Wednesday, June 27, 2012

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Yesterday was our one year anniversary, I received flower delivery, which is always great!

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My husband surprised me with a secret planned dinner at the Montage hotel in Laguna Beach. I shamelessly brought my camera with me and took pictures of our food. It was great to watch the sunset over the ocean from the gorgeous windows while sipping wine. I feel so lucky to have a husband that remembers all the important dates better than myself, and goes out of his way to plan romantic evenings just like back when we were still dating!

Monday, June 25, 2012

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I'm done with teaching, done done done! I officially finished my last lessons today, actually, my last lessons finished a while ago but I offered parents some free lessons as a thank you note for the years that they took lessons from me. It was very emotional because the older kids who were beginning to understand the meaning of saying goodbyes started crying, if I didn't try hard holding back my tears I would start crying too.

So that's it, years of laboring over the piano, childhood lost in practicing rooms instead of playgrounds, adolescent lost in practicing rooms instead of the beach and camps, and college lost in practicing rooms instead of parties and real life, performing dreams, years and years of teaching experience, putting all that behind, this time, for real. I drove home tonight feeling a mixture of nostalgia and relief. It was, after all, a heavy responsibility to be a teacher. All these years of me constantly asking myself if I'm wasting their time, or am I making their studies worth while? Am I happier teaching instead of performing? Now I can put all that questions behind. In the end, I realized that I can only do the best I can, and if I can't say anything from the students' end, I know I've learned a great deal more from the kids and parents than a lot of things I learned from years of schooling combined.

I've really closed a chapter of my life, an important chapter, and turned the leaves to a new one.  Sometimes it feels though life is a constant stream of saying goodbye and hello, and just as I thought I've made home in one place, I am already on the road for another.
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Having green tea with my Chinese clay tea pot puts a smile on my face!

Thursday, June 21, 2012

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I'm taking things real slow this week so I can sleep whenever I need to and do stuff that's really good for me such as taking pictures of my dogs and blog about it.
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It's been a dog kind of day today. Everyone got a hair cut, except mommy:)

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Our new sofa arrived yesterday, I'm already liking it so much better than my old settee!

Tuesday, June 19, 2012

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This is called Hokkaido elm, Chinese elm, or my favorite name, Princess elm. It has the tiniest of leaves of the dwarf elm family. Once I saw it as a display at a nursery and I simply couldn't forget about it! It's very hard to appreciate the delicate leaves of the tree from pictures, but in my opinion they are quite elegant.  Fairy garden material? I think so:)

Sunday, June 17, 2012


I haven't done a fairy garden tutorial in a while. While I was at OSH this morning I saw these indoor/outdoor LED light, and they would be perfect to put in fairy gardens because of how tiny they are.


Here's how it looks in one of my fairy gardens, all I had to do was wrapping the wire around the fairy trellis, turn on the lights, and there you have it!


What's so great about these light is that they are on a timer, so once you turn them on, they stay on for 6 hours til the next day. You won't waste battery during the day time. There's something about the lights that make the fairy garden truly magical, so far I love it!

On a side note, I would wrap the battery box in plastic eventually so they won't be damaged by water, the lights themselves seem to be holding up ok:)

My husband spotted these shoes chew toys at my local pet store, and we had to get these for the boys. Uggie has a "thing" for my flip flops. He spots them, chews them up, spreads the pieces all over the house in no time. The average life span of my flip flops is about two days. I laid the chew toys by the door entrance and not before long they were on it, crack me up so much!


Here's one of Fie Fie in action!

Thursday, June 14, 2012



I could use a rest, I mean a real rest, no more non stop phone calls that last from 7am - 9 pm, no more prolonged driving with nausea and hives, no more emails that sits in my inbox when I'm too tired to read it, no more laundry to do, junk to move around, and maybe some good walk and light exercise.  But then again, you can always think that there are people in worse shoes in the world, such as this poor bird, he somehow lost a foot, so he's hopping on a leg without a foot, he (she?) starred a lot instead of moving often, and while I was on the beach he stayed not too far from me.  What is it to live as a bird in a world that's rapidly diminishing in natural habitats? I wish I could be free as a bird, but even the birds have it tough now a days.

