Last year several bloggers did a re-cap of their year with links back to some of the posts from the previous year. I thought it was such a great idea, but frankly the thought of looking back over a year's worth of posts overwhelmed me. I'm always a little late to the party. So before it becomes February and it seems too weird, let's look back at 2011.
It was a big year around here, it began with me in a sort of fog as I watched the days go by and still had to live with the fact that my daughter was not home. But life most go on so, we celebrated Valentine's day with a visit to a nursing home and I continued to bathe my kids :) which lead to one of my all time favorite posts about Jack singing a song to his fish while I pondered this big love I've been given.
In March we finally got the call to go and bring Chloe home. So we went to Korea: day one, day two, and day three. Finally we met our daughter, Chloe So-hyeon and we even did some remodeling so that she could have a room.
During the spring, a stranger made me cry (no surprise there) in Cracker Barrel, we celebrated Easter, and I waxed poetically about my sisters and just how important my relationship with them is to me.
This summer was the hottest summer on record and the driest but somehow we survived. We started the summer with Kylynn turning 5, I still can't believe that my baby could be so old, not to mention what it says about me :). We went on vacation to New Mexico with my family and escaped the heat! Then before I knew it summer ended and I accomplished some of my goals.
We started off the "fall" with Kyle turning one year older and Kylynn starting Kindergarten. We then continued my favorite season with some fun, we went glamping (yes I know how to spell), we celebrated Halloween, and some not-so-fun we realized the IRS was out to get us. We ended the year by finalizing Chloe's adoption! We also of course celebrated Thanksgiving and Christmas, but really do you expect me to get things like that posted on my blog during that crazy season, just try and picture it in your head :).
It was a great year, one that found us trying on a family of five for the first time and after a few adjustments, found it to be a nice fit. A year of change for each one of us, none so much as our newest member, and so it was at times exhausting and stressful but it was always good. It was the year that God had for us and it was for our good, of that I am convinced, it was a year that we felt held securely in His hands, a year we felt loved, a year that made us marvel at His grace.
"If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?" -Romans 8:31, 32
Sunday, January 29, 2012
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Seollal, Hunger (Games and mine), and public manners
*I'm sorry I have been absent so much from this blog, it has actually been a good thing, the month of January has had me catching up on a lot of my to-dos I had been behind on and enjoying spending much less time on the computer. I seem to either spend way too much time here or ignore it alltogether, next month I need to work on finding that balance again so I can blog AND not waste hours on pinterest. :)
*Jack is a bit of an adrenaline junkie he loves to run really fast, jump off of high objects, and most of all talk of horrible things happening in a very excited voice. He spends the entire day talking about imaginary scenarios where there's a fire (at the doctor's office we're on our way to) and the firemen will have to put it out! Or an accident happening and the ambulance will have to come and help people! Pretty much every scenario that sends me into a panic attack are the ones he loves to shout about as we drive in the car to our destination.
*We celebrated Seollal (the Korean Lunar New Year) for the first time this year, we were a day late due to Kyle's schedule but we had a great time. I made pajeon, dukgok, and both savory and sweet hoddeok. I cooked for about four hours so it definitely felt like a big feast. When it was finally all done and we sat down to eat, I was both hungry and worn out. I was really impressed with how good the food had turned out, since it was my first stab at Korean cooking (Kyle has always done it in the past). Apparently I was enjoying my food a bit too much, Kyle pointed out that I was making a "mmm" sound every time I took a bite, I was grossing him out with my umm...enthusiasm, what can I say Korean food is good! :)
*To avoid that akward situation where you child points to someone and says, "look mommy that man is really fat", we have a rule that the only thing you can say about/to a stranger is a compliment, such as, "I like her dress." It has worked really well and I have only had one embarrassing incident (so far) with each child. Unfortunately most adults do not have as good of manners as my 5 and 3 year olds. Twice a week we are at a building containing many doctors' offices and we have to ride the elevator. Every single time we are there we have an adult on the elevator/hallway tell Jack that "he is tiny, small, so very very tiny!" They say this as if they are paying him a compliment or as if he is not intelligent enough to understand them. It always makes him feel uncomfortable and he looks at me to try and figure out what to do, and I'm at a loss. For the record, boys who are almost four do not find being "so very tiny" to be a compliment and sometimes it's okay to not say every thought that comes to your mind. Thank you!
