Happy Hamburgers

Happy's Goose

2012-01-17T22:43:00.000+01:00

Sorry in advance mom. I love you.

This is our Christmas Goose. It is a Christmas decorations that my mom made ...I think. I do remember my mom making wreaths at some point. I obviously get my awesome craftiness from her. :)

Anyways, this festive decoration was handed down to me many, many years ago. The goose comes out every Christmas and is put in a special spot. :)

We put it right where Happy can see it the most ...because he loves it and thinks it's wonderful. In Denmark it hung above his computer ...here in Germany it hung right next to his big TV. Over the years it has turned into Happy's Goose. It's his favorite part of Christmas.

Good Family Makes Cookies. GO MOM!

2012-01-09T23:35:00.000+01:00

Look at us. Making Cookies... like a good family... There is some unwritten rule that if you don't make Christmas cookies with your family you are a terrible mom. :) FYI.

HA! I only say that because every year I actually succeed in making cookies with my kids, despite swearing that I'll never do it again... :) Usually it's okay because in the end, although I have a complete mess in the kitchen, I at least have yummy cookies. This year I made cookies with ...ugh, ...crisco. I thought they would be good since that is what the recipe actually called for and this time I actually had it. Shortening? Isn't that Crisco. Ewwww..

The dough wasn't even yummy to eat. Oh well, lesson learned... crisco is gross, just use butter. I don't think the kids noticed though. :) ...and I don't think I'll ever use Crisco for anything else ever again.

We don't have a lot of counter space in our German kitchen. :)

Here is Michaela's cookie. She made it for Happy. First she took a teeny tiny rocket shaped cookie and covered it with as much frosting as she could, then she figured out how to maximize the amount of candy she was able to stick on to it...

I'm not sure why, but her cookie reminds me of a caterpillar. :) Anyways, she then convinced Happy that he HAD to eat it because she... "made it with love" just for him.

Then Happy proceeded to make a "special cookie" for her.

He went into the kitchen and five minutes later he returned with a plate of tiny carrot, celery, and cucumber pieces... and then began to "decorate" a cookie with "vegetable sprinkles" for Michaela. Nice. Those two are an interesting pair.

...and if Andrea had her way she would just make flour cookies. Actually, Andrea has zero interest in making a cookie. She would rather throw flour on the dough repeatedly ...and roll it out indefinitely. :)

...and she got mad because I eventually made her stop. Please note the perfected pout by my angelic three year old: crossed arms, sad eyes, big fat lower lip ...she's got it down! But she's the fourth kid and this doesn't work on me. Sorry pup. :)

ok.

...not true, it did work ...she continued to "flour" and roll out dough for quite a while because she is the fourth kid ...and I've learned that wasting a blob of icky-tasting crisco dough is well worth a solid half hour of entertainment for a three year old.

Back up to the Eve

2012-01-05T22:55:00.000+01:00

On Christmas Eve we went over to Kelly's house for a FONDUE PARTY! :) We had cheese and chocolate and I have to admit to eating way more of the chocolate than the cheese. :) It was a really great day because all my favorite German-Living families were there... :) The kids kept to themselves, the husbands mostly kept to themselves... perfect. :)

Krista and Andrea! They have gotten twin comments several times while being out in public. They have the same floppy hair and I caught them both hitting themselves in the head the other day. Smart ones....

Brett and Scotty!

Kelly was my friend until she got this for Andrea. It has a million small pieces and if they aren't arranged in the right order my sweet Andrea loses her mind ...so I hid it. It's not really part of our family anymore. Sorry, Kelly, I couldn't take the stress!! :)

Boys playing chess... FYI, Scotty is a chess superstar. The Boy kicks our butt all the time and we never let him win. He sets traps for us and then whips his little queen around the board killing all our pieces right before yelling "CHECK"... He is his daddy's boy. Can't spell to save his life, but is a math genius. :)

Happy with a book. Well, it's Michaela with a book, but she is happy. :)

So there you have it. Our Christmas Eve. :) Sierra was in charge of pictures, so she isn't in any ...she'll make a great mom one day! :)

Christmas Morning!

2012-01-05T22:37:00.000+01:00

The monkey danced and sang... Andrea loved it! Thanks Dale!

Michaela got some Norwegian money to spend in Norway. It looks like more than it really is. :)

Love those mermaids!

Poozie would open a few presents, but always end up back at the castle....

Yes, there is candy in her mouth.

Can you find the kid in the mess?

Fuzzy socks...

I survived!

2012-01-01T23:27:00.002+01:00

It's all done! Christmas is back in the attic... New Years Eve has been cleaned up... Michaela comes home tomorrow. Andrea starts school back up this week. The other three kids go to school next week. I can't wait for a schedule!

Yes, that's what my life has become, one where I thrive on waking up at 6:45, drinking a coffee, making four different lunches, waking up four children, and heading out the door on the way to school at 8:00am. I really do love it! A schedule makes me happy. I have two calenders, I make lists, and I have a special laundry basket filled with things I should do something with. It's the only way a mom of four kids, of totally different ages, with completely different activities, can function. ...and my "functioning" is sometimes questionable at best. :) Tonight I forgot to give the kids dinner and opened up a precious box of macaroni and cheese at 9:00pm. Oops.

So Christmas. Our Christmas morning didn't even start until 9AM!!! We have been training the kids to sleep in ever since school got out and it worked out pretty well for us this Christmas morning. :) It's really good that we got to sleep in because on Christmas Eve Santa dropped off a pink play mobile princess castle for Andrea ...and good ole' Santa asked Happy to build it. Who would have thought a child's toy would take a solid four hours to build!! It was a bit much, and we've learned another Christmas Eve lesson. I'm sure by the time the kids are all grown up we will have a fool proof way to NOT be up ridiculously late on Christmas Eve.

Anyways, I think our Christmas was pretty reasonable. This time of year I'm often annoyed at the amount of, ummm, let's see, for lack of a better word I'm often annoyed at the amount of CRAP our kids have. I think we did an okay job at not raising the CRAP level of our house.

Andrea got the above mentioned play mobile castle. It's pink and is silly big, therefore she loves it ...lots of new various play mobile in Andrea's life now. She can play "house" all day long. Andrea also got some new mermaids because she is obsessed with mermaids. Special thanks to my friend Kelly who gave her her very first mermaid for her birthday. :) I'm not sure what about mermaids are so special, but Andrea loves them ...almost as much as Hello Kitty. :)

All Scotty really asked for was a new Mario Kart game, which of course you can only get for the new Nintendo 3DS, hence he got a new DS. (Oh yah, Andrea also got a new DS so she would leave Scotty's alone.) :) Scotty also got lots of wood toys: Two big domino sets, a marble track, Kapla - which are like wooden flat rectangles that you build stuff with. He also got a new piece for his hot wheels track and a battling spin-y toy thing.

Sierra's big gift was a new iPod that takes pictures. She got lots of clothes and some drawing stuff. Jewelry, random things, blank CDs to put music on... Nothing too exciting. She's 11 and officially done with toys ...although when Andrea wants to play castle Sierra is her favorite person to play with. :)

Michaela's big gift was a week long ski trip to Norway. :) She also got lots of clothes and jewelry and some drawing stuff, several books ...random things... basically the same "stuff" as Sierra. She did get a membership to an online game too ...that made her happy. :)

Happy got some stuff. I got some stuff. Lots of stuff, nothing too exciting, we already have everything we need ...and I could now write something really cheesy about how all we really need is our family ...but it would be cheesy ...so I won't. ...but it's true. It feels very safe to know there are people who love me no matter what. I will never be stuck alone.

HA! Alone? I can't even be alone when going to the bathroom! ...Andrea always comes in because she wants to "pee with mommy" ...and she has to finish first because everything is a contest in which she has to win. Hmmmmmm... I don't know where she got that from. :)

...pictures later. I'm tired. That was a lot to type and it's been a while since I've written lots. :)

THE TREE

2011-12-23T22:41:00.000+01:00

Here is Michaela with her yellow playdoh star that she made when she was three years old. Little Playdoh Star is too old and brittle to go on the tree anymore, but every year we pull him out and take his picture. :)

Maybe to a normal person our tree looks tacky, but I think it's awesome. :) Every branch has several ornaments on it and his lights are colorful and blinky. It's a giant, fat tree ...and it's filled with "stuff". :) I think trees with "themes" or trees that match are blah and boring. Of course, if you have a boring, themed tree that matches your curtains and couches ...and it makes you happy, then I'm happy for you and your tree. :)

Christmas Trees turn into members of your family. You become instantly biased and love your tree no matter how funky it looks. :)

That said, the day after Christmas I start looking forward to the moment when I can toss my tree off the balcony and vacuum up all the pine needles! :)

Michaela + Math = Dubai

2011-12-19T19:50:00.015+01:00

In February, Michaela is going to Dubai!!

She is going to Dubai because she is smarter than all of us put together. :)

My little 13 year old daughter will be going with two other middle school kids from the school to participate in a Hungarian Math Competition called KOMAL ...and it's insane. I can't even begin to figure out the answers ...I get half way through the questions and I'm completely lost.

She has been studying with "her math team" once a week during lunch, and Happy helps her at home when necessary. She is thoroughly annoyed with me every time she asks me a question, because, although sometimes the question looks familiar, I am never quite sure on exactly what to do. Good thing Happy is smart.

I have cut and pasted some of the questions that her math coach gave her to practice on. Let me know if you figure out any of the answers!!

KÖMAL Questions:
If 73 hens lay 73 dozen eggs in 73 days and 37 hens eat 37 kg of wheat in 37 days, then how many kg of wheat are needed to produce a dozen eggs?

If the last digits of the products 1.2, 2.3, 3.4, ..., n(n+1) are added, the result is 2010. How many products are used?

Solve the following equations, where x and y denote positive prime numbers. a) xy(x+y)=2010, b) xy(x+y)=2009.

The sum of six consecutive integers is multiplied by the sum of the next six integers. Prove that the product obtained in this way will always leave the same remainder when divided by 36.

First Grade Baking Day!

2011-12-19T18:58:00.001+01:00

Scotty on Christmas Cookie Baking Day. :)

Andrea was beyond excited to get to hang out with Scotty's class.

Scotty and one of his best friends. They are the same age, but his friend is the son of the Heavyweight Boxing Campion of Germany... or something like that, he is as tall as me. :) For the record, Scotty still says his best friend is Clay, who moved back home to America. :( ...but I love the loyalty.

She never did make a cookie... she just kept adding flour. :)

More Geburtstag pictures

2011-12-18T21:38:00.000+01:00

Happy's Birthday is almost over ...so here are some more pictures. :)

Lego from his mUmmy. :) ...just like every year. Scotty loves it! :)

One of Happy's favorite ice creams is an Ice Cream Sandwich ...but of course you can't get them here in Germany ...and you can't import them. So we had to make our own ...AND if you are going to make your ice cream sandwich, you might as well make it a big one. :)

Glücklich Geburtstag Glücklich

2011-12-18T11:15:00.004+01:00

Today is Happy's birthday. It's the day I go through his Christmas presents and decide which ones I can pawn off as Birthday gifts. :)

I think next year we will have a "half birthday" for him because, like everybody else with December birthdays, he kinda gets ripped off a little. :)

The highlight of his birthday was a super bright flashlight which I'm sure will be very useful at somepoint in life... Not quite sure for what though. :) Is it obvious that he bought the flashlight for himself ...and it was too expensive so it turned into a birthday present. However, I'm pretty sure that his Birthday Flashlight will burn the retinas of one of our children at some point as well. It's that bright.

So if you are wondering what to get the guy who has everything... You get him a special flashlight that can light up a room in the middle of the day. :)

Off to go hide the dangerous flashlight so the kids can't find it.

Happy Birthday Happy, we love you!!!

Croutons

2011-12-18T11:01:00.002+01:00

I decided that my first post in over three weeks should be about the fact I make my own croutons. :)

Sierra took a pretty picture of them so I figured I should share.

What this really means is that I have finally downloaded all the pictures off the camera so I can start to write more. :)

Real Thanksgiving. :)

2011-11-29T21:19:00.008+01:00

Here is the real Thanksgiving blurb ...and here are some of the crazy village children. :)

There were four families who all got together for Thanksgiving this year and that made for a lot of people ...most of whom were kids. Ages: 13, 11, 7, 6, 6, 5, 4, 4, 3, 3, 3, .5 :)

My girls are the oldest and the two of them are at the point where they are stuck between the adult table and the kid table. Maybe we should make a teenager table? Look at what a loving table it would be.

Here is Pooz with Krista. They see each other every single day and they hang out all the time... so often that they act like sisters most of the time. :) I'm glad Poozie has friends... Three year olds don't often have friends, like real friends... but my little Andrea is already building her village.

Michaela also has her own little village going on... She is headed to Norway the day after Christmas for a week of skiing with her best friend's family who moved from Hamburg to Norway last year.

...and hey Grandma, check out my pie!!! It's my best one yet. I nearly forgot to put the evaporated milk in this time, which I've finally learned is called Kondensed Milk here, but at least this time I remembered the eggs!!!

AND. My pie has that little line in the middle. It's where I stabbed it with the knife to see if it was done. To me a pumpkin pie needs to have this line in the middle because I'm pretty sure every pie my mom ever made had a line in the middle from being poked with a knife. ...and so this pie ...with it's line in the middle, is how a real pie should look. A pie without this line in the middle looks weird. :) j

Thanksgiving...

2011-11-28T21:52:00.003+01:00

This was our fourth Thanksgiving away from "home".

...and this thanksgiving more than any other thanksgiving I am extremely thankful for my friends and family.

I'll leave it at that, but there is no way I could have survived the past month without my family and friends. It really does take a village ...and my village totally kicks butt. :)

...and if you don't have a village, and I mean like a loyal village, not a pretend group of "in-the-moment-followers"... but if you don't have that group of people to help you along and guard you like a German Shepard would, you are going to be eaten by some crazed rabid wolf somewhere through life...

