Day 120

This morning we went to a friend's birthday breakfast, it was delicious and a lovely morning. After I went shopping whilst Florian and the boys went to the car wash - all this pollen needed to be washed off, before it damages the paint. So it probably won't be long until we have to go again!

Back home we went straight out into the garden, where Florian trimmed the edges of the garden, I mowed the lawn and Richard helped us in his own personal way!!

He spent a good bit of the afternoon with his scissors and with the dandelions!
Whilst Florian was in the barn for something he heard a lot of chirruping and look our swallows are back! At the moment they are "decorating" their nest. Now we have to take special care to keep Sunny out of that part of the barn!!

Now we are watching "Slumdog Millionaire" on TV, so just a short post during the adverts!
CU tomorrow

Day 116, Day 117, Day 118, Day 119 (Center Parcs)

We're back, we have been to Center Parcs on holiday this week, and we had a great time, even without internet! We were in the middle of nowhere and there was hardly any mobile coverage, so no chance to get on and blog. So now be prepared for a long post!

Day 116 (Tuesday)
We went to Park Eiffel, which is about 3.5 hours from here (and 2.5 from Mum and Dad) we left at 9am and Mum and Dad just over an hour later and we all arrived within 10 minutes of one another! Couldn't have timed it better! We got there at lunchtime, and as we had Early check in, we were in and having lunch by 1.30pm

The weather was beautiful, so we didn't rush to anything indoors and the boys got on their skates and looked for somewhere a bit flat to skate, then they played their new game they got for Easter on the garden out the back of our chalet, whilst Mum, Dad and I sat and enjoyed the sun. And for some unknown reason, I never got the camera out for that.
We did go to the indoor playground later to check it out, and there I got a picture of the boys on the only thing in there that costs money!

But as the cars weren't properly charged they only wanted one go!

As we had only paid a little for our holiday, we decided to eat out every night we were there. Well, this Center Parcs only had two restaurants, one only did an overpriced buffet, so we went to the Italian restaurant. Very nice, the boys loved it, as the kids meal came with an ice cream and a surprise!

Day 117 (Wednesday)
Busy busy day today. First stop the swimming pool. Yesterday when we peeped through the windo at it, I was a bit worried as it did look small, but once in there it was a lot bigger, it had a hidden part! Richard fell in love with the slide, and Florian was a great Dad he was up and down it all the while we were in the pool. The pool also had like a circle with a current going round it, it was great fun, but really strong. Getting off the slide the boys had to cross the current to go on the slide again. Once Robert didn't make it, and Mum and I found him going round the current, looking a bit exhausted. He was fine though and then went round and round in the current with us until he decided it was time to do some more sliding with Daddy! It was great fun in the pool but at about 12 it was time to get out, as lunch was at 1pm. The after lunch Dad took the boys to the indoor playground again, then at 4pm it was time for bowling!

Richard had the cutest technique, but that technique worked wonders cause he came third out of us 6!!! Way to go Richard! After bowling, it was time for the kids disco, they LOVED it, I got some cute videos of them, but I don't know how to shrink them...So here a photo instead!

And then, guess what, the kids wanted to go back to the Italian restaurant, so we did. Good job they had a diverse menu!
in the evening after the kids were tucked up in bed, we all played Rummikub! It was great fun!

Day 118 (Thursday)
Thursday was much the same as Wednesday. We had more vouchers for free bowling, so we booked and after swimming and lunch we went bowling again!
Richard's technique got him a spare and a strike today! Here is the proof!

After the bowling it was up to the indoor playground for a Kids Parade. Dad was really really bored with it, and was so sure the boys would be too, but Richard is still talking about it "and the big giant flowers that only grow in Center Parcs and were 100years old!" Point proven, that we were not the target group for the parade!

Then it was back to the Market Dome for another kids disco, and from there for a third time to the Italian restaurant. We actually managed to not double up on meals (except for Florian) not bad really!

Day 119 (Friday)
Our last day so that meant packing and leaving the chalet. We must have had too much practice cause this time we were finished well in the given time and even had time for a drink before going swimming! This time I got the camera out at the pool, and we managed to get one of the boats they had at the pool for the boys to have a ride on! Couldn't decide which picture to post, so here are a few!

After swimming we had lunch at the Burger Bar where the boys got an ice cream and someone tried to get a lick!!!

