Mom's Birthday

Yesterday (July 2) was my mom's birthday. She got a nice gift:

 I somehow managed to have enough time and energy to make dinner, do dishes, and make a blueberry pie for my mom. Don't ask me how.

we woke him up to take pictures and he wasn't very happy about it

Happy Birthday, Mom/Grandma.

White Day

Last year we celebrated White Day by Taylor giving me chocolate and flowers. This year, we went to dinner, got Coldstone, and saw The Vow. We also celebrated at church. Last year a tradition was started at our church on Valentine's Day. All of the girls held a banquet in honor of the guys. In return, on White Day, the guys honored the girls. We got to be a part of that this year. The church has doubled in numbers since last year, but the guys are still much fewer than the girls. There were about 18 guys preparing food, entertainment, decorations, and gifts for about 55 women! The night was a success. They made homemade pasta, salad, bread, and meatballs. For dessert we had brownies, ice cream, and fresh strawberries.

The best part of the night was the entertainment- hosted by none other than Taylor Hankins himself. Not only was the the host of the event, but he was also in charge of all of the events including a dance routine done by his "boy band" and a music video.

I can't put the music video on the blog, but I can post a link where you can go and view the video. Go watch it! http://dl.dropbox.com/u/67843640/White%20Day_All%20My%20Life.mov 
***We just got a notification from Dropbox that due to high traffic, the video has been disabled for 3 days. If you really want to see it, you'll have to check back on Thursday, March 22.
If you want to see the girl's reactions, you might be able to watch them here: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10100977208228679

Here are some pictures of us from the night. I'm in the 6th month of pregnancy now, 26 weeks.

Valentine's Day Video

This is another little something my hubby surprised me with on Valentine's Day.

Best Valentine's Day Ever!

Yesterday, 2 days before Valentine's Day, my wonderful husband surprised me with an amazing Valentine's gift. This is one of the best gifts he's ever given me- both for the gift itself, and the time and effort he put into getting it.

He got me..............

A PREGNANCY PILLOW! And I love it so so much! We talked about buying one in the States when we were there for Christmas and bringing it back but it would be too expensive and too much of a pain. Then I would just leave it here when we left Korea so it wasn't worth it. We tried looking for one here but there just really weren't any good ones available. I guess he decided I really needed one so he was about to buy it on Amazon and have it sent to our friend's address on the military base. This is the pillow: http://www.amazon.com/Todays-Mom-Comfort-Pregnancy-Pillow/dp/B001A0M3LI/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1329014573&sr=8-6. He actually placed the order then the very next day one of our coworkers (Taylor had already asked for her help finding one in Korea) said a friend of hers found someone selling a pillow that had never been used. And guess what.....it was the exact same one he was going to buy on Amazon. See- God is looking out for us even in the small stuff.

The only catch was that he had to go outside of Seoul to a city called Bundang to pick it up. He tricked me and told me he was going for a really long bike ride. He got dressed in his bike clothes and later I found out he just took his bike to another floor of our apartment building to make it look like he took the bike and he changed into regular clothes once he got to the subway. It took him an hour and a half to get there with subway and bus transfers, then an hour and a half back. And on top of that, he had to walk through Seoul carrying the pillow! I took a picture of him when he came back:

Don't mind the shirtless look :)

Isn't he amazing? Taylor is such a selfless man. This baby is lucky to have a father like that. Ever since I've known him...even back to when we were just friends in college, he has always gone out of his way to help people when they ask for it. I've seen him take people to the airport- acquaintances, not even good friends, run all sorts of errands for people who ask for his help, go above and beyond his job description at work, and many other things. He's always willing to help even when it means sacrificing time or sleep. I'm admittedly too selfish to do many of the things he does for others but that's just one reason why he's so wonderful.

And the result of his effort? A happy mamma!

I was so excited to try the pillow out last night!

pretending to sleep

Come on, honey..there's still room for you!

So happy...creepily happy even!

Babymoon/Lunar New Year

Last weekend was a big holiday in Asia- even bigger than Christmas! Most know it as the Chinese New Year. Here in Korea they like to call it the Lunar New Year. We had Monday and Tuesday off of work so we decided to plan a trip somewhere. Instead of allocating a portion of our trip budget to transportation, we decided to stay right here in Seoul and spend 2 nights at 2 different hotels.

