I Know It Is Christmas Time When...

 ...I have no time to write a new blog post.  Sorry this one is so delayed.

...I VOLUNTARILY bake for an entire day.  As you may remember from a previous post, I do not like to bake.  But I make one exception to that feeling about 2 weeks before Christmas.  I usually spend an entire day baking Christmas cookies.  This year I did something I have never done before, I invited a friend to bake with me.  She had a few recipes that she wanted to make and I had few to bake.  We both basically doubled our recipes and then split what we had baked between us.  It was a really fun day of fellowship and I got a very good variety of cookies to give out to our friends and Russ' co-workers.

Before

During

After and this isn't even all of them.  We had a few more that were cooling and 2 other batches that were in the refrigerator.  (Donna-since I know you read this-do you see what kind of cookies I was forced to make for myself since you aren't here to make them for me?  They don't taste nearly as good when I have to make them as when you make them for me.  Miss you.)

  I didn't take any pictures of us baking because we didn't look so good that day.  But we had a great time.

...my days are filled with class Christmas parties.  The moms in Taylor's class planned a fun Christmas party for the kids.   The party took up almost the entire last day of school.
We played games:

Made crafts and snacks:

Had a book exchange and a Christmas movie.  It was a fun day in the middle of an intense year for her.

She looks so pretty and grown up in this picture.

...our evenings are busy with holiday events.  As part of a social studies project, Taylor's class started a business this holiday season.  They sold handmade holiday cards, gift bags and gift boxes.  Her teacher used this opportunity to teach the class wonderful lessons on what is involved in running a business but also made it a fun experience for them.  They all had a position and responsibilities in the business and had to work together to make it a success.  At one of the PTO meetings the class sold their products to the parents for a donation and all the profits went to benefit Toys For Tots.

Taylor's friend was in charge of keeping record of the money.  Taylor was a wonderful sales woman.  She had a great little speech memorized that she would say to the parents as they walked by their table.  The class would not have sold nearly as much as they did without Taylor.

Their table with the products for sale.

A few of the class members and their teacher, Ms. Anthony.  The business was named "Ms. A's Holidaze"

...the shops are filled with last minute shoppers.  Another mom and I took the money the class had made from the business and we went out shopping for toys to donate to Toys For Tots.  It is great fun to spend money when it isn't your own, especially when you know it is going for such a good cause.  The class had raised almost $500.00 so we had quite a bit to spend. (remember it was for donation only and it was going to a good cause, lots of parents gave very generous donations)  Koreans don't celebrate Christmas quite the same as Americans do but they still do buy small gifts to give each other.  The stores here, just like in America, have been getting busier and busier as it gets closer to Christmas.  My friend and I had one day to spend all the class money so that we could turn the toys in to the Marine's who then deliver them to local orphanages.   If you remember from a previous post, I talked about toy alley.  We decided that was the best place for us to head to get the most bang for our buck (or won, since we were buying with Korean money) and to get the biggest selection.  The only problem is it was so full we could barely walk and by the time we had purchased hundreds of dollars worth of toys we had huge and very heavy bags that we were trying to maneuver through busy streets.

Can you see my friend waving at me trapped between the 2 trucks that had just parked in the middle of the street?  She was waiting for me while I paid for our purchases.  She has 3 huge bags at her feet and that red cart is our as well.

I can't even see my friend any more in this picture, she got separated from our cart.  It was so crazy full.  There were people everywhere.

...it is freezing cold outside.  The HIGH for the last 2 days has been in the low 20's.  I like the change of seasons and the different temperatures, but 20's for a high is a bit cold for me.  Especially when most things we do involve walking outside.  One day when we were out I saw this cool ice creation.  The man was just spraying water and it was so cold it was pretty much freezing immediately and this was what it looked like.

...we run the Jingle Bell 5k.  Our friend Chino, who is here for a year without his family, is staying with us for Christmas and he was crazy enough to do the run with us.  The Saturday before Christmas the base put on a Jingle Bell 5k run.  Remember my previous point?  It is freezing outside.  I didn't think very many people would be as crazy as we are to run in the 20 degree weather, but I was wrong.  About 100 people showed up to run the 5k and many of them were dressed in fun costumes.  We ran in Santa hats.

After the run.  It was cold before we started but even colder at the end after we had sweated.  Do you see the snow on the ground behind us?

Russ ran with me, but Chino ran ahead of us and took this picture as we were crossing the finish line.  The cold weather must have made me run faster because I ran a personal best on this day.

Buddy the Elf ran the 5k.  He stayed in character pretty much the entire time.  He was great.

