I love buses.

I chased down three buses today in an attempt to NOT miss them. Made it onto all three thank you very much! Freezing temperatures and eye stinging wind really inspire you to NOT miss buses.

Scotty had to go pee-pees at the bus stop... so he did. This is of course when the bus pulls up. I zipped up his snow suit with his naked bum inside and carried him like a sack of potatoes onto the bus. I refer you to the first comment about my inspiration for NOT missing buses.

On the last bus of the day, Sierra and her two friends didn't get off the front of the bus while I was getting off the back of the bus with Michaela, Scotty and the stroller. Chased the bus down yelling, it stopped, and three stressed out girls got off. I laughed.

I'm going to bed now. Two more bus days.

Me NOT complaining.

I will not complain.

I will not whine about the fact I don't have a car for an entire five days. I gave it up voluntarily so I won't complain even a little bit. It is good I am not complaining because I gave my children a long lecture about those less fortunate than us and how going without a car for a week is nothing compared to the burdens some people deal with. I am happy for the exercise, I'm sure the cold air is good for my lungs.

I will also not whine about the ghetto buses I had to ride on all day, you know the old beater ones with leaky roofs and steep, anti-stroller steps. I won't say anything mean about those rude, selfish people who didn't help me on or off the ghetto buses. I'm not going to complain about the continual rain ALL day long which stopped only to turn to hail before going back to rain. I'm not going to say how I looked like a wet, windblown mop when I finally arrived home after four hours of bus riding around Aarhus.

I won't tell you how depressing it was to come home four hours after I left the house at 8:00am, to sit on the couch for an hour and then put back on my still wet coat to go back out to ride more ghetto buses to pick up my son. I will say how happy I am that the girls had a ride home from school as well as to and from ice skating.

I will say that I am happy that I had three cans of Campbell's chicken noodle soup to feed my children dinner. I won't complain about the fact that they didn't like it, I'll just be happy they prefer the chicken soup that takes three hours to make out of a real chicken and real vegetables. What has happened to my children?

So there is my day... the "not-complaining" version. The complaining version would only make my mUm call me a whinger... which I can't spell correctly anyways. :)

To end on a happy note: All my children are my heros today because:

- Michaela and Sierra both skipped a level in ice skating. After a couple months of lessons they are both on level three! (out of seven) They can skate backwards as quick as they can skate forward, they can spin around, they can wiggle their skates all over, and stop like a little hockey player. I'm super impressed. Unfourtunately, the ice skating rink is now closed... so I am in search of a new rink somewhere and I am willing to drive. :)

- Andrea spent the day in her carseat and was a happy little girl about it. She then made me super happy tonight by drinking the fourth bottle of her life. She slurped it all up like a pro and went into a milk induced sleepy-coma and went to bed. I HOPE she sleeps well.

- Scotty is just great because every day he goes to bornehaven and listens to Danish all day... and he is happy about it. He never crys when I leave, he is great. He was even happy today when I picked him up at 2:00pm!! (His new pick up time when it's above 40 degrees or mommy is on a bus.) When I walked onto the playground another little boy who was sitting on a bike yelled to him, "Scotty, moa-ah komma something, something..." Scotty ran over to this little boy, hopped on the back of the bike and the other little boy gave him a ride to me. :) He has friends. :)

So those are the reason my children are super-cool today. Paul is super cool too, but not today because he's far away in Germany with my car and will be there for the week. :) But he did call me three times to say Hi... so he can be my hero too. :)

Now I will go to bed and dream of ghetto buses and hail.

The Bus

I have mastered the Danish buses... Well, I didn't get lost at all today so I'm feeling pretty good about it! Much better than the second day when the kids and I ended up soaking wet in a dark alley hiding under some scaffolding in the pouring rain while trying to make it to school. :) Today we even rode a bus to take our new ice skates to the public (free) ice skating rink downtown.

I've been testing out the buses to see how difficult it is since we aren't too excited about paying $80,000.00 for a Ford Escort to drive. Scotty loves them and there is a stop at the end of our driveway. We'll see how it goes, but the buses go everywhere and pretty often; and not like in the US. For real. Most people use them and it's rare to have a two car family here (I refer you to the $80,000 Escort mentioned, and then go ahead and throw in the $9.00 for a gallon of gas, and then try to park the thing somewhere downtown -UGH)

I'm not passing judgment on the buses yet, I'll try for a bit more. As for my dark alley story... It was dark because the sun wasn't up yet, and alleys are pretty common here so it wasn't scary or anything, we found an umbrella in Sierra's backpack and made our way to a coffee shop where we stopped and had some fun hot chocolate and waited until another bus came along. Hot Chocolate is a cup of hot milk and a chunk of chocolate on the end of a stick that melts in the milk! YUM. ($8)

Pictures are of Sierra and her friend Alex at PE at school. :) They are having an ice skating "unit" and go once a week. We bought some skates to go on our own since the rink is free. The other is of a.... guess..... It's a fish stick. We were a bit concerned there was a head and fin and tail inside, but it was just shaped that way. ;)