Double Digits

It is offical, Jacob is now 10! Yesterday was his birthday and it couldn't get here fast enough for him. We had a small family birthday celebration for him at dinner. We gave him the option to open all of his family gifts then or wait for his friend birthday on Friday. He chose to wait until Friday but at the last minute, he broke down and opened one gift.

Walking into the dinning room as Anna uncovers his eyes.

This is what he saw on the table, his favorite meal- Cheesy hotdog casserole and his gifts.













After dinner, he got down to business deciding which gift to open. He was ver diplomatic and roll a dice. Sarah decided to help Jacob too.





Jacob was the nice big brother and he let Sarah assist him in opening his gift.

Just what he wanted, another Bionacle! The rest will have to wait until Friday.

Mail

Sometime in early April, my parents let us know that they had mailed Jeff his birthday card. Well, his birthday came and went, no card. We left and came back from our trip, no card. We started back to school and no card, until this showed up in our mail box on Tuesday.

Aparently, the card somehow got jammed at the post office and the thoughtful U.S. postal service stuck a generic apology on the back of the letter to make us feel better. It reminded us of another time when Jeff was sent another card by my parents and they had enclosed a thin plastic case of breath mints. I guess the German government didn't like it so they carefully cut a small slit in the envelope and pulled the mints out leaving the card intack. Once the card arrived we were left to guess what had happend until we called my parents to get the real story.

This make for interesting dinner conversations as we have been enjoying sitting on our back deck enjoying temps in the high 70's.

Jacob the beekeeper

While we were in Bielefeld, jacob was able to assist Peter in tending to his bee hives. This is a hobby that he began after he retired a few years ago. The first thing to do was to put on the gear.










Next, making the smoke so the bees will relax and not sting you while you are changing the cones. At one point Peter "Accidentally" dropped one and the bees started buzzing. But Jacob stood still and kept pumping the smoke out.









Another shot of the bee meister Jacob. Keeping those bees at bay.

Hooray, Jaocb survived and didn't get stung once!

Easter trip part 2

Here is the second part of pictures from our time in northern germany. On Monday, it was a holiday called Oster Montag. Since everything was closed, we walked down the Altstadt of a quaint town 30 minutes from Bielefeld called Limgo. There were many restored building showing off the arcitecture of 500 years ago.

There were some fun play things spread out through out the city center for Jacob and Anna to play on. There are basically fancy sit n' spins.

Jacob gave Sarah a ride on one and she didn't want to get off.

On our way home, we stopped at Germany's largest Mall complex a two story Mall that would rival any in the States. Also on the grounds was an amusement park and a gian aquairium. We spent the whole day there and spent most of our time outside at the park. The kids got their fill of rides.

Oster sind da!

Here is a recap from our Easter Sunday spent with the Schumman family. After a nice breakfast of brotchen, and coffee, the children eagerly waited for the "Oster hassen" to hide the treats in the garden.

When it was time, the children were let loose to search for the treats.

Sarah of course didn't know what it was all about. She just played along with dad or mom and tried to look like she was having fun even though she was confused about the whole concept.

The Peter Schumman family almost 20 years after Jeff lived with them as an exchange student.

In Germany, it is tradition to decorate a bush outside or inside the home for Easter. This is called an "Oster baum". Heidi had one in her dining room.

After an afternoon rest and walk to a local playground, the family sat down to a big dinner. There were 16 of us together to enjoy wonderful food, and conversation around the table. This is where Jeff and I brought up some questions about the meaning of the ressurection and asked direct questions about their own beliefs. We got some very interesting comments.

While the adults ate and visited, Sarah and Helena ( grand daughter of Heidi and Peter) Played together.
Tomorrow, I will post some pictures of a day trip we went on to a local town.

Little traveler

We arrived back from our trip this morning at 1 am. We decided to drive straight back from just north of Dusseldorf instead of getting a hotel room. We were very tired but were happy to be back in our own beds. Over the next few days I will have posts from our trip that took us to Bielefeld, Lemgo, Essen and home. That is a round trip of the Western portion of Germany.

Starting on our trip, Sarah shows off her many activities of traveling.

Here she is the playful girl ready for a fun time.

Then she enjoyed some light reading during the trip.

My favorite activity of Sarah's was her sleeping. She did this alot since she wasn't feeling well.

It took us about seven hours to arrive at the Schumann's house. Even though we were tired from our trip, we were all still friends and ready for our time with them.

Birthday boy and Easter happenings

We decided to celebrate Jeff's birthday a couple of days early because we are driving to visit friends on his birthday. So, our family celebration with him was yesterday. I wanted to make sure that we had enough time to eat all of the cake before we left.

Jacob and Anna made jeff a cute card and gave him some of their cherished american candies.

We all love and appreciate Jeff. He is a great dad and husband and doesn't look a day over 36!

In other news, we colored our Easter eggs. and tried to decorate them from a kit that Grandma Sandi sent, Anna got a bit frustrated that nothing would stick on the eggs. But we tried. and still had fun. Thanks Grandma Sandi!

As I mentioned before, we are spending Easter with a family in northern Germany. So until then, I will not be able to post until we get back. I hope everyone has a wonderful Easter celebration.

ICEC Conference

Over the last four days, BFA has been hosting the International Christian Educators Conference (ICEC) through ACSI. Over 300 delegates from schools all over europe and africa came to our little corner of Germany. It was a lot of work for us staff members, but all the visitors seemed to appreciate it. While the conference was going on, there was a children's program held at the elementary school during the day. Jacob and Anna loved this. They learned how to do neat tricks with a yoyo, make fun craft items, play, it was just like summer camp. They hated when we picked them up everyday at 5 to bring them home. I was limited in my participation, because of Sarah and her nap schedule but I did go to evening sessions with Jeff. Here are some pictures from the kids time. They were treated to a special chapel by Dr. Kathy Koch from Kids Inc.
Sarah played outside on the playground with Jeff while I sat in and listened to the kid's chapel speaker.


Last night, Jeff and I served at the closing banquet for the conference. Jeff was incharge of scrapping the plates of un used food and I was responsible for the coffee table during the dessert. We are very tired from our service time and looking forward to a week of rest to refule before the final push of the school year.

Jeff listening to the final comments to end the conference. Now we can enjoy our break!

Book review

About five years ago, on our furlough back to the states, I came across this book at a christian bookstore. For some reason it jumped out at me. At the time, Anna was only three and when I read the back of the book about going through this one day with her it seemed like a long way off, now we have begun to go over this book and it amazes me how much she is changing. I am convienced in this day and age our culture has stopped teaching and reinforcing Character traits and values to our girls. This book, "A girl of Beauty" addresses issues such as truthfulness, sincerity, service, respect and contentment. Each chapter has scripture and discussion questions to go over together. I wasn't sure if Anna would go for it. I thought that she may drag her feet to sit down with mom everyday for some one on one time reading a talking over these issues. It turns out that she loves it. In fact, if she had her way, we would be done with the book by now. Every morning, she brings me the book and aks to read the next chapter together. The book is geared for 8- 12 year olds so I wasn't sure if she would get the contex or not. I think once we go through the book, we will review it again in more detail when she is older.

So far we have talked about good character building in our life now by making one good decision at a time.

That the foundation of our character is truthfulness and that people will be able to trust us if we are truthful.

Everyone has a part to play in life given by God. Because my life is not to be lived for my own personal pleasure, there are times when I must be willing to sacrifice my desires for the care of others.

It is my prayer that Anna and eventually Sarah will be able to take these truths and live them out and eventually pass them on to their children.