Konglish at it's best

The word for father in korean is Ah-Pah. So when I'm with Elle and we're about to see A-man, I say "it's Ah-pah" or Ah-Pah's here" etc. When A-man refers to himself to her, he says "daddy".

So about 3 weeks ago, Elle started to say Ah-Da!

Now, she just screams it out whenever she sees him.

It's the most adorable thing ever in my humble (yet biased) opinion.

Best Blog Ever... if you're Korean

I just came across this from kimchi mama's blog and I have tears in my eyes from laughing so hard. I can't even begin to tell you which ones are my favorites because they all had me on the floor laughing. I was trying to hold it in so as not to wake up the sleeping baby and hubby. If you're not of korean decent, you might not find it as funny but dude, just knowing me, you know a korean which means that you can relate somehow.

check it out.

http://stuffkoreanmomslike.blogspot.com/

some of my favorite lines:

Korean Dramas are to Korean Moms what Mcdonald's is to a fat kid.

The three magic words that a Korean Mom will say only 5 times to you. 1) When you are born. 2) When you get into Harvard. 3)When you marry someone who graduated from Harvard. 4) When you buy her a house. 5)When you have a son.

The infamous 'Italy Cloth', or 'Ddeh' cloth. It removes dead skin, a layer of fat, some muscle, and if you scrub hard enough; your soul.

There's more, every single entry had me peeing my pants. If my mom only knew. I could hear her now. "Mee-chin-yun!"

Just because

"Do I have something on my face?"


"You, get out! I'm trying to read here"


A cake I baked today, topped with coconut flakes and oh so yummy!!

Too much time on my hands

I feel like I have too much time when it comes to sitting on my ass in front of the computer but I never have enough time to cook and clean. I had big plans for today, exercise, clean, laundry, cook, shower, and nap. So far, I did get the living room vacuumed and my bedroom reorganized but I just shoved everything into the dining room and it'll all eventually just end up in the basement. and that's a whole different animal I have to tackle someday. My basement is one big storage room for now and I really would like to organize it so I could at least access my exercise machine without possibly dieing from falling.

Story of my life.

But the second I have a minute to myself, when baby takes a nap, I prop myself in front of the computer and waste time. I actually have shit I need to get done online as well but all I end up doing is chatting on a mommmy forum that I set up and had to redo cuz it wouldn't work as of yesterday. So I spent all morning creating another one so I can chat with my friends. Speaking of which, do you want to join? Send me a comment with your email address (I won't publish the email addresses) and I'll send you the link. I don't want to post it here because I have enemies that will register just to spy on me. It's so fun to have enemies, isn't it? Ha!!

Anywho, I'm going to go clean now and try to make a pathway from my dining room to the kitchen since I just push things out of one room into another until I have to actually put it away in the last room. Am I the only one that does that? Its the ultimate sign of laziness but as least the room that is cleared out looks good:)

She finally did it.

It was only a matter of time.

She broke skin.

She bit my nipple. and it bled.

It didn't pour or anything, only a couple of drops of blood but it hurt like hell and back.

Whose baby is she?

I don't know where she gets it. A-man is such an introvert and hates being in a group of people. He hates going to the movie theatre cuz that's too many people, even though we dont' have to interact with them. We're both pretty shy and soft spoken. We're pretty much one on one type of people who likes their alone time and loves being at home just with each other. But not our baby! She's a wild child. She loves having a ton of people around. She can care less if I'm there or not. She never looks for me as long as she's not hungry and even if I was gone for a while and came back, she doesn't act like she's all that happy to see me. Sometimes I feel like just another face to her. She smiles at everyone, has the voice of ten women, and the strength of an adult. She's also a complete daredevil and climbs everything and will try to lift anything in her way! She gets so frustrated if she doesn't get what she wants or can't do what she wants so she'll start throwing things. Plus, nothing scares her. Loud noises, screams, other baby's cries, barking dog, etc. nothing! Plus, she doesn't sit still for a second! She's always on the go! She hates the stroller and car seat and pretty much hates being confined even if it's in a room.

I'm totally blessed that I don't have a whiney, clingy baby but I am baffled at how much personality she has already. She'll keep us busy for sure. I just hope she gives us some time to sit back and relax.
That might be wishful thinking.


Did I mention she's only one year old who can barely walk in a straight line? Imagine when she can actually run? I'm in trouble!

Pathetic

That's me. I've been MIA watching korean dramas whenever I get some time online and usually in lieu of sleep so I'm a miserable mess during the day. I've recovered some and wanted to say hi to ya'll before I go back to feed my addiction. Ha!!

I've finally (somewhat) baby proofed my house this week. I've been kinda in a mess the past couple of weeks because I was told that my cousin said that I had a messy house and she couldn't understand why I would raise my kid on organic clothes and food if I kept my house so messy. She claims not to have said that to her mom who told my mom who is the last person who needs more reasons to bitch to me. It just really hurt and I've been in a major slump because of it. that's probably why I "escaped" into the korean dramas.

