A Few Kicks in the Hiney!!

Ok so on September 6th, I decided to start up my blog again... it has been unsuccessful so far, so... I've decided to do something that will get me in the habit of documenting little bits of my life daily and I'm hoping this will help me get more consistent with blogging. I've decided my life needs a few kicks in the hiney in different areas of my life. When I got home from Korea, I was a confident, happy, spiritually boosted woman and although I still am a stellar individual :), I feel like I've let myself slip into slacker mode and have lost a bit of my spunkiness. I have gained a few unwanted pounds back, which will be gone asap.. not acceptable, I've found myself being bitter and sad about my dreary love-life (boys are ridiculous), and just have all around not been an spontaneous or happy as I usually am. So here's what I'm going to do... I have started my PJ diet again today, not as strict as I was in Korea where I pretty much was a rabbit and only ate greens, but I am going to be aware of the calories going in and out of my body daily. I'm going to start writing in my thankful journal daily again and making some goals for this semester that I can focus on achieving, and I will pray daily to be more happy and positive with myself and those around me. As for the boys.... meh... it's time to focus on me... they can wait till I'm ready to give them another chance :)

So one way I'm going to kick my blogging hiney is... I came across this challenge on one of my friend's blog and decided it would be a fun lil challenge to hold up for the next 30 days... we'll see how it goes...

Thirty Day Challenge

day 1 - a stranger

day 2 - your crush

day 3 - your parents

day 4 - your sibling (or closest relative)

day 5 - your dreams

day 6 - your best friend

day 7 - your ex-boyfriend/girlfriend/crush

day 8 - your favorite internet friend

day 9 - someone you wish you would meet

day 10 - someone you don't talk to as much as you'd like to

day 11 - a deceased person you wish you could talk to

day 12 - the person who caused you a lot of pain

day 13 - someone you could stay up all night with talking

day 14 - someone you've drifted away from

day 15 - the person you miss the most

day 16 - someone that's not in your state/country

day 17 - someone from your childhood

day 18 - the person that you wish you could be

day 19 - someone that pesters your mind - good or bad

day 20 - the one that broke your heart the hardest

day 21 - someone you judged by their first impression

day 22 - someone you want to give a second chance to

day 23 - the last person you kissed

day 24 - the person that gave you one of your favorite memory

day 25 - the person you know that is going through the worst of times

day 26 - the last person you made a pinky promise to

day 27 - the friendliest person you knew for only one day

day 28 - someone that changed your life

day 29 - the person that you want to tell everything too

day 30 - your reflection in the mirror

Dear Stranger,

When I pulled up to school today, you looked at me like I was crazy. Was it because I was jamming out to my sweet tunes and it just so happens that my car has amazing base and it scared you? Was it the volume?... we can blame that on my dear father... I grew up jamming at a high volume when there are good tunes on. Was it because my hair was drenched from the rain and I looked like a drowned rat? Whatever it was, I hope my lil smile made you feel a little more comfortable and less edgy for the day!! :)

Take 2

So.... it's been a while I know. I got home from Korea and my life was... well... a bit boring. Ok so maybe it wasn't boring, but I just didn't feel like my life had blog potential. NOW... it does.. and I'll tell you why in just a few short sentences. This past summer, I spent 6 days a week going door to door selling alarm systems for APX. I wasn't really sure how I would like it, but at the end of the summer I came to the conclusion that it really isn't that bad of a job and if I had worked hard for the WHOLE summer, I could've made some really good $$$... I still did very good and am happy with how the summer ended up. Kaitland moved out to Winnipeg with me at the end of June and we ended up having quite a good time. This summer was a bit of a trial of what to expect for living together in the fall, which leads me into whyI feel my life is now blog worthy.

So this is the first blog of many hopefully. Kaitland, Carson and I have all made the move up to Edmonton for school this fall. My mom was the trooper who helped us move into two different houses and almost 3 (bet you're wondering why the 3rd). Well Kait and mom showed up at our house first... I came a few hours later... I walked into the house and down to our basement where Kaitland and I were to share a room. As I started walking down, I first noticed the spider webs/laundry lint plastered all over the roof. Our carpet was just placed down on the floor with wrinkles and extra carpet laying around. Kaitland mentioned that when she first walked into out 'new' basement she wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry. In short, we spent the next day looking at a few different houses and trying to decide whether we were going to get out gloves on and get your room up to our expectations or... find another place.