Mum and Dad left after lunch, but we all had another (free) game of bowling before leaving. But I now know that bowling three days in the row, makes the ball get heavier and heavier!! Still fun though!
We got home at about 5pm and I switched the TV on straight after unpacking! I wanted to see some of the wedding of the decade (Kate and William incase I am reading this in years to come and can't remember!) Center Parcs didn't have a TV where I could see some of it live, so I watched the news. Beautiful I thought! Loved her dress and smile! I hope she can handle the pressure, I wouldn't want to swap with her!!

OK, off to bed now

CU tomorrow!

Day 115

Another beautiful summery day! And another one spent outside all day! Richard and Robert did a lot of rollerblading, and wow, I cannot believe it, but Robert is already skating on his own! He even at one point jumped over a ball taht got in his way, landed on his feet and carried on skating! UNBELIEVABLE!
And by the end of the day Richard too was taking some steps on his own! Wasn't expecting that at all!

After lunch we met with Katrin and Sabine (and kids) and walked up the back of us to the dandelion field and took LOTS of photos! Here a couple

Richard didn't want his picture taken so is missing here!

Being silly!!! And loving it!

And then after the photo session Richard wanted a walk in the woods, Robert didn't so he went back with my friends and we took Richard to the woods, where he collected even more sticks! Bless him!

CU tomorrow!

Day 114

Happy Easter!

The Easter Bunny was a bit late coming this year...we think it was cause the boys were up too early and he saw them sitting there and thought before he got caught, he'd better wait! Whilst we were busy welcoming Mum, Dad and Ulla at about 2pm he must have sneaked around the back, cause when we went into the garden, there was chocolate and presents EVERYWHERE! Here a few pictures of the boys finding things!

Reading the letter from the Easter Bunny (he talks German)

Mum and Dad got them (sorry the Easter Bunny) some Rollerblades, which they tried out straight away, they both preferred it on the grass for now. That will teach them to balance, then we have to get the rolling mastered. I am not going to be any good at teaching them, as I can't do anything like that! So we'll see if they do eventually master it! Here some pictures of their first steps!

We had a lovely barbecue, much too much to eat, but we have enough leftovers for another bbq tomorrow! Yummy! We have to make the most of the lovely summery weather before it goes again on Tuesday/Wednesday!
CU tomorrow

Day 113

Summer is here early I think! It certainly felt like it all day! I went shopping in the morning, it's been a while since I have been shopping, when everyone else goes, it was so full there! Very different atmosphere, I think I will go back to missing all the people! BUT I got all I needed for our annual Easter BBQ tomorrow!

We didn't BBQ today but we did have lunch outside, so nice. Florian indulged the boys today and played with them all day. We played a lot of Rummikub (Robert's new favourite), they played quite a bit of table football, and they were on the trampoline a couple of times. I caught them on camera when they were taking a bit of a bouncing break and were watching the clouds and determining what they looked like!

It was a LOVELY family day, and during all this, I actually managed to get all the washing done!
And it was a good job we have a dryer, cause the pollen was bad today, this is Florian's laptop after only the morning outside!

CU tomorrow!

Day 112

We were awake nice and bright and early with the church kids making as much noise as possible at 6am. They have wooden things they bang to make the noise, and I just looked it up on Wikipedia (click here) and apparently the church bells aren't rung from Good Friday to Easter Sunday, so to make sure no one forgets to go to church or such, they make this noise!
Well needless to say the boys were up nice and early, Florian and I stayed tucked up for a bit longer, until we heard strange noises from downstairs, and then Florian went to investigate! (It was the boys getting their dishes out for breakfast!)

Gorgeous weather today, we played all sorts outside, first Rummikub, and then Florian and I got the table football down from in the barn. Not a really clever idea (I think I will have a bruise across my shoulders for a while), but the boys were thrilled to get to play with Daddy!

And this is a photo I wanted to take, can you tell that the boys didn't!!!

CU tomorrow

Day 111

Well, I spent the whole morning going back and forth to Kindergarden! First I took Richard there, that was at about 8am. Then at 9am I took Robert and me there for our English lesson! Robert took his camera with him, so now I actually have a few pictures of me teaching English...and maybe even a video or two! But as they aren't my kids, I can't actually show you! So at 9.50am Robert and I left again, then at 10.55am we were back there again picking Richard up.
We picked him up early, cause this morning was their climbing catch up lesson! She offered that I could come back early for them and take some pictures if I wanted. Don't need to tell me that twice! So here are my boys climbing!

