Sunset Ward

With our stake splitting and all the ward boundaries being rearranged, we are now in Sunset Ward, and I've been called as the Relief Society Secretary. We got a presidency pic at church recently--I promise there was no wardrobe consultation, it just happened. (Hopefully this bodes well for our working together! We are in sync!)

After working with the cub scouts for over two years I was hoping to be in Relief Society for a while. I get to take attendance, rather than passing the roll around, so that'll help me get to know people.



One of the things I get to do is send birthday cards to all the sisters, and of course I decided I had to make them myself. This is a job for the gelli plate! And I have a whole ream of cardstock I got for a project recently, that turned out to be too heavy to go through our laser printer, but it makes great cards.



I've been making a lot of foam stamps lately, so it was fun to have a chance to try them out. I really like the way this one turned out. Pretty!

Misionary Montage

I drew this for Dena, whose son is leaving to serve a mission in Mexico.  It's  a composite of three pictures that I found online, all done in mechanical pencil. 

Kate's Baptism

We've been preparing Kate to be baptized when she turned eight. It was a lovely evening.  Friends and family came (Grandma Mary was up in Everett visiting Aunt Erika, so she was able to be there). The water was very cold but Kate was brave.




Family picture! (And there's Grandma in the back.)

I asked Jill Tracy if she could play "Each Life That Touches Ours For Good" for me, in the prelude music.  In my mission we sang that at every single baptism.  (I remember singing it at a mission reunion and getting all choked up... and singing it in Relief Society when I was pregnant and pretty much bawling... darn hormones.) It wasn't part of the program, but I wanted to include it, just for me.  It was just a small, sweet moment--a brief surge of emotion, the echo of Korean lyrics, and then getting back to the matter  at hand, getting my daughter ready for her own baptism.  Nobody else knew.  But I appreciated Jill doing that for me. 

Grandma Mary gave the talk on baptism, and Sister Campbell (who's been sitting with on Sundays to help me out with the kids, since Doug's on the stand) gave the talk on the Holy Ghost.  Scott gave the opening prayer and Rebecca gave the closing prayer.  It was a nice way to include everybody.  And when we got home we skyped with my parents in Ohio.  Thanks for sharing our special evening with us!

Welcoming 2012

I have picked out a "one little word" for 2012.  My word is FOCUS.  I know I let myself get too distracted by the internet and it keeps me from focusing on the things I should.  So I'm going to re-focus on using my time and resources to do the things that I really want to do.  And on figuring out what those are. 

We spent New Years Eve with the Tracys, playing Ticket to Ride and eating cheese and veggies till the unfashionable hour of 9:30.  Yes, we are the big partiers.  (Normally the kids get their pajamas on at 7:30, so that was pretty late for them!)  We hadn't played Ticket to Ride before.  Doug and I both enjoyed it.  (He always likes maps.)

We've had several game nights like this, over the years, playing Settlers or Killer Bunnies or something of that nature at the Tracys' kitchen table while Kate played with the Fisher Price castle and other toys on the living room floor.  (Other people's toys are always more interesting.) She would almost always go home with a beanie baby that she would borrow until the next time we were there, trading it in for another one.  This time felt like some kind of milestone, or transition, as instead of playing in the living room nearby, Kate spent most of the time down in the basement on the Wii.  My baby's growing up.  (Andy ended up on the computer, right next to where I was sitting, playing on starfall.com.)  We went home with borrowed Wii games instead of beanie babies. 

We started 11:00 church today.  We alternate between 9:00 and 11:00 (there's also a student ward in our building that keeps the 1:00 time slot, so we don't do that one, thankfully!)  Since we were out last night the kids didn't get their Saturday night bath, but I thought, "Hey, we've got two more hours to get ready in the morning; we'll do it then."  This worked out okay but I don't think I'll make a habit of it.



Andy is a Sunbeam now!  The kids are assigned to their classes according to what age they are on January 1.  Since Kate and Andy's birthday is right at the end of the year, they get to leave the nursery when they're newly-three.   We have a picture of Kate as the Littlest Sunbeam, on her first day in Primary. Doug has told me several times that this is one of his favorite pictures of Kate, just right on the cusp of babyhood. Andy is actually not the Littlest Sunbeam, since there's another boy in the ward whose birthday is today. I also was not able to get a picture of him sitting in his chair, because he just wouldn't do it. He is a wiggler and a roamer. So he spent the first while sitting with his teacher, and then came to me.



