Week 14

This was a pretty low-key week. Didn't do too much. My obsession this week was Facebook (as if I needed another reason to procrastinate unpacking).
I finally set up an account so that I could see the wedding pictures of my Brother and brand new Sister-in law. I never really understood what the big deal was but now I'm addicted to it! lol!

Also this week we had our first house guests. Jeremy's cousin Jacob and his friend just graduated from the Naval Academy and are traveling Europe to celebrate. They made us their first stop. It was fun having visitors. Who's next?


Whitney discovered that if she tries to be as cute as possible someone will take her out of her carseat. How do girls learn this skill at such a young age?

blowing kisses

Whitney also found the potty chair I used with Emma this week and was so happy. She kept saying "Emma Potty". (I wanted to cry from missing Emma so much!) She has been sitting on it all week long (and never wants to get off) but has still never done a single thing in it. hmmmm...... I was hoping she would be as easy as Emma was to potty train on it.

Whitney trying to keep her legs closed. lol!

Saturday Connor's school was having a book fair. Afterwards we went to the park and had a little picnic. It was beautiful!


My little watermelon piggie was in heaven!!


We didn't get a lot of organizing done around the house. I keep hoping it will magically get done all by itself. I'm totally in denial.

Weeks 11-13: Finally!!

We finally moved into our new house (pictures coming soon) and the house where we will most likely be living for the next 3 years, which is exactly 3 times longer than we have ever lived anywhere!!!

It has been a little chaotic, to say the least, during this move. But.... we are starting to get a little normalcy back, which is good. The best part is that we have internet and phone with unlimited calls to the US. YAY!! Now if it weren't for the huge time difference I could actually call people.

A lot has happened since my last post. I promise, I will try to be brief.....

Right before we moved out of the hotel we took the missionaries out to eat on base at Wingers. They loved it! Whitney had us all cracking up.

I attended a 3-day class to learn all about Mannheim and what the Army bases had to offer. It was really informative. I only wished I had taken the class earlier! One day we took the train downtown. Here are a few of the other girls on the tour with me.



Inside the Mannheim castle there is a beautiful chapel with this sculpture of Alfred Delp. I thought it was interesting because this is the name of the street we live on.

While we were on the tour the Army paid for 3 days of daycare for Aiden and Whitney. One of the other girls on the tour had her son in the same class as Aiden. We all got together after class one day to play.


We have gone out exploring a couple of times in our new town. Just a couple blocks down from our house you are in a big field and forest. It's great to just run around in the field but I'm still too creeped out by the forest to go in too far. It's really dark and there are HUGE snails everywhere! You can't really tell by this picture but they are really big. The town is beautiful though.



May 18 was Whitney's birthday. I can't believe she is 2!!! We BBQ'd some burgers (her fave) and hotdogs, had some cake, presents, and soccer (her other fave). It was fun.

My sweet little 2-year old!

May 21 was a holiday for the Germans, every year our ward spends the day at Luisenpark on this day. Jeremy and Connor couldn't go since this is not an American holiday so Aiden, Whitney and I went. We had a blast! Whitney loved walking up to complete strangers and playing with them even though they didn't speak any English. She just made herself part of the group. Aiden loved playing sports with the Missionaries. They played football (American), baseball, soccer, and frisbee. Aiden was in heaven!







Over the Memorial holiday weekend we went to Strassbourg, France. It is only a couple hours away so we did it all in one day. I had to take this picture where you can see Germany on one side of the river and France on the other.


I put the rest of our pictures in a slide show. I haven't figured out yet how to do captions on the pictures... anyone know? In the pictures you'll see we explored the city on foot in addition to a tour on the Ill River by boat. The most impressive part of the city was the Notre-Dame Cathedral built in 1277. It was amazing! The stained glass windows were breath taking and dated back to the 13th century. Unfortunately the beauty was very difficult to capture in a picture... especially on a cheap camera. We ate little bits here and there at the local shops and markets then we had a picnic at a beautiful park before going home. It was a great day!

Week 10

Babysitting

A couple of kids showed up a couple of weeks ago at our boarding house. They started coming over everyday. Somehow our little group expanded to this:

The weird thing is that I haven't met any of their parents! These kids just show up at our door everyday after school and we have to bluntly kick them out when it's time to get ready for bed. Is it just me or is this weird!?! They all speak all different languages but their common link is English. I seriously feel like a babysitter.

Mexico

This week we got a package from my parents. They just returned from a cruise to Mexico. Luckily, they got back before the Swine Flu outbreak. It could have been rocks in the package for all the kids cared. Look how happy they are to get these cute shirts!

Thanks Mom and Dad.

Music Class

Connor's music class invited parents to come and watch. They don't do "music programs" so this is the closest thing to it. It was very interesting. Here's a video of one of their songs.

Connor is standing in line behind his little crush.
He's got this goofy look on his face because of it. lol!!!

Cute kids!

Volksfest

Manheim Volksfest is going on right now. When Jeremy was in Utah I kept telling the boys we would go when Daddy got back. We took the train to the city and checked it out.



So much FUN!!!

I had to catch a video of Aiden bustin a move while Connor and Daddy were on a "scary" ride. He's got some moves!

Finally

We are finally moving into our new house!!! I am so excited. Not only are we moving into a new, much larger, house - but we also get all of our things that were shipped here from the US. Wednesday is our last night at the boarding house. Thursday will be crazy. Everyone will be at our house inspecting, dropping things off, hooking things up, putting things together, etc.. I will most likely just hang out somewhere with the kids all day and let Jeremy take care of everything. But then that night we will sleep in our own beds again. YAY!!! Have I mentioned that I'm really excited!?!

Here are a few random pics that we took this week at the boarding house: