Pet Octopus and the Markets

One day we went over to the fish market and got a live octopus for our pet. I mean where else can you just pick out an octopus for the day to play with? It inked in the bucket after it got dropped once and only lived for a few hours, but we had our fun with him and then took him over to the office elders to have for dinner :)

The fruit and vegetables in Korea are HUGE!!!! SOOOOOOO tasty and everything is so pretty and gigantic. Apples and pears practically the size of Paisley's head, and carrots that turned our cheeks orange after eating them because they could barely fit in our mouths. Yes, we could have cut them up but it was WAY more fun to just chomp on them whole.

The market is a favorite place of mine to go. You get to see lots of cool stuff and find great deals. The fish market is full of every kind of seafood you can imagine and more; stingray, eel, octopus, squid, etc.
Those are little sharks over Luke's shoulder!

Daejeon Zooland

First stop of fun we had was to go to the Daejeon Zoo. This place was so fun and funny. They have some of your typical zoo animals like tigers and bears, but they also had geese and guinea pigs. Quite the range of animals to see! We took a little safari bus tour that was like entering Jurassic Park the way we had to go through metal gates. The bus took us right up to bears, lions, and tigers. One of the zebras practically came on the bus and since we were in the front seats the kids all took a turn petting it. That was so cool! Even Paisley went up and touched him on the nose.

This monkey was CRAZY bouncing off the walls and making us laugh. It kept slamming into the glass right at our faces and sucking on its toes.

Some yummy ice cream to cool us off

There was also a little amusement park section in the middle of the zoo and the kids ran around for over an hour riding all the rides. This zoo was like the Wal-Mart of zoo's. It was one stop for all kinds of entertainment!

I love this picture of the kids. They are screaming happy on this ride and the Korean's next to Phoebe thought she was so hilarious and cute.

We enjoyed a little show at the end of our day and since we were the only blonde's in the entire place the kids were constantly getting their pictures taken. Everyone wanted their little kids to talk to my kids and get a picture with them. They'll probably end up on the brochure for the zoo somehow because some of these picture takers had some serious cameras. We actually got a lot of that the entire trip. Sometimes people just taking pictures and sometimes coming up to us. It was a beautiful warm day and we had a GREAT time!

Munui Ancient Fortress

We spent the afternoon at Munui, an ancient fortress built in 474 AD. I love looking at historical things and you can't get much more historic than this. It was an entire village full of buildings and pagoda's. We all had a great time and learned a lot. It is so great to have my parents here as our personal tour guides. Family time and sightseeing all in one!Luke climbing and echo gateway, he thought it was Spiderman's web.
Natural spring water, said to heal. Usually used to purify yourself before entering temple grounds.
Chungsingak, a memorial shrine built to honor the loyalty of Kim Seon-bok. He met a heroic death in the 16th century.

Phoebe by the many Kimchi pots.
gateway to a Commoner's House
Munsangwan Hall, guest house

Back in my Birthland!

We have been sooo excited for this trip to Korea. My parents are serving as mission presidents for our church in Korea and we decided it was time to take a trip and visit. I will have TONS of pictures to post when I get back but here is our arrival at the airport. I flew with the 4 kids myself and Scott is meeting us a week later. The entire flying time took almost 22 hours from start to finish and let me tell you it felt like that long too. The kids were actually really great on the flights, but it is just a looooooong time to be on planes. It got boring for me. Each seat has its own little t.v. and they have several channels you can watch a bunch of movies on, but after about 2 shows that gets old too. I looked at the inflight map when I thought we must only have a few hours left and was VERY disappointed when it said we weren't even to the International Date Line (which is about halfway there). I couldn't believe there was still over 7 hours to fly! We got a little sleep, but I was actually glad we didn't all sleep a ton. That way the jetlag wouldn't be as hard to get over. After landing it took a little time to get all of our stuff together and get through customs, but my parents were waiting there waving a Korean fan and our last name on a sign :) Happy Happy at last!!!!!!!!

Giddyup

Luke had his hoedown at preschool this week. All he had cowboyish was a bandanna so he doesn't look super festive, but he sang real cute and had a fun time.

With the weather nice I took Luke and Paisley over to the park to feed the ducks one day. It is always fun for them and we even took some time to play on the swings. I love it here :)

Star Luke

Luke was Star of the Week in his preschool class last week. He got to make a poster with pictures of him all over and bring in 3 show and tell items to share. He picked a yellow poster board because that is his favorite color and he drew some great pictures on the sides of it. Here he is in his classroom with the poster up. I would like to note that he looks a bit rough in this picture. Ethen fixed his hair that morning into a mohawk and apparantly it needed more jell or hairspray because this is how he looked when I came to pick him up.

Today we are having some nice warm weather so it got me in the mood to do some work outside. I fixed the gate door and put out some weed killer on the back lawn. Luke and Paisley were having fun watering all the new plants coming up in the front yard. They love feeling like big helpers and holding the hose all by themselves. It was even nicer because they weren't fighting over who gets to hold the hose but kept taking turns. The mood was destroyed for Paisley when the trash truck started coming down our street. She started screaming at the sight of it and was running to the door and wanted all of us to get inside. I don't know why or how she developed this fear. Maybe it is because the truck is HUGE and LOUD. So we came inside for a few minutes, but Luke loves watching the trash truck so when it came back down to do the cans on the other side of the street he went back out on the steps to get a better view. This put Paisley into a screaming fit of tears. She just kept yelling Luke's name over and over telling him to come back. She didn't calm down until he was back inside safe. It was all pretty funny to me and I loved that she is so concerned about her big brother. That just melts my heart :0)

Cake

Scott and Ethen made this Texas flag cake for the Blue and Gold banquet. It was very yummy and won Ethen a certificate for smoothest cake. It has become tradition to have a father and son cake decorating contest and each year they do a great job. The theme this year was anything Texas or scouting.

Overtired

Here is what happens when a regular nap isn't taken. It is possible to sleep while standing up!who knew?

And here is Luke being himself

Powder Mountain Trip 2009

Scott took his annual father kid ski trip last week. This year Phoebe got to go for her 1st time. She got all her gear for Christmas and was ready to go with the boys. Nathan came up with Annie and Graeme so that made for and even better time to be with some family. I stayed home with the 2 younger kids, but was kinda bummed that I didn't decide to go. It would have been so fun to see them on the slopes. Annie and Phoebe spent the 1st day in ski school, but they didn't have enough instructors so Scott ended up working with Phoebe the second half of the day. She has natural talent, just like Ethen and Scott, and did amazingly. She took right too it and by day 3 wasn't even falling down anymore. She got several compliments on her cute outfit and that made her smile. Ethen seems like he has been boarding forever and took to the slopes full force. He loves going off in the powder and trees. He was very proud to tell Mom that he went into the trees when she told him not to do that on this trip. Apparantly Daddy slamming into a tree and getting a huge bruise didn't deter Ethen at all! Really I just don't want him in the back country tree areas and Scott wouldn't have taken him there.... yet. They got a chance to visit with James too. I am glad he was able to stop by so they could visit for a bit. They haven't seen James since before his mission over 2 years ago. John came up to ski for a day with everyone too. Here are A LOT of pictures!! Enjoy!!

Phoebe looking adorable in her ski gear

Phoebe and Annie Getting set for Ski school

1st time on the ski lift


Phoebe coming through the pretty trail

Ethen, Phoebe and Graeme

Scott and Ethen

Ethen carving his way

Everyone on top of Powder Mountain

silly face

Phoebe taking a little break