Our Home for the Holidays

We are ready to start and make this little apartment feel like home. Above is the view of the big city from our pool and grass area. Turn around and you can't see our place, but you can see part of the railing of our balcony.

The one on the bottom of the photo with the glass and shade covered balcony is floor 10, so go up 4 and you're at floor 14 and here on the west end of the building is our little corner of the world.

I almost finished unpacking today - just going through the last few piles of random clutter and papers. Our address is Los Militares 5300, apartamento #144, Las Condes, Santiago, Chile. Here's where we are on Google Maps.

We've started to get in the Christmas Spirit. Sunday we assigned the kids to make a lego tree, which they did, but then we decided it would be too small for our presents. Then it got broken. Then they were assigned to make a Nativity Scene.


They don't have all the legos they were used to working with from Utah, but with the ones on hand and a little toilet paper creativity, they were able to make a very nice manger, Joseph, Mary, and one shepherd.


At least that's all that survived until today when I finally got the camera out. They had made several wise men and camels, sheep, a donkey, and the star. But then Abi and Lily got to them or they decided they needed the pieces for their spaceships. We'll try to get the rest of the scene figures together in time for St. Nick to enjoy on Friday night.

Joseph and baby Jesus

The Mother Mary and her Child.
Love the single lego pieces on their heads holding on the tp.

The Shepherd, from the shadow he's apparently seeing the choir of angels singing Hallelujah! And that is what we did today for our Christmas week - we got some Christmas Music! Thank you Corey! He introduced me to PayPlay and they had Mannheim Steamroller!!
I've teared up a few times as I listen to the music - I'm transported back in time to 1984, I think of growing up and sitting in our living room seeing all the trees, listening to this same music, Neil and I pretending we were amazing musicians playing the songs for Ridgecrest Elementary, everyone in awe at how awesome we are! Music is the secret ingredient to making memories. When I put in music from my mission, all the feelings come back and I can remember a singular moment in time driving along Apache Boulevard with my hand out the window, or my last p-day in Chandler before coming home and listening to The Forgotten Tales, I was not His Father. Music is key! I'm excited to play this music 24/7 this week and give my kids a key to their time machine, they'll be able to transport here to Santiago when they are older just by pushing play on their Manheim CD. Love you Mom and Dad, this music reminds me of you!

Sala De Los Ninos

Like the hotel in Vina del Mar, the kids love the play room here. Not as cool, but it still works. This is now the only place where they are free to express their creative side. Unless it's just with toilet paper. Toilet paper is still allowed in the apartment. No pens, no crayons, no paints, no pencils, NOTHING! And with a kitchen door, I think we might be able to keep this too nice of a furnished apartment decent for the owner. Except for the black feet that follow us everywhere. I'll post something about that later - gotta figure out that one.

Joe standing to compose his story.

And the back of the kids room is a glass sliding door that opens to the back common area with a slide, sand, pool, grass, it's great.

Here's the view looking up on the back lawn at our building.

We're on the right, see the balcony with all white glass and shades covering the balcony? That's floor 10, so we're up 4 from there, #14, my lucky number! :) My number for most all my soccer days. I loved #14, that was my number. The kids have got it down I think, so hopefully they won't ever get lost in the building.

New Background

Oh, and do you like the new wallpaper on my blog? For Costa Rica I tried to do a beachy-looking background. I thought this sunny and ocean blue stripped one worked nicely.
Here's how it looked on the laptop at my end. After arriving in Santiago, I thought this glitter one I have now looked nice, like city lights at night!

It's easy to add a background to your blog if you don't know how. Go to The Cutest Blog on the Block, click on free backgrounds, browse the different backgrounds, and they'll walk you through the rest.

Media Mouth

I probably can't say too much about this, as he's still got the cat in the bag, shh!! But Corey has been working hard and we feel the Lord's blessing in helping him with his Media Mouth business. Basically, the software is to help people use movies to learn languages. (Corey, email me if I've said too much) That's what took us to Brazil, and that time there has helped him much in knowing the market. That was also part of the reason we went to Costa Rica. And Corey heard about a program called "Start Up Chile" in August before we went to Costa Rica, and we both thought it would be perfect for him and Media Mouth, seeing as he served his mission here and there are lots of people who want to learn English here. He applied in October and was accepted in November, and told he had to be here by Nov. 25th, and so here we are.

