California Girls' Weekend

A couple of months ago, one of my sisters suggested a girls weekend with all of us sisters and our mom. We found a weekend that worked for all of us and booked tickets to go. The meeting place of choice was southern California.  My sister, Kristina, lives with her family in southern California.

I flew out of National Airport which can be cool if you sit on the correct side of the plane to see the national monuments in downtown Washington D.C. from the air.

Lara, K and I on a walk near K's house the first evening in California.

The next day Heather, Mom, and I went to the San Diego Zoo while Lara and Kristina stayed at K's house to take care of the household until K's husband got home from work.
 

We knew we were going to be hungry by the time we made it to the zoo, so I researched places to eat in the zoo. The only restaurant inside the zoo with decent reviews was Sweet Shack (but there also were only two reviews). We decided to test it out and eat at Sweet Shack. The food was delicious! (Just as a side note, although it's name is Sweet Shack, it did not only have sweet food there).

After we ate lunch, we saw most of what was on that side of the zoo. We saw cool birds and reptiles and monkeys etc.

We took the skyfari to the other side of the park and saw more cool and cute animals.

 

We saw red pandas and leopards and elephants and bears and giraffes and all sorts of other kinds of animals that I cannot name here. (H took the pictures of animals I have on this post.)

The San Diego Zoo is apparently one of the best zoos in the world. 

Mom, Heather, and I spent a lot of the day at the zoo and got a lot of steps in. It was a really nice sunny day that day (which was nice since K said it had been raining most of the days before that day).

 

After the zoo, we met up with Lara and K and walked around the area that our Airbnb was to find food for dinner.

We ended up eating at Marcy's Taco Shop which was delicious! I got a chicken taco and a carnitas taco. I enjoyed both, but I think I liked the chicken one slightly better. :)

 

The next day we headed back north (just for the day) to see my nephew, Andrew, do shot put at an invitational meet he was invited to.

 

 Andrew ended up getting third place overall in shot put. Good job Andrew!

We ate lunch at Burger Lounge which was really good!

 

 We got donuts from Sidecar Donuts for dessert!

 

We got six different donuts. Lara got a gluten-free one and the rest of us tried a little bit of each of the other five. They were good! I liked a couple of the donuts more than the others but they were all good.

 

After we ate, we went on a whale watching boat tour. It was a two hour tour and we saw two gray whales making there way north to the Arctic waters to feed. 

We were able to follow them from a safe distance and saw them blow out of their spout quite a few times and saw their tales multiple times. It was a nice tour. (I didn't get any pictures of the whales because they were a little too far for my camera to catch a good picture).

 

You know when you're on vacation, calories don't count right?! ;) We got ice cream at Cowafornia after the boat tour.

We headed back to San Diego and drove to Old Town San Diego to eat dinner. Old Town is a fun place to walk around and go into the different shops and look at all the restaurants etc. We ate at Miguel's Mexican restaurant. I don't remember what I got, but I remember enjoying it!

The next morning, Lara, K, Mom and I went on a walk near our Airbnb. It was a nice area and a lovely walk. 

We went to an hour of church this morning where the parking was horrible. K had to park a few blocks away, because no parking was available closer to the church building.

We got food from The Crack Shack, a chicken place, for lunch. It was pretty good! 

We wanted to hang out more in this part of San Diego but we had a hard time finding parking near where we wanted to go so we drove to Cabrillo National Monument.

Cabrillo National Monument has a beautiful view!

 

A view of downtown San Diego from Cabrillo!

 

 

 

After Cabrillo, we headed back to K's house. It was a fun, mostly relaxing weekend in San Diego with awesome company and delicious food!

Lara, Heather, and Mom left the next day (Monday) to go back home. I stayed until Thursday and hung out with K and her family. I might do a separate blogpost about the time after everyone else left, but we'll see if I actually do.

 

Temp Agency

Job searching sucks. I know the best way to find a job is through connections, but that's really hard to do. Especially when I don't know exactly what type of job I want (since I loved my most recent job and I don't think I can find another job like that one) and it also requires talking to people about my situation.

