A Year in Review

I think one of my favorite parts of a new year is looking back at the last one. This year has been no exception. I am amazed at just how much we accomplished, how many funny expat stores we've accumulated, how many trials we've gone through and grown stronger from, how much we've been blessed, and how much traveling we've been able to do. Here have been some of my favorite moments of 2012.
Visited Japan

Found out I had kidney disease and then was miraculously cured the next week.
Finished our first year of teaching

Found the best burgers in Korea

Went to the Cherry Blossom Festival

Joined the hipster movement and got grandpa glasses

Our little clown car celebrated it's one year birthday with us (mind you, we only expected it to last a few months)

Went to the Mud Festival

Visited home and saw my niece for the first time

Ate a year old cake

Went on a Roadtrip up the East coast of Korea.

Saw North Korea

Ran my first 5k

Added Zeke to the family

Celebrated two years of marriage

And lastly, I made the big switch from Wordpress to Blogger about two months ago. I just want to do a little shout out to all of the people who read, comment, email and follow this little blog. Without you it would just be me, talking to myself, begging family to read it. So thank you from the bottom of my heart, it means the world.

And no new year would be complete without a set of New Years resolutions. As much of a planner as I am, this idea was all hubs. He was insistent on sitting down and coming up with personal, financial and couple goals. Some were actual goals of things we wanted to accomplish but most were just fun ideas of things we wanted to try or attempt to get better at. Along with being more intentional with our time with each other, better contact with people back home, and more patience with students we had other ones that have been my favorite.

.pray every night together-when we were dating and long distance, we excelled at this, making sure we prayed ever night before we hung up the phone. Then after we got married...I'm not sure what happened. I'm thinking that if we do it in the morning we can avoid the ever so popular 'Thank you for this day, Amen' type prayers. I feel like when we pray together every day we feel more patient with one another and generally feel closer. Who wouldn't want that?

.memory jar & journaling-I'm really excited about the next two activities we're wanting to start this year. The first is a memory jar. You write notes of good things that happen that year and stick it in the jar. Then, on New Years, you open up the jar and read all of the memories from the last year. It's a perfect way to document both large and small moments throughout the year (because you know, a blog just isn't enough is it?). The second is starting a journal together. It will be a place that we can write notes, love letters or prayers for one another and then pass it along to the other person to read and write back. I'm clearly more excited about this than hubs but I think that's only because I told him about this when he was half asleep in bed...he'll catch on.

.sponsorship-the last thing we're hoping to do this year is sponsor a child in need. We've been wanting to do this for awhile but just haven't taken the time to research companies and find one that is reputable and that we're comfortable with. Any suggestions?

So long 2012 and the warmest of welcomes to 2013. I can't wait to see what you have in store.

Also, be sure to check out my guest post over on From There to Here

A Merry Little Christmas

I apologize for the slight silence around here this week. A massive but happily welcomed food coma ensued for the better half of three days (no complaints here) and I simply got lazy. And instead of doing anything productive, I spent massive amounts of time cuddling up with hubs watching movies and enjoying the fruits of my baking labor (again, no complaints here).
To say we had a good Christmas would be a great understatement. We were able to spend the better part of the holiday with friends and of course massive amounts of delicious food. We have found such an amazing community here and it has made all the difference in the world when it comes to celebrating holidays overseas and away from family. It all started Christmas Eve when a huge box from The Land of the Goods (aka my mom's house) arrived with 43 pounds of everything that expats dream about. Our little apartment is now fully stocked with all the ingredients needed for s'mores, fudge, and a giant cookie cake. Bring on the winter 'warmth' pounds. Sadly, I have no photos of this box of love because as soon as it entered our cozy apartment, it was ripped apart.
That night we headed to church for a cozy little candlelight service. Being away from the states, and therefore distanced from all the fuss of this season has given us space to really reflect during this holiday and truly celebrate it's purpose. I'm not saying that we wouldn't do the same if we still lived back home but I think that with more distractions comes less focus for reflection. Being overseas during the holidays can be extremely bittersweet for us expats. On one hand I miss the lights, the Christmas music being played in every store, the family time filled with good food, games and an abundance of laughter. But being away from it all has given hubs and I a chance to really bond together during these times and enjoy the simplified version of this holiday.

