Meet the Kitty and So Long Kitty

We have had a couple of kitties for a few months now.

A flame point Siamese and a seal point Siamese.

They are brothers.  We thought getting 2 kitties would be a great idea.

They coud play with each other and each of the kids

would have a cat to torment.

We named the kitties Aslan and Prince Caspian.

Isabelle and I are big Narnia fans.

Here's a picture of Aslan.

Here's a picture of Prince Caspian, or Caspian.

It didn't take Soungsik and I long to figure out that we have a 1 cat limit.

Were you  aware that

1 cat + 1 cat = 3 cats fur and 4 cats poop?

I wasn't either.

We also discovered that when you have 2 cats, you will never see them.

That is unless you are feeding them or cleaning up their business.

That kindof takes the fun out of having a pet.

It only took us about 2.5 seconds to decide which cat to keep.

Prince Caspian.

Aslan really lived up to his name. 

He only came around on his terms, and very rarely.

Caspian is pretty lovable and nice to a fault with the kids.

William loves to lay on him like a pillow.

 William is actually pretty gentle with him, this picture is a little deceiving.

This picture shows the most common situation.

William follows the kitty everywhere.

Up stairs and back down again.

Into dark basements and up on furniture.

Under tables and inside nooks.

They make a great pair.

Isabelle also loves him, but Caspian kindof seeks out William.

Maybe he is a suicidal cat?!?

I hope Caspian is part of our family for a long time to come.

The Return of the Hermit

The inevitable has happened. 

This happens to me every year.  It usually hits me around January 5th,

so I would say that making it all the way to the 12th is amazing progress!

Every year without fail I start having the same emotions.

I transform into a hermit.

I don't want to set one foot outside of my
house until at least the end of March

and possibly longer.

Some people would go stir crazy but I am here to tell you that

as long as I had my health and a good supply of
life necessities I would be in heaven.

It may be that I have that "seasonal mood disorder", but if I go to a doctor to get diagnosed with it then he would probably find many other brain "disorders" as well.

That's a chance I am not willing to take.

I know that I have some Indian blood in me. 
Probably from those Indians that came from Southern Florida. 
I know I couldn't be from Canadian Indians.

I think my Indian name would be "Sleeping Bear". 

There are many reasons why this is a fitting name for me.

Not only could I hibernate, but I also enjoy napping even when the weather is perfect, I also love fish, get cranky for no apparent reason, protect my young to a fault, and I like fur coats.

I have pioneer ancestors too.

My pioneer name would be "dead".

There's just no way I would have made it.

I am sitting here in my heated house with my sweater and

warm fuzzy socks on complaining about the cold.

When I go somewhere it will be to the garage to get into my heated car.

When I return home if I need to I can whip up a cup of hot, hot chocolate.

I know it's spoiled and selfish, but I still wish I could stay home for the next few months.

This too shall pass, it does every year.

The Princess and the Chicken

A bedtime story created in the mind of Isabelle Kim.

Once upon a time there was a Princess and a chicken.

One day the chicken came and asked the princess

"Do you have any chicken legs?"

The princess said "No".

The next day the chicken asked,

"Do you have any chicken legs?"

The princess said "NO".

The next day the chicken came back and asked,

"Do you have any chicken legs?"

The princess said "NO!!!"

On the fourth day the chicken came back and asked,

"Do you have any chicken legs?"

The princess said,
"If you ask me that one more time I am going to shoot you!"

Then the chicken said

"Do you have a gun?!?"

The princess answered...

"no..."

The end.

My review of this story,

funny and ironic.

What a smart princess.

 She knows the best way to get chicken legs!

I must admit our children are exposed to

guns at a very young age.

Education is power.

I am holding my breath that our children

won't end up too morbid!

Jinxed!

Last week I was so excited about getting back on schedule.

I was certain that nothing could stand in my way!

Boy was I wrong.

Monday started out just great, so it really got my hopes up.

William had a bit of a cold but he wasn't going to let that slow him down.

Our day went like this...

Exercise - check (for a whole hour I might add),

Clean rooms and make beds - check,

Do LOTS of school - check,

Practice piano - double check,

Reading practice - check,

Clean most of the house - check,

Catch up on laundry - check,

Scripture Reading - check,

Kids happily sleeping by 8:00 - check!

