We got a light blue tea pot and navy mugs from my friend.  I've been thinking to buy tea pot for a while, so it was a thoughtful, unexpected present. :)  Actually, I asked a favor of her to buy a lot of grits when she went to the States in the middle of June.  We couldn't make an appointment for a while after she came back to Seoul.  Finally, we met, and I got two boxes of grits.  Ironically, the time I asked her to buy grits Mike and I didn't set up the date to move to the States.  So now, we have enough grits to eat until September. 

We bought our flight tickets to move to the States on the last day of September.  It is getting to be real.  I started making "to do" lists before we leave.  There are many things, already, to arrange since I've lived here for my whole life. 

Last Sunday, Mike went to get a haircut and I waited for him outside of the hair shop.  This was the first time he went to hair shop without me.  But anyway, now, his stylist knows his style well so he doesn't need to talk to her.  The reason why I didn't go with him was that the hair stylist always pushes me to have perm when I go there for Mike's haircut.  He usually gets a  haircut about once every three weeks and I have perm every three months or more.  Last time, she looked at me like my hair condition was terrible so it was the right time to have a perm. :(   I decided against her the last time she asked to me have a perm, but I didn't want pressure from  her this time.  So I waited for him to get his haircut by taking photos and had a coffee in a cafe.  

Light dinner in the summer time.  Vinaigrette source, fresh vegetables, roasted corn and bread.  It is enough. :)

My 3rd knitting class photos are here.  My friend and knitting teacher, Joo-hyun came to my house to knit something together.  It was a very peaceful afternoon.  She is quite talented at making anything by hand.  She made dolls which inspired her character design and I made some basic motifs for doilies.  I learned many skills from her. :)   

I finally got my immigration visa from U.S. Embassy.  The night before the interview for the visa I was distracted with many thoughts.  One of the thoughts is how many times will I have tense moments like I have now in my life... worrying doesn't make the situation good.  I tried to be relaxed.  Mike and I had a sort of rehearsal as an interviewee and interviewer.  I just wanted to make sure I would speak exactly to any questions they might have had. :)  

Luckily, the whole process went smoothly.  The interview was simple, and the many copies of documents we prepared were in order.  After, I left the Embassy with a relaxed breath.  We said "Congratulations!" to each other with a big smile.  We felt that we are stepping forward together.  My feelings are divided into two parts exactly.  One part is really happy to get the visa without any trouble, and another part is sad to move to somewhere far from my family and friends.  I'm still not sure how I feel about it but, I'm fully trying to run!

These badges are from my friend.  She designed new version and gave us a couple deers as a present. :)

I haven't been breathing well almost for 3 weeks.  At first, I didn't think it was serious, I just thought it was because of pressures of the visa interview.  But, it has been getting worse and worse, I couldn't bear it anymore this week.  It caused me to feel anemic and have headaches.  So I went to hospital, had an electrocardiograph and took a x-ray.  The doctor said my heart and lungs don't have any problems and I have got too much pressure and stress from my subconscious.  It baffled me because I didn't think I have been too stressful...  "Be relaxed.", I just got this diagnosis from doctor with a prescription of sedatives for 4 days. :(  

We watched 'When Harry met Sally' again.  How touching and adorable Meg Ryan is.  This movie makes me full of romantic feelings whenever I watch this.  I can't wait until Christmas season!

Usually, I don't watch movies from before 1980's even if they are Korean movies or Western movies.  But, Mike likes watching old movies, different kinds of black and white films.  He has his private old movie collection that I tried to watch, but I failed.  It required me to drink a lot of caffeine. :p

These photos are from my brother when he traveled abroad in Europe last month.  He showed me all the photos he took, they looked amazing!!!  I know the way he felt, learned and thought a lot while being alone for a month on his travels.  And now, he has grown more like I did after I traveled abroad. 

I found we had many brown bananas in the refrigerator.  So, I baked 9 banana muffins with 4 bananas on Saturday morning.  I didn't measure the amount of all ingredients correctly.  I was totally thrilled with how the muffins would turn out when they were baking in the oven.  They were soft and sweet from the bananas.  Mike and I enjoyed some muffins for breakfast and I took these to my breakfast appointment with my friends.  Doing something in the morning time is always good!   

