Family Picture 2008

we needed a family picture to put in our Christmas cards and we couldnt all seem to get together.

so. Travis was helping Santa out and dressing like him and listening to kids requests at the BX this month so he could pass on the word to the real Santa. ;)

well, last Saturday was the last day he would be there and I decided we would try to go there and get a pic with him. I didnt tell anyone- and I waited to tell Robert until we were already in the car. so, no one is really dressed up. I didnt care.

we got to the BX and when SantaTravis got into his seat, we all got around him for our pic. And this is what is going into our (Late) cards this year! I need to go back and see if I can get a bigger one to put in our big frame hanging on the wall that holds our yearly family pics. I figure if this is the only way to get us all together, then so be it. :)

the pic here is grainy.. its a pic of the pic. I dont have a scanner so couldnt scan it in. but, you get the idea.

Stick a fork in me

where to begin? I havent updated because I have been having issues getting into blogger. I can read peoples blogs- including my own, but couldnt get into making a new post or editing or even commenting on anyones blog. frustrating.

so last Wed, we took the suburban in to be fixed. the check engine light has been on for awhile and we needed to have it looked at. the guy hooked it up to the fancy Chevy/GM whatever it is machine that tells them whats wrong with it.
so they figure out that some 5 and 6 thing are misfiring. ok then. well they said it probably needed new spark plugs and wires. ok, fix it then. so we had to bring it back in this morning to be fixed.
or not.

we dropped it off first thing in the morning. this means I have to follow Robert to the place because one of us needs to drive the other one back home. well, my car has been broken for months now and we just havent taken it in to see what the problem is with it. Roberts car is a stick shift which I cant really drive. I sort of know how, but not well enough to actually drive it anywhere. :p
so we go out there early this morning. drop off the truck and then I get dropped off back at home. no biggie.. the kids are out of school for the holidays and I dont need to go anywhere today so I dont have to have a car.

the car place calls Robert this afternoon- he calls me with the bad news.
the spark plugs didnt help the problem, so they took something apart on the engine and discovered its some valve thing that connects those #5&6 things. okee dokee. well they could put it all back together and we could drive it, but that could also break something else which would be much worse and cost twice as much and still have to get this part fixed too.
so we leave it there. we go in, get a rental car from them.

$1500 euro estimate on the truck. today thats $2174 dollars. OUCH!
we had a 20% coupon and we get the tax off of it.. although I dont know if that estimate is before or after the tax. I only hope and pray that the exchange rate gets better before we have to pay for it. and the only reason we even have money to pay for it is because we have money sitting aside to buy heating oil when we need it. which, thank goodness isnt right now.

yeah. so Im now driving this little car. so if the whole family needs to go somewhere we will have to take 2 cars. ugh. this also means no trips next week when Robert is off work. not that we would really have the money to do it now anyways.

ok.. other news.

Trace hasnt been feeling well all day. I gave him Motrin and he seemed better, then bad again. gave him more. feels better. goes to bed. its 1 am and he came in feeling bad again and hot. so I gave him Tylenol. we'll see how it goes but I hope hes doing better tomorrow and that this doesnt go through all 8 of us. :(

Roberts mom had surgery on her hand last week. she was in a car accident and broke it bad. has pins and a plate and stuff in there. so, she cant drive for a long time now (did you know its illegal to drive in Germany with a cast on??) well, we were going to go get her and bring her here for Christmas, but now she doesnt want us to. so we wont see her until our truck is fixed and we can all go to her for a day.

Travis has been considering joining the AF for a little while now. so he talked to a recruiter and he took the ASVAB test and he scored pretty good on it. he did one part of his physical already and goes to do the other part tomorrow. I guess Ive been in denial or just didnt think he would really do it or something. he is not the type that I would think would join.. Im not sure he could handle basic training.. anyways, the recruiter called tonight and told us that we need an officer to do the enlistment on WEDNESDAY! huh???? its a delayed enlistment so he wouldnt leave until spring.. but I had no idea we were looking at enlistment so soon! holy cow.

I know I had a lot more to talk about but now I cant remember what. maybe tomorrow Ill post another long rambling of things.