Pretty much a perfect day.

Then on Tuesday a water line broke at Nathaniel and Jenny's house.

I take full blame for this happening, it was my fault for saying

everything would follow "my schedule".

I guess the universe wanted to show me who was boss!

At any rate we got house guests.

It was much, much harder for them than for us.

The girls couldn't have been happier!

The rest of the week went like this...

Play - check,

Play dress up - check,

Watch movie - check,

Play house - check,

Snacks - check,

Play Wii - check,

Watch movie - check,

Color - check,

Read stories - check,

Watch movie - check

Run around - check,

Play Wii - check,

Giggle - check,

Fight - check,

Make up - check,

Watch movie - check

Play games - check

Kids to sleep at 8:00 - ha ha ha ha ha!

Kids to sleep by midnight - check, check, check, check, check!

Poor Nathaniel and Jenny couldn't go home until Saturday! 

When I told Isabelle they were going home she said

 "not all ready", in her whiniest voice possible.

Saturday morning Isabelle woke up sick.

This was the universes' way of making sure I

still didn't get back on schedule.

Here's a picture of my sickly little girl...

So very sad! 

All she wanted to do was sleep and lay on the couch.

She wouldn't eat anything!

This bowl was originally placed by Isabelle 

"just in case" she needed it for something.

It didn't stay by her for very long though.

William decided it made a great hat

and an even better drum.

You can fit a bucket load of toys in there too!

On Sunday I went to church and left the kids home with Soungsik.

It was so weird to have to sit still and not have anyone jump

on you or rip holes in your nylons.

I didn't have to take anyone out because they were crying or stinky.

On the upside I got to hear some great talks.

One the downside,

 church is longer and more boring without distractions!

We made it back to another Monday

and the amount of work I got caught up on today was

pretty impressive, if I do say so myself.

Don't worry universe I am not even thinking about planning

more than a day in advance.

Tomorrow will just have to be a surprise.

Please universe let my children stay healthy and my

families' homes stay in one piece!

BOOK REVIEW: A THOMAS JEFFERSON EDUCATION

Written By: Oliver Van Demille

Number of Pages: 141

Number of Stars I'm Giving It: 5

This book is basically a handbook for some homeschooling families.

I had taken a class on this at the homeschool convention

I attented in last June.

It has literally taken me 4 months to read this book.

That may sound like a contradiction since it is less

than 150 pages and I gave it 5 stars.

This book was a little hard to get into and seemed

quite repetitious to me. I just kept picking up other

books instead of finishing this one!

That being said I really agreed with the content.

It is a book that everyone should read

 because it will change the way you view education.

It had many worthwhile and memorable quotes such as:

"You must be the change you wish to see in the world"

Ghandi

"You were born with potential.

You were born with goodness and trust.

You were born with ideals and dreams.

You were born with greatness.

You were born with wings.

You are not meant for crawling, so don't.

You have wings.

Learn to use them and fly."

Rumi

And perhaps the one that hit me the hardest and made me think was:

"...the world's greatest civilizations have progressed through this sequence:

from bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage;

from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance;

from abundance to selfishness; from selfishness to complacency;

from complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependancy;

from dependancy to bondage."

Alexander Tytler

This quote is also in "The 5000 Year Leap" I believe.

Another book I highly recommend reading.

I believe as a people we are now somewhere

around the complacency in that sequence.

It is clear that education reform is desperately

needed in our society.

While I know that the method taught in this book in theory would work

amazingly well, in real life this is not something that would work for us.

I am sure there are many families who find great success with this method.

I am going to incorporate the classics heavily into our curriculum.

While it is a book used a lot by "homeschoolers" this method

could and should be applied, at least in part,

 in all schools and at all levels.

Our children need a return to virtue, honesty, mutual respect and

great expectations.  By choosing to homeschool,

I feel the weight of my childrens futures more heavily on my shoulders.

It is my responsibility to prepare my chidren for the

trials and joys this life has to offer.

It is both a burden and a blessing,

but I feel a sense of peace and

comfort in my decision.