I carved a new pattern into a rubber board for block printing.  I like the hand carved result.  It is not sophisticated and little rough, but the result has a special look by my hand.  I should adjust it a little bit more and print on some canvas fabric.  I have a plan to embroider on some cross-stitching after printing this time.  I'm curious of the final result!

 

I bought this canvas bag at an amazing price, just 5 cents in the flea market.  The stitching is a  little poor on the upper side, but this treasure is great to wear with any outfit.  I like the passage "LIVE GREEN."  I barely use my leather formal bag and shoes these days.   I am dressing very casual with this light bag and flat shoes this summer.

We both like to drink a tea.  We start the day drinking a tea with breakfast and finish the day drinking green tea.  I prefer to drink hot tea or coffee, not cold things, even though it's summer time.  My friend living in Germany sent many kinds of tea to us.  I feel rich with various flavors of tea. :)  One of these, ginger+orange tea tastes so well together, ginger makes the flavor softer.  This strawberry shaped tea infuser is ideal to enjoy tea time. 

Photos of Shelter Island which is about one and one-half hour away from Manhattan.  His friend's family owns the Pridwin Hotel in Shelter Island so he went there before.  He mentioned this beautiful island to me a few times, so we decided to go here.  It was very beautiful and peaceful everywhere.  We were lucky to go there right before the summer season.  Many people living in Manhattan have their vacation here, so usually it is crowded on weekends in the summer time.  It was little chilly there in the middle of May.  We spent a very romantic time here. :)  I liked the furniture and the color coordination of our room's styling.  

Fun time at the rooftop bar around our apartment for PECHAKUCHA Seoul.  It was the second time to go seeing this design event.  Some artists, designers, and architects presented their artwork selected from Pechakucha organizer.  It was drizzling in the middle of presentation, but nobody cared about the rain.  We got lots of youthful energy. :)

I baked rye bread with organic ingredients-rye powder, multi grain flour, sugar.  It is little dry and homey tasting.  I emphasized that this bread tastes homey to Mike. :p  The smell of rye and multi grain of the bread in the oven is really good.  This bread is healthy because it uses lots of rye powder as much as flour.  When I traveled in Germany, I fell in love with their dried bread using a lot of grain and nuts.  I will bake Christstollen bread usually eaten in  Germany at Christmas next time.  

Peter Cincotti - Some Kind of Wonderful

I can't stop listening this song by Peter Cincotti.  His voice is so sweet!  *.*

No more meat, no more bread, no more coffee... We are so sad....

These foods, actually many more than these, don't suit our body constitution.  I don't think we can follow this new meal plan absolutely.  Mike and I like eating all kinds of meat and pork!

We went to an Oriental medicine clinic to check our body constitution.  I just wanted to know which foods are good for us.  Since I've started cooking, I've wanted to cook dishes with things that can make our body more healthy.  The examination process is different from Western hospitals.  We were lying on the bed set high so that three doctors can feel our pulse.  The doctors diagnose our heath after feeling our pulse.  They gave us a chart of good foods and bad foods for each of us.  Mike and I have almost same body constitution, with only 5% difference.  So these bad foods are almost same.  

Yes, we felt good to know about our body constitution in detail.  On the other hand, we are sad that we should be conscious of these foods we love to eat.  Mike already feels bored eating only fish and salad.  So we reached a rule, we can have meat twice per week.  Maybe small amounts will be okay, we want to believe... :D

We went to Jeju Island to take pictures of the villa Mike designed last weekend.  We met the manager of the villa and had fun at brunch.  I tried to assist Mike while photographing, but he could manage pretty well by himself. :)   After then we drove around the island.  The scenery was not so good but we enjoyed breathing fresh air from the ocean.  This short trip was good to be out of our daily routine. 

I finally scanned my first Leica film yesterday.  I was excited waiting to getting data from the photo house.  Maybe, this is the reason people still like film cameras.  So the result is not too bad. :)  I was interested in these individual photos of the same place because they have a different depth of color.  I changed to a new roll of film, now I'm ready for my 2nd roll!