Tag Archives: December

Run Around

So far its been a crazy busy week, I cannot believe that we are already on day three of our visit home. I knew once we’d get home the hands on the clock would just spin forward ever so quickly. Today we did all sorts of fun little things. We baked raisin cookies, strolled around Giant, and grabbed a bite to eat at Panera Bread.

After baking cookies, we decided to go for a stroll around Giant. Yes, we are really odd and have enjoyed “strolling” around Wal-Mart, Target, Sam’s Club, Heimbach’s, and no trip would be complete without including our local Giant grocery store. Hmmm maybe we can squeeze in a Wegmans too?

Goodness, endless amounts of decisions and options. The experience was almost overwhelming! I found myself wanting to read every single item in the Organic section. It’s incredible how much we take for granted with the endless amounts of selections and sales on food in the US. We are so lucky to be able to just purchase endless amount of stuff. In the end it always leaves me with the thoughts of, do we really need all of this stuff?

We’ve been Panera Bread enthusiast for quite sometime now. The smell of freshly baked bread, the delicious soups, the free wifi, the bakery-cafe atmosphere. We were absolutely delighted to see that they had opened in our hometown while we had been away. I knew we’d have to stop in and grab some lunch sometime while running around. Today just happened to be that day!

Have you ever ate at Panera Bread? What is your favorite thing to order? I think mine is now the Vegetarian garden vegetable with pesto. In the mood for soup? You’ve got to try it out!

Heimbach’s Country Store

When we Bees lived in the area we always picked up candies and lunch meats from Heimbach’s country store. Nothing fancy here folks, just a quaint little country store packed with all sorts of fun foods and trinkets. We had to stop in when we near it, just for a stroll to reminisce. Clearly we are all about nostalgia here folks. Okay, okay, we ended up buying candy for the plane too. We couldn’t pass up the multi-colored black licorice candy and gummy bears.

Feel free to check out the photos. We didn’t even know they still made candy cigarettes anymore…

 


 

Fresh Tofu and Bean Paste

Without giving out to much of another good thing… we met some undisclosed friends at another undisclosed location near our home that served fresh homemade tofu and homemade bean paste. Forget the typical Christmas dreams of sugar plums dancing in our heads, we are now envision kimchi pots filled with fresh homemade tofu and bean paste. Mmmmm!

What I can disclose is that our bee bellies were both very pleased by the end of the meal. The location is fairly new and makes the homemade tofu and bean paste on location for ordering or to pickup and take home with you. The view was excellent! I could picture the backdrop with a fresh covering of snow in the winter months or the lush dark green trees in the spring and summer months.

(Before)

(After)

From an outside perspective, what do you think about all the side dishes that accompany a traditional Korean meal? Are you thinking what I’m thinking…Dang, who is doing all those dishes? HA HA!

Yook hwe

EEK! How in the world is it already Tuesday night?! Please! Someone tell me how we already flew straight past the first part of the December month? It seems as though ready or not, The holidays are coming full speed at us! This means we Bees are only a few days shy of making our trip back to the states for the holidays.

Speaking of ready and Christmas, I’ve got to tell you, that Mr. B makes me feel so unprepared sometimes! This man has his entire luggage packed for the trip and even has it sitting by the front door. Bless his little heart. On the flip side there is pokey little me who hasn’t even thought about packing or anything related to that subject. You’ve got to believe when I say this is completely not my style. Perhaps my brain is on holiday overload right now? Or perhaps i’m just choosing to stay in my little bubble of denial. Well, whatever the case I guess I better get a move on it here!

I’m a teeny bit behind in blogging from our past weekend too. See holiday overload line above. I’ll just jump right into it for you now.

This is Yook hwe. (Sorry vegetarians blog followers). This dish just intrigued me way to much not document a photo to share with the rest of you.

What is Yook hwe? Yook hwe is basically like a steak tartar, only this is a Korean dish. The dish traditionally is served with thin slices of a juicy asian pear, salt, sesame oil, and sesame seeds. And uh yes, we actually tried the dish….we lived to tell the tale…and we actually really liked it. Folks you know by now we are strange birds.

We traveled down South for a holiday get together with some fantastic friends. It was so nice to catch up, chit-chat, laugh, and of course eat! And gosh did we eat! The food just kept coming and coming!

Wishing you all the best the last few days before the magical day of Christmas is here!

20 Degrees

After a wee little snafo with forgetting a tripod piece…oops…who would have thought that piece belonged to that thing…

We crazily shivered captured ourselves in the beautiful snow covered belly of the Soyo mountain. Yes, in 20 degree weather.

Brrrrrrr.

Dear  Lord,

Thank you for leading my heart to this very patient and kind man. Bless his huge heart for not putting up a fight when his crazy wife comes up with silly little things….

well…not that much of a fight.

