A Clone Trooper and a Purple Crayon

We went trick or treating on base in the US Embassy housing. All the US Embassy families here in Korea live on base...there are hundreds of them. They welcomed all the kids from off-post housing to come trick or treating. It was a nice night with thousands...more kids than I have ever seen roaming the streets on Halloween. It was fun! Dorothy and Indiana Jones are Madi's friends. They are on her soccer team and their dad is the coach and I think it's cool that he works for Nike.

Today Madi is home sick. She woke up with a really stuffy nose. She is so fun and crazy. She read something on the Cheetos bag about how many puffs long is your arm...hers is 8.

Halloween Party at City Park

Today after school we rushed over to City Park(the tall towers we see out our living room windows at the end of the base) for a spooky fun Halloween party. It was hosted by Charlotte's family. Charlotte is the little girl from Madi's class who walks with each day to the nurse's office for her blood sugar checks and insulin shots. I love Charlotte for being such a nice friend to Madi.
Now I really love Halloween but I think I have met my match...Charlotte's mother. She threw a great Halloween bash and their Korean apartment was all decked out. Would you look at this killer kitchen...everytime I go to another Korean home I am amazed at how beautiful they are. I must say I think the apartment Charlotte lives in is the most beautiful home I have ever been in...why would anyone want to live on base in Korea? I think Korea is the best kept secret the military has. You want to know the craziest thing. We only live 45 miles from North Korea....that is so strange to me how wonderful South Korea is but we are less than an hour from such a dreary place.



The kids had fun bobbing for apples.










The food was great. Nathalia is from France and she made the yummiest madelines (french cookies).






These girls were all giggles in the elevator. We headed downstairs to the parking garage for more fun.










A pinata! Look at Madi hit that ghost.




Ben went as himself. A Bulldog football player. As soon as the party was over we raced back on base for Ben's game...Friday night lights at Yongsan.

Happy Halloween!

Pumpkin Fluff

It is a beautiful fall day here in Korea. All our leaves are changing. This morning started off so good. I went to the gym with my neighbor Liz. I got to talk to my mom for an hour. Tried to call my sister.

We are skipping all activities tonight to stay home and enjoy some family time and we are having Beef Stew for dinner. My kids have sports every night...but not tonight :-) Tonight is Bunco with the Weather Wives!!! Our commissary got canned pumpkin in stock...THANK YOU! So I just finished making pumpkin fluff to take. All it is is canned pumpkin, cool whip and pudding mix....click here to see the exact recipe. I thought it would be fun to serve it out of a white pumpkin along with some ginger snaps. I LOVE Autumn!!!!!!

Samsung Hospital

Today went soooo well! Today was Madi's first time seeing an Endocrinologist here in Korea. Dr. Tan is good and was very sweet towards Madi. Samsung is a beautiful facility...I had been so nervous about how Madi's care was going to be in Korea. Heck, Samsung just might be nicer than the place we had in Atlanta.

So the best news is Madi's latest A1C is 7.6!!! YEAH!!!! Steve and I and the nurses at Seoul American Elementary School work very hard to keep Madi's blood sugars in range. All day long Madi is in my head. She gets up and we check her blood sugar then depending on how many carbs she eats for breakfast she gets an insulin shot around 0700. So by 0800 or 0830 I am always wondering is she may be low or high. Is she going out side to play and then is that going to make her go low. Every morning at 0930 I think it's snack time at school. I gave her a 7 carb snack...will that hold her over until lunch? I am always listening for my phone incase one of the nurses are trying to reach me. They do call each day after Madi eats lunch so we can agree on an insulin dose. The Novolog she takes works roughly for 2 hours, so by 1:45 until 2:15 when she gets her blood sugar checked again at the nurses office and they call me, I constantly play a guessing game in my head what I think and hope her blood sugar is. When we were planning our move here someone asked me if I was scared to fly on an airplane with Madi. I had not thought about that...so of course then I was until Steve told me how rediculous that was. That plane ride here was over 14 hours with no place to land if Madi did have a problem...but we never have daily problems and we always plan...we always have food and glucose on us. So after writing all this I am so happy and proud to have gotten to this point with such great results! It feels good to have the Dr. tell us we don't need anything from her...Madi's Diabetes is very well controled. Thank you to all those who helped us get here too!

Caramels 2010

Making caramels every harvest is one of my favorite traditions. click here for my Grandma Kiehl's famous caramel recipe I posted a few years ago.











My printer is still not hooked up since our move so I had to come up with a tag idea without using my printer...it was hard. But then I remembered my friend amber made tags using fabric on them a few year ago...great idea. I handed out these treats to all the Weather Wives in Steve's Squadron the other night. I have more for some of our other favorite people around the base.




2010 Halloween cards. These were very enjoyable to make.








I also just made Ben and Madi new trick or treating bags. I got my ideas from moda bake shop and cluckclucksew. Look at these super cute bags being made.














I know a lot of people are working on their Christmas cards so I am following their lead. I know of a girl out their who once had all hers made by Halloween. I don't know if I will be done by Halloween but if not hopefully soon after...see I have 30 done...stacked on my shelf.




Steve...today for PT early this morning had a really long run with his Squadron...all the way to the Hyatt...see that building way out there on the top of the hill. YIKES!