I held him for just a few minutes and then he just conked out.  Right at 1:30--nap time!  (We've been trying to discontinue the nap but he keeps falling asleep anyway, so we just try to keep it short.)  Kelly Dickson put her coat down on the floor for him and he slept that way till it was time to go. (That's his Happy Birthday sticker, on his shirt.) 

I have to mention that we did not sing "Ring Out Wild Bells" today. I've always liked the way that last chord resolves.

Kate keeps asking me when it's going to snow.  She knew that the solstice was the first day of winter, and anticipated that winter would bring snow.  This morning when I went in to wake her up she asked me again, "Did it snow?"  No snow.  It's been pretty mild, lately.  The cloud cover keeps in the warmth, like a damp gray blanket.  (I'm not saying that in a bad way--it's kind of a cozy damp gray blanket.)  Today was clear and sharply sunny, but still well above freezing. I'm okay with a mild winter, but I do hope we get at least one good snow.

Happy New Year to you!

Kate's first Primary talk

Kate gave her first talk in Primary on the first Sunday of the year. I wrote out the talk for her and she wowed everyone with her mad reading skills. Here she is with her "Happy Birthday" sticker and her "I gave a talk in Primary" sticker. Big grin!

Nativities R Us

The first weekend in December was the Festival of the Nativity at the church again. We went on Saturday to check it out. (Right after Andy's nap!) I was hoping to get a family picture like last year's but it didn't work out so well.





Kate was not interested in family pictures, but she did want to wear the sheep costume. She makes a cute little lamb.





With all the look-don't-touch nativities on display, it was nice that they also had a room where the kids could actually play with things, along with this cute Little People backdrop. We spent a lot of time in that room.





They used the backdrop that I painted for Savior of the World in the Relief Society room. It's always fun to see that again.

침례식

Our neighbor Hyun Ju (정현주) and her older daughter Glory were baptized this last Saturday. They've been attending church for a few months and taking the discussions with the missionaries, and decided to get baptized. Our neighbor Catherine (also Korean) gave the talk on baptism, and Hyun Ju asked me (!!!) to give the talk on the Gift of the Holy Ghost. In Korean. Whew. I probably wouldn't have been up for it a few months ago, but I have been getting a lot of Korean practice lately. It was a little choppy but it went okay. And it was just cool to be able to do something like that again. I was happy to be asked.

I was hoping that we could all go, but Doug's mom came up from Klamath Falls that weekend, so Doug and Kate went to the Seattle aquarium with Grandma while Andy and I went to the baptism. (The aquarium is cool, but there was no way I was going to miss the baptism!)



Hyun Ju's husband works on Sunday and hasn't been to church, but he was able to come to the baptism and I think it was a good experience. Everyone was very friendly and welcoming. (That red blur in the bottom corner is somebody stepping in front of the camera, but this was the best shot I got for people's expressions.)



Mom and girls. Sky's too young to get baptized, she just happens to be wearing a white dress. (With ladybugs on it.)

I found out that I had Sky's Korean name wrong. (For a whole year now.) I thought her name was 하늘이, but it's really 하누리. (Which sounds almost the same.) The confusion stems from the fact that her English name is Sky, and 하늘 does mean Sky. I guess I'll have to go back and change my previous entries.

After the baptism we had watermelon (yum!) and 콩떡 (bean rice cake) and everyone stood around in the hall visiting. There were quite a lot of people who came. The members are great. I've been up to the Korean branch (for church) four times now and really enjoyed it. (I'll enjoy it more when Andy's old enough to go to nursery--just one more month!)

Korea videos--church and temple

When we were in Cheonan we attended the local branch. I got permission to film part of a hymn (unobtrusively from the back) one Sunday, and then we got some of the general mayhem after the meeting.



Sister Cho Kyung Sun (조경순) also served in Taejon mission, and was in my greenie house in Gwangju. Her husband was the branch president in Cheonan. I remember going to church there that first Sunday and seeing her. "Hey, I know you!" That was cool.

The Tices were another American couple that was there teaching. We discovered that Sister Tice's sister was friends with Doug's brother Al's ex-wife. Kind of an odd connection. And after we got back home I realized that I had a book by Brother Tice, that one of my Young Women's leaders gave me when I was fifteen. We just recently got back in touch with them, and found out they're in our area now! It's like we keep following each other around.



The temple in Seoul. I love the way you walk up the street and turn the corner and Bam! There it is. They do have a sign, in English and Korean, out on the main street, so hopefully that helps people find it!