...and rightfully so because IF you somehow manage to go through life and NOT have a loyal and trustworthy village to back you up, you probably SHOULD just be eaten because you are most likely too snakey and two-faced to have picked up a village along the way. Hmmm.... :)

Happy Thanksgiving. :)

HA! :)

How's that for English Homework? :)

Before Bug & Pooz....

2011-11-17T19:11:00.004+01:00

ISH Wins!

2011-11-12T18:24:00.004+01:00

Here is Sierra, #4, serving the final winning points of a volleyball game here in Hamburg. She served the last four points! First one to 25 wins! :)

She is much, much better than last year. Last year she had trouble getting it over the net very often, but she kept practicing and practicing and she is awesome this year! I love it!! I'm very proud of her... even if their tournament in Holland didn't go so well this weekend. :)

I can't wait for her to play High School Volleyball!

Halloween 2012!

2011-11-12T18:23:00.001+01:00

Plants vs' Zombies. Papa knows exactly what Scotty is for Halloween. :)

Hippie Chick. Sehr cute.

Goth Chick. Sehr hasslich

Andrea chick. Andrea is just like Scotty was at the sweet age of three. She refused to put on a costume of any kind and when I forced the adorable pink puppy suit on her the screaming made my ears cry ...not worth it! She did wear a tutu for some of her party though and that made me happy enough.

At least she would wear her "bat hat" for the preschool play. :)

Spider cupcakes for Scotty's class. This is what they looked like before they all landed on the floor of my car. I carried a tray of spider parts up to Scotty's classroom and tried to rebuild the spiders. Whatever. The kids liked them anyways.

Here is our little pile of candy that our four children collected together. :) We got marzipan balls, lots of pennies, a wooden toy, a few chips, an orange and an apple... nothing we really cared to eat. :)

I can't wait for real trick-or-treating, but thankfully my kids don't know/remember the difference... at least the two little ones don't. As far as Scotty and Andrea were concerned this was a giant pile of candy and they were perfectly happy about it ...so I tried to be happy about it too. :)

We tried trick-or-treating this year again and it worked out fine. Last year we went to a row of apartments which is well known for housing all the International Families; this year we tried something new and went to a neigherboorhood that we heard also did trick-or-treating... :)

True. This other neighborhood did do trick-or-treating, but it was clearly a German neighborhood. There were other groups of kids running through the streets and it felt very "halloweeny" and that made me happy, but those little kids all had a cute German song to sing when the door opened. All we had was Scotty with a flower pot on his head yelling "trick-or-treat" at them as they opened the door. Sorry, no song.

Most of the time the Germans would just stand there and wait for our song. Nearly every opened door ended in a stare down... they'd stare at us waiting for a song, we'd stare at them waiting for candy. In the end we usually got candy, but even Scotty knew it was a bit awkward. :)

WWII Leftovers

2011-11-08T16:40:00.005+01:00

I will try really hard to catch up with life...

Let's go all the way back to when an old WWII bomb was discovered 600M from Andrea's preschool... October 27th.

I was on my way to pick up Andrea and a friend's daughter from school. On the way I met Policeman #1 who told me the road was closed... I thought it was weird because it was a small back road, but I just figured I'd go around. I kept driving and, about the same time that I came across Policeman #2, who also told me to turn around, my phone rang. It was the Preschool Teacher saying not to worry and that they were in the basement.

Huh?

Seems that when Andrea's little preschool class was outside at the park a policeman came up to them and frantically yelled "something something something RUN AND HIDE in your basement"... Way to not invoke panic Mr. Police Officer.

Anyways, the preschool teacher, who is the person I'd most want Andrea to be with in a bomb situation, ran the kids back to the school and took them into the basement/toy room. :) I'm sure there are worse places to be stuck in during a bomb scare. :)

Neither the teacher, nor I, had any idea how serious it was, so I simply decided to go around and come in on the other side of the school. Then I met Policeman #3. I told #3 that I needed to get my kids who were hiding in the basement of their preschool. He said "No." He told me there was no way to get to my kids by using that road.

See, here's the deal. There was some digging/construction going on and they found a "not yet exploded" bomb from WWII. A British bomb, so thank you England... The immediate circle, ~500M, around the bomb was evacuated house by house and nobody was allowed to enter under any circumstances. However, around this immediate, inner circle, there was an "outer circle" that nobody was allowed to enter either, but the "outer circle" had not been evacuated as thoroughly as the "inner circle" and #3 said there was a chance I could talk my way in.

According to the policemen had been showing me, Andrea's school was in the "outer circle", just a few houses outside of the "inner circle". She could in theory be reached, but not on the road I was currently on because that particular road let straight into the inner circle. Policeman # 3 said I needed to go around the "inner circle" to the other side and come in from the back. Making sense so far??

Okay, so I start driving and it's pure chaos on the already ridiculous roads. This is when I began to get scared because other people were acting scared. I've learned that's how panic works... you see other people freak out and then you freak out and so on and so on... Strange, but it happened to me too... I didn't freak out, but I did become very, very focused on getting to my Poozie as quickly as possible.

The road turned into a video game. Do what you want and just don't hit anything or you lose your turn. Nobody was following rules, people were driving down sidewalks, honking from everywhere, bicyclists randomly riding places, the not-so-calming police plowing through traffic with their sirens and lights on... Eventually I got to the other side and met Policeman #4.

#4, who was a much older man, said, "No, you can't go this way." I explained that I had to pick up my two three year-olds who were were in the basement of their school." He told me to go back a road and try there. I stared at him and just said okay. As I was getting into my car I turned back and gave him my "mommy eyes" and said, "Please". He paused for a minute and said okay. I love you Policeman #4.

WHOO HOOO I was in. HA!

But not really, but at least it got easier because there was considerably less traffic inside the guarded "outer circle". :) But there were two more policemen I had to talk to and convince to let me through their individual barricade. Six policemen and one hour later, I made it to Andrea.

I had spent an hour trying so hard to get to little Poozie and her friend. I grabbed them both, gave them hugs, tossed them in the car, and then became rather focused on getting us all away from the dumb bomb.

We eventually made it home. My friend had picked up my other kids from school and we met at my house safe and sound, but a little traumatized from the entire event. :)

There you have it. Poozie's first WWII Bomb Experience ...mine too. :)

Michaela is 13!!!

2011-11-07T21:46:00.005+01:00

Here she is in all her teenage glory. :)

I have a teenager, a real live teenager...

UGH. :) She does make me feel old, but on the other hand she makes me feel like I've accomplished something. I raised this kid for 13 years! Someone should throw ME a party. :)

Seriously.

Anyways, here they are... a group of teenagers. Not as scary as I once though, but that's just because my teenager picks nice teenagers to hang out with. I still believe that teenagers as a whole are pretty scary.

The girls hung out, watched movies, giggled, ate insane amounts of candy and chips, played all the games I used to play at sleep over parties, drank insane amounts of soda, bounced on the trampoline, giggled some more, and eventually went to sleep. Then they woke up and ate insane amounts of pancakes.

Teenagers are hungry, giggly people.

Here's the "cake". Michaela had a sushi party, so she got... sushi cupcakes ...which were handmade until 2am. :)

Stonehenge Adventure

2011-10-31T21:08:00.007+01:00

Yes, we went to Stonehenge. :)

Once Paul flew in to meet us we decided that since we were only an hour away from Stonehenge that we should all go and see it.

Sounds simple enough, but the GPS was out to get us.

A certain person, who was not me but will rename nameless, used the GPS a week earlier and set it to "avoid major roads" ...and you can guess what happened.

We drove for two hours on the backroads of England, through the tiniest of towns/villages... some towns were even just one lane and to drive through the "town" we had to wait for a traffic signal so we could take turns with the traffic going the other way.

After two hours of driving through lovely little meandering roads we not seen a single sign for Stonehenge. We just kept following that dumb GPS ...until it's battery died and we realized the car chargers didn't work. Now we were two hours into the middle of nowhere England... and without a GPS. See the excitement of the situation?

Oh, but it gets better because it always does...

Andrea throws up.

All over. We had a change of clothes and we get her cleaned up.

Ten minutes later Scotty throws up. No change of clothes though...

...and we are still in the middle of nowhere England and still without a GPS.

So we stopped at a roadside pub to get out of the puke-mobile and take a break. We ate some British food. I had a jacket potato (baked potato filled with stuff), Happy and Sierra had fish and chips, and Michaela had this... it was called yorkshire pudding. The yorkshire pudding Happy's mom makes is WAY better. :)

At least we were in a country that spoke English, so as we were leaving I asked the bartender guy how to get to Stonehenge. He looked confused and said we were an hour away. HA! I explained to him that we were an hour out when we started nearly three hours earlier!

As he was trying to give me directions a guy drinking a beer at the end of the bar said he was headed that way and that we could follow him... So we followed a toothless drunk man to Stonehenge. ...but the toothless drunk man was very nice and was sure to drive slow for me so I could keep up... and he wasn't really drunk. :)

Please keep in mind I'm still on the wrong side of the road and the only one authorized to drive the rental car. WHEEEEE.......

We followed him most of the way and then we used Happy's cell phone's map to get us the rest of the way there. What a mess, but by then we were pretty determined to get there.

We finally saw a sign and had a small little celebration in the car. Turns out Stonehenge is right next to a "Major Road", that we could have followed straight from Ingrid's house... for an hour.

But we made it and got to see The England Countryside too.... :)

On the way home I got on the freeway towards London and refused to leave it. After disregarding a couple GPS directions to get off the freeway we finally figured out the dumb thing was set to avoid the only road we needed.

We were home at Ingrid's house just an hour later... (PS...For the ride home the GPS was only working because we found a charger in the trunk that worked... we had charged it while driving with Happy's phone.)

The End!

Vacation Report: London

2011-10-23T08:32:00.007+02:00

Michaela was obviously there too... but she took the picture. :)

While in England we did travel into London for a day. Our family has been to London before so we had seen all the big things, but when you are just an hour away, you need to go. :) We hopped on the tube and off we went.

As a mom it's a huge deal to "give" your day to someone, so I really do appreciate that Ingrid escorted us the five of us through London from place to place. She was an outstanding tour guide and I'd highly recommend her services!!! :) I didn't have to look at a map once which was a nice break!!

While in London we basically just went shopping. :) We went to a HUGE book store and Michaela picked out books for her birthday. It was a really nice book store, but Borders makes me happy enough when it comes to book stores. :)

Then we also went to a HUGE toy store and it was slightly unreal. Hamleys is HUGE. Five floors and every floor has a different theme! They had a floor for girls, one for boys, one for stuffed animals, one for crafts, for one for something else, games maybe? Can't remember. It was enormous though and the best part was that it was very well designed so that you just keep walking in circles and you can see everything.... no roaming aimlessly. :) We roamed with purpose...

They also had demonstrations all over the place so the kids could watch magic shows or watch flying helicopters or swirly markers. I realize all the demonstrations were to in order to sell things to us, but it was still fun and the kids loved it, especially the magic ones.. It felt very Disneyland-ish; the California one, not Paris. :)

There was even an entire corner dedicated to Teddy Bears... not to mention the Build a Bear corner! :) However big you are picturing this toy store in your mind... it's bigger.

Because I had not yet spent enough money, Ingrid found an American food store. :) We bought some root beer and some candy and also got some snacks for later. I even splurged and bought these FRUITY PEBBLES!

England is tricky because they use the Sterling Pound as their currency, it looks like it could be dollars.... 5.85 would be a reasonable amount of American dollars for me to spend on this one small box of Fruity Pebbles. 5.85 pounds is a bit more ridiculous though. To convert to US Dollars you nearly double it ...so this sill box cost almost ten dollars!! But I hope Ingrid's kids are enjoying every bowl full... because we forgot it there. :) Ingrid don't let them go stale, if your kids don't like them then share with the eye-closed, hoola-hooping, singers. :)

If Ingrid writes on her blog about the Jiffy Pop we bought I'll post a link, because it was fun to show her family how Jiffy Pop works. :)

We even made it to Princess Diana's playground, which was really cute! We hung out there for a while and then made our way back home.

Andrea is a pouter. If you tell her something that doesn't make her happy she will flop to the ground and "pout". I guess being a "pouter" is better than being a "temper-tantrum-er". It's much more quiet and almost funny.

I also learned that, in London, cabs are black... "Black Cabs". I might have already known this, but I doubt I'd ever thought about it. Our family is way past the "fitting into a cab" stage. :) You don't even notice them as much because they are black, not bright yellow. :) Of course I still like the yellow ones more though because I'm a loyal American and yellow is even my favorite color, but the black ones are still cute.

That was our day in London. :) Thanks Ingrid. :)

I didn't crash!!

2011-10-19T21:52:00.006+02:00

We have been to London a few times, but NEVER have we been brave enough to drive. I guess it hasn't been a matter of fear, it's just that between double decker buses, black cabs, and the maze of underground tube lines, you don't really even need a car.

However, Ingrid lives about an hour outside of London's city center... and once you start factoring in the price of train tickets for all of us, and the extra traveling time, it just made sense to rent a car.

So I did.

I rented a car when I arrived with the children at the Stansted airport on Tuesday afternoon. For this trip, Paul, again, got left behind :( At least he was able to meet up with us Thursday night and spend the weekend with us... He's an important boy with important things going on at work.... :)

So I had the wonderful opportunity to drive a car with the steering wheel in the wrong place and on the wrong side of the road!! BUT it gets better, because it always does....

I didn't have a GPS.

My portable GPS was in my car, which Paul had taken on a short business trip. The day we left I had his pretty car with the built in GPS... so I had no GPS to bring with me. Super!