Wednesday, June 13, 2012


Pictures of Carmel-by-the-sea. This week I took my dad for more sight-seeing in Northern-California. I'd prefer to have the whole family but my mom and husband both had to work, so we went by ourselves. The morning we had to leave, I suddenly had a bad out break of hives, call it stress related or hormonal in-balance, I was in total agony for the whole trip while driving hundreds of miles.  The scenery on the other hand was beautiful, and we had some pretty good food along the way!


There are lots of little inns very close to the beach, ours was literally a block away. My room had a fireplace, no tv, and beautiful antique furniture, perfect for me! I woke up the next morning and had breakfast in the lounge among other tourists, it was quite nice!

As soon as I got back home I ran into my husband back from walking Uggie,  he had been working at all hours, watering all my fairy gardens, taking care of all my dogs so the house was in even better shape than I left it, so what can I say? I've got the most giving hubby in the world and I love my family!

Now I can finally post my fairy garden pictures,


I found the bucket at a gift shop, the cashier was kind enough to drill a hole on the bottom of the bucket once she learned that I planned to use it as a plant container. I used two trees here, a pink Serissa, and a double white Serissa. I often use this combination of miniature trees in my fairy garden because I love the way they look together. It is also impossible to buy large sized serissa because nobody grow them around me, so I plan to keep them for years until they become a decent size!


Another example of a pink serissa ( right) and a double white serissa (left,) though the tree hasn't got any flowers on it yet!


The last one is a hedgehog house fairy garden. I can't remember the name of that pine looking tree, but the other one is a small cotoneaster.  I truly missed taking care of my garden while I was away, almost as much as my dogs, isn't that strange?  The fairy gardens are their own worlds, and who's to say fairies don't "really" visit those gardens:)

Sunday, June 10, 2012




I got up early in the morning and bought a huge load of grocery from Korean super market. This is the last weekend my father stays in the States, I decided to invite my parents to our house for some backyard BBQ. In the morning my husband cleaned the leaves off the backyard, I cleaned the water fountain, we dragged out our grill, dusted off a thick layer of leaves and dirt, and got our house ready. I cooked a Chinese salad dish, grilled some marinated beef, chicken, and fish, and opened a bottle of wine we got as a wedding gift. It was quite nice grilling and eating dinner in our backyard under the big maple tree! I've done some serious fancy meals in my house but not so much cooking for my parents, although they are picky eaters, they actually liked my cooking this time, which is rare! So, I know there are restaurants that can do all the work for you, but it's nothing like cooking and chilling at home with everyone relaxed and enjoying a home cooked meal, agreed?


The fairies are getting ready to enjoy their cakes too, the tree on the left is a azalea, can't wait til next Spring when it blooms. More fairy garden posts to come!


Dog park after work today, and then a big pizza for dinner, all I can say is that good food makes me feel like life is real good! I probably did about three months of gardening work tonight, trimming and freshening up all my fairy gardens, I didn't finish EVERYTHING, but I was close. I've got some new fairy garden picture coming up tomorrow!

Saturday, June 9, 2012


What seem like an unappetizing mush is actually apple of the eye for my dogs. The past two months I practically cooked no food for human or dogs. Even Kelly started eating kibble, and a new dog like Uggie simply had no idea what real home cooked food taste like. I feel so behind on a lot of chores but today I decided to pull myself together and start cooking for my doggies again.

One of the easiest thing I make for them is shredded chicken meat boiling with brown rice, green peas, carrots, potatoes, celery, until the juice run out. I give them a big spoonful in each bowl, chill until the temperature cools down a bit, and then serve! It makes me feel so good to know they are eating healthy food instead of packaged kibble!


I try to feed them at the same time as my husband and I are having dinner so they don't hover over our food, but sometimes I like to watch them eat food, after all, it was hard work to cook for two human and three dogs, I'd like to see it being eaten. After dinner Uggie immediately came over to me and gave me a lick on my leg as a thank you note, dogs are the best!

Wednesday, June 6, 2012


I made this fairy garden quite a while back but forgot to post it! Due to the recent heat wave, I lost a couple of plants, and there are a few that looked not so happy! I started gardening as a hobby during October last year, so heat wave effecting plants is something I haven't thought of. With me being so busy lately, it's been a struggle to keep everything happy and live, but I'm trying!

New Year Preparation

I always like to do a bit of preparation at the end of each year to welcome the new year, although this year things were very challenging, I...