Robert checking out the height!

Robert nearly at the bell!

Richard on his way up, up and away!

Move over Spiderman, here comes Richard!

 The weather was so beautiful today, that when I picked them up from climbing (which incidently is only round the corner from Kindergarden!) they got to walk home in their shorts! Summer is coming! Let's just hope it stays!

In the afternoon we went out in the garden. Someone had opened the side door to the chicken run and the chickens of course were all out, and what a mess they made of my garden, so whilst the boys were on the trampoline and such, I got to try and find my little plants in the mess!

Now I am waiting for Florian to come home and then our holiday begins! 10 days all together! Woohoo!
CU tomorrow

Day 110

I was on call for work all morning, but no one needed anything translated today! Which meant that late in the morning Robert and I got to go shopping! We met Katrin and the Dad that is on the parents committee at the shop, and arranged to all meet up at the playground in the afternoon!
Richard wasn't too happy at that arrangement, as he really wanted to do some painting today. But once there he soon cheered up, when his best friend was there too!

The kids had great fun together, and we had great fun chatting! I took my photo books with me and Katrin's Mum had a look at them. Speaking of photo books, I have nearly finished a fourth - 2007! Just need to make a cover for it!


There was a beautiful field of dandelions up by the playground, and the kids were all very obliging and let me get their pictures in the field!

Good job they all know me as the Mum with the camera!

CU tomorrow

Day 106, Day 107, Day 108 and Day 109

We went away for the weekend, but I'm back now, and can bring you all up to date!

Day 106 - Saturday
We got up bright and early to set off for a long weekend up north. Saturday and Sunday we were spending with friends. We got to them just in time for lunch, and we started all our catching up over some delicious noodles and tomato sauce. After lunch we set off for a local zoo (in one car), where I got lots of photos, but I'll only post a few here. I loved seeing the raccoons wide awake, but the highlight were the goats!

After the zoo we walked back home. It was through the woods, and quite a bit longer walk, than we are all used to, but it was great fun, the weather was so beautiful, we just had to be outside! (in case you are wondering about the car, Kirsten had to go and get a little bit more shopping so she took the car, whilst we walked). In the evening we did a cheese fondue, ooh it was soooo good! Very filling but delicious - even the boys enjoyed it, the kids though had one without the alcohol (Kirschschnaps and wine). I never started to itch, so maybe Kirschschnaps is not one that affects me, but I would have ignored it anyways, I love cheese fondue too much!

Day 107 - Sunday
We were up nice and bright and early - we shared a room with the boys, which was fun in the night, when all three of my men were snoring...!!! But being up early was good, cause the boys went with Knut for some rolls for breakfast, and we had a leisurely breakfast and then headed out to a Dinosaur Park! It was amazing, I was expecting it to be a bit "boring" but NOT IN THE LEAST! A few years ago they found some dinosaur footprints in a quarry, and instead of transporting them away to some museum, they left them right where they were and built a themepark around them. There are no rides there, but still BRILLIANT fun. The kids took part in a quiz type thing. They had some cards and had to answer questions all around the park, they loved that. OK, now for some pictures!

The dark spots are the dinosaur footprints

Hundreds of "life size" dino statues all over the park, some you could climb on!

 At the end of the round trip, they had some things that the kids could join in with. Richard and our friends daughter are sieving sand looking for fossils and semi precious stones (which they got to take home with them).

Robert made his own dinosaur from clay - we only have pictures of it, he didn't want to take it home with him.

It was a lovely day out, and I can highly recommend it, check out their website www.dinopark.de
There is an English page there too!

Day 108 - Monday
Our friend is a "Heilpraktiker" (alternative practioner/traditional healer) and Richard's skin was really bad this weekend, so I showed her, to see what she thought, and she reckoned it is Neurodermatitis. She took us to her practise and measured all sorts of things on his skin and has given us some supplements to try and get it under control. She was also able to tell, that the main culprit is probably sugar along with his nerves (probably down to Daddy being away from home), so now to reduce his sugar intake without upsetting his nerves! Oh dear fun times ahead!
I am so grateful that she did all this for us, cause now I can finally start to solve the problem!

After that it was time for Florian's mother's 70th birthday party. Lovely weather for it, and there was a playground at the hotel for the kids. Florian, his sisters and kids sang Happy Birthday for his mother, I just took the photo!

