Top Ten Tuesday: Things I can't remember

My friends might expect the top of my list to be getting groceries, but that isn't something I forget, it's just something that I don't get around to, which is a different problem altogether.
The top of my list does involve the grocery store though.

Top Ten Things I can't remember:

1. Most of the things my husband asked me to get at the grocery store.

• So sad, and so very true.  This would not be a problem if I could remember to write them down.

2. To write things down.

• If I don't write things down, I forget to do them.  Which is a catch-22 since I also forget to write them down.

3. Where I put my keys.

• This would be a bigger problem if I wrote things down and then got around to going to do them.

4. To charge my cell phone.

• My phone is always almost out of battery when I go out.  But since I can't find my keys and didn't write anything down, I don't need to go anywhere anyway.

5. My phone number.

• I doesn't really matter that my phone is always almost out of battery, because I can't remember my phone number so no one can call me anyway.

6. To move the clothes to the dryer.

• This is only a problem when I write stuff down and find my keys therefore having somewhere to wear the clothes.

7. How old I am.

• The older I get, the less of a problem this is.

8. My youngest child's birthdate.

• The older he gets, the less of a problem this is because he can remind me.

9. To take the trash to the curb.

• I can never remember that it is trash day until I hear the garbage truck driving away.  I should set an alarm for it on my phone.  When it gets done charging, of course.

Top Ten Tuesday: Korea

We have been stationed at Osan Air Base in the Republic of Korea for a year now.  In two nights time we will fly back to the states and make our way to our new station in Alabama.  I did not want to be sent here, but it has been such a great experience living here.

The top 10 things I have enjoyed while living at Osan Air Base in Korea:

1. The view from our 10th floor apt.  In the early morning hours, the kids and I loved to snuggle out on the patio wrapped in blankets, drinking hot coco and coffee and watch the sun rise.  At night, the lights of two different cities that twinkled in our view was stunning.  Though I often tried, I could never get pictures that adequately captured how beautiful those two times of day were.

 2. Being within walking distance to everything on base.  The chapel? 5 min.  The school?  The grocery store?  The indoor pool?  8 min!  The gym was 15 min. but the walk added to our exercise!  Don't feel like walking?  Call the base taxi.  $2.30 will get you almost anywhere you need to go on base.

3. Taking groceries from the car to the kitchen in shopping carts.  So convenient!  The carts are also convenient for anything else you need to take up or down.  And for playing in too...

4. Having a trash chute.  Its not that I mind taking the trash out to a trash bin, its that I can never remember to take the bin to the curb on trash day until I hear the garbage truck pulling away!  Not looking forward to that again.

5. The restaurants.  The main strip full of stores and restaurants right outside the main gate has just about any cuisine you could ask for, and we enjoyed them all.  Ok, the Mexican wasn't that great because they never had limes, but the Italian was fantastic.  The Meat restaurant was a family favorite for Korean food because they cooked it right on your table.  The Indian/Pakistani restaurant that opened not too long ago was really goo, and the Turkish one was our favorite of all.  Yum!  There was also Brazilian dining, Japanese sushi, Thai, Chinese...and those are just the restaurants off base.   On base there was Chili's, Oriental House, Flying M Steak House (where kids eat free on Tuesdays!), Checkertails, Popeye's, Pizza Hut ,and various other fast foods, and almost all of them delivered.  What will we eat now?

6. Speaking of good food, we loved to hop in the car and head to E-mart or Home Plus.  Kind of like a cross between a Super Walmart and a department store.  We would always stop at the food court first and decide what to order from the display.  Most of the time, we didn't really know what we were ordering, we just hoped that it was something that we would enjoy.  They had the coolest stuff too.  And the best produce!

7. The mountains.  Most of our favorite memories here involve mountains.  They are beautiful and we have enjoyed seeing them and hiking them throughout the various seasons.

8. The rest stops.  The rest stops here are fantastic!  They are master-planned with restrooms, food court and convenient store.  There is usually a playground for the kids too.

9. Safety.  The kids got a lot of attention from locals here.  Everyone wants to give them candy or take a picture with them.  The youngest has started to say 'Cheese!' anytime anyone even looks at him.  It's very safe to allow that here but they are in for a big surprise when we get back to the states.

10. Experiencing Korean culture.

Top Ten Tuesday: Things I love about you

I love your generosity.

I love your dependability.
I love your attentiveness.

I love your intelligence.
I love your initiative.

I love your strength. 

I love your leadership.

I love your sense of humor.