*I have been in a very experimental mood when it comes to food lately, I'm sure it's because of Pinterest. Anywho, I want to pass on the best breakfast sandwich of all time. I often make myself an egg and cheese muffin to eat on my way to drop Kylynn off of school but I thought I'd shake it up a bit the other day and wow! it was amazing. Take a toasted (I like mine very toasted) english muffin, put blackberry jam on both sides, cook an egg over medium (so that the yoke is just a little runny), put a piece of swiss cheese on it while the egg is hot, and there you have it, so good! You'll make noises when you eat, right it's not just me that does that sometime...
*I've started reading the Hunger games and since I'm only about half way through the first book I'm doing okay at not letting it take over my life. So far I find it not half as addictive as the Twilight series, but I believe that the first book in Twilight did not consume me either, so we'll see. Reading it is part of the reason I have been so productive lately, I've been making deals with myself of things I need to do before I read. I haven't been so on the ball and so consistent in reading the Bible in months! :)
*If I talk about pinterest again will you stop being my friend? I would, geez lady get a real life friend! Ok, so I've noticed a trend in my use of pinterest I'll pin anything crafts I'll never do, clothes I can never afford, homes that will always be 47 times cleaner than mine, but the only thing I've translated from pin to real life: food. I have cooked proably a third of all my recipe pins and haven't touched the other categories, I'm not even sure what's on my other boards.
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How about you what bit of randomness do you have for me today? Books I need to read, food I need to eat, movies to see, stories to hear? Let me know! I hope y'all have a week filled with random beauty, it's all around us if we just take the time to notice.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Modern day machines (the good and bad), teeth, and more on Pinterest
*Can I get a hallelujah for modern day machines. I am finally finding the time to write because dinner is cooking in the crock pot and bread machine, the washer and dryer are cleaning my clothes, and of course the TV/DVD is babysitting my children. I feel kind of like superwoman, which makes absolutely no sense because I am doing very little work at the moment.
*Chloe doesn't watch TV yet so she is not actually being babysat, just being ignored, which I will regret later. Besides climbing and opening doors, she is really into hitting Jack these days.
*I'm making Creamy Chicken and Rice soup for dinner, oh man it looks so good! Of course I pinned it.
*Jack is no longer being babysat either, due to 1)his decision that all movies (Corduroy is on) are scary, no matter what the topic, he tells me he doesn't want to watch this movie anymore after about 1 minute because it's scary and 2) Chloe and the whole hitting Jack fascination.
*On Saturday I had eaten a really large breakfast and so for lunch I decided to make this really yummy looking smoothie(from Pinterest duh), with spinach and all sorts of berries. I loaded up about $5 worth of produce into my blender and it died on me, I was so upset at the thought of throwing away all that (expensive) food, that I put it in the fridge. It's still there and it looks disgusting I really need to throw it out, but then I will have officially wasted all that food.
*Kylynn's first tooth is loose, last night at dinner she started crying about how her tooth was stuck. I looked at it and it was really loose and bleeding a little. Kyle and I both were a little freaked out about it (which says so much about us I know) and I realized that once again I've reached a stage in parenting where I have no idea what's happening. Later that night she used my magnified mirror to check it all out and found that her permanent tooth has already broken through behind it. If you're a tooth expert, let me know if for some reason that's a problem.
*I was over at a friend's house the other night and I walked in and instantly saw something on her wall and just knew...Pinterest! But most of the time when I'm with friends and I try to tell them about something I saw on Pinterest (which is sadly often) they're not members and have no idea what I'm talking about. If my phone wasn't from 1987, I could pull it up and show them, but instead I just say never mind and they're left thinking I need to get a life, which is entirely true.
*I have probably used Wikipedia about 3 times in my life and then today of all days I needed it to look up information on the Lunar New Year and how they celebrate it in Korea, we've never celebrated it and I saw some of my fellow Korea mommies do really cool things with their kiddos so I wanted to this year and of course today they're protesting with a blackout. Unfortunately with the brain I have these days I will not remember to check back tomorrow.
*I'm sure that there was more randomness that I intended on writing when I sat down, but Chloe has come in every 30 seconds to pull on my arm and then throw herself on the ground in dramatic flair to inform me of her extreme dislike that I am not paying attention to her! So for now friends I hope you have a great Wednesday, full of randomness, and that you see the beauty in all of it around you.
Oh crap Chloe's got the cookies and some of my pottery and is playing the "drums", peace out!
*Chloe doesn't watch TV yet so she is not actually being babysat, just being ignored, which I will regret later. Besides climbing and opening doors, she is really into hitting Jack these days.
