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About my order. . .

If you ever decide to let your young child travel out of the country with people you've never met, to a country that apparently has some difficulties transporting mail in a timely manner, (or possibly a child that has difficulties writing letters in a timely manner), I highly recommend that you plan to host an exchange student shortly after your child's scheduled return. That way, you have an endless number of projects to keep your hands busy while your mind alternates between wondering what your child is doing at any given moment, and counting down the minutes until the mailman's daily arrival.

Elisa is now completely moved into Julianne's room, and the girls' things are organized and tidy. Marie's closet is empty and ready for her arrival, and the decorating is coming along nicely too. I painted her dresser a nice almond color and decided Elisa's old Beauty & the Beast comforter just wasn't going to do.

The wallpaper is a bit busy, so I had to find something that would match, but be simple. I found the bedding I wanted at jcpenney.com. (Speaking of which, you should never pay shipping. Just do a Google search for "JC Penney coupons" and you will undoubtedly find one for free shipping.) Anyway, I ordered a soft pink comforter, a tan bedskirt (JCPenney calls the color hay), and some sheets that would pull it all together with the wallpaper.

Today my order arrived. The bedskirt was exactly as expected. The sheets will work perfectly. I pulled the last remaining bag out of the box. The label said "Twin Comforter: Soft Pink". However, inside the shipping bag was--are you ready for this?-- a navy blue wool coat! I called JCPenney and told the nice lady what I'd ordered and what I'd received. I added, "I'm sure the coat will keep me warm as well as the comforter would, but it doesn't look nearly as good on the bed."

She said she'd have a comforter shipped out to me today--with no shipping charges. Brad said I should have asked to keep the coat.

My Convert

Isn't it exciting when you spend a long time, even years with someone, slowingly teaching them truth a little at a time. You never know whether it's sinking in or rolling off their back, but you just keep at it, little by little.

Sometimes you see results quickly; other times there appear to be no results at all. But you have to just keep on, because you never know what's going on inside the other person. Many people believe you should let your actions speak for you. Just live your life and hope it rubs off on the other person.

Well, last night I got to experience some of that kind of fruit. It was just a little fruit, but enough to make me believe that a full-blown conversion is just a matter of time.

We were at Dairy Queen as a family, talking about the kind of dessert Brad wanted to make. That's when I heard the words I've never heard before. Actually it was just one word, but a very significant one. Brad said he wanted "banana pudding". Not banana puddin' but banana pudding. With a smile on my face, I told him what he'd said. He replied, "We're going to North Carolina in the fall. They'll get me back on track!"

It's so hard to get people to accept truth, isn't it?

Host Families!

In the search for a few good host families, I've called everyone I know, and brought up hosting with everyone I bump into. I'd gotten quite a few good leads for future school years, but was getting pretty discouraged about my prospects for this year. About a month ago at Caleb's baseball game, I met a very nice lady who--to make a long story short--ended up deciding to host a boy from Brazil. I've done her application, gotten school approval, completed a host family interview, and checked her references--and struck gold.

One of her references mentioned to me that she hosted an exchange student several years ago. I asked her if she knew of anyone else that might like to host and she gave me the phone numbers for two families in Bandon that have adopted Korean children. I contacted them and both families decided to host! (Both chose a Korean student.) And not only that, but they encouraged friends at church to host, so I've also placed a Chinese girl and there is still one family on the fence.

These three new families (and the undecided family) all attend the same church. It's a small church (about 150), so I'm sure having three (maybe four) foreign students will be quite an adventure for them!

I did the in-home interviews for all three families today and was just praising the Lord all the way home. I couldn't have asked for better host families. All three were warm and loving with great kids that are excited about hosting.

I am so looking forward to this school year!

Party time

Elisa turned five yesterday and celebrated with a party today. She'd invited eight of her little friends, and all were on vacation except one! Can you believe it? We still had a nice group at the party, including Mom & Dad, Rod & Dora, their friend Frances, and Hannah's mom and siblings. It was actually quite nice having a managable number of kids. They played great together and the adults had a nice time visiting.

