I want to SCREEN!

WHY ARE THERE NO SCREENS ON THE WINDOWS??!! ...and I don't care how many reasons anyone can come up with - they will never be good enough. How are you supposed to leave a window open without a screen to keep all the bugs out?

SO. In my ongoing attempt to bring American-ness to my Denmark house... today I built screens. :) Well, I made one... and maybe I should have waited for Paul because I ran into a few engineering problems and a slight design flaw. Whatever though... I have a screen on a kitchen window and the hour I spent on it was well worth it when I saw THIS!
I spoke out loud to this spider. I said, "HA!! take that you dumb little Danish spider... I'm from America and we don't let ugly little bugs like you into the house." Michaela will be so proud. I'll make one for her window next. :)

In my opinion, I feel the lack of screens is a HUGE problem with Danish homes. The windows all over Europe are very modern and they look really nice. It's fun how they open all kind of odd ways too, but I haven't seen one that slides up and down or right to left like in the States. Windows that open don't leave much room for screens because they would open right into the screen. Windows that slide are just right for screens. :)

No air conditioning + lots of windows + 16 hours of sunlight = 1 hot house.

You have to open the windows or you will melt... and once you do.... in come the bugs. Ewwww...
Paul took a picture last summer of our kitchen ceiling COVERED in bugs because the light was on and the window was open. I hope this years "new and imporoved" screens keep them out better.

Oh yah, that little design flaw I talked about... Remember my before mentioned statement: "Windows that open don't leave much room for screens because they would open right into the screen." I am so smart I put the screen on the inside of the window!!! TA-DAAA
...but now I can't reach through the window to open, close, or lock the window ...because there is a screen in the way. The best darn screen in Denmark I might add. :)


Scotty helped take care of Andrea while I was crafty with my screen. :)

Here she comes!!!

Andrea is taking crawling steps with her arms! ...her feet and lower half never move... but she makes her arms go forward!!







Writing about this would never convey how incredibly cute she is... so here is Poozle thinking about crawling. She's been doing this for two days now. :) I couldn't decide what movie to put on here because each one makes me smile, so I put all three - it's my blog and I can do what I want. :)

You can tell she's concentrating so hard, but then sometimes she gets so excited at the thought of whatever she is trying to get at, that she falls. She often gets stuck and Scotty yells, "She's stuck!!!", which is cute in itself. Scotty gives her a lecture once I have her sitting up again, he tells her she's not very good and that she should just "Stay there or you get stuck."

Her "scooting" makes me happy... it makes everyone happy, everyone in the house cheers her on, even Scotty... But then until I realized that in 54 days I will have this little, MOBILE child on an airplane for 11 hours. 11 hours of trying to contain a little girl who's only concern in the world is what she can can get at to put in her mouth next. Toss in a three year old and you have a party!!

Scotty is feeling better, he really wanted to go to bornehaven today to ride bike #3 (the bikes have numbers written on them - Bike #2 is "bad", Bike #4 "is okay", and I haven't heard anything about Bike #1... in case anyone is wondering). I let him go to school, but I know that he'll need the potty before lunch.... so I used my best Danish translator to write a note to his teacher explaining the situation and to watch out! I hope she gets the point. :) I think/hope he'll be fine.

Plan for Day 1

I'm feeling very grumpy today so I'll write what I will do as soon as I arrive in America. That will make me happy.

It will be late when we finally arrive in California, but I will most likely want to eat something. I just googled In-N-Out Burger in Woodland, CA. While I was typing I was remembering they don't have one... so I was thinking of what else would make me happy. BUT - I read they are opening one in Woodland!!! If it is open by then, I will definitely go there... I'll have a double double and fries! YUM.

The next morning we will probably wake up at 4:00. Never fear though, because in the wonderful USA there are always things to do at 4:00 in the morning! So Denny's for breakfast it is... Hashbrowns! Yum!! or Nations... I'll have to google them later. I'd rather have Nation's hashbrowns - WAY bigger portions! :)

Afterwards it will still be early so we can always go to Target for some aimless roaming of the aisles... We'll buy some sandles or flip flops... since we don't own any. I'll buy some fun, cute, and yet very unnecessary baby items for Andrea... and Scotty will get a frisbee and ball (so he can play with them at grandma's. :)

That's all the typing I have in me now because I am hungry but have nothing good to eat.

Scotty has been sick and we can't go more than 50 feet from the potty... It's been great.

Super Best is the Super Best!!

WE HAD ROOT BEER FLOATS TODAY!!!!

Super Best has a real American isle!!!

