Klaire Bear

Eight years ago today, the baby of my family was born. I was lucky enough to be at the hospital when Klaire Ann Bitter was born and one of the first people to hold her. I was also able to sleep at the hospital and help out with taking care of her. I remember getting little sleep and answering the nurse's questions about feedings and diaper changes. I basically did everything I could to make sure my mom got as much rest possible. I think the only time I wasn't holding Klaire was when I was taking a nap here & there and when she was eating. I loved having that special time and having her all to myself. Ahhh, the perks that come with being the oldest.

Since she is so much younger than I am and I've lived in a different state for more than half her life, we're not as close as I am with my other sisters. But I still love her and miss her. I think my last trip home was one of the best times I have had with her. We had fun playing games, doing each other's  hair (more like her turning mine into a giant knot), taking selfies and doing other things. I can't wait until she is older so we can do more together and have more in common. Right now she's got some major attitude and she's pretty spoiled (she is the baby after all). I'm excited to see what kind of young women she becomes.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY KLAIRE BEAR!

I love you!!

Picture Dump

I don't have anything to write about today so I'm going to just post a bunch of pictures, mainly from when I was home for Christmas break.

Me and my sisters, just missing the youngest

Me and Meeja

 We're babes

Love this girl

 First time meeting our cousin Bennett

He's such a cutie and great at taking selfies

Baby Avery

Christmas Eve 

Me and the youngest

Eating Lucky Charms at 2 AM because that's how we roll

Forget Starbucks...The West knows what's up! I wish Utah had Dutch Bros.

Cuddled with this girl and had some alone time

Last picture with the the famous PDX carpet 

at the Portland Airport before they replaced it :(

Fondue at Amber & Parker's for New Year's Eve

I left Amber's early to go over to Rachel & Lindsey's house to ring in the New Year. 

Lindsey and I had fun with the confetti.

Sarah gave me Milkis, a Korean drink, as one of my Christmas Presents and it was delicious. The can says "New feeling of soda beverage"...

My beloved Porter passed away and this was the box he was buried in

Since I don't want to end this post with a sad picture, here's some more pictures of me in my Kangaroo costume. I am SO in love with it and I happen to think I look great as Kangaroo.

Thanksgiving Break 2013

On Wednesday, after 13 hours in a car, I was home! It was so nice to be home for Thanksgiving this year, the first in four years. I'm sad I didn't get to see everyone though. Since it was a surprise that I was coming, some family made other plans and I wasn't able to see all my siblings. Luckily, I'll be back for Christmas in 21 days. 

This Thanksgiving was pretty special because we had eight Oregon State football players and 2 of their girlfriends join us for dinner since my cousin is a freshman on the team. My younger cousins had a blast playing with them and they were very entertaining. They were very friendly and enjoyable to have around. We had a lot of food, but they didn't eat as much as you would expect since some of them had the Civil War game (Oregon State vs University of Oregon) the next day and the ones that didn't play had to watch their weight. We played a game of Spoons with Fred, my cousin's roommate, and they all went swimming after dinner. It was a great day.

Yesterday was the Civil War and sadly we didn't win, for the sixth year in a row. We lost by one point, which is almost worse than losing by a lot just because we were SO CLOSE. It was fun how the family kept looking for my cousin and the players we had over the day before on TV. We saw them a few times. It was pretty exciting. 

I had also spent over an hour on the phone with Verizon. My grandma was on the phone for a while and we found out they had made a mistake and wanted me to change my phone number because of it. I was going to go along with it just because I didn't want to make things difficult for Nana, but I didn't really want to change my number. I took over the call and after over 2 hours on the phone between the two us, we finally got it resolved. Working at a call center has its perks because I definitely knew how to get them to fix it our way. I still have the same number :)

Today I spent most of the day shopping with my aunt and sister Sunhee. She has her first formal dance next week. She is in Jr. High and growing up so fast! We went to seven different stores before finding the dress. It was hard because she is small so it was hard finding the balance between something that fit but looked her age and not too childish, but we did it. One of the highlights of the day was watching her try to walk in heels for the first time. I would compare it to watching Bambi walk. She went with some cute wedges since they give her the height (oh the curse of the short Asian genes) but are still comfortable and she can actually walk in them. 

I spent most of the evening held up in the craft room making Christmas decorations for my apartment. They are so cute! I'll post pictures when they are finished. Now I'm just finishing a movie and then I'll be off to bed so I can get up bright and early for the trip back to Utah. To sum up, it was a great (albeit extremely short) break and trip home.

*Actually posted on March 11, 2015 but I used the date I wrote it. I think I just forgot to post it.*

Winter Break

Here's what I did over break, in list form. At the ripe old age of 21, my memory is starting to fail me so it won't be too long or detailed. 

• Slept in...A lot
• Scheduled consultation with surgeon
• Got Just Dance 3 as an early Christmas present
• Played Just Dance 3
• Christmas Eve with the whole family. Ate yummy food. More Just Dance 3...Klaire was so cute dancing! Opened presents from aunts and uncles. Got some cupcake PJ's (which I love!), cupcake liners and edible ink pens for decorating, a cupcake calendar, cupcake book, and probably a few more things. Seeing a theme? 
• Spent the night at my aunt's and got to spend time with my sisters
• Christmas. Opened presents...three more cupcake books, more cupcake liners, an OSU hoodie (which I also love!), 
• Met with surgeon the day after Christmas. Scheduled surgery for the 28th.
• Watched my sister Sunhee at her Jiu Jitsu class. Ended up being a part of the class. The instructor likes parent participation...older sisters too. It's really hard to practice moves on someone who is half your size.
• Had surgery. Detailed post to come.
• My friend Sara visited me the day after surgery. I couldn't do anything so we got caught up and watched YouTube videos. Not the best idea. Laughing was painful and I felt it for the next few days.
• My cousins stayed with us New Year's weekend. Lamest New Year's Eve ever. I couldn't do anything or eat anything. With 10 seconds left on the countdown, everyone accumulated downstairs in the living room and we hugged, kissed, and wished each other a happy new year.
• Watched Harry Potter 7 Part 2
• Watched the Pretty Little Liars premiere with my sister
• Made my cousins and sister CD's with KPop (Korean Pop) songs. I'm glad they've jumped on the Kpop bandwagon. Pretty soon I'll have everyone listening to it. 
• Went shopping. 
• Hung out with my friend Stephanie, something we hadn't done in a long time (like a year).
• Went to church. The bishop held up a garbage bag filled with a paper chain. It was his Christmas present from the primary children. Each link on the chain represented a week where a child read the scriptures by themselves or with their parents. He had everyone go into the gym after sacrament meeting and had the children hold the chain up for everyone to see. It was so long it stretched around the whole gym. It was pretty impressive and inspiring. My home ward is so awesome.

I think that's pretty much it.