About a month ago, I decided I needed to change the way I was looking for a job and ended up signing up for a temp agency. I knew it was something I should do to at least have some money coming in even if it was only for a day or two job. 

There were a lot of things holding me back from applying for a temp agency earlier.  I was stuck, I was scared, I was insecure. I still struggle with all of those things but I finally got a little bit of courage and applied for a job through a temp agency. It was scary, but I did it.

I had a phone interview with one of the recruiters and at the end of the call she asked if I'd like to do a one day job the next day answering phones and greeting visitors in an office. I said yes but I was super stressed the rest of the day and didn't sleep very well that night in anticipation of the job. I was trying not to panic on my way to the office the next morning. But you know what, it ended up being okay. 

The next week I got a call from my recruiter saying that that same company would like me back for three days. And then later the next two weeks. I just finished my second full week at the temp job. I'll be there next week too and then we'll see what happens after that. It's been a learning and growing experience and I'm glad that I finally got a little courage and signed up for the temp agency.

I have no idea if anything will come from my employment with the temp agency but at least I'm gaining some experience and I have some money coming in for now.

 

So this post isn't all just words, here's a pretty picture on one of my favorite trails!

Time is Marching On...

And Time is Still Marching On... (I'll give anyone a prize if you know what I'm quoting in the title and the first line of this blog post). 

Here it is another new year. The month of January has come and gone. Sometimes it surprises me how fast time seems to go. Sometimes the days seem to go by so slow but then the weeks go by so fast.

It's been over three years since Covid-19 was introduced to the world.

It's been thirteen years since I graduated from university. 

It's been almost seven months since my dad died. 

It's been eighteen years since I entered the MTC to begin my mission. 

It's been a year since I lost my job. 

It's been twelve years since I came back from teaching English in Taiwan. 

It's been about five months since I drove back to Virginia from Utah.

Although some of the things I mentioned happened a long time ago and some not so long ago, they don't seem like they happened that long ago. 

It's still crazy to me what it was like at the beginning and in the thick of the pandemic. 

Playing at a park was not allowed

Wearing masks if we went anywhere outside of our homes was highly encouraged

One way aisles at grocery stores

Eating inside a restaurant was not allowed and curbside pickup became a big thing

Those who could, started working from home 

Schools were closed and teachers and parents were trying to figure out how to continue school online from home

Movie theaters and hair salons (anything deemed non-essential) were closed

At this time all of these things were normal! 

When finding toilet paper in stock at the store was a miracle! This was three years ago. Not that long ago, but seriously how has it already been three years since the beginning?! 

I do realize we are still in the midst of the pandemic but things aren't as crazy as they were at the beginning. A lot of people are vaccinated, masks are optional now, schools are open fully again, movie theaters and hair salons are open again. The strains of Covid-19 now are not as deadly.

I graduated from university thirteen years ago. I enjoyed my years at university! I learned a lot and I made some good friends. But how could that be thirteen years ago?! It makes me feel old sometimes. ;)

My dad died almost seven months ago. It does not seem like it's been that long. I think about him and miss him everyday.

This picture is from 2018 when my dad and mom and sister, H, and I went on a Caribbean cruise.

 

I always feel kind of old when I say that I returned from my mission 16-1/2 years ago. How the heck did that happen?!

A desk I had set up to work from home during the pandemic before I lost my job a year ago.

I loved living in Taiwan and had a great time there! I still think about my experiences there everyday and it's so weird how long ago it was now.

The picture above is when the parents of two of our students invited us teachers to go on a weekend trip with them. It was a fun and adventurous little trip!

This was five months ago, so crazy! My sister, H, helped me drive part of my trip back to Virginia.

It was a tradition on road trips growing up to stop at Little America on I-80 to get ice cream cones. Of course, H, and I had to stop at Little America to get ice cream cones on our way to TN. :)

My brother, Matt, helped me drive the rest of the way on my trip back to Virginia. 

Matt suggested we stop at Buc-ee's to fill up on gas and get food. I had never been to one before but apparently it's a big thing in the states that actually have Buc-ee's.

