Life is Beautiful

Motherhood, Sewing, Family

NY- Rochester & Rose Water

~ Etc.

While in Rochester, NY, I visited my oldest brother Joseph and his adorable family.  We visited the Eastman School of Music and went to a recital held by their students and enjoyed their beautiful buildings.  My adorable niece was my little shadow for two days, following me everywhere and wanting to play with me, which was awesome since I was missing my girls and I got to cuddle her and spoil her with attention instead. I didn’t take much pictures, and she’s the reason why!

After Rochester, I flew to NYC to visit my dear cousin Ginny and her husband Colby.  Ginny is my soul mate and one of my favorite people in the whole world.  The first place Ginny and Colby took me to was their favorite brunch place called Rose Water, and oh my goodness, that place was heaven.  I still didn’t have my appetite back from morning sickness, but that restaurant did it for me!  My appetite is back now, ya’ll!  Appetite back+10 lbs. weight gain in two weeks, I owe it all to Rose Water.  The foods are organic & locally grown, and everything we ordered was perfect.  I highly recommend it to anyone with fine taste.  Wait, have I mentioned yet how much I loved Rose Water? 😉
It was really windy so after attempting to take a few pictures of us, we realized it wasn’t gonna happen.  But the wind didn’t stop us from exploring this beautiful city!  More pictures to come!

Hello Utah

~ Etc.

I’m back from New York!  I got back a few days ago but I’ve been busy spending time with my husband and the kids to make up for all the time I’ve missed!  I cried several times during the trip, especially when I saw little kids around adi & ana’s age, and the parents must have been so freaked out by this strange girl sitting across from them in the train, starring at their kids with a big grin on her face and intense longing in her eyes to just grab and hold them and to give them a piece of candy or a toy while telling them how special they are.  
While I missed my family everyday, I’m not gonna lie, it was soooooooo nice to just take care of myself instead of someone else.  Two words to sum up my 5 day break would be peaceful, and rejuvenating.  It was such a nice break, and I pondered a lot, read a lot of scriptures, and made many goals to be a better person/wife/mother.  I came back home energized and refreshed and couldn’t wait to see my family!
A big thanks to my husband for making sure all my plane rides were windows seats, a touching card he had me open only when I got on the plane that made me cry, not only taking excellent care of the girls, but being genuinely excited to spend 24/7 with them for 5 days, and for letting me come back home to a spotless, meticulously clean home, and this amazing chore chart he made.  I’ll show you guys later, but seriously, I came back to these amazing, well behaved, listening when asked only once-kids, and I was speechless.  This goes to show he would make a way better mother than me, and I’m so grateful we are partners in parenting.  Now, I just need to find a job that will pay me more than his so he can be a stay at home dad!  

My heart melts…

~ Etc.


dress: old navy | cardigan & belt: banana republic | necklace: DIY

So I’ve been a little moody lately if you can’t tell, but the good news is that my morning sickness is gone, hooray!  I’m happy most of the time but the tiniest thing will make me cry or really irritated or both.  Yesterday I yelled at my daughter when she asked a sassy question for the 4th time demanding a reason why I told her she couldn’t do a certain thing, and I went to my room and cried.  I felt like such a horrible mother!  My patience level is down to zero and I hate it.  I know I don’t have control over my emotions lately but I do have control over how I act with those emotions.  It gives me no excuse to yell at my children.  Oh, how I thought raising kids was hard when they were under 3 1/2 and couldn’t really voice out their feelings or opinions! At least I know my girls are very persistent and smart and dang good with their words and sure know how to use their words to debate or make me eat my own words or actions! My mom told me I was just like them, always cleverly using my words to prove my case so she’s probably smiling inside and saying it’s payback time!  Later, I apologized to my daughter and told her I was sorry and how it wasn’t her fault, and even when I do yell at her, I love her and I never stop loving her.  I cried while telling her that too, dang you hormones!  

Even though at times I get frustrated with myself with this whole motherhood thing, those moments are rare compared to the joy I feel of being a mother.  Especially when there are moments like this.
-“Mama, mama! my poop wasn’t coming out and it hurted so I prayed to Heavenly Father and then my poop came out and it wasn’t hurted!” little Ana recently told me.
-One morning when we were all having a morning cuddle as a family, I asked the girls what they did right when they woke up.  Adi said, “I woke up first, and then Ana, and we gave each other a morning kiss.  And then we talked.”
-“Mommy, mommy, I love you more than you love me because I love you all the way to Jesus, all the way to Hawaii, all the way around the world, to the highest sky in the universe!” Adi told me one night before bedtime.
-“Mommy, you and daddy make really cute kids, so I can’t wait to see your new baby when it comes out of your belly!”  Adi told me while she was rubbing my belly one afternoon.

