Our fun and crazy days: August 2008

Summer has been a blast and gone pretty fast! Here is a little catchup with the last couple of weeks of summer break-

We have stayed up way too late every night watching the Olympics! I have loved every minute of it. My kids are into it, too. I asked Joshua who he wanted to win in the Olympics and he said, "David Archuletta". I just had to laugh. Looks like we haven't gotten over American Idol, either.

The highlight of my week was James making my birthday extra special by making me my own individual chocolate molten lava cake with homemade ice-cream. It was the best and made my day!

We were up at our cabin this past 3 days and the kids had a ball playing in the river and watching little baby fishes up in the river at our cabin. They had so much fun!

Here is one of their catches! When I said little baby fish, I mean little baby fish!

Daniel enjoying life, as usual

Joshua taking advantage of being a boy in nature without a bathroom around!

Finishing up the summer with an afternoon at the Gateway water fountain. Looks like Hannah got a good dose of water in the face. They loved it! Joshua and Joseph played with their Ninja Turtles in the fountains and would put them over the hole before the water came and they would fly up when the water sprouted.

Now we are ready for school to start!!

Well, we are back after a wonderful trip to Germany to visit my parents. We left super early on the 25th and traveled 30 hours to get there. Our plane flew to Amsterdam and the kids did pretty darn good on the flights there, but it was taking two trains from Amsterdam into Germany (an additional 5 hours on top of the 2 hr. and 9 hr. plane rides) which nearly did us in. But, lucky for us there was a nice American couple who helped us get our luggage and strollers on and off the trains. All in all, the kids did amazingly well and we met my parents in Hannover, Germany and then drove to Hamburg to the mission home.
James is the traveler of the bunch so he planned out some fun cities to see. My parents don't get out much to sightsee since they are so busy with mission stuff, so it was fun for them to get out for a bit and see some other parts of their mission without focusing on the mission part of it and to enjoy being with family.
The kids were in absolute heaven being with my parents and Joseph was like a little shadow of my dad. He followed him around almost every where he went. Even in church, Joseph followed my dad (without him knowing) up the the pulpit to bear his testimony. So, Joseph bore his testimony, too. It was cute. He just loves spending any time he can get with Opa. The kids played a lot of ping-pong and games at the mission home when we weren't out traveling. Josh would run around to people everywhere we went "singing" guten tag, guten tag, guten tag. It cracked us up!!
Some of the cities around Hamburg we went to were Luneberg, Bremen, Wiesmar, and Sylt. We went to Sylt because it is supposed to have beautiful beaches. Well, the beach was indeed beautiful and the kids caught little jellyfish by the shore. The jellyfish must have been too little to grow tentacles because they didn't sting. They loved catching them in little cups.
We went to another beach in Wiesmar with only my brother and were attacked with swarms of ladybugs. They were awful! They landed all over us. Other people around didn't seem to be bugged by it, but we certainly were! At least it wasn't bees or yellow jackets.
We had fun riding the trains, going to the aquarium in Hamburg, shopping at H&M (I sure wish we had one here!!!), seeing a water fountain show, sightseeing, taking walks, getting a daily dose of ice-cream and Joseph's favorite was the model train exhibit. It is a world famous exhibit and he went to it when he and I went to Hamburg last November. He loved it so much that we all went and it truly is amazing. Rooms and rooms of detailed, miniature cities with moving people, trains, cars, etc. The kids also love "Herbie" and were in heaven finding Herbie cars at the little museum as well as finding them driving all around Germany.
When it was time to leave, the kids all got so sad and Joshua kept saying, "I don't want to leave the misson house!". The look on Joseph's face when he had to say his final goodbye to Opa and Oma was the most unbearable look of pain and anguish! He was so, so sad. It was hard to watch.
I asked the kids what their favorite part of Germany was and they said, "Just being with Opa and Oma". We sure loved it and they spoiled us rotten when we were over there! They are the best! We love you Opa and Oma and miss you already!! It was also so enjoyable for me to watch my parents serve these missionaries so diligently and with their whole hearts. I love watching my dad speaking German and talking to people on the street and handing out pass along cards. I hope these missionaries know how lucky they are to have such a wonderful mission president and mission mom!!

The kids sleeping on the floor of the train on our way to Germany from Amsterdam. The train was so crowded and hot and no vacant seats.