Thanksgiving 2007

With Blake working in Europe he, of course, doesn't get the American holidays off like Thanksgiving. This year we were planning on celebrating it on Saturday. However, some friends at church called us a couple of days before and invited us over - yeah! This is just a picture of the kids before eating. I love sharing the cooking with others! I only had to make rolls, 1 pie, broccoli salad and bring drinks. Of course, Blake wasn't able to make it, but we brought him home a couple of plates of food! The kids had a ball!

Sydney the "Professional Tour Guide" Star

Sydney was the star of her classroom play. She acted the part of "Tourguide Miss Hanna". She had 17 lines to be exact - and very long ones. She "taught" the "tourists" all about Sacagawea and how she came to be on the $1 coin. She did an amazing job and everyone was amazed how she could remember all her lines (especially me!)

Blake's Latest Injury

As usual, Blake went and played Basketball on Saturday morning. He called me on his way home to ask if we had any superglue. Apparently, he'd been playing and bumped heads with some guy pretty hard while doing one of his cool moves. He ended up getting a pretty deep cut. There were a couple doctors playing too. One of the doctors (a pediatrician) took Blake to his office to try and sew it up, but couldn't find keys to the cabinets to get out the supplies needed...oh well....luckily we found one bottle left of superglue at home that wasn't completely dried up! Woo Hoo! That saved us another trip to the doctor! If you were wondering, he's healing fine. The wound has only broken open once, but after some butterfly bandages were attached, he's as good as new!

Horseback Riding in the Mountains!

Sydney, Cameron and Caleb have found a new passion - horsback riding!!! The General Manager/President of Comedil (where Blake works) owns stables, 3 arenas, etc. She races horses - jumping over the fences (I have no idea what you call that). She lives in the mountains close to where we live. She invited the kids to come up and gave them riding lessons. They seem to be naturals and are absolutely loving it! Sydney, especially has become passionate about it!

Cameron's excitement

Cameron's had a little excitement these past few weeks. On October 29, he turned the big "10"!!! I can't believe it's been 10 years since he was born. We had a family party that night and then a week later he had a birthday party at the bowling alley on base. Also, I got a note from his teacher inviting me to an awards ceremony where he received an award for all A's the first quarter. He made runner up for the "Citizenship Award". He was also elected by his class to be the Student Council representative. He's having a great year!

Caleb begins Grade 1 in the Italian School

Caleb has finally started Italian school. The Italian kids go to school M, W, F from 8:10 until 4:10 and T, Th and Saturday from 8:10-12:30. Yes, I said Saturday. Apparently on M, W, F they have an hour morning break and a full 2 hours for lunch and recess. I told Blake that somebody needs to come in and teach the Italians a little about cutting out a few breaks a day. We told them we didn't want Caleb to go on Saturday and they thought we were nuts. A guy at Blake's work told us, "Hey, this is Italy, if you don't want to go to school on Saturday - don't go!" When in Italy, do as the Italians, right? We found out they do do a program M-F from 8-4 everyday. So he's in that. It's been a little rough for him. Everyone tells us that it will be a rough few months until he can speak and understand a lot of it. The teachers kept kissing him (the italian way). There was a boy that kept kissing him on the cheek too. Caleb got so mad about that. The 1st picture is of Caleb right before school with his black smock on. He has to wear that to school everyday to "protect" his clothes. On Thursdays he's required to wear a sweatsuit for gym class. The second picture is our typical routine every morning when I drop him off. This too shall pass - right?

October 2007

Well, just as an update to our crazy life in Italy...We finally found a house and our movers came on October 8th and 9th....The movers (who are from Germany) showed up at around 5:00pm - yes at night ....They unloaded part of the moving van and then asked us if they could sleep at our house that night (we hadn't even slept at our house yet!) We were too in shock to even ask questions and said that they could sleep there. They unloaded their overnight bags and a big recycling bucket of empty beer bottles (which they had been drinking on the way down to Italy since they all reeked of alcohol). When we showed up the next morning (we were still staying at the hotel) they had moved our couches in to sleep on. One slept on the couch, one took cushions off the other couch and slept on those on the floor and then the other two brought their own stuff. After they were done unloading, they all showered at our house and took off - yes, I said showered at our house - we didn't even have shower curtains so there was water and dirt left all over the bathroom! Nothing like "saving the company money"! It was seriously the "college buddies/Elders Quorum" moving us. They literally just put boxes wherever they heck they wanted unless we were standing there at all times looking inside each box to check its contents because they weren't labeled. We were so glad to see them go!!! Surprisingly, there were only a couple of things broken, but nothing major! YAHOO!!! (I still wouldn't recommend them). I don't think I told you how they packed us, but that too was a nightmare. I wanted to cry and throw up all at the same time.