Week of Sept. 5th

Today is Labor Day, but not a holiday here.  I spent most of the morning at school.  This morning was difficult with Amber because she started crying and didn't want me to leave her in the classroom.  She was fine last week and now is crying.   After I got her off my leg I went and had coffee in the cafe with other moms.  Then I went to the PTO meeting.  I signed up to help with the wine tasting event the PTO will put in on January.  They host a couple big events through out the year so it seems nice.  Then 2 of us went over to the sports office to figure out why we couldn't get the online signup to work and come to find out they never unlocked it for people to start signing up.  So she unlocked it and let us sign up.  We will see what happens b/c if kids had been on a waiting list for this class last year they are given priority first.  By the time all of this was done it didn't make sense for me to go home so I just stayed and waited for Amber to be done.  After school we had some friends over for a playdate so that was nice.  Today the washing machine decided not to work properly and ruined 2 of my shirts, my pjs and Amber's too.  The pj's fine we can wear them blue, but not my shirts- ugh!  Today Jason recieved our Slingbox for our TV.  This is the device which plays our TV from home on a TV here. We couldn't get it to ship to Luxembourg, so it had to go to his secretary who lives in France.  He tried hooking it up, and then accidently unhooked the internet and the internet didn't come back on for a couple of hours.  Once the internet came back on he tried hooking it up in the TV room upstairs and that didn't work so then he got it to work on the TV in the family room.  By the time he finished it was after 1am.

Monday we finally got all the insurance and stuff so Tuesday I was able to start driving the car.  Our garage is 2 car deep but only 1 car width wide so it is a tight squeeze.  And to back it up our driveway is like going backwards up a steep ramp.  You really have to step on the gas to get it up the ramp.

I like driving the car, but it is a diseal, as are most cars here, so it is louder and drives more like a truck.
This morning Jason drove separate and went with me and we took all the kids to school so he could see what he would need to do with the Amber if he takes the kids to school every once an awhile.  Then I followed him to this big shopping plaza way on the other side of town.  It is a huge mall with a grocery store that has 2 floors.  And in the bottom of the parking garage, 3 levels down, is a car cleaning service.  Jason then left and went to work and I went grocery shopping.  The car cleaning service was 2 hours.  So after that I rushed home dropped off the groceries and went back to school to get Amber since she is done at 12:20.  I was pulling the seats forward and adjusting her car seat and such and saw a ton of stuff on the floor under the seats!  What kind of cleaning place doesn't clean under the seats!  I was so annoyed.  It was expensive to get done in the first place and now the car still has crap in it!  I even found 3 DS games left by the previous owners.  Jason was able to hook up the sling box to the right TV tonight so the kids were excited to see their shows from home!  I decided at the last minute to trim Amber's hair before her school pictures.  I ended up taking off about an inch.  It looks nice.  Jean you will have to give me some tips for just trimming her hair!



Here is a picture of Amber in her rain pants for school.  She leaves these at school with a pair of rain boots.  If it isn't raining maybe she could go fishing (:
To become a resident of Luxembourg, in addition to all the paperwork, and dr. visits, we also had to get TB testing and chest x-rays done.  So we did this Wednesday after the kids got out of school.  Everyone did well.  Now we have to wait a few days and go back and have it looked at.
Thursday was Sean's and Amber's picture day for school.  They looked good in the morning before school but can't be so sure they will still be clean when it is picture time!

 In the morning at school they did the whole lower school picture outside.  Here is the half with Sean and Amber.  It was cold and they were out there waiting for 1/2 hour before the guy was ready to take their picture.

Amber is in the second row up and about 4th from the left.  Sean is in the 5th row up and is leaning forward.  You can't see his face it is blurry but he has on a blue vest sweater.  Today Amber started her class at The Little Gym and loved it.  It is taught in French, but one of the guys also speaks English if she gets confused.   Later this evening I saw her talking to herself in front of her mirror jibber jabbing and she said she was speaking French, too funny!  After school we had a play group at the park close by for Amber's mom and tots group from the American Woman's Club.
Friday-yeah!  Jacob has his school picture today.  Then after school we had to go back downtown and do that paperwork we tried to do when we first arrived and they told us no, because we were there after 7 days and they said now it is 3 days after you arrive you have to come and register with us.  So our relocation agent got new paperwork and we had to start the process over again. We were there for 1:45 min.  You can imagine how happy Amber was to be there that long- ugh!  So after that we drove down into the Grund and went out to eat at this place called Maybe Not Bob's.  It is in an old old building across from the river so since most places don't open until around 6:30pm we walked around down there and along the river.

We found a Brazil restaurant we decided we will have to come back and try!  Bob's restaurant was good food.  They had burgers, wings, ribs, salads, and sandwiches.  It is more American food.

Sat. we went to the Farmer's Market in the morning and figured out where the closer underground parking was so that was nice.  We got fruits, vegetables, bread, and a roasted chicken, so dinner was all set.  And was very yummy! Then since it was going to be a sunny day, we decided to try a new pool.  We drove about 1/2 hour away to a town right along the Moselle River.  The pool was right on the river then across the river was Germany. Here is a picture of the kids by the river.

We didn't realize that today was also the wine festival in this town too, so before the pool opened we walked around the cute town.  Here is a picture of what I think was a fountain and they filled it with ice to put wine and champagne in it.

We also went to the park along the river.   Sean is driving the pirate ship.

Then spent a couple hours at the pool, and came home and picked up a few things we had bought from another of Jason's coworkers moving back home. 

Beyond the fence of the pool is a hill with the walkway we walked on, then the river then that hill in the background are the grapes growing in the Germany vineyards.

The bottom of the pools here seem to be aluminum.  This is the baby pool the boys are in but they had 2 bigger pools one with 2 diving boards, and one with a slide that Jason and Amber went down.  Those pools had cement on the bottom.  But that indoor pool we went to last month all the bottoms of the pools were aluminum as well.  As you can see here there are no chairs to sit around the pool.  You put all your stuff in the grass outside of the pool area.  To get into the pool you first go through a building and pay on the other side and there are dressing rooms there, then you walk across a big open field and that is where most people sit.  Then you get to the pool.  And there are showers right at the pool entrance you must use before you go in.  It was a nice day, now we are going to have movie night.  It is Jacob's turn to pick one!