The Ficus Killer

Plants do not usually have a long life expectancy in my house.

A couple of weeks or months tops.

Soungsik and I were given a ficus tree at our wedding 10.5 years ago.

I am now of the opinion that a plant is a horribly mean thing to give newlyweds. Let me explain why.

When we got it I thought it was such a great idea.  But as I have almost killed this ficus tree 20 times you can't imagine the guilt associated with almost killing something precious from your wedding.  It's not like breaking a bowl or a dish, it an actual living thing.  Somehow it turns into a testament to the strength of your marriage and your own maturity.  When I was pregnant with Isabelle and I almost killed the ficus I ran to my dad, a plant lover, and begged him to save it for me.  I was worried that if I couldn't even keep a plant alive, what was I going to do with a child?  My dad saved the tree for me and while it was under his care it miraculously even grew a few inches.  It hadn't grown at all under my careful love and attention.  It turns out you have to water plants every now and again.  Now my ficus tree looks like this.

Every time you walk past it 10 leaves fall off. 

So I could look at this 2 different ways.

It could be a bad omen that our marriage may be coming to an end and dying like this ficus tree.

Or I could be very happy that or marriage is so strong it has outlasted this tree. 

I'm going to go with the second option!

Maybe I'll go water it and see if love (and water) really can conquer all.  I still can't bring myself to throw it out.  Maybe when all of the leaves have fallen off I will throw it out. 

Maybe I will break down and go crying to my dad again.  

To sum things up,  don't give people plants for their weddings.  It's just a gift wrapped in guilt and doubt.  Unless it's a money tree, now that I probably would have watered more!

Primary Class Party

This year in primary I taught the Valiant 10 class.

It was a class made up of predominantly boys, and I learned something new about 11 years old boys.

It is a myth that girls talk more than boys, at least at this age.  All of the girls in my class would just sit quietly. 

The boys were non stop jesters, announcers, and auctioneers.  Not really, but it seemed like it some weeks!

Despite the rambunctiousness I have to say I really LOVED my class and the students this year!

They kept me laughing and thinking about things in a whole new way.

They give me hope that even though William might be a complete goofball when he is 11 his heart can still be as good as gold.

We had a pizza party last night to celebrate the end of the year.  

Our entire class couldn't make it, but here I am with some of them.

 

There are two depressing things about this picture for me.

First, I clearly look much, much older than my 11 year old students.

Secondly, without my high heeled shoes I am about the same size as my 11 year old students!

What can a girl do?  Nothing - I know!!!  I keep eating vegetables, but I just don't seem to grow!

We had pizza & tons of junk food.

If you want to have a really great time with lots of laughs you should invite a group of 11 year olds over, give them lots of sugar, then teach them how to play spoons!  We were laughing so hard and I had more fun with them than with adults, because like me, they are very uninhibited. 

We gave the losers of spoons 2 choices,

#1 - you could be eliminated from the game,

#2 - all of the other players get to hit you on your wrist 

(this is Korean style in games)

Most of the time they chose to get hit.

I am pretty sure hitting your students is against the church handbook

and I may be getting fired from my calling shortly after posting this!

Lets hope not, because I am looking forward to getting a whole new group of children next year!

Happy 6th Birthday Isabelle

Isabelle is officially 6 now! 

She is always the last of her friends to have a birthday, so she has been waiting anxiously for many months.

She decided she wanted a taekwondo party this year.  It was lots of fun!

Soungsik did a little TKD class for the kids and then they played a few games.

 

William was so excited to be a part of a "class".

Bethany (behind William) was a big help!

 

It's still unclear where Isabelle gets her competetive nature from.

Soungsik and I are truly baffled.

 

William doesn't weigh enough to pop a balloon,

but he can sit and bounce on one for a long time!

After the games we beat a pinata!

 

William really enjoys hitting things with sticks - scary!

 

Isabelle actually broke the pinata this year!

It was very exciting!

Soungsik claims it was all because of his superior rope swinging skills.

I think Soungsik is full of candy...or something else that rhymes with snot bear.

 

Pizza was enjoyed and devoured by all!

And then it was time for cake.

 

The biggest reason Isabelle wanted a TKD party was so she could cut her cake with a sword.

The funny thing is we have swords at home too, but she didn't seem to make that connection.

The concentration needed for cutting cakes with swords looks something like this...

 

Not to seem materialistic, but presents are always exciting and fun.

Karli wanted to do "heavy, heavy hangover" on Isabelle.