Elisa was thrilled with all of her gifts. Here she is with her new Korean doll that Marie sent. (Click on any picture for a larger view.)


A couple months ago when Rod & Dora were here, Elisa invited them to her birthday party. After discovering that Rod's birthday is July 30, she decided they should have a joint party. Here's Rod opening one of his gifts.


Opening the presents was lots of fun, but the kids were especially excited about hitting the piñata that Aunt Dora made. Here they are, full of excitement and ready to take a whack at it.


Elisa gave it her best shot. . . .


but it was Caleb that busted it open and let the candy fly! (This picture really is worth clicking on for a larger view.)

Feliz Cumpleaños

My baby is five. I just can't believe it! For her birthday dinner she chose Puerto Vallarta because "they sing to me and give me FREE ICE CREAM!" She had a few chips & salsa, a half a chicken enchilada, some rice. . . . and a Roy Rogers, two sopapillas, and a dish of chocolate ice cream with whipped cream and strawberry syrup drizzled over the top. Talk about a sugar buzz!

True to tradition, all the Mexican waiters came to our table and sang to her, then took her picture wearing a sombrero. She loved every minute of it.

Rod's birthday is the 30th, so we celebrated his and Elisa's together. They sang to him, gave him a hat, and he even got a dish of free ice cream.

Oweeee!

After taking a too-long break from regular exercise, I decided to get myself back into the habit. Monday I pulled out my favorite toning video by Tami Lee Webb and did part of the I Want Those Buns segment.

About the video: Before making the video, Tami went into a lab and did a bunch of exercises while monitering her muscles electronically. She only included on the video the exercises that proved most effective. So what you get is a short workout that is highly effective. It's a series of squats (picture using a public restroom without touching the seat), plies (something between a ballerina and a sumo wrestler), and lunges. Youch.

It's a 15-minute workout and I did just about half of it. I woke up yesterday morning just sore enough to know I'd worked out and feeling pleased that maybe I hadn't fallen as badly out of shape as I thought. However, as the day went on, I got progressively more sore, and by last night I was hobbling around here like a little old lady.

Yesterday afternoon I decided to even things out by doing an upper body workout, so now I'm sore all over. The up side is that this motivates me to keep up because I know that once my muscles start getting stronger, I can do this with no soreness. But once I slack off, I have to go back to square one.

Mail

Today's mail brought us a package from Marie! She sent a birthday present for Elisa and an ornament for us. There was the sweetest note inside the box. It said,
Dear Mom,
Hi Mom. This is Elisa's birthday present and ornament. This doll is Elisa's present. (Elisa! Happy Birthday. I love you.) Doll wearing a Han-Book which Korea traditional costume.
Ornament is called "The silla tile engraved with a human face" It this simple unaffected look we feel a warm affection of a mother or an elder sister.
I go there soon.
I love mom, and all my family.
Sincerely,
Marie Kim

I will post a picture of the ornament and doll later, but for now, check out the return address of her package. Cool!


By the way...Marie's package came here from Korea in less time than it took Julianne's letter to go from Florida to Gold Beach. (!???!)

What a cutie

Wouldn't it be fun to have a bad hair day, zero make-up, and still look this good?

Betsy's got a boyfriend

While I put the kids to bed, Brad took Betsy for a walk around the block. He returned with two extra dogs in tow: a HUGE black lab and a small little curly-haired mutt. The mutt didn't hang around too long, but the lab is outside our door now whining for Betsy to come out and play.

They had a grand time playing together on their walk. When Brad tried to carry a few Walmart bags in from the van while holding Betsy's leash, the lab bolted right into the house--much to the surprise of Cookie, our cat. Cookie is very gentle, and he and Betsy are the best of friends. He wasn't so sure about this enormous lab though, so he did the hunched-back-hissing-cat routine. Both dogs joined his game and an all-out animal brawl ensued. We broke it up, but not before Betsy took a claw across the face from Cookie. Oh boy, our first domestic dispute.

Catching up with the Jones'

For the first time in quite awhile, we got together with our good friends, the Jones' tonight. We always enjoy visiting with them, and the kids always have a great time playing and watching movies. Tonight, however, included a new activity.

