Summer 2013

Yeah!  Summer was finally here!  We had a very long, cold winter here so we were excited to go home and get some warm weather!  We flew home and enjoyed our time there for about 7 weeks!  Jason worked in MI, Europe and a bit from home.  Jason's parents came up and stayed with us the first week and then Jason and I flew to NC for a weekend for a wedding on my family's side. 

So it was nice to see that side of the family and NC is so nice.  We were in the Raleigh area.
The following weekend we went down to IN and saw Jason's Grandma and sister and family and the boys had fun at the lake kayaking and tubing.
Amber petting a fish!

 

 

We had 2 friends from Lux come and visit us.  One family moved back to the states this year and another is still here with us but comes home not too far from us.  So I had everyone at the house.  Jason came home and there were 10 kiddos in the house!  But the kids all play really well together.

 

We went to WI for the day and visited with my Grandma.

The boys did a rock climbing camp and a baseball camp and really enjoyed both of those.

Amber did a safety town camp where they work on teaching the kids all about safety things, fire, street, etc. 

One day my parents and I took the kids into Chicago and we saw the Cat in the Hat play and Amber got an American Girl doll!  She was so excited.

 

 

And the boys got some legos at the lego store right next store.  Then we ate at the Cheesecake Factory for lunch, so fun day!
This summer Amber went to her friend's party that was bring your favorite doll for tea, so she couldn't wait to bring her doll!

We got together with lots of friends and did things around town.  So nice to see everyone.

We enjoyed eating at all our favorite restaurants.

Amber learned to ride Sean's old bike without the training wheels!

The kids and I and my parents went up to northern WI and stayed in a nice cottage for a week.  The boys did lots of fishing with Grandpa and we had lots of bonfires.  Sean fell in the lake fully dressed including his tennis shoes fishing one night!  It was Grandpa's biggest catch of all times!  A 70 pounder!  We saw a ton of wildlife up there!  And this was in the back yard.

 

 

 

 

My Aunt and cousin live up north and this is her dog, Dude!

 

Grandpa fishing with the kids.

 

Inside the cottage.

 

 

 

Then our good friends from WI came down and we spent the weekend hanging out with them and our other friends from the subdivision so good to see them.

The 3 cool dudes!

 

The 3 couples went out for a lovely evening!  It was a really good wine restaurant.

 

The boys made rockets with Grandpa and then had fun launching them!

 

 

 

 

I had to have hernia surgery so no fun.  When I went to the dr. for a checkup he recommended I get it fixed.  I have had it since Amber was born.  When I was pregnant with her she ripped my stomach muscles apart over my belly button so they repaired that.  But it was a week of pain and not doing much.  So no fun for our short time home.  I couldn't lift anything over 15 lbs for 4 weeks and no exercise either.  The boys really helped me out the first week making breakfast and lunch.  And my mom would take us to the movies or out to lunch. 
We saw a lot of movies while we were at home so that was nice.  The kids saw all their friends and had sleepovers with friends and at Grandma and Grandpa's house too!

 

We had a great summer at home.  It is always a little bit hard to leave. 
Then the end of August I packed up all our goodies I had gotten over the summer and we came back to Lux to start our 3rd year here!  Crazy!
We got back here on a Wednesday night.

Thursday, jet lag setting in,  we met Amber's friend at the park so nice to catch up with them.  And went to the store to start shopping for Jacob's school supplies and food of course b/c we had none.  So for the Lower School all the supplies are provided for the kids, but once in Middle School you have to provide them.  Which is weird b/c we pay more for middle school but have to also supply all the stuff?  So of course I didn't understand some of the stuff they were asking for.  I tried asking a lady that works there but she didn't know and was getting out a dictionary to look up the words.  They need certain notebooks that are certain sizes and these box things in certain colors so of course they didn't have all the colors.

Friday, still have jeg lag and hard to get up in the morning.  I started trying to unpack everything. It was a mess.  We went to the 2nd store looking for the rest of Jacob's supplies but didn't find much.   After lunch we went over to Jacob's friend's house and spent the afternoon over there and the kids played.  Then there was a paper supply store not far from their house so we went there as she hadn't bought any of the supplies yet so we found the rest of the stuff he needed except a calculator.  So that was good, but my 3rd store! 