Happy Valentine’s everybody!

yunikelly giveaway winner announced here.   so late, so sorry.

Happy New Year!

~ Etc.

Yesterday was a Chinese/Korean new year, and we gathered with many people near the Lindon boat harbor for a sky lantern release.  I knew the girls would love to see a bunch of sky lanterns fly up the sky just like the movie Tangled and we watched Tangled earlier in the day to get them even more excited.  Well, nothing went right that evening.  We got lost and realized we were on the other side of the boar harbor so by the time we back tracked and went to the right location, it was all over.  We went anyway and it was freezing, much colder than we expected and the girls were complaining how cold it was which irritated me since we told them many times it was going to be cold and they needed to layer up.  One of my sweet, always obeying daughters refused to layer up and she was just shaking.  We decided to fly our lanterns anyway and we brought 10 lanterns, and we tried 5 of them, but none of them flew.   It was too windy and the sky lanterns I bought on Amazon were no good.  I took 2 pictures with our camera and then the battery died so I took the rest with my iPhone.  We were suppose to meet up with our friend there but I couldn’t find her because there were so  many people and it was really dark, and we were also so late.  
If it was a normal me, I would’ve brushed it off and said(with sarcasm), “That was fun, I’m so glad everything went so right!  Now, who wants to go get hot chocolate?” and be perfectly fine, but I’m not normal these days,  I’m a 16 1/2 weeks pregnant woman.  That means the world is over.  I got in the car so bitter and angry.  I drank my hot chocolate all bitter and angry.  I told Jay I was so angry and I didn’t know why, but I was just so angry!  Then I realized, I know why, I am pregnant, that’s why!  And I remembered how moody I got when I was pregnant before, and I had completely forgotten about it until last night.  Oh, the joy of miraculously forgetting everything that has to do with having a baby until you experience it all over again!  Well, realizing that made me more angry and I felt like I was tricked and there must be a big conspiracy going on that makes woman get pregnant over and over again.  No one tells you any of these things, not your doctors, your nurses, your birthing class, nobody!  
I woke up today feeling totally fine, so I need to remember how I get when I feel tired and needing more sleep.  Do any of you get moody and angry and irritated easily while being pregnant?  Or is it just me……?

Food Love

~ Etc.

As soon as I found out we were going to California, I knew I had to make a list.  A list of places to go see?  No.  A list of things to do?  No.  A list of things to pack?  No.  It was for a list of foods to eat.  I even googled and read a ton of reviews to see where they had the best certain food from my list and wrote down the restaurant’s name and it’s address.  It’s a little embarrassing to admit I did this.  Can you tell I’m pregnant?

So here are all the foods I checked off from my list.

Paris Baguette.  A popular bakery in Korea that has many chains around California.  Such delicious pastries that are not too sweet, but soft, flaky, buttery, and perfect.
Wurstkuche.  Jay was told by several local people from LA that this place sells awesome bratwursts.  And they did.  They had exotic flavors such as rattlesnake, rabbit, pheasant, & crocodile.
 Ten Rens Tea Time.  We just picked a random boba place and I was happy with my mango boba.  
Food trucks galore!  I’ve always heard of food trucks but never followed their tweets and track their location.  The famous Kogi truck was there too & their famous kimchi quesadilla.
Dim Sum!  It’s my kind of food since I love tasting a little bit of everything, which dim sum is exactly!  

My sister and I went to Korea town in LA one night after all our bebes were asleep, and went to a place where you go to drink.  We didn’t order any alcohol but they sell delicious sides you’re suppose to eat with alcohol haha.  We got ddukbokki(spicy rice cakes), and soondae(glass noodles stuffed in intestines).  
Yuchun Nangmyun.  This place sells the best cold noodles & awesome giant dumplings!  
Can’t forget about Korean B.B.Q!  We went with all of Jay’s cousins after our day at the Knotsberry Farm and Jay was busy going around all the tables explaining how to eat like a real Korean…  which was funny since he’s not Korean at all.
Now I need to make a list of foods to eat in N.Y… I mean a list of places to visit, eh hem.