 At 5pm we started the long drive home, we had to drop Florian off at the station as he had to go straight down south to be at work on time the next morning!
The boys and I got home about 8.15pm and I never got around to blogging, so on to

Day 109 - Tuesday
Work for me and Robert today. I had to go in to work today and as Robert has school holidays he came with me!

 Whilst I got on with my translating, he played dinosaurs, did some homework, played some more dinosaurs, drew some dinosaurs and played some more with them. Until 3.5hours after arriving we headed home again!

In the afternoon we went out in the garden and enjoyed the sunshine. We made our "egg chain" to decorate our well with, and hang it up.

 We had coloured exactly the right amount of eggs for it! What is left over I will save for next year, and then we will do the well AND hang some on the tree too!

Now I am going to tackle two difficult ADSR scrapping challenges, I have a deadline to reach...
CU tomorrow

Day 105

Fun start to the day today...Got to the bus stop and some of the older kids were coming towards us, going the wrong way...very strange. Well once there we found out that the earlier bus hadn't come...the kids were all excited that their bus wasn't going to come either...Shame for them, that this morning 3 Mum's were there, and we made a few phone calls, and the school told us, that oops, the bus driver thought he had a day off...They organised something and another bus showed up to take them all to school - 40 minutes late! Still it was the last day of school, so they only had 3 lessons anyways!

I went to the garden centre in the morning and got a couple of presents for the weekend - one of them might be quite interesting, I got a "grow your own mushroom" set! I'll have to make sure they send me an update on that one!
In the afternoon Robert's friend came round to play and at 5pm we dropped him off home to go and pick Florian up - here he is coming up from the station to meet us. That is "our" mountain in the background - also known in our family as "Aunty Kerri's mountain"

And this morning I took another picture of it, it was so blue the sky and the mountain just looked picturesque, so I stopped at the side of the road and had a bit of "me-time"!

Shame that some grumpy old man had to spoil it for me, by giving me a mouthful, cause I had parked on the path (only one wheel)! Grrrrr, spoilt my morning that did, and it annoyed me that it annoyed me...Just one of them days I think!

I might be a bit scarce at the weekend, we are meeting up with friends we haven't seen for a while so we have a lot to catch up on.
CU soon!

Day 104

Today wasn't quite as planned, we got up as planned, had breakfast - that was as planned, and headed to the bus stop, so far so good. Then at the busstop Robert complained that his ear, really really hurt! And as our doctor is on holiday next week, he didn't get on the bus! We took Richard to Kindergarden, although he wanted to come to the doctors too - apparently his tummy hurt! I ignored that one, and hurried to the doctor with Robert!
It took us twice as long to get there...but luckily there weren't many there and we were in and out again within 30 minutes! Robert just has a cold, which is causing pressure on his ears, mainly cause he refuses to blow his nose or sniff! We have some tips and medicine and he will be back at school tomorrow - last day before his Easter holidays tomorrow, so he doesn't really want to miss that one!

As he was home, he had to join me at Kindergarden for my English lesson. He thought it was great fun "helping" me! And he wants to come again next week when he is on holiday!

After lunch I got the surprise of my life...remember the MESS they had created on Tuesday in their bedroom, well today was to be tidy up day! After what the boys call "snoozy time" (time where they play on their own in their bedrooms) I went up armed with camera and determination. I went into their room and WOW!!!!
They had spent their snoozy time tidying up, and they had made a REALLY good job of it! All the Lego, Playmobil, cars and trains were back in their proper boxes and the boxes were back in their rightful homes! UNBELIEVABLE! I was so touched, I nearly cried!
I gave them both a HUGE cuddle and then took them out in the garden for an ice-cream, Mum put that idea in their heads when she praised them over the phone! It was a bit cold out their - summer hasn't returned again yet- so after the ice-cream we came back in and I let them watch "Pete's Dragon". We all enjoyed that!

Whilst that was on I thought they might like to try the coconut I bought last week. I got out a hammer and cracked it open. Gave them both a spoonful of the coconut milk, that got me a YUCK from both of them and then only Richard wanted to try the rest - he was NOT impressed.  But when he sees the shell, I am sure that is one part of it he will want to have!

This evening I came back downstairs after putting the boys to bed to find Sunny asleep on Florian's chair...so cute!

 CU tomorrow