Sat. we left after breakfast and drove about 3 hours to Rothenburg, Germany.  It is an old medieval town with a wall around the city.  There was an article about it in our paper while we were home over the summer so I looked it up and found it wasn't too far so we went for the weekend!  It is super pretty.  We stayed in this neat old hotel.  It used to be a noble's man house in the 16th century.  A huge house for then and now!
Then it has been a hotel for about 100 years.  It was pretty nice.  We had a 2 bedroom suite.  The bathroom was remodeled.  The door to get to our room looked like something out of Alice in Wonderland.  My head just cleared the door.  The wood above it was all different angles.

The center of the hallway in the hotel.

 It was a really nice day so we ate lunch outside at the hotel and then spent the afternoon walking around town.

 We saw their crime museum.  What they used to do to people that disobeyed the laws.  We saw a church.  They used to have a castle at the point, but it got destroyed so now it is just a garden to walk around. 

Views from the garden.

Sean hiding in the bush.

 

Little castle down in the valley!

 Wall around the other side of the town.

 

The whole city is surrounded by the original wall that was built with it.  It is really neat.  We did the town hall tower.  It was a lot of steps, very tiny ones! Then we took pictures from the top.

 

Pictures from around town.

 

 

 

Then in the basement of the town hall was where the dungeons and prison cells were.
This town had my favorite Christmas store here.  It was huge.  I wanted to take a picture inside b/c it was decorated so neat but they said no pictures. 

We bought some Christmas items!  Then I went to the other Christmas store across the street and in there they had some Polish pottery from Poland where my friend and I went in June shopping.  They didn't have any of my pattern but I bought some as gifts.  It is just so pretty!  It started to get pretty cold and windy so we went back to the hotel for a bit.  Then for dinner we walked to an Italian restaurant.  It was sprinkling by then.  After dinner we did the Nightman's Watch tour.  It was really neat.  It started at 8pm.  It is such a tourist town the tour is only offered in English!  So this guy comes up the street in a cloak and a funny hat and this big stick like thing with a sharp point on the end and an ax also. 

The boys loved the tour and Sean was right up front following him.  It lasted an hour and it was history about when the town had watchmen watching over it at night and some history about the town.  It was a really good tour and the guy was pretty funny. 

Week of June 24th, 2013

Sunday we got up and ready and had breakfast and checked out.  Then we headed out to one of the stores that was open on Sunday on our way out of town.  We got a few more things here and then headed home.

It was another 9 hours!  Traffic wasn't too bad and we just made 2 quick stops.  So long day!  But we had a great time and got some nice things!  The kids were happy I was home and wanted to see all the pottery I had bought!

This is most of what I bought minus the tea cups.

Monday morning the garage door guy came and fixed the door.  It wasn't closing all the way, so hopefully now it will.  I drove Sean to a friend's house for the day.  He was excited.  There were 2 others coming as well.  He had a good time.  On the way home from dropping Sean off we picked up one of Amber's friends and she stayed until 2pm.  I had baked brownies for my neighbors that are moving soon.  The movers were there today starting to pack up.  So I brought her a going away gift and some brownies.  They are moving back to the states after only being here for 1 year.  Then her daughter that is Sean's age came over and played with Amber for a couple of hours.  I was going through all the kids stuff from this year, organizing things and sorting clothes.   Once Sean got dropped off we packed up all the boxes and kids recyclables from school they brought home that we don't need and drove to the bins to put them in there.  Then I had gotten a box of my friend's pottery in my house so we drove it back to her.  All the kids played for a bit and we had tea with another friend with her new tea set!  It was nice.  Then we came home and got dinner ready a bit later then normal.  Kind of a busy first day of summer! 

Tuesday Jacob's friend came over in the morning and stayed until the middle of the afternoon.  Then after lunch Sean's friend came over.  Then a bit after that my friend came to pick up Amber and she went over there to play and spend the night!  Bring on the playdates!

I got more stuff organized and once all the boys left we went to the store for a few things.   Then Sean's friend came back for dinner and a sleepover.  They decided to camp out in the sitting room.

They were watching Star Wars and the movie ended around 10:45 and then they went to bed.  A little after 11 Sean's friend says he can't fall asleep so I move him to the couch and he lasted about 5 minutes and then started to cry that he can't sleep.  Sean is trying to tell him he needs to give himself more time and he has to lay down for a bit and close his eyes, so funny.  So we try again and no luck.  So I move them to Sean's room and he lasts a little bit and then more crying.  So I get him a stuffed animal and rub his head but he can't settle down so I ask him if he wants me to call his mom and so I did.  She tried to calm him down for over 5 min. and it didn't work.  I told her and him I can take him home, it isn't a problem b/c I think he is now so upset he just needs to be in his own bed.  So she agreed and came to pick him up.  The next morning he told his mom it was really silly all that crying!  We think he was just over tired and then couldn't calm down.  He has spent the night here before and all was fine.  Poor thing, but at least he got some sleep once at home. 