- Pop Tarts
- Hershey Kisses
- Cake Mix and Frosting
- JIF Peanut Butter
- Grape Jelly
- Skittles
- Root Beer and Dr. Pepper and other sodas
- Shredded Wheat
- Marshmallow Fluff
- Dryer Sheets
- Weight Watcher food
- Chili
- Salt and Vinegar Pringles
- Enchilada Sauce
- Muffin Mix
- Cookie Mix
- Salsa
- Lucky Charms
- Mustard
- Heinz O's (like spaghetti Os)
- ...and more!

Sounds good and I'm excited. BUT a box of Cake Mix is $18.00!!!! I about died! $18.00??!! I could import suitcases of cake mix and pay for my plane ticket this way! Actually I'll make this into a math word problem for Michaela:

- I have one 20 foot container that costs $5000 to ship from California to Denmark. In America I buy MANY boxes of $1.00 cake mix. How MANY would boxes of cake mix would have to fit into my container to make a profit considering I could sell them for $18.00 each when they arrived in Denmark? ...and would they fit?

Frosting was $10.00. A small tiny bag of Hershey kisses was $10.00. It was hilarious to see the prices!! I paid $20 for a six pack of Root Beer and $4.00 for a single serving of Lucky Charms. :) I also got a can of the O's to see if Scotty approves, they were only $4.00.

They also had things from the UK. Marmite? Shreddies? and some other things that may make some British people happy. :)

Needless to say my daughters were excited for Root Beer Floats. (It only took us an hour to find plain ole' vanilla ice cream that had not been violated with marzipan or black licorice...at 7-11)

I do think that SuperBest is getting their food shipped from a "food from home" website, which is smart. What is really smart is that they put it in the store next to the Danish Language school where all the forgieners learn Danish. :)


Kelli, I looked - No Crystal Light or Tea Drinks (I can't remember what exactly it was you addictivly drink.) :)

She's Trying!

Go Andrea Go!!!

She isn't happy to just sit anymore... this little girl wants to go.

Little Poozie watches the rest of the herd running around the house and you can just see it in her eyes... SHE WANTS TO RUN!

This stage is difficult though because she isn't happy to just "sit" and play. She tries to crawl and get at things she can't reach, but then she usually falls forward on her head and gets stuck leaning on her face. She understandably does not like this. I sit her back up and the cycle continues. :)

I went to the beach!

It was nice and sunny today (again) and pretty warm, so in an effort to be happy and enjoy Denmark I quickly packed the kids in the car and drove to the beach. - The beach should more appropriately be referred to as the "shore" or the "edge of the land". It's not a California beach... by any means. Or at least not what I think of when I think of a "beach"; it is some sand, rocks, a few shells, and some tiny waves just big enough for kids. It good enough for us and is pretty and relaxing.

Anyways... we took a blanket and a towel and played in the sand for an hour or so. Sierra dug around in the sand happily. Michaela watched after Scotty and played with him... and I created a wind barricade with the stroller and all engineered all of our belongings to protect little Andrea from the wind.

At the beach today I had a Huge Mess Realization:;If you decide you don't care whether or not your child makes a huge mess of themselves your day will be much easier. - Today at the beach Andrea sat on the blanket with a cookie as happy as can be. I had a bib on her but she yanked it off 32 times, so I stopped playing the "put-the-bib-on-Poozie" game and gave up. However in an effort to mantain a clean baby I started wiping her mouth with a wipee after every few cookie bites ...and like a normal eight month old she verbally protested everytime I did this. Finally I gave up and let her just make a HUGE mess. She was happy and I was happy... until I had to finally touch her and all her drooly, slobber-cookie-glory. I just dipped her in the water and she was all clean.

Kidding. I did not put my child in the freezing water.

I'm hillarious. ...SO. I think we have a few more days of sunny warmth before some rain comes back, but I'm pretty sure the worst of the weather is over. The sun gets up pretty early too... so do all those dumb birds. As an "ex-bird girl" I should love all those little Passerines out there but I HATE them. ...4 am and they are chirping all over the place like I live in a giant bird enclosure at the zoo. Birds are great to listen to in the afternoon, but I don't want to have anything to do with them before 7am.

That was our day in case anyone was wondering. Paul missed out. He is in Germany again, but should come home Thursday in time to see the girls school plays on Friday. We have another work dinner to go to this weekend too... but I don't think my babysitter can handle Andrea though... I don't know why. I need Nana. :) I'd actually buy a plance ticket for Nana just to have a good worry-free babysitter for a couple weeks! :) Nana want to come over this weekend and watch the kids? mUm? :)

My Jealousy

I am actually jealous. I don't think I've ever been jealous before, not a REAL jealous... but when you have a real jealous you know it - its no fun either. :(

I often acknowledge that others sometimes have things I want:

- a neatly decorated "magazine" house, opposed to the toy fest I live in;
- a nice fun car, opposed to the long seven seated station wagon "brick" I drive;
- a mega stroller, opposed to the squeaky puny one I push;

... but when it comes down to it I like all my stuff just fine and I think what I have is perfect for me. I'm not really jealous.

