Day 180: Happy Birthday, @annabaik!

finished product!

shirley curled anna’s hair for her birsday bash!

yayyyyy it looked pretty pretty!

so, about 6 days before this day, i bought a dress to wear for her birthday bash; however, i found out that peeps under 21 had to leave the restaurant at 9 =[ and… since i’m 20… and would be the only underaged person there, i would only be able to stay for 30 minutes so i stayed behind, and sent her and shirley off!

it was fun! i felt like SUCH a girl that day. we got our nails done together, then shirley and i helped anna curl her hair (mostly shirley did it! haha i only moused), then parted ways

afterwards, i went down to  glenview and spent some time with Christopher. he was feeling dizzy, so i drove to his house instead of him driving up i was really kinda bummed that i couldn’t go to the bash.. and Christopher ended up not going either :/ but, if we did, we would’ve danced the night away, RIGHT CHRIS!??! hehe yup! you know it! i could show you my Chandler Bing! and Monica Gellar-Bing! :b ….one day… haha

annabelle–

thank you for being such a wonderful big sister! i’m so thankful for you i hope you have a wonderful 24th year of your life! =) i love you!

Day 179: Little Me, Big Me

little old me. i think i was 4..? first school picture ever!

for the sake of this post.

haha. i told Chris this the other day, but… i really wish there was some way i could meet my little self… i wonder what i, big-me, would’ve said to her… i can’t believe i’ve been on this earth for 20 years now.. it’s kinda surreal because… i’m just umm… i dunno… haha… still a little girl? that’s how i feel, anyway.

i wonder if little me would have listened to anything i said to her.. i thought about this while i was reading Time Traveler’s Wife, as well. a lot of people say that i look exactly the same right now as i did my freshman year of hs. i think that’s BOGUS! i do not look the same! haha

these days, i’ve been really wanting a sibling… whether it’s an older or younger (i prefer both)… but being with all these younger kids at lakeview ss, it made me wonder how different i would be if i had a younger sibling. i mean, God’s plan is God’s plan, so maybe i would’ve ended up as the same exact person as i am today, or maybe.. i would’ve been completely different! maybe not as aggressive? maybe more loving? compassionate? caring? mollah.

i really wish i had a sibling. hehe but yup. i love looking at pictures of me when i was little… sometimes, i feel like i actually remember things from when i was super young.. i mean, some things i DO remember from when i was like 3, but… most of the things, i don’t. however, when i look at pictures, i’m like, yo, i totally remember that. hahah. false memories? made-up memories?

i’m going to have lots of kids! well, at LEAST two!

Day 178: The Fourth Kind

He is, He is! i actually didn't grow up with Veggie Tales, but it's cute

so, this is one of the scariest movies i’ve ever seen… the things in it weren’t that scary–mostly jumpy parts–but just… the plot? or… the actual storyline was scary to me…

i actually watched this with Christopher and Jonny (they were fine during the whole thing -_-) at their crib. i was talking with Christopher afterwards and we both didn’t really understand how they thought it was aliens.. o_O” if you watch the movie, you’ll see why… but… yeah… i think i was the one that suggested watching it =\ boo on me.

after the movie ended, Christopher walked me out to my car, and as i was saying bye, i started crying.. hahaha because the movie really really really freaked me out. however, being the loving boyfriend he is, Chris gave me a big hug, called me a baby, and reminded me that “God is bigger than the boogie man”

i don’t think i’ve been that scared in a while.. i think i was more scared because the street right in front of his house is pretty dark :/ and if y’all didn’t know… little connie is afraid of the dark _-_,, i know, i know. i’m a baby.

as i got home, i realized that nobody was home!! at this point, i was still kinda scared, so i called Christopher on my way inside my house. hahahaha. I’M LAME! but it’s okay because i am still loved by Jesus! my dad was on a business trip and my mom slept over my grandma’s house because her oppa (my uncle) from Korea was visiting… so, i had to be continuously reminded that God is bigger than the boogie man…

PTL.