Wednesday was Jason's and my anniversary!  Happy Anniversary to us!  I had gotten him a card about a month ago but of course couldn't find it last night to put it out for him this morning.  But I did find it later today! 
This morning Sean went over to a friend's house around lunch and stayed there until the afternoon and then they went to the indoor pool, b/c it is only like 60 some degrees, and then came home for dinner.  I picked up Amber from her sleepover which she had fun at.  We ran to the store with Jacob too for a few things, and some how managed to get sandwiches from the bakery and ice cream cones!  Also did cleaners, etc.  Then in the afternoon we went to a friend's house where Jacob was going to be spending the night and stayed and had tea and Amber played with her daughter as well.  So that was nice.  Then home for dinner when Sean got home.  We made cookies and brownies to have tomorrow and made some taco meat too as we are going to a little get together tomorrow to wish everyone a happy summer!

Thursday morning Sean's friend came over then we picked up Jacob from his sleepover, and went to the chiropractic office.  From here we went to the park in the forest for a picnic lunch with the family where Jacob had spent the night.  So all the boys played together and then their daughter and Amber had fun.

So we stayed there for a couple of hours.  It sprinkled a little, but was a bit chilly.  Then came home for about 20 min. to gather everything I needed for the dinner and went to my friend's house who had us and 2 other good friends over for a farewell dinner as we all get ready to go our separate ways for summer!  We did a taco salad night.  I brought stuff for that and then brought the cookies and brownies and put them out on my nice polish pottery!  My friend used hers too!
We had a good time and said see you all soon!

 

Friday we packed up and headed back to the states for a visit!!!
Yeah and Happy Summer to all!!

Our second year here went a bit smoother then the first!  In 2 years we have now visited 15 countries over here!  That is pretty amazing! 
In the fall we will return for the start of our 3rd year.  Time flies!

Week of June 16th, 2013, The Last Week of School!

Sunday, Happy Father's Day!!!
I made French toast for breakfast, a big favorite here!  So Jacob missed that this morning since he was at a sleepover.  He went directly from the sleepover to a Lazer tag b'day party so I didn't see him until I picked him up from the party at 1pm.
I had a lot of washing to do today and then it was a beautiful day so I went for a walk downtown and remember that today was the outdoor Church mass and picnic, but since Sean wasn't feeling well we didn't go.  So I ended up going to the mass and then walked back home. 
We baked some peanut butter chocolate brownies for Jason which everyone seemed to like.  We had a BBQ to go with the brownies!  The kids wrapped his gifts and were excited to give them to him. 
Tonight Jacob and I made brownies so he can take those to his 5th grade disco tomorrow after school!
Here is a picture from last week one night at 10pm!  Crazy how light it stays here in the summer!

Monday morning Jason wasn't feeling so well so he stayed at home and worked from home today.  That doesn't happen much!  I had some errands to do and then another great fishy lunch at my Norwegian friend's house.  It was a beautiful day here today, about 84 degrees.  We probably got our one day of summer!  So we had lunch outside.  She does such a lovely job of hosting.  She loves it and everything is always so nice!

After school Jacob had his 5th grade disco.  So we brought the food we had for that.  It was for 2 1/2 hours.  The rest of us went home plus I dropped off the neighbor girl.  Then later I went back for Jacob.  He had a good time!  They also made T-shirts and everyone got to sign them.
Sean got his yearbook today.  So they had been signing them at school.  They are really nice books.
Still washing all the other bedding from the extra beds.

Tuesday was Jacob's graduation ceremony in the afternoon.  So at 1pm we could go in the classroom and see things and finish the last page in their scrap book together.

Here the teacher gave the students their diploma too.  Then at 1:45 we went upstairs to the auditorium, which was like a sauna with all these kids and parents- ugh! 