Happy Holidays 2012

Cheers to the new year!

With Love,

Tree Lighting

It’s hard to get over that it is December already, the very last month of the 2012 year. Goodness, what a full year it has been.

Tonight the sounds and smells of Christmas were in the air, it was absolutely wonderful! Perhaps even the best time of the year? Our small community held a tree lighting and wouldn’t you know it the big man in red even stopped in for a visit.

This past week we even had our first  snowfall of the season in our little town of Dongducheon. The backdrop from our living room windows are snow-covered fields, hills and trees. It’s so magical! I truly don’t believe it gets any better than this.

 

Winter Wonderland

Lately all I feel like doing is staying in. Being cozy. Keeping warm. I guess it doesn’t help that the temperatures continue to dip very low here in the evenings. Luckily for me we had an early dismissal from work today due to the weather and the road conditions. A real winter wonderland here in Korea.

Wait..I know what you are thinking.. and yes, we are from the North.. but It’s been very frigid and frosty here the past week. I feel like I’ve been living in my PJ’s. I can’t think of anything but jumping right into something fleecy right after work. Are you that type too?

Its hard to get motivated to leave ones home. Not to mention that little tree of mine is ever so distracting. Its so simple but so cute. Maybe I can blame my not wanting to leave the house on our tree, yes… that’s it! I mean we really only get to enjoy it one month out of the year, why wouldn’t I want to make the most of it. Wink, Wink.

Hope you are staying toasty and cozy in your neck of the woods.

Christmas Market

Good evening! Ah, today has been such a beautiful and awesome day! To jump start the festive season I ventured into the city to check out a Christmas Market with my dear friend Mary.

The Christmas market was a bit smaller than what we were expecting, however it was something different and Christmasy so we were both pretty excited. It was really easy to find, located at the Seongbukcheon Fountain Square (성북천 분수광장) just off Hansung University Station (exit 2). Seongbuk Global Village Center hosted the event, the tents were all ran by the European embassies each selling goodies and treats from their home countries.

There was Gluehwein, sausage, chocolate chaud, Roesti, Raclette cheese, lasagna, Italian coffee, crepes, a heavenly divine slice of cheesecake, and holiday cookies too. Children could write a letter to Santa for Christmas, there were a few Christmas decorations, and a live band. We arrive right before noon and had the chance to walk around to each tent before the larger crowd moved in.

After leaving the marketplace we wanted to grab some lunch together before heading home. We strolled up the street to check out the area and see where our tummy and noses lead us. As we strolled we found multiple fruit stands all with delicious displays of persimmons, clementine oranges, apples, and pomegranate. We couldn’t help ourselves we had to grab a little bag of persimmons and clementines.  Both Mary, I, and our families really enjoy the fruits of the Fall and Winter months here in Korea.

In the end our tummies and noses lead us straight to a budae jjigae restaurant. We were outside discussing the sign and picture of the stew when the Korean women inside came out to explain in her best English what the restaurant was. I have had budae jigae many times before but Mary had not. The woman was very convincing, the restaurant looked really clean, “sure why not” Mary said. What a free spirit this woman has, I just love it! In the end she said she loved the stew. I was so happy that she got a chance to try another new Korean dish that she enjoyed.

 Enjoy the rest of your weekend folks!

Oh Christmas Tree

“For every year the Christmas tree,
Brings to us all both joy and glee.
O Christmas tree, O Christmas tree,
Much pleasure doth thou bring me!”

Did you brave the black Friday sales this year? If you were brave enough, I hope you got some incredible deals!

You know, as crazy as it may sound, I always looked forward to black Fridays. It really wasn’t because of the sales. It was because I got to spend time with family. We crazily braved the crowds together and shopped until we dropped. This is the second year that we missed getting to shop with my dear mother-in-law. I still get visions of the SUV packed so full that we couldn’t even see out of the back window and giggle, clearly we were a road hazard.

After the shopping excursion we’d go home, Mr. B would crash, and I’d be completely wired from the shopping high, so I’d decorate the entire house with all of our Christmas swag. No room was off-limits, even the bathroom had some holly leaves and berries!

The Saturday after Thanksgiving Bean and I Christmatized our home with a teeny tiny Christmas tree. I just couldn’t help myself!

When Mr. B and I started to travel abroad together, we started the tradition of collecting an ornament/ thing we could place on our Christmas tree from each country that we visited. The ornaments were just begging to be properly displayed, plus twinkle lights make me swoon. Yes, it was settled! A Christmas tree was needed to continue on with our holiday traditions.

Speaking of holiday traditions…To Bean I guess it really doesn’t matter what size the tree is, as long as she can squeeze at least some part of her body under it.

Crank up those holiday tunes and enjoy the weekend!