We ran into Sister Jung Su Jin (정수진) outside the temple. She'd been a stake missionary in Gwangju. There was one sister missionary who was serving in the little visitor's center by the church (which I hear is not there anymore), and Sister Jung filled in as her companion for a while. At the time I couldn't really say much in Korean, so it was fun to run into her again and actually be able to carry on a conversation. She was serving a mission in Seoul.

After I got these videos put together I thought I really should get ahold of someone in Cheonan, so I got the number for the missionaries serving there now, called them and got Sister Cho's number, and called and talked to her. She has four kids now. When we were there she had two little girls. Now she has two boys as well.

I asked about Sister Yoon Jung Hee. (윤정희--she's not in the video.) She was always really sweet. I remember we had her and her husband over for dinner once, and then she fed us the night before we left Korea. Sister Cho said they were not in Cheonan anymore but had moved to Jinju. So I called the Busan mission office and got the number for the missionaries in Jinju. I talked to Elder McCain (who was serving there with his companion, Elder Elder. We had an Elder Elder in my mission too. Apparently not related). I asked him if he knew Yoon Jung Hee, and he said, "Yes, we just had dinner at her house last night!"

So I got Sister Yoon's number and gave her a call. It took her a minute to figure out who I was, which was kind of comical (well, it has been a long time!). We exchanged email addresses. I knew that her husband had family in the U.S. and occasionally came over to visit, but I was surprised to learn that his mom lives in Tacoma. Holy cow. He said he was just here a couple of months ago, and should be coming again this summer. I said, "Bring your wife this time!" It would be great to see them again.

You know that six-degrees-of-separation thing? In LDS circles it's waaaay closer.

Korea calling

After I got home from my mission in '93 I wrote letters, in Korean, to a few friends and companions. This is a card that I kept tucked into my dictionary, where I made a list of words that I found myself looking up frequently. After Doug and I got married, went and taught in Chonan for nine months, and then went to Newfoundland, the list continued. (I can kind of tell what was happening when by looking at it--moving from words like "graduation" to words like "Canada" and "dialect.") I wrote to Kim Ji Won, who'd been a student in one of my classes; to Mr. Ha from Doug's kendo class, who owned a restaurant and made wonderful soon tubu jjigae (we spent a memorable New Year's Eve with his family); to Lee Soo Mi in Suncheon; and to Kim Son Mi in Nonsan. Somewhere along the way I stopped writing.

I've thought about my neglected correspondents every once in a while. Wondered if there were any poor sad letters wending their way to Newfoundland and then getting rejected and sent back. This year I finally made a card for the Lunar New Year, and planned to see how many of those friends I could get back in touch with.

I still might never have sent them, as February approached and they remained under my desk. But after we had the Korean lady randomly show up at church and I was just stumbling all over myself, I was seized with a sense of urgency. I pulled out my White Field Korean book and went over some grammar forms. I watched videos on youtube. Then, that Friday, I had planned to make keema matar (not Korean, it's Indian) for lunch, and realized we didn't have any garlic. Immediately I had an idea. I would borrow some garlic from our Korean neighbors. It was like a sign.

On the Tip of my Tongue

I've had Korea on the brain a lot the past few months. (More than usual, that is.) Since I made the banner and background for the Daejeon mission blog, I've been following the blog and sometimes looking up the names of new missionaries that Sister Perriton posts about. This is how I found Sister Rebecca O'Bryan's blog. She's a brand-new (greenie) missionary serving in Gwangju, which was also my greenie area. (Missionaries can't use the internet, but her sister is posting her weekly emails to the blog.) I always enjoy reading about people's experiences in Korea, but there was something about finding a missionary blog, especially somebody in a place where I'd served, that was a special treat. My mind was spinning for days with things I wanted to tell her. I was finishing up Mom's calendar and didn't want to get distracted from that, but once that was finished I sat down and wrote a snail-mail letter and babbled a bit about Korea and Gwangju and being a missionary. (I just got it off in the mail last Tuesday, so I expect it'll be a while before I hear back.)

People sometimes ask me if I've managed to keep my Korean. It's been over sixteen years since my mission, and twelve years since Doug and I taught English in Chonan. I like to think that I've kept it up pretty well. I often construct Korean sentences in my head, just for the heck of it (in the shower or whatever), or walk around the house singing a Korean hymn or children's song. I have quite a few books in Korean that I'll pull out and practice reading every once in a while, though not regularly. (It's been a while since I've done that. I gave up on Harry Potter after I realized the translation wasn't very good.) But when the opportunity comes up to actually have a conversation with someone in Korean, then it's all too obvious that it just doesn't come out as well as it used to.

