Homebody Confessions

I am such a homebody. My idea of paradise is eating something delicious and vegging out watching Korean dramas.

I am such a T.V. addict that I refuse to let my children or anyone in my family watch any television in front of them. I used to watch my K-dramas when they were asleep, but I don't have the energy to stay up anymore. So I read drama recaps at dramabeans.

One of the purposes of this blog was to help motivate me to be more one with nature with my children. And I've been slacking. So, I made a pledge: I will go outside with my children everyday rain or shine--at least for ten minutes.

So, day #1 was yesterday. We ended up staying out for an hour. It helps that my backyard has a little swing and slide set and that it's basically a forest. I was terribly homesick, but there are many aspects of moving that I am thankful about. And having a mini-forest, despite the mosquitoes even in November in your backyard is one of them.

The foliage here is different from Chicago. I saw this star-shaped leaf that was my favorite leaf from Ken Robbins' Autumn Leaves. I can't remember the name of the leaf, but will find out soon. One of my future projects with my kids will be identifying leaves, birds, and pine cones. I borrowed a more heavy-duty leaf book a while back, but I was still mystified. I'm learning with my children.

We also went bird hunting. That is, hunting just to view them. It's been hard to see birds the past few days though I was so excited to see a woodpecker. One Hindu-inspired Montessori activity is the listening game. You just ask your children to pause for a minute or two in absolute silence and just concentrate on what they can hear. In the summer, it's great to hear cicadas. But near-winter, bundled up with hats, it's harder, but still worthwhile. And if you concentrate, you can hear several different types of birds.

When we finally spotted some birds next door, Cheeky started yelling in Korean, "Wah!" (Translation: Come!) and proceeded in gibberish and finally ended with an evocation of my mom's dog, "Buku!" I tried to explain to her that we needed to be quiet if we wanted the birds to not fly away, but I don't know how much she understood.