What was your favorite part of the holiday?

Merry Christmas!!

Merry Christmas from Korea! We wish you and yours a very special holiday season with no shortage of love, laughter and joy.
We'll be spending the day enjoying the company of friends and trying to recreate some family traditions from back home. One of my favorite traditions is waking up to my dad's homemade cinnamon rolls on Christmas morning. Emphasis on dad's cinnamon rolls. I think I would enjoy them so much more if I could just roll out of bed, have the coffee already made and sit down to eat right away like I do when I'm home. The things we take for granted. But alas, I'll be in my kitchen (which is the size of my parent's kitchen pantry) slaving away and making everything from scratch. But if I can get them to taste even similar to the one's my dad makes, I'll be one happy girl.

Here's a little flashback to hub's adorable kindi kids from last year.

What's your favorite holiday tradition?

Oh Christmas Tree

Just a few photos from our tree excursion. 

Us, our tree and our tiny little clown car.

Merry Christmas Charlie Brown! I'm starting to actually like the Charlie Brown trees more. Guess it will save us money at the tree farms when we get back to the states and we don't mind taking the rejects. 

Homemade ornaments. The first one you simply cut out several circles then fold them all in half. Glue them together and before completing the circle add a string in the middle to hang it from.

The second you do the same process as the star garland. Cut a star shape, fold along each point then glue two of the stars together and string some twine though it. 

We finally got a cute picture of Zeke with the lights! I love my little family.

Merry Christmas Season everyone! Can't wait to see everyone's beautiful trees! 

Honeymooners

Today marks two whole years since I said 'I do' and inevitably it changed my life forever. It’s the day I said ‘I do’ to a traveling lifestyle, syrup Saturdays, and a never-ending list of new things to try. To the marriage veterans, two years is nothing; they look back at when they’d been married for just two years and laugh at when they thought they had everything figured out. But as self-proclaimed life long honeymooners, every year is a landmark. It is another year that we proved the negative marriage stereotypes wrong. I am definitely not an expert on marriage nor do I ever want to come across as one. I know that each day is different, each day is a new and wonderful challenge, and each day has its lessons to be learned. Speaking of lessons, here are some that we've learned in our two years of marriage:

-Starting a serious discussion late at night is never a good idea. Beds are for sleeping, couches are for talking.

-Always make more food. I learned this the hard way. I figured a meal that I made for myself when I was single would surely be enough for the both of us. Wrong.

-Long drives through the country rice fields are the best for long talks.

-Always remember to turn off the water heater after hubs gets out of the shower (ps our water heater needs to be turned on for each use, best and worst thing I’ve ever experienced)

-First one up makes breakfast. Aka hubs.

-All things said out of hunger should be immediately forgotten.

-Prayer, prayer, prayer.

This pretty much sums up our two years...

Happy anniversary hubs! Here's to many many more! Even though neither of us can remember very much of the vows that we wrote, we do both remember promising to always be partners in adventure. I think we've done a pretty good job so far. I can't wait to see what the next 70 plus years has in store for us.

merry merry christmas

this december has been surprisingly cold outside. when we first came to korea it was cold but we were told not to turn on the floor heat in the apartment because the cost of it was so high. (apartments here have heated floors instead of central heat) so we plugged in an electrical heater and thought nothing more of it. turns out, it was just as expensive if not more so. our bill was the highest in our building (something i'm slightly proud of) and a government official was sent to our house to find out why we were wasting so much electricity. i guess we know better for next year.

we were debating whether or not to get a tree but the holiday season just doesn't seem the same without one. we went to homeplus (the local supermarket) to look for one. we saw a lot of decorations and decided to come back the next week to pick some out. by the time we got back to the store, around the 10th of december, everything was sold out. they had a sad looking fake tree and some bulb ornaments left. we decided that we would try out luck at finding a tree out back, and by out back we mean the mountain that sits behind our apartment complex. the mister did an amazing job at finding the perfect charlie brown tree and even made a stump holder for it. i was in charge of making homemade ornaments and decorations...never again. it was kind of like our idea to string popcorn for our tree last year. we made it half way around one side of the tree and stopped. i enjoyed the first hour or so of making the ornaments and then wanted to give up. i have never folded so much paper in my life. you would think i was majoring in origami. but now it's done and over and we're going to try to save all of them for next year somehow so we can sit back and enjoy more of the season.