The first hotel we stayed at was the Sheraton Hotel at D-Cube City Mall. It was recently built so everything was really new. We left for the hotel mid-day on Sunday.

A screen comes down to separate the bathroom for privacy if you want it.

 My favorite part of the Sheraton was the bathroom. We only have a shower in our apartment, so I was finally able to take some baths!

View from our room

Screen Golf

In the D-Cube Mall looking down. Shortly after this photo a security guard
came rushing over and said "No Photos!"

 The biggest complaint we had with the Sheraton was that we were approached by an employee of the Sheraton while in the pool who didn't speak any English so she had to call someone on her cell phone and hand us the phone in the pool. The person on the phone told us that we must wear swim caps to be in the pool. Everyone in Korea wears swim caps at the public and gym pools- it's a must. But come on, Sheraton is an international brand....they shouldn't expect that of their international customers. Furthermore, nothing was posted on the pool rules about wearing a swim cap. When we transferred to the Hyatt Regency, there were lots of people in the pool without swim caps. Sheraton needs to get that memo.

The outside of the mall

 The next day we left for the Hyatt but we stopped on the way at our favorite breakfast place in Korea- Butterfinger Pancakes.

 The Hyatt was definitely a luxury hotel. Everything looked really nice and classy. We stayed on the club floor and even got upgraded, thanks to Taylor's dad's Platinum membership. He and his dad share the same name, so we were able to use the membership and get the extra perks. The club lounge was really nice- hors d'oeuvres, cocktail hour, snacks and drinks all day, and breakfast the next morning. 

My husband also treated me to a pregnancy massage at the Hyatt Spa. The massage was really nice...until later that night. I felt completely relaxed for a long time after the masssage, HOWEVER, I broke out in a rash all over my body. I guess my skin didn't like the special rose hip lotion they used which ironically was specially selected for pregnant women. Almost a week later, I still have a few rough patches on my skin leftover from the rash. :(

Lobby at the Hyatt

Checking out the spa packages

We also went ice skating on what I think was probably the coldest day of the entire winter so far!

 Don't worry- I held onto Taylor the whole time and didn't fall. :)

Korea has some weird quirks about exercise. Look at #2-
Please shower and exercise lightly before entering...what??

The view from our room at the Hyatt

Overall, we had a great weekend! And that could possibly be our last getaway for awhile.

Happy Thanksgiving!

How was your Thanksgiving??? Thursday and Friday were just normal days for us. I think we said "Happy Thanksgiving" to each other once, but we didn't eat a special meal or do anything else. In fact, we had to work. Korea doesn't honor American holidays. Sheesh! But it was all made up for today. We had a Thanksgiving Banquet at church. Turkey, stuffing, potatoes...the works! So much food and there were even some leftovers.

The best part of the night (beside the turkey) was the talent show that Taylor co-hosted! I missed his opening act, but everyone said it was hilarious. I was able to catch his second performance on video. If you've ever seen Arrested Development, this video will just be that much more hilarious.

Here's a couple other performances from the show. 1 hilariously funny and 1 serious but good.

This guy was seriously hyped up on some Red Bull or some kind of energy drink!!

This is Marcus, one of the pastors at our church. And yes, ladies, he is single.

Exciting News

We have some exciting news- we are planning to come home during Christmas-time!

I (Ashley) have been asked to be a bridesmaid in one of my good friend's wedding on December 16. So I will be coming home earlier and Taylor will follow about a week later, on the 23rd or 24th. We don't have tickets yet.

Speaking of tickets...some of you have already asked us about Christmas. Well...we don't want any gifts! We want to see YOU! So if you were planning on giving us something for Christmas, would you instead consider contributing to our "Send Us Home" fund? Tickets are really expensive, and we want to get home to see our families and friends. We can't see everyone of course. Sorry.

And if you weren't planning on giving us anything, that's okay too. But if you feel so obliged.... feel free. :)

You can either mail a check to Taylor's parents house and they'll deposit it into our account. Or we can give you our account info. and you can do a direct transfer.

Sorry for the shameless Christmas fund request. Totally not an obligation- even for family. But just in case you felt so inclined to help us get home, we just wanted to give you the info! We're hoping to see as many people as we can in the short time we're home- mostly family, but we love our friends too. It will be sooooo nice to see the people we haven't seen for a year and half.