I am so grateful to live in a country and at a time

where I have the freedom to make this choice!

Back To Normal

After basically three weeks of "vacation",
we started getting back to normal.

Well at least as normal as anyone in our household can ever hope to be.

Taking a break from school, taekwondo, gymnastics, piano, and

 extra chores was only planned to be two weeks,

but we checked out a week early this year.

We had a lot of fun but I was more than ready to get some structure back.

Three weeks must be my limit for chaos.

Isabelle was not so excited to get back to regular life.

Today she decided she hates all things associated

with her past life of 2010.

This was what she sounded like all day,

"Mom, I hate making my bed.  Why do we have to do school,

can't I just play the Wii all day? 

I like my hair messy. Piano?  I hate piano."

I understand that she doesn't actually mean any of those things -

except for possibly the hair and bed parts. 

 She is just lucky that we didn't have more
 "regular" stuff on the schedule today.

Liam went back to some kind of new normal.

I think a switch must have gone off in him again.

He has always been a climber, but he is starting to venture off into extreme sports.

He can't seem to go more than 30 seconds without getting into trouble. 

Soungsik's mom had to sew leather patches on the

knees of his jeans when he would get new ones because

 he would wear them out so quickly.

I desperately hope that isn't a heritable necessity. 

I left Liam in the kitchen for literally 10 seconds alone. 

When I had come back he was standing in the middle of the table. 

I had to run as fast as possible to catch him before he could

"run away" from me off the edge of the table.

He kept getting up on the ottoman and jumping onto the couch face first. 

He must have done that at least 50 times. 

He was also missing a lot today and I kept finding him in the

 pitch black basement hanging onto the cat by his tail.

As a side note he is also sick, with a bad cold. 

He has a sore throat, cough, and extra runny nose.

I am getting nervous about how much trouble he'll be able

 to get into when he has his full health.

Is it bad for a mom to pray to keep her child just mildly sick?

Today has gone as smooth as I could have hoped and
I got many things accomplished.

I wonder how long we will be on our normal schedule before

I am begging for another three week vacation.

I am hoping for one week at a minimum!

I'm Loving It

The first Sunday of the new year, and you know what that means... 

A new church schedule!

I was a very happy girl this morning.

Our ward moved to the time slot 11:00 to 2:00!

I have been counting down 52 weeks for this Sunday.

It was so perfect just waking up to sunshine and not an
alarm clock this morning.

Not that we use an alarm clock on any other day of the week. 

I just have an aversion to alarm clocks.

I didn't have to go shake my kids and Soungsik awake and watch them

pitifully try to eat breakfast while half asleep.

I didn't have to beg anyone to take a bath or get dressed.

We were even on time for church today with very little effort on our part.

Isabelle got to move up to CTR 5 and

Grandma and Grandpa are her new teachers.

She was sitting behind me in sharing time and kept poking me

and saying "Mom I really miss you."

I got a new class with only 4 little people,

they are so cute and funny, it's going to be a fun year.

The rest of the day was just a typical Sunday at home.

Ending with a little pajama ballroom dancing with daddy.

Yes I think I am going to be enjoying the next year of Sundays quite a bit!

Happy New Year 2011!

It is another new year and I must say I am looking forward to it.

2010 flew by way too fast and I have a hunch 2011 will do the same.

I am keeping my fingers crossed that this year will be a

little less eventful than last year.

Last night was New Year's Eve and I probably should have

taken some pictures of our get together.

I was too busy having fun to think about the camera.

Actually that isn't the whole truth. 

There were many times when I thought
 "I should go take some pictures of this",

 but I was too lazy to go get the camera. Oops.

Last night we didn't have a huge group just our family, Mom and Dad,

 Nathaniel and Jenny's family, and Soung-Jo and his family

 came by for a couple of hours.

It was Jee Hoon's 11th birthday, so that was a great excuse for
some cake and ice cream -

 as if we ever really need an excuse! I do have 1 birthday picture, yay!

After cake and ice cream we played lots and lots on the Wii.

And then we played card games and aggravation.

Mom and Dad won aggravation about 20 minutes before

the new year for possibly the 1st time of 2010!