Isabelle had no idea what that was and I think she was 

afraid Karli might drop the present on her head.

Isabelle & Hannah

Isabelle & Sariah

Isabelle & Jessica

 Isabelle & Lily

Isabelle & Faith

Isabelle & Natalie

Isabelle & Joey

She had invited more boys, but Joey was the only one to show.

He really didn't seem to mind much!

Isabelle & Aubrey

Isabelle told me a few weeks ago,

"Mom when I started school Aubrey said she hated me, but now she likes me a lot."

I am not sure what girl drama went on at school, but I am glad they seemed to work it out on their own.

I don't like being a mom with a child old enough for girl drama!

Isabelle & Grandma & Grandpa

They got her the scooter that even Santa wouldn't be getting for her.

That's why Grandparents are the best - even better than Santa.

Isabelle is crying in this picture because she was using bratty talk with me right before I took it.
I informed her that even though she was 6 she is not too old to receive a spank when needed.
Luckily no birthday spanks were dished out, but just the thought of it was clearly disturbing.

Sorry to make you cry on you birthday kiddo!  Mean mommy moment.

Soungsik and I gave her presents earlier in the day.

 

A nintendo, so she will stop stealing Grandma's.

She has been playing this non stop for 2 days now.

And "Too Many Monkeys" which she loves and we'll be playing as soon as we can get William down for nap.

Happy Birthday Isabelle.

We are so blessed to have you in our lives. 

You are growing up to be such a great person.

Keep up all of your hard work, never stop being happy and loving, and we'll check back in with you in a year!

Love, 

Mom & Dad

In Our World: Death of a Tyrant

Kim Jong Il communist dictator and tryant leader of North Korea died on Saturday, December 17, 2011.

I am quite happy about this news even though the future of the country is so unsettled right now.  

I have to hold out the belief that the death of such an evil person is always a good thing. 

We are living in very uncertain times in this world right now. 

I am mostly concerned about China making some kind of power grab for North Korea right now because I don't believe the U.S. will do anything against China at this time.

We will have to watch and wait to see what the future holds for North Korea.

Our thoughts and prayers are with our family and friends in South Korea and we hope with all of our hearts that their economy and safety will be protected throughout whatever this new future holds.

Tae Kwon Do Christmas Party

On Saturday we had our 10th,
or it may have been our 11th Christmas party.

Most years we put much, much, much more emotional
energy into our parties.

I think Soungsik and I are both running low on emotional energy,
so this year we just flew by the seat of our pants.

The decorations may not have been the best this year but other than that I still think things went pretty smoothly.

I hope everyone that came had fun.

We had belt ceremony before the party.

 

We had 6 students test for 1st degree black belt this month and 3 who tested for 2nd degree.

It's still amazes me to see the kids start at such young ages and we get to watch them grow up in front of our eyes.  That is one of my favorite parts of our jobs!

 

After ceremony we had a breakfast followed by games.

The parents against children dodge ball seemed to be the crowd favorite.

 

When the games were done we had a visit from Santa Claus.

 

This year William has decided he likes Santa.

He walks around the house saying "ho, ho, ho!" all of the time.

It was nice that he didn't scream and try to beat Santa up this year.

Isabelle is Santa's most ardent fan.

She is a true believer this year and even though some of her friends have tried to dissuade her, 

she will have nothing to do with it.

She was thrilled with the chance to get to talk with the big man!

When the party was over Isabelle stole my camera and went around taking many, many pictures.  I will spare you most of them, but I love to see the world through children's eyes, and from their perspective too!

She took many balloon pictures.

She took pictures of the decorations...and of herself taking pictures.

She took pictures of Eli by some targets.

(I wonder if she bribed him or threatened him to get this picture...)

 She took pictures of William.

We also had pictures of floors, doors, other pictures, muffins, etc.

Perhaps she'll become a famous photographer someday.

All I can say is I am happy our taekwondo party is over until next year.

I came home and took a long nap.

'Tis the season for needed parties and consequently needed naps!

Violin Concert December 2011

We just got home from a very enjoyable evening.

Isabelle had her first violin concert.  She has only been taking violin for a few months, and I think she's doing pretty good.

 

She loved hearing all of the advanced students play their parts.

It gives you a goal to work towards.

Here is Isabelle with her teacher Mrs. Macias.

She has been so patient with Isabelle and we love that she doesn't underestimate Isabelle just because of her size/age.

 

Isabelle made a new friend while we were waiting for our turn to go onstage.

 

She really had fun playing with so many other students.

