October

I know I've been awful at keeping up with my blog. Sometimes the longer you leave something, the harder it is to get back into it. I guess I feel like I've probably lost all my readers so what's the point now!

Anyway, October is finished and November is almost half over. We're had a whirlwind of a time as our teacher just quit so we were scrambling, trying to keep her classes going and find a replacement. There's still a ton of work to do and I should really be at work today (Sunday, our dayoff) but I can't quite bring myself to go in. I'll probably go in tonight after Ethan is sleeping and try to get some work done.

Anyway, Ethan continues to do well! He's more fun everyday! His latest hobby is tickling my stomach and sticking his finger in my belly button! I start laughing and then he starts giggling! He's also started helping me hang up the laundry on our drying rack - he picks out socks from the pile of wet clothes and hands them to me! It's a nice change from his previous favorite activity of taking everything off the drying rack!

Yesterday we finished teaching at 10 PM we wanted to go out for a family dinner so we were at the restaurant after 10 and Ethan was running around like a crazy boy. He had a mandarin orange in each hand and he ended up tripping and falling and hitting his head on the side of one of the low tables. He was just howling and I had to leave the restaurant and run home with him screaming in my arms. Ugh. Sometimes you want to have some nice family time together and it's just not possible with the number of hours in the day. Anyway, I think a lot of the crying was from being overtired and he woke-up this morning happy and in good spirits so I guess there was no long-term damage!

My goal today was to try to put up some decorations to get a little into the Christmas spirit! So far I haven't accomplished much except for cleaning the house and doing laundry. Anyway, I think I'll pull out all the Christmas CDs and perhaps look for some Christmas decorations in the store!

Ethan's First Halloween Costume!

Last year Ethan was only a month old and I wasn't able to find him a costume so this year I wanted to make sure he had something! So I went to the department store and sprung for this cute monkey outfit! Although he doesn't look too impressed with it in this picture, he wore it happily for 2.5 hours today at the Halloween party we attended!

Mom

It's so nice having my mom visiting! I feel so guilty that somedays we barely get to spend any time together though. Today was a very hectic day. This morning Ethan had a doctor's appointment so we went there at 10 AM. We'd arranged for mom to meet us at our house for 11 AM because we had a teacher coming for an interview. However, in the middle of the doctor's appointment the teacher phoned to say that she'd come early. So we went straight from the doctor's to the school to have the interview. That ended up going much longer than expected so at noon we finally got home, dropped Ethan off with mom (who'd been waiting in our house for us for an hour) and went back to school. Then when I got home around 9 PM Ethan was sleepy so I fed him his bottle and he went to sleep. Anyway, I felt like I finally had some time with her. We sat around chatting, doing some things on the internet and drinking tea and eating snacks. It was nice to just relax together, finally. Today she cooked, did our laundry for us and took care of Ethan - I just felt really thankful to have her here suddenly. Her trip is going by much too fast.

Friday Excursion with Mom

On Friday we had the day off from teaching because it was the day before Korean Thanksgiving. I was supposed to be at my mother-in-law's house, helping her prepare food but I was released from my duties by my husband who stayed and helped. Me and mom went downtown to check out this recently opened square. It was such a nice afternoon. We walked around in a park and talked, checked out the square, went to the bookstore and then went back to the in-laws place for supper. Mom brought a bottle of wine for dinner that everyone really enjoyed. A perfect day, except that Ethan was up from 1:30-4:30 a.m. that morning so we were sort of wrecked for Thanksgiving today!

The First Birthday!

Trampoline

I wish I had a video of Ethan's latest walking exploits! He's doing really well - he's walking so much at his grandparent's house because it's so big. At our house, however, there's always something nearby to hold onto so he's always crawling. Whenever I go over there to visit him during the day, I'm shocked by how much he can go! Jong-Man's mom keeps telling me how much he's walking but you can't really believe it until you see it! Anyway, this week is almost done, the weather is finally cooling off in Korea, Ethan's first birthday is only 3 1/2 weeks away and mom's going to be arriving in Korea soon! Lots of things to look forward to!