Birthday Week

my little CadeMan...just up from his nap

I feel like I should update you on the status of my disenchanting birthday. To start, we actually had cake and celebrated my birthday with our newbie group on Wednesday night before my actual birthday, so that was my first celebration. I already told you how my real birthday went, so we won't cover that again. 

Charissa stealing our kids

Our Friday went really well (mostly because I did not have unrealistic expectations!), and then on Friday evening we had Fun Fest at school. Each classroom (or homeroom in the middle school) set up a booth with games and activities for the kids. Then you bought tickets and paid a ticket for each game. The kids loved hanging out with their little friends, their big friends (our students), and their adult friends (the single girls had much more fun playing the games with our kids than playing them on their own!). They set up food booths, too. So Eric and the kids got to have grilled hot dogs and hamburgers, and I got to have Indian food. At the end of the evening, one of the high school girls took the kids to get s'mores and hot chocolate, so Cade was literally running from one end of the soccer field to the other burning off all of the sugar! Then the kids got to pick out books (in English!) at the school book fair. They had a great evening!

the kids fishing at Fun Fest

Saturday, Eric had cross country, so by the time we were ready to leave after the kids' naps to go out and find my birthday gift, the kids' moods were not up for an adventure. Eric decided just to take them on a walk while I cooked dinner. The upside was they managed to find a hand mixer for me not too far from our house (and he was able to talk the guy down since it had been on the shelf since 1985). The downside is, it is an American mixer with an American plug. But I'm sure that even with the transformer, it will have more power than my hand with a spoon, though!

Esther, Miranda, and Charissa...yes, Miranda always looks like that! :)

On Sunday evening, while Eric and Cade went to the basketball birthday party for one of our neighbors, I decided to take Kennedy out on the trip to Myeongdong that I had been attempting to make for the past couple of days. I was finally able to find my own birthday present, and she enjoyed walking through the streets of crazy town looking at all of the people and things for sale. We had dinner at California Pizza Kitchen (not exactly the same as the States, but pretty good nonetheless), dessert at Paris Baguette, and a successful bus ride to and from Myeongdong. It was a great ending to what I turned into my "birthday week"!