So I set up my living room for baby, with a 10X13 feet rug so she can play in it and just cleared it out of any potentially dangerous items (well, except for my "office", there's just no room for it anywhere else). I had my family over today so I've been cleaning little by little all week and it looks freaking awesome and I didn't get any slack from my mom today so I guess I did a good job. It's not that my cousin will see my house again (she's been here twice in the last 4 years) but even though I only really kept my kitchen and bathroom a mess and not in the rooms that baby plays in, I just wanted to make sure that I don't give that impression to anyone else.

Another crazy thing this past week was that my cat, Sati, got attacked by something and had a few holes around his neck. He's an outdoor cat now and on Thursday A-man picked him up and he was really hot and the holes were all swollen. So he took him to the emergency vet and they shaved the neck, cleaned out the holes and we've been giving him antibiotics since. He's doing a lot better and the holes are getting smaller but I just don't understand how he lived through that. He has holes in his neck!! you can probably stick a pencil through it but there's no blood (he probably cleaned himself) and he's totally acting normal. Animals are an amazing being!!

I'll end this with a little update on baby. Elle is walking. Completely walking. She may crawl maybe for a minute a day but she's a regular upright human now! She took her first steps on June 15th and in less than a month, she taught herself how to walk really well, albeit with a little wobble. She looked like an upright iguana walking with it's arms flailing but she's doing much better now.

We had her year check up last week and she's perfectly healthy. She weighed 24 pounds, 6 ounces, is about 30" tall and her big old head is about 48cm. I took her to a different doctor because her doctor for the last year didn't remember us at all everytime I saw him and it pissed me off. Our new doctor is supportive of my attachment parenting methods and was so encouraging and nice. AND the kicker is that he was A-man's pediatrician. It was such a coincedence. I told A-man that I found this new doctor and he said that the name sounded familiar and asked his mom about it and bingo. I think it's cute and hopefully he'll be around for the next 17 years:).

That's about it for now. My sister is still in town since coming for Elle's b-day party and she'll be leaving in a week.

Oh, I totally forgot, we're planning a vacation!!!!! Yippeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. I'm not sure where yet. We're deciding on a road trip or the carribbeans. I guess that's a no brainer but it all depends on money and how long we can take off. I have to figure out the details this week but just the thought of it is making me happy as can be. I'll keep you posted.

my new addiction

Korean soap operas is a phenomenon in korea which I never really got into. Every red blooded Korean couldn't call themselves Korean if they didn't see at least one soap opera a week. They are highly addicting and I used to pass by my mom and sister laughing or crying along with their favorite soap operas which they rent at the local korean grocery stores. Most, if not all korean grocery stores have a korean video section and they carry all the latest copies of bootlegged korean videos.

I used to watch an episode here and there when i had nothing else to do and wanted to spend some time with my mom but a few years ago I started watching this one called "What happened in Bali" and I was instantly hooked. I have never been attracted to korean men but from that moment on, I was madly in love with the lead actor and fantasized as I did in grade school of love and marriage and I wanted to get on the next flight to korea. Now with everything available online, I found this site that has almost EVERY korean drama ever made. it's freaking awesome.

I realize I'm opening myself out for mass ridicule but hell, this is the least of my dorkiness.

If I go MIA on you here, you know where I'll be: mysoju.com (so aptly titled!)

The forever project

I started this about 2 months ago and I FINALLY finished it yesterday and it's not even really finished. I still have to add a molding stripe on top to match the door frames and touch up on the black paint. But here's my chalkboard in my kitchen for baby to draw on (when she can) and for me to keep organized with a permanent 3 month calendar. If I could do it all over again, I'd save some space for a "shopping list" and a recipe section but all in all, I'm very proud and happy with it. Everyone should have a chalkboard in their house, it's so awesome being able to freely write on your walls and it looks great too.

My punk rock baby!

Elle has a double cowlick on her hair creating a natural mohawk. but when she wakes up from sleeping, the side hairs gets pressed down so the mohawk is even more pronounced and it is the cutest thing in the world to see when she wakes up from sleep. These pictures show a little but somedays it's straight up in the air and I wish I had a camera with me but I try not to bombard her with camera flashes as soon as she wakes up so these pictures will have to do.

Isn't she the coolest baby you've ever seen?

BEST baby purchase evah!!

I bought this yesterday with gift money and exchanges received from her birthday party and we are in love!!

Dol Pictures

Here's a few pictures from the dol. It was a crazy day and I didn't get to eat anything and I am pissed. The food was great from what people tell me and I know the cake was great because it's from my favorite bakery but I didn't even get to taste it. Even with 3 of my friends helping and with A-man, it took forever to decorate and by the time it was done a lot of the guests had showed up. There was a slight issue with setting up the food and that got delayed and as soon as that was ready, I lite the sterno candles for the chafing dishes and one of the dishes caught on fire but not for long, it just smelled a little. So to be safe we just put out all the sterno candles but not before A-man and I burned out hands. There's no scar on my hand but A-man burnt the hell out of one hand.

I had asked the in laws to bring their super high resolution camera because Elle had pretty much destroyed ours and although it takes pictures fine, it's not as nice. But they didn't bring it so I'm really upset that we didn't get great pictures. I really regret not hiring a photographer, I mean why go all out if you have no pictures to remember it by?

