet seat cover display.  Now I'm sure you can get these somewhere in America, but who the heck actually uses something like this?  Here it is very popular and the more plush the better.  My friend Angela has a 'my little kitty' one on her western toilet. It is real soft and nice on your buns, but oh so disturbing at the same time.

 Speaking of the store and disturbing, this is how I found my child one day.  I was shopping with our driver, Mr. Xing, he and his wife usually go shopping with the girls and I once a week.  While we are in the produce/meat area he usually takes Madi and they go peruse the area.  Kaylie and I go get everything we need and they meet back up with them.  On this particular day Madi had a small crowd gathered around her when I walked up and they were all laughing.  And this is what I found.  And yes, that is a raw chicken foot.  With the claw in her mouth.  Gross.  I mean super super gross!!  I wasn't sure what the proper move was at this point however, considering it is normal to be digging around in raw meat with your hands... luckily for me Mr. Xing's wife came up and grabbed it from her and proceeded to scold him.  Someone has to get some control over here!  Unbelievable.  You will notice I started taking pictures along with everyone else.  'Where is this kids mother anyway?  Just because she and I are the only foreigners here, doesn't mean she belongs to me!' 

haha!

 After that episode Mr Xing's wife decided that she wanted a fish.  So she told him to get in there.  Can I just say that I love going shopping with these two?  Always an adventure.  They can't speak English any better than I can speak Chinese so it is always super entertaining.  We somehow manage to get a lot said with few words.

 The girls were in heaven.  They got a front row seat and let me tell you, it was a show!

He caught one, but after carefully studying it, he tossed it back.  Then caught another, more studying, and again, threw it back.  This happened several times and the great thing was that while he was fishing a crowd gathered and started giving him advice.  This seems normal.  I often ask him to help me find something and he will find it and pick out a brand for me.  Then several women will stop and give him their opinion.  We usually go with whatever the last woman tells us to do.  It seems easier just to do what they say.  Anyway, finally he gets one that everyone is happy with.  Hands it to the meat guy who bags it and weighs it.  The meat guy hands it to Mr Xing.  Mr Xing sees the price and starts yelling at his wife.  Yelling is normal here, it is how they all talk to each other because they have to talk over everyone else.  Reminds me of a Gerber family get together.  Anyway, he is upset because it is too big.  Too much money.  He started handing it back to the meat guy but his wife yelled at him.  I think she was over it.  He gave her the fish and she put it in the cart.  Madi of course wanted to see it, so she gave the bag to Madi.  Madi held the bag and put her face down beside the fish the fish jumped.  Madi threw the bag and screamed.  Oh my word.  It was so funny.  Mr. Xing's wife put the fish back in the cart and every time we saw her throughout the store Madi approached her cart in a Kung Fu position, ready to attack.  And looked at me and yelled 'FISH'.  It was SO funny!  

 Saturday night movie night.  Our friend Jim always brings over popcorn from America for the girls.  They love it and so does their dad :)

We went to dinner with Kyle's Chinese language teacher and her family.  Both she and her husband teach English at the local college.  It was so much fun being able to have a conversation without trying to think of how to say something in Chinese.  They are both really funny so we had a lot of laughs!

Unfortunately for both Kenz and her parents, mainly me, she hurt her arm real bad on Tuesday night.  She fell over something in her room and landed wrong.  We aren't sure what is wrong with it yet, we will take her to get x-rays as soon as we get in the States.  In the meantime all doctors are advising that we keep it still and in a sling.  She is real unhappy because it is her right arm.  I am real unhappy because now I am her right arm.  Every time she wants to color she tells me where and what color to color on her picture.  Tonight she wanted to teach me how to draw.  Fortunately she has figured out how to eat and do basic things.  She is getting really bored though.  I'll be happy when we figure out what is wrong and how long until she can use her arm again!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!  We hope to see many of you soon!!!!