And I thought it was going to be a ceremony but it was really like a show.
It was cute.  Each class did a skit, then the band played, they sang a song and had a slide show of the whole grade and then 2 pictures of each child.  So that took an hour.  Then down to the cafeteria for treats.  They had yummy slushies, little desserts and then a mom from school has a cupcake business and made cupcakes for the kids.  I had a bite of Jacobs and it tasted very good!  Jason made it in for most of the stuff today so that was nice.
The boys had tennis later.

Wednesday morning Jason got up early and flew to Amsterdam.  We had slept with the fan on b/c it was so hot last night and then this morning I never heard my alarm go off!  After drop off I tried to drop off my tennis form for next year but at 9am the receptionist lady wasn't there. 
Jacob was having his class picnic at the big park between here and school today.  I had sent him with a drink in his lunch box, and a water bottle, but he left his regular water bottle at home.  I had to be back at school a bit before 11 to help with Amber's end of the year party, so I got there a bit earlier to see if I could catch the 5th graders as they were walking.  I caught the tail end of the group and I started running but I wasn't catching them in time.  Can't run too fast in sandals.  So I started yelling one of his friend's name.  The teacher at the end of the group heard me and turned around and took his water bottle.  It was just so hot here today, 90 degrees, I wanted him to have as much water as possible!  So then I went in school to help get the pizzas from the kitchen for Amber's grade for their end of the year party. 

All 4 classes came today and had pizza, then they went back in their rooms and our class celebrated a girl's b'day, then outside to play.  Then I went up and got the ice cream cups and they came back in after doing a couple little dances for the parents and the kids had ice cream!  Quite some treats today!

Then back in the classroom and I gave the teachers the gifts and gift cards we had for them and I got a nice serving platter from them which was thoughtful. Amber and her teacher.

Then Amber was done since it is her short day.  So we went to the park with another friend and they played and I also saw and visited with Jacob's group on the picnic.  It was a nice time, but so hot! 

 

 

Then Amber had to go back to school for the last ballet.  Today the parents were able to watch so that was nice.  We all enjoyed watching them.  They looked so cute!
Amber didn't want her tights on since she was so hot and sticky but she didn't want to take her bright green socks off!

When Sean finished school, I ran upstairs and got his book bag which then I proceeded to leave in the ballet room all afternoon!  I got the book bag and gave him the b'day present as he was going to a b'day party in Belgium today.  The parents were driving all the kids so that was nice.  It is to a big indoor trampoline and play area.  The boys all had a blast.  This boy who was having the party has a brother Jacob's age, so we sent him to religious education class with Jacob and then after class I took those 2 to a lazer tag b'day party- geesh!  This party was only an hour and a half and I didn't want to go home b/c with traffic I would have only about 20 min and have to leave to head back out this way.  So we went to a park near by, but after about 20 min. Amber was done.  So we walked down the street to one of Jacob's friend's houses and they were home so Amber played with the girl and I had a nice visit with the mom.  It was very nice! 
A bit later I went back to the party and picked up the boys and then met his parents back at school to get Sean and they would take their son.  It was here that I noticed I left Sean's bag in the ballet room so we ran back in school and downstairs and luckily it was still there! 
It was so hot in the house by the time we got back this evening, yuck! 
Jacob won 2nd place out of all of 5th grade for drawing a movie poster for a 5th grade project!  He won a free movie ticket.  So he was pretty excited about it.
We had a horrible storm come through here.  That is what we get for having a 90 degree day!  Around 11pm the thunder and lightening came on full blast.  It was really bad.  We don't get storms like that here.  It lasted about 30 min. but continued to thunder on and off all night long.

Thursday morning it was still dark, raining and thundering.  Since I won't be at school tomorrow for their last day I took some pictures this morning of them with some friends.

I did my last reading for Amber's class today.  It was the book The Night Before Summer Vacation.  It is a cute book, and the kids enjoyed it.

