A GLORIOUS day!!!

After 3 months of having NO dryer and weekly visits to the base dorm rooms for my "laundry day" which consists of hauling three overflowing heavy baskets and a poky three year old up and down 3 flights of steps (no elevators mind you) the day has come...WE HAVE AN AMERICAN DRYER IN OUR APT!!! I have to say this has been one of the happiest days of my life...a little drama has never hurt anyone! :) But seriously I feel like the 1950s version of the elated, spoiled housewife!!! So we live on the 11th floor of a 12 floor complex and the doors are too small for the dryer to fit through so they have to get this crane to lift the dryer up to our apt laundry room WINDOW!

Yep, that is the dryer coming through the window!!! I'm telling you I don't make this stuff up! You wouldn't have believed me if I didn't show you huh???

Isn't it beautiful? It's the simple things we take for granted. This assignment has definitely humbled me.

Softball Champ!

Marc plays intramural sports at every base we are stationed at if they are offered. Right now is softball season and he has a game one to two nights a week. This past week he made one slide and one dive and this is only his right side of his body injuries. I'm telling you, the boy isn't 14 anymore and he has been so sore....poor thing! The price of being a stud muffin...

21 June-Benjamin Caleb Bremer is HERE!

Our good friends from pilot training days had their 3rd baby this past week! Baby Benjamin is here and healthy....what a sweet sweet blessing!While Laurie and John were in Seoul having Benjamin, Marc and I had Faith and Joshua for a couple of days! I have a WHOLE new respect for mommies and daddies of 3 or more! LOVE these kids but 3 is hard work. :) However, the kids all played awesome together and that was fabulous for me...Ana was busy the whole time just playing!

Rub a dub dub dub...how cute are these kids in the tub???

After bath...is books!

The kids made this poster for their brother (and new friend!) :)

Congrats Bremer's! We love you guys!

Happy Father's Day Marc!

This is "Agema" and she invited us to her church this past Sunday. She comes to our house every Thursday and cleans and watches Ana for me if I need to do anything. She is the SWEETEST lady. Her English is MUCH better than my Korean, but we end up doing at lot of "pointy talky" to communicate. Her church was having a celebration that she wanted us to be apart of. Marc thought that it would be a great cultural experience. The nicest people ever! The service was in Korean...but the music was wonderful. It was familiar hymns...all in Korean of course...but one can still appreciate music in any language! Since everything was in Korean we didn't understand the message...but what I thought was interesting is at the end of every prayer they DO say "amen". IN ENGLISH...they would say amen and Ana would chime in with her amen...sweet little girl!

After naps we went to an area not too far from our house for a hike/picnic!

Ana picked up just about anything that wasn't attached and then some stuff that was! Notice the rice patties in the background?

This was the "off the beaten track" trail. SO pretty!

Popped a squat and had a yummy picnic.

Ana got Marc "Laser Sidewalk Chalk" for his gift!

Happy Father's Day to our dads and all our friends who are daddy's!!!

Friends!

There are two families here that we do most things with, the Hummels and the Bremers. All our kids play so well together! Once a week we will watch each others kids so mom's can run errands for a couple of hours. It's a great system! :)

I had popped them some popcorn and we had a "Snow White" party! SO sweet. Ana's Granddad had given her this ABC Train puzzle and it's a huge hit every time!!


This is the new splash park that just opened at Camp Humphrys....which is an Army post about 30 mins. away. WAY worth the drive! VERY much like something we would see stateside. VERY FUN....this will be a good place for us this summer!

Hummel's and Banana on the "Dragon Slide".

Katie and Ana warming up after playing!

Not Quite Right #2

Ana's first choice at any restaurant will be Macaroni and Cheese. WELL...we CAN NOT find it anywhere other than the Officer's Club brunch. SOOOO noodles with alfredo sauce is as close as it gets and she is happy. BUT..."it's not quite right"!!! This is where I like to get a pedicure. GREAT people and GREAT foot massage AND if you ever need a "Horn Removal" they can do that too!!! Again..."not quite right"!!

Instead of 911 you dial 119 and the firefighters will be right there. Actually, I don't know who is "not quite right" here...us or them!

6 June- Off to China!

I had started the day BADLY! I had pink eye earlier in the week and was getting sick. We took a bus to Seoul to the airport and about 30 min. into the ride I HAD to poo. Not the kind ya can hold either. So I tell Marc he had to help me with a baggie. He was NOT thrilled to say the least! SO glad the windows were down so it was noisy and we had the back of the bus. I have to say I have a new talent! Not one spill or miss! So after I'm finished there I look at him and tell him to find another baggie...so I could PUKE! So it is coming out both ends and we aren't even off the bus yet. We get to the airport and meet up with our tour group of 12 (including us) and I take some Imodium and get on a plane to CHINA!

Welcome to CHINA! Our flight was delayed and we get in late, but the good news is my poo is under control!

Thank goodness, because we sat in INSANE traffic for HOURS! We were late getting in so we missed a couple of things we were to do on our tour because of that...then the traffic was so bad we missed our "Acrobatic Show" we were suppose to do. We only had time for the "Peking Duck Dinner" I was so excited about earlier...before I was sick. Everyone enjoyed it but it was just not what my tummy could handle that day!
SERIOUSLY INSANE TRAFFIC!

Things aren't "quite right" in China either!

After a good night sleep, I was able to rally and enjoy our trip! Thank goodness it was only a 24 hour bug!

7 June- Jade Carving Factory

First on the agenda for today was a 1.5 hr bus ride out of Beijing to the Jade carving factory. Amazing stuff! This is ONE piece of Jade. It was a fountain. SO pretty.

This is the store...fountains, jewelry, statues, you name it...they had it!