Day 177: 5th Grade Replay

the sun and jupiter. photo credit to google!

a little tidbit about my youth:

-school attended from K through 6th: Alexander Graham Bell Montessori School
-i was basically the only asian child in my elementary school
-students in the whole elementary school: 26
-i learned cued speech while i was in elementary school; we had a number of hearing impaired students, and i had the privilege of going to school with them and learning to interact with them as a child!
-my first friends were Kate Besenjak and Chris Donovan. haha, we used to play ‘house’ (not the tv show, but… like… you know, what the kids play when they play pretend) together in kindergarten. hahaha, i remember Chris’s dog’s name still–Shadow.

anyways.

when we were in 5th grade, we had the privilege of going to a nature camp. it was 5 days and 4 nights, i believe, where we got to live in cabins, experience nature in its fullest (for 5th graders, it was pretty awesome…still is now when i think about it!), and meet students from other schools! now, coming from a small school, we were really excited to meet new people, but the nature part of it was THE BEST.

i learned how to amplify sound by just cupping your hands behind your ears and bringing them a tad forward, learned about compost/ort, saw Jupiter with the naked eye, learned that birds don’t all fly the same way (there’s this one bird that flips around when they fly), and i learned about TRIBOLUMINESCENCE! hehehehe

anyways.

i think the most spectacular part of that whole trip was being able to see Jupiter. it was SO odd. it was only a SPEC in the night sky, however, i SWEAR i could see EVERY single color that makes up Jupiter! WITHIN THAT LITTLE SPEC! nature is truly amazing… God is seriously SO amazing…

Day 176: De.Voured.

devoured.

so, this summer, i’ve been spending a crazy amount of time in glenview because of work and hanging out with Christopher. i don’t mind, but i’m rarely home! i dunno. i like being home, but at the same time, i don’t. it’s a weird, conflicting paradigm.

anyways. today was one of the few days that Chris came over to MY house after work. we were both really tired, so we just watched some tv and napped before we decided that we should get some grub. honestly, he fell asleep, and i thought of going running because i hadn’t worked out (and still haven’t to this day (Sunday, July 25, 2010)… this day was actually Tuesday, July 13, 2010), so i got dressed and took a jog for about 10 seconds, realized the weather was too nice to do this by myself… so i went back inside and tried waking him up. i told him the weather was super nice, but he seemed really really tired, so i didn’t ask him to go out with me. so after some time, we went to get wings, because… i’ve been craving Buffalo Wild Wings for SO long.. since before school ended, but i hadn’t gone to get any =\

we actually ordered 30 wings, but ended up getting 36 wings–6 on the house! because of a order mix-up. i thought i was hungry enough to eat at least 15… but i was NOWHERE near… i don’t get why these things make you so full so fast… =\

i only ate around.. 8 or 9, and Chris ate the rest. he’s a beast.

i think i actually like some of their other food with the sauces they have instead of the wings..

Day 175: Learning

photo credits to tumblr

lately i’m realizing that i have so much to learn. most of the time, i feel like i should’ve already learned this a long time ago, but… the reality is, i haven’t.

1. i don’t know how to love
2. i don’t know how to be selfless

if i could HONESTLY sum up LIFE in one word, it would be unfair. forreals. life is just. unfair.

i think many of you could vouch for me when i say that, no? not everything falls under Hamurabi’s rule of “eye for an eye”.. how easy life would be if that were the case, right? maybe.

two things:

1. love is not fair
2. selflessness is not fair

it’s really not. in both situations, you’re thinking about others before yourself.. now, what if those ‘others’ you’re thinking about have hurt you in some way? then you’d think, ‘oh, it’s REALLY not fair’… but…

was it fair that Jesus, someone who had the perfect eternity going for Him in heaven, came down onto this very earth and was put to death for something He did NOTHING to deserve? no.

if you think about it that way, the “unfairness” that we tend to label “Life” turns into

“thankfulness”

.

we shouldn’t even be living right now, right? but. we are. WE ARE. each breath we take is a blessing and each step we take is a miracle..

although, life may seem unfair… i want to learn to be thankful. it’s easy to be thankful when everything is good; it’s easy to be thankful when you know there’s something better waiting for us than what this world can give…

Day 174: Grandpa’s Day of Birth

one of the only pictures of my gramps that i've ever seen; my eemo used to have this picture right on her night stand..

today was more family time

the first time i’d seen my cousin, annie, since like… january… seriously -_-” and it was the first time i was with more than one of my cousins at a time! julie AND annie were with me! chyeah. after church, we went to woodfield and shopped around it was fun! i hadn’t gone with them in a long time. so, when we left, the adults told us to come back around 5 so we could all eat dinner together.. and, we did get back by then. but the food wasn’t ready for another 2 hours! =(

annie had to leave by 650p, and julie had barely eaten all day PLUS, she was mad tired… so julie was very cranky, and annie didn’t even get to eat before she left -_-” i actually got pretty upset because our family hadn’t seen annie in months, and they couldn’t even pack food for her because of some tradition… ugh.

anyways. saw christopher later that night. bowled a few games, but i wasn’t in the mood to bowl, so we left. got some bk, and sat in the car for a little bit, then we split.

