The Plan Is: There Is No Plan

Most of the time, I fly by the seat of my pants. A lot of times, I just don't have a clue and make it up as I go. I was raised to have a general idea of what I'm going to do or accomplish, but not to fall to shit when it all falls apart. You still need to have enough of a plan or information to be able to switch gears, but don't be so tied to a schedule that it's unbearable. I have my parents to thank for that gift. Because it came in handy Saturday. Without further ado:


Part Two: Because sometimes, having one more beer will cost you more than what's on your bar tab.


So, we left the bar and strolled to the Metro station. Once we got down there, it dawned on us that it was relatively late (almost 11 pm), but there were still trains running, so it didn't concern us too much. We hopped on the train and away we went down the line.


That is, until the train stopped at Guro station and everyone was told to get off. You see, the subways don't run 24/7 here, they only run from 5:30 am to 11:30 pm. And we had checked the last train at the station but it was for the station we were leaving, not the station we were headed too. DOH!


Enlisting the help of the Metro worker who understood enough English to get by, we were routed onto another train in the hopes of transferring and getting to the express bus stop. So we made the train to the next transfer point, and well... Nothing. It was close to midnight and the last train had left that station about 3 minutes before we got there. By this time, we knew we were getting in a tight situation, so we called the babysitter and explained what was going on and what our plan was, but that we would call her to keep her updated.


So, we're stuck somewhere in Seoul with no trains back to Songtan - fine, we'll take the bus. We saw a patrol of Korean police officers and approached them for help. Yeah, no one spoke English. Luckily another patrol approached and one of them spoke decent enough to figure out what was going on with us. We explained that we needed to get a cab or a city bus to the bus terminal. By this time, another friendly Metro worker approached, who also spoke decent enough English. He tried to arrange for a cab for us to get to where we needed to go and did translation so we knew what was up.


All the while, the rest of the police patrol were playing grab-ass. Seriously, we had some Stooges-esqe comedy going. One was trying his best to use all of his English phrases, the others were making fun of him and the routine would start all over. It was a good 5 minutes of giggling with them. I only wish I had the presence of mind to take a picture with them because it would have been a nice momento.


While the Metro worker was trying to find us a cab, he had a taxi driver say he could get us where we were going for 20,000 Won. It just didn't sound right to me, so I said no, he could bill us off of the meter that I would pay that amount, plus tip. The taxi driver refused my offer and he went to find another fare.


All of a sudden, there were Koreans all around us talking loudly. I just thought they were bidding for the cab, since this was the only non-reserved taxi. Then a few drunken folks started getting really loud and shouting back and forth. I started to get uncomfortable because one person kept pointing at us and the only words I could recognize was the name of the bus terminal. About this time, a friendly person came over and asked where we were trying to go, and said it in perfect English. He and his friend, Rachel, turned out to be our lifesavers at this point because the Metro worker was still trying to do his best to keep the peace and take care of us at the same time. It was getting chaotic. Turns out our helping hand was Korean-American and was born and raised in Minnesota. He's over here on a teaching contract.


I finally asked Rachel what everyone was shouting over. She told us that they were upset with the cab driver because everyone around us heard what he was trying to do with our fare and they were calling him out on it being unfair. The cabbie finally had enough of the crowd and drove away without a fare.


Rachel told the Metro worker that she would get us in a cab so he could get back to work, and we followed her to the rendeavoux point for a reserved taxi. Turns out that reserved taxis are hard to come by after midnight in Seoul, so we waited for a good hour for ours to turn up. It finally did and off we went to the bus terminal, still hoping we could get home. Rachel came with us, since she lived on the way and to be sure the cab driver got us to the right destination.


By the way, Rachel is our new friend and I hope we get to meet back up with her soon. She speaks fluent English, was very kind in offering to show us around the next time we came up to Seoul, but the best is she works with the Korean orphanges for adoptions. She was just getting home from an all day tour with a group from Colorado, yet she made the time to help us. Needless to say, we've made a date to head back to Insa-dong for tea. I can't think of a better person to share this with.


After dropping Rachel off near her apartment, we continued on to the bus terminal. And just as everything else was going, it too was closed. Figures, since it was 2 am by the time we got over there. We paid the driver and decided to find a hotel for the night and catch the first train out. I had spotted a hotel on the way to the bus stop so we doubled back and enjoyed our walk. Again, it was just a beautiful night; way too beautiful and catastrophic for either of us to really get pissed.