There were over 50!  Of course Isabelle was still the smallest.

I think she is just going to have to get used to that for the rest of her life!

Here are most of the songs that she played at the concert.

 

After the concert we met Soungsik and William at IHOP to celebrate.

I asked her what she wanted for dinner and she told me "KFC".

I said "I was thinking of someplace a little nicer than that."

So she responded quickly "How about McDonalds then?"

Clearly we eat at "nice" restaurants a lot.

We went with extremely fine dining with the IHOP decision.

I am so happy with all of Isabelle's hard work and practice.

Violin has really challenged her, and even thought there have been a few tears here and there, she never gives up.  And after all of the practices and tears she still loves it.  She has been begging me to play the violin since she could talk.  I hope she keeps that desire in her for a long time to come!

Piano Recital December 2011

A few days ago we had Isabelle's Christmas piano recital.

She did pretty good and it's getting really fun to see how far she has come in just about a year and a half!

Isabelle never really gets nervous, but I get plenty nervous/stressed for the both of us.

All of the kids did so great, and it was really enjoyable to listen to everyone.

Here she is playing "The Parade of the Tin Soldiers".

She practiced this song for hours, and hours, and hours.

All of the hard work was worth it.

(Sadly my recorder stopped working before the end of the songs.  It's one of those moments that will guilt me as a mother for a long time to come.  Hopefully she won't need counseling later in life because of it!)

I know that one day I'll be looking at my daughter and she won't be dwarfed by the piano.

That makes me a little sad because she looks adorable at this size.

She told me today "Mom, help me!  I keep growing up and there's nothing I can do about it!"

I have had the same thought thousands of times!

 

Isabelle is really loving piano.  We are so proud of her and all of her hard work!

'Tis The Season

I finally got the Christmas decorating done yesterday.

Soungsik took Isabelle to work and William took a 3 hour nap, so I had the perfect opportunity!

My house now looks like Jolly Old Saint Nick threw up in here.

It's hard to believe this mess could turn into something beautiful.

 

But it did.

 

 I am a tree Nazi.

My children are not allowed to touch this tree.

They can't help decorate it either.

Sometimes it's hard having a mother that is a complete control freak.

Because I feel guilty about not letting the kids help decorate the tree we gave them this one to decorate by themselves..

 

It takes every fiber of my being to have this in my house and not want to rip all of the decorations off and start over.  I never give in though.  I just try not to focus on it.

The poor ornaments on this three are somewhat akin to the misfit toys on misfit island.

They were the unwanted ones that got banished and no one really cares if they get broken.

Which is really a good thing, because the tree has only been up for 48 hours and I am pretty sure that at least 5 ornaments have been broken.

Isabelle did sneak a couple of "nice" ornaments to this tree, hopefully they'll survive the season.

It's finally starting to feel like Christmas around here.

Now if only we could get a foot or two of snow, that would be just perfect!

The Person That I Am, But Not Really

I have an honesty in blogging pledge.

Not to the three people who read it, but to myself.

I blog so that I can have a small history of our lives.

I could only write about how perfect I am, my children are, or my life is.

But sometimes life is less than perfect, sometimes I am less than perfect too.

The last little while I have been in a bit of a funk.

Actually it's been about two months now of zero motivation and some discouragement.

The person I am right now is not the person I am.

My bathrooms haven't been cleaned in weeks...extremely embarrassing to admit, but true.

Cleaning the house has been on a bare minimum basis.

My patience with my children has been next to nothing.

Laundry had been piling up like snow on Mount Everest.

Isabelle's school has dropped of the chart and her practicing of various things has slackened a lot.

The boxes for our Christmas tree have been stacked in my living room for 4 days.

Decorating for Christmas is usually one of my favorite things to do each year.

The list go on and on  and on, believe me.

Now that you all have me diagnosed with clinical depression let me tell you how I plan to deal with this.

First of all, I don't have depression.  

I don't even really believe in depression, it's just life and we all have to go through it. 

I have decided that the only way to get over this funk is just to buck up and do all of the things I don't want to do. 

So far today I have done 5 loads of laundry.  I now have sparkly clean bathrooms and a mostly cleaned house.  Isabelle did double practices for violin and piano.  She also had a dip back into school - she was thrilled. Tomorrow I am going to tackle that Christmas mess.  I also plan on sticking to my somewhat new rigorous exercise routine.  

I am not sure if all of this will help me get some motivation, but even if it doesn't at least my house and body will look better!  

I have been thinking about the words to a song that I love by Carrie Underwood called "So Small".