I was too cheap to rent a GPS for the same price I could have bought one, so I figured that if I could just make it to Ingrid's house... on the other side of London... it would be fine and Paul could simply bring our GPS with him when he came.

So I printed a map from Google Maps. HA! Who does that anymore?!!

I studied the maps and verified the directions with Ingrid. It seemed simple enough ...until I had to do it all on the wrong side of the road!

**Long story short, I drove through London ...using a map.

Okay, fine, it was mostly freeways, but there were times when I couldn't believe I picked the right way.

What I learned about driving in England:

1. The seatbelt is not over your left shoulder.

- I would flail my arm around searching for it every time I got in the car... then I realized the seatbelt is over my right shoulder and that I needed to use my left hand to grab it.

2. There IS a rear view mirror. It's just in the middle of the car ...which is on your left.

- I drove the entire week and finally as I was frustrated I couldn't see behind me Paul told me to use the rear view mirror and I said, "Oh yah". I hadn't thought to look left ..at all ...for the entire week.

3. The other cars... and motorcycles are also driving on the "wrong" side of the road.

- You have to remember which way cars are supposed to be coming from ...and it's not the direction you think!

4. Roundabouts are evil.

5. Shifting with your left hand would be impossible.

- Thankfully the car rental place only had an automatic to give me. It was hard enough to go from drive to reverse with my left hand. I had never even thought about it. I would have been in real trouble trying to shift with the "wrong" hand.

6. To drive the car you need to get in on the right side of the car.

- It took a few days of actually opening the left door before I realized that if I wanted to drive I'd need to go open the right door. When we picked up the car from the rental place at the airport I actually sat down in the left front seat and paused for a minute... I thought the rental guy was going to take the keys back.

7. Left means left and right means right.

- When someone would give me directions and say, "Turn left at the light." I'd think in my head... "Okay, left, so that really means right because everything is backwards" ...and I'd get myself all confused. I don't understand how I would think that it would mean the opposite, but I did and I kinda spent the week not really knowing which of my hands were left or right.

...and you have to turn into the correct lane when you turn ...and parking lots are pretty sketchy... and cars come from the lane where you wouldn't expect them... and roundabouts are a whole new world, but all in all driving wasn't that bad and I'd do it again.

Oh, and roundabouts... There are no such things as roundabouts in Germany or Denmark. The "roundabouts" they have here are tiny little circles in which you can see every car that is involved. They should be called "baby circle roads".

A real roundabout is a mess of lights, arrows, street markings, and merging cars coming from several directions. They are so big and even come with their own maps to help you navigate them. They are rarely even round! Roundabouts are more like a giant oval with many, many roads branching off in every direction; not just four like in a German "baby circle road." Some roundabouts had roads going through the middle and some were more like "Figure 8-abouts". Simply crazy...

However, after all of that, I would still tell everyone that driving on the wrong side of the road is something that you should try to do at least once in your life. It was just plain weird. :)

...and Paul never gave his driver's license information to the car rental place so he didn't get to experience the JOY I had... guess we are headed back to Ingrid's in the future so he can have a turn. :)

Home from Potato Break!

2011-10-17T21:46:00.004+02:00

We are home.

But I really didn't mention we left. :)

The kids were off of school last week for Potato Break so we went to England to see Swedish Ingrid, who we first met in Denmark many, many, many years ago... but now her family lives outside of London. :)

Ingrid is one of the nicest people on earth and her family is just great! Really though... they are one of the sweetest families I know. The kids are kind and caring and helpful, her husband is one of the best behaved husbands I know of. He has been well trained and even cooked dinner one night while we were out shopping in London. :)

I never even hear their kids argue, but maybe that's what all that Swedish was about. :) I think I will learn German just so I can have another language to threaten the kids in.

"Verhalten oder Ich werde dich in einen Schrank sperren und futtern Sie toast fur drei tage." sounds much nicer than, "Behave or I will lock you in a closet and feed you toast for three days."

Speaking of Swedish... Ingrid's family speaks perfect English, all of them do, and English seems to be pretty easy for them, but when we plain ole' English speakers are not in the room, they change to Swedish... because that's their language. :)

As soon as we boring English speakers enter... they immediately switch from Swedish to English ...even if their conversation means absolutely nothing to us. It was just a polite thing they do and they were so aware of it all the time.... Once I just kept walking in and out of the room to hear them go back and forth between languages. :)

See? Nicest couple on earth... We arrived the day after Michaela's 13th birthday and Ingrid had a cake waiting. I love these two people... I really do!

Here are the kids, who I also love...

....and more friends, ...makes me happy.

Another good friend who I miss a lot also moved from Denmark to England... She brought her family to visit with us for a day and it was so nice to see them again. Thanks so much to her for coming out!!! :) This is a picture of us running to each other, open arms... :) It was like a movie. :) :) I miss them and hope we can figure out a way to get her oldest out here to spent a week or two!!

Seems as if I'm finally cashing in on the International Lifestyle we have going on here. :)

I'm a Sand Collector

2011-10-06T22:44:00.001+02:00

I'm a sand collector!! :) Cool huh?

It started off as kinda a joke, but after getting a few different sands, they really do look different and it's kinda fun. :)

So I have about 15 different sands from all over the place. If you go somewhere cool, send me some sand!!

Chibi

2011-10-06T19:33:00.000+02:00

Here are the long awaited pictures of the newest rodent of the family. Chibi.

He sleeps all day and about the time Sierra goes to bed he gets into his little plastic wheel and runs like a tiny little cheetah. I've never seen such tiny little legs go so fast!! It's hilarious.

...and when he runs it's unbelievably LOUD. I can't believe the noise this thing makes ...I can't believe Sierra can sleep through the noise this thing can make. I guess they are the perfect match for each other. :)

Dear Tooth Fairy,

2011-10-03T22:30:00.002+02:00

Hamburg Freezers ....lost.

2011-10-03T21:58:00.006+02:00

Hockey.

Happy has a season pass so we are now official Hamburg Freezer fans... except after tonight it will be tough, because it was so frustrating to watch the Freezers take 145 shots on goal and miss all but two. ...but that's another story.

It's not real hockey, it's European hockey, but I don't really know the difference so it was still fun. :) Maybe tomorrow I'll try to watch the game in which the Hamburg Freezers play a real live NHL team as part of a special something ...but probably not. :)

At today's game:

- Michaela was bored out of her mind. I had to tell her to pretend to watch.

- Sierra watched with me and tried to figure out the scoreboard and the rules and why people had to go sit in the "naughty box".

- Scotty's favorite part is the watching the Zamboni, clapping to the loud music, and eating ice cream during the breaks. :)

- Andrea thought it was too loud, but it held her interest because of the clapping and dancing that was involved ...and the giant TVs.

Anyways... Today we all went to the game and it was a tie. 2 to 2. Then they had another five minutes to play. Still a tie. Then there was a shoot out, which doesn't seem fair at all, but it was fun to watch. :) ...and in the end the Other German City Roosters won. I don't think Roosters or Freezers are even German words. That's odd.

HEY Shelly, this picture is for you. :) See the guy in the yellow shirt? HE'S THE PRETZEL BOY! He carries his checkered fabric lined, wicker basket up and down the aisles selling PRETZELS!! :) I thought of you the second I saw him!

Ich bin Frau Happy

2011-09-28T13:12:00.002+02:00

Look. Parking spots for girls. Cool huh?

...and they are wider. :)

Flat foot?

2011-09-26T21:24:00.002+02:00

Here is Bear. Her paw hurts.

After the summer Sierra's foot started hurting. It looked like her right foot had another ankle bone sticking out under the real ankle bone. She kept complaining so I finally decided she had a problem and I took her to the doctor a couple weeks ago.

The doctor immediately sent me to the surgeon ...and told me to hurry because they closed in an hour.

Scary huh?

Not really though ....although I spent the next hour thinking a surgeon was going to have to cut open Sierra's foot and remove whatever funky growth she had ... it turns out "surgeon" was a word that was "lost in translation". I think it the doctor was more a bone doctor of some sort.... but he was definitely not a surgeon. :)

After waiting for an hour in the waiting room filled with people with casts on it was finally our turn. The doctor looked at Sierra's foot for 18 seconds and said, "She has a flat foot." Well, he didn't really say that, it was more like a sad game of charades with a mix of my German and his English, and a lot of pointing ...and in the end I guessed that Sierra had a flat foot and that was making her leg bone rest differently on her one foot which caused the bone to poke out at a slight angle ....which was putting pressure on the inside of her foot. Oh.

Her foot looked fine to me. ??

Anyways, the not-surgeon-doctor gave me a prescription for a pair of custom fitted inserts for her shoe and the next day we went and had custom fitted inserts made for her shoes. Simple enough. We'll see how it works out, but it's not looking good. The inserts raise her out of her shoes all together so I think this will require some new shoes too. Too bad those aren't also free with the super cool medical insurance we have.

I also think that her foot was made angry by wearing flip flops all summer and that if she just started wearing normal shoes with good support then maybe it would solve the problem all together.

It's always something... I'm also in the process of removing a "wart" from the bottom of Poozie's big toe, but I'm pretty sure it's not a wart. I'll try, but if nothing happens it's a visit to the dermatologist.

Still makes me smile to get free everything and free medicine for kids under 12 ...made me smile until I realized Michaela turns 13 in a couple weeks. Hope KE doesn't get sick. :)

Volleyball Bear

2011-09-20T22:35:00.003+02:00

Sierra is doing Volleyball again and she is really good!!

Turns out volleyball last year was more of a learning year for her ...because aside from the traumatic Danish Volleyball lesson in 2008, she had never really played before.

But this year is her second year on the ISH Volleyball team and I'm super proud of her. She is scoring points with her serves and returning the ball and calling "Mine" when it comes near... She's awesome.

She went to Dusseldorf a few weeks ago for a game and this past weekend we had two girls from Holland stay with us when they played here. In a few days she will go to Amsterdam to play and her last away trip will be back to The Hauge in Holland for the tournament and I think we will have to go along to watch now that she plays more of the games. :)

Good job Bear!

I hate this tree.

2011-09-14T22:05:00.003+02:00

The BEECH TREE.

I hate this tree in the Spring when it's leaves turn a depressing brown ...a brown that some delusional people like to refer to as "purple" to make the tree seem a little more exotic.

I hate this tree in the Summer when it's brown leaves turn to a dark green similar to that of lake scum.

I hate this tree in the Fall when it creates these seed thingys: E V E R Y W H E R E

What a wonderful joy of nature this tree is.

Today I spent nearly three hours straight cleaning up after the two enormous, ugly trees in my front yard. I filled two garbage cans and ten big plastic bags full of these stupid seed thingys.

...and as I cleaned and raked and mowed and scooped; the stupid little seed thingys kept bouncing off my head.

I can't wait until all of its never-pretty leaves fall off. I'm done with the dumb tree.

The ironic part here is that we just bought real furniture ...a dining room set complete with a big table, side board, bookcase, and eight really cool looking chairs. All wood. :) hee hee

My new dining room furniture was made from the "core of German beech trees". HA! I will now love my new furniture even more because we have helped to kill off some of these frustrating trees. :)

I had no idea what kind of trees these were until this afternoon when I finally whined to a neighbor. She said it was a birch tree, but when I googled the picture to post here I realized she meant beech trees. Little translation problem, but I'm pretty impressed she came up with birch at all.

:) Maybe I should order some more beech tree furniture. :)

Ewwwww.....

2011-09-11T22:24:00.003+02:00

I've recently wondered why there were so many pigeons hanging around our yard. I think it's because of these lovely little creatures.

Maybe little isn't the right word... I've never seen such big slugs before. Santa Cruz had the banana slugs, but these German slugs are gross! This one was was nearly as big as Scotty's foot.

Yucky huh? It gets better. Just imagine running one over with a lawnmower, or tagging the end of one with your car as you drive in the driveway, or better yet.... stepping on one as you take the garbage out. Disgusting enough yet?

Now I feel bad for saying how gross the slugs are. The slugs on their own are not gross. It's when they get squished and their sluggy guts go everywhere that things get a bit disgusting.

Thought I should share... :)

Birthday Season is over!

2011-09-04T21:50:00.010+02:00

We are officially done with August birthdays! That was hard work. :)

Scotty had his birthday party today, Sierra's was last weekend. My birthday was somewhere in there...

This year I did kinda cheat though ...not with the cakes, because we have some strict standards around here concerning birthday cakes. I cheated on the parties. :)

Sierra wanted to have her party at an indoor swimming pool and Scotty wanted to go to an indoor play place. So we traded some money for our sanity and decided to let the kids run free somewhere other than our own home.

Scotty's Party: 23 kids, 4 hours.

I would have never survived without my husband and the nice parents who helped me. Go Team!

The highlight of the party was Daddy. Paul was flinging kids all over the place and they loved it. He was also throwing giant foam pieces at them so hard that they fell over ...those crazy kids couldn't get enough. Even the little girl who only spoke Russian kept tugging on Happy's arm for more. :) It was hilarious/scary.

The cake had some definite problems while being made, as they all do. It basically broke into crumbs and I had to search around the kitchen for other things to frost. It was a mess, but in the end it turned out okay. There were so many kids at the party I had to make a spaceship AND a Moon. :) This worked out okay because the Moon on it's own kinda looked like a hairball/turd.

Sierra's Party: 13 girls, 4 hours

Michaela was my helper during this party. She was a great big sister and I hope Sierra realized it. :) She helped with organizing people, clearing plates, handing out cake, and even skipping cake when there wasn't enough to go around. Thanks KE.

The only scary part about this party was that I was dealing with 11 year old girls who are scary enough on their own, but now I was dealing with a German speaking Pool. It took some time to figure it all out, but again, my mastery of the German language pulled through. :)

Here are the girls...

Here they are again...

...and not a lifeguard in sight so it was a free for all. Just little ole me down at the bottom of the slide pleading with them to be careful as they sprinted past me and back up the stairs for another ride.

