My Kind-a Bachelorette Party!

When my 4 sweet girlfriends from the other side of town told me they wanted to throw me a spa / girl day for my bachelorette, I knew they knew me well!  I'm not one for parading around town with penis headbands and half naked boys dancing and rubbing up against me, while I down shots of vodka to celebrate my upcoming nuptials!  That's just never been me, and I'm pretty sure Aaron's a fan of my toned down bachelorette party style!

So, the plan was for me to come to Gill's apartment at 2pm on Saturday and to dress comfy, but to bring something nice for later!  Easy enough!  :)  When I got there, Gill, Crystal, and Anne were all waiting for me, with a bed mat, pillows, and towels laid out on the floor, and a table full of every spa necessity...

...And 2 yummy plates full of delicious fresh fruit and chocolate ganash 

(which was the first time I'd ever tried it!  YUM)

Gill had even pre-made her own little concoction of a cocktail punch for all of us...

After lounging for a bit and catching up on the latest TV and real life gossip, they told me to get comfy and relax!  It's one thing to have spa services, it's another when you're OWN friends do it for you!  I felt soooo special! 

Crystal was the pedicure-ist extraordinaire...

... Not only did she paint my toenails with little pink hearts, because what better to paint the bride's toenails with than pink hearts, but she did an exfoliate and foot massage too!  Now that's REAL friendship right there.

 Gill studied cosmetology back in South Africa and is a really great make-up artists and hair stylist... What I didn't know though, was that she can do facial's too!  She did a fabulous mud mask on me and a facial massage!  I could get used to that!

Sam got there around 2:30pm...

She was late because she was baking these delicious orange and banana muffins! 

 Anne hung out on the couch, sipping her cocktail, while snapping some pictures of me getting pampered!

We had such a nice afternoon together at Gills... It was the perfect way to spend one of my last Saturday's as a single lady (well, not single, but not married!)

At about 6:00, the girls said it was time to get out of our comfy clothes and get ready for our night out!  Gill actually did ALL of our make-up, which was such a fun treat!

Anne and I were the first two ready for the night! :)  And yes, that is a tiara on my head!  They made me wear it so that people knew that something special was happening!  Most of the Koreans I saw just thought I was trying to be cutesy (talk about embarrassing) and all the foreigners kept wishing me happy birthday! 

We were out the door and in a taxi by 7pm, heading towards Gwangali Beach, where we had a fabulous dinner together, overlooking the famous Gwangan bridge and beach! 

After dinner, we took a walk down the street (which had been blocked off for street performers)... the girls kept jokingly telling me that they had organized the street to be shut down and for all the performers to be out for my bachelorette party!  I'm gullible, but not that gullible!  We stopped and gawked at an incredible Taekwondo show (previous blog), and waited until after the show to get some photos with them!

Check out that tough face!  I don't mess around!

Next stop was Thursday Party Gwangali and then Kyungsung for some after dinner fun!  Pretty nails!

This is a typical Anne and Crystal photo and shows their personalities perfectly!  They are a blast to have around and are always being silly and cracking jokes!  I think this was taken shortly after our table had been approached by some Australian guys and Anne was doing her best to shoo them away by talking with a VERY exaggerated lisp.

We were all dying!

I've known these four (except Sammy dear) for over 2 years now and I adore and love all of them to pieces!  Thank you so much for making me feel so special on Saturday and for pampering me, toasting to me, and just all around being fabulous friends! :)  

Love you 4!

See you when I'm a wife!

Black Belt

I've seen my fair share of elementary student Taekwondo shows living in Korea, but I've never seen a black belt performance, until Saturday! After dinner with 4 of my girlfriends, we walked the street along Gwangali Beach and stumbled upon a FREE Taekwondo show in the street! There were about 15 black belt university students (guys and girls) performing in front of about 200 passerby's. I felt like I couldn't lift my jaw off the floor! They were doing some pretty amazing things, like blind folded back flips while kicking an apple with their foot! I didn't even know that was possible, to burst an apple into pieces, without throwing it! Leave it to these kids! Enjoy the video of some of the highlights!  