HOWEVER....

The last American family is leaving and going back to the States... back to a normal life with soccer teams, Targets, libraries, Safeways, girl scout cookies, American TV, holidays, dollar stores, etc... AND I AM JEALOUS. : (

I'm happy for them.

But I want to go too...

So I was in a bad mood. I was grumpy. I didn't like anything for a day. ...just being honest. Today I am finally over it.

It's a definite mind set you have to be in to survive here away from things you know and prefer. So I've gone back to trying to get what I want with things that are here... and being happy about it. :)

Warsaw, Poland

Okay, I'm ready to tell ALLLLLL about Poland.

Poland was very different. I liked it.
I can't make one of these slideshows go away... two are the same, two are different... you'll figure it out. :)


This trip to Warsaw, Poland was very interesting because you could "see" the past. It seemed the "past" was so recent that it was still around. Some parts of Warsaw appeared new and "American" looking... like the large, beautiful shopping malls or the big office buildings downtown; while other parts or Warsaw looked like they really had been through a war... beat up and falling apart.

It wasn't even different parts or areas of Warsaw. It was all mixed up. New, tall buildings next to a pile of rubble that previously had been a building. Rows of grey, cement, box-like apartments that looked very communist, and then right next to those were the new apartments with balconies and pretty paint.

I was more interested in the older things. I think many years from now Warsaw will be a boring, modern European city with new everything, but now it seems to be "in between" so you could still see the history. And I've never cared about history at all... but since we were staying with some friends they told us all about their country: it's history, famous people, events, specific everything; they were so knowledgeable about their country... I was very impressed. It made me feel slightly dumb though about my knowledge about the history of my own country. :) But having them tell me about Warsaw's past made our trip more personal because of the way it's history had effected them. ...It made me even choose a museum over a park one day! I wanted to learn about the "Warsaw Uprising" so we went to a museum about it. Instead of just roaming around the museum aimlessly while Paul read things, I read everything too and actually learned things!!

So our Poland trip to me was very educational. I really enjoyed it. I hope our friends know how much we appreciated them sharing their home and family with us too. I don't think our trip would have been as good without them. I probably would have just seen the plastic palm tree and called it good. (There is a plastic palm tree in the middle of Warsaw.) :)


Oh, this was the very first thing I noticed about Warsaw: They have concrete light poles and concrete power poles. No wooden poles... it's all concrete, and so old that some are falling apart and you see the rebar sticking out. ....yes, I know it's sideways. Turn your head. :) There were lots of grey concrete things around...

I have time to keep typing, Andrea is still asleep... lucky you, you get to keep reading!

We did find a McDonalds that served breakfast and we were so excited because it's rare for a McDonalds here in Europe to be open to serve breakfast. Other than McDonalds we ate some pretty interesting and different foods. The girls even ate duck happily! I ate liver, blood, other internal organs, the fat from some animal, and raw beef... all in one day! Phew! :) I told our friends we wanted to eat some traditional Polish food... and they sure provided us with some! :)

The food was quite interesting in Poland. Different, mostly good, and some mostly interesting! I did get some roast beef that was really good and some Easter soup. AND I ate the yummiest piece of Polish candy, it was a taffy of some sort but with a very unique flavor. YUM!

My liver experience wasn't so YUM though. I've never eaten liver, and this time it was even an accident. I thought I was taking a bite of a grilled chicken or beef so I had a BIG bite. Hmmm. I almost became ill after chewing for a few seconds... Then I see Paul laughing at me. It was very hard to swallow and took a great amount of concentration on my part. I didn't know liver could be so... icky. :) So, what do I do after I successfully swallow it and am convinced it isn't coming back out... Feed it to my children of course! :) They each had a bite and suffered as I did. :)

We spent Easter in Poland too. On Saturday each of our families prepared an Easter basket with different symbolic things inside: meat, bread, chicken, egg, and a branch from a green plant. Then we took our baskets to the church to have them blessed, your basket was to be your breakfast the following morning on Easter. So everyone is out walking on their way to all the local churches and everyone has their baskets with them. At the church every 15 minutes the priest comes out to the table where everyone puts their basket and he blesses them. Then you take your basket back home. You also don't eat meat or treats on Saturday... but you get plenty of meats and treats on Easter Sunday!!

