The 4th & Culture Night

 3 July - 14 July 2024

Hola, mi familia! 안녕, 가족이!

Just dropping a few pictures and updates on the last two weeks! What isn't mentioned below is that I am getting a lot of new clients, so my schedule is filling up, which feels like a huge blessing! I am also feeling more competent in my work and seeing more positive outcomes, as well as overcoming my impostor syndrome that was with me for so many months. Also, my dad cut his hand open on a grinder and ended up at urgent care and the hospital on the night of my FHE Korean presentation. It is healing up quite nicely, but it caused him a lot of pain. The culture night for FHE was fun! I think I stayed there for two hours! There were presentations on Brazil, Bolivia, the Baltics, etc. I think people really enjoyed the effort I put into my presentation. Some people enjoyed learning about the Korean alphabet, though most just looked intimidated by it. Some enjoyed using chopsticks while some didn't seem to care to try. But oh well, you can't win over everyone! Even though they should all love Korean culture!!!!! Hahaha. It was still a fun time. I'm being more social at church, trying to get to know more people and help them feel welcomed and loved. I am meeting more therapists and getting more referrals. I feel more supported. Things are going well. My stomach did hurt a few days this week, and I really am going to try to eat healthier and cut out sugar. I really need to do it! So, that's all you really need to know about the past two weeks, besides the stuff I wrote below to accompany each picture:

Fourth of July pizza party at Letti's house! Spent the night helping people make their pizzas and talking with new people!

Prepped my presentation on Korea for FHE culture night!

Sunday night family dinner! Sent this pic to Lu to make her jealous... ;)

Presented on South Korea! Got to teach some people a bit about the language as well as how to use chopsticks. I don't think anyone was as obsessed as me or really understood my obsession, but it's okay.

Went to Emily Gillette's bridal shower and we got to make flower boquets.

Whitney sent me a Scotland postcard! She went to Europe for 15 days!

Selfie with Sean at the lunch-in. AKA his house where he's currently living.

This was taken at the lunch-in after Cody and Carly's sealing in the temple! Lol, Gracelyn isn't even looking, haha.

Lucy did a fabulous job of cheering me up on a sad day. She is so cute and funny. I sure love her a million and am eternally grateful I get to call her my sister.

My text conversations with Hanna have pretty much become all in Korean now! It's been so helpful to be able to learn from a native speaker! It makes me wonder just how quickly I could pick it up if I lived in Korea for a time, fully-immersed!

Much love,

Emily Burnham

World's Largest Snickers & Korean Souvenirs

 24 June - 2 July 2024

What is holding me back from accomplishing my dreams? My own self-doubt, insecurity, exhaustion, and anxiety. When my mental, emotional, and physical health is balanced and stable, I am able to go off and explore. Try new things. Make things happen. I'm going to try to write a little more often in my blog, because I definitely noticed a difference in my wellbeing when I cut back how frequently I was writing and reflecting over my life. To be fair, things have been getting better, and one of many reasons is because I've started journaling more in my hardcopy notebooks. But I really do like keeping track of things here as well because then I get to add all the pictures and those are so fun to look back on. Journaling helps me keep things in perspective, express and feel gratitude, notice blessings, etc. Plus, I am a huge verbal processor, which means I need to let it out and make sense of what's going on inside externally, whether that is through talking my mom's ear off (sorry mom, love you!) or writing about it. 

Anyways, this past week was pretty epic! I'll share photos and talk more about the week from each photo. 

I picked up mom and dad from the airport after they spent a week in Utah visiting Lucy, and withing 20 minutes of being home, they were each doing what they do best ;). I sent this "stalker" photo to Lucy and it made her crack up!

Hanna arrived back from her trip to Korea and brought back souvenirs! She was gone for an entire month. She got me a keychain of a cute Korean couple, which I told her was a keychain of me and my Korean husband, which made her laugh. I love how easy it is to make her laugh, and when it really strikes her has funny, she will lightly hit me as she laughs, so yes, I will get swatted for my jokes :). She finds me so cute, and I also just find her adorable. Her sister also sent back a limited edition BTS book as a gift for me, which made me really happy. Hanna took a video of me with it to send to her sister and I spoke a few basic Korean words. I absolutely love how my interest and genuine love for other cultures has brought so many incredible connections and bonds into my life. God is good!

We made snickers at the cooking class Thursday night at the church. It's part of the Gather Place series. We have a chef in the stake who is teaching them. However, the caramel did not set up, so we ended up rolling it into a log and dumping chocolate on top. So instead of making little snickers bars, we made the world's largest snickers!!! The funniest part was that they had bought hole and half peanuts, and I figured it'd be best if they were crushed, so I self-appointed myself the job and got the hammer out of the toolkit in my car and crushed up the nuts, haha!

I've been working on being more social, trying to talk to more people, and I have been spending time taking care of myself and healing, so I am feeling incredibly grateful and blessed.

Much love,

Emily Burnham