My story begins in Morocco.
I was just a dream in the minds of my mother and father.
They were struggling to make me for 10 years
As I was stubborn and did not want to be made.
My mom began Invetro Fertilization treatments and was taking shots while on vacation with my dad and grandma in Spain, Portugal and Morocco. She believes that the reason she was finally able to get pregnant with me is because she took shots longer than she was told to because she didn't want to be confused with timezones when trying to remember when she started the treatments. For this reason, I claim Morocco as my motherland because I like to think of myself as a little potential miracle sparked into my mother on a warm day in Northern Africa that summer.
My first name was embryo #A00012. There were 4 embryos inserted into my mom and I was the lone survivor. As I have mentioned before on previous birthdays, I think it is only right that I do not have to share my birthday with the others as I was the strongest and the fittest. So I absorbed them.
As I grew up and began to understand the world around me, I couldn't help but notice that every year around my birthday, the ugliness of winter and bare trees disappeared and the flowers were in full bloom. Obviously, as I told my parents many times, God was decorating for my birthday. They still remind me of these narcissistic little comments I was known to make but there's still a small part of miracle baby Kristen that believes them to be true, regardless of whether I am turning 4 or 23.
Written by my mom inside of the Birthday card she sent me this year.
Obviously <3
The cherry blossoms are out in Korea too :)
I am that girl that wants to make as big a deal about my birthday as I can get everyone around me to tolerate and I make no apologies. I love my birthday. It's a magical time. It is a time when we can all celebrate what a miracle baby I was.
Knowing that I would be away from home this birthday was bittersweet for me. I was sad to be away from my family and friends, but I was excited to have an international birthday, setting the tone for all of my birthdays to come, and it really was the best day ever.
The birthday countdown in Kristen Teacher's classes began when April started. Every sentence quiz ended with "Kristen Teacher's birthday is in ___ days". They are very lucky to have me as a teacher because at least ONE of them will always know how to properly count down to something. (Sidenote: They were not happy yesterday when they thought those days were over and I gave them the sentence "Kristen Teacher's birthday was yesterday". But now they're learning to count backwards. You're welcome students). I was also doing this to see if I could get some presents hahaha.
And one of my students actually brought me this little cake!!! I'm super flattered because that means he actually went home and was talking about me to his parents. <3 I love my job.
I got presents from Holli, Ambar, my mom & my cousins. This was from Jess, Rob, Kenzie & Zac and it arrived ON my actual birthday which was awesome <3 The box in the background is from my coteacher :)
I opened this present on skype so that Jess, Mackenzie and Zac could watch me.
You did good Jess, you did good.
This is from Mackenzie, who wants to make sure I stay up to date on the latest B&BW scents.
And this is from Zac, who wants to make sure I stay up to date on who his favorite hockey player is. I opened this and he watched as I promptly put it on my wall where I will look at it everyday and think of him.
I should have taken pictures of the amazing gifts from Holli, Ambar, and my mom. They were just as pretty on the outside and awesome on the inside. Please still love me guys!!
I took lots of pictures with my Kindy kids in the morning and all of my little girls were in love with the pink birthday ribbon I was wearing that I got from Andrea before she left.
My baby <3
My big boy :) He used to run out of class and escape the first week of school because he was so afraid of me and my non-Korean face. Now he loves me <3
He's my newest & just started 2 weeks ago. He lived in Australia for 3 years before moving back to Korea recently. He speaks English with his sisters at home so he has better comprehension than a lot of the other kids in the class. He's so different from the other boy in the class because the first boy definitely favors my Korean coteacher but this little baby is all over me. I must remind him of Australia LOL. (In this picture he is hiding behind me because the girls were ganging up on him and chasing him with foam letters.)
I love him.
And I will be bringing him back to America with me.
Arum is always on chill mode. She is the most smiley little girl I have ever met until you turn the camera on her and then she makes the most non-emotional face ever. I crack up every time.
Thursdays are my easy days at school because I have a long break so I went home when I was finished with my Kindy babies and relaxed for a little bit before coming back to school for my afternoon classes. This is what happened when I walked into the office...
It was literally the best surprise ever. I love my coworkers so much. I know I'm super obnoxious for getting just as excited about my birthday as the kids do for theirs but the fact that they played into it with me was so sweet and meant a lot <3
My coworkers signed a card for me and Mimi got my little Kindy kids to write in a card for me too. It was amazing. They also gave me lots of little treats that were on my desk when I finally got to it.
Including this awesome Green Tea Kit-Kat from Japan.
Card signed by my coworkers <3
Outside of the card Mimi made and got all of the kids I teach in Kindy to sign.
Inside <3
My last class of the day was my most advanced class. They sang Happy Birthday to me in Korean and it's my favorite video from my birthday.
Psy face.
Bros.
This is when the Zombie poses began.
The girls were not nearly as excited to take photos. Which was fine.
Because I have enough enthusiasm for all of us.
We had to leave class shortly after taking these pictures because one of my girls ripped her tooth out and I freaked out because I don't know how to handle the blood and it was killing the ambiance of my birthday. But I'm happy to say it there were no other blood incidents that day.
That night my coworkers and I went to a bar we go to in Sinchon for dinner and drinks. It was the perfect end to a perfect day.
Giant pig in a blanket & white wine (to balance out the class). My birthday feast.
Justin, Chris & I got there first and waited for the others to meet us after they got off. When they arrived they informed me that they were ordering me a shot. I hate shots. I asked them what it was and they told me "Don't worry about it" which made me worry about it lol. But they were very nice to order me a chaser shot to take after it. I couldn't even tell you how the mystery shot tasted because I was too terrified to breathe out of my nose when I took it. I know it had Jim Bean, Bacardi, Jack, Jose Cuervo and Jameson in it and I hope to never take one again lol.
Thank you everyone, here and home, who made my birthday this year so amazing!!!!!! I'm going to see Nanta with Mimi tonight after we go to a new Indian restaurant she found. I'm super excited! Nanta was one of the things at the top of my Korean bucket list so my amazing birthday is definitely turning into an amazing birthday weekend. I'll post pictures soon!
*****On a serious note, this birthday was especially meaningful to me because my grandma passed away the morning of my birthday last year and I was definitely missing her yesterday and thinking about my family. I wanted to have lots of fun with my kids because I wanted to only focus on the positive and spread as much birthday joy as possible. So to everyone that contributed to me having an amazing birthday, it means more this year than you'll ever know <3
