Fast Facts (this year's Christmas mailing)

No time for Christmas letter - only fast facts:

1) We moved to South Korea. Driving in Korea is downright scary. This is because the Koreans have only been driving automobiles for about 5 months. The other day we saw a father and his 3 small children riding a motor scooter into oncoming traffic. This would not have been so unusual had he not been programming his cell phone and hauling a refrigerator at the same time. The only passengers wearing helmets were the grandma and grandpa. Koreans are very proud of their large organ-donor pool. Apart from the traffic, Korea is wonderful.
2) We loaned our dog abby to Grandma T because they eat dogs in South Korea. Just kidding – that’s just what we told the kids. Really, they don’t eat dogs here anymore because they are too busy stuffing their faces with Kim chi. Kim chi is a delicious fermented cabbage dish, which is served at every meal. Kelly has taken a religious vow of Kim chi abstinence.
3) Troy gradiated from neurology residency . . . “congraduations T”.
4) Kelly is the glue that keeps the various parts of our family together. She was rather sticky this year.
5) N is progressing rapidly on the violin. He is preparing to honor his parents with a Christmas recital soon. One of his fellow fiddlers is blind. There is nothing wrong with blind people (except that they cannot see the notes while fiddlin’).
6) E has taken heartily to a Korean craze called “Dahchees” (pronounced dah-cheese). A dah-chee is a flat paper disc with Korean writing on it. The object of dah-chees is to chant “tai, bai, bow” (Korean rock, paper, scissors) and then throw your dah-chee at your friends dah-chee to overturn it. If you are successful, then you get to keep them both. Dah-chees is really flat marbles for lazy kids who don’t want to chase round marbles.
7) A has a very scruffy voice. It’s fun to tickle him and hear him squeal scruffily. He is brings a lot of joy to our house. Also, his favorite recipe is: 737-5546 which is the number for pizza delivery. Also also, he is a great dancer and likes to boogie.
8) A is the sovereign authority at our house. She is planning a coup to take over the local government as dictator. She pretty much gets whatever she wants because she is so darn cute. Her cheeks are like sugar plums, round and plump (often coated with sweet stuff). She has a line of clothing coming out next fall.
9) This letter is due at the post office by December 10th so this is the end of the facts (and the reason they had to be fast). We pumped this baby out just 1 hour.
10) Kelly’s making me say that we love you all and yada, yada, yada . . . Merry Christmas, Season’s Greeting, Happy Chanaka, Happy Kwanza.


Love,
Us

Santa's first gift

D, after playing one of the shepherds (mustache and all) in the Christmas play, is happy to have a gift from Santa. (The shepherd costume also doubles as a Master Yoda get-up for Halloween - resourceful in costuming are we.)

Hellow

Here are the first of many photos of our favorite Korean mishaps in translation. We get a real kick out of the things they come up with. They say Korea is the land of the 'not quite right' and these are a couple of fine examples! Coffee with your counselling anyone?

Attention! Attention!

A has been quite the main attraction in Korea. It's the blonde curls we think. Wherever we go they want to touch her, take her picture, talk to her, etc. She pretty much gives them the cold shoulder (sometimes it's literal as she turns away and buries her face). She has even on one occasion played possum, pretending to be asleep in her stroller, peeking through half closed eyes to see if the coast is clear yet. We have tried working on her manners, but well... she is 2, and for those of you with 2-year-old experience, you can guess how that is going. Here is a picture of what things were like when we took her to a fish market. The nick name that day for her was "little doll" (Can't remember the Korean word for it right now).

Dec 17th

Little Boy made a large cutout of Santa at school using construction paper and cotton balls. It's about as big as his little sister and we stuck it onto our fridge. All day yesterday A was playing interactively with this Santa. She read to it, told it stories, asked for presents, etc. It pretty much ignored her all day. A is very excited for christmas. She walked in on Kelly the other day while Kelly was wrapping presents. Audrey exclaimed "Ohhhh is this for me? Is it pink?" Pink is her favorite color - truely we have done nothing to encourage this.

Due date

We had to get our Christmas cards in the mail by Dec10th. Because of this we had no time to write a decent letter. Instead, we pounded out "fast facts". Sorry if it's offensive in any way . . . yada, yada, yada. This photo was the runner up for the Christmas pic.

Kudos to Grandma

We are especially grateful to T 's mother for dog sitting our new dog Abby since we moved to Korea. Abby is one lucky dog. She now has a new friend, Shilo (Grandpa's labrador) to tease. We are pretty sure Grandma is treating her like a queen. We miss our dog and look forward to taking care of her ourselves when we move back to the states. Thanks Grandma!!!