These 13 girls kinda ran the pool while we were there. It was like a little mob of English speaking chaos running from area to area. They stopped at the deep diving pool for a while and took turns jumping off the 3 Meter platform and yelling things to Sierra like, "Sierra is awesome", "Happy Birthday Sierra", "We love you Sierra"

It was cute and when it was time to go the girls started singing Happy Birthday to her for the whole pool to hear. :) Very cute and it made me happy.

Since Sierra just made the Volleyball team I decided to make her a relatively easy Volleyball cake. :) (Not sure why, but the picture insists on being sideways so tilt your head and move on.) PS. It wasn't that easy... I dare you to draw a volleyball, it's harder than it looks! :)

So for a while my kids are now 12, 11, 6, and 3 ...and that makes me 34!

Das ist mein schultüte!

2011-09-03T08:59:00.004+02:00

The first day of first grade is a huge deal to Germans. Parents take off work, get dressed up, and escort their kid to school ....AND the kid also gets a schultüte!

Thanks to my mastery of the German language I know that schultüte means school bag, although it looks more like a schule-waffle-cone.

The good parents, such as myself, buy a plain carboard cone and decorate it themselves. The slacker parents buy a pre-made cone that comes covered in sponge bob or pirates pictures, which seem to be the only two boy themes acknowledged in Germany. :) Of course, I think the best-est of parents probably form the cone themselves from a piece of poster board.

So being in the second-to-best parent category, I bought a plain yellow cone; and being in the busy-mom category, I made Happy decorate it with little dirt bike people going in circles. I guess this technically made Daddy the good parent here. :)

I saw other schultütes had felt on the top and bottom so trying to fit in, I put some felt on and stuffed it full of school supplies, a toy, and a piece of candy. :)

At first The Boy didn't want to bring it to school because it's a giant pain in the butt to carry and you can't set it down anywhere. German engineers did fine at making a BMW, but perhaps a Schule-box would have been a little more reasonable shape for a six year old to deal with. However, as soon as he got to school he saw that some other kids had cones and he was suddenly very proud of his.

This is my son, who within three minutes of being in his new classroom, was sitting at a table drawing a dirty bubble. Don't ask....

Have a good day kids!

2011-08-28T23:04:00.003+02:00

Here are the Kinder! Grades 8, 6, 1, and preschool!

WHOO HOOO for School!!!

Even little Poozie is headed to "birdy school" for three full days a week! :) I have looked forward to this moment all summer.

Who am I kidding? I've been looking forward to having "free" days for nearly 13 years!

I deserve all the bon bons I'm going to eat! :) ...right after I do the shopping, clean the house, do the laundry, make the dinner, cut the grass, and iron the shirts. Basically all the same stuff I did before, but now I get to do it without a carting Andrea to and from. :)

Back "Home"

2011-08-28T22:04:00.006+02:00

These pictures are for Gwyn and Tatey... who have never been on an airplane and wanted to know what it was like. They will have to check out the youtube movie we made just for them!! :)

So yes, we are back home... been home for a while now, although I don't even know where "home" is anymore. :)

When we are here in Germany we talk about going "home" and things we miss from "home", but when we are in California or Canada we talk about going "home". So home is always wherever we are not. We are never home.

Hmmmm... That sounds depressing. Well, it kinda is. I guess I could take the "glass is half full" approach and pretend home is everywhere, but that would be a la-la-my-life-is-awesome comment more suitable for facebook. :) (Having a fed up with Facebook moment too.)

My main problem is that when I came back to my German "home", Shelly, one of my most favorite friends on earth, had moved back "home". Shelly was the first friend I made here in Germany and I never would have made it without her. Never.

...and the last few days have made me wonder if I will make it now that she is gone.

If I had a terrible day I would call her and she was guaranteed to have a worse story from her day: her oldest son peeing in his eye, her youngest son having a monster fit at the grocery store, or about her daughter voluntarily telling the entire school and all watching parents that she didn't brush her teeth that morning. :) I know I can still call her, and she will probably have some good stories, but it just isn't the same.

Even Scotty woke up on the first day of school excited to see Shelly's son, his first real best friend, Clay, at school. I had to explain to him that Clay moved back to America and wouldn't be in the school anymore. I thought Scott got it, but today he asked why he still isn't seeing Clay's name anywhere... "not even on library book or weekly helper list." ...so that just means my little brown eyed boy is still looking for him. :(

So I'm still kinda bummed our friends have gone "home" ...and I kinda wish I had a home.

But maybe home is where you can pass out on the couch... in which case I guess we are home. :)

...but I guess by those standards that would make the London airport our home too...

Superstar Scotty

2011-08-22T23:02:00.003+02:00

Scotty is awesome.

He's definitely got the skills, The Boy just needs a little guidance. :)

Go Buggy!!

He is checking to see how many "views" he has too. He told me ten people had viewed it. He seemed pretty proud about it too. :)

PS. It's Scotty's birthday today and Sierra's tomorrow!!! More to come about that obviously!! :) I'm excited to have a new 6 and 11 year old!

Maybe this 11 year old will be better than the last 11 year old I had. :) HA! I'm hilarious, huh Michaela?

:(

2011-08-18T09:00:00.001+02:00

Maybe this is why I went off on healthcare last time...

...and did I mention that we bought travel insurance for our entire family for 18 euros a year? :) We did our best to use it this year. :) I'll be interested to see what they cover because I think we used every aspect possible.

Anyways, Andrea had woke up one night and was crying and was holding her eyes. It just so happened that there was the biggest thunder and lightening storm I've ever seen at the time so I thought she was scared. It was a long night with her whimpering and being sad. :(

As the night went on I started to think she was hurt. She started saying Oww and she wouldn't open her eyes at all. In the morning she still wouldn't open her eyes. She just sat there with both of her eyes closed. I was talking to her and telling her everything that I was doing so she would know. "Mommy is going to put on your socks." "Scotty is handing you your bunny right now." "Mommy is going to go potty so I'm going to stand you up on the floor." "We are going to the car now." "We are going inside the doctor's office so he can fix your eye." "Mommy has to open her purse so sit here and hold my arm." :( It was so sad, but I'd love her even if I had to do that forever. She just sat there, eyes closed, silent, still. :(

Anyways, I had taken mUm and we went to her eye doctor. We walked into the eye doctor completely unannounced and he saw us before we even had a chance to sit down. If you don't call, they can't tell you no ...and who can turn away a cute two year old? :)

I will forever love the eye doctor who made my daughter see again. :)

Andrea did great. She didn't cry at all.

The eye doctor put some numbing drops in her eye and we persuaded her to open it. Eventually she did and then we had to see what was wrong. She had to put her little tiny chin in the big grown up eye exam machine and hold on to the sides. :( She looked so tiny, but she did everything she was told. I was so surprised. She looked where she was supposed to, she was patient and sat still. I'm pretty sure she wanted to be helped.

It took a while, but the eye guy took some sand out of her eye. Then he had to flip her eyelid inside out to get one tiny piece of sand out. Ewww. She just sat there on my lap, little chin in the giant eye exam machine thingy...

In the end he took out just a few grains of sand, but her eye had been really scratched up. She was fine from that point on. Phew.

($90 and one hour) :)

(If you are going to get hurt in Canada, make it an emergency.)

..AND.....

Michaela had her braces break while in Canada. At first a wire popped out and snapped, but a jet ski crash took the entire bracket off her tooth. I took her to a random orthodontist who charged me $40 dollars to look at her mouth and say, "Wait until you get back to Germany to fix it". She did give us some grape wax in case we needed it. Ummmm thanks. :) :)

Boat Rides ....and healthcare. :)

2011-08-16T08:00:00.001+02:00

We drove the boat to the park! :) How cool is that?!

Technically this is about two boat rides. Once we rode to the park, the next time we rode to Port Carling for ice cream. :)

Even Charlie the dog came with us. :) This is probably more amusing to me because I find it really amusing that we could ride a boat somewhere ...and park in a boat parking lot ...and instead of putting on seat belts we put on life jackets. :) Cool huh?

It is definitely cute. Even though I got motion sickness and Scotty fell asleep at the park because he had an ear infection and strept throat which later landed us in a walk in clinic for four hours to get antibiotics.

Canada got twelve points for fixing Happy's tooth quickly, but they lose 986 for making Scotty, Michaela, and Me wait in a walk in clinic for four hours before being seen by a doctor who was clearly in a hurry to get to the next person. ($50, antibiotics $30)

...and I only put the prices because people ask me about the health care over here in Europe. I'm not political, but I have some definite opinions on the health care now that I've used it in a few different countries ...and I do realize that it's only based on my own personal experiences, but it's my blog, I can write what I want. :) Nah.

Denmark: They gave me nothing. They were not concerned with my comfort. They were cheap and everything we dealt with there from child birth to ear infections was miserable. ...except for that time a doctor showed up at my door and gave me a shot in the butt. That was awesome. :) Everything else made me cringe.

Germany: We have the basic insurance, what I think most regular ole' Germans have. It's not private even though my husband says it is. :) I've never seen a bill. I only pay a $10 copay once every four months. Scotty gets speech therapy on a regular basis for free and anytime I show up at the apotek for antibiotics they give them to me for FREE. I see all the same doctors as those with private insurance and I don't have to wait.

America: I can't remember details, but I know copays were expensive and the girls being born put me in debt.... and my dad had to help me pay for insurance when Michaela was born or else I would have had zero coverage for her birth. Thanks Dad. I don't think the US is the worst though... I can see how it misses people, but honestly, nothing will be best for everyone. As a mom of four kids, someone will always be unhappy... :(

Canada: I'm not a citizen, but I've used it several times ...and from what I understand residents do the same thing I do unless they have private insurance. Not sure though. It's always been easy to get care, but it takes FOREVER!!! It's not silly expensive though

I'm not sure how a post about going on boat rides turned into health care, but there you have it. Tara's Opinion's on Healthcare. :)

Here is Scotty with an ear infection and strept throat. :) He's the best sick kid I know.

Squeeze over, but not too fast

2011-08-15T19:50:00.001+02:00

I see this sign every year in Canada and I finally took a picture of it. :)

It says if you are caught going 50km over the speed limit on the freeway ...so 30 miles over, then they will take away your car immediately and fine you $10,000.

Love it!

(Little note: When we got home to Germany we had yet another speeding ticket for going 6 km over the speed limit 6 km is 3.7 miles per hour.... 15 euros)

Here's my favorite. :) Maybe "Merge" means something different in Canadian.

Fun?

2011-08-14T21:00:00.000+02:00

It's all fun and games... until someone loses a tooth.

All that goofing around and having fun in the water and Uncle Pauly ends up getting half of his tooth chipped off by an airborne kayak. :)

Canada had it fixed ...two hours and $350 later.

Go Canada.

Canada... hotter than California!

2011-08-13T23:38:00.000+02:00

...back to our first days in Canada.

When we arrived in Toronto at midnight we were greeted with the hottest and most humid weather I would have ever though possible for Canada at midnight. I'm not sure how we plan our trip around all of Canada's record high days. :)

Once again, Paul's brother and his wife picked us up from the airport. Now that we travel with 900 lbs of luggage and six people we require more than one car to help us get from A to B. Thanks so much to Uncle Greg and Auntie Red for picking us up!!!

We went to the hotel which, well maybe it just needs a picture. It's a plain ole hotel. Pretty cheap. But it has a pool and a huge room in the center with pool tables, play area, tables, water fountains, big open places for the children to run around in and act unruly... It's near where Paul's brother and sister both live and we have managed to stay there every year we visit Canada. It's a new tradition. :)

So we stayed at the hotel that night and the next day half the cousins (one family) arrived. :) All kids were beyond excited! They really do enjoy these weeks with each other and I really enjoy hanging out with them.

The next day we headed up to the cottage where the real fun happens... :)

Here is the cottage. It's one of my favorite places on earth!

THREE!

2011-08-10T11:24:00.009+02:00

Even though we are already home in Germany I have to backtrack and tell about Canada!

Starting with.... Andrea's Birthday!!

Andrea is THREE!!

She is such a big girl now and I'm SO happy I'm done with "babies"... Babies and little kids are great and all, but I've had a solid 12 years of it and I'm all done. :) I'll just play with my friends babies and send them home when bedtime comes.

Anyways... like her last two birthdays, Andrea spent the day with all of her Canadian family! She had a great day playing in the water, riding jet skis, fishing, and going tubing. She is definitely the adventurous one; although Scotty did manage to do all of the above as well, just not as willingly. :)

The birthday bonus this year was that Andrea wasn't afraid of her birthday cake!! ...and she was only afraid of a few presents. :) Ladybug sleeping bags and bumblebee umbrellas can be pretty frightening you know, but at least she was excited to open gifts like a normal kid. :)

Then came the birthday cake:

There she stood on a chair.

Surrounded by her brother and sisters and all eight of her cousins.

As we brought out the cake I quickly flashed back to last year when our loud, loving song emotionally destroyed her for the rest of the day.

I quickly warned everyone to sing quietly.

We all sang, not to loud, and the next forty seconds were one of the top ten experiences in my life.

As we were singing Andrea just looked around at everyone with the best smile on earth. A slightly embarrassed smile, but a genuinely happy smile, like the smile she would give a cute little bunny rabbit. Not a smile because she was given candy or tickled. It was a just a happy smile. A real happy smile. She just kept looking at each individual person and smiling. She totally knew that we were all singing to her. She knew she was special and she was loving it. I wished I made a movie, but these pictures will probably be put to more use.

...but I still wanted a movie so I made everyone sing again. :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-MvoVZiUGU

(I can't make it show up, all my videos can be found be searching for the keyword "kebearbug" on you tube.)

Her smiles are still cute and adorable, but just not the same as first round.