When we recently got together with our friends, the Sterkens, they taught us one of the coolest tricks ever, so we're passing it on to other families that we think will appreciate it. All I'm going to say here is that it involves a straw and an armpit. If you want more detail than that, you'll have to e-mail me. Hmmmm. . . . .

Here's what I learned today

I took the test and my results are below. I wonder which questions I missed?

You Are 82% American

You're as American as red meat and shooting ranges. Tough and independent, you think big. You love everything about the US, wrong or right. And anyone who criticizes your home better not do it in front of you!

How American Are You?

Nice girls

Each Wednesday throughout the summer a different business in Coquille sponsors "free swim" day at the pool. Yesterday I took Caleb and Elisa to the second half of the session. We forgot to bring Elisa's floaties, so she remained in the kiddie pool the entire time--and had a blast. At one point, she was the only kid in the pool, so I started talking to the lifeguard, Kathleen.

She's a student at the high school Marie will attend, so I asked her how exchange students are received there. She said they are generally very well-liked and always have people around them talking to them. They don't usually have any problems making lots of friends.

I asked her if cheerleading tryouts had already taken place, because Marie had mentioned in an email that she might be interested in cheerleading. Kathleen said tryouts were held in the spring, but she thought that an exception might be made for an exchange student. She said she'd talk to her friend, who is a cheerleader.

After we finished swimming, Elisa and I were waiting for Caleb to come out of the locker room, and another teenage girl came up to me. She said, "Are you the one hosting an exchange student? I'm Jamie and I'm a cheerleader. My friend said your student is interested in participating." She was so friendly and helpful, even offered to give me the phone number of her advisor. We decided we'd cover all that once Marie is here and registering for school.

I was very impressed by these two girls. They were friendly, polite, and helpful. It's reassuring to know that my Korean daughter will likely be welcome in her new school.

My cool finds

In the past few days, I've discovered two different things that will make my life better.

The first is a retractable clothesline. There aren't many places to hang a clothesline at this house unless I want our underwear to fly in front of anyone who drives by. The one location that includes privacy is on the deck, but who wants to have to look at that while you're grilling burgers?. . .not to mention the risk of one of the kids running by and..well, clotheslining themselves.

When I lived in Chile, my host family had a retractable clothesline, but I'd never seen one in the States. I finally started searching the internet and found they do exist, but were a little spendy. While we were in Eugene this weekend, I dropped Brad off to take his class and found myself in the parking lot of Home Depot, which much to my delight, carries retractable clotheslines! I bought two 20-foot lines and Brad installed them for me. They are amazing! You pull out the line, attach it, and hang your clothes. When you're done, the line sucks right back in like a piece of spaghetti in the mouth of a child. I can hardly wait to get my next electric bill!

My other amazing discovery is that I can order photo prints ONLINE and have them in my hands in one hour. No kidding! I can take a picture with my digital camera, upload the photo to walmart.com, and stop by in an hour to pick up the print for just 19 cents! The pictures are crystal clear and the process is simple. I can even order different sizes of prints, but so far I've only tried 4"x6".

Date Day

Brad and I had a nice day in Eugene together. He had to go to take a computer tutorial for Edward Jones, so I ran the kids to Gold Beach yesterday to get a little special time with Grammy & Papa so I could go with Brad. (It turned out to be extra-special time, since I'd forgotten it was their anniversary. I'm sorry, Mom & Dad!)

Brad and I drove to Eugene this morning and I dropped him off at his class and played around in Eugene. After his class, we had an early dinner at Chili's (my favorite!), grabbed a Starbuck's (another favorite!), and headed home. To make a long story short, we met Mom & Dad in Bandon to pick up the kids and brought them home. They were both exhausted (the kids, that is--well, maybe Mom & Dad too).

I've decided we're not going anywhere this week. I'm tired of driving.

Happy Birthday to me - take 2

Brad made grand plans for my birthday. He'd arranged for Elisa to spend the night with a friend so we could go out to dinner and have an evening alone at home together. But you know what they say about the best laid plans. . . I ended up with a major allergy attack and Elisa had a stomach bug.

