After the viewing last week, Lydia, Adelle, Jeff, and I played Pretty Pretty Princess. I took pictures this time and thought I should share. Adelle won (again). I think she's just really good at the game because she's a real princess inside.
At the end, we got a little silly as Princess Adelle showed off to Grandma. I love Lydia's look. And Jeff's. It's great.

On a much sadder note, on Monday morning my brother Dustin's cat Patches had a stroke or something. He was leaving my room to go upstairs and started making really odd and worrisome noises. When I went down to check on him, he couldn't move his back leg. And he was really freaking out. I've never seen him so agitated before. It took him a few hours before the shock wore off enough that he could sleep. I stayed with him all day and fed him. Dustin was at work. And I knew that he would want to see his cat again.

Monday night, Patches seemed to be doing a bit better. He had stopped panicking and could pull himself around very awkwardly with his front legs and use his other back leg a bit, but by Tuesday morning things had deteriorated. He could hardly move. Dustin made the very difficult decision to put him down. I'm going to miss talking to him during the day when I'm home alone. He was a very vocal and generally loving cat.
Goodbye, Patches!

Hey. It's been a while since I've posted. Guess it's time I should post again so everyone knows I'm still around. The past few days have been very different from my normal schedule. Different is a good thing...but I wish it were for happier reasons it's been different. My sister-in-law's father passed away. I wish I could do more to help her...but as I've never lost any relatives, I don't know what to say. So, instead of just saying that everything will be okay, Mom and I have watched the girls a few times while different preparations were being made.

They came over on Saturday a little more subdued than normal (which is saying something, because they both really get excited when they can play with me). Adelle was very much excited about her loose tooth, though. She even called Tasha and told her all about it. I wish I had as easy a time talking on the phone as Adelle does. She's fearless. And adorable. Anyway, we played for a bit and then I decided it would be fun to make cupcakes. I've been debating as to whether or not I want to go back to school and learn to be a pastry chef...so I've been practicing by making cakes and frosting and fondant. I made a really good pumpkin cake the other day and put fondant over it...but man, fondant is a lot sweeter than I thought it was...

Anyway, we went up and made cupcakes from the box. They were white cupcakes, and both Lydia and Adelle helped me measure out the ingredients. We each got to crack one egg, which was pretty fun. Lydia did hers really slowly and Adelle nearly dropped her eggshells in with the rest. They then helped me spoon the batter into the cupcake pan. We made buttercream frosting. Adelle got bored until we started adding the powdered sugar. She thought that was pretty fun. They both helped me keep count of how many half cups of sugar we'd put in--which was good, because I would've forgotten.

Once the frosting was done, I mixed in yellow (it turned out more orange), blue, green, and black per their requests and we prepared to do some cupcake decorating. I was amazed by how awesome their cupcakes turned out. Once I showed them how to make flowers, they were showing me up!

This is Lydia's first cupcake. She made a pirate ship out of gum paste.

This is Adelle's first cupcake. I had some WALL-E decorations that I got on clearance. Her first one was of EVE.
This is Adelle's pretty flower cupcake:
And this is Lydia's awesome flower cupcake!Here's a picture of all the cupcakes Adelle and Lydia took home:

And these are the rest. The girls got sick of decorating, so we had a bunch that were naked! Aah!
Afterwards, we put a little ship I got from Tasha for Christmas in some water to see if it would grow. Here's a video that the girls made up on the spot:



Now....Adelle has been telling everyone about her loose tooth. Today it finally fell out! She was eating an oatmeal creme pie and realized there was something hard in it. Turned out to be her tooth! She was afraid it would hurt, but it didn't. I snapped a picture of her hole. She's excited to be able to squirt water out of her mouth through the hole (I totally didn't give her that idea...).
We played Pretty Pretty Princess a few times today. Guess who won? Miss I-Lost-My-First-Tooth! She was a beautiful princess. She chose pink for her jewelry. Sadly...no pictures. I wish I could've gotten one of Lydia wearing an extra purple earring on her nose...

Adelle and Lydia are real sweethearts. I'm glad they're in my life.

Liz, you're in my thoughts and prayers! I love you.

Hello!

It's been over two months since my last blog post. I'd say that I haven't updated because I've been super busy...but that's not the case. I haven't updated because life has been pretty boring lately. No crazy stories to tell. No pictures to put up. Well, Mom and I did visit Martin's Cove back in September, and that was pretty neat...but otherwise, things have been pretty tame.