It's also funny because looking back it never even occurred to me to sing "Happy Birthday Dear.... Andrea". It naturally came out, "Happy Birthday Dear.... Poozie". :) Sorry Grandma who is not a fan of the nickname. :)

Here comes the trauma ...because we all know it's coming...

The cake, which she obviously loved, was now ready to be eaten. I asked her if she wanted one of it's sparkly ears. She said yes, and I cut the ear off and gave it to her. I had wondered how she'd feel about cutting her special kitty cat cake, but she seemed okay. I cut a few more pieces. Everything was fine ...then someone asked for the chocolate eye. As I cut the eye piece and handed it away I realized I had done a very, very, very bad thing.

Andrea pointed at the disfigured kitty cake and started yelling "Owwwie, Oww Owww". Her words quickly turned to hysterical crying and screaming and pointing. I had just slaughtered her cat and I was now serving it to her cousins who she, just a few second earlier, had smiled at with all the love in the world. Now she hated each and every one of us. :(

Figures, huh? I felt bad, but then again, I should have known better. Plain rectangular cake for Andrea next year.

I eventually had to take her away from the table and amuse her with the new non-scary toys until the cat eating was finished and all of the evidence was cleaned up. I gave her a Popsicle later as a special birthday treat because she obviously just has problems.

I love you and all your problems Poozie. :)

Pedaling mit my Dad!

2011-08-04T06:38:00.001+02:00

P.S.

I rode 20 miles on a bike.

As in, I pedaled a bicycle 20 miles ...with my own two legs!

This is nothing to my dad who used to ride 100 miles at once and now considers 20 miles a "short ride", but I feel that riding 20 miles makes us both awesome! :)

It didn't take all day either, maybe an hour an a half. :)

Nope, my legs didn't hurt the next day, but I should have worn the special padded-butt bike pants because my butt was super angry at me. :)

Love ya Dad! Happy Birthday!

LADY BUGS

2011-07-31T06:05:00.002+02:00

When I was little I was on a soccer team and we were called the Lady Bugs ...thought everyone would like to know that.

My brother Kevin was on a soccer team called the Grasshoppers.

I don't remember if Mikey played soccer.

Anyways........

I bought these at the store and we kept them and loved them for a few days before setting them free in my mom's yard. :) Mom, can you please go outside and look for them? See any? :)

!

2011-07-30T06:11:00.000+02:00

Bear and Pooz!

My favorite bums!

Grandma and the boy!

Aunt Gail and Mary Ann!

Jessica, Audrey's mom!

Grandma!

KE!

Scotty... doing something weird!

Grandma... giving us food ...as always!

Grandpa and his cake!

Cheetos!

Uncle Bruce and the "German" Ingrid!

Nana and the girls!

Audrey!

Pooz!

If I missed your picture, sorry... my husband says I have to get off the computer and go to bed!

Best Beach EVER! :)

2011-07-30T05:44:00.000+02:00

Santa Cruz!

I talked my grandparents and parents and brothers into coming to Santa Cruz with us too. The Santa Cruz Beach & Boardwalk has turned into a yearly tradition for us. It's the best place ever! :) If I ever had ditched school during my high school years I might have drove out to this beach and hung out for the day.... If...

So here we are at the beach... Scotty LOVED it. I need to find a beach in Europe. It probably won't have an amusement park on the edge of the sand, but I'd be pretty happy with some waves ...real waves. Of course those big waves did take out Scotty once, but he loved it so much he spit out the salt water, dried his face off, and ran back for more declaring that he lost one life and had five more... (as if it was a video game and the waves had just sent him back to start...)

PS. Hey Grandpa, Thanks for helping look after little crazy-wave-running Scotty ...even if your shoes were ruined by the saltwater. :)

A beach is actually pretty scary. You really have to stand next to the kids and stare at them, just watching from a lounge chair isn't good enough. Waves are fast and tricky and can suck you up and swirl you around, just ask my little brother Kevin who was body boarding with Michaela and got sucked under and had to swim up to the surface. Glad you didn't drown Kev, but thanks for taking Michaela into the freezing cold water. (It's hot in California, but the water is as good as melted ice.)

Brr...

California Cool Sunglasses.

I have recently decided that I need pictures of me in this blog so that my kids will remember how super cool I am ... especially with my ....as my husband calls them... my "California Cool Sunglasses".

...and Hey Audrey, in California we eat corndogs, not sand... Silly Utah Pup.

No, she didn't fall. She ate the sand... Twice. :) Gotta love that kid!

Grandma and Grandpa

2011-07-29T04:46:00.006+02:00

Here we are! My parents, my Dad's parents, my two brothers, and any involved spouses and children. :)

(This is the good picture of Scott. There are several with him yelling at all the cameras. He was tired of "saying cheese" and no amount of ice cream and candy bribes would change his mind.)

My grandpa is super awesome because he is 80 years old and still swims and wrestles with the kids.

I miss my Grandparents lots. They live in Utah and we didn't get to see them last year, but they flew out to California to see us which saved us the drive there. :) YAY and Thanks!!

My grandparents really are great though. My grandma is so sweet and kind and loving and giving; she is really the perfect grandma. I love her! ...and my grandpa is great too. I love his funny jokes and sarcasm. It makes me smile. I see where my dad gets it from. :)

We had a fun time with them this summer. My little brother Kevin and his wife and their daughter also flew out from Utah. So for the week we just hung out and had a fun and relaxing time.

Grandma's House

2011-07-11T23:40:00.006+02:00

Grandma's House!

Last week we spent a few days at Grandma's house! ...the "Grandma with the Orange Trees" :)

Grandma has lived here forever.... see. This wall is where we measure ourselves every year. FYI I haven't grown since 1995. :) If you snuggle up real close to your computer screen you can see how tall Sierra was in 2009, 2010, and 2011. :) You can also see Michaela in 2009 and my little brother Kevin from 1989. The wall has been around a while.

I'd take Grandma's house over Vienna or Rome any day. My Grandpa built it and it's on a huge piece of land surrounded by corn and watermelon fields. She has orange trees, lemon trees, plum trees... :) It's a fun place to explore and she always has a fridge full of cold drinks that we love to help ourselves to. :)

Safety First

2011-07-10T00:41:00.004+02:00

I've written before about how much treats from home can mean to someone who is far away from their "home".... but unless you have been brought to tears by the sight of SpaghettiO's or Fruity Pebbles then you won't understand, but I won't go into that schpeel again. :)

My uncle's wife is originally from Germany, so when I come to this side of the ocean it makes me really happy to bring her things that she misses ....and this Eichbaum beer from Mannheim (and ONLY Mannheim) was on the top of her list. No need to say more, after I shoved some German reading material and chocolate into my suitcase I set off to try and fit an entire case of beer in. :)

So, FYI for anyone who needs to transport beer via an airplane. this is how you wrap bottles safely. Wrap in a couple layers of bubble wrap and stick it in a Dora the Explorer Swimmy Diaper... just in case. :)

PS - No bottles were lost during their journey across the world. :)

Fourth of JULY

2011-07-10T00:15:00.007+02:00

Yes, Sierra... I realize every country has a Fourth of July, BUT only in America is it a giant party all day long! USA#1!! (Oh, and Happy belated Canada Day on July 1st)

On our Fourth of July we went to the park with Nana and Papa at 6:00am to watch the hot air balloons get set up and take off. We ate our pancakes and then went to watch the parade. After the parade we got shaved ice, but by then... (~10:30am) it was already too hot to be outside. We went home to hide in the air conditioned house. We emerged only to run to the air conditioned car, with which we drove to an air conditioned restaurant. :)

Later that night the girls went with their dad for fireworks fun and Nana, Papa, and I took the two little ones to see the fireworks show at highschool... just like we do every year. :)

Poozie was kinda scared of the loud fire noise which made the hot air balloons get big. I feel somewhat obligated to put this picture in because it is the only one with me in it. Happy might want to print it and stick in on the fridge because he misses me so much. :)

Poozie, pouting... over a chocolate donut I believe.

Getting pancakes from the pancake truck at the park.

Yes, Rufus the cat had to come and see the hot air balloons too.

Hot

2011-07-04T20:37:00.002+02:00

Andrea loves the sun! :)

Sunscreen every day. (He's laughing because "it tickles".)

It's a spray. :) 8 seconds and you are done....

...and free to frolic in the water.

The following pictures will forever be known as the 2011 Attack on Nana .

...and here is the proof of who started it. You'll notice he disappears from the rest of the pictures.

Nana is attacked.

She fights back though.

...and the girls turn on each other.

...and Poozie happily munches away on her grape Popsicle while watching the screeching, crazy, wet people...

They eventually called a truce and went to take a break in the non heated jacuzzi which was still too hot...
So Papa poured ALL the ice from the freezer into the water. :)

The girls were floating in an ice bath.... but not for long. :)

Giant jugs filled with frozen water.... just trying to cool off in the nice 100 degree weather. (38C)

We are enjoying the sun and hot, but in reality spend most of the time inside the air conditioned house hiding from it. :)

We miss you Happy!

Lost Tooth!

2011-07-01T14:35:00.003+02:00

Scotty lost a tooth!

He has had a wiggly tooth for weeks, maybe even months, but not anymore. My little five year old lost his first tooth!

As always he was wiggling it around and it just fell out! He looked so surprised and showed me for two seconds and then quickly ran off to show his new best friend, Papa. :)

Then he showed Andrea who quickly started to cry. She wanted one too. She is terrible like that. Whatever anyone has she wants it too.... a gap in your mouth where a tooth once sat? Yes, she's gotta have one... Now.

That night he put it under his pillow and the International Tooth Fairy came and left him 5 DOLLARS for his tooth which, even though it's chewed more European food in it's life, fell out in America... and you get the currency of whatever country the tooth falls out in... OR you are traveling to. We've researched the tooth rules for how it works on the International Tooth Fairy website.

i HEART california

2011-06-29T17:53:00.003+02:00

We made it!

I remembered how much I love America during the flight from Frankfurt to San Francisco. So many friendly Americans!! I had fun talking to random people on the plane, people just start up meaningless conversations with you... Everone offered me help with the kids, Scotty rested his head on the lady next to him. The woman next to Poozie played peek a boo with her while I went potty. Grown ups let the kids skip to the front of the bathroom lines. People were just friendly and nice...

The flights were pretty uneventful and somehow we ended up in Economy Plus. :) Not quite sure how, but if it was something Happy's work arranged then DANKE! :) Economy Plus really is not that much different except I think you do get a fair bit more leg room.

Michaela took care of Scotty the entire time so she gets a zillion points and we ALL slept for about 5 or 6 hours, we had to sleep because the flight was so long and boring... and we were exhausted. :) Thank goodness it was only 11 hours... any longer and I would have gone insane. The last two hours are always the hardest for me. Poozie slept all the way until we landed. The kids did better than they ever have before though. They are seriously some of the best travelers I know. They sit nicely and never kick the seat in front of them, they ask for their own drinks, they conserve their own iPod battery, they are great. Phew.

Nana and Papa were at the airport to greet us and drove us back to their house. It was pretty late, but Nana and Papa stayed up as long as they could with us. :) They left us to eat cereal and watch cartoons and we finally went to bed around midnight. We all slept until 6 or 7 which was really quite impressive.

First place we went to eat: Denny's.

We left Denny's and drove immediately to.......

TARGET

I tried really hard not to go crazy and buy everything I saw. I think I did really good. I need to pace myself.

I'm not sure what is on the agenda today but I'm pretty sure it will involve In-N-Out Burger!!! Maybe right now!

2011-06-27T06:25:00.001+02:00

Getting on an airplane today! Bye Happy, see you in a little bit!

The Tooth Machine

2011-06-22T22:11:00.003+02:00

It's kinda like the Willy Wonka candy machine that makes Everlasting Gobstoppers.... except it makes teeth. :)

I had a crown put on a tooth today and due to my ignorance about dental procedures I thought I was just getting a little "hat" to rest on the top of my tooth to protect it. Nope, I got a whole new tooth... and this is the super cool machine that made it.

The dentist waved some magic wand thing over my tooth a few times and up popped this 3D image of my tooth on the screen. Then the dentist wiggled her mouse around and the tooth moved around on the screen... you could see every angle of my tooth. Then she moved the tooth around on the screen and outlined the entire thing. After a lot of clicking she had eventually created the perfect tooth just for me. :)

15 minutes later my tooth popped out of the machine like a gumball and after 30 minutes of the nice dentist cramming it into my un-numbed mouth I left with a new tooth. ...and Paul's favorite part was that for all of this super cool technology we only had to pay 480 euros. Root Canal and all... :) He said Germany gets a point.

AND Scotty's first dental experience....

Earlier this week Scotty had his first cavity filled. It was just a little tiny one, and I was terrified for him ...but he was super brave. I didn't even take him to a "kid dentist", I took him to my regular dentist because I like and really trust her. She would stop every time he raised his hand... and after him raising his hand about 20 times she finally finished and he left happy. I was surprised it went so well, but very relieved. :) I wasn't even upset that he didn't get a toy afterwards. :)

No more tooth issues for now.

OH, I also got a "frequent flyer dentist card"! If I take care of any teeth problems for an entire year I get one stamp from my dentist. Five stamps and my insurance will cover more of my dental work. :) Cute huh?

My Crazy Weeks

2011-06-21T22:58:00.005+02:00

School is out.

All four kids had school parties and after school parties, treats and snacks were made for each of their events, gifts for teachers were given. Last week was crazy. There is really no quick and easy way to explain how crazy my days have been. Perhaps a hour by hour log will be necessary to prove how nutso my days are. :) I give you today...