 I started the new year off with a HUGE mistake.

We let all of the kids stay up until midnight and the

dad's were playing on the Wii.

We discovered last night that the clock on my stove

 is about 5 minutes too slow.

Which explains a lot of things,

like why we are always 5 minutes late to church and

 also why it always looks like it takes 12 minutes to get the kids in the car.

I made the boy's turn off the game so that we could

all watch the ball drop, that's when we found out it was 12:01

and the ball had already dropped. 

 We got to watch the very last of the confetti though,

which it not exciting at all. 

We also got to watch a replay of the ball dropping on

some people's camera phones,

which is also not exciting at all.

Isabelle was crying on her way to bed because she

thought we had missed the new year.

I had to explain to her that we still had plenty of year left.

Nathaniel and Jenny's family stayed the night. 

Isabelle and Natalie slept in Isabelle's room and they

didn't go to sleep until around 1:00.

It was amazing that the kids didn't fight at all today, but all of them

took turns crying multiple times today for no particular reason.

We all just sat around and ate snacks and played all day.

Not the most productive way to start the new year,

 but that is what Monday's are for.

I am keeping my fingers crossed that this year will be a wonderful one.

I hope and pray that everyone we love will be safe and healthy!

We may not be able to get everything we want,

but hopefully we can have everything we need.

I am grateful to start our the new year with

family and friends we love, with good health,

and a comfortable house.

We are truely blessed.

The Recovery

I have spent the majority of today cleaning the house and
putting away the Christmas decorations.

It is always amazing how fast the time goes between
Halloween and New Years.

This year I just blinked and it was gone.

I love putting up all of the decorations for the holidays, especially Christmas,
but there is something so refreshing about boxing them all back up again.

Isabelle was practically in tears as I dismantled the trees.

Although the house seems to feel a little empty now,
it also feels like a clean slate.

Yesterday I spent the day cleaning and organizing the school/play room.

Well one thing leads to another and cleaning that one room
required me to also clean out 3 closets.

I was going to wait until January to start getting the house organized,
 but I already have a big headstart.

Its not the most exciting post I know, but it has taken up two days
of my life so it deserves a paragraph!

I am so very tired.  It's time to hit the hay!

You're a 5 Year Old

Every year for my kids birthdays we get pictures taken.

I have loved that tradition.

This year I am feeling broke and cheap at the same time

so I didn't go to a studio like we usually do.

I took Isabelle to the Joseph Smith Memorial building
to see what we could come up with.

It would have been better if Isabelle had smiled,
but I think we got some cute ones. 

It's sad to admit, but that really does look like a 5 year old.

She's becoming beautiful instead of cute.

She was in love with that chandelier.

"Mom, it's so pretty, I can't believe it!"

Thanks for the nice backdrop Salt Lake City.

She had to take her "Fancy Nancy" doll with a matching dress.

I had to limit the number of pictures Nancy could be in.

How many cities can you get a picture like this in?

Sometimes she felt like this about the pictures...

Sometimes she felt like this...

I always laugh histerically when I see a nativity scene too.

Welcome to being a big 5 year old Isabelle.

I am so excited to see what will be in store for you in this next year!



Wii Fit...Wii Wish!

I got the Wii Fit for Christmas this year.

Yesterday was the first time I got a chance to try it out. 

I think it is going to be pretty fun.

I am not sure I like the idea of my games being able to weigh me

and tell me what my BMI is.

When you turn it on it goes through a setup process and it has you

try out some basic balancing techniques.

I am not Jillian from Biggest Loser,

but I consider myself to be in somewhat good shape.

Of course not as good as before I had kids,

but I could hold my own in a tug of war.

After I did my balancing practice the little digital "me" says

"I don't think balancing is your forte."

SLAM!  What a little snob digital "me" has become.

That really hits you where it hurts.

If she told me "I don't think being a chemist or a professional opera singer is your forte", then I would have to agree.

Isn't balancing just one step above breathing and brushing your teeth?

I mean it's lower than walking in terms of physical fitness. 

It's a miracle I even manage to get out of bed in the mornings.