...everything is lit up beautifully.  The base here really goes all out to decorate for the holidays.  They have a tree lighting ceremony when they light everything up.  We took these pictures as we were driving so they are a little bit blurry. 

Check out how they line each of the tree  branches in lights.  They work for weeks before Christmas to get all of this ready.

...we attend the Christmas Eve Candle Light service.  This is probably my favorite service of the year.  I love to sing the Christmas songs and celebrate our Savior's birth.  It always takes me back to when I was a little girl sitting in church for the Christmas eve service with my grandparents, family and all my aunts, uncles and cousins.  I love when the church goes dark and we all light our candles and the entire church is lit up. 

This is a funny picture.  I told the girls to really pay attention so that they don't spill the wax all over themselves or burn the church down.  This is the difference in their attention spans.

Merry Christmas from our family to you.  We hope you have a great holiday season celebrating the birth of our Savior. 

Tour of Our Home

I cleaned yesterday.  So, since this is pretty much the cleanest my house will be I decided to take a few pictures of our house to show you all.

First, I couldn't take pictures of the house and not have a Christmas tree picture...

We bought this tree at the PX in October after we got here.  It is pretty small, but since we don't have a lot of room for a tree, it works good for our 3 Christmases that we are in Korea.  I love to watch TV in the evenings with the Christmas tree lights on, so the tree is in the TV room.

Here is the entrance to the house.  Since we live on an Army base it is an unspoken rule that all Marine families proudly display a MC flag. 

This is the view into the house when you first walk in the front door.

The first door on the right is our TV room, the second door on the right is our kitchen and it opens up into our living room and dining room.
The doors on the left are some storage and our furnace.

Entry way:
The Koreans take their shoes off before they enter the house, so there is always a place for some shoe storage right when you enter the home.

The TV room:
Walking into the house the first door on the right is the TV room.  It also has a scrapbook desk in it that I can sit at.

 The massive bean bag sac made the trip to Korea.  We were not sure whether to bring it or not because it take up a lot of space, but we are glad we did.  All 4 of us can easily fit on that thing.  The sac is facing  the TV and the Christmas tree is beside the TV.

Behind the screen is my scrapbooking desk and supplies.  To the left is an opening to the kitchen.

The kitchen:

This picture is from the kitchen looking into the TV room.

The Living Room and Dining Room:

 Walking straight into the house you come to the dining room/kitchen table.  This is where we eat all our meals.  This picture is standing at the table looking into the living room.

This picture is taken from the computer desk.  The hall to the left leads back to the bedrooms and bathrooms.  On the right is an enclosed porch.

The Porch:

We actually have 2 porches just like this.  This one we obviously use for working out.  I didn't take a picture of the other porch, which is right off the the master bedroom, because it is where I store my obscene amount of shoes and it is also where we keep any thing we don't know what to do with.  It is sort of our collect all spot.

The Hallway:

The hallway is directly opposite of the kitchen and right off the dining room.  The "beautiful" accordion door at the end of the hallway to the left is my laundry room and the door to the right is the girls' bathroom.  If you turn left you see the girls rooms and right is the master bedroom.

The Girls Rooms:
This is the first time since Lucy has been born that the girls are not sharing a room. We let them pick out the theme for their rooms.   Taylor choose zebra print with hot pink accents and Lucy choose hot pink, purple and orange flower power. 
Taylor's room:

Looking into Taylor's room from the hallway.

Her homework area at the end of her bed.

On the other side of her bed.

Lucy's room:

Looking into Lucy's room from the hallway.

Standing beside the bed.

The wall opposite her bed.

 The Girl's Bathroom:

Probably the biggest drawback of this house for me is that the girls' bathroom is the same as the guest bathroom.  Other mothers always tell me how dirty boys are, well let me tell you little girls are very dirty too.  I have so much trouble keeping this bathroom cleaned up and guest ready.

I didn't take any pictures of the master bedroom because it is just a plain white room with a bed and a dresser.  Not exciting at all.  There is another bathroom off the master bedroom that Russ and I use.

This concludes the tour of our small home.  Now that I have put a picture of pretty much every room on the internet for anyone to see, I hope I don't attract any unwanted visitors.

It Doesn't Get Much More Korean Than Kimchi

One of the things we love about eating out in Korea are the free, all-you-can-eat  side dishes that come with your meal.  One could almost make an entire meal out of the side dishes.  It is pretty normal that 5-7 small dishes of sides will be brought to your table right before you are served your main dish. (Kindof like bread or chips and salsa in America) The sides vary from restaurant to restaurant depending on what is served but the one that is pretty much standard at all restaurants is kimchi.