Amber with 2 of her boy friends she likes playing with!
After reading I ran to the store to pick up some things for Jason to fix for himself and the kids this weekend.
Then I came home and spent 2 hours filling up 200 water balloons for Sean's class tomorrow to have a water balloon fight that the teachers wanted to do which will probably be over in 5 min!  I started doing this in the powder room, and myself and the powder room were soaked!  Then I found it easier to put on the sink faucet in the laundry room so spent the rest of the time down there. 
After lunch the sun came out and it was a beautiful afternoon!  I brought my balloons into school along with the 2 b'day gifts the boys needed to take to their parties today after school.  I tried to say goodbye for the summer to people but it just didn't seem like school is ending. 
So after school both boys found me and dropped off their book bags, with extra bags attached of stuff to bring home and then I gave them the presents.  You should have seen me trying to carry all of this to the car!  Sean was going with a friend to a lazer tag party, and Jacob was suppose to go to a paintball party but b/c of the weather the mom had to change it to lazer tag!  So he went with that group there.  So that worked out well.  Then I didn't have to go to lazer tag until both parties ended and get the boys and one extra to drop off.  It worked out well! 
Earlier in the week I had seen 2 Carebears at the store here!   I loved these when I was little.  I had tried to buy them for Amber a few years back and couldn't find them anywhere.  And then this week they were just in the toy section of the grocery store.  I couldn't believe it.  So of course I had to buy 2!   I didn't really hide them, just put them in my closet.  Well Amber walks in there this week and finds them.  So all week she has been asking who they were for.  So today she was sad that no one could play and the boys had 2 days of parties, so I let her pick one of them.  She was so excited and chose the pink one.  She played and held that bear all afternoon even when we went back inside lazer tag to get all the boys! 
Jason came back from Amsterdam tonight and we all had dinner together. 
For Jacob graduating from 5th grade and going to "Middle School" we presented him with a phone tonight.   But it was just our guest phone we had here.  I gave it to him and charged it and then we realized it is out of minutes- ugh.  So I will have to look into that.  Sorry Jacob.  He was pretty excited even thought it isn't a fancy phone.  We will see how he does with this one first.  We were so proud of him this year.  He had a great year, with doing percussion for band, student council, staying on top of his homework and projects all by himself and getting good marks.  He did the sports that he could through school, made new friends, lost a good friend,  and had a successful Switzerland trip away from home.  He really seemed to take some responsibility this year.  My little guy is growing up! 

Friday morning I got the kids off to school with Jason for their last day of school!  Yeah! 

And then my girlfriend came and picked me up and we drove 9 hours and a bit to Poland for the weekend!  We were doing a girls trip to a town in Poland that sells this Polish Pottery.  It was a long drive, but went by pretty fast without the kids!  She had heard of this place other girls had stayed at when they did this so we stayed there.  It was a cute/quaint bed and breakfast place.  It was a remodeled barn on the outskirts of town in the country.

The horse barn was across the parking lot and we could hear the horse and donkey neighing in the morning. 

We got in around 6pm and got settled and then had dinner there.  They have about 8 tables for meals.  It was a good dinner.  We then went for a walk down this country road.  A lot of neat old looking buildings. 

This is an old building on their property that people are living in.

Our room was quite large.  It was a studio, so it had a couple of beds and then like a family room sitting area and TV. 

Each of the kids went home with friends after school today and Jacob also had a sleepover.
Then after work Jason picked up Amber and Sean and came home and made pizzas.

Sat. we tried to sleep in but it didn't work too well.  So we were up before 7:30.  So once we were ready we went down for breakfast.  It was ok, the European usual.  Then we were off to pottery shop!  This bed and breakfast had all of this down to a tee!  They had a whole packet of information about the 25 or so shops around town to see.  So we started off with one and were completely overwhelmed!  There was pottery everywhere!

So we visited about 10 shops or so not really buying much and then headed to lunch at this thatched roof place the guy at the bed and breakfast had recommended. 

It was cute and authentic food.  And that is a tea pot in front made out of wood.  This whole town is around this pottery stuff. A round about in town.

My friend had a pasta/ravioli dish that they filled with either meat, cheese or a mushroom mixture.  I had a more basic chicken and rice dish.  After this we drove to a couple of stores way out of town and only got a few things and then realized that some of the first stores we went to were going to close soon so we went back there and just got a few things.  Then it was closing, so we looked at another store that my friend thought she saw a pattern that she liked.  Most stores had different patterns so it was hard to find one we liked.  So at this store my friend got a lot of things, a tea set, and everything to go with it.  From here we hit 2 more stores.  The last one was our favorite by far.  They had things laid out all over so you could see the patterns and they had big dishes for baking and serving which is what we wanted so we did good here!  Then it was time to get back to the B&B for our massages.  Again this hotel was great, you could schedule massages, facials, manis and pedis and the people come to the hotel.  So 2 ladies came and brought their massage tables in the room and we each got a massage and facial.  That took about 2 hours and was wonderful!  Then we got ready for dinner and enjoyed that.

Jason and the kids went with my friend's husband and their kids to McDonald's and a movie so that was fun for them!