Yesterday I stopped in the base library. They have tons and tons of DVD's to check out. I brought home season 1 of "CHIPS". My kids love it...I did as a kid and still do. It's so funny hearing the theme song and remembering the episodes.

Louis Vuitton

Yesterday was so fun...louis vuitton shopping in namdaemun market. It is only four subway stops from my house. My friends Betty (she took this pic) and Liz went on my Louis Vuitton hunt with me.

See my new purse. It was 35,000 Won = $30. Usually I am a $15.99 from TJMAXX kinda person but holy smokes this is the deal of all time. Look here... it's a $715 dollar purse. Liz got this $1,480 purse for $60...now that is the deal. Betty didn't get one so now we have to go back...oh darn :-)

Last week Steve and I found the yummiest Arab Kebab stand there in Namdaemun, so us girls ate there yesterday too. Thank you Betty and Liz for such a fun day out exploring Seoul!

Krispy Kreme in Myeongdong

Myeongdong is Seoul's Times Square and it's only maybe 10 minutes from our house. Seoul is like Manhattan. Not Staten Island or Long Island but Manhattan Island if you are familar with NYC. This place is non-stop fun for us. On Friday night after dinner, we thought we would treat the kids by taking them to Krispy Kreme. Regan is Madi's friend and she lives on the 25th floor of our building...she came too. Here in Seoul there is a Dunkin Donuts and Starbucks Coffee on every street cornor. In this first picture check out the grandest 4 story Dunkin Donuts...but we have one of these right next to our house...we passed it up to get to Krispy Kreme.








Krispy Kreme is also a classy 4 story glass building.














They look the same and taste the same. It's kinda hard to miss the United States here.






The kids sat at the window watching the masses down below. Steve came up with a fun Friday night out!

Home Sweet Korean Home

Yesterday I was talking to my friend Donna...she was my neighbor when we lived on base at Wiesbaden, Germany. Since Germany Donna has gone to Alaska and is now in Japan. When thinking about moving to Korea I thought it would be fun. We really liked Germany but LOVED Japan. Yesterday Donna told me I was brave to move to Korea and off-post too. It got me thinking. Before we got here I was scared to death. Things were perfect in Georgia. And I also have a child with Type 1 Diabetes for crying out loud...I was very scared but Steve and I love adventure so we did everything we could to make things work. We spent hours looking online on living conditions here. The Drs. at Emory University and Children's Healthcare of Atlanta helped out too by finding out about the care we could get for Madi here. So we are here and love everyday living in Korea.




Okay, so besides the location of our house/apartment and the big windows in every room, the kitchen is my favorite I have ever had!
We didn't bring much of our own furniture...just bits and pieces. So for our dinning room table in this house it's a table we used as a sofa table before with a few mixed matched chairs. I brought small stuff thinking they could be used in the kitchen, dinning room, living room....













I have my own built-in TV there in the corner...love it.





My craft room is at the end of that hall on the left and the master bedroom is on the right.

At the end of this hall is a bathroom. On the left are two rooms...one for Madi and one for Ben.

This morning before school Madi was sitting reading me a book aloud...life is good in Korea.

Baseball in Korea

Looks like a Braves game doesn't it? But it was SO MUCH LOUDER!!! It was here in Seoul. LG Twins vs. Samsung Lions. It was just as rowdy if not more than say a Georgia vs. Florida or Ohio State vs. Michigan college football game. It was the playoffs so it was pretty packed full in the stadium.

It was such a beautiful night. We went with the Baldingner family and another Air Force Weather guy came too...one of Steve's friends from a previous base.

The fans were amazing...a show in themselves. They would sing and sing and sing...something to the tune of ABBA'S Dancing Queen and Puff The Magic Dragon. Lots and lots of chanting too by everyone in the stands...the entire 12 inning game.

They even had the cheerleaders and drums.

No thank you...nothing for me from the snack stand...dried squid and octopus...ewwwwww!

I didn't get any good family pictures at the game. We had really close seats behind 3rd base. See my Steve, Betty's Steve, Munier, Ben and Delany...Madi must be next to Ben...Betty and I had been up snapping picutres of the night out.

O Pumpkin Tree

My friend amber sent me the cutest pattern to make this Halloween quilt...I think she knows I {heart} Halloween very much. Since I had just gotten the pattern last month, I didn't know if I would have enough time to make it for this year, but it looked so cute and I had never done a quilt like this before, I made up my mind to do it. Look how beautiful it is. Now I need to figure out how to display it...any ideas?

Yesterday I noticed out the window these men on top of the Mercedes-Benz building across the street. I got weak just watching them.

Madi won 1st Place...

...in the hula hoop contest at the Fall Festival on Post today!!! Go Madi Go Madi Go Madi...

She won a totally cool picture printer worth at least $100.

I took a picture of the Seoul Tower while we were driving on Post today.

Another picture I took out the front window of the car...Korea is so pretty...look at those mountains.

We all enjoyed the festival, they had TONS of fun stuff.

What's up with our kids stanz?

The day ended with a BANG!!!! For real. First there were fireworks to the left of our place, then there is a huge loud concert going on across the way and then these fireworks on Post...we could clearly see them from our house! Ben was making a movie of them with his ipod.

This was a bigger show than the 4th of July....we can't wait to see what New Year's will be like here in the heart of Seoul.