home for the holidays......

yeah i arrived home safely and was able to get great rest on the trip home. paul picked me up at the airport and it was so wonderful to see him. :) we went to dinner at el gallo with my mom and katie which was fun. that night i actually slept pretty well. sunday morning was early as i wanted to see paul play at church. the normal sunday morning routine was kept just as usual----starbucks on the way to church!!! it was awesome to see everyone and i even started crying during the morning band practice. gosh, i miss my community in houston! church was great and i got to see paul sing the worship song sing to the king which was rocking! after church we went to the black lab for lunch. fun fun fun!

monday i had breakfast at brasil with my mom and then we hung out all day. it was nice! tuesday i had my first date with paul. (more details on that in next blog)
wednesday was girls nite out at the mad potter which was lots of fun! i had a blast hanging out with the ladies and catching up. thursday was the day o' the doctor's visits----ugh! i made all the rounds to get all the check ups and such i needed. later that night i had the dressy date with paul which was awesome! friday katie and i got to hang out and i went to get my hair done....yeah! i love the people who do my hair.....sufi and sufi are the best! saturday was another all day date with paul which was the most amazing day i have ever had in my life! yeah! paul rocks!

sunday was christmas eve and paul and i had a marathon of family visiting to do for christmas. we started at his aunt's in clear lake for lunch and the early afternoon. i got to meet the rest of the family which was really great. they are a lot of fun! we exchanged white elephant gifts which was really funny! then we opened the real gifts. it was great getting to meet his family and spend more time with them. i cannot wait to be able to see them more.

after his aunt's we trekked back to sugar land with dinner and the evening time with my family. it was really nice too. i got to hang out with josh for the first time since i had been home which was awesome! we had a nice time together. we ate dinner and then opened presents. i had lots of fun watching my family open the presents i brought them from korea. then we went to the late service at my brother and sandra's church. it was nice to be together and celebrate the season.

after church we headed to paul's parents for the night. christmas morning started at about 9:30 and we unloaded stockings, had breakfast, and then opened gifts. it was great to spend that time with them. the rest of the day we just hung out and rested. later in the afternoon we went to christina's mom's house to have dinner. the whole maiorana crew was there and we were able to announce our engagement which was fun! we had a great time.

dec. 26th was paul and i's one year anniversary. we celebrated by doing the same thing we did one year earlier on our first date. we ate lunch at pei wei on heights and then went to see a holiday movie. this year we saw "the holiday" at the angelika. even though we were a bit late, it was a good movie. after the movie we had dinner at nicole's house with her family. yeah for friends! paul and i had a great time visiting and seeing the kids. :)

wednesday i got to hang out with josh all day! it was awesome! we went to lunch at earl of sandwich and then saw the movie "night at the museum"----great flick! paul's parents had invited my family over for dinner to celebrate our engagement which was good. it was nice to see our families come together and share a meal together. cream taco is yummy!!!

thursday-saturday i stayed at my brother's house to animal sit while they drove to tennessee to watch the cougars play in the liberty bowl. friday night we went to dinner with the guy paul works with and his wife. we got treated to dinner at the capitol grille. it was good!

saturday i went dress shopping at david's bridal and had fun. it is really exhausting trying on those heavy dresses. finally after about 2 hours, i found the one. we made the purchase and then headed to lunch at central market. yum! one more thing to check off the list of planning.....

sunday paul and i went to church at grace even though he was not playing. it was different to sit next to him the entire service. :) we went to brunch at the black lab and had matt's mom take some engagement photos of us there too. later that night we went to tricia and allen's new year's eve party at their house. we got to kiss at midnight!!! it was fun and kelly documented the moment for us. :)

monday was a lazy day! nothing major....just hanging out. tuesday we met with t. doug, our pastor, to talk about getting married and the dates and such. God was really watching over us because the morning went soooo smoothly. we met with the wedding coordinator at the church and the facilities lady as well. we are getting married at grace pres. on july 14th, 2007 at 2pm with reception to follow in the fellowship hall. yeah!!!! huge stress out of the way!!!

that night we went to dinner with my family at seoul garden, it was good, but not as good as the korean food in korea. go figure. i had a great time sharing new food with them and getting to speak a little korean.

wednesday i finally got rid of my car at carmax! yeah i am officially sans car!!! :) oh what a glorious feeling! i ran last minute errands and then did some laundry. we had dinner at lupe tortilla's which was awesome as always! we ate with katie and my mom which was good too. i had to stay up late packing as i left on thursday. again, i waited to the last minute to pack all my junk. poor paul!

he had to get me to airport for 5:30am, but we did not get there until 6:15ish. it was ok although the line was sooooo long. it all worked out though. i slept most of the flights here which was nice. i think sleeping makes the time go by faster. :) in san francisco there were 9 other SFSers coming back to Seoul so that was fun seeing people at the airport. we were all on the same flight. i rode the airport bus to the school and then another SFS teacher who was already home came down the hill to get us and our luggage. it was great!!

it is good to be here although i do miss home a lot. i got to love on sam and india and hang out. i went to bed around 10:30 and woke up at 5:30am to snow.....lots of snow.