Week of December 4th, 2011

Sunday after church we took the kids out to lunch at a kind of American BBQ restaurant.  Then we walked around the mall a bit before our movie was to start.

After this we went to see Happy Feet 2.  It was the only kids movie in English.  The other ones were in French and German.  If you want to buy anything for your movie you walk into this self service area.  They have all different sizes of popcorn lining the wall in the back so you grab what you want, they have ice cream bars, drinks, candy bins to pick out pieces of candy that you put in a bag, and slushies- the boys were so excited!  And of course Amber wanted one too!  Then you just take all your stuff to the check out line.  It is faster then waiting in line at home.  So we bought the ticket and told her we wanted the English version.  When we are in the theatre the kids that are coming in are not speaking English.  I start thinking I don't think we are in the right theatre b/c if the kids aren't speaking in English more then likely they wouldn't be coming to see a movie in English.  So I look at the tickets and it has a D after the movie, which means German.  So we go back and ask the ticket checker guy which theatre is the English version in and he tells us we need to go back down to the ticket booth and get a new ticket- ugh!  So a bit later Jason comes back with the right one.  This theatre wasn't too crowded.  But it is huge.  Bigger then the ones at home and the screen is like the full length of the wall in front.
I had gotten sausages for Jason to grill out for dinner, and it was so dark outside at 5pm and there is only one light outside but on the other side of the patio that he had to use a flashlight to grill!
Later in the evening I went out to dinner with 2 good friends, one of who is moving this week to Norway.  So sad.  So we had a nice evening out at a Thai restuarant.

Monday I had the PTO meeting and then after school Amber had a friend over for lunch and a playdate.  They had a fun time giggling and playing!  Then we dropped her friend off and headed back to school a bit earlier to help make the St. Nickolas goodie bags the preschoolers will get tomorrow for St. Nicholas Day! 
Ball skills has ended for now so home to do homework and work with Sean on his diaorama.  He is doing the desert.
Jacob came home from school today and told us the Black Santa story that his French teacher had told him.  Not a pleasant story or appropriate to tell children!
There was a butcher that lived in the forest.  One day 3 children stopped by his house and asked if they could come in and get something to eat.  He said sure and ended up chopping them up, putting them in a box with salt on it and storing them in the basement for 7 years.  Then one day St. Nicholas comes by the butcher's shop and ask for some meat.  The first plate he brings him, St. Nicholas says this is not good enough, the 2nd plate he brings to St. Nicholas he says isn't good enough.  Then the butcher says he has some good meat in the basement. St. Nicholas says stop, where are those 3 children?  The butcher takes him downstairs and St. Nicholas puts his hands on the boxes and brings the children back to life.   The butcher becomes the black santa and goes around with St. Nicholas all dressed in black and with tree sticks that if a child is bad he hits them with the sticks?  Ok nice story for a teacher to be telling.
My kids put their shoes out tonight in hopes of St. Nicholas bringing them a little gift!  Of course Amber had to put her pink sparkly shoes out for him.

Tuesday the kids were excited to wake up and see that St. Nicholas had left gifts.  They got a cholocate St. Nicholas, the boys each got a lego gift, and Amber got a princess ornament and a baby bottle for her babies! 

This morning at preschool when Amber went to put on her indoor shoes there was only one there!  St. Nicholas had come to the preschool and taken one of all the kids shoes and put it in the classroom with a goodie bag inside it.

Here St. Nicholas is very much celebrated.  So in the goodie bag was a St. Nicholas chocolate a yummy gingerbread type biscuit, and a clementine.
Jacob got a goodie bag too at school with a clementine and a chocolate St. Nicholas as well.
Since last month the stores have been selling certain sweet breads in the shape of a gingerbread man.  Some are plain, some have choc. chips in them, some all choc. on top, some like a fruit cake, and today was the Gingerbread Man Giant!

I bought 2.  One for one of Amber's friend who has been really sick, and one for us.  Sean saw it and went running out of the kitchen screaming the gingerbread man was going to get him! Ha
Tonight we baked our yummy Christmas tree cookies.  We got as far as making the dough, refrigerating it, rolling them out and baking them.  The frosting will have to be done another day.
Here is a picture of the view outside of Jason's office.