I'm currently looking for a job. I occasionally work as a substitute teacher. I hate substituting, though. Children these days are evil monkeys. I don't remember so much drama when I was in grade school--and I also don't remember so much swearing. I've been subbing for a fifth/sixth grade split class, and you'd be surprised by the language these kids use without even meaning to. Depressing is what it is. There's also a lack of caring about other people. Kids are really cruel to each other. Yet again, I don't remember that happening back when I was in grade school. It seems like there's two or three bullies in every class now as opposed to maybe one or two in an entire grade...

I digress. The main reason I wanted to post today was because I saw New Moon on Wednesday. Tasha dragged me to it with a promise of food. Which I had. It was yummy food, too, otherwise I would've gone crazy. Here's my disclaimer: I'm not a fan of Twilight. I will be mentioning things that are probably considered spoilers. And I will be merciless in attacking Stephanie Myer's terrible use of mythology.

First things first: I have a soft spot for romance novels and movies. I enjoy them. I'm a sucker for sappy love stories and whatnot. But I am not a fan of Edward and Bella's romance (or lack thereof). First of all, Bella is a terrible character. She's a stock character that is terribly static, emphasizing all of the traits that women have been labeled with for centuries unfairly (in some cases). Bella is self-centered and wholly reliant on a strong male character to make all of her decisions for her. My strongest evidence is the way she reacts in the movie when Edward tells her that he has to leave. She doesn't even really protest. And, yes, arguably that's because she feels like she isn't worthy of his love or whatever--but the first book should've shown her that Edward was willing to do anything for her. After all, he managed to stop feeding on her before she became a vampire herself. Instead of begging or demanding Edward stays, she lets him go. And then spends the rest of the movie moping. Which is a little understandable, as heartbreak is terrible--but it takes her months to move on. Months. That's not realistic. If she were really depressed for months, she would probably progress to more self-harm than simply not eating or talking to people.

The apparitions of Edward are ridiculously contrived to try and bring him into the movie more. Which is ridiculous. I don't know why anyone decided Robert Pattinson was a good casting idea for a vampire that's supposed to be handsome. He's scary looking. And compared to Taylor Lautner (Jacob), I don't know why Bella choses him. Honestly. He's brooding (but not in a good brooding way like Angel from the Buffy universe) and immature. Why would vampires choose to spend years repeating high school? Yes, I know they eventually go to college...but that doesn't change the fact that they willingly decide to go to high school over and over and over. Which is stupid. Anyone who has lived through high school doesn't really want to go through it again. Especially since basically the same things are taught over and over. As anyone who has watched Twenty-One Jumpstreet knows, hearing the same thing over and over gets to be monotonous and boring. Are vampires too stupid to remember that they've learned how to solve algebraic equations over and over?

I was glad when Bella finally started hanging out with Jacob. Mostly because the pacing during her depression was boring! The scene where the camera rotated around her to show the passage of time seemed to take an eternity. I felt as though I'd been stuck in the theater for all those months. Which wasn't good. For most of the movie I was actually playing with a butterfly clip I'd had in my hair to keep from crying out of boredom. It was so predictable.

Anyway, I'll move on to the Volturi. Goodness. That was stupid. A council of vampires that make up rules that all vampires have to follow? Lame. And contrived. My biggest problem with the Twilight franchise is that Stephanie Meyers has taken the fangs out of vampires. They just aren't scary in her universe. The point of the vampire mythology is to keep people inside at night like most other mythology. They are widespread in different cultures (though my favorite form of the vampire is one from Japanese mythology that detaches its head and flies around through the sky at night with intestines trailing underneath to suck blood) and are supposed to be feared. Not sparkle. European vampires die in the sunlight to add to the mysteriousness of the pale strangers--as well as to make daytime safe. Other vampires look like normal humans during the day and can only be revealed as vampiric creatures by turning their body parts around so that they reattach themselves all crooked-like. They're scarier if there's no real way to tell that they're killers during the day. Sparkling vampires are not scary. They are ridiculous. I might have been okay with Meyer twisting the mythology if not for the sparkling. They're more like fairies. And not scary at all--which isn't helped by the lame action sequences in both the first and the second movie (and the books).