Food

When we first arrived a year ago I was overwhelmed.  That is probably a gross understatement but it is as close a description as I can come up with right now.  I was most overwhelmed by the food dilemma  which was mainly the issue of getting my kids to eat.  We do not have a oven and western food and ingredients are pretty rare where we are located.  In the large cities it is much easier to get what you want.  So for example Chinese people do not eat much dairy.  So butter and cheese is imported.  Yogurt as my kids know it does not exist.  They do have some small yogurt cups here, but you drink it with a straw it is the consistency of thick milk.  Also things like flour are imported so they are harder to get and come in small quantities.  Inventory here is pretty basic.  When the shelf is empty, order more.  The only bummer is that when it is an imported item it can take weeks to restock the shelves.  I waited for 4 weeks for butter when we first got here.  The lesson, stock up!  The other issue I had was the meat.  When you go to the supermarket if you want fish, you grab a net and catch dinner.  If you want chicken, rabbit, duck, or other odds and ends you just dig into the bins with everyone else and grab whatever you want.  Raw meat.  Hundreds of people touching it.  And they aren't just touching it, they are carefully inspecting it.  I've learned that it is pretty normal to be super cheap here and they inspect everything they buy very carefully, even if that is just a little chicken leg. Basically I found it super hard to come up with ideas for meals.  So for the first few months that we were here we ate out for dinner every single day.  It cost about $5 to feed the whole family so it wasn't that big of a deal.  But by the end the kids were seriously sick of going out, they would rather eat pancakes every single night and stay home (I brought over pancake mix and syrup). Their father was not super pumped about the pancake idea, something about me ruining pancakes for him after Kenz was born.  Long story, actually that is about the whole store.  Anyway,  my goal this time around was to start cooking again.  Basically this blog is for my sister in law because she wants to know what the heck I'm making over here!  :)   

Breakfast:

 Steamed bun, usually has veggies or ground pork inside, Madi and Kaylie like these.  The other stuff is Kenz favorite, not sure how to spell it but it is pretty delicious.

I brought cinnamon and sugar from America so the girls have this on toast or they have peanut butter toast.  We also are able to buy oatmeal and some cereal.  The cereal has a real funky taste but the girls are used to it now so it is no big deal.

 This is where we get breakfast - the big round containers is what they make the steamed buns in.  These are very very popular here.  In the top picture you can see the pan that they make the flat bread in, it is on the right side of the picture.

Lunch:

Lunch is the same.  Every.  Single.  Day.  This does not phase the kids, but I'm over it!  They have either grilled cheese or PB&J with chips, Chinese yogurt, an apple or banana and Kaylie and Madi like to have scrambled eggs on the side.  It seems like they eat a ton at lunch.  This has slowed down since Kenz went to school, she eats lunch at school and then comes home and just has a little something with the other two.  

Dinner:

 When Kyle gets home from work he and Madi sit in the kitchen and chat with me while I make supper.  They always eat peanuts together :)

 This is beef with corn and carrots on top of rice.

 This is called Coke Chicken, Kyle's translator taught me how to make it.

 This is a basic at our house, almost every dinner includes fried eggs.

 We often have them with a bowl of noodles.

All the kids love coke chicken, but we usually have to give them a bath after eating it! :)

We have chicken and dumpling soup.  We also have a lot of chicken noodle soup and chicken and rice soup.

 This is one of Kyle and I's favorite.  It is beef and broccoli over rice.  I also make something very similar with pea pods instead of broccoli.

This is little chicken legs covered in seasonings and fried.  We usually either have rice or noodles on the side.  I also brought pancake mix and mac and cheese mix from the States.  I've tried a few other things but these are definitely our favorites so far.  It is still hard to find ingredients but it is getting a lot easier and I have discovered that you can eliminate a lot from a recipe and still make it work :)

We avoided sweet tea the entire time we lived in the south.  It took China to finally get us addicted.  I mean serious addiction going on here.  I cannot even guess how many gallons of this stuff Kyle and I have drank in the last 14 weeks.  Kyle's favorite is the red and mine is the yellow.  It is seriously amazing.  In fact I'm slightly concerned about what in the world we are going to drink when we get back to America!