I woke up to 13 screechy girls and one whiny five year old boy. I quickly took Andrea to her preschool and returned home to make waffles. Twenty minutes later my German teacher arrived. I tried to learn German for two hours while the 13 girls and 1 boy ran through the house and thankfully ended up outside on the trampoline. Minor drama ensued. German lesson ended. Most of the screechy girls were picked up to go home and I was left with just my own. I hurried Scotty to his speech class, ...arrived on time thank you. I dropped him off at the doorstep and turned around to go back to get Poozie from preschool. A friend was in traffic so I grabbed her two year old too. I drove home. I left two two year olds at the house with Michaela and Sierra and drove back to retrieve my son.... only five minutes late. We came back home, the extra two year old went home. I made lunch for everyone. I took Andrea and Sierra to get the dry cleaning and stop by Staples, which, for some reason, is a much bigger event than it seems. In Staples I bought gummy bears to elude a massive Poozie Temper Tantrum. I came home again, made croutons and dinner and sat down. It wasn't so bad I guess, but I could write a story like this every day and that is what gets a little tiring.

No complaints though... In reality I love it, and I'd be bored out of my mind without my kids.

Of course I am just coming off a girls weekend away in Copenhagen, during which we took a train to Sweden, rented bikes, and pedaled through the sunny city of Malmo. :) It was a much needed rest and I'm ready for some more crazy nutso days. Bring it on kids!

...and Bring It they did...

Yesterday Sierra and Michaela had a big sleepover party in which they stayed up until 6:00am. Paul saw them awake when he went to work. :) Sierra said it was the best sleep over party she has ever been to so I guess all my suffering was kinda worth it. It's kinda a right of passage for every kid to stay up all night... :) I guess we finally checked that box. :)

So all the crazy end of school stuff is over and now we are starting to get ready for our big summer trip home. WHOO HOOOO! :) Of course this just means that now I get different crazy stuff to deal with like doctor, dentist, and orthodontist appointments ...and renewing residency permits for Michaela and Sierra who, up until four days ago, I didn't have valid passports for... hee hee. No worries though, it's all under control. :)

I'm headed to bed. It's midnight and, remember, I was up all night listening to giggling girls?

PS. Yes, they do have Staples here in Germany. It's called Staples and even has the same stuff inside. :) ...and Yes, I know you shouldn't give candy to a child just to keep them quiet, but it's all about survival now isn't it.

Mary Poppins

2011-06-11T21:22:00.000+02:00

A real life CHIMNEY SWEEPER!

I asked him to dance around singing "Steppin' Time" in my drive way, but he just stared at me. :) He even has a tall brush; and see on his shoulder...? He has a ball on a chain to toss down chimneys.

Here is the deal with this guy... He comes once a year and sweeps your chimney! :) AND if you touch him and take a piece of soot off of him then you have good luck the whole year!

Cute huh?!

I was at a friends house and MY Chimney Sweep shows up at her house. She has an actual chimney, so MY Chimney Sweep climbed on top of her roof and it was very Mary Poppins like. Super cute. It was really fun and we all waved good bye to him with our black soot covered hands... even us moms. :)

Happy just said I already wrote about him, but I can't remember... so here it is again. :)

Norway according to KE

2011-06-10T23:12:00.005+02:00

I send my daughter to Norway and tell her to take lots of pictures and these are the pictures I get back... Trees, Pacifier Tree, Mud, Sprite, and a Chip.

I did get this one back, so I was happy. :)

Don't Eat Your Veggies!

2011-06-02T22:04:00.002+02:00

The kids are thrilled and apparently it's world wide news. !!!!

E-coli is in a vegetable that people eat and tons of people are getting sick and even dying ...AND it's been traced back to Hamburg, Germany... where I happen to buy all my groceries. :)

I have been buying less fresh veggies lately, but tonight I actually got scared enough to throw away all the veggies in my fridge. We had gone to dinner at a friend's house and her husband kept telling me all about the deadly veggies and kidney failure and dialysis so when I got home I threw out all the healthiest items in my fridge. Oh well.

It's not really worth the risk and there has to be some link to something in the area... Plus, I don't even like cucumbers. :) But it's not even the cucumber's fault.

When the whole thing came out Germany quickly pointed the finger at Spain and their E-coli ridden cucumbers. Turns out there isn't any proof that the guilty veggie is a cucumber, much less a vegetable from Spain ...and now Spain is suing Hamburg, which makes kinda happy for some reason.

I do feel sorry for cucumber farmers though. I feel like I should keep buying their E-coli Veggies and just throw them away. Maybe they need a "Cucumber Farmer Donation Box" in the veggie aisle...

So my kids are happy not to be eating their veggies, but I think frozen and canned veggies are still okay. I'll look into that one.

Scotty has even been telling me that eating vegetables will make him sick and he could die. Great. Five years of telling The Boy that veggies will make him big and strong and now he thinks they will kill him. :)

Kids: Coming and Going...

2011-05-29T21:36:00.004+02:00

Okay. Michaela came back from Norway... The soccer tournament was canceled because a boy from Norway who was playing in the rugby tournament collapsed on the field and after a couple hours in the hospital he passed away. The girls tried to salvage their trip and did some sightseeing instead. I was beyond happy to get Michaela back home safe and sound.

Then I sent her away again. :(

This past weekend both Michaela and Sierra went to Düsseldorf for their Track and Field meet. Michaela did a relay race and the long jump. Sierra did the mini-hurdles, a relay race, and the ball throw. Their actual participation in the entire meet consisted of probably eight minutes each, but I think they had more fun with their friends for three days. :) I was beyond happy to get Michaela AND Sierra back home safe and sound.

Now I will send Michaela away again.

She will be gone for a week. :(

She is going sailing on the Baltic sea with the entire 7th grade and she will return licensed to sail a sailboat. :)

Should we ever become unemployed....

2011-05-21T09:34:00.002+02:00

Surprise! Uberraschung!

This is a Kinder Egg. It's actually called a Surprise/Uberraschung egg.

It's an illegal item in the States because it has an inedible choking toy in the middle of chocolate. ...I think I've written about them before.

However, this is a MAXI-sized Egg. It's big and the Easter Bunny gave them to us.

Then a friend showed me this... CLICK HERE

It wasn't as fun to eat knowing it was worth $20.00. :) The Easter Bunny probably only paid $3.00 for it. I bet the Christmas ones will go for more. :)

So, should we ever become unemployed I will start exporting Kinder Eggs to those less fortunate.

"New"

2011-05-20T11:31:00.002+02:00

It's string cheese! (kinda)

I had bought some at the British Food store for the insane amount of $7.00 for four pieces of kinda-string-cheese.

BUT NOW...... You can buy it in the stores!!! ...and it's only $2.50!!!

It's doesn't really taste like string cheese, but it will do for now. :)

KE in Norway

2011-05-19T06:22:00.003+02:00

At 4:00am I woke up.

I took Michaela to the airport.

She went to Norway to play soccer.

The whole way there I reminded her this is not normal.

Poozie's Potty Power

2011-05-19T05:47:00.007+02:00

I haven't written a story about how the magic has happened for fear that I might jinx it, but Andrea is a now an offical Potty Superstar, so I'll go for it. :)

My plans started with inviting a little three year old over for Andrea to play with. Kenzie is super cute AND potty trained! I thought since Andrea thinks Kenzie is like the coolest person on earth that she would do whatever she did. So Kenzie showed up with her potty and some potty videos and we went for it.

...It ended with Andrea yelling and swinging at Kenzie and then me putting a diaper on her because I felt bad ruining her playdate with the girl of her dreams. :)

But the next day.... Little Poozie Foo Foo was sitting by the laptop, watching Potty Videos, and thinking in her head.

Down came the good Mommy and she said, "Little Poozie Foo Foo, how about we poo poo, in the pink potty and I will give you chocolate."

:) (Did you sing it? If not, please go back and sing it...)

Poozie said okay. She wanted to sit on her potty!!!!

This all happened at 8:30pm... We stayed up until 11:00pm, watching the Potty Power video, and desperately waiting for pee pees so I could shower her with chocolate. Nothing. :(

But the next day.... Little Poozie Foo Foo woke up and wanted back on the potty! AND this time she made PEE PEES :) Whoo Hooo for Poozie Foo Foo!!

She refused the underwear and ran around in just her dress all day ...good enough for me, baby steps!

Over the next few days she went potty. I even carried the potty in a bag when we went out because in my world stores don't have bathrooms... really. We rode the bike to the store, potty with in the basket. We picked up kids from school, potty was strapped to the backpack. We went to field hockey, potty was in stroller...

After a few days I think it was too much potty for her and she went back to hating the potty.

Being the terrible parent I am I gave her back diapers and was at least satisfied that she wasn't scared to tears of the potty. Here's the thing though... I'm not really a terrible parent. This isn't my first kid and I have zero interest in the unspoken contest of who's kid can be potty trained first. It's a zillion times easier when your kid wants to... and in Europe, with a girl, it's a zillion times easier with diapers. :) So please spare me the, "consistency is the best thing you can have while potty training-blah-blah." :) I've read that book too. It's just that my sanity is worth more.

Then "the incident" happened. She was playing in the living room, where her potty still sat in the corner. She stopped playing and I could tell she had to go potty. She looked at me. She looked at the potty. She looked at me again. She looked back at the potty. Then she PEED in her diaper and went back to playing. It felt like a teenager trick. "Yah, I could do what you want. Yah, I know how to do it. ...but I just don't feel like it right now. So nah-nah on you."

So I took all the diapers and hid them at the top of the closet. From that moment on we have been diaper free. We've pee pee'd in public big pottys. We've pee pee'd at school. We are potty superstars over here! She even woke up dry the last two nights!!!

As a special Poo Poo note: She makes no differentiation between pee pee and poo poo... both go in the potty and she's okay with that. PHEW!

Scotty's been helping....

Ich bin awesome!

2011-05-16T20:12:00.000+02:00

I have advanced with my use of the German language. I have reached two major milestones!

- I have made an amusing comment to someone ...in German.

- I have reprimanded someone ...in German.

My amusing comment:

I was making my usual trip to the recycling center. This is how the recycling center works: You pull up, tell the attendant what you have to drop off and they tell you which bin to toss it into. Simple enough ...and I'm pretty good at saying "Ich habe papier." and waiting for them to take it to bin "funf".

So I pull up, say my "Ich habe papier." and the guy looks into the backseat of my car where Scotty and Andrea were sitting.

He says "Du hast kinder" ...or something meaning, "you have kids".

Here comes my magic German comment... I SAY... "Yah, und wo ist die Kinder Bin" HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! I'm HILARIOUS! :)

My reprimand:

Andrea and I were going to the grocery store right after dropping off the other three kids at school. It was early so I tried for the "Good Parking Spot".

The "Good Parking Spot" is the spot's reserved for those with kids and there are only four of them. They really aren't that good because they are on a steep hill and you have to hold the cart near the car with your foot while unloading it... but whatever, you don't have to cross a street and push your full crooked cart up a big hill just to get back to your car. (Everything is about the lesser of two evils here.)

Anyways, I pull into the "Good Parking Spot" area. One car was in front of me. I see the Good Parking Spots and one is open! WHOO HOOO for me!!!

THEN the car in front of me takes the spot!! A car which DOESN'T HAVE KIDS ...just some guy! ...and HE IST OHNE KINDER!! So I stop the car because I'm kinda mad and my mom says I have a temper. :) I roll the window down getting more irritated knowing that I will soon be pushing my full grocery cart out of the store, across the street and up the hill to the Bad Parking Spots all because of this jerk.

This guy is clearly ohne kinder and he is clearly in the kinder spot. I said, "Wo ist deine kinder." Then I gave him my irritated look and drove off just in case he tried to reply. :)

There you have it. My German teacher will be so proud. :)

The Poozie Whisper

2011-05-15T22:48:00.004+02:00

Andrea talks. Well, she whispers.

We've recently learned that my little Pooz is just too shy to talk! It's surprising news to me, but I swear it's true!!

With her potty training lately I've really wanted her to just say "pee pee" so I know when we need to make a run for the potty. She kept refusing to say it and acting like she was too embarrassed. She does this anytime I ask her to repeat something so I have learned to interrupt her yells, and whines pretty well over the past couple years.

Last week I took her to her Birdy school (her preschool) and her teacher told me, "she whispers". I wasn't really paying attention though and didn't think much of it due the chaos of a mass of mothers picking up their two year olds.

Later that day I told Andrea to say pee pee and, of course, she refused. Then I whispered to her and asked her to "whisper it in my ear".... and the little stinker whispered "pee pee" in my ear in the cutest voice on earth!!!

I couldn't believe it. I wanted to make a huge deal and squeeze her to pieces, but instead I gave her an oreo cookie and said good job. :) I couldn't believe it!

Later she wanted to watch Rio. I know this because she was handing me the remote while flapping her arms and saying, "caw caw". I asked her to SAY Rio. She stared at me. Then I asked her to whisper Rio to me... and the little stinker whispered "Rio"!!!!

It's not 100%, but I can usually get her to whisper things to me, or at least get her to try.

So after nearly 13 years of parenting I'm still learning tricks.

B R A C E S

2011-05-11T23:15:00.000+02:00

Michaela has braces! Phew... it has been a long process just to start the long process!

The poor kid has had five baby teeth yanked out just to get ready for this! Now that I think about it, we have been pulling baby teeth for nearly a year. I was starting all of this before we went home for our summer trip last year.

Anyways... her mouth was ready and the timing was in our favor, so we just did it.

We. HA! I dropped her off and I went shopping.. SHE sat in the chair for two hours with her little mouth open. :(

Not Really. I didn't just drop her off and go shopping. I sat in the waiting room for a while and contemplated busting through the door, grabbing her, flinging her over my shoulder and running away ...maybe kicking the orthodontist on the way out.