These are all free and different side dishes that came with our meal.

As many of you know Russ and I lived in Korea before this experience back in 2000.  When we lived here the first time, Russ took a pretty much immediate liking to kimchi, but it took me quite a bit longer to enjoy it.  I tried it once or twice a week for about 6 months until I could actually say I liked it, but once we came back this past summer we both jumped right into loving it again.  The girls, not so much.  Someone made the mistake of telling them what it is and pretty much they didn't even give it a chance.  Hopefully before we leave here we can get them to the point of liking it as well.

By now, many of you are wondering what this kimchi I am writing about it is.  Here is a definition I found in the dictionary:

A Korean dish made of vegetables, such as cabbage or radishes, that are salted, seasoned, and stored in sealed containers to undergo lactic acid fermentation.

Basically it is spicy, fermented cabbage.  Knowing the definition you can understand why my girls aren't super excited about eating it.  But like I said, Russ and I love it.  You have to have an open mind and like spicy food in order to like it.  We both will eat it plain but love it mixed with a little bit of rice.  The rice acts as a buffer to take away some of the spiciness.  

When we received orders to come over here we both expressed an excitement to do very "Korean" things, so when we were given the opportunity to make kimchi for a day we both immediately jumped on it.  As luck would have it, Uncle Joe was with us that day and he was "lucky" enough to experience this adventure with us.   I talked about the Good Neighbor Program (GNP) before in a hike that we did.  This adventure was another GNP outing, therefore it was not only Americans but quite a few Koreans that participated as well.

We had to get up early and took a  bus about an hour and half outside of Seoul to a locally owned farming area.

In the Korean culture making kimchi is a woman's job.  Therefore, it was a very big deal that there were numerous Korean men there to help as well as they were very excited to see all the American men there to work.

Many of these men were retired Korean military officers.

There were a lot of people there to make kimchi.

My friend and I, before the fun began.  See how clean we are?

Mrs. Lee the ROK commandant's wife

Mrs. Regner and the girls

 Not being Korean, we had no idea what was involved with making kimchi.  Therefore, they had quite a few older Korean ladies there to "instruct" us.  When I say "instruct" I basically mean tell us we weren't doing it correctly.  

They had all the supplies there and ready for us to start when we arrived.

The cabbage is the main ingredient

They brought the cabbage in to us in wheelbarrows.

There are many types of kimchi and many different ways of making it.  The kimchi we made had some radishes mixed in with it.  These are sliced Korean radish.

This is the powdered spice.

Here they are mixing the spices with salt in massive buckets.

  They started with the men bringing in these huge bags of radish and spreading them all along the long table we were all standing at.

That is a lot of radish.

 Next they brought in the spices and spread them over the radish.

We had to mix it all together really good to get the spices all over the radish.

We assumed making kimchi would be messy so we wore old clothes, but we had no idea how messy it would be. We were all covered in kimchi spices from head to toe (literally I had it in my hair and on my shoes) by the end of the day.

The next step was to add some sort of greens to the radish.  I couldn't quite figure out what the green leaves were and no one could tell me in English.

 After it was all mixed together really good they brought the heads of cabbage in.

Because my hands were covered in kimchi spice I wasn't able to take a lot of pictures during the day.  Therefore, most of these pictures are ones I got from someone else which is why we aren't in most of them.

There was an exact science to putting the spicy radish in the cabbage.  You had to open each of the leaves on the cabbage head and rub the spices in each one then you had to put just a little bit of radish in between the leaves.  If you did to much or to little the Korean ladies would take your cabbage head and redo the whole thing.  I pretty much never got the ratio correct.  Thankfully, the ladies were very patient with us.  

Bending over the table for hours our backs all killed us.  Here we are almost done.  Just a few small piles remained.

  That day we made over 1000 heads of cabbage worth of kimchi.  That is a lot of kimchi.  They had cut each head in half in order to get the spices more evenly distributed so we ended up making almost 2500 half heads of kimchi to give out.  The kimchi we made that day was being given to families that are under privileged. 

The finished product.  Looks delicious, doesn't it?

We filled over 200 of these tubs with kimchi and there was still a ton left over. They were heading out to buy more tubs when we left.

Kimchi has to sit a few weeks and ferment before it is good to be eaten, so we couldn't eat any of our finished kimchi that day.  But they did feed us a good Korean lunch.

Uncle Joe had no idea what he was getting himself into when he told us he was coming to stay at our house for a few days.  Thankfully he is a wonderful house guest and just goes with the flow.

 Overall, this was a great experience for our family.  This is something they do every year and we all said on the way home we were looking forward to going back next year.