Yesterday we were both feeling better, so Brad gave it another shot. Elisa spent the night with her friend, Jamie, and Brad and I went out to dinner at Benetti's, my favorite Italian restaurant. We came home and watched a movie, then enjoyed our newly-working hot tub. (Why did we wait so long to get that thing running???)

I woke up in the middle of the night feeling nauseous and have felt under-the-weather all day long. I think I must have caught Elisa's bug, although I'm not violently sick like she was. (Thank you, Jesus!)

Brad is home from work now, so he will take care of Elisa and anything else that needs taking care of, and I'll lay around doing nothing, except maybe napping.

Tomorrow Caleb comes home from camp. I can't wait! Things are way too quiet around here.

Let's just slow down a little

I can't believe Julianne's only been gone a week. It seems like much longer, but maybe that's because we've crammed so much activity into this past week. Between having company and watching fireworks, we haven't really gotten a good night's sleep since the middle of last week. Maybe it's the lack of sleep that made me nearly forget that this is the week Caleb goes to summer camp!

So after staying up late watching fireworks, I roused Caleb out of bed at 6:45 this morning to get him ready to go. I know he hasn't been getting enough sleep when it's hard to get him out of bed on the first day of camp! Once he was awake and up he was excited, but it was a little strange to not have the days of anxious anticipation that usually preceed camp.

I was hit with a major allergy attack today, so I've spent my day driving up the value of Kleenex stock. (I know a great broker, by the way...) I had to get my driver's license renewed, including a new picture, and my license now has a mug shot of Rudolph the Reindeer on it.

This afternoon I steam-cleaned the carpet in the van to remove all traces of where Elisa got sick in there. She apparently still has a touch of that bug, but it is affecting her differently now. 'Nuf said. I suggested she take a nap this afternoon, but she insisted she wasn't tired. A little while later I found her like this.

4th of July

Happy Independence Day! We spent the evening at the home of our friends/neighbors, the Jepsens. The other Owens' were there too, as well as a bunch of neighborhood kids. We had dinner together, the kids climbed trees, had a pine cone fight, and eventually we got around to lighting off some fireworks. At one point I had to run home for a minute, so I told the kids to come up with an interesting pose while I was gone, and I'd take their picture when I got back. Here it is.

Dress up

Dean & Mary's daughter, Allison, is a year older than Elisa and the two girls immediately hit it off. They were inseperable the whole weekend, and their latest adventure was playing dress-up this morning. It just doesn't get much cuter than this!

That special kind of friend

You know how there are some friends that are just easy to be around? You don't have to constantly try to think of things to talk about; the conversation comes naturally. And if there does come a point of silence, it doesn't feel uncomfortable. That's the way it is when we get together with Dean & Mary. We just have fun together no matter what we decide to do--even if we decide to do nothing but hang out at home.

They arrived Friday night and we all stayed up late--even the kids. Their kids, Michael and Allison, are close in age to Caleb and Elisa, so everybody had a playmate. The kids got along wonderfully, without a single disagreement, arguement, or tattle the entire weekend.

On Sunday we decided to go to Gold Beach for church. The guys figured out that we could remove the captain's chairs from our van and replace them with the bench seat of Dean & Mary's van, converting our 7-passenger van into an 8-passenger van. So the eight of us rode to Gold Beach together.

After church we had lunch at Mom & Dad's house, then went to the beach for a little while. On the way back from the beach, Elisa suddenly became sick (believe me, you don't want the details!) so we hurried back to get her (and the van) cleaned up. She layed around watching movies for the rest of the afternoon.

Mom & Dad offered to stay with the kids while Dean, Mary, Brad, and I went to dinner with Mark & Susan (more of those comfortable kind of friends). Good friends, good food, and lots of laughter--the makings of a perfect evening.

Hot tubbin'

Our friends, Dean & Mary, came for the weekend and we've had a wonderful time with them. They have a hot tub at home, so they helped us get ours up and running. It really is wonderful to sit in there in the evening and wind down. Why didn't we do this sooner?

RABBITS!