Then as the main table centerpiece, I borrowed my friends collector's Hello Kitty dolls and put it in the center as balloon weights and towards the end, I had noticed that this one boy kept playing with it and taking it out of the room and back. So I was completely preoccupied with watching him and making sure they didn't leave with it. Then at the end we collected all the dolls and instead of being 8, there were only 7. I was so worried that someone had taken it so a few of us went around looking for it. We put the 7 dolls on the gift table while we were clearing off the tables and all of a sudden, my cousin came up to me and told me that there was only 6 now. There had been 7 just a few minutes ago so I knew it couldn't have gone far. So I ran down the stairs and heard the elevator open and who comes out from it, holding one of the dolls? My MIL!!!! I'll just leave it at that since A-man reads my blog now.

After we got home, A-man and I went through a few boxes and we found the missing hello kitty so they are all safe and back at home with my friend who generously said from the beginning that it was ok. You're the best J!!!

Most of the time, I was making sure that the balloon guy that I hired didn't go over time because his overtime would have cost me another $100. Yes, one hundred dollars!!!! But people kept requesting balloon animals from him. When he came in, I told people to go request a balloon from him but no one did until the end. So I was following him for about 15 minutes trying to shoo people off him so I wouldn't have to pay extra.

The other time, I was making sure that the main head table pieces wasn't being touched because most of those were rented and I didn't want it to break. So I kept having to keep this little boy off of it. This little boy being A-man's cousins' son, who I can't stand along with that whole side of the family. but his mom was just busy eating (she's about 26 years old and probably tips the scale at around 300) then when I asked her to please keep an eye on her son the second time, I overheard her say "we should go" after I turned my back. Please do leave!! But she came up to me and asked when we were going to do the cake. Of Course! And when I was done serving up all the cake she came up and asked me if she could take a piece home for her son. her son? Her 2 year old son? Yeah fucking right! I told her she could take the pieces that were already cut and plated since there were so many left over but she wanted the uncut part of the cake with flowers on top. I said ok and walked away. The piece she took was about 5 inches square. like 3 times the serving size.

Another thing, MIL was there when we were setting up but all she did was talk the whole time and annoyed my friends and I and she would go see what we were all doing, touch one thing or something and move on. I had to have A-man make her leave. But do you know what she said to my friend afterwards? "I can't believe the 4 of us decorated this whole place". HA!!! Again, I can't say what I want cuz A-man reads this blog. Sorry hubs, I love you but I wish they moved to Montana with your sister.

All in all, everyone told me that they had a great time. That the food was fantastic, the decor, amazing, and they loved the amazing animals that the balloon guy made. So as a hostess, I am very happy that it turned out ok. Plus the birthday girl couldn't have been any greater. She was happy the whole time, she let anyone hold her, she walked on her own very well, and didn't even let out one little scream. All that from a baby that didn't get her afternoon nap nor was able to nurse because of the commotion. I'm telling you, she loves being social and I just dont' know where she gets it.

Besides not being able to eat anything at the party, we had PLENTY of left overs but my mom had packed it up and gave it to all her friends. She said that she had left a lot and I know that there was left over cake but either someone took it or it got tossed in the garbage. Oh, I just can't think about it anymore. It breaks my heart.

Oh, here's the pictures.

Dol-picking game

I wrote about this before but I'll explain it again. During the baby's first b-day party called Dol, they play a little game, mainly to appease the parents, where they are given items that represent their future. For example, items like thread (symbolizing long life), pen (symbolizing scholars), stethscope ( doctor) etc are placed in front of the baby and which ever one that they pick will represent what they will become when they grow up.

For Elle's Dol, instead of putting actual items on the table, I put pictures of them on a card and laid it out in front of her. The pictures I put out were:
microphone (entertainer)
red cross symbol (ngo)
book and pen (writer)
stethoscope (doctor)
gavil (judge)
presidential symbol (president)

guess what she picked?





can you see it? she picked the presidental symbol.
We'll see what happens. She sure does have a magnetic personality. You never know! :)

Happy Birthday, My Love!!

From the second I found out that I was pregnant on November 5th, 2006, I knew that my life would change for the better. I was so proud to be pregnant and was very lucky to be able to deliver you naturally, thanks to the wonderful people that were with me that day. I never thought that being a mother would be such an amazing experience and I absolutely love being your mother. I melt when I see you smile at me. My heart stops when I see you in discomfort and all I want to do is be by your side. I miss you when you're not with me and I cherish each moment that we get to spend together. There's nothing in this world more important to me than our family and I feel so blessed to have you join us. I hope that I can be a good mom and teach you to be a good, caring person. My dream for you is to do the best that you can and find happiness in all that you do.

We have had the most wonderful year since you came into our lives. You showed me how to love even more, you taught me to be patient and calm, you made me rethink my priorities and for all that I am truly grateful. I look forward to each waking moment and all the years we will share helping each other become better people in this world. I am so proud of you for all the accomplishments that you've already made in your first year of life and I know that you will keep making me proud.

Thank you so much for sharing your love, giving us endless joy, and being apart of our lives.

- Your loving mom.