My self appointed job as Media Mouth secretary is to take photos of language schools or advertisements in our travels. These are from Costa Rica

Learn English NOW! at Oceano Languages

Costa Rica Language Academy

And I saw a school on the short walk to Lider

I also take this pictures so that I have their phone numbers if we want to call to sell them the software later. :)

I also take pics of things that prove people need this software. Asia is another target market for Media Mouth - have you seen ENGRISH? Some funny Stuff - just scroll left or right at the bottom of the photos to see more. This one from the Monkey Park in Costa Rica meant to say "Dead End" The kids thought it was funny.

1999 to 2010 Timeline

This post is for some friends who are curious about our adventure here in Chile and how it is that we got to this point. So I'll give quick timeline of our married life and Corey's school, work, and efforts at entrepreneurship~

1999 Feb - married 

1999 Fall - school at BYU - go full time during spring and summer terms, fall term we're each taking 18 credits cause we're expecting 

2000 Jan - Welcome Baby Joseph! 

2000 Aug - Graduate from BYU, move to Sandy, Utah 

2000 Dec - Welcome Baby Melodie! (What?!?) Insert Corey "If you'd have told me last year that by next year I'd have two kids?" and he gets that deer in the headlights expression. 

2002 Mar - Welcome to the world Ethan! 

2003 Aug - Welcome to the world Hyrum! Corey applies to MBA programs, was really interested in the Lauder program with Wharton cause of the international emphasis. He took a trip to Chile to attend an Endeavor conference in Santiago. Endeavor recruits Wharton grads. 

2004 Apr - move to BYU for Corey to get his MBA - his emphasis is international entrepreneurship. He goes to Brazil a few times to teach GMAT classes to a group of LDS members there. He loves waving BYU's flag. 

2005 June - Hello baby Wesley, 1st year of MBA over, Corey works on his own business called Evolving Web. 

2006 Apr - Graduate from BYU, we move to Virginia for Corey's job with a start up company near Washington DC. DC is my promised land. I love it there. Corey teaches another GMAT class in Brazil. 

2006 Oct - Corey learns that most all entrepreneurs are just figure it out as they go. He begins to think of really doing his own thing. 

 

2007 Feb - Corey quits his job, we move to Campinas Brazil where he has friends from GMAT classes, where he hopes to do market research for Media Mouth. We are there for 4 months. I'm pregnant and we've got 5 kids. Here's the first post on our blog, which is the beginning of that experience. 

 

2007 Aug - Move back to Utah, rent a home in Granite this time (part of Sandy), I love Granite! 

2007 Sep - Abigail is born! 

2007 Oct - Corey takes a trip to India for three weeks to visit his Media Mouth developers there. 

 

2008 - Life in Granite is peachy, but I always can find something to gripe about! What's wrong with me? Corey still working on Media Mouth. 

 

2009 Jun - Lily is born! Doh, 9 people now! We need to buy another car... 

 

2010 Mar - Corey keeps running in to people who have recently visited Costa Rica or have lived there and they all say "How come no one ever told me about this place?!?!" It's amazing, wonderful, magical, and the wheels start turning in his head... I guess it has been a while, and we can't rent here forever, can we? 

2010 Jul - We go and get passports for everyone. 

2010 Aug - We give our 30 days notice to our rental management company. We buy tickets to Costa Rica and plan to stay there 3 months. We find out, the day after giving our 30 days notice, that they had written us an email saying that we had to be out by October 1st cause the owner had to move in. We feel the Lord is in it. I've been good about blogging since August 2010, so feel free to catch up on the blog that way. I will now post about what exactly Media Mouth is, from my perspective. Corey, feel free to contribute if you have anything you'd like to share.

Up through 1999

For people who are new to this blog and want to get up to speed on why and how we are living life this way, I thought I'd see if I could type it all down for you. Here we go with Part 1:

Briefly - Corey and I are high school sweethearts, kinda. Well, I guess not really. We were friends. But I liked him, a lot. We actually met in 7th grade in Home Ec. I liked him then and through Junior High but he wasn't interested. Later in High School you could say I was obsessed, some could find evidence that I stalked him. I took up the science club, the chess club, and every other club he was involved in to give myself more opportunities to be involved with him in stuff he was involved with. Fast forward to college - we go our separate ways, me to Snow and him to BYU. Now being in the BYU environment of "find your eternal companion" his brain switched from off to on and he began to think about girls, and as he'd meet girls, he'd think of me on occasion and of my fine qualities, then he'd think "I never really 'dated' Tiffanie..." a.k.a. he never gave me a chance to win his affection. So thank goodness for us, email had begun and we were able to write to each other from our respective colleges. And lucky for me, my roommates were from the Utah valley and went home most every weekend, so I'd get a ride to Provo and hang out with him until he went home to Salt Lake, and our courtship began.