I knew the whole event would... for lack of a better word ...suck. :(

I felt bad. I think that before we showed up for this appointment I spent so much time telling her it wouldn't be a big deal, it would be easy, lots of people do it, we have American drugs, blah blah blah.... I had convinced myself it wouldn't be a big deal. When it was actually happening I was a wreck. I felt sick. I don't think I'll get much sympathy from Michaela though. :)

Before it even started I even sat in the waiting room and tried to justify with myself that her teeth were fine and seemed to be straightening themselves. A Butter Knife Friend had to reel me back into reality.

She did great though. I picked her up. She looked awesome. You can't even really notice the braces. I'm a mom. I notice everything about my kids, but honestly... You really don't look at her and see braces. I think they blend in and I kinda like them...and I'm not just writing that to make her feel better. :)

Currently her teeth are sore and she has a sore on the side of her mouth from some wire thing that held it open for two hours, but all in all she seems to be doing okay. I didn't say great, but okay. She's being served mashed potatoes ohne cauliflower and fruit smoothies every day so things could be worse.

I just made her lunch for tomorrow and it's a salami and cheese sandwich minus the bread and I've cut the salami and cheese into smaller than bite size pieces for her. It looks like a salad. I hope it works for her... or else it's pudding and yogurt again. :)

1.5 years was the estimated length of time she will have these super cool braces. We'll see how it goes!

Good job Michaela. You are one of the bravest kids I know.

Really.

Twenty

2011-05-09T21:32:00.000+02:00

20 is the number of letters in my street address.

I obviously won't write which letters are involved. :) ...but just for fun write down twenty letters.

Fislgiwhblsengudhvke

Giwhdlbiehfeldwobeda

That's how long my address is. It barely fits on those forms that gives you little boxes for each letter. It's kinda fun to have a "German" address... and mine is about as German as it gets. :)

Happy Mother's Day!

2011-05-08T21:22:00.005+02:00

Happy Mother's Day MOM!

This mom thing is hard. Super hard.

My mom made it look easy... which I guess is back firing now because I think this mom thing should be easy. It's not. This mom thing is tough work. :)

My mom really did make it look easy. I can only remember three times she yelled at us. I've only ever heard her say a bad word once... and not even a really bad one. She cleaned the kitchen every night. She made our beds once a week with fresh, smooth, cold sheets. She made sure our house was always clean, but she made me dust and vacuum

my own room. It's no wonder I turned out to be so awesome. :)

So here is an event that's bound to make my mom smile. :) Sierra painted her fingernails last week so Andrea decided she wanted to be like her big sister. This is what Poozie did with a green marker. I've since helped her paint them pink and she LOVES it. :)

See...... hard work.

Love you mom!

Answers... for a special friend. :)

2011-05-02T13:17:00.004+02:00

Yep, we did go to an American Egg Hunt last year. We made some cool friends in the last year so we hung out with them and it worked out perfect. :)

Kinder Eggs are illegal because of the inedible choking hazards inside the chocolate egg. Dumb huh? Not in Canada though... :)

AND... we don't save eggs forever. Goof Ball. ...maybe a week or two tops. We normally go through eggs pretty quick though. Of course I put MY eggs in the fridge. In the States eggs are kept refrigerated in the stores. It used to freak me out that in the stores here eggs are not kept in the cold section. Now if my fridge is full the eggs get kicked to the counter and I haven't died of egg disease yet. (Remember when I was concerned about your salmon that you let sit on the counter for 6 hours to marinate. :) Now I do it too. I did it for my parents, but didn't tell them about the 6 hours part... or they would have ewwwww'ed.) :)

I think that soup can was in hiding ...and probably passed down from expat to expat. :) I don't really even use them that often, but when you need one it hurts not to have it.

The resteraunt was great. It was nice and there was a cute old man playing a "laying down harp on a table"?? It was fun. I guess there are several themed rooms and one room is where the famous people have signed the walls. We didn't know until we read the brochure they gave us on the way out and it was too expensive to go eat there again and see the signatures. :) The food was good though. Our pictures didn't turn out, but I took them! :) It was mostly a great dinner because the kids behaved. Screaming kids can ruin anything. :)

Like Scotty's jacket? :) I haven't had to buy a coat for years. Thanks Johan!!!

Elaine is headed to Slovakia on Thursday!!! She is going for the Hockey Championship or some other big important game. Funny huh? It was an easy trip from Vienna so we figured we'd check that country off the list. :)

Something to know...

2011-05-01T22:14:00.004+02:00

He who readeth my blog hath a choice.

If you don't liketh it, don't readeth it.

Vacation Report: Slovakia

2011-04-30T22:26:00.005+02:00

Slovakian Cheeseburger. Cheers to Bratislava!!!

Slovakia.

a

Bratislava Castle.
Okay... I did NOT want to see this castle. I wanted to go to some castle ruins somewhere and some snakey train driving guy lied to me and told me we were going somewhere we were going to the ruins and we ended up here... at Bratislava castle. :) It was fine though, we got to ride a train and Poozie Loves Trains.

This is Michaela desperately trying to connect to the WiFi. She's getting pretty good with computers so if anyone could do it she could, but she couldn't. :)

From the Danube river boat.

Best Lunch ever. :)

Bratislava, which as Michaela knows is the capital of Slovakia, was small. It wasn't as extravagant or architecturally impressive as other cities we've seen. That was a nice way of saying "ghetto" wasn't it? :) It was great for the kids and I to do on our own. We ate at a McDonalds on the main square and fed pigeons and listened to a one-man-band. It was easy and for a mom traveling to an even more foreign country, easy is good. The highlight for the kids was probably the boat ride on the Danube River.

My favorite part was talking to all the American tourists who were being nice to my kids and me.

Vacation Report: Vienna

2011-04-30T21:51:00.007+02:00

What we saw from our super great hotel. :) Our new thing is to get two rooms that are connected... instead of a "family room". But when they connect rooms here , they put a door at the end of the hall and you get part of the hall, then you just leave your doors open :) Cute huh?

We watched HOP. In English! ...and yes, those tiny little children ate ALL that popcorn. It was real movie theater popcorn - Salty and Buttery, not sweet which is what the insist on serving here in Germany. Sweet popcorn is fine, just not at a movie theater. :)

Sometimes Scotty is the sweetest boy on earth.... sometimes.

We got on this train because it was pouring rain, and it took us here....

:) Good deal huh?

Easter Market - Really cute!

Top: Poppyseed and sugar syrup over the top of.... POTATOES... then topped with applesauce. Weird, but surprisingly NOT gross.
Bottom: Apple slices dipped in batter and fried? powdered sugar on top. Kids ate happily.

Painted eggs. Real eggs. :)

This is Poozie in the most expensive restaurant our family has ever eaten at all together. Mozart and all those other famous composers have signed the wall. :)

(Another pink bunny picture since Nana loved them.)

I forgot I wrote all this a while back... so I'll stick it in... it's a bit long... sorry.

Since we were in Vienna a day early Paul wasn't supposed to be at work yet, but I should have known better. :) While he worked at the hotel I took the kids to an obligatory tourist sight, Schonbrunn Palace.

It ended up being really cool only because there was an Easter market out front and a little tour train that went around it. Turns out Andrea Loves Trains!

The Easter market was just like the Christmas markets except you replace Santa with a Bunny. :) We bought some "interesting" food items there, just to try them... Unique. I'd never buy them again, but it was in the name of experiencing culture ...or so I told the kids. :)

Next thing we know it starts to pour rain and hail so we run like crazy people to a nearby tour train and hop in not knowing where it would go. Poozie Loves Trains and it was enclosed, we were warm and happy... It ended up taking us to the top of the Palace grounds where you could see everything. It was neat, the kids liked it, and it even stopped raining so we could get out and run around taking pictures before the train left again.

We went back to the hotel, picked up Happy and went to a yummy/way too expensive restaurant down the street from the hotel. The kids all behaved so it was a nice dinner and everyone was happy.

Day two in Vienna I took the kids to check out the town on what I thought was a tram that would take us in a big circle. We hopped on a tram. It went for ten minutes, it stopped, and the kids noticed... "gee, we are the only ones on here... cool!". Turns out it's not so cool. The bus driver came back, speaking some sort of a language, but we quickly figured out we needed to get off. Fine.

We got off and we are in the middle of a grassy area. No streets, people, cars, signs in sight. For the kids sake I confidently say, "we'll just walk across the street and catch a tram going back." We cross the tracks and see a tram stop and after reading the sign we determine that the next tram will be in two hours.

HA.

Then it starts to rain.

HA again.

Too bad I didn't have a map at all huh?

We decided to start off walking in a random direction and thankfully the same tram we had just gotten off, pulls around and is now heading to us. I'm not sure if it was supposed to stop, but I think the driver knew we were confused and lost... he stopped and let us on. 387 points for Vienna.

Anyways, that was a long detour from my real story... so I was still sure this was the tram that would take us in a circle of the city, and I figured I just got on it the wrong way... so we rode it for a while the opposite way. It was going really slow and the kids were getting antsy so we got off when we saw a trusty S-bahn station (subway)... We took the S-bahn a few stops and got off at the main square.

It was still raining but I thought there should be a tourist information booth somewhere so I made the kids circle the enormous church in the middle of the square. Nothing... but now we were slightly soggy and Poozie's shoes were soaking wet from happily jumping from puddle to puddle. I see a big ice cream store that we had been to the day before. I knew there was only two in Vienna and I was impressed I managed to find both!

We walked towards it and Michaela told me it looked familiar... yah, yah, yah... big old buildings, cobblestone, it's all the same kid. Then we see the Pizza Bizi place we ate lunch at the day before... Turns out we took two hours, rode two trams and a subway train and ended up on the other side of our hotel. We got some bagels from a bagel man and went to the hotel and watched cartoons for a while while Andrea's shoes dried out. UGH.

After I got my confidence back we ventured out once again. We went to find a big ferris wheel. Luckily it was big so we found it easily. :) We were the only ones there. No lines, no crowds, the entire thing was to ourselves... :) We took another train ride through the deserted amusement park because... Poozie Loves Trains. :)

I was feeling better about our day as we started to head back to find the movie theater that shows movies in English. Long story short... We roamed the streets for an hour, asking dozens of store owners for directions... Finally we found the theater down an unnamed side street/alley... and around the corner. It was worth it though. We watched HOP in English and ate two HUGE buckets of good popcorn. We had the theater to ourselves which was good for when Andrea woke up from her nap and was angry at the world... until she noticed the cute little Bunny on the screen. :)

Day Three of Vienna. Paul flew back to Germany for an unexpected meeting so the kids and I decided to leave Austria too. We went to Slovakia... as you do.

...to be continued.

2011-04-29T20:08:00.000+02:00

Here is an 11 euro watermelon... and a can of Cream of Chicken soup that expired in July of 2003.

Both are pretty impressive in their own special ways.

Spring DOM

2011-04-28T22:57:00.002+02:00

The Dom comes to Hamburg three times a year. It's like a giant fair ...but more giant than you are thinking. It's huge.

I impressed that it leaves at all because it's HUGE. It must take forever to set up/take down.

It involves the worlds largest portable roller coaster. See, even dumb ole' wikipedia talks about it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympia_Looping Maybe next time I should go on it. :)

concentrating in car.

riding on train.

fishing for ducks.

michaela and me up high.

michaela and korey, my friend's brave husband, upside down.

Easter Pictures

2011-04-26T22:28:00.005+02:00

Our newest addition to our Easter Decorations... I think they are cute... especially that big dopey looking one.

Poozie on a swing.

Sierra and Michaela got Easter Bike baskets from that super thoughtful little bunny. I'll write about their new bikes later!

Michaela is super creative. Here is her... all purple egg.

Andrea and her new little pink bunny that moves and makes adorable little sounds.

I wish I was a cute little pink bunny so she'd look at me like that... :)

Mommy draws a bunny, she colors it in... way better than subjecting your kitchen to five brightly colored cups of evil staining liquid.

Poozie's favorite. Kinder Eggs... which by the way are going for $20.00 on ebay since they are super illegal in the States. Who wants to be my business partner?

No, she's not sleeping... she's pouting. She's my special child.

Did Scotty get an iPod for Easter? NO. He got a game worth a dollar and he was ecstatic! (Angry Birds Rio if you're wondering...)

Shelly whipped these up in the kitchen for us. HA! She did order in German though... just as impressive. :)

I was stalling the kids and gave them crayons and hard boiled eggs and Sierra made some really cute ones! She preferred to color them, fine with me! Less Mess!

When we were done decorating eggs we had a grand total of 37 hard boiled eggs. Super. We have managed to eat a whopping total of six in the last week.

Scotty is awesome because he found a GOLD egg with two Euros in it! He said he will buy ice cream with it in 15 days because he wants to save it too.

Here are all the American kids that made our Easter egg hunt fun. Last year we really didn't know any of them.... so it's been a productive year.

Poozie had a great time. She's a good little egg finder.

Vacation Report: Munich

2011-04-20T16:21:00.005+02:00

Here Michaela!!!!!

It was during this holiday that I realized I am officially "done" seeing European cities. I have zero interest in it anymore. The cities are not bad and I'm not complaining... I just think I'm done seeing the "BIG" European cities. I'd rather hang out on a beach for a week or go camping or stay on a lake. ...so that's what I think I'll be promoting for upcoming vacations. :) Sound good Happy?

...and yes, we were supposed to go see friends in England this month. However, these two people are getting married in London... Will and Kate plus the Eight Million people who would be involved. :) It would have been insanely crazy there and Paul ended up having to work in Vienna so we had to postpone our England trip and tag along with Paul to Vienna. -Sorry Ingrid :(

On the way to Vienna we stopped off in Munich for a few days. We went to the Deutsche Museum which Paul has wanted to visit since the first day we came to Europe. We spent an entire day at the museum and didn't even see it all. It was HUGE and Andrea had had enough, and the sweet little angel let us know in her own little special way. (crying, flailing, kicking, spewing venom, etc...)It's 10:30 on the sun clock! It worked!
We watched a high voltage show. CRAZY LOUD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That night we tried to come up with something to do in Munich the next day and realized we didn't want to see the "sights". :) We went to Olympic Park, ate some crepes, took a little train ride, played putt-putt, and paid way too much money to see a small aquarium. We laid in the sun and fed the ducks pretzels which we kept buying from a vending machine. :) I enjoyed the sun and was happy to lay there all day... so we did.

