Loose Tooth

Eyan ran up the stairs this morning with very exiting news. He has a loose tooth. He is almost 8, but this is his first tooth to come out. When he was in 1st grade it was pretty tough being the only kid with ALL his teeth. In the next days he will earn bragging rights. He has been wiggling and turning his tooth as much as he can. Pictures of the empty space to fallow.

Sunny Afternoon

It's Wednesday March 3rd at 2:30 in the afternoon. The sun is shinning. We all sit in the living room letting the sun warm us. We are reading. Books about bears and bratty kids, books about cowboys and farms. It is quiet, until a book is exchanged. Toben whines about a book that someone is actually reading. It is passed over to him, and once again there is only the sound of turning pages. A very wonderful sound.

An Update

It's been awhile. Life just gets busy, and things get put aside. I do love blogging, but I'm afraid it was one of the first to go. I would have much rather skip out on laundry or lunch maybe cleaning the bathroom, but it was the blog.

In the last month we had a newly wed couple stay with us for 2 weeks. They just moved here and we helped find them a houses, showed them around town and everything else that goes with moving to Germany.

I had a birthday and went on a lovely trip to Switzerland. I joined a quilt guild and have also been learning about German history.

Martin had a field exercises and has been away much of the time. He also took the computer with him, so that did make it a little harder to blog. We have decided to take a few trips as a family before he leaves for Poland in about 6 weeks.

Naomi has been keeping her room clean and has made excellent grades in school. Can't even say how proud I am of her!

Eyan had fallen out of a tree and tripped up our stone stairs, so at the moment he is a little scrapped up. He also got a very good report from his teacher and is doing excellent in school.

Silus has ridden his little tricycle to school as the weather is starting to warm up. Funny when at 45 it's a real heat wave.

Toben is still 2. He stopped drinking out of a bottle, and is showing a new interest on walking around town. He stands just under me and repeatedly wines "a walk, a walk, a walk" until I either give in or distract him. I'd say it's about 1/2 the time he wins. I do love walking in the woods here.

SO, that's it in a nut shell. I am hoping to be better this month and get some pictures of the kids up.

Skype

Skype. An Internet phenomena that I have recently come to love.
 It's so cool to see those you love when you are far away.
It only takes a few minutes to set up an account and most computers have a web cam, or you can get one for around $50. 
Seeing each other priceless. 
I hope to Skype you soon.

Here is Silus talking to Nana and Popi.

Yabadoo

Yabadoo is an indoor bouncing balloon run off energy let the kids go wild kind of a place. Kind of hard to describe it really. Like the American Hoots except bigger and a little stinkier. It is a great place to take all 4 kids. They all leave tired, hungry and happy. What more can I say? Yabadoo!

Magic Eraser

At one time I thought that kids who wrote on stuff were just left unattended, or found markers all over the house and wrote on stuff because they saw their other brothers and sisters doing it. That is until Toben came into the picture. This little guy finds markers and crayons like nobodies business! The other kids never wrote all over stuff AND he isn't left for any amount of time that he could do MUCH. Well I guess it doesn't take much. I have to admit that it is harder to keep markers and crayons out of reach at ALL times. BUT that doesn't stop him. He has written on the refrigerator, shelves and the couch just since we have been here. And the Magic Eraser isn't as magic as I thought it was. It won't take the pen off of the couch. Darn it!

Etch-A-Sketch

We have way too many toys. As I have been thinking about what we can get rid of and what can stay, it never fails that the kids play with something they haven't taken interest in since they were born! I don't know that I'll be getting rid of the Etch-A-Sketch, it's a toy that is not played with much but it really does not take up much space. Eyan picked it up the other morning. He sat at the kitchen table for a little while and in maybe 20 minutes with no directions came up with this great picture. It's a boy with a bow tie on, holding a leash and his dog. It impresses me, mainly because I can't even do a basic square or even write my name. He picked it up for the first time and has a picture!