Fast forward to Spring 1995 - he's going on a mission to Chile, I'm pretty sure I'm going to go on one too. He never wanted to be a missionary with a girl friend, but I'm just too irresistible and we seal our love with a kiss, a long awaited kiss for me, at 2 a.m. on the morning of February 19. I go home and after briefly looking at a 5 year calendar in my planner and guessing when we'd both be home from our missions, I write in my journal "Corey and I kissed! Yes, we kissed on the lips!!! And I will marry Corey in 4 years on February 19, 1999."

Fast forward 3 1/2 years of letter writing (still in boxes):
- Corey serves a mission in the Chile, Santiago West Mission from June '95 to June '97.
- Tiffanie serves a mission in the Arizona Tempe Mission - Spanish Speaking from May 97 to December 98.

I come home and it's like we'd never been apart. He proposes, I say yes, we're in love, I don't want to wait, February is too long away, who cares what I wrote 4 years ago, let's try January? Nothing works out, the only day that works is Friday, FEBRUARY 19, 1999. And so we are married on the 4 year anniversary of our first kiss. (Now you all say "awww!)

Chocolate Cereal

Our first week in Chile we were introduced to Chocapic, which I found to be a pretty tasty cereal. Nice and crunchy. In Costa Rica the boxes of cereal were pretty small and the kids were able to go through a box of cereal at a sitting. Here, the boxes are a bit bigger and we can get a meal and a half from a box. So we've already gone through three boxes of Chocapic, so I thought I'd go with what seemed to be a generic brand of the same cereal: Power and Rolls to see how it was - Gran Cereal - that means Great Cereal. This is what it looks like...

I saw the rolls on the box, but seriously didn't think they were really chocolate candy for some reason. I mean no body would think that was a good idea for a cereal - that's not healthy, who would buy that for their kids? Well, I opened the box, and these rolls are seriously chocolate covered balls of cereal. It made me think of Toy Story 2's Cowboy Crunchies: "the only cereal that sugar frosted and dipped in chocolate!" They put that part in the movie to make fun of sugar cereals, trying to think of something that would really be over the top. And here I had proof of it in front of me that South America is over the top!

Corey saw me dishing this up for the kids, and asks "Why do you keep buying this stuff?" I don't know, I really don't. Oh well, "Kids, let's say a prayer..." Corey made me laugh as he commented "I don't think a prayer will help with that..." "Okay... let's pray that it doesn't kill us."

The kids liked it. Enjoy it kids, cause I can't ever buy it again.


This was in Vina del Mar in our one bedroom suite. That's why there are kids are eating their cereal on the floor.

Fiesta de la Navidad

Friday night was a Christmas Party in El Golf ward here in Santiago. I heard it mentioned briefly in Relief Society but then I got called out to take a toddler to the bathroom and so I didn't catch the time. A different Relief Society activity was on Wednesday at 7 (had a paper invitation for that one) so I thought maybe 7 is the standard starting time. So we asked around to check, those we spoke to thought 7 too, so we went at 7 for the party. But it was at 8. So we played soccer.



Had a good game, our kids are learning to say "Aqui! Aqui!" (here) and "A mi! A mi!" (to me).

Then at 8:00 we went in to the chapel - the people who told us it started at 8 were the people who arrived there at 7 like us and they were the people who were setting up for the party, and they were still setting up. The internet guy who Corey had been waiting for all day called to say he was on his way and so Corey ran home to open the apartment for him. The kids ran around the halls, we danced to Christmas music, and didn't help set up at all. My kids did come and ask me many times "When is it going to start?" "I don't know." Then we found out we were supposed to bring our own plates. I called Corey to ask him to bring plates and forks for us. Around 8:45 people were still arriving, setting up, and visiting. 9:00 we sat down as our plates had arrived via Kurt, Corey was still at home with the internet guy.