Sorry it's sideways! I should know better... but i completely forgot when I was recording it! And the sound is terrible because I had to use a program to combine the videos and it ruined the sound. You get the picture. Enjoy, regardless! :)

Casino Night!

Last night, our friend's Adam and Ashley invited me and A to come with them on a lil' double date to the Casino on the 2nd floor of Lotte Hotel in Seomyeon.  I love this, considering we introduced them to the casino about a month ago and now they're hooked and inviting us to come!  We all decided to dress up and make it a fancy night, which gave me an excuse to wear my new MANGO dress that was 70% off!  Ahhh, yes!  $25 is much better than $100... and it also gave us an excuse to take a taxi there, instead of a bus or the subway.  (instagram photo)

We spent 4 hours together, playing at the roulette table, laughing, betting, cheering, and whining when we would lose our chips. Taking pictures is a SERIOUS NO NO inside the casino, so I had to secretly snap this one, with my iphone, from the dining room of the casino, where we ate FREE dinner. :)

Ash and I

Aaron didn't get the memo that we weren't showing that we were losers yet for this picture!

... but it's true, we all lost. :(  It's never fun to lose money, but that's kind of the chance you take when you walk through those doors!  Luckily, I only played with $45.00, and only lost $30, so it wasn't all that bad considering I played a game for 4 hours, and ordered whatever I wanted to drink for free, and had free dinner!  Gotta love the casino! 

Love it more when we're all winners, but whatever!  

As a side note, Ashley won $900 last time!  So, the little money she lost tonight was a wash!  Lucky girl!

Thanks for another great night together you three!

Fifth Grade Friday!

There's no better weekday morning to wake up than Friday!  Not just because it's the last day of the work week, but because I LOVE Friday's at my job!  I teach (3) 5th grade classes (which happen to be the SMARTEST and most well BEHAVED group of kids I've ever taught in Korea) and that's it... Just three classes!  Since the huge elementary government test was yesterday, I decided to let my classes do something a little less strenuous and intense this morning... Their little minds need a break sometimes!  I debated throwing on a movie, but I feel like such a slacker when I resort to movies, so... I made a writing/drawing/coloring assignment that went with this month's lesson and let them take the full 40 minutes to complete it.  Easy for me, fun for them!  I wasn't planning to snap pictures, but it was such a mellow, rainy day, and I realized I won't be in Korea forever and wanted to remember days like these...  So, there you go.  

Welcome to my 5th grade English class.

Molly and Ji-ji... BEST FRIENDS!  

My lovely co-teacher, Loola, who was enjoying today just as much as I was!

 I have (60) 5th graders, so I chose the top 30 papers and taped them to the archway in our classroom.  Koreans are uber competitive, so I knew this would push them to work harder and harder in my class! Heck, if their papers can be chosen to be posted on the wall, they'll study English during all their free time!

I've got quite a few lil artists at my school.

Teaching English can have it's bad, boring, and frustrating days, but days like this make it all worth it!

Happy Friday from the other side of the world.

Invitations Revealed!

There are quite a few perks to having a small, intimate wedding, in my opinion... Other than the obvious reason of being able to spend quality time with the people you know and love the most, instead of schmoozing with people you only sorta kinda know, and being too busy to notice all of the details of the day, or not being able to spend quality moments together with your new hubby!  Ugggh, shame!  But, one of my favorite parts about having a smaller, more intimate wedding are things like being able to make personal touches... because hand making 65 wedding invitations is a whole lot easier than hand making 250!  

Can I get an AMEN?!

Lucky for me, my guest list capped out at 63, most of whom are couples or families, which left me with the attainable goal of hand making 36 invitations!  Easy, peasy, right?!  Well, do you know how hard it is to do any sort of projects with a cat who constantly wants to help?  I'm sure all you moms with toddlers get where I'm coming from!

This left me with one option, to make all 36 invitation during my afternoon free time at work.  Lucky for me, this is my 4th year teaching in Korea, so I don't need all afternoon to plan for classes!  Oh yes!  I'm not sure how many days, or hours it took to make these little treasures, but I'd do it all over again if I had to! (Well, not for a couple years though!)  I'm such a sucker for hand made wedding invitations!

    

I love their fun, flirty, colorful, and personal feel, and hope that our big day is all those things!