As we go through life good and bad things happen to us. And as time keeps marching on, I hope we have mostly happy moments to reminisce on.

Kdrama Wrapped

Because I've seen quite a few Korean dramas this year, I decided to do a Kdrama Wrapped for 2022 (like Spotify wrapped but with Kdramas). (A lady on Instagram that I follow and posts content about Kdramas suggested doing this and I liked the idea so here I go).

My Top 7 Kdramas I watched in 2022:

1. While You Were Sleeping

2. Fight For My Way

3. My Liberation Notes

4. Thirty but Seventeen/Still 17

5. Extraordinary Attorney Woo

6. Shopaholic Louis

7. Gaus Electronics

My Favorite Genres (I just guessed on this one. I didn't actually count how many of each I watched, but it's probably pretty accurate the way I ordered them):

1. Romantic Comedy

2. Fantasy/Science Fiction

3. Slice of Life

4. Action

5. Historical

My Top 6 Songs From Kdramas I Watched in 2022 (in no particular order):

1. Pray by Klang (from Angel's Last Mission: Love)

2. Sweeter by Jess Penner (from Angel's Last Mission: Love)

2. Christmas Tree by V (from Our Beloved Summer)

3. Hallucination (feat. NaShow) by Jang Jane (from Kill Me Heal Me)   

4. Let Me Out by by NU'EST W (from A Korean Odyssey)

5. Satellite by SALTNPAPER (from Chicago Typewriter)

6. Blooming Memories by Baek Ye Rin (from Chicago Typewriter)

Total Kdramas Watched in 2022

I would tell you but I don't want to be judged. 😉

 

Sometimes my brother's cat will join me on my bed as I watch Kdramas.
 

In case you couldn't tell from my previous post and from the tab on my blog of Kdramas that I've watched, I love Kdramas! If you'd ever like to start watching them, I'd be happy to give you a recommendation.

Ukraine 2

Even though the war in Ukraine is not at the top of the headlines any more, the war is still going on there. And I feel just as helpless and as heartbroken as I did at the beginning of the craziness.

I've been thinking a lot about my mission recently. This week marks 18 years since I entered the MTC. It seems sooooo crazy to me that it was that long ago. Sometimes it feels like yesterday, while at other times it feels like a lifetime ago.

I decided to write another post about more people I met in Ukraine. I wanted to put faces with people who are directly affected by the war. Whether or not they still live in Ukraine, I'm not sure, but either way it's their homeland being destroyed and people they know being killed and injured and it's really really sad.

Front Row: me and Violetta; Back Row: Sister Larisa, Sasha, Kostya, Marina, Ira, and Sister E. 

We went to FHE at Sister Larisa's house sometimes and always enjoyed going there! Sister Larisa is the mom of Sasha, Kostya, and Ira in the picture. Marina was Kostya's girlfriend and Violetta was a family friend. This family was awesome! They were so kind to us and it was always fun visiting them. This was in Lugansk.

On the back of this picture I wrote that Sister Larisa and her family had a hard life. They had to choose between the Dad (Sister Larisa's husband) and all their material things or the Gospel of Jesus Christ. They chose the Gospel and the Dad was not very happy nor nice about it. He gave them a really hard time, but they stayed true to the Gospel.

Dasha and Nikita are the twin babies in the picture. Angelika is the mom. 

Angelika was someone Sister E and I taught in Lugansk. We found her while knocking on doors. 

We knocked on her door and Angelika's mom answered the door (I'll call Angelika's mom Grandma for this story). We said our little TryingToGetHerToListenToOurMessage statement but Grandma didn't want to hear what we had to say and started closing the door. Right before she finished closing the door, we asked if we could sing a song for her. 

Surprisingly, she said we could, so we sang I am a Child of God. After we finished singing, she immediately opened the door and invited us in. Grandma wasn't really interested in hearing our message but her daughter Angelika was. We learned that missionaries had been to their house before and Angelika wanted to hear more.

We taught Angelika for a few months and we enjoyed visiting her. She was one of the kindest, most sincere people I've ever met. She was married and had four children. Her husband ended up opposing her learning any more about the Gospel so, alas, we had to stop visiting her. But we did leave her the Kniga Mormona and a conference Ensign.