I know it's hard on a rainy day
you want to shut the world out and just be left alone
but don't run out on your faith.

It's so easy to get lost inside
a problem that seems so big at the time
it's like a river that's so wide
it swallows you whole.
While you siting 'round thinking 'bout what you can't change
and worrying about all the wrong things
time's flying by
moving so fast
you better make it count 'cause you cant get it back.

Sometimes that mountain you've been climbing
is just a grain of sand.
And what you've been up there searching for forever
is in your hands.
Oh when you figure out love is all that matters after all
it sure makes everything else seem so small.

Tomorrow's a new day.  I think the mountain I am climbing right now is just a grain of sand.

Hopefully I will wake up in the morning with more motivation.

It's time to be the person I really am again.

Scrumdiddlyumptious Thanksgiving!

Yesterday was my favorite holiday. I can't really pin down why it's my favorite.

It could be the food. It could be the family.

It could be that I don't have to go anywhere.

It could be the relaxing 6 hours of food preparation ending in the glorious stuffing of our faces and tummies.

It could be the 7 choices of pie that follow.

It could be the parade in the morning or the wonderful smells that fill my house.

It could be the 13 children running around the house and playing with absolutely no arguing.

It could be just the feelings of gratitude that we all tend to feel more fully on Thanksgiving.

I think it must be the culmination of all of these things.

We had such delicious food this year.

We had 3 tables of people full of people.

Here's the breakdown.

(Please notice the increasing niceness of dishes - even the little people get glass though)

You have the table reserved for the young and beautiful.

Then you have the table for the cool kids.

Here is the wise adult table.

I remember being a kid and wishing I could sit at the awesome adult table.

The one with the China and all of the food.

I finally made it, but it sounded like they were having more fun at the cool kids table.

Perhaps I want to go back to that table!

 

We were honored to have Grandma Cain (Tootie) with us this year.

She is 92 years young and one of the funniest people I know.

Or one of the easiest people to make laugh I know.

She is so positive that she would be proud of her Gandkids and Great Grandkids for just getting out of the bed in the mornings.  She would say something like "The way you get out of bed is just so impressive!  How do you do it so well?  Great job, really great job!"  She always makes you feel like you're loved and special.

She keeps trying to figure out why she can't just die already.

She said "I am not really sure what I'm supposed to learn anymore.  

I think I've learned it all."

I told her she's still here because while she is praying to die we are all praying to keep her here.

After a while all of the girls flocked to Grandpa.

 

This is not an unusual scene with this group.

I love Thanksgiving!

It doesn't get any better than this!

Hard Things

I saw a sign in a store the other day that I just HAD to get for Isabelle.

 

It is now sitting smack dab on the piano.

I felt she might need the extra reminder, just in case I stop saying it for a minute.

I bought it for Isabelle and then I started thinking how hypocritical that is.

Why should she be the only one expected to do hard things?

I have been thinking for a couple of days now about it and have decided that we can all do hard things.

That we all need to do hard things.

Why? Because it is our purpose in life as humans.  Because it is our responsibility as citizens.

But most importantly because we are part of a family.

And families can't stay together and be happy unless they are ALL willing to do the hard things.

Sometimes the "hard things" aren't really that hard.

Such as giving the kids some Christmas presents early and with a good attitude because they happened to stumble upon them underneath my bed.

 

 They were very happy and I learned a valuable lesson.

Underneath your bed is off territory for presents a month before Christmas.

Sometimes we do things that aren't very enjoyable because we are part of a family.

 

Soungsik asked me today if he was the only one who hated putting up Christmas lights.

I told him everyone hates putting them up, but we all love them once they are there.

This "hard thing" was to make other people - small people - happy.

So maybe it's worth it.

My hard things today were hard simply because they are so mundane and never ending.

You mothers all know what I am talking about.

The dreaded laundry, cleaning, dishes, helping children practice, feeding people, making sure people wash hands after using the bathroom and brush their teeth, etc. etc. etc. and so on and so forth forever.

But I do it.

Why?  Because I am part of a family.

I am learning more everyday that the mom is the super glue of the family.

When I get weak and fall apart so does everything else around me.

So we will continue to do the hard things.

Why?  

Because we can.

Because it's worth it.

Because when we do hard things they become easy.

Because when we do hard things we get blessings.

Because when we do hard things we become stronger.

Because when we do hard things our love for others grow.

Because most of our hard things aren't actually that hard.

Because we have been given this life as a gift,

we will not waste it.

I can do hard things...and so can you.