First Day of School!!!!

It's offical. Ellie started Kindergarten today! She had a great day, lots of familiar faces and she loves her teacher Mrs. Solis! Great first day!

Bring on the Homework!

Summer Highlights

 The Beach

                                                                                    7 Years

Frozen Bananas and Swim Lessons

  Bonnie's Big Day

Big Pink CASTS!

Dedicated Side walk chalk
and Jeff & Allie's Wedding!

Beach Volley Ball with a Seaweed Net

Caprice's Baby shower and Visit Home!

It's been a super fun summer! Ellie start's school this Monday! I can't believe it's almost OVER!!!!

Dance- Last Day before Summer

Dance this year was a combination of Tap, Ballet and a little Gymnastics. Ellie learned how to skip and has been showing off ever since! 

 Ellie and her teacher Ms. Sara. She was so great with the girls we will miss her next year!

Like Father Like Son.

At Tim and Becky's Open House. I think Andrew is modeling Will. What will I do with these boys??

Will........

I think Will came along to scare me into only having two kids. Will and I have two very different agendas EVERYDAY!! I try to make my agenda his by including activities that he would enjoy. Such as gymnastics, toddler story time, and the park. But most of those activities always turn into a disaster!!! What am I doing wrong with this child!!! Today at toddler time instead of coloring, or putting stickers on rabbits and listening to stories, all he wanted to do was climb on anything he could put a foot on. He was stealing other kids water and running around stealing snacks!! I was literally on him for an hour and he still managed to break free sometimes. When I try to hold his hand and guide him in a new direction he has a tantrum and just lays on the floor for about 2 minutes, then gets up and runs away. If I don't carry him or put him in a stroller when I go out, he would run away and keep running. The boy doesn't care if he can see me or not! Before we checked out he was laying on the ground in a silent protest by the cash registers. This is really embarrasing, I am such a bad mom! So glad Ellie is such an angel or I'd have some major issues with even leaving the house!!

Back For Good

I've been putting off the blog. I'm sorry. The posts I wanted to post were piling up into an unending never to be caught up with pile in my head and there is now no way to possibly catch up. So let's start with the present.

It's so nice to be home. We enjoy being able to see a movie right when it comes out, going to any restaurant and all restaurants we missed and getting everything we need at the grocery store! I also enjoy being able to try on my clothes before I buy them (not as much internet shopping) and not having to shop at Esprit anymore. We also enjoy spending time with our friends and family again!!!

We found a cute little house, with a quiet neighborhood, excellent schools and it's nice to be settled down for a bit. Andrew loves the new dental practice he is working for and the ward we are in here is great- 80 primary kids! Back to normal feels nice.

I was thinking about this list the past week, might have to add to it so I'll remember. Some of the things we do as a result of living in Germany for 3 years:

1. Pause at the yellow light, still thinking it may turn green instead of red.

2. Catch myself speeding WAY to much.

3. Tell my children to "sitzen" when I really need them to sit- German is more demanding.

4. Stand close to the next person in line thinking someone is going to rush my line at the grocery store or really any line for that matter.

5. Hang Easter eggs on pussy willows.

6. Ellie calls her "owies" "owas" when she gets hurt, makes me laugh every time.

7. We drink a lot more herbal tea than before

8. Candied almonds at Christmas

9. and Enjoy spending all of our extra time with family:)

I'm sure there are more I'm not thinking of. It's great to be back!

Just a little that's happened since being back-

Playing at the beach

Will turned 2! He loves hims some nuggets:) Papa made him his Angry Birds birthday cake!

Ellie turned 4 and started pre-school. She starts kindergarten this summer!

Christmas back home!!

AHH Venice!

Piazza San Marco

Grand Canal from the Rialto Bridge
Gondola on the grand canal. A little expensive if you ask me. 100-180 Euro for a ride!! Thats over 150-270 dollars right now!
Venice was great. Yes it was scorching. Yes it was continuous up and down stairs with strollers. But Gelato for breakfast lunch and dinner was a plus! And is was so amazing. I WILL be coming back here-- NO strollers and probably no kids. Sorry guys.

We just got back from non- stop vacations. My mom came out and we went to Dubrovnik, Croatia, Olympia and Athens Greece, Padova, Verona, and Venice, Italy back to southern Bavaria, and finished in Paris. SO much fun and we are very tired. I still have clean clothes in bags and no desire to put things away yet.

We finish our time here in Germany mid September and it's coming too fast. We have one more big trip planned to Switzerland and Western Italy. Still going strong. There is so much to post. I hope we can get to all of it!

In Bruges

I LOVE THIS PLACE.

Brussels

The Elizabeths
mmmmm. Waffles
Manneken Pis, (the only reason Andrew came:)

In all his glory
The Grand Place

Construction, Not so grand. In the background you can see one of the tintin comics on the wall.

I'm still dreaming about belgium waffles.... We might have to make one more trip.

London

The Tower Bridge

West Minster Abby

The red car on the London Eye

Big Ben
mmmm. Fish and Chips

London Tower
Helpful road markings

Princess Diana Ring
The Queen is in