Day 173: Ohana

my eemos, samchoon from Korea, grandma, mom and dad in front of the Lyric Opera building on the chicago river; i want to watch an opera here! OH. and i know y'all can't really see from here, but the only two XYs that hung out with us today wore the exact same thing: navy blue polo from Polo and jeans -_-''

my whole family has gone into the city before, but that was when we were much younger. hrm, actually. maybe not my WHOLE family, just some of us.. we went to the Shedd however, today, most of the adults in my family and i went downtown for the day!

-train at 10:37a
-bought cta one day fun passes
-stopped for a quick meal at jimmy john’s
-headed towards  the Field Museum
-looked around in there for a couple hours
-took a break by the lake: the adults got hot dogs; not ALL of them did, but about 4 of them? man, so expensive… my mom said a bottle of Aquafina (bad) water cost $3!!!!!! -_-”
-headed down Michigan
-enjoyed the Wendella boat tour; we didn’t do the sunset one because we didn’t know what we’d do just waiting around for it, so we did the regular 90 tour which ended up taking around 2 hours because getting the boats out of the lake (due to a storm) was taking a long long time -_-”

• saw a rainbow
• saw the duality of a sunny sky and a stormy sky side-by-side twas awesome!
• the waters were pretty crazy compared to when chris and i went on the tour, a few days back
• the boat was much smaller than the one chris and i went on, so i was kinda sad (for my family) but.. s’all g =)

-started to rain after we got off the boat
-walked down Michigan some more
-they wanted to eat at the same place that my older cousin, annie and i went to eat: Grand Lux Café… so we did.
-afterwards, we were gonna go up to John Hancock, but.. it was already 9:30p by the time we were done eating, and the train was scheduled for 10:30p and then another one at 12:30a, and i honestly was SO tired from getting so little sleep the night before and from walking around all day, so we decided that we’d just head back towards the train station after dinner. i kinda wish we’d gone up because… well, the view of the city is just magnificent from Big John’s observatory, but.. i guess we’ll have to do that some other time.
-went home.

i actually had some fun with my family in the city at first, i didn’t think i was going to because.. i was the only “kid” there, from our family.. but, at the Field museum, while we were walking through the animal sections, i basically made fun of everyone in our family and called them a nasty animal. hahahaha, well, all of them weren’t nasty, just some of them =b but, i’m an awesome cheetah. i wish i remembered which animals corresponded to my family members.. haha

afterwards, everyone that went + my baby cousin, julie, slept over my house! julie and i made a midnight run to jewel/osco and just walked around there. she originally wanted to get some acne medicine or face wash or something because she said she was “breaking out” with a tiny pimple on the lower part of her cheek… man, people blessed with good skin… >_>” hahaha but we ended up getting… some other things, which i can’t really remember right now.

also, we rented a few movies from Red Box so we could watch them when we got back home. we rented Ninja Assassin, for the adults because they wanted to watch Bi in it haha, and Shutter Island, for us to watch. i saw it while it was released in theaters, but she hadn’t, so we decided to get that one. it was good =) but i was so tired.. i fell asleep towards the last half of the movie.. she, however, stayed up to finish that movie, watch cartoon network, and slept at freaking 7am -_-” she’s crazy, but i love her

–

if you guys don’t know yet–i LOVE the city of Chicago. i just LOVE LOVE LOVE it!

however.

it is a bit bittersweet. lots of good and bad memories when i think of the city. i was reminded of some of those bad memories that are associated with Chicago when i went out this day with my family; i don’t know why God was doing that to me, but i think He was trying to be humorous… >_>” haha. a mean yet funny kind of humor, you know what i mean? like the kind of humor you can use with kindergarteners because you know they’re still so naive and such, but it could be kinda mean, too? haha. anyways, yeah. so, i was in kind of a bum mood; and a lot of times, i feel this way when i’m in Chicago, but i try not to think about it, because i don’t want those bad memories to overpower me being able to make new, good memories, know what i’m sayin’?

anyhoot; i could walk around  Chicago forever.. just give me my walking shoes, an ipod with infinite battery life (that can also fit all my music), and some water and a book..i’m gone.