My next problem is the whole werewolf thing. I know that in the book Meyers makes the distinction that they are not werewolves. But no one seems to remember that. They're skinwalkers, people! Not werewolves. There are legends of skinwalkers in many Native American tribes that walk around with the pelt of wolves, bears and other creatures that eventually turn into them. There are also legends of similar people in Eastern European countries. People that willingly change into wolves. Werewolves do not willingly do so. They are forced into their wolfish state during the full moon. Meyer's wolves are skinwalkers. Okay? Good. Now to complain about the CG. Goodness, I haven't seen wolves that look that fake since Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (at least they weren't hairless like poor Lupin). The CG in this movie seems to be three or four years behind the times. Yes, I know that this isn't a big budget movie...but the first one made enough money they could've paid for something decent, right? They look stupid. And entirely unrealistic.

I know that I'm supposed to suspend my disbelief and forget what I know about mythology...but I'm sorry. The script wasn't very good. Pattison looks disgusting with his shirt off (I wish I could erase that from my memory) because he looks like he's dead. The Volturi are ridiculously contrived and not really scary. And Edward can't read Bella's mind because she doesn't have one. She's a doormat. She doesn't even drive her own truck for most of the movie! This franchise reinforces stereotypes that women need saving and that bad boys really can have soft centers like Edward. Bella is fixated on death. And not a good role model for the little girls who read these books (I've seen several fourth graders with the books). I suppose the only good thing about the books/movies is that vampires are popular again.

Thanks for reading my rant!

I'm back in Utah, sitting on my bed. I don't know how I feel about being home, frankly. I wish I were still in Korea some days, but other days I remember how hard it was and don't really want to go back. I've been kept busy here at home, which is good. We've been waging a war against little terrorists in the house and had an exterminator over yesterday. It was fun getting ready for it. Gave me something to do most of the day.

It's amazing how fast life moves. Korea feels like a dream and an eternity ago, much like home felt like a dream the moment I entered the MTC in April. Everyone has been super nice. Which is good. It's also been super awkward. Especially at church. I hate feeling like a disappointment to people. Before you start telling me that I'm not a disappointment, I know. I've heard from President Perriton and my stake president and my bishop that I'm not. I'm not a failure. My mission wasn't pointless. But that doesn't change the look in people's eyes seeing me home. It was awkward at church, and I can see why a lot of missionaries who come home early go inactive.

President Perriton and I talked about this feeling of failure in length before I came home. I know I'm not one. I just sprained my hamstring and had to be pulled from the game before I did some serious injuries to myself. So here I am. Home. Taking it easy for a while.

I didn't take many pictures in Korea (I thought I had a year and a half), but here are some pictures from my mission.
Me and my trainer, Sister Lee Se-ri. This was our last day together as companions. There's a restaurant behind us that looks like a pig.

This is Sister Jung Eun-ju and I my last day in Gwangju. She was an awesome companion. I love her to pieces. We made every day a special day.
This is my first district in Korea. They were crazy. Lots of fun, too.
This is in the MTC with my district and with Brother Murray.
This is the MTC too with Sister Son and Brother Erickson in our classroom.


I'm sure I'll post more pictures and stories and whatnot in the future. This is just a quick post to let everyone know I've come home safely.

Erica

Hello one and all! Time for another confession. I don't particularly want to make this confession...but I figure it best to do so quickly so that you have time to think about what I'm about to say. I'm coming home. Relatively soon, actually. For the past five months, I've had some highs and some very bad lows. Recently, the lows have been getting worse and more prolonged. I have a hard time finding energy to just smile some days. So...I talked to a psychologist in Japan and he recommended that I come home to get treatment. Apparently I'm suffering from severe depression.

The thought of coming home is both a relief and a disappointment. I love it here in Korea. The food is delicious. Everyone is remarkably kind and respectful. I've seen some miracles. Three of the sisters I've had the opportunity to help teach have been baptized (though I only got to physically see one this last week). They will be great members, and I consider it a real privilege that I've been able to meet them. I wasn't able to say much, but I was able to testify. Which I'll do now. I know that this church is true. I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet, and through him, Heavenly Father restored His church on this earth. I know that God answers prayers, even though I sometimes don't feel as though they are. He has helped me make it this far in my mission. And though I feel as I've failed Him, I do know He loves me. And you. If we follow His commandments, we will be blessed. I've seen it in my life.