Jade comes in lots of colors too!

I just thought this fountain was neat! It's fish!

Ther Great Wall of China!!!

The history of this wall is AMAZING!!! I was trying to find a year that this wall was built and there is no exact date. According to many web sites it dates back to the "Spring and Autumn Period", which is 8th century BC. (722BC and 481BC) Roughly corresponds to the 1st half of the Eastern Zhon Dynasty! However, the wall as we see today was built during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). STILL... OLD OLD OLD and NO words or pictures can really give you the true mouth dropping, awe inspiring feeling when you are there! This is at the bottom of the "Juyong Pass". Grannie did great to get to that part and she was done! It is quite the cardio workout!

Donald and I made it up to that first tower. I'm telling you...it was tough!!! It didn't help that it was crazy hot and that I had pooped the ENTIRE day previous and was dehydrated before we even began the hike! :) This picture does not do it justice as to how steep it is, plus the steps are not uniformed in height. You will have a 3 inch step followed by an 18 inch step, so you can't get in a rhythm. Like I said it makes for a heck of a cardio workout.

This is us with the wall behind us after a bit of hiking. I WISH IT HAD BEEN A CLEARER DAY FOR YOU TO REALLY SEE THE WALL...it was amazing. We didn't have one blue sky day the entire trip. With the humidity and polution combined it was hazy the whole time. (Or we can just blame it on Donald since every trip we take with him it looks like this or worse...Grand Canyon, Mt. Mckinley, Sedona, you name it). You can see Ana thinking what we were all thinking..."what the heck are we doing on this steep, hot, wall...who's dream is this and why?" I took it VERY slow and told Marc, Ana, and Donald not to wait for me and they took off. About an hour later I find Donald at the top of the 1st tower and he wasn't in good shape. I wish I would have taken a picture, but I seriously thought he was about to die so I didn't want to take the picture and people wonder why I wasn't helping him vs watching him die! I think he had heat exhaustion. His eyes were rolled back in his head and he didn't even know I was there. I moved him to an area with a breeze and gave him more water and he finally came back around. We ended up making it to the "Hero Station" and got hero cards for our accomplishment! Looking back now...it was totally worth it, but MAN what an experience!

Marc on the other hand was GONE! He was far beyond us and had a 25 lb kid on his back! He was with one of the other guys on our tour and they made it past five towers (beyond the tower in the upper right corner from two pictures back) but ran out of time before getting to the top. He said he kept telling Ana it was a father/daughter mission! :) She kept saying she wanted down and was making up every excuse to get down. I guess when she said she had to pee he told her to go for it because he was already soaked with sweat and stinky...what was pee gonna do! But she really didn't...just another excuse to get down!

This is him coming back down and barley able to stand up...Ana is asleep on his back! I'm telling you...this was an amazing ordeal! Gotta hate it and love it all at the same time! After the wall we stopped for a huge lunch and Marc was a bottomless pit. He had worked up quite the appetite!

Summer Palace

The Summer Palace is the archetypal Chinese garden and is ranked amongst the most noted and classical gardens in the world. It was constructed in the Jin Dynasty (1115-1235) to the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) and had become a luxurious garden providing royal families with rest and entertainment. This Palace has over 3000 structures including pavilions, towers, bridges, and corridors. QUITE THE SITE!!!

This is the entrance with the man made lake...Kunming Lake in the background.The famous "Marble Boat". I hadn't heard of it before, but it was awesome to see.

We took a little boat ride in our dragon boat back to the entrance.

Us on the boat with the "Hill of Longevity" behind us.

On top of that Hill is the "Tower of Buddhist Incense".

This is our tour guide for our entire Beijing trip...her name is Shelley. Very sweet lady. Her sister lives in the US now and has become a US citizen. One of her dreams is to see the Grand Canyon. She was explaining how hard it is to get paperwork to leave China so she doesn't know if she ever will. After the Palace we went to the Pearl Market to do some shopping but it was closing as we got there so we didn't get to do much. Between the late arrival to Beijing and the traffic, we just ran out of time. But to make up for the "drama" of delays and airline time changes the agency gave us all a free massage. VERY NICE!

8 June- Forbidden City

The Forbidden City was built in 1406 and is a COMPLEX of 800 buildings! It was the Chinese Imperial Palace and home to 24 emperors from the Ming and Qing Dynasty. This complex is built with "fungshui" principals. VERY FASCINATING! The Forbidden City ceased to be the political center of China in 1912 and is the world's largest surviving palace that covers 178 acres.This is the entrance to the Forbidden City through the Meridian Gate.Crazy details and colors...amazing how they did it with NO modern tools!!
One of the temples within the city.

HUGE BUILDINGS...this one is the "Hall of Supreme Harmony".

Like the Koreans...the Chinese believe in the "guardians" to protect them from evil spirits on their buildings.

The throne in the Hall of Preserving Harmony.

The complex was amazing with SOOOO much history and beauty! The magnatued of this complex is hard to explain with pictures. So many different symbols and meanings from the buildings to the surrounding walls and grounds. Fascinating culture.

Silk Factory

One of our stops on our tour was a silk factory! We got the entire lecture of a silk worm and how silk is made. They took us through the factory to see the procedure.

This machine takes the cocoon from the silk worm and gets the silk manageable to work with to make products.

These are the cocoons of the silk worm and when you unravel the cocoon, guess what is inside?

THE BUGS!!! Those are "the bugs" they eat! They are silk worms!!! They said they taste like peanuts and are good for your skin! I'm still not trying them. :)

This is the raw silk ...so soft!


This is them stretching the silk into blankets.

This is the blanket/comforter we bought!

They had a "fishing show"...it was funny...the accent sounded like "fishing" vs. "fashion"! Beautiful silks!!!