On Easter we woke up and found a scavenger hunt for Easter eggs, not a Polish tradition, but a family one our friends had adopted/invented. We had our Easter breakfast, which I thought was just going to be what we had in the basket... I was concerned we would be hungry. :) Nope, We had a big breakfast and I was FULL. We took a walk to the local church where they hold services all day. We arrived at the end of one just in time to see the "chickys".

They had little yellow Easter Chicks (baby chickens) for the kids to go up and hold. You'd have to be there I think, but I'll try to describe this. All the kids, and parents for that matter, were shoving and pushing their way up to the chicks, it was loud and crazy, I couldn't find Scotty (who was up at the front), my girls were stressed, my friend told me show Andrea so in the middle of CHAOS I hesitantly picked up Andrea out of her stroller to show her the chicks. Meanwhile my friend somehow got hold of a chicky and as soon as I get Andrea out she hands this chick to me. I held it in my hand and showed it to Andrea. She just looked at it and it was the sweetest look my little daughter ever gave anything. It suddenly seemed very calm and we just sat there with this little chick; this was definitely the highlight of my day!! So Andrea and I just stood there with the little chicky and held it for a while. ...then I put the poor chick back into the mad swarm of children who had now broken the walls of the chicky enclosure down and now these poor chicks were trying to escape. :)

We left for the airport Sunday evening and had a relaxing journey home since the airport was empty. We arrived in Copenhagen and most of us except for Paul and Michaela slept for our ride home.

We woke up Monday and since there was no school we had an American day of Easter-ness... but that's another story...

We are home!

We made it safe and sound... it was a very interesting trip... lots to tell, but I'm too tired to type right now. I'll just say for now that we made it home safely so my family doesn't worry... because I'm even too tired to call anyone. :)

We arrived late last night after a long drive home from the Copenhagen airport, and today I caught up on EVERYTHING around the house. After I drop the three loud kids off at school tomorrow morning I may even have enough energy to type and get some pictures up!

night night!

Bye

I forgot to say bye. Bye mom, and mUm, and everyone else.

We are in Copenhagen right now. Had a yummy dinner. Right now we are in our nice TWO roomed hotel.

We will take a ride on an airplane to Poland early tomorrow morning... good thing I baked a yummy "brown bag" breakfast for us tomorrow. :)

Typing on a Danish keyboard is VERY difficult. I've hit delete 76 times.

BYE.

**MISSING SHEEP**

REWARD IF FOUND!!!

Sleepy Sheep has gone missing!!!

I am very sad and now determined to get as many Sleepy Sheeps as possible. Ingird, this is the Sheep you gave us in California, so he will most likely need to be imported. :) To everyone in the USA... IF YOU FIND THIS SHEEP - BUY him. Buy LOTS of him. Mail him to me.

Description of Sleepy Sheep
- softest fur in the world
- floppy and cuddly
- small, about 8 inches long
- "beans" only in the feet, the rest of him is filled with fluffy stuff
- no tags attached to him anywhere
- small, short tail

Please study the pictures carefully. Print them and put them in your wallet for later reference.

I do think that Sleepy Sheep is probably in the house so that makes me feel a little better, but we have been searching all day!!

Here Michaela...

Michaela has requested I write something on my blog.... I've been so busy this week, but here goes me catching up with our life wonderful activities.

First, and most importantly. It has been sunny and relativity warm. Friday morning Scotty woke up and wanted to go play outside at 7am as we were getting ready for school. So he played as the girls and I got ready for school... then he hopped in the car with a bagel and juice box as his breakfast. He is cute.

Thursday night I had a babysitter and went out until MIDNIGHT! :) Our friends are moving back to the States this month so Pauls' work had a "going away party" for him. It was cute - they had a big American flag hanging up and no pickled fish products of any kind were served! I was scared to leave Andrea since last time didn't go so well but I called at 10:30 and everyone was asleep so that made me happy.

...and this family who is moving back gets one 20 foot container to fill up... SO! That means lots of their unused American things come to us. We got their peanut butter, grape jelly, frosting, and so much more! It was better than Christmas!! They also have a daughter who is a bit taller than my girls SO we got lots of new clothes too! So they have seriously saved us five suitcases of imports... now I can bring different things back.. :) I REALLY hope they know how much we appreciate all their "donations". Since they've been carrying their peanut butter and cake mixes over an ocean for three years I'm sure they do. :) Thanks Erica!!!