I hope her and her family are safe! I know she had a teenage son at the time I was there so he's fighting age now.

Sister C, Sister J, Marina, Nastya, Ira, Ilya, Sergei, Valeri, and me

Oh how I loved this family! Ira was married to Valeri and they had four children Marina, Nastya, Ilya,  and Sergei. They were such a good family who owned a little farm in the country and grew mushrooms. Sister C and I loved visiting them. This was in Donetsk.

Front Row: Ilya; Back Row: Nastya, Ira, and Marina

This is the same family as the picture above. Nastya and Marina got baptized on this day and the rest of the family got baptized a few months later (after I was done with my mission). I wish I could have been there for the baptism of the rest of the family, but I'm glad I was able to see Nastya and Marina baptized. 

Alas, I have not kept in contact with them but I do know that Marina and Nastya are both married to Ukrainian men and have children. 

This is a normal street scene near our apartment in Gorlovka. This may have been seventeen years ago, but it shows what it was like before war hit the country.

These were some kids that lived in our apartment complex in Gorlovka. They loved coming up to Sister L and I and practicing their English and just chatting with us in Russian. They were so cute!

Unfortunately I have not been very good at keeping in contact with people from my mission so I don't know how these specific people are doing now. But I hope the people that I wrote about today (and the ones I didn't write about too) are safe and are able to adjust to whatever new circumstances they might be in.

Here's the link to another post I wrote about Ukraine earlier this year. Also I hope that this war will end soon with Russia leaving Ukraine alone and the Ukrainians getting their homeland back!

My Spotify Wrap Up

It's that time of year again to look at my Spotify wrap up. I didn't know they did this until I started paying for a subscription last year, but I like it. I think it's fun to see what I listened to the most in the last year. 

I listen to music on Spotify the most out of any other way of listening to music.

My top five most listened to songs! This does not surprise me in the least. My number one song, I apparently listened to 192 times this year.

Two of the songs on my top five this year I had on my top five last year also, Imagine by Ben Platt and Husavik by Will Ferrell and My Marianne.

These are my top genres, which also does not surprise me. :)

 

 And this is how many minutes I listened to Spotify this year. I calculated it into hours and apparently it's 431.2 hours of listening!

 I just wanted to remember my statistics for this year. Here's a link to my Spotify statistics last year.

My Birthday

My birthday may or may not have been a few weeks ago. :) This year is not quite a big birthday for me but next year will be... and I am not looking forward to it.

 

My birthday this year was good though!

In case you don't know I love narwhals. I often receive narwhal related items when I get presents, which I am totally okay with! I received this awesome narwhal shirt from my sister, Lara, for my birthday. :)

 

And I got this cute narwhal card in the mail from my friend, Heather. 

 

 

I love burgers and one of my favorite burger places is Big Buns. They used to only have two locations, which were a little bit of a drive from me. They've branched out and now there's one not very far from me. Yay! 

I knew that I wanted to go there for my birthday dinner. I invited my brothers who live in the area (one of them couldn't make it) and we ate at Big Buns. It was as delicious as I remember!

 

 

I wasn't going to get a shake but my brother, Peter, saw the unicorn floaties sitting on the counter and thought I should get a unicorn shake for my birthday. So I did! 

 

It was so pretty. It was just a regular shake but it sure was picture worthy.

  

 

I celebrated my birthday over a few days. The day after my birthday, I walked around Burke Lake. It was a beautiful day!

 

 

 

 

I love Burke Lake! It's about 5 miles around the whole lake and it's beautiful!

 

 

The evening after my birthday a few of my friends, Rachel, Diana, Kate, and I had dinner at Mod Pizza. Then Rachel invited us over to her house for an Oreo cake she had made for my birthday. Everything was delicious! (I didn't get a picture from that night). 

Then the next morning, Cat, Rachel and I went to Germantown, MD to the Amish market and ate breakfast there and bought donuts for later. 

Overall I had a lovely birthday week. I got texts and calls from family and friends, I hung out with various friends and family members, and ate lots of delicious food!