We woke up early Saturday morning and decided to get cleaning. I took a vacuum to the ceiling while Kait and mom did some sweeping and organizing... gong show!! BUT the place has sure come together... it's starting to look a lil more like.. well a place that Kait and I would maybe live in :) I have a feeling we will have a few more crazy/fun experiences for the year and i think I would like to stay updated on here... I know my family has missed my crazy blogs.. so get ready.... :)

Life is starting to wrap up here in Korea and I'm having a lot of fun and staying really busy!! It definitely is helping the time go by super fast!! This past Sunday, David, Liz and I made dinner for the Rogers family. We had a ton of fun and the food...was stellar if I say so myself!!! We made poppyseed chicken (well poppy-less-seed chicken... I forgot to put the poppyseed on top haha), potatoes, broccoli salad and pasta... with some smoochy woochy in a pan (my new name for it). Everything went really well and Liz and David were super helpful!!

This is after dinner.. we were a lil full... what better thing to do then jump on the love sac for a lil rest.
We couldn't get Lia to look at the cam....
my helper chefs
Liz and I were a lil hungry, so we snuck somem broccoli salad before dinner officially started..

We also had graduation at school a couple weekends ago... it was a lot of fun!! My kiddies did so good and I was soooo proud of them!! I'm definately gonna miss the lil rascals when I leave next week... That's right... I leave next week to come home!! woot woot!!!
My girl, Liz, and I taking a break from the craziness of grad...

Costumes were... intense... some of hte things they put the kids in were so scandalous... apparently the more flashy and skanky, the more the parents liked it... unless their kids were bigger.. it really was kinda sad... but they still looked cute and did a great job... here's my Brown Bears getting ready to do their play.
Annika..... again.. adorable
me, Linda and Liz
My cute lil Pooh Bears... my sailor moon style
on our way to grad
I went over to the Sawatka's to make some cookies... here's Amanda, Xander and I
My lil man, Xander...

I'm getting very excited about going home... I can't wait to see my family and friends again!!! I will definately miss everyone here in Korea, but I'm ready to be with my fam again!!! I have got a lot to do before I leave though... packing being the biggest thing to tackle... mixing that with school and church stuff.. it's going to be a super fun busy time before returning home!!!! Hopefully I'll get one more blog up before I come home... we'll see :)

Daddy

Happy happy birthday Daddy dear... Happy days will come to you all year (especially in March)... if I had a wish that it could be... a happy happy birthday to you from me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I know I already wished you a happy birthday on Korea's 25th of February, but I also needed something for you to wake up to on your birthday back home... :) You know me.. always on top of things!!! :)

I am so excited to be come home in a few short weeks and be with my family again!! Maybe I will finally get that foot massage you've been promising me for doing so well on my essays in college.... :) I know it's sometimes hard to remember these things, but no worries, I am here to help remind of the truth!!

Mostly I just wanted to tell you that I love you eleventy four and I so glad that you are my daddy!! I have so many great memories with you and I can't wait to continue making great ones with you and the fam!!!!
Thank you for always being so great!! You make me want to be better in so many ways. Although, I may deny it at times to your face... I do know that you are brilliant and have a lot of knowledge that I can learn from... if I listen and maybe not be quite as stubborn :)

Have a wonderful day and hope your marathon training is still going stellar!!

oh Valentines Day

I've never been real fan of Valentines Day. Perhaps that's because I've never had a studly boyfriend to share it with and I figured this one would be like most the rest... just another day... BUT I was wrong :)
On Friday night, I kept things pretty chillax. I thought a bit about starting to pack.. I know a lil early :) On Saturday, I headed into Seoul pretty early to help decorate for a mysterious ysa activity that had been planned. I met Gina, Maureen Cahoon, and Britney Hansen to start decorating and when they pulled out the heart balloons, I have to admit, I was a lil discouraged to stay for the whole event. We had a blast setting up though and as people mingled in, I could tell I would be in for a treat!!