The first hotel we stopped at was booked, so we decided to wander around a bit to get a better idea of what all was in that area. We ran into another group of people in the same situation as we were, and they were Americans too. They said they had found a hotel around the corner from where we were standing that was pretty reasonable and looked clean. We thanked them and walked on, but decided against strolling much longer. It was getting close to 3 am, which is curfew time for Ronnie, and I was in dire need of rest. We tried to find the hotel the guys told us about by heading down a side street, and stumbled across a jjimjilbang (Korean sauna/steam bath). It sounded like just the place for us to rest for 3 hours or so.


Turns out the jjimjilbang was down another alley and then we entered the front door. The hallway was lit with blue fluorescent lighting and the desk clerk was sitting behind thick plexiglass. Not a good sign, but we decided to go for it - it was only a few hours and we didn't have the girls with us, so why not. Secretly I was hoping this was just for show on the first floor, that the rest of the floors would be normal.


Alas, I was wrong... our floor was lit up like a night club too. Tentatively, we opened the door to our room, expecting the worst. We were pleasantly surprised to find a nicely appointed room with a comfy bed and a jacuzzi tub in the bathroom. After calling the babysitter to tell her what the final outcome was, we laid down and took a nap until 5 am.

5 am came in the blink of an eye. We were up and out the door in about 10 minutes flat and walked back to the Metro station. Caught the train, made a u-turn to catch another train, and headed back to Songtan. I got off at our normal stop and caught a cab to the house, as our babysitter had somewhere to be. I met the sitter and sent her on her way in time to catch a call from Ronnie. The call dropped because Ronnie's cell was dead. Then I realized, the keys to the car were in my purse; he gave them to me to hold. CRAP!

So I got the girls gathered up and off we went to the station to rescue daddy. Little did I know that he had hopped in his own cab and was heading to the house. He called me when he got his phone to a charger to tell me that he was at the house. The girls and I had a good laugh and made another u-turn to get to the house and pick him up. By the time we finally got to the station where our car was parked it was 9 am - we had been on a date for 16 hours.


Boys and Girls, what do we learn from this? The moral of the story to this is be sure to check the last train to the station you need to return to, not the one you are leaving from. Be sure that your cell phone is fully charged. And if you do get lost in a foreign country, keep a sense of humor about the whole thing. There were several points where either of us could have lost our tempers, but we relaxed and asked for help. Luckily, we were blessed with people who were willing to lend a hand and we were too busy having a good laugh at the whole thing to really get mad.

And that's the rest of the story! Good Day!

Everything Tastes Better When Its Served On A Stick.

This is going to be a two part post, so read on for the all in good fun part of the date; next post will be all about the adventure. Bet you didn't know there was a difference? Well there is.... Trust me!

Saturday night was here and it's date night for us! It started out pretty much the same. I have the babysitter booked for a non-squadron event outing, "What do you want to do; I don't know what do you want to do's" were exchanged, and after some hemming and hawing, we settled on hopping on the Metro and heading up to Insa-dong in Seoul for a street food dinner and strolling.
We've been planning to do this for quite some time and the weather was finally beautiful enough to do it - clear, a little chilly, but the moon was bright in the sky. So, babysitter gets here, we kiss the kids goodbye and off we go. We decided to try out the other Metro station by our house, just to see. The other station is closer, but this one has express trains to Seoul that we're trying to figure out the time tables on.

About 90 minutes later, we were exiting the Metro into the hustle and bustle of downtown Seoul. We tucked down some alleyways that looked promising, but none had the street food carts we were looking for. Finally we stumbled upon the mecca! Street food carts and gift carts lined the pedestrian street with art galleries, gift shops and tea houses galore on the sides. Score 1 for the Olivers!

We had heard about this wonderful concoction called Dragon Egg Bread through one of the Korean sites I frequent. It was described as bulgogi or sweet potato wrapped in a sweet egg bread. About 5 steps down the street, we found the cart. Karma maybe? We got one of each kind. And they lived up to what we thought they would be. This is what Hot Pockets needs to strive for! The bread was toasted on the outside, moist inside with tender bulgogi in the middle. The sweet potato bread didn't disappoint either - creamy and sweet with some chopped roasted nuts (chestnuts maybe) mixed in. They were wonderful!