We opted to leave Munich a day early (I told you we are bored of cities.) On our last day we woke up, went to a giant toy store where DADDY thought it was a Christmas Free For All. :) Then we drove four hours to Vienna ...in a car FULL of cute (read as: overpriced) German toys.

Look. I feed my kids veggies for snacks.

...and because this blog has turned into a "journal" for me which I will someday spend hundreds of dollars to print.... I have to write about this. :)

After we played putt-putt, which by the way... you weren't allowed to walk on the course. You had to stand off the side and we saw several other miniature golf courses and they were the same... weird. :)

Anyways, we were walking out of the putt-putt course and we saw an elderly lady who had fallen over and had landed on her face? and was bleeding all over the place. I had a first aid kit so I ran over somewhat happy to have use for the big thing I lug around everywhere, but my first aid kit was useless. (Note to self: get better supplies in my first aid kit... 18 sizes of band-aids with varying cartoon characters on them are not all that useful in an actual emergency.)

However, I did have diapers to use to stop the bleeding. This poor woman went through several diapers as I sat there throughly irritated with my German. I was terrible. I couldn't talk to her very well. I could tell her about my family "Ich habe vier kinder, Haben Sie kinder?"... which, maybe entertained her, but all I could think of is my grandmas and that I'd NEVEr want them to be in this situation. So we sat there with her until the ambulance arrived. I just held her arm and tried to talk to her... in my PATHETIC German.

I was happy my kids saw Paul and I help her though. Happy smashed our ice bottle up and we used our pocket knife to cut the bottle open and get the ice to make an ice pack with Kleenex; that mixed with the diapers... I think we really helped her... The kids were scared I think, it was kinda stressful... but I hope my kids took away some lesson from the entire event. They asked about her later, I'm sure she's fine, but I just wanted to go home and hug both my grandmas.

Bye

2011-04-08T22:09:00.003+02:00

...and just so you don't think I'm being a slacker again...

We are headed to Munich, Vienna (Austria), and Bratislava (which Michaela will tell you is the capital of Slovakia... DUH!!!)

Exciting updates to follow... :)

Go to School Drunk Day

2011-04-08T21:46:00.003+02:00

It was the last day of school for all the seniors at school yesterday... they now have a couple of months to "study" then they come back and take some tests.

So of course their last day of school (Thursday) was a big party. The school hosted a catered dinner for them that night; complete with wine and champagne. :)

Here in Germany the drinking laws are interesting...
- Age 14: You can drink if your parents buy it for you and if they are there when you drink it.
- Age 16: You can buy and drink beer and wine.
- Age 18: You can buy and drink whatever you want.

Sure, the school just fed kids alcohol, but this isn't the crazy part.

After the school-hosted-dinner these teenagers are then released out into Hamburg ...and off they go to the Reeperbahn. I'll just let you google Reeperbahn to get the full description. The kids are now on their own to party all night long...

P.S. My senior year of high school we went to Disneyland all night and ate churros and chicken nuggets. We rode it's a small world and took our picture with Mickey Mouse.

Anyways, we haven't gotten to the crazy part yet.

The following morning the kids, who have been out all night long drinking, return to school with the rest of the sober students who are going to class. Now you have loud, hung over teenagers acting stupid, "cool", and obnoxious in the sames halls that my kindergartner is going through.

It was pretty dumb. I don't get it. I'm just glad Michaela has a few more years before I have to tell her that there is no way on earth she's going to the Reeperbahn. :)

Fur meine Deutsch Ingrid...

2011-04-06T22:37:00.003+02:00

Ich bin am Kurs zwei mit meine Deutsch stunde. Jetzt ich bin awesome!

Das wetter hier is mere varm.. Das ist gut weil ich gern in die sonne schlafen. :) Ich nur schalfe fur ein klein moment weil ich vier kinde habe.

Wie gehts ist Sophie und Buddy? Sind hubschr hunden. Ich bin glucklich fur deine hunden.

Mochtest du lebensmittle auf Deutchland? Spaghetti? Kein fleish bitte. Ich darf nicht fleish nach Kalifornia habe. Der hund auf die flughafen ist sehr intelligent!!

Fur mir schriebe ist nicht einfach. Ich brauchte immer frage, "Wie schribt man das?" Aber Ich weiB klein worten

Wann ich spreche ich frage, "Wieherholen Bitte, Langzon, und meine lieblings ist, "Entschulagen meine Deutch ist hasslich. Wie ist deine English?"

Ich habe Deutch stunde morgen am morgen. :)

Tschus! Schon tag!

Sushi Sundays

2011-04-05T18:10:00.000+02:00

Our family is going through a Sushi phase.

We even involved Scotty's friend who also loves sushi. (PS. Scotty is the only one who does NOT eat sushi. We even tried to make hot dog sushi for him... nope)

We've made sushi a few times now (on Sundays) and we are getting pretty good at it. :)

We have even found a "Sushi Bar" that we call the Sushi Train because the sushi goes around on little plates that are on a little conveyor belt. It's cute... and yummy. :)

Happy is the only one who eats the slobbery sushi, the rest of us are happy with fake crab, avocados, and cucumbers. :) It's cute that the girls like it so much, maybe due to their "international life"... I can't image eating sushi in our little town of Tracy, California.

Are there any "Sushi Trains" in Tracy yet mom?

Green Day...

2011-04-04T17:57:00.000+02:00

A little late for St. Patrick's Day...

...but here it is.

Our Green Dinner.

Again, nobody celebrated St. Patrick's Day here, but again, I made the kids wear green to school. :)

Then I was told that Americans will make a party out of anything.

Yep ...but I'm okay with that. :)

Here is Andrea with her green dinner. See her cucumbers? This is how she eats them... She's crazy... cute, but a little crazy. :)

April Fools Day

2011-04-03T22:43:00.004+02:00

I'm sorry to disappoint this year. I didn't try and do anything mean on the blog, but I was too busy and more worried about trying to pull off tricking my kids.

I've seriously used up every super awesome trick I had and this year I went to bed on March 31st NOT knowing how I was going to trick my kids the next day. It was a little stressful!

I decided to trick Scotty with plastic, fake food in his lunch like I did to Sierra once. Scotty was not impressed. He was irritated at me because, "I used a minute up of his eating time." Sorry Scott. :)

I was really quite stressed about dinner. I ALWAYS make food that really isn't what it looks like. I was so desperate I searched online for hours about what I could do to my poor kids. I really had done everything I read about. :(

Then I came up with a great idea. Candy Hot Dogs. :)

I got the Danish hot dog buns that are like long cups... I filled them with candy and put a small piece of hot dog in the top. :)

I had envisioned the kids finding the candy and dumping it out onto their plates and THEN eating it, but they actually left the candy in the bun and ate it with the bread... just like it was a regular hot dog. Ewww..... I didn't think tic-tacs, pez, smarties, baby m&ms, gummy bears, and nerds would taste very good with the bread.

I also colored some water red and they thought it was kool-aid.

The kool-aid trick made Scotty 10% happy.
The hot dog trick made Scotty 100% happy.

Scotty is learning about percentages in class and so he always tells me what percentage happy something makes him... :)

For anyone wanting to trick their kids: If something looks yummy and sugar filled and ends up being boring and healthy it's not as fun as if it's the other way around. :)

So we ate candy hot dogs and drank red water. Paul missed out, he was away... :(

Sierra tricked Michaela by ringing the doorbell and making her get it. Sierra also made an "fried egg" out of melting a piece of cheese. :) I'm creating little monsters. :)

Recycle Queen

2011-04-03T15:32:00.004+02:00

This is just for Ingrid... Not German Ingrid in California, but Swedish Ingrid in England... :) (I'll do one just for you later German Ingrid...)

I have started recycling ...everything!! :)

They do have glass and paper bins along the side of some roads, but then you have to squish your paper into a tiny hole which drives me insane because my hands freeze before I'm half way done. ...so I have been driving 15 minutes out of my way so I can go to the recycling center and throw my paper and glass in the appropriate dumpsters.

I have been very good at recycling paper and glass, but that's it. I haven't recycled plastic anythings... However, I don't ever use disposable paper plates, cups or utensils so I figured I was about even. :)

BUT I had a my American neighbor over and she told me about these great yellow bags you can fill with all your plastic recyclables and someone will come pick them up every two weeks. I thought I'd try it because I AM going through five liters of recyclable milk containers a day, and my plan was to just do milk and juice containers... and it sounded easy enough.

Then I went to a friends house and saw that their entire garbage can was for recycling and they had a smaller one for the "non recyclables". I doubted it would work, but I tried.

I put a big yellow plastic recyclable bag in our main trash can and started yelling at everyone every time they put regular garbage in it. Sierra made me a sign to help. :) (It's not broccoli, it's a tree)

It worked! I was surprised that I have such a small amount of "trash". ...mostly food and diapers. :)

Then I asked the lady downstairs to help me order a paper recycling container so I don't have to haul that anywhere either! WHOO HOOO! I told you I'm a recycling QUEEN!

I have even changed our small downstairs bathroom into the "Recycling Center" of the house. I keep all the paper and plastic bags in there until it's time to take them to the curb. It's not as bad as loading it all in my car. Now the only thing I need to take into the recycling center is glass, and I can handle that. :)

So Ingrid? Are you super proud of me??! You should come over and we'll go out to dinner to celebrate how environmentally friendly I am.

Tomorrow...

2011-04-02T09:22:00.002+02:00

I've been a pretty bad blog writer this last week... again. Who reads this anyways? :)

I have been rocking under the table this past week, but today is supposed to be 20 degrees C; not sure what that is in F, but whatever it is it's sunny and warm so I'll write tomorrow when the rain comes...

The Two Year Old Gang

2011-03-27T22:28:00.002+02:00

These four kids are best friends... as are their moms. :)

They are the most innocent little people you have ever seen huh?? HA! They are tiny little monsters, each in their own special way! Don't let their cute innocent smiles fool you. They are probably secretly planning their next escape from the house to chase the cats.

Each one has a special skill which the group as a whole utilizes.
From left to right...

- Quinn is in charge of the entertainment. He works any buttons: TV, iPod, DVD player, Microwave, Oven, Dishwasher, Fondue Pot... He'll make it light up, don't worry.

- Krista heads up the deception department. Her random hugs and cute little chatter makes you believe all children can be nothing but sweet and innocent.

- Andrea is the scary one. Beware of the scowls. They can scare even the bravest of moms.

- Ben is the muscle. He special skills include opening doors and front gates. He is also in charge of helping anyone up who falls.

Andrea will be three in August.
Quinn will be three in September.
Krista will be three in October.
Ben will be three in November.

I'm so thankful for my little group of American moms I have here. I didn't realize how much I missed Americans until now. In Denmark, I was the only American. It was fun to have international friends of course, but it just wasn't the same.

It's been so much fun to have American friends to joke around with, be sarcastic with, and talk fast and use contractions with... People that you can just be normal around because they totally get you. I don't have to watch what I say and they understand how hard it is to live here even, especially with a family which includes a two year old.

I'm sure I'll make other American friends whenever we move on from here, but it will NEVER be like this; NEVER will I find four other moms like this. I don't think I'd be very happy here in Germany if it wasn't for them. I'd go crazy-nuts within days without them.

I talk to them everyday, our families hang out, we go out as couples, our kids go to school together, do sports together, we grocery shop for each other and babysit each others kids.

...and when one of us reaches a breaking point and finds herself under the kitchen table silently rocking back and forth with a Rusty Butter Knife, it's a given that the others will quickly step in and save her. I've been saved. I've saved them. It's just how it works.

I love my Rusty Butter Knives! :)

Michaela and 47 Countries

2011-03-20T08:34:00.005+01:00

Michaela had a school assignment to memorize all 47 countries in Europe AND their capitals!!! She got a 6 on the test, which is basically an A. 7 is the highest.

Did you know there was a country called Andorra? It's right between France and Spain! I had no idea. When Michaela told me I didn't believe her... :) Andorra sounds kinda "star treky" to me

Let's play a game with Michaela... She can, impress us/make us feel dumb, with her vast knowledge of Europe.

She's sitting next to me.
I'll ask her questions and write them down with her answers and then we'll check them. :) I won't even waste my time with the boring "What is the capital of France?" questions... they are too easy for her. :)

What is the capital of Andorra?
Michaela: Andorralavella
Mom: (Michaela just called me a dummy for spelling "Andoralavella" wrong. So... New Idea... I will type some questions, hand her the computer, and she will type in her answers. I'm obviously too dumb to participate.)

Spell the capital of Andorra correctly Little Miss Smarty Pants...
Michaela: Andorra la Vella (My own mother is a dummy)
Mom: Correct. Don't call your mother a dummy.

What is the capital of Estonia?
Michaela: IDK
Mom: Tallinn, duh ...but it did take me a minute to figure out IDK means "I don't know."

What is the capital of Moldova?
Michaela: Chisinau
Mom: Correct

What is the capital of Croatia?
Michaela: Zagreb
Mom: Correct

What is the capital of Iceland?
Michaela: Reykjavik
Mom: Correct

What is the capital of Romania?
Michaela: Bucharest?
Mom: Correct

What is the capital of Malta?
Michaela: Valletta (not sure about spelling) XD (Of course at least I knew Malta was a country, see how ignorant my oh-so-smart-European mother is?)
Mom: Correct. Don't call your mother ignorant.

Michaela: In my defense this was like forever ago. I learned it in one night and a half of a history class.