Our first activity was being put into groups to do a photo scavenger hunt. Each group is given a list of things they have to get a picture of... the trick is that two of the members of the group have to be in the picture also.. some things that were on the list include:
-a picture of one of your members holding a 'free hugs' sign in a busy part of town (bonus points if the member is hugging a stranger in the picture),
-heart attack someone's house (you cut out hearts and decorate them and tape them all over someone's front door) (we did the Rogers!!!)
-get a picture of one of your members on a scooter (bonus points of the owner of the scooter is also in the picture
and so on... Now you may thing this is simple... BUT remember, I am in Korea where the communication is a bit slow. Try telling someone you don't know and who doesn't understand a thing you are saying that you want a picture of you sitting on his scooter and you also want him in it too... I had the liberty of doing this task... I'm pretty sure the scooter guy though we were all insane too :)
It was freezing cold outside, but we had a lot of fun travelling around and getting pics!! We headed back to the church and had some pizza. After dinner, we had 3 ysa members teach us different dances... the salsa, swing dancing, and a traditional dance from somewhere!! It was a lot of fun and the cool thing is.. that one of my goals this year was to learn how to salsa dance!!! We didn't do a whole lesson, but I got the first steps down pretty good!
The night ended with us dancing the night away with DJ's... aka Gina and Bob.. with I thought would be a total disaster... BUT we had a ton of fun dancing and singing our hearts out!!! The ysa here are truly amazing and I am really gonna miss them!! Here are some pics of our great time!!
I totally look like a natural salsa dancer eh!?!?! :)
This Anahita... she got baptized just before coming over here and she is stellar!! She is about to go through the temple and has a fiance back home waiting for her!! She is also Canadian.. east coast though!
This is Elder and Sister Knudsen!! They are soooo cool. We always do our ysa break the fast dinners at their apartment and they have had a huge influence on me while I hvae been over here!! They leave in April to go back home and I will definitely be keeping in touch with them!!
Sean from Australia! He has become one of my closer guy friends here... he surprised me with a fun card and a rose... so sweet!!!
Ha ha... here is Tim and Amber pulling the best couple dance moves of the night... most awkward dancing position.. but totally church dance worthy! There could definitely be a few scriptures put in between them!!!

I had a great weekend and was super glad I stayed for the whole activity!!! Just a few short weeks left with my friends in Korea and I am dead set on making them stellar and memorable!!! I'm still loving life and feel so happy!!!! Life is great!!!!!!!!

Just a Lil Fun

It's getting to crunch time here in Korea and it seems the time has slammed into full speed ahead and I've become very thankful that I decided to use a planner for my last month and a half here!! I'm trying to make sure I spend time, aka dinner, with the special individuals that I have become close with here in Korea. I have made a lot of acquaintances here and have been lucky enough to make a few really good friends. My main focus for these last few weeks will be experiencing the few Korean things I haven't got around to yet: going to a jjim jil bang (korean bath house), go to a Korean professional basketball game (not that great of quality ball, but I made a goal to hit one up before I come home), eat at my favorite Indian restaurant here, eat some bee beem bop (one of Lynz and my favorite Korean dishes), and spend a day getting some photos of the random/interesting things I may miss seeing in Korea. Should be a busy, exciting, fun month in Korea!!!

This past weekend was a lot of fun. We kicked it off with an 'Idaho Theme' party. We have a few ysa members from Idaho and they decided to plan a party for us... they cooked us some potatoes, had us take a quiz, and made a special Idaho dessert. Gina and I went shopping and then hit up the party. It was a lot of fun to be with the crew and we had some good laughs for sure.

Lauren, muah, Garrett, and Troy... Garrett and Troy are in the army and Lauren is Troy's lil gf in Korea. Garrett has become a really good friend of mine. We met at church about 5 months ago and is a pretty stellar guy. Troy and Lauren aren't members, but we still attempt to invite them out to church and our ysa gatherings every weekend.

Robyn and I...

That's my girl, Gina, with Rebekka and Amber!! Rebekka has the best, most insane laugh... I still need to get a video of it before I come home... :)

So this week at school we have been talking about Valentines Day and how it's a great time to tell the people we love and care for how much they mean to us. One of pages in our activity book had the students draw a picture of their best friends or someone they really cared about... our class had some adorably cute pages come out and I couldn't help but take a few pics.