Come to think of it maybe my "me" has a point, sometimes

I do find getting out of bed to be difficult,

could it be my poor balancing skills are to blame?

I refuse to give up though. 

I pledge to work on it every day until snobby digital "me" has to eat her digital words.

At my funeral all of my friends will say

"She might not have been a genius, but that girl sure had good balance!"

Christmas Day

The countdown finally came to an end!  Santa didn't fly by!  He came!
The kids got new jammies on Christmas Eve, one of our few traditions.
I tried to get a picture of them together in the new PJ's but alas my children never
hold still, and certainly never at the same time!

We are fortunate parents, our kids didn't wake up until 8:00.

I wonder how many more years we'll get away with that.

William was feeling partly cloudy and mostly just wanted to be held all day.

It wasn't too bad, but he didn't get overly enthused about his presents.

A Pillow Pet is the only thing she really wanted!

She wanted the unicorn one, but Santa thought it was too ugly to buy.

Fortunately Jee Hoon was nicer than Santa and got the unicorn for her.

2 Pillow Pets in one day!  Life is sweet.

William needed one as well. 

I think Santa might just buy duplicates of everything next year.

We got Isabelle this dog because William got one for his birthday and she is
stealing it ALL of the time.

The age recommendations are 6 to 36 months. 

There is no way I am going to tell her it's a baby toy,

I am going to let one of her friends break it to her when she's 7.

Paybacks!  That'll teach you to steal my dog!

He wasn't excited about his presents but he couldn't get enough of Isabelle's!

Daddy's toys.  He was saying "Mine" to Isabelle.

I am 98.8% sure that he was joking!

This tent was a spur of the moment buy at the last minute.

This was the favorite of both of the kids.

They played in it for hours and when it came time for bed

we had to clear off Isabelle's bed and put it on top.

It was there that she slept for the night with a pile of blankets,

her new pillow pets, and all of her Christmas loot.

The last thing she said before going to sleep...

"This was the BEST Christmas EVER!"

Victory is mine!

Oh yeah, what did I get for Christmas? 

Well besides my Wii Fit I got the best thing ever,

a 2 hour nap!

Christmas Eve 2010

Oh what a fun day! 

Today we had our family Christmas party.

We decided to do it at our Lehi Taekwondo center so that we would have LOTS of room for the kids to play.  It certainly wasn't as formal as many people's Christmas parties probably are,

but we had so much fun!

We had to start off the party with some food!

Holy Cow - our family looks HUGE!

It was so nice to have Grandma Great with us for our party!

Sue and Mac stopped by too, that was nice since we haven't seen Sue since she moved out.

(She stayed with us for just a month or so not too long ago, but Isabelle still misses her!)

Let the games begin...

Now thats what I call a handful!

Erica will always be a kid at heart.

I have to let you know this was only 2 days after Erica had a

very large, very painful shot for her cancer treatment! 

She is amazing!

This is way harder than it looks...

Unless you are Nathaniel and you have a very big mouth!

He didn't seem to find it challenging at all.

Isabelle on the other hand found it very challenging!

Oh, oh...you almost got it!

DODGEBALLL!!!

I think the dad's were playing a different game than the kids.

Liam was just running around the whole time thinking he was a big kid!

Last but not least....presents!!!

Isabelle played with Hungry, Hungry Hippos for hours tonight!

What a hit!

Yay - Cars for him to be excited about,

and shoes for me to be excited about!

Thanks Grandma & Grandpa.

Boots, and they are even pink - score!

Again, I was more excited than her about these.

I love having practical parents.

Wesley's 1st Christmas.

I think he's pretty into it!

After the party we still had to come home and have a little fun.

Christmas cookies for Santa just had to be made.

Well, 2 for him and 1 for her.

I left her alone for 3 minutes and when I came back 95%

off the sprinkles in that bottle were on those 3 cookies.

I hope Santa loves sprinkles!

After a few games of Hungry Hippos and a game of memory it was off to bed for Isabelle.

The scary thing about this memory game is I won, but not by very much. I only had two more matches than Isabelle.  She has a good little memory and I am afraid that by the time she is

 6 she will be beating me everytime.

Soungsik on the other hand...didn't care so much for that game!