Christmas Break

Well, we are now on our second day of the kids having Christmas Break from school. For the second day in a row, I was able to sleep in until 8:30am. Usually I have to have the kids up by 7am for school.

Today we have stayed home and I have done a lot of bread baking to give a way at church on Sunday. So far, I have made 4 loaves of Banana Bread and 4 loaves of Zuchinni Bread. I am not done yet either.

The kids have played Play Station 2 and are now watching Narnia. It is just a relaxing day at home today. Although, I have done a lot of cleaning as well. Gardner's Parents are coming to Germany for Christmas and they arrive tomorrow.

Gardner has been working late these last few weeks. He is out the door by 7:30am to catch a bus. He then transfers to what is called the S Bahn (Train). From there he has to transfer one more time. It takes an hour to get to work. He has been getting home after 9pm every night. I wish he was home more often. But I also know that right now things are work are hectic.

Ian is growing like crazy. He will be 4 months old next week. He has been eating cereal for probably a month already. I just started him on fruits two days ago. He seems to really like it. And I really love the Cereal Bottles. I can put all his food in there and he can eat it. He really is too young to feed him with a spoon already.

Emma has adapted pretty well to life in Germany and in our new home. I just have to get her more used to wearing gloves and hats when we go out. She does not like them at all.

Shantal had her Christmas program at school 3 nights ago. It was hard for me to concentrate to understand everything in German as I was there with all the kids by myself. Luckily, Spencer is a great big help with Ian. I had to keep Emma quiet through out the whole thing. Anyway, back to my point: Shantal had a speaking part in her program. And she did WONDERFUL. She had her little poem memorized and everyone clapped afterwards which made her feel great.

Spencer did a speaking part in the Primary Program at Church a month ago. People there were really in awe of Spencer. They kept telling me that he spoke German so well. And they could not believe it was such a short amount of time since we got here and he also had no accent.

Hannah's German is improving every day. She will come home from Kindergarten and ask me what certain words are that she heard at school. She is even talking more at home in German. This past Saturday, we had our Christmas Party at Church. There are several English speaking families there. There is one girl Hannah's age named Olivia. Olivia got a Pinnochio book from Santa Claus. I over heard a conversation between the two girls. It went like this: Hannah: I got a book from Santa Claus, too. Olivia: Really, which one? Hannah: I don't know, I did not open it yet. Of course, there was more to the conversation, but I was a little stunned as these two girls are from America and their whole conversation was in German. So, needless to say, the German is coming more and more for Hannah.

I personally am trying to keep up with life. With Ian eating every two hours and me breastfeeding, it is hard for me to do much else. Emma has been sick the last week. I think she had croupe over the weekend. Now it is just a cough and cold. So she has been a little more whiney than normal. I stay up way too late at night. I usually crawl into bed at midnight or shortly after. And then it is not long before Ian starts crying. So being tired is something that is just a part of being a mom I suppose.

I can't believe that Christmas is just three days away. It is strange as this Christmas is so different than any other one. We just put up our tree last week. I usually do that on Thanksgiving. And then, I have not done much shopping at all. We keep telling the kids that with the move, it will be a small Christmas. For one, our funds are tight. We have had to buy so much for our new home (furniture, kitchen appliances, washer/dryer, ect). And we still have so much to buy. We have a lot of stuff that did not make it on the boat to come over here.

OK, Ian is waking up from Nap. So, I need to go and take care of him. I will have to update again later.