*I'm making Creamy Chicken and Rice soup for dinner, oh man it looks so good! Of course I pinned it.
*Jack is no longer being babysat either, due to 1)his decision that all movies (Corduroy is on) are scary, no matter what the topic, he tells me he doesn't want to watch this movie anymore after about 1 minute because it's scary and 2) Chloe and the whole hitting Jack fascination.
*On Saturday I had eaten a really large breakfast and so for lunch I decided to make this really yummy looking smoothie(from Pinterest duh), with spinach and all sorts of berries. I loaded up about $5 worth of produce into my blender and it died on me, I was so upset at the thought of throwing away all that (expensive) food, that I put it in the fridge. It's still there and it looks disgusting I really need to throw it out, but then I will have officially wasted all that food.
*Kylynn's first tooth is loose, last night at dinner she started crying about how her tooth was stuck. I looked at it and it was really loose and bleeding a little. Kyle and I both were a little freaked out about it (which says so much about us I know) and I realized that once again I've reached a stage in parenting where I have no idea what's happening. Later that night she used my magnified mirror to check it all out and found that her permanent tooth has already broken through behind it. If you're a tooth expert, let me know if for some reason that's a problem.
*I was over at a friend's house the other night and I walked in and instantly saw something on her wall and just knew...Pinterest! But most of the time when I'm with friends and I try to tell them about something I saw on Pinterest (which is sadly often) they're not members and have no idea what I'm talking about. If my phone wasn't from 1987, I could pull it up and show them, but instead I just say never mind and they're left thinking I need to get a life, which is entirely true.
*I have probably used Wikipedia about 3 times in my life and then today of all days I needed it to look up information on the Lunar New Year and how they celebrate it in Korea, we've never celebrated it and I saw some of my fellow Korea mommies do really cool things with their kiddos so I wanted to this year and of course today they're protesting with a blackout. Unfortunately with the brain I have these days I will not remember to check back tomorrow.
*I'm sure that there was more randomness that I intended on writing when I sat down, but Chloe has come in every 30 seconds to pull on my arm and then throw herself on the ground in dramatic flair to inform me of her extreme dislike that I am not paying attention to her! So for now friends I hope you have a great Wednesday, full of randomness, and that you see the beauty in all of it around you.
Monday, January 9, 2012
Let's talk Pinterest
Have y'all noticed I've been a little absent on this here blog lately, it's because of a little thing called Pinterest. Are you on Pinterest, if so let's discuss, if not well listen in and decide if the good outweighs the bad, I honestly don't know.
You see Pinterest is a little like crack. Well I've never done crack (shocking I know), how about this Pinterest is a little like cheese puffs. One taste and your hooked, before you know it you can't stop consuming until the last one has been eaten. When it's all said and done you're left feeling a little guilty but mostly thinking about when you can have more.
For those of you not on Pinterest, it is website where you can create virtual pinboards of pictures (that include links to the website they're from) organized by category. You also follow others and see what they're pinning, which if you're not creative (like me) you can just re-pin whatever they do. I have a board with recipes, one with fashion, one with ideas for my home, one I used while Christmas shopping, and one for guilty pleasures, like this picture of my favorite vampire someone pinned and I literally could not stop myself.
Here's the thing about Pinterest that separates it from all the other time wasters out there on the web. After I spend an hour on Pinterest I feel like I just cooked this dinner and this one, made this dessert to boot, styled my hair, bought a whole new outfit, learned how to clean my bathroom with a grapefruit, and painted my island turquoise! Only problem is all I really did was spend an hour looking at pretty pictures and pinning them onto my boards.
But believe or not I do actually use the things I pin. I've become much more fashion conscious, well some days at least. I've cooked many of the recipes I've found, and found that just because someone has a fancy camera doesn't mean their recipe is any good, but sometimes it does. I've tried the sock bun for curling my hair, and it made my hair look like a rat's nest, but I'm hoping it was user's error and will try again. I used it very effectively to pick out Christmas gifts, and have a list as long as Kyle's arm (he's got long arms) for projects to do around the house. In short, it's made me more creative and eager to try new things then I've been since I grew up and lost that creative energy that used to drive me.
Are you on Pinterest? If so let me know I'd love to follow you, because the more people I follow the more cool pins I see when I log on and the less likely I am to click on the "popular" pins link and find myself drowning in a world of amazing pins that never ends. Afterall a girl's gotta sleep sometime.
*wow, the word "Pinterest is very hard to spell and blogger needs to learn it's a real word so I can easily see where I've messed up*
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