As we were walking on air enjoying our bread, we heard a familiar "Ping", "Thud", "Ping". Any American would recognize the sound of a batting cage! We figured out where the sound was coming from, charged up there, and fed the machine 4,000 Won for four at bats. My one and only at bat, I got a piece of two pitches; Ronnie did very well (of course) and awed the Koreans around us. I think Ronnie thinks "Wow" is how they cheer for you in Korean.

Giddy after our baseball excursion, we continued on to find some chicken on a stick (dalkgalchi). And boy did we find it. We passed a cart that had some skewers but it wasn't interesting enough to stop. But the next cart down was rocking it. This guy had music going, a finesse about how he sauced everything, and even would dance a little bit. Of course we bought from him! They were SO good - think terriyaki chicken with spicy wing sauce on it. YUM!

My lips were on fire after the skewer that I told Ronnie I really wish there was a beer street vendor. A few steps away, I saw an interesting stairwell lined with beer caps, so we went down the rabbit hole. It was a wonderful hole in the wall bar that had a great beer selection. After enjoying a Becks and a XXXX, an Australian Lager, we were back on our way.

Heading deeper in the alley, we found that a lot of the art galleries and stores were closing up. But I was in search of another Insa-dong treat. Dragon Beard Candy can best be described as a honey candy with chopped nuts. Like some of the candy making places in the tourist traps in the states, they have a show and tell you about what they're doing. We're going to head back and get a video, because they were awfully entertaining!

Anyway, they make the candy by taking a chunk of warmed honey (I'm sure there's more in there than just honey, but I digress), dredging it in cornstarch, making a hole and then stretching. They make this just as we pull taffy, but they keep dredging each turn in the cornstarch so it doesn't stick together. Once they get it to the magical number of 16,000 strands. Then they cut the strands and wrap it around a chopped nut filling. Ronnie and I chose the almond as our inaugural taste. It was great, but as with all Korean treats, not as sweet as you would think it would/should be. Best way I can describe it would be a not so sweet pecan log. Like I said, really good.

We toured around Insa-dong a little more and ventured into Jongo for some more street eats. Enter the land of Gim-ddeok-sun stands, and us getting something we've been curious about for a while, ddeokbokki with the red sauce. I was a wuss because I'm not accustomed to chili pepper heat like I used to be, and I didn't have any Soju to squelch it. But Ronnie went ahead and got a serving - so glad he did. It was more of a sweet savory sauce than spicy, kind of like a tomato based curry. Wonderful!

Wandering around some more, we knew our time was coming to an end, but decided to get one more beer. How could we not when the "Beir Festival Hous" was right in front of us. A Guinness and Erdinger Heff-Weis later, we made our way back to the station.

But not quite on our way home.... TO BE CONTINUED!

Soothe Your Soul

For my mom, Sue Price and the WF Cooler Dept.

It's still strawberry season in Korea. I don't know why it amazes me but it does. I can tell it's winding down though, because there aren't as many berry dealers at the market and the pricing is starting to inch up. I have a market post that I need to do here soon.... I have all the pictures, but haven't thought it out yet. Guess I need to get working on that.

The girls and I love to go to the market and buy fresh fruits and veggies. Holly is especially giddy because her favorite thing in the whole world (right now) is strawberries. Mostly because they are in season and are just sweet as ever. They are sold by the gram/kilo, not by the pint or quart size plastic container we normally see. She convinced me to buy the size equivalent to 4 large size containers of strawberries, in a way that a child begging her mother to feed her healthy food can.

But what to do with all those strawberries? Simple - make some strawberry pie!

Ahh, but we had another stumbling block. I normally cheat and get the strawberry glaze stuff from the grocery. Yeah, they don't stock that here. So, we made it from scratch using a recipe from Cooking Light. Again, focusing on eating a little healthier with our junk right?!?

Holly really enjoyed making the strawberry juice, and we made her some extra juice to have as a treat (and polish off the strawberries that were really about to turn anyhow). We used a premade crust because I had one and didn't feel like running to the store.

I pasted the recipe we used below.If you have the time and find yourself with an extra 8 cups of strawberries, consider doing the same because it was delicious!

Making the juice and the finished product

Fresh Strawberry Pie from Cooking Light Magazine

Ingredients

Crust:
50 reduced-calorie vanilla wafers
1/4 cup butter or stick margarine, melted
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon grated orange rind
Cooking spray

Filling:
2 cups ripe strawberries
1/2 cup water
2/3 cup sugar
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
6 cups small ripe strawberries
1/2 cup frozen reduced-calorie whipped topping, thawed and divided

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 350°.