Danny surprised a lot of us when I read his page. He wrote about Annika and how he thought she was pretty with a picture of them holding hands... who knew I had young love in my classroom :) Danny and Annika both had a bit more of a pink tinge to their faces for a few moments in class!! It was pretty cute!!
Annika was the first one I read... and guess who she wrote about....ME!!!!!!!!!!! I had to hold back the tears as I am a little more emotional about my kids these days!! Annika is definitely one of my favorites and she has been more clingy since I told them about my leaving. I'm going to miss her A LOT!!

So my friend, Garrett, left Korea on Wednesday to go back to the states. We've been trying to find a time to hang out for a month of so now and it just so happened, the night that worked the best was the night before he left. I traveled to Seoul and met up with Garrett at the subway station where we were picked up by Clint, another member in our ward who is married and has two lil adorable kids. We headed over to Clint and Katie's place where we ate some delicious spaghetti and then played a card game. It a monopoly cards game and it was a lot of fun. Maybe the reason I had so much fun was because I was the newbie and won both games hehe!!

After they got tired of losing to me, Garrett and I headed on base where we met up with Troy and they took me to where they work and showed me a real blackhawk helicopter.

No big deal, I'm just chillin on the top of an army helicopter!! Garrett made sure I was educated on all the important information I might need just in case I ever had to fly a blackhawk! :)

At this point, I was explaining very politely that my natural instincts were more than enough to take the helicopter for a lil spin! He didn't go for it :(

But I did get to sit in the driving seat... of course, Troy was in there to make sure I didn't pull a quickie on them and take off. It felt pretty natural to me... I'm pretty sure I could've handled things on my own :)

We had a lot of fun and I will definitely miss having Garrett around to hang out with!!
This weekend is going to be real busy too. Friday night and Saturday morning I'll be hitting the gym pretty hard. Saturday afternoon and night I will be at a ysa shindig that has been planned. It should be a lot of fun and we have invited some new ysa that have just arrived... so hopefully I'll get to meet some cool new friends! I'll be staying over at PJ and Lori's on Saturday night and taking Jaida and Amaya to church with me on Sunday as Lori is home with baby Cooper! They are doing great and healthy as can be! I have still been a lil sick so I haven't been able to hold the lil guy yet, but hopefully this weekend I can get some lovin!!! Then on Monday, we have a holiday, so I'm going over to Amanda Sawatka's to learn how to make her amazing Christmas cookies... so it should be a great long weekend!!!

I Love My Weekends!!

So last week, school was a lil stressful. I've been trying to get my kids on board with practicing their play scripts and songs and they just haven't quite got there. On top of this, Elisa has been on my back about it and by Thursday, I was done. So I've decided to just relax and do what I can, but not get too stressed out abotu the play and such because the facts are... I'm going to be leaving shortly after the whole grad shindig, so no worries for me...
On Friday, I went and met up with Matt and Richard (the Aussie boys) and Robyn and we went to a dvd bong and watched 'The Proposal". We had a lot of fun, but I got a text from Lori shortly after hte movie ended asking when I was going to be over there because she may be making a trip to the hospital that night... so I said my goodbyes and headed over there to find both Lori and PJ passed out on the couches. Pj, of course, had his laptop barely hanging on his lap. It really is amazing how quickly he can fall asleep!
On Saturday, Lori, PJ, Lia and I headed to Amaya and Jaida's basketball game. It was fun to see the lil girls at it! They are going to be quite the athletes!

Lia was really enjoying the game too!!

PJ and Lori headed out on a hot date Saturday night to a Thai restaurant. As you can see, Lori is defiantely feeling ready to have this baby! She's not due till the 12th of February, but she said she wouldn't be too surprised if he came earlier!

And the highlight of my weekend was defintaely the spa morning Lori and I had on base. Lori treated me to a pedicure, manicure and massage. It was amazing and I loved every minute of it! They did a great job and my feet felt softer than they have ever felt before! Plus, we both got some cute lil flowers on our big toes too!

My camera is getting a little old... I'm thinking of buying a new camera before I leave Korea, but I tried to get a good pic of my toes and french manicure... this is the best I got!

On Sunday, I woke up early so I could make some chocolate chip cookies for the ysa fireside we had on Sunday. Church was stellar and the fireside after church was great too!