korea is predominantly christian but when it comes to christmas there's not a lot of celebration. the day is more seen of as a day to hang out with friends and your significant other than it is to be with family. we spent the day making crepes and mexican food with friends and watching old christmas movies. the perfect way to relax before heading back to work the next day.

these are salt dough ornaments that are really common to make with children. we tried them with our kindi classes too.

this one was probably the easiest of them all. you simply cut a star shape out of cardstock paper and fold along each point. then fold the insides so it kind of pops out. then glue two of them back to back to make a tree topper or the ornaments.

the amazing bottom that jeremy made for the tree

we'll be heading to japan tomorrow and we can't wait for a getaway! i'll be sure to get pictures posted when we get back! merry christmas!

gobble gobble

it was our first thanksgiving in korea and thankfully there were no fires! i think that alone classifies it as a success. despite being away from our families during the holidays, we have so much to be thankful for this year. not only do i have an amazing mister to spend my time with (who cooks an amazing turkey by the way) but we have great friends in korea (who saved my butt by helping me with all the cooking!). we also have great jobs this year and jobs lined up for next that enable us to save money and travel a lot. AND we have signed the contract on our new apartment! we could not be more excited. after much searching and A LOT of help from our korean co-teachers (its a little difficult to negotiate with someone who speaks no english...go figure), we are happy to say that we will be moving in january to our new place. finding a place of our own in a foreign country definitely has its difficulties but we had a relatively easy time finding a place we love. with all the help we got and with everything falling so perfectly into place, we can't take credit. it was definitely a God thing.what's thanksgiving without a mustache wearing turkey? compliments of mister diamondabout a month ago, jeremy found (ahem! stole) a wild pumpkin and brought it home. just in time for me to learn how to make homemade pumpkin puree for pumpkin pie. i'm still amazed at how many things we buy canned, processed or already prepared in the states. when i lived there i had the mindset of not going out of my way to make things from scratch because i figured that it was too difficult. i constantly surprise myself at just how easy things are to cook from scratch and how little time it takes. cooking thanksgiving dinner in korea certainly has its challenges. first off, my main helper and close friend, alissa is now 9 months pregnant and had to sit down between cooking because of contractions. not that i was a slave driver and making her do it, i was just afraid that we would have to rush her to the hospital in the middle of it all. thankfully, dinner was finished, and no baby came. another challenge came to the oven and space situation. we do not have a proper oven by american standards here in korea. the one in the picture is actually alissa's that she brought with her and ours is slightly smaller than that. as you can see, the turkey just barely fits in there. we had to set up an extra table in the living rooms and run an extension cord out there so we could have enough room to cook everything. after 6 hours of cooking, we're finished! proud mister slicing and dicing. the whole group for dinner 

Children's Day

on may 5th korea nationally recognizes and celebrates children's day. school is let out, work is canceled, and parents agree to do whatever the kids want to do that day. on that day, our friends mike and alissa invited us to go hang out with the kids at the orphanage. we couldn't resist. 

this is the place where over 50 kids from ages of 1 year to 20 years call home. most of the kids here are either handicapped, or given up because of death or financial circumstances. for reasons unknown, people are not allowed to adopt the kids. 

the kids all prayed together before each meal.

this little guy's dad actually stopped by during the celebrations to spend time with him. we were told that he comes by every few weeks to take him for the weekend then drops him back off again. the only reason we could think of as to why he was in the orphanage in the first place is because the mom is no longer present. traditionally, mothers in korea quit work and stay home when the children are born. and men working 10-12 hour days is not uncommon. with the mother out of the picture and most companies not understanding that the father may need to leave work early to take care of the child, this little guy's father may have been forced to give him up.it was great to see how much the older kids looked out for the little ones. whether it was toting them around or helping them get dressed and eat.

all the kids were extremely affectionate and were excited to have someone new to play with for the day

they took us to a school gym where they had games, prizes and food for the kids all day.

the boys weren't quite as talented as the kids when it came to hula hoop games.