To prepare crust, place wafers in a food processor, and process until finely ground. Add butter, 2 tablespoons sugar, and orange rind, and pulse 10 times or just until wafers are moist. Press into bottom and up sides of a 9-inch pie plate coated with cooking spray. Bake at 350° for 15 minutes; cool on a wire rack.

To prepare filling, mash 2 cups strawberries with a potato masher. Combine mashed strawberries and water in a small saucepan; bring to a boil, and cook 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Press the strawberry mixture through a sieve into a bowl, and reserve 1 cup strawberry liquid (add enough water to measure 1 cup, if necessary). Discard pulp.

Combine 2/3 cup sugar and cornstarch in a pan; add strawberry liquid, stirring well with a whisk. Bring to a boil; cook 1 minute, stirring constantly. Reduce heat, and cook 2 minutes. Remove from heat; stir in lemon juice.

Arrange a layer of small strawberries, stem sides down, in the crust. Spoon about one-third of sauce over the strawberries. Arrange the remaining strawberries on top, and spoon the remaining sauce over the strawberries. Chill for at least 3 hours. Serve with whipped topping.

Hope you enjoy as much as we did!

The Diorama to DIE for!

It's no big secret that Ronnie and I are geeks. Seriously, any couple our age who still get into highly scientific arguments about Physics constants rate pretty high on that scale. Luckily, our children seem to have the same interest in learning everything just like we did when we were young.

They are different yet similar in so many ways. Holly is very imaginative but is also curious about how things work. Sarah loves puzzles and counting, but she also loves to play puppet show. Holly can recall facts she's learned and things that happened a while ago, while Sarah can put together a puzzle with ease even if she hasn't seen it in quite some time. I am in awe of these two bright, beautiful little girls. Which brings me to this week's story:

As you know we just finished up Spring Break, but not without having a little bit of homework to do while on break. A Dinosaur Diorama! I can't tell you how excited I was when I got the first note home about the assignment over break. Seriously, Ronnie and I were secretly doing high 5s because we eat this kind of stuff up!

Alas, it wasn't my project to complete, it was Holly's and she needed to do the work. So,I did what any good mother would do - we headed to the library and checked out some books on dinosaurs. Holly looked through the books and finally settled on the Massospondylus, an evolutionary grandfather of the Brontosaurus. We took our research to the internet and pulled up all sorts of facts about Massy: where and when she lived, how big she was, who her family is, and what she ate.

Then the real fun started, time to make the diorama! Like any good mom, I had also bought some modeling clay, construction paper, paint, and foam brushes. Holly decided to make her models completely out of clay. She made Massy, her nest (complete with eggs) and a volcano. While the clay was drying out, Holly glued construction paper down onto her box. We then got to painting the background to make it more "realistic." Using her books as a guide, Holly painted trees, made the ground a little more muddled, and dressed up her sun. We let it all dry overnight.

She was really excited the next day when we told her she could paint the clay models. She just painted them the way she wanted to, kind of copying the pictures in the book, but not really. Once the paint on the clay models dried, we got everything in the diorama, and with a little help from daddy, got everything secured. As a finishing touch, Holly added "ferns" so Massy could eat and cottonball clouds in the sky.

I don't know who had more fun with the project, her, Sarah who made all sorts of shapes out of clay too, or us guiding her through it. Here she is with her final project. Doesn't she look so proud of herself? I know we are sure proud of her!

Press 2 for English-e

After moving to Korea, the realization set in quickly that we are completely illiterate. Not only do we not "know" the language but the written language of Korea (Hangul) is a series of symbols versus traditional letters. Luckily, there has been a push for "Romanization" to help us poor Westerners, but a lot of things are only written in Hangul.

But times they are a changin'! Just as we push our children to learn Spanish in the States, the Korean parents push their children to learn English, Japanese and Chinese. And if they can get an English speaking person to teach them, they tend to learn proper pronunciation.

A few months ago, my neighbor, Heather, approached me about tutoring English for a group of 7-8 year olds. Her family owns a school here and they do after school learning activities for older children. I lept at the opportunity, hoping that they would also teach me some Korean.

