Weekend 91 of 52+

Christmas Tree, Train, and Gingerbread House at the Millennium Hilton

So I just realized that I didn't post the extant pictures of Joah in his Santa hat. But now seems as good a time as any since we adorned him with that hat to go look at his first proper Christmas tree. We hiked up some treacherous alley inclines, scaling staircases inappropriately steep. But we otherwise arrived in the lobby of the Millennium Hilton without much difficulty. We immediately set to disrobing the child, discarding his snowsuit, and Dan set to waiting in line for our photo opportunity. Every event in Seoul is always excessively attended, but the holiday urgency did make this feel more fun and Christmasy.

We found two smaller Christmas trees outside of one of the hotel's restaurants, and that's actually where Joash got to engage. He could touch those trees, and he definitely liked exploring a new texture. It will be nice for him when he can sit somewhere and caress things to his heart's content, without being bound by the limited strength of his parents' arms. And I'm sure I'll cry because he doesn't need me anymore.

Even just now I watched him discover that he can lay his head down when he flips on his belly and so doesn't have to flail in desperation, unable to flip back over. Such an independent.



I knit him a Santa hat, and he made this chubby face. It is only moderately deceptive as to his chubbiness.


He ended up being a really good Santa hat model. He exudes jolliness.


See?


We went to this fake Chipotle called Tomatillo. Walking in made us really excited because it sure looks Chipotle-style, but the end product was more Moes-y. It was expensive and okay, and Korrine's was almost inedibly spicy. We'll stick with our Taco Bell.


Dan holding his foil-wrapped burrito and his burrito baby.


We scouted out some Christmas lights, and this is actually when we decided we would have to go see the big Christmas tree.



This is how we will get him into foreign baby modeling.


Decorating the tree.


With tinfoil.


So here we were trekking to the tree. In Cincinnati, we trek through a forest of fir trees, in Seoul a concrete jungle.


Big tree.


We managed to make it to the throne. A man offered to take a picture of all of us, which is always kind and irrefutable, but my auto focus is broken, so these favors rarely turn out. I just can't believe no one else is in either of these pictures. There was a lot of milling around.


Sneaking some out-of-the-way looks.


That's an awful lot of fake presents.


Arrayed in twinkle lights. Photo by Dan.


Momma and boy. Photos by Dan.


A massive train set circled the tree on the lower level. Photos by Dan.


Checking it out. Photo by Dan.


All the billboards and train car ads represented donations made to a local orphanage. Meanwhile, that polar bear is about to brutalize someone. Photos by Dan.


At the humbler, lonely tree. Photos by Dan.


Santa reclined suggestively atop a real life gingerbread house. Someone took a bite out of it. I wanted to, but I refrained.


One last look at the trains.


In motion. Do you see the carousel move too? Fun.


Joah in his first face-in-the-hole picture. Dan was distracted in the second frame by a couple ladies fawning over our sleeping kid. Similarly, we got a coffee on Monday, and the two ladies running the shop pulled out their camera phones and started snapping away. We keep trying to tell him that America doesn't work that way.


Dinner at On the Border after our festive afternoon.


One of our favorite things about Christmas in Seoul is the Christmas cakes and the free gifts that come with them. Every chain bakery and dessert place has different prizes as incentive. This year we went with the Baskin Robbins sock monkey cap and matching cake.

On Friday we will take our first vacation as parents. We're going to Jeju Island to spend Christmas with Korrine and a couple of Dan's co-teachers. I'm kind of nervous. I don't necessarily like to parent in public just yet, and I wonder how Joah will do with so much activity. Already, he's suffering because we did the ol' pre-vacation fridge clean out, and I haven't eaten a vegetable since Sunday. All there is is tuna and cookies. That can't be good for the baby. Or for me. I'm going to get scurvy. I cooked myself an onion today just to acquire some nutrients.

Joash is trying to type for me. Mostly he just bounces the mouse around and turns on CAPS LOCK. Silly baby, computers are for grown upsS! (He typed that wayward S. Good job!)