One Year Ago...

my wonderful maedeup book came out. My only regret that it was written while we were living in South Korea and I had to curtail a lot of exploring of Korea to write the book. But I'm so proud of how it turned out and the response I have received on it. It has touched many people and I hope it continues to do so.

In celebration of it's first anniversary, I'm giving away a free copy. To enter is easy, just leave a comment here on my blog. I'll choose a winner Friday, Sept. 24th and 6:00pm CST. Good luck everybody!

Turkey Time

The last couple of weeks during my daily walk I've run into a flock of turkeys. They are very skittish and take off when I come near. I brought my camera hoping to catch a picture of them but by the time I got the camera out they had already gotten pretty far away. They still are pretty impressive.

I love, love, love FT Island's new song "Love, Love, Love." Here they are performing it live and take that Justin Bieber, they do not lipsinc. I was also sad to see the lead singer has dropped his golden locks for brunette:

Maedeup Monday!

A very dear friend of mine wanted a maedeup necklace for his granddaughter. Her favorite color is purple and this is the finished project.


I added a dragonfly charm which in Korea means so many things like good luck and prosperity. It was fun do make and I decided to try my limited photography skills outside using this rock in our yard as the background.

The rock has a story all in its own. It came from the St. Croix River which is about 10 miles from our house. The rock is pretty large and I would guess to say it weights between 50 and 75 pounds. My son brought the rock home while we were living in South Korea to help him with his weight training. He told me that he would walk around the yard carrying the rock for exercise. I can only imagine what our neighbors might have thought. Of course, our son has moved out and forgotten his rock so it sits under our deck. I was happy for find a use for it.

Korean Food American Style

This week I've been down with a nasty flu bug. I came down with it Labor Day and have spent most of the week in bed. I'm finally starting to feel better but it sure did hang on for the longest time. To make matters worse, Rocketman had the week off.

But last week I got a craving for kimbap so I decided to make some. I had never made it before but my Korean girlfriend, Hannah, taught me once when we lived in South Korea. You start with some sticky rice which you add some rice vinegar and sugar to.


These are the ingredients I used. Also one of my favorite Korean kimbap is with SPAM. Our favorite place to get kimbap in Korea is a chain called School Food. We also try to hit it when we are visiting.

This is the roll I made for myself. I like cheese in it too but a lot of people don't. You can make it with just about anything.

This is what it looked like after I rolled it. Rocketman was surprised to come home from work to a Korean meal.

I also found this ramyeon in our local Cub grocery store and was so excited. The checkout lady said her teenagers were mad for it and she bought it by the case. She said it was too spicy for her. I only bought a couple in case we didn't like it but it was just like we would get in Korea. So I'm stocking up on it. We had it with our kimbap.

Here is the video of Hannah teaching me how to make real Korean kimbap:

Maedeup Monday!

I found this Tinkerbell pendant while living in South Korea and it was just too cute to pass up. If you couldn't tell, lavender and purple are my favorite colors. Maybe that's because I was born in February.


A closer view and Tinkerbell was not cooperating thus the sideways view. All the knots I used in this necklace can be found in my maedeup book "Elegant Knotted Jewelry."

Next week I will teach you how to add these premade garakji maedeups. It's very simple but adds so much to the jewelry.

The flea market turned out to be a bust. Last minute both my daughter and son-in-law came down with the flu so we went and picked up Noah to watch overnight. Wouldn't you know it, 12:30am that night the vomiting began and we were up most of the night cleaning him up and doing laundry. Everyone is feeling better now but Grandma and Grandpa are still recuperating. It's been a long time since we were up with a sick child.

I hope everyone had a great Labor Day weekend. Rocketman is taking this week off to work on his ever growing "Honey Do" list. I still can't figure out why it never goes down.

Toadily!

While mowing the lawn the last few times, the grass has been jumping with baby toads. They as so cute and I certainly don't want to run any over. They hear me coming and jump out of the way. But if they jump close to the mower, I stop mowing, try to catch them and put them out of harm's way. It may take me longer to mow but that's the way it is.

The cool front came through and today I'm wearing a sweatshirt. It's cold and blistery with the forecast saying we won't be out of the 50's today.

Tomorrow I'm hitting a flea market in Elco with my daughter. Rocketman is hoping I won't find any treasures.

Minnesota State Fair - Part 4- The People

We found tons of people at the Minnesota State Fair.

We love to get above the fair and look around. It's a fun ride except when it stops in midair. It doesn't help that I'm not fond of heights.

I loved this sign: NOT as seen on TV.

We met some pitchmen. They are always fun to watch. I miss Billy Mays.

The Shamm-Wow guy was there.

And then there was the fudge guy.

We ran into an old friend, Jeff Loven. He's amazing and do you know he turned down the opportunity to audition for Guns n' Roses? True story.

He played at our daughter's wedding.

We saw people flying through the air.

And on a float in a parade.

We saw a flamingo bike.

And a rooster bike. Sister 3 collects roosters and I bet she would have loved to add this to her collection.

I waited in line to get my picture taken with my favorite news anchors from WCCO television. This is Mike Max, a sports reporter.

This is Amelia Santaniello, half of the husband and wife anchor on WCCO. She and hubby, Frank, arrived late due to the record traffic so she wasn't able to be at the photo op.

But as luck would have it, the camera broke when it was my turn and as Mike Max and I were waiting for it to be repaired, Frank popped in. Mike asked me if I knew Frank Vascellaro and I was shocked to turn and there he was!!

We got to talk a long time and then he saw that Sister 2 was taking pictures so he called her over.

We took the picture in true Korean style. They were such good sports. I left and I don't know if they ever did get the camera working but it sure worked out for me.