Sand! - Mallipo Beach, S.Korea

We had more beach fun earlier this week at Mallipo Beach! It was different than the first beach we went to. This one had real sand! 

There were starfish and other creatures too...

The kids all made friends and played with some local kids that spoke English very well and seemed excited to get to practice using it with us!  :)

The blue starfish were the most exciting find that day...

As usual, we had a few photoshoots with the local Korean people. It's so funny how many of them want their picture taken with random American children. My kids are so use to it now though, they don't seem to mind. Joshua even hams it up quite a bit and really gets the Korean girls squealing with delight as he poses for them and with them! It's a good thing we're in Korea while he's 5 and not 15.  :)

We also checked out another beach that day that was close to Mallipo but it wasn't as sandy. It was much more wet and muddy...Samuel still enjoyed playing in it though!

I think a few tiny crabs lost their lives that day because of this cute little guy! He kept trying to pick them up because they were everywhere, and they mostly got squished!

His other favorite part of the day was chasing all of the "doggies!" We kept telling him that all the seagulls were "birds" but he kept shouting "doggie!" as he chased them. :) By the time we left he did say "bird" a few times, but even the crabs he was calling "doggie" that day! :)

Summer Reading Club

We have had the opportunity to be a part of an amazing summer reading program over here at our library. Our friend who is leading it is doing a wonderful job and the kids are so excited about going to their 'reading club' every Friday!

The theme this summer is "A Midsummer Knight's Dream." The kids all recieved fun shirts to wear the first week we went and they've been wearing them every Friday since.  :)

Every week they do a great storytime with wonderful books and crafts and then the kids get prizes for turning in their reading logs from the week. We record the books they've read and some of the ones that I read aloud to them too. This week, their prize was a giant bouncy ball that lights up and changes colors. The kids thought that was pretty cool, and then were even more excited when they got fuzzy caterpillar stuffed animals just for being there!

My kiddos were already 'book worms' before, but the incentive of the reading program has them reading ALL THE TIME! 

Even Faithy, who's not reading for herself yet, will bring me stacks of books so she can add more to her reading log to turn in (since books that Mom reads count too!) Of course Joy is always willing to read aloud to them also. She's such a good big sister.  :) 

Beach Treasures

The kids have been enjoying their treasures from the beach all week. Rocks and shells can be so much fun to explore and play with!

Faithy was especially excited about the cute, teenie-tiny ones that we found. They don't look that small in her little pudgy three year old hand, but they are pretty itty-bitty.   :)

Joshua had fun turning some of his shells into a shaker by putting some of the little ones inside one of his bigger clam shells. 

We've got quite a collection of beach treasures now and everyone is having with them.  :) 

Faithy's Verse

I finally figured out how to post video on the blog!...This is going to be fun! Now we can share some of our movies of the kids with all the Grandparents (and anyone else who watches.) 

Here's one we took of Faithy recently reciting one of her Bible verses.  :)

Samuel Speaking Korean

A little video of Samuel speaking Korean...pretty cute stuff.  :)

Dancin' Adams'

Peter is teaching his kids his awesome dance moves and his love for 80's music...

Dinosaur Egg Fossils and Jebudo Island

We went on another awesome adventure with some sweet friends this last week to search for some Dinosaur Egg Fossils that we heard were here in S.Korea and also made our way over to a beach for some fun in the  mud  sand on Jebudo Island.

We started at the dinosaur place where some very kind Korean ladies showed us around and seemed very excited to have a whole group of American kiddos visiting.

Have you ever heard of this species?  :)

They even showed us this neat little video all about this species of dinosaur that is said to have once lived here in S.Korea....of course we couldn't understand any of it, but the kids sat so nicely and enjoyed the whole thing! :)

She showed us out the window where they had model dinosaur eggs and a t-rex busting through the wall as if he was going to eat them for lunch!

She lead us outside so the kids could play on them and Joy thought it was so funny that all the kids were sitting on giant eggs...

We got to look through the window of what appeared to be a lab where they had some interesting things they were working on. 

Finally it was time to head outside to see the real dinosaur egg fossils....

See those hills WAY OVER THERE....Yeah, that's where we're going.  :)

The view was gorgeous though and the kids didn't seem to mind the long walk in the sun at all, in fact they ran almost all of it!

We realized after walking for a few minutes that we had our own paparazzi following us. Such is life in S.Korea when you've got a whole group of adorable American kiddos with you! This guy seriously followed us all the way there and back. Every now and then he'd stop and show me one of the pictures he took if he was really proud of it. At the end of our trip back, he took Peter's email and somehow communicated that he would send them to us, so we'll see. I hope he does because he got some great shots with that amazing camera that I would love to have copies of!

There were many creepy crawlies to examine along the way...

It was so peaceful out there, I loved the walk even though it was a little long for the kids. 

When we finally arrived, our guides pointed out the fossilized dino eggs...

 They pretty much looked like rocks...See the "nest of circles"...those are 'eggs' that have been cut crosswise so they are just flat circles now.   :) We saw a few more roped off areas like this and then we headed back.

Here are all the beautiful women and children that Peter was stuck with  had the privilege of spending his entire day off with...

Joy enjoyed the attention from the photographer that followed us and captured every little thing she did. Here she was tying the long grass together and for some reason he thought he needed pictures of that too...

My friend Maia is SUPERWOMAN! She carried both her boys like this for a long part of the trip back...

We tried to get a family shot on the long way back...should have done it on the way out there before everyone was tired!

More sweet Daddy shots...

After our 'car picnic' in the air conditioned vans, we drove out to Jebudo Island. We got to cross the very cool 'Moses Road' to get there that is only open for 8 hours a day. It's called the Moses Road because when the tide comes up the entire thing is covered with water. So if you don't get back across it before the tide starts coming, then you'll be stuck on the island till the tide changes and the waters part to reveal the road again! Here is a picture of the road on our way home. You can see the sandy shores on either side...

The island was very fun for the kids. We checked out the little lighthouse and spent most of the afternoon digging in the sand. 

The kids found tons of cool rocks and shells and Peter showed them how to find the crabs and other creatures...they LOVED it!

It was SO muddy! We definitely should have worn rain boots, next time we'll remember!

Samuel loved diggin' in the sand too...

We found TONS of crabs!

Faithy's beautiful sand creation...  :)

Mommy likes all the cool rocks too.  :)

The kids loved exploring the beaches and we came home with buckets full of shells and rocks. Our friend Carrie's son accidently came home with some shells that were still being lived in and didn't realize it till one crawled across her kitchen counter! :)

I'm so glad he had the day off.  :)

There were some REALLY GIANT shells out there!

The sailboats were exciting to see too...

Peter really wanted to go climb those big rocks but we never made it down that far. Maybe next time.  :)

It was a very fun day for The Adams' & Friends!  :)