I tutor 3 children once a week for 2 hours. We have a basic workbook that lays out the lesson plan for the week, and Heather has asked that I also work with them on their Phonics. Lucky that I have a pre-reader in my family, because that skill is highly polished right now. We review the previous week's lesson, work through our lesson for that week and build our vocabulary through conversation. Then I move on to our book of the week from my book collection. Sprinkled throughout is all sorts of games aimed to help them with their counting, letter recognition, or just to blow off some steam.

This week, we were learning our basic colors and members of our family. The lesson plan had this laid out as members of the family went to a birthday party. Being the good Westerner I am, I baked some cupcakes and colored the icing blue, green, red, and yellow. It's a Birthday Party right???? Plus, I figured the cupcakes would be a special treat for them working so hard on their "lesson."

We had a great time! When I showed them the cupcakes, their eyes widened and they were so excited to get going on learning. I had them ask for the icing by color (and using our Western manners), then we shared with all of the teachers at the center.

Now I just have to figure out how to top this lesson.....

Coloring our cupcakes

Sunny, Jenny, and Justin enjoying their studies

Yeah! No School!

This week was my first Spring Break since ..... well, let's not say since when. Holly was on break this week, as was Sarah. What's a stay at home mom to do? Keep them so busy they don't have time to wreck the house right?!?!?! Well, it was a whirlwind week full of friends, fun, and learning.

On Monday, the girls and I hit Everland for the day. It was a beautiful day and the park wasn't that crowded, which was really nice. The tulips and other spring flowers are starting to pop up and most of the flowering trees were in bloom. I discovered they had a times guide in English printed up, so we were able to hit a few shows. The girls really enjoyed the seal show and they have a new festival square show complete with some magic tricks. Mostly we just walked around, enjoyed the flowers, and played until the sun went down.

We headed to the Gwacheon National Science Museum on Tuesday with a great group of ladies. This is where Holly's field trip was a few weeks ago. Sarah had a lot of fun exploring with Holly and Holly had a great time showing Sarah all the stuff she learned before. Again, this time I discovered an English times guide (seriously, why did I not see these before). We went to the Robot Dancing show, the shortest robot demo of all of them. It was a lot of fun - seven robots dancing to K-pop. We spent a majority of our time in with the dinosaurs and down in the hands on science areas.

Wednesday brought us some cooler weather, but we decided to brave it anyhow. We visited the Korean Folk Village with the Haugh's and the Kaercher's. What a great place! It's laid out into the different areas of the peninsula and show how people in those areas live. They also have "showtimes" with a traditional Korean wedding, acrobatics, and a horse show. We didn't get to see everything, because you can't do it all in one day. But it's now been "pre-flighted" for a return trip with Daddy soon!

Come Thursday, the girls were quite tired and ready for a break so we kept it low key. Camp Humphrey's Youth Services held a Prince and Princess party in their new youth gym. We gathered up the Stockman's and the Smiley's and headed down for the day. The girls dressed up in their princess best and they showed Sleeping Beauty on a big blow up screen. They really did this right: popcorn, juice and a copy of Sleeping Beauty for every family who attended. Not sure if the kids watched the movie or not, but they sure had a great time playing in the gym.

Today is also a down day for us. We got out of the house early to run some errands on base and playing at the BX for a little while, but we had to get back hom. Being that I haven't been at the house much, my house is really showing the neglect. Plus, Holly has some homework to do over break, so we are sitting down to get a move on that (another post on this coming soon....).

To finish out our weekend, we plan on taking the girls to Everland Saturday afternoon and staying for the fireworks. Looks like the weather will be perfect for it!

But I think this will be the Spring Break to top for years to come! We had a great time with some wonderful friends, and also got to learn a ton about the country we're living in.

Hi Ho, Hi Ho...

it's off to work I go!

While I am a person who enjoys my career and I need to stay busy, I always want to be sure that if I go to work then it is something I will enjoy, since it takes valuable time away from my family. After months of stay at home momhood, I finally hit pay dirt. I have been hired to work in the Tuition Assistance office on base and I start in a little over a week.

Can you say Federal Employment?

It's something I've hoped for as we've made each move, but I never wanted to leave my career as an HR professional to be a secretary. Not that being a secretary is a bad thing, it's just not my calling. But here I am in a country where there aren't many opportunties for me in my field. And while I'll be pushing paper, at least it is in a offshoot of HR and is what I did way back when at Moen.

Let's just hope they have good coffee!