Korea Foundation Day

Last Monday (October 3rd) was a holiday for us here. National Foundation Day doesn't really mean anything to us except a day off work. And we made good use of our 4-day weekend.

On Saturday, after a nice morning of sleeping in we took the dog and headed for the mountain. 

She fit nicely in Taylor's backpack.

We stopped in Gangnam (where Dr. Fish is)  for breakfast at Butterfinger Pancakes- delish! There was a 45 minute wait, so we go the dog out of the bag to walk her around but it was kind of chilly and she started shivering. Good thing we brought her blanket.

Previous to this day, I (Ashley) had been on a detox/cleanse. No wheat, no gluten, no dairy. Pretty much just fruits, vegetables, rice, olive oil, vinegar, and chicken or fish. I really could live by that lifestyle- except for my love/addiction of sweets. I had already been doing my cleanse for almost 2 weeks and decided to reintroduce some things. So we ordered the chocolate chocolate chip pancake with cookies and cream and vanilla ice cream and fudge on top. Wow. Bad idea right before you go on a hike and right after your body has been cleansed of all that filth. I quickly began to regret that decision.

We made it to the mountain and began our hike. Mount Umyeonsan is a nice retreat from the business of Seoul. It's nestled right in the heart of the city, but there are plenty of trees and greenery to block the sight/noise of all the busyness.

As always, the stairs for hiking.

 We stopped halfway up- Taylor to play on the exercise equipment, me to lay down because I was starting to feel sick.

 The whole reason I started this detox is because I've been having problems with my health since last Spring. I began doing research into gluten intolerance and thought that might be what I was suffering from. It was worth a try. So I went off everything gluten for awhile. I should not so quickly have reintroduced it into my life. Maybe it was the gluten in the pancakes; maybe it was a sugar overload- I'm not sure, but I do know the pain was intense!

no more gluten for me :(

We finally made it to the top and got a nice view of the city. Check out the intense excercisers in the video above. This is not unusual to find in Korea!

 

I felt sick the whole way down and pretty much the rest of the night. Note to all: when going off a fast/detox/cleanse, do it slowly. Don't quickly reintroduce all the bad stuff. In fact, continue to avoid if possible. Otherwise, your body will hate you and strongly react. 

feeling sick

Moral of the day: treat your body right so it will be nice to you.

Banpo Bridge at sunset.

dirty puppy got a bath

On Monday, the actual holiday, we went to the Han River Park, which is about a 5-10 minute walk from our apartment. We love being so close to the river. We had a picnic and read our books by the water. People were flying kites, we had our books, lattes from Starbucks, all was well. 'Twas a beautiful day!

Happy 추석 Part 3

Google even knows how to celebrate with a traditional Korean spread. I can't explain everything in the picture, but I know that a lot of it is made from rice!

We came back to Seoul on Monday and were so thankful not to be stuck in crazy traffic. All of our Korean friends thought we were crazy when we said we were traveling during Chuseok. Bus and train tickets were selling out, not to mention all the people with cars of their own. We were warned that what was normally about a 3 hour drive to Sokcho would probably take us somewhere between 6-10 hours with all the traffic. We decided to think of it as hurricane traffic leaving Houston, which Chris and JB had already experienced and we went anyway. Well, guess what- no traffic! On the way there and on the way back. So take that Korea! We ran into a few minutes of slow traffic right on the edge of Seoul but it didn't really delay our trip at all. Maybe everyone heard about the coming typhoon and cancelled their plans toward the coast. Our hotel even gave us like a $10 refund because of "bad weather." How often do you hear of that happening? If anything, you'd think they'd hold on to every dollar since people were cancelling their reservations.

So after a rainy weekend, Monday turned out pretty nice. We even got some sunshine. Once back in Seoul we headed to Gyeongbokgung Palace- the main and largest royal palace built by the Joseon Dynasty.

First we stopped at Gwanghwamun Square to take pictures. Gwanghwamun Square is right in front of the palace. It has a fun little water area for kids and a statue/museum in honor of the great King Sejong. He developed the Korean alphabet (Hangul) and did many other important things for the nation.

 

 

King Sejeon Museum

King Sejeon Museum

  

 

Because it was Chuseok, the palace entrance was free

We got to wear traditional Chuseok clothing and take pictures.

 

One of my favorites.

Random people started asking to take pictures with us.