Two weeks ago, Doug went out on a Saturday afternoon to get his hair cut. He went to a place nearby run by some nice Korean ladies. Later he told me that he'd talked to a lady there who was a social worker in Korea and had come over to improve her English. She asked him if he went to church, and he just said he was Christian, since they changed the name of the church in Korean a while back and he couldn't remember what it was. So the next day she showed up at church. We're not sure how she ended up there, since she never actually asked Doug where he went to church. After Sacrament Meeting a friend told me that there was a Korean lady there. Someone else was already talking to her, so I went over to help.

Her name was 지현 (Ji Hyun), from Seoul. She told me she'd picked Zelia for an English name. We talked just a little--I told her about where I'd been in Korea, and she told me my pronunciation was good (yes, I can say Daejeon, Gwangju, and Suncheon properly! Yay!). Then she asked what the topic of the day's talks had been. Well, the topic was revelation and I could not for the life of me remember the word for revelation in Korean. Which was really embarrassing because it was definitely something I should have known. I was pretty sure it started with 계 and just kept running through 계 words. (계획? No, that's plan. 계단? No, that's stairs....)

Then I asked her if she had a Book of Mormon and she said, "This is a Mormon church? I did not know that!" Oops. I answered a few questions in a mixture of Korean and English, but I only got to talk to her for a few minutes because she said she had an appointment. After she left we managed to track down a Korean Book of Mormon. We didn't see her the next week.

I was feeling kind of agitated about this for a while, and kept wondering if there was something I was supposed to do differently. With all the Korean-related stuff I've had going on recently, of course I can't help but wonder if there's a reason.

There is a Korean branch that meets in Auburn. A couple that was in our ward is attending there now. I'd love to go and do some Korean schmoozing in a no-pressure setting.

This week I've discovered the blogs of three sister missionaries serving in Busan mission: Sister Rose Hadden, Sister Alyssa Linford, and Sister Rachel Ogilvie. Sister Hadden and Sister Linford were companions at the Misisonary Training Center, and Sister Ogilvie was in the next group after them. I particularly enjoyed Sister Hadden's blog. She has a way of capturing everything that just brings it all back. I've enjoyed reading through it and remembering so many little things, and especially the sweet Korean sisters that I served with. Sister Ogilvie's blog was a lot of fun, too.

I also discovered that the current mission president in Busan is Ken Jenning's father. I just got a kick out of that.

I am determined to get back to Korea, somehow. I have no idea when or how this might take place, or for how long, or even who all it would involve. (It occurred to me recently that Kate probably wouldn't appreciate Korea very much right now.) In the meantime, I feel a need to get myself back up to speed (as much as I can, anyway) on speaking fluency. Last night I watched some Let's Speak Korean videos on youtube (these are actually pretty good--they use some nice colloquial forms), and went to bed with Korean in my head. 앞으로 더 열심히 공부 해야돼요.

Photography at the Nativity

This picture of Andy just cracks me up.

The first weekend in December was the Festival of the Nativity at the church. (We went to see it last year and Kate wore her dragon costume. This year we were all more traditionally attired.)

They had a manger scene where people could dress up and get pictures taken. Larry Golden was doing the photography, and he had asked me if I could come in and spell him for a bit on Saturday so he could get a break.



Here's the setup (not crooked in real life), complete with fake sheep and fake baby. There were a few people who put their own babies in the manger, if they were small enough.



And half of Larry's lighting. This was fun to use.

We went over early and got Larry to take some family pictures for us, with my camera. (Not dressed up, just us.)



This one's pretty good...



... but I like myself a little better in this one. (Doug looks exactly the same.) We finally got that vertical 8x10 for my mom! We tried back at the six-months photo shoot and just couldn't get anything.

I took Andy's Saturday pictures, too (which I will post next) and then Doug took the kids around to look at the displays and I manned the fort while Larry went home and got something to eat.

It wasn't really busy, but I did get to take pictures of a few families who came in. All the pictures are here. Anything with an absurdly wide angle is probably mine. I was using Larry's camera and had a few times that I moved up and zoomed out where I should have moved back and zoomed in. (I'm just not used to working with a zoom at all!)

I didn't get any pictures of the rest of the festival, but it was quite a production. They even pulled out my backdrop from Savior of the World to use in the Relief Society room with the artwork display. It was such a big production, in fact, that it completely displaced the three wards that meet in that building and we had to meet somewhere else that Sunday.