I love your perspective on life.

I love your way of loving me.

Happy Valentines Day, my Love

Top Ten Tuesday: Thankful

I am thankful for parents who loved me and raised me right.

I am thankful for a husband who loves me and supports me.

I am thankful for three beautiful, happy, healthy children.

I am thankful for a place to live, clothes to wear, and food to eat.

I am thankful for my country and the freedoms it provides.

I am thankful for my husband's job serving our country in the Air Force.

I am thankful for my friends, most of whom I met through the Air Force.

I am thankful for technology that keeps us connected during separations.

I am thankful for the tickets the Air Force is providing for us to travel home in December for three weeks to see our friends and family.

I am thankful for the fact that since we will be gone for so long, I will not have to bake any Christmas goodies or decorate for Christmas this year!

Top Ten Tuesday: Hawaii

When I found out we were moving to Hawaii, I was beyond excited.  I didn't want anyone to pinch me in case I was dreaming.  When I got there, I found that it was all I had imagined it to be and more!  We loved every minute of living in paradise and everything about it suited us just right.
Well, almost everything...

Now that we've moved away here is a list of ten things I do and do NOT miss about Hawaii.

I do NOT miss:

1. The cockroaches
 
Need I explain?  EEW!

2. Geckos and gecko poop
Now I don't have a problem with critters.  In fact, we caught a few lizards in the yard and kept them as pets.  One mother laid an egg that hatched and we enjoyed watching the little baby grow up.  I was so super sad when a gust of wind knocked the cage off the porch into a nest of fire ants and they all died from the bites.  But the geckos, they come out at night and 'chirp,' and the noise really bugged me.  And the poop!  They poop on everything and it is SO hard to scrub off.  EEW!

3. The fly poop
During the rainy season, the flies migrate indoors by the hordes.  They leave little clusters of brown poop 'spots' on random places on the walls (just out of reach but right within eyesight) and in the corners of the windows and it is hard to scrub them off!  Plus, just EEW!

4. The smell of mildew on the towels

If you don't move the clothes from the washer to the dryer within like an hour of the end of the cycle, your clothes will smell like mildew.  Its hard to get the smell out and it really gets fragrant when you sweat.  Eew!

5. The red dirt

I know it made a lot of money for the Dirt Shirt company, but it cost me a lot of money replacing all the the clothes that got stained with it because it does NOT come out.

I DO miss:

1. The sun
The first two weeks here in Korea were monsoon.  There was a blanket of gray clouds that hung just over our heads and blocked out any hint of the sun.  We've have many sunny days now, but it is just not the same.

2. The rainbows
The sun is always shining in Hawaii, even when it rains.  This makes for the most beautiful rainbows!  They never got old for me.

3. The air
Hawaii is listed among the best air quality in the world.  It is not just the quality though, it was the smell of plumerias and other flowering plants and trees that always perfumed the air.

4.  The beaches
We didn't go very often, which is especially sad because we lived 5 minutes from a great one.  But just being near them, knowing that we COULD go, and seeing them everywhere we drove, was perfect.

5. The color

Ahh, the color.  So vibrant, so beautiful, so plentiful!  The plants, the trees, the sunsets, the sky... 

Eye candy, no, soul candy.

This alone would have been paradise enough for me.

Top Ten Tuesday: Things they say

My children are three fantastic bundles of pure energy.
They get it from me of course.
And I mean that literally...they suck the energy right out if me like little leaches...

But they are nothing if not entertaining.  I watch in amazement as their bodies grow and their minds expand.  I watch and listen.  Sometimes what I hear just makes me smile, sometimes it makes me laugh outright.  Sometimes it just makes me go, "What?"  You can decide for yourself which ones are which.


Top ten things heard at my house recently...

Ethan (3 years)
Ethan: I almost getting my dressed on.
Ethan: I'm winning last!
Me: Do you want me to put you down?  Ethan: No.  I'm still picking you up.

Asha (5 years)
Asha: Mom, Ethan is peeing on the towels in the bathroom!
Asha: I can't hear you cause my eyes are locked.
Asha: Mom, What will you name me when I grow up?
Asha: Daddy, when Daniel and Ethan grow up, will they have no hair like you?

Daniel (7)
Daniel: Mom! Asha and Ethan got blueberry juice on the ceiling!
Daniel: I was playing and my legs are so tired because I didn't have any other mode of transportation.
Me: Daniel, did you forget I'm on video chat and Grandma can see you dancing around naked in front of the mirror?