Surprise!

For Dave's 26th birthday, I held a surprise birthday party for him. He was indeed surprised. With 20 of his closest friends and my family, it was definitely a great turn out. We especially loved the individual birthday messages everyone left for him on our camera.

This will be Dave's last birthday that we spend at Trinity.

September

Another year has gone by and September is here again. It's a time for school to begin, but most importantly it's the month of two very special occasions for our family of two. Dave's birthday AND our wedding anniversary fall in September. For our two year anniversary last year, Dave and I ventured to the Channel Islands for a day trip and had fun hiking the trails. This year, John (one of my many cousins) and Michelle will be getting married.

This time last year, we met Mike Brown for the first time and went to Newport Beach. Morgan, who joined us at the beach last year, is also getting married this month.

I woke up yesterday from my nap to a vague shadow of something crawling on my ceiling. It was blurry because my contacts were out... but I flipped. I ran out of our bedroom screaming and Dave (happily napping beside me) jolted up along with me. "I think I saw something!! You have to go check it out! I don't have my contacts on." Poor Dave, confused from his sleep, goes to check the room and nothing.

I was pretty sure I saw a creature or a bug that was 3 inches long with 3 long protrusions... I think? Man was I freaked out... but the more I came to my senses, I don't think I've ever seen anything shaped like that in my life. Not a bug or an animal.

So this is what it feels like to hallucinate. Was it a dream?

I had a patient before that saw cats in her room and couldn't believe otherwise. This patient was at least pleasant. some patients have hit, kicked and yelled at me as a result of their delusions.

This gets me to thinking, where and how does the good news of Christ sit with those who have dementia or psychiatric disorders - who genuinely you can not reason with. Those whose fear is genuine to them, however, delusional it is in reality. Even when I knew what I saw was probably a dream, I still barely could step foot back in our bedroom.

Forward-rising

I've been so busy updating my family history blog that it's been a while since I've attended to this one. Yesterday, we went to see Abby Road (a Beatles coverband) and Led Zepagain (a Led Zeppelin coverband) perform at the Santa Monica Pier. It was interesting to see these young performers who have found their niche in the music business, even if it is a cover band.

These are some pictures from Dave's performance at the Key Club on June 4th this year for his Do-It-Yourself Music Marketing class. The students in his class learned to book, promote, and perform. It has definitely been a challenge for Dave, trying to find his place in the music industry where he is good at what he does, enjoys what he does, and where it sits well with our souls... but it is pretty fun!

Understanding Dave's love for music has also been a challenge for me since the beginning of our courtship. During undergrad, I couldn't understand why he spent so much time playing the guitar, composing music and not "studying" according to my standards. When we got married, Dave started his own music fund from his tips that I agreed not to touch. I learned to critique his music without being too harsh, starting with the good stuff and ending with the needed improvements, but also being honest.

When he made the decision to take an indefinite break from Fuller and explore his options in the music industry, I learned to break away from my traditional view of Christian outreach and formulate our role and duty as Christians together in a more creative way. The journey is just beginning, and maybe Dave will be called to traditional ministry in the church one day, but for now, I'm learning to be ever more reliant on the Holy Spirit. We are constantly re-evaluating what is acceptable in God's eyes and not the eyes of those around us. To those who see this transition as "back-sliding", I see it as just the opposite.

**title amended from Forward-sliding to Forward-rising

The Park Family Tree

The blog has begun!

http://theparkfamilytree.blogspot.com

Climbing my family tree

At our last family gathering, my cousin Jiea and I shared an idea that has been on both our minds: hearing about our family history from my maternal grandparents. I recently saw the Lisa Kudrow version of Who Do You Think You Are on NBC.com and was inspired to find out my own family history. It's a little harder tracing Asian ancestry because there's less of a variety of family names: Park, Lee, Kim, Cho, etc... you get the picture. I've been wanting to blog about it and Jiea had the idea of capturing it on video.

To the best of my knowledge, my mom's family migrated from North Korea to South during the Korean war and came to the United States from South Korea somewhere in the 1970's.

Tomorrow, I'll be visiting my grandparents with lunch and will start this exciting process of discovering my roots.

Catalina Island

This week, our adventures took us to Avalon, CA on Catalina Island. We took an early morning ride on the Catalina Express from San Pedro, CA. We were told the weather would be cool, but it was actually perfect for kayaking, snorkeling, mini golf and hanging out on the beach.


Our accommodations were at the Hotel Mac Rae on Crescent Ave which is a prime location - a staircase away from the beach in the center of all the hustle and bustle. The hotel provides free beach towels and DVD rentals. We claimed our territory on the beach, Dave reading "The Craft of Lyric Writing" and I, the women of faith series on Florence Nightingale.


It was our first time kayaking and snorkeling. There was a not-so-early-bird special that we took advantage of. $68 for kayaking and snorkeling gear for two for 4 hours, including a cooler for a picnic. We made it to a secluded beach where we enjoyed a couple turkey sandwiches and an iced white tea with pomegranate. We spotted several different fish species snorkeling- the Garibaldi was the most exotic looking (our California state fish). Despite it being our first time, it all came pretty naturally.


For food, we tried Joe's Place for salad and clam chowder, Ming's for Chinese food, the Lobster Trap on two occasions for fish tacos and for king crab, queso sticks, steamed artichoke and poke, and Jack's Diner for breakfast food. All the food was wonderful!

All in all, a great 3 day, 2 night trip to one of the closest island destinations to where we live.