When Doug came back to get me, there was some great light coming in the side window, so I asked him if he could take a picture of me with the kids. They were not into it.



Kate, for some unfathomable reason, fell in love with this plastic fish (it was there for a prop, though I don't think anyone used it). She named it John and was just heartbroken when we told her it couldn't come home with us.



Andy conked out!

Silent Pipe, Holy Pipe

(The title was Doug's idea.)

This last Friday was our ward Christmas party, where we played the pipe chimes. Doug got a video with his PDA--not great, but you can hear it.



I'm the one doing the pointing. It's hard to tell, I know!



Better pictures! (I think they're having a good time, they're just concentrating.)



That's Don Tracy's twenty-year-old Christmas sweater. Isn't it fabulous?



You can see Doug in the background, trying to film and hold a wiggly baby at the same time.

Originally I had planned something quite a bit more complicated with the bass part, but I didn't test it out with a piano player ahead of time, and we discovered that it just didn't sound right. So we improvised something simple using only three of the six low notes that we'd made. This was probably just as well, as we didn't really have enough people for three more big pipes. Most of our players were doubled up, and Tim and Don each had three.

Big thanks to everybody who helped out with this! (On both sides of the pond.)

We are finally getting some snow today. It's been cold and dry for about a week now. Andy and Kate are both fascinated by the falling flakes.

Blessing Day

Andy was blessed this last Sunday. (Here's a brief explanation if you don't know what this is.) My sister Barb made this cute little outfit. I put it back on him to get pictures today, since I wasn't able to on Sunday for reasons which I shall relate. (Barb also made the dress that Kate wore for her blessing. My mom blogged about it recently.)



Another sneeze! Achoo!

My dad flew out for the occasion. It was a quick trip--he came on Saturday and left early Monday morning. My mom wanted to come too, but a few weeks ago she realized that she just wasn't feeling well enough and needed to stay home. We missed her. (Hopefully we'll get to go out to Ohio this summer.)



Andy meets Grandpa.






Grandpa had hardly arrived before Kate roped him into a game of Hungry Hungry Hippo. Then she said, "Let's play funny faces! Ten funny faces." She made (and numbered) ten faces, and then pointed at him and said, "Okay, now it's your turn!" Ha.

Since moving to the 9:00 schedule, we've had a little trouble getting to church on time. I got up at 6:00 and took a shower, to be sure I'd have enough time to get everyone ready. As it was we still got there after the opening song and prayer, and when they said it was time for Andy's blessing I had to hurry and get him out of his car seat and do up that last button in the back.

Our friends Scott and Tom came to stand in the circle. Cousin Lonnie wanted to come but couldn't get off work. (He said, "You try getting the day off on Superbowl Sunday.")

I was worried that the outfit would be way too big for Andy, but the legs hiked up nicely and he wasn't quite swimming in them. The collar kept flipping up into his face and he kept trying to eat it.

After the meeting we got some pictures out in the lobby. Here's our less-than-successful attempt at a family picture:



I'm not sure what I'm doing here. Probably saying something to Dad about the camera.



Kate's playing with a little googly eye that she found on the floor.



Kate flips her hair; Andy looks like he smells something bad.



Absolutely no one looking at the camera.



And now we're all blurry! What's up with that?

Kate went off to Primary, but we had to subject Andy to a few more photos. (Okay, I suppose Doug will object to my use of the word "we" here, so I'll admit it was completely my idea. No surprise there.)









Andy says, "Enough with the pictures, already!"

Andy slept in his car seat for the rest of the meetings. He didn't even really wake up when I buckled him back up for the ride home. After we got home I asked Doug, "So, do you think I should get Andy out now, or eat first?" and Doug said, "Eat first." So Andy was in the seat for a while longer. Then when I went to get him out I discovered that he'd had a blowout all over his beautiful white outfit. Ack. I called Barb to get washing instructions, and everything came out just fine. Hooray!

After naps, we went out to Cousin Lonnie's house in Puyallup for a yummy dinner of smoked trout. My mom had requested a vertical family picture, so we tried to get one out there. The lighting was not great.




(I can clone out that pole.)

And some of Grandpa with the kids:



Andy's face in this one just cracks me up.




Is that enough pictures? Whew!

We had a nice visit, though very short. I got up early the next morning to give my dad a hug on his way out. (I was going to anyway, but Andy woke me up just at the right time.) Thanks for coming to see us!