I don't want to come home, but I can't wait to see all of you again. Thank you for your continued support. I've appreciated your prayers on my behalf. The church is true regardless of where I am or what I'm doing, which is a great comfort. The next few weeks will be rough. But through God's help we can do anything. I love you all!

Sister Erica Ellen Oates

Hi all! This week I promised to write something better than last week. Which I truly intended to do. Alas, there's someone who wants to use the computer nearby who is trying to be patient...but as I know how hard it is to be patient, I think it best for me to help him by giving him a chance to email as well. Anyway...

I want to make a confession to you all. I've wanted to come home several times this last week. I know I make it all sound glamorous, being in Korea and learning Korean...but it isn't always that way. This is hard. Really hard. Ridiculously hard. I feel like I'm trapped in the mud some days and will never learn Korean or help anyone or do anything right. When I was young, I thought missionaries were always happy and that everything always worked out for them because they were doing what God wanted them to do. They would never want to go home because they were saving souls, right?

Of course, now that I'm a missionary...sometimes it's hard to see the impact we have on people. We've been asked to speak to at least 140 people each week as a companionship. It's hard, because most people say they're busy and don't want to listen to us (especially since I'm really only capable of talking at people now rather than with people). Our investigators sometimes make big changes in their lives...but mostly they seem a little on the lazy side. (It's hard to remember to read from a book you'd never heard of before, after all.) And it's full of disappointment--people cancel their appointments, and people decide they don't want to meet with us, and they don't want to do anything we ask them to do, and they're afraid to change. So it's hard.

I also used to think that missionaries learned their language in no time at all. After all, the gift of tongues is a miracle. So shouldn't it just come overnight? Or maybe in a week? That would be nice. I could live with that if I went to bed and then woke up speaking perfect Korean. Lamentably...it's hard! I suppose I could put forth a little more effort, but as missionaries in Korea, we speak a lot of English because we teach a lot of English. If we found more investigators interested in the gospel, it would be much easier... That was another thing I thought was easy. However, solid investigators who progress are hard to find. Usually when we get a referral from someone in one of the wards, however, they do much better. So, if you know anyone who might be interested in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, you should talk to the missionaries.

Obviously I haven't come home. I've come close to making that decision a few times...but if life were easy, people wouldn't write songs about it. If missionary work were easy, then there would be almost no point to it. Following the Savior was never guaranteed to be easy--His life certainly wasn't. There are good times. There are times that I love. But I wouldn't experience those times without all the times where I feel wholly ineffectual at being a missionary or helping people. Life isn't easy.

So, my message to you is just keep working! If I can be here in Korea learning Korean and teaching the gospel to people who sometimes don't really care, you can keep going too. There is help if we ask for it--we're not alone. I love you all!

Sister Oates

Greetings from Korea! I don't have much time today to leave a long message (plus I didn't really think of one this last week), so today it will be short and hopefully sweet. I want to tell you about my fun experience yesterday and today going on splits with a greenie.

So, Sister McKay was in the MTC with me--she arrived six weeks after I did. She's amazing, and she ended up with my trainer as her trainer this transfer. Which is awesome--I get to see her almost every week for P-day. And we get to go on splits with each others' companions. I wrongly assumed that I would go on splits with Sister Lee twice this transfer...nope! I found out on Monday that I would be going on splits with Sister McKay. Ahh! I started to panic. She's on her first transfer and doesn't understand most of what people say, and I'm on my second transfer and also don't understand. And neither of us is particularly gifted with Korean.

So...I was very worried. I figured it would be terrible, because August is really hot, and we would probably spend the whole time just proselyting.

It turned out to be not too bad. Thankfully all of the appointments for yesterday cancelled (teaching a lesson would have been very hard to do successfully), so we decided to heart attack doors (attach hearts to the door with tape) and deliver cookies. We cooked a lot of cookies and had a very good companionship study (that was a little long, admittedly) before going out into the heat. I found my way around by myself. We didn't get lost. We found apartments and delivered cookies (without actually having to talk because it was an attack). Then we taught English class and went home--I could've done a better job talking to people, but it was pretty fun. Sister McKay and I got a lot of compliments.

It's amazing how the Lord can work with such imperfect beings to do His work.

Anyway, I hope you have a great week! Next week I promise to have a better blog post.

Sister Oates