Wednesday we cut into the giant gingerbread man and he is delicious!  It is a very sweet bread with a little frosting on top.
The fog here has lifted and now the rain has settled in.  It has been raining on and off for a few days now.  We are using our rain boots here more then our winter boots!  And of course today I had to carry in Sean's diaoroma in the rain.  Not a good day for that., 
Today was suppose to be our going away party for Amber's good friend that is moving, but she has been really sick this week at home and another good friend of Amber's just came back to school today after being out really sick!  It is so sad that she is moving this week and hasn't been able to spend any time with her friends ):  So we are moving the party to Friday afternoon in hopes that everyone is healthy!
At guitar lesson tonight it just poured buckets, and I was worried how we would all make it to the car which is not close and no umbrellas.  But luckily it had calmed down quite a bit by the time we had to leave.
Tonight we were able to frost the christmas tree cookies we had made last night and then everyone got a nice cookie treat!

Thursday we had our last morning coffee at the mall with my good friend from Norway who is moving back home this weekend ):
Amber had her gymnastics class today and we went and I got her b'day party all set to be there, but she was so tired from not going to bed last night until way past her bedtime that she was so tired and crabby she wouldn't stay there, so we left.
Jacob had bball practice and I found out that I am housing 2 boys from Belgium who are coming down to play games this weekend,  Should be interesting.  They have 2 games on Friday night and 2 on Sat. morning/afternoon.  Alot of bball for one weekend!

Friday early morning it was so windy that the medal shutters that cover the windows on the outside were making a lot of noise and it woke Amber up who ended up in bed with us scared.
In the morning I had a few errands to do and then got the food ready for our going away party for my friend and her daughter- Elise.  Elise and Amber have had a wonderful time playing together and have really made a connenction.  She talks about her on the weekends and is always trying to invite her to come over.  Her mom and I got together a lot for coffee's.  They have been here for 3 1/2 years, so now they are headed back to Norway.
After school I picked up Amber and a one of her boy friends from school and we went over to my friend's house for the going away party.  It was very nice.  It was just a handful of close friends.  We had a lovely time, but a sad day.  We will hopefully we able to go and visit them one day.   So safe travels and we will miss you!

Amber has her arm around her friend!

Jacob had 2 bball games tonight and Sean had a party to attend on the other side of town so Jason went to the games.  We were suppose to house 2 of the opposing team boys, and Jason calls a bit after 7pm when the games were over to let me know they were on their way home so I could start dishing up their dinners and says we didn't have to take any boys.  I kept asking him are you sure.  I could just see 2 boys just standing out there b/c Jason left them behind.  But not all the players must have come or last minute older boys may have housed them.  So Jacob got to play one quarter of each game.  The size difference b/t the boys is pretty big.  The older boys are a good whole head taller then the 4th graders and Jacob is a good size for 4th grade! 

Sat. Jacob had to go back in the morning to school for 2 more games, but they were spaced out a bit one at 10 and one at 1pm.  So I had a handyman come over in the morning to take care of a few things here and then we joined Jason and went to the 1pm game.  Jacob played part of each game again.  Long day at school for him with basketball.  But he enjoyed it and has about 5 friends on the team so it was good.
In the evening we had Jason's Christmas work party.  My sitter canceled on me at the last minute but thankfully she found one of her friends to babysit for us.  So that was good.  The party was at Jason's bosses house.  They live outside of town so have a house, and not just a house I would say a US mansion.  It was amazing, and especially for a place like here you don't see anything like this.  It was a huge Italian Villa.  So beautiful.  I would have taken pictures if Jason would have let me (:  The woodwork in the house and built in's were amazing.  In the dining room all the furniture was built in except the table, but even had couches built in along the curved wall that jutted out with windows.  Over the buffet built in in the dining room, which was the length of the wall, was a glass scene from  St. Mark's Square in Venice.  I recognized it right away since we were just there.  Beautiful!