Chats with Zach and the Christmas tree

What do you do with an old candy cane? Zachary has a great idea!

Uncle John

On November 7, 2009 my uncle, John Woodward, went to be with his Lord and Savior.
John was a man whom everyone wanted to be around. I don't think I have ever met someone who was so full of joy and life as much as he was. John loved life and was going to enjoy every minute God gave him. He loved everyone around him and wanted all to know the source of his happiness, Jesus Christ. He was a loving husband, father, grandfather, brother, uncle, and friend.

Our family loved Uncle John. If there was anyone we had to get stuck on a desert island with, it would be John. Why? Because we know we would never be bored. Some of my fondest memories of John are playing board games, wii, or volleyball and bocce at the beach. John was always up for a game of any kind and would play his heart out to beat you no matter how old you were. Even when we were kids, John made us earn our wins.

John's laugh was infectious. So many of my memories of Uncle John involve laughter and singing. I will pass on John's legacy by teaching "We're going to the lake" and "We're going to the beach" songs to my kids. Songs that John made up but for the longest time I thought they were real songs! I will miss John's laughter and hope that I can still hear it in my mind many years from now.

As I have grown older, I have appreciated John's love not just for me but for my family as well. He and Patricia would travel down to Raleigh to make sure they said goodbye to us before we left for Korea or come see us when we got back and would even write about us on his blog. He was genuinely interested in our lives. We don't get a lot of calls in Korea but he would always make sure he called to see how we were doing. John was like another grandfather to my kids. Zachary loves Uncle John. He shared John's passion with the wii and I think gained a lot of his skills. Even Zachary knew from a young age that Uncle John was the fun one.

Life will be very different with John gone. I know he is in heaven rejoicing and singing praises to his King at the top of his lungs. He is not looking back. He is in a much better place. Life is always harder for those left behind. John can never be replaced but we will keep his memory alive. Zachary reminds me so much of John with his thirst for knowledge, wii fanaticism, silliness, and competitiveness. John's legacy will live on through his family.
We love you Uncle John!

You're future is so bright...

...you gotta wear shades!

Halloween 2009

Halloween morning began with spooky spider pancakes!

Yum!

Luigi and our toddler turtle

Trick-or-treating at school with buddy Seth

Chim chiminey, Chim chiminey....

Chim chim chiree..a sweep is a lucky, as lucky can be!

Zachary and the Super Marion Brothers turn 4!

October is a busy month! My little man is not little any longer and has embarked into the preschool years of life. Zachary chose a Mario and Luigi birthday part to coincide with his Wii fetish. Here is my little Luigi all dressed up for his big day.

The spread- popcorn and cake. A Mario cake and mushroom cupcakes.

Mario and Luigi hats sitting on a brick cube made from the ELC blocks. The first clue to our scavenger hunt for Princess Peach is on the brick.

This is probably my favorite cake I have ever made.

We played a variety of games. We went on a scavenger hunt for Princess Peach. Bowser had capture her and hidden her away for us to find. The kids had a great time time following the clues. We had Yoshi's egg hunt. The eggs were filled with gold coins. I made coin boxes for the kids to keep their goodies in.

I also made a pinata to look like a chomp chomp. Zachary was too afraid and didn't even hit it even though he had been looking forward to it all week.

Zachary and his friendsOpening presents with little sister by his side playing with all the leftover eggs in the basket.

Happy Birthday Zachary! We love you!

Shelby Grace turns 1!!

I can't believe her big day has come and gone. Our little girl is growing up so fast. Our little 'ladybug' had a buzzing good time at her party.

Her two outfits for the day- her ladybug attire and her traditional Korean hanbok.

It is Korean tradition for a one year old to pick an object from a group placed before her that will tell of her future. The objects include:
string- longevity
book- knowledge
apple (or another food item)- never go without food
paintbrush- artist
money- wealth
pencil- intelligence

microphone (for the modern day)- fame

Shelby Grace chose the apple....

then the paintbrush. No starving artist here!

The ladybug themed spread

Traditional Korean duk cake with her name spelled in Korean.

Her traditional American cake with her name spelled in English :).

Happy Birthday to me!

Delicious ladybugs

For more pictures go to
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=126845&id=729352306&l=00cec96f2f

A weekend away

For the first time in over two years, Patrick and I left the kids with someone overnight and spent the weekend together. We are so thankful for John and Nikole Mitchell for taking care of our kids for two days. They were so loved on and John and Nikole learned enough to decide to wait awhile before they ventured down the 'lets have a kid' road. :)

Patrick and I went to Seoul to see two of our friends, Anna and Liz, run in a marathon. We went up early and spent the day exploring a little bit of Seoul, ok really the subway. :) Patrick booked us a room at the Grand Hyatt in Itaewon, one of the 'foreigner friendly' parts of town. It is way up on a hill and you can see a beautiful view of Seoul from the room. Of course, we spent most of the weekend thinking or talking about the kids. We went to Toys R Us and picked out birthday presents for the kids. We love that in Korea, all stores provide free shipping. We got our cart full of toys shipped back to Daejeon for FREE! Awesome!

After Toys R Us, we decided to visit a Korean Folk Museum that was in the Lotte Mall where Toys R Us was located since we can't enjoy those kid of places with the kids.

Below is a picture of Korea's interpretation of evolution. We found it quite enjoyable to see evolution from an Asian point of view. Did you know we came from Asian monkeys? Quite an interesting thought. If evolution is true, did different races evolve from different species of monkeys? Another reason to believe in God's amazing handiwork when he created the human race.

At the museum we got to try making traditional paper art. We made little bowls.

After our adventures, we met up with Liz and Anna in Itaewon. This was their 'night before we run serious picture.' Don't they look ready to run?

The next morning we had a delicious buffet breakfast at the hotel's restaurant, The Terrace, that overlooks the city. Beautiful view to enjoy while you eat breakfast.

Then we were off to see Liz and Anna run their half and full marathons, respectively.

Anna begins her full marathon. She was pretty easy to pick out in the mob of Korean runners.

Liz ran her half marathon. I loved watching her run with her tongue out. :)

After they took off, we had a little fun with Kirstin and Julie who also came to watch. They are cheering Patrick on as he is finishing his marathon in record time! Only 18 minutes!!

Apparently we played around a little too long as we tried to meet up with the runners at the halfway point, thinking if we road the subway we would meet them, but we didn't have much luck. We tried and tried and decipher the map that one of the workers at the marathon gave us and couldn't figure out why we couldn't see it in runners. Of course, it could of been that he gave us a map for a marathon in November!!! Oh well, we made it back in time for Anna's finish but missed Liz. Our camera died so we didn't get any pictures at the finish. Liz and Anna did awesome and walked away with a certificate, a competitor's medal and a frozen chicken!
Oh Korea!