Bloomin' Fun

Spring is slowly arriving to the Korean peninsula. So slow that we still have temperature dips below freezing, but nice enough that there are signs of Spring all over. The girls and I have been snapping pictures of flowers and sprouts while enjoying the warmer weather. Granted warmer means high 50s, low 60s, but that's much better than the 20s we were having.



Korea has an abundance of flowering trees. Pleasing to the eye, not so pleasing to my sinuses. Currently we have apricot blossoms, azaleas, cherry blossoms, forsythia, and magnolias in bloom. I'll add more pics as I take them this week. It's Spring Break and we're bound and determined to not be at the house much.



Hope you enjoy the sights!

Take Me Out To The Ballgame....

As our parents did for us, we have been encouraging our girls to play sports. I think there are a lot of good life lessons you learn when you play a team sport. Like not everyone can be the pitcher/quarterback/point guard, but every position is key to winning the game. The best lesson of all is also how to be a humble winner and a gracious loser. Life lessons, doled out freely game by game, practice by practice. Learned not just by the kids, but retaught to the parents as well.

I bring this up because we have now entered the realm of our kids playing sports. Holly is playing T-ball on the Osan Reds. YEAH!!!!!! How exciting is that?!? Ronnie says that T-ball is reminiscent of Calvinball. Everyone stands around on the field, and not really playing a base, because normally they just stand on it anyway. Each team has a complete run through their lineup. There are no outs and score isn't kept. I have to remind him that we're not really playing baseball, it's just more of a scrimmage than an actual game, but it's fun.

Holly was super excited about her first game. We bought her a glove a few years ago, and picked her up some pink "sleeves" to wear under her uniform like a "real" player does. Mostly she twirls around, talks to whomever is standing by her, picks at the astroturf, and tries to field the ball while running the bases. But it's all in good fun and she gets excited when I tell her to go get her glove.

Of course, this hasn't come with us learning a lesson or two about ourselves. In case you were wondering and didn't know this already, I'm "THAT" mom. You all know her and who her offspring is because she screams at the top of her lungs cheering and coaching from the sidelines. Yeah, that's me and there is video evidence. Ronnie's lesson that he's learning is he can't be the one to teach his kids all the time. There is a reason behind the saying of it takes a tribe, and never is that more apparant when Holly hangs on every word that her coaches say, but ignores the crap out of what he's trying to show her. Guess he got stupid quick.... and obviously doesn't know a thing about baseball (insert sassy eye roll here).

Speaking of, Ronnie is playing baseball again! Well, trying to at least. He's found a Korean baseball team that plays every Sunday. We went out to watch the team today; somehow it reminds me of when the Bad News Bears went to China to play. Or was it Japan? Whatever, the point is that they aren't really good. But it's baseball and that's a good thing. We're hoping he and our friend Matt will get to play this upcoming weekend, so more posts to come on this.

So, if MLB Opening Day didn't get your engine going for the baseball season, I'll leave you with this video. All I can say is this is what our national pasttime is all about!

What's That Dog's Name?

As we were driving home today, the girls noticed there were a lot of dogs running around the neighborhoods. There was one on Sarah's side, so she asked me what his name was. I told her I didn't know, but he looked like an Akita to me.

Seizing the learning moment, I asked them if they knew that dogs had other names called breeds. They didn't so I went in to explaining that on "101 Dalmations", Pongo was the daddy's name, but his breed was Dalmation.

This started them asking what kind of dog Grandma's Riley was; I answered that he's an Australian Shepherd. Sarah said, "Yeah, Riley is a play dog, not a work dog."

Then they wanted to know what kind of dog Grammy's Oscar was; I answered that he's a Pekingese. To that Holly answered, "Yeah, Oscar is a fancy dog."

These kids crack me up sometimes.....

She's Crafty and She's Just My Type

The great debate of whether or not I'm a crafter is still brewing.... I make things that I'm inspired to, but not all of just one thing. I think I create best with food (go figure) and am able to come up with some cute things to take to the girls school or be able to pick out a yummy recipe to try out. I've always been able to experiment with food, because it doesn't take any more time than cooking a normal meal.

Since having the girls though, I've found that I've had to come up with other ideas and things to do. Lately, I've been branching out into sewing and other crafts thanks to my set of Childcraft books. It's also out of necessity since you can't just run to Wal-Mart and get what it is you want. Plus, I need to keep the girls busy when we're cooped up in the house due to weather. So, here are a few projects we've done just in the last few weeks.