It was now starting. Or so we thought. My kids were relieved. After a welcome by the bishopric there was a prayer, then each of the counselors said a few words for a few minutes, then the bishop, all the while my kids were struggling to be patient. Hyrum, who wins top complainer for the evening, was saying too loud (luckily he doesn't speak Spanish so hopefully no one understood) "I can't stand listening to Spanish anymore!! I wish I never came here! Why can't we eat yet? Why do we always have to do what the adults want?!?!" Then a missionary who served in the ward for 8 months said a few words and received a gift from the ward - his parent's were there with him to pick him up. Then, my kids thought the torture was over, but no! There's more!! We adults just LOVE tormenting our young! HAHAHAHA!! (evil laugh) So next, they played the Christmas Devotional message from President Monson, which I must say was excellent, but my kids were dying - it was 9:15, the food was waiting for them to come get it, and they had to sit and listen to Spanish again, AND to top it off, for some reason they had it on slow speed, so the message which should have been 9 minutes and 45 seconds was 15 minutes. At 9:30, an hour and a half later than they had expected, my kids were finally given some food. They asked for people to remain seated and they'd come serve the tables. A brother came and gave my kids a serving of corn and ranch salad, and they ate it and licked the ranch dressing off of their plates, which was a little embarrassing...

Ethan and Hyrum there with their hands on their plates, bringing them up to their mouths for another lick.

More food came around - turkey, rice, more salads, it was delicious and worth the wait. We made the kids wait until 10 people were eating cake before they could go attack the desserts. Corey fatherly advice: "You just don't want to be the first one to the dessert table..."

There were two other parts to the activity, which I didn't think they'd do cause it was getting so late, but they did - the young women sang the Nativity Song as the primary kids came out dressed in their parts - this part was my favorite and it had Corey and I almost crying with laughter...

Can you see Hyrum?

He's the one in yellow...

We're not sure what he was - I thought he was a wasp, Joe and Ethan say he was a bee, Mel says he was a firefly, Corey thinks it was a grasshopper costume, it had a huge abdomen sticking to his bottom, it was hilarious.

Ethan, Wesley, and Kurt and Ashley's daugther playing their parts -
Ethan was a reindeer? Don't know about Wes and Mckinley...

Joseph and Mary - I was still trying to get a photo of Hyrum that did his cuteness justice. His little resigned smile was just priceless. I love it, Corey was visiting with someone at the other end of the hall when they started, so I was trying to take pictures but also trying to call to him to come see. He made it in time to capture the moment and we were both in tears from laughing so hard. LOVE YOU HYRUM!! You're the cutest, and are hereby pardoned of your top complainer award for the evening.

The other part of the social was wrapping presents to send south to areas affected by the earthquake. 11:12 and the party's still going!

11:40 - we decide to head out. Hyrum's done, that's my watch there that is on my arm that Lily's bottom is resting on - she's asleep on my shoulder.

We all slept in on Saturday until 10. Chile has cured us of living the good schedule that we were on in Costa Rica. We're all back to normal. :) Feliz Navidad in one week! We've gotta get a tree or stockings or something. We've been postponing it, slackers. but we're going to try and do something special each day to try and get some of that Christmas spirit.

Kid's Day

Viña del Mar is a beautiful city. Unfortunately I didn't discover that until Wednesday as we were leaving. That is because I couldn't get my kids to leave the hotel. They loved the Kid's room. And since I let them call the shots, that's what we did. Someday Corey and I will come back here with teenagers or no kids at all and it will be a different experience. Until that day, it is possible that each day and everyday will always be Kid's Day.

So the kids went to the Kid's Room (the Mini Club side)

And they painted

and showed me their painted creations: masks and wands!

And sculpted clay

and drew

(I love seeing Abi at work.)

and climbed, slid, and jumped

We did go outside once while Lily was napping, and the kids had fun in the pool...


but it was a little cold...


Then, after they've spent themselves, it was off to bed again - 5 little monkey sleeping in the bed

two more chose the crib instead.


Joe won tonight's bedtime battle to be with the baby (Joe, you're a little big for this crib, aren't you?) We really did go home on Wednesday, cause we were already pushing our luck with 2 days cause only brought one change of clothes for everyone. Tomorrow is laundry day - I haven't done laundry since Costa Rica.