Friday was our movie night. We had ~35 people over to watch Madagascar 2... In English. :) I took a picture of us all watching, but I was just thinking it would have been more amusing to take a picture of my house after everyone left. I think all the popcorn crumbs everywhere are funny... good thing I think it's funny huh? :) It's just popcorn though so it gets vacuumed up pretty easily. ...this is why I only give out popcorn and water ...and why I'm willing to do it again.

Today (Saturday) was nice and sunny again; we did nothing in particular... although I did have things we needed to do since we are going to Poland in a few days. We did go out and try to buy Scotty a bike. We had finally talked ourselves into spending $100+ dollars on a bike for Scotty and piled the whole family into the car. The only problem is that we got in the car at 12:45 and EVERY BIKE STORE IN DENMARK closes at 12:30. So now he doesn't get a bike for tomorrow since EVERY BIKE STORE IN DENMARK will be closed tomorrow too. As soon as Denmark starts to complain about their economy at least they can very quickly solve the problem by opening the stores so people can spend money in them.

I'm off to bed now... don't feel like getting the camera for pictures - sorry!!

APRIL FOOLS DAY!!!!

April Fools!!!!

I've had so much fun tricking my children (and you) all day. I'm surprised how much I have amused myself today! I found myself just laughing throughout the day about all my little tricks. I'm even smiling now just thinking about it. I never knew how much I loved April Fools Day. :) I've just discovered it's one of my favorite holidays!

SO for starters... let's clear this one up. Nope, no Target in Denmark. That was mean and I actually felt bad typing it. ...but then I smiled. ...and I smiled all day as I read comments from poor unsuspecting, and hopeful, wannabe-Target-shoppers. I even had to delete all the comments that made reference to April Fools Day too - wouldn't want to spoil my fun. :)

After I wrote my mean Target story. I woke the kids up and began my day of "fun" with them. I gave them toast for breakfast with jello in glasses instead of juice. HAHA #1 :) Scotty, however, did NOT think this was funny; he thought it was "BAD".

On the way to school I turned off the car in the middle of the road and said we ran out of gas. I made the girls walk the rest of the way to school. :) I waited for them to turn the corner that leads to the school, then I started the car and drove past them with the window down laughing and yelling, "April Fools!!!" :) HAHA #2 Ahhhh.... still makes me laugh to see their little faces.

My favorite thing was their lunches. I packed them all of our plastic toy food. :) HAHA#3 I put a bottle of water and plastic food in their lunch bags and then gave their teachers a brown bag with their "real" lunch in it. Sierra did NOT think this was funny. (She does now though.) Thinking of this made me laugh out loud all day... on the way to school to pick them up I was just laughing in the car for no reason other than I couldn't wait to see what they thought. I felt like I was 10 and couldn't stop giggling. I thought I was just hillarious! :)

HAHA #4 - Their "real" lunches.... weren't so real. I gave them individual bags of chips, which would have been a special treat. But I had opened the bag, took out the chips, filled it full of carrots, and then glued it shut again. :) I made this better by giving them a "cheese sandwich" made out of pound cake and orange frosting. I threw in some real real food just out of pity. :) ...and they can have the chips tomorrow.

Ohhhhh... I wasn't done quite yet. When they got home from school I had made some "fish sticks" as a snack. I took them out of the oven and gave them to them. This one everyone was happy with though because the fish sticks were really vanilla wafer cookies coated in peanut butter and rolled with crushed cornflakes. :) HAHA #4

So today was a productive day and I'm exhausted from all my tricks... and staying up so late last night to prepare them all. :) It was fun.

It also made me happy that Sierra and Michaela wrapped up a big rock and gave it to me as the present they "made for me at school". I'm glad they joined in on the fun!

This is definitley one of our traditions. I've tricked them every year, but it's always involved dinner though. Meatloaf muffins with mashed potato frosting... Corn made out of yellow starburst... Clear kool-aid as water... :) This time dinner was safe. OUUUU I've even thought of something for next year!!! It's a good one!!! :)

...and I'm sorry for any "Almost got to go to Target anxiety attacks" I've caused.

TARGET IN HORSENS!!!

YESSSSSSSSSSSSS!

Life is so great now!!!!! A TARGET IN HORSENS (which is a nearby town)!!!!! I will SOOOO drive the half hour to go to a Target!!! I'm so excited. I translated the sign I saw about five times just to make sure I read it right. Yep, Opens May 15th!!! WHOO HOOO! It even had Target's little bulls-eye sign!

I can't wait to see what they have! What if they have goldfish crackers?! OR Ziplock baggies!!!?

So I'm planning a huge caravan to Target on May 15th! Let me know if you are in!!! I'm saving my kroners!