French Memo Boards - I took the girls to our local fabric warehouse, Happy Quilt. This place is awesome. Their fabrics normally run 3,000 Won/yard. They picked out the fabric they wanted and I bought some extra to do some cute dresses here in the next few weeks. These took about an hour to do all together, mostly because I did both of them at the same time and explained to Holly what I was doing every step of the way. Can't learn early enough to measure twice, cut once right? The finished product turned out way cute!

Cascarones are confetti filled eggs which are said to bring good luck to the person who's head they are broken over. We picked up having this tradition around for Easter when we were in Texas and it is just plain fun! Unfortunately, they don't have ready made cascarones in Korea. So, I took to the internet and figured out how to make them. Even though it was a multiple day project, they were pretty easy to do. Day one was tapping a hole in the egg to get the yolk out, rinsing and letting them dry. Day two was dying them and letting them dry. Day three was filling with confetti and sealing the hole closed with tissue paper. The girls helped me pick out the colors and make the confetti by hole punching some brightly colored scrap paper. It was a lot of fun!

Next up on the craft project list is making dresses for the girls with the fabric they chose for their memo boards and sewing curtains for my room.

Happy Easter!

Hope everyone has a wonderful Easter!

More Sarah-isms

Sarah is turning into quite the manipulator...

We had a Hail and Farewell today. When heading for the house, I told the girls that they were going to ride home with Daddy. Sarah said, "No, I want to go with you mommy." I told her no, they were going with Daddy.

Sarah then summoned up all the pitiful she could muster and said, "Why mommy? Don't you like me anymore?"

Knowing that she was playing me, I just looked at her and shook my head. She started cackeling and said " But, I love you mommy!"

We're in for trouble with that one if she really learns how to properly guilt and manipulate someone.....

The Earth Laughs in Flowers ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Never is that quote more appropriate than at the Yangjae Flower Market in Seoul. We had tried to go there last weekend, but really missed a lot of the action. Ronnie had to work today, so the girls and I headed to the Flower Market for the day.

It's sectioned off into different buildings: potted plants, cut flower retail zone, the auction room, cut flowers wholesale zone, and the floral materials area. The potted plant building is a big greenhouse full of any type of plant that can grow here. The most overwhelming of this area is the orchid room; imgaine stall after stall of beautiful orchids. If I were more sure of my gardening skills, we would have brought one home. They had azaleas and water lillies too. I told the girls we would do some research to see what all can grow on our porch.

The cut flower retail zone is stall after stall of florists and floral arrangements. They ranged from really small bud vases of a few stems to the large palm frond standing arrangments. The bouquets in here are full retail prices. Holly was really wanting roses, but the florist wanted 20,000 won for them. No thank you....... We went home empty handed, but armed with tons of intel for our next visit.

Our return visit was far more successful, including finding a quick in/quick out parking spot (SCORE!). Since we had checked out the greenhouses and retail zone already, the girls and I headed straight to the cut flower wholesale zone. When you walk in the door, the floral frangrence engulfs you. Not in a make you sick kind of way, in the take a big deep breath and enjoy kind of way. This place is the Pike's Place Martket of cut flowers. The stalls had 3 or 4 shelves full of roses, irises, lillies, gerber daisies, and the like.

I had given the girls 3,500 Won each to spend on any flowers they wanted. We made the rounds first to see what everyone had to offer, and I then directed them back to the stalls that carried the flowers that caught their eyes. Sarah chose a mixed bouquet and a purple pom-pom type flower bouquet. Holly chose a bouquet of medium-stemmed fushia pink roses. I chose a bouquet of deep purple irises for myself.

Now, you probably are thinking that we broke the bank... NOPE!!!! We spent a grand total of 12,000 Won , or a little less than $12. AMAZING isn't it?!? And we didn't just get 2 or 3 stems; Holly got 10 roses and I got a dozen irises. That's the best part of this place. Beautiful fresh cut flowers for cheap. Needless to say, we will be back there....

After our finds in the cut flower area, we headed out to the floral materials area to see what they had. The girls picked out a flat of brightly colored bedding plants to plant in a container on our sunroom/porch. Unfortunately, we didn't find the "perfect" container for them, and the girls were getting restless and hungry. Plus, if we spent any more time we would have been late getting home.

After a trip to E-Mart for lunch, we headed back in our wonderfully perfumed car with our beautiful flowers.

Sarah's flowers

Sarah's other flowers in her room

Holly's roses in her room

My irises with a few of Holly's roses "for color"