Mindful Frugalista (formerly Chaostimes5): We're in Korea!

I know, I never said we'd even left yet. It's been crazy. We had a vague idea Thursday afternoon and by the time I left the kids' awards assembly Friday I had a voicemail from the agency saying we had travel clearance and could leave Saturday. So at 3:30 am we left home and by 4:00 am the next day we were in Korea....of course in Korea it was that afternoon...late. That really throws you off when you miss a day like that.

Anyways, I'll try to post here and there about our travel so far, but not exactly sure how that will turn out. I just happen to be up at 2:00 am Korea time and couldn't sleep so I got my pictures off the camera and thought I might post a little.

The first flight was exactly on time and then we had about 3 ½ hours to get back through security before the next flight, which was way plenty time. Then, Lois went on MANY walks through that area with the girls. By then, it was 8 hours after we’d left home and they had done really well. But, on the first flight Kae ended up with a window seat and she REALLY enjoyed getting to see the ground beneath us and slowly going away. She was pretty amazed by that. It was actually pretty funny on the way to the airport too. The girls both fell asleep and had been asleep for quite sometime when we arrived. They both woke up right as we were pulling in to park and Kaelin got so excited (she was woohooin' the whole time to park) to find out we were already there and Chelsi promptly told us she almost fell asleep. ;)

The first little flight was just an hour long. It was American and Kaelin thought it was great just because it was a new experience. But, when we got on the Korean Air flight she really thought it was awesome. They love eating on the airplane, picking out movies to watch and listening to their pick of Korean kids songs. Chelsi ate a hamburger and some other kids stuff for lunch, but Kaelin and I had bibimbop. Lois had the pasta. She was too hungry to try something new at that time. All the girls did was talk about how much they loved the airplane. They obviously don't remember their crabbiness after they had been awake for almost 24 hours and FINALLY fell asleep the last few of the trip. We barely woke Chelsi up enough to get off the plane and get through the airport.

Incheon International was very easy to navigate. We were out of there in about 1/2 hour even with collecting our luggage, going through immigration and customs and exchanging our money. I guess people felt sorry for us and people were asking us as we got close to the doors where we were going so they could help. We knew which bus line, so that helped and Korean Air got us on their limo bus and we took the 85 minute ride to NEAR the hotel and walked another 2-3 blocks to the hotel. with two kids, two large suitcases and 4 backpacks, we decided we were taking a taxi back to the airport. I don't care....I'm not dragging poor Jaemin through that. Chelsi unfortunately thought we were seeing him right away. It was nice to be able to tell her this morning it's tomorrow now.

We're staying at the Fraser Place Central serviced residences. It's very nice. Our reservations didn't go through from the agent, so we were worried for a bit. But, it was on my eticket so the guy at the front desk gave us a little bigger room for the same price (160,000 won)...about $127/night including two adult breakfasts. Really cheap for Seoul. The room is very large. We have a separate bedroom with a queen and single. Chelsi and I slept in the queen, Kaelin slept on the couch and Lois slept on the single. We have tons of shelves and closets everywhere! Tons of places to keep everything. We even got two bathrooms. The floors are hardwood and we really like that. We have a kitchen, so we're grocery shopping for some things today...just some basics to avoid some meals if we don't have time to stop and eat somewhere. We'll probably still eat out a lot because we all like Korean (except Chelsi) and I heard it's very inexpensive here in comparison to eating American here.

It's getting closer to breakfast time and then we'll pack what we need to venture out. Today is just shopping, so we're hitting the markets.

Some pictures of our trip so far are below. Please continue to pray for our safety while here and the safety of our loved ones still at home. I'm SO glad we decided to have a friend come with instead of Brian and I bringing all 4 kids. We were exhausted with the 4 of us.

The trip from Chicago to Korea. We flew Korean air from Chicago to Incheon (outside of Seoul). It was a great flight. I mean as great as a 13 hour flight can be. The food was good. There were tvs in the seats, so the girls could watch whatever they want or listen to music or track the flight. I, sort of, watched 3 movies on the way. I don't think the girls really watched any, but they watched some Korean kid shows like Pororo. They listened to some kids music and Chelsi got really loud when she heard the Three Bears song start. She started singing along. It was great!