Day 172: Dozebo with a Side of Dunbins

sam "chicken little" posing with his garfield

so, on friday, july 9, i actually had a chance to visit the Brookfield Zoo again with a different group of peeps and. meh. ionno. these kids were very troublesome… haha, they talk back a lot and stuff whereas the younger kids will just listen to you, or if they don’t… at least they’re uber cute, right? =b jk, kinda.. haha

anywho, it was pretty hot this day. it wasn’t as hot as it was on wednesday when the younger kids went, but… man… it was still hot! so, they had this water spout thing where it, well,… spouted water? hahaha. it was a mist of cold water; felt nice.

water misting spout thing @ Brookfield Zoo

alright. so.. after work, christopher and i hung out, as usual. and to be honest… i don’t remember EXACTLY what we did… but, i know that somehow, we ended up at Dunkin Robins on Dempster! hahaha. honestly, the last time i remember being there was in the summer of 2005! haha. i remember that charley drove me there after…church…? cuz a bunch of people were meeting up there. maybe it was a missions team thing.. hmm, probably.. anyways, but yeah. and i got rainbow sherbet.

but. today, we, christopher and i, spent a lot of time there! i think we actually didn’t stay at his house because the power was out :/ but, it was a nice change of pace! i didn’t know that Dunkin Robins had free wifi! we actually got there around 7? or 8? i’m not too sure, but christopher decided that he’d give the car to jonny for the rest of the night after cyc friday night was over because jonny and a couple of other cyc students decided to go to the 찜찔 방 by H-mart and then go to six flags in the morning! such crazy cyc kiddies so yeah. after christopher gave him the car, we took my car and drove BACK to Dunkin Robins! hahahaha

OH OH OH, i remember what we did before Dunkin Robins! hahaha. the weather was beautiful, so i suggested that we go to the dock/gazebo at the glen to just read and chill he took lots of pictures, and we did very little reading =) hehe. i think it was our first time up in the gazebo with each other! lots of firsts this summer.. haha it’s like we just started dating haha

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these are just a few of the photobooth pictures i took at the dock! i forgot my actual camera, so i had to use my phone and my macbook haha. i know, it’s weird to forget my real camera and bring my actual computer instead, huh.. oh well i’m weird. haha

oh, and for that picture where i’m pursing my lips, please don’t focus on it. hahaha, try to see the reflection from the glasses! those are actually my little bro’s glasses–jonny–so, thank you, jonny, for letting me where them!

we haven’t stayed out that late in a while, actually. we stayed at Dunkin Robins until… after 1? and yeah. i got upset at him for something that i shouldn’t have… =\ so i ruined a good day because i was selfish (nothing new…).. blah. miahn =(

Day 171: @chriskim818 and @munchcon in the Sit-A :)

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today was really really fun
july 8! kind of “our day”, i guess you could say.
it started off pretty normal, work for me, tutoring for him, and then we met up afterwards, ate some mandu and blueberries, took the train downtown, and just… walked down to michigan ave, like we usually do while we were walking towards michigan, he asked me if i wanted to go on an architecture tour of the city. he’d actually asked me this much earlier in the summer, but i said no; however, today i felt an urge to say yes, so i did! hahah. we actually ended up going on it, and it was 2 hours of awesome chicago and awesome christopher (+ his baby: nala, the nikon d90. i don’t think he’s gonna like that name because i just made it up on the spot. hahahaha) he’ll have pictures up on his zenfolio sometime soon (hopefully hehe)

right before we got on the boat, i started getting really itchy on my arms, so i thought i was getting bitten by lots and lots of bugs (which isn’t unusual).. it stopped for a while when i got on the boat, but as it got darker, i got itchier! it started getting dark kinda fast, so i didn’t even really look at what i was scratching, but later, when i looked at my arms/legs under light, i was starting to get blotchy… so i told/showed christopher, and he confirmed that it was hives.

yes, yes, i know what y’all are asking… “WHAT ARE YOU ALLERGIC TO, CONNIE???”

unfortunately, i do not know… this was the second time in my life that i’d ever broken out in hives (first time was in the summer of… 03? at the vega’s household after i ate some chapchae that their dad had cooked–it was so good. he’s such a good chef! ).. and i was thinking about the things that i had eaten that day, and i had no idea what i was allergic to… =\

but. being the good boyfriend that he is, he texted one of his friends who’s in pharm school (thank you, christopher’s friend! ) and asked what we should do. she said benadryl is a must, and then some coritisol to help relieve the itching. we got some benadryl, or like walgreens-brand benadryl and it definitely helped!

yeah, i’m making a big deal about my little hives-outbreak haha, but it was kinda scary for me. hahaha bc when i usually have an allergic reaction, it’s to furry animals, mainly pet dander, so.. i had no idea what had spurred this reaction :/

we all made it home, safely!

a great 7/8 thank you, christopher! you is awesome, g.

side note: the reason it’s “sit-A” and not “sit-E” is because of CHRISGOPHER =b haha. he’s sitting next to me as i type this, and he said “you’re copying the last post!” hahaha so i changed it to “sit-a” like ‘CITAYYYYY’ hahahaha. i’m not lame at all, i know.