Stick a fork in me.. Im DONE

so far behind

the goal was to post a bunch of posts all at one time so I could catch up on things.. but itll never happen, so Im skippinig over some stuff.

Tyler turned 17 at the beginning of the month. how is it that I have a 17 and 18 yr old??? not to mention the others.

so back to trying to post more often..

I am not ready for Christmas. its in 5 days and in my head I still have a month or so to go!
we finally finished making the cookie plates and giving those out- though I missed a couple people that I would have liked to have given plates to. This year we made almond roca, some kind of chocolate/butterscotch candy things, a chow mein noodle chocolate thing, turtle cookie bars, and sugar cookies. We also made a huge batch of jello cookies but they were nasty! even with frosting on them. blech. I need to get in touch with Doreen and find out what her recipe is. I might have added too much lemon extract- seems to me like I used vanilla before.

I still havent done my cards, but I have got the letter done. No family picture taken yet. Maybe we can arrange that tonight. Then it will have to be in the living room, but its better than none at all I suppose. At this point, we could wait until Sunday to take one .. Travis' work schedule really makes things hard to plan.

I havent wrapped any presents yet, but I think we finally bought them all. I do need to get a few small things for Robert.. dont know what though! why are men and boys so hard to buy for? and I have 6 of them to shop for every year. so frustrating.

the kids get out of school for winter recess today. I love my kids, but I do not enjoy listening to all the fighting and bickering that goes on when theyre all home for weeks at a time..so Im not really looking forward to the break.

ok, off to balance the checkbook.. fun fun

German Christmas Market

ok so between Abbys actual bday and her cake bday (haha) we went to the Christmas market in K-Town.

This really isnt the best example of a Christmas market I dont think.. this one is mostly drinking and some foods.. not so much with the booths of things for sale like Ive heard they have at the bigger, nicer ones.

Hopefully we can get to one or two this month and see what they are really supposed to be like.

Anyways, the big drink at the market is Gluhwein.. its some kind of wine drink and its hot. I dont know what it tastes like, but it seems to be a big hit! they also sell Kinder Punch which isnt alcaholic and its also hot. so we go and get that. it comes in mugs usually with the year and town on them, so we go and just get the drinks so we can keep the mug. (If you dont want to keep the mug, you get your deposit back)

This year we also got some hot chocolate. I love german hot chocolate.. and Belgium hot chocolate.. its like a given that it will have whipped cream on top and sometimes chocolate shavings too. Yummy!

one of the foods we have seen at the few we have been to are these potato pancake things. they serve them with or without applesauce. I like them without applesauce and Travis likes them with. I cant eat a lot of them now though... so I just had a bite of one of his. :)

we also get french bread pizzas when we go.. MmMmMm

the night we went it was COLD! we didnt stay long!

Abby is 6!

the Day after Thanksgiving, Abby turned 6!

I cant believe its been 6 years since my youngest was born!

I was horrible and never got around to making her a cake.. so we bought her a pretty one with pink roses on it at the commissary.

how bad am I?

but... it gets worse.

we gave her presents that day, but held off on the cake until the next day!

Thanksgiving

so, to continue playing catch up...

the day after the pin on ceremony, was Thanksgiving.

Like last year, we decided to go to Baumholder and eat at the chow hall.

it was crazy crowded and we ended up sitting in the same section, but not all together.. but it was ok. the food was good and we saw a lot of people from church that we knew.

my favorite this year was the chocolate fountain that i dipped a lot of strawberries in LOL

the only pic with me in it has my eyes closed as usual, so Im not posting it.

Making up for lost time

NEW RANK!

Robert finally got to sew on SMSgt on Dec. 1, but he had his pin on ceremony on Nov. 26 since that was the last duty day before the 1st.

woohoo! It took forever for Dec. to get here! ;)

very proud of him!

I took all the kids and Roberts mom came and we all punched one side of him, and his old commander did the other arm.













horrible pics in the theater lighting. :( Hoping the professional pics look nice.





then we had to take his uniforms in to have the new stripes sewn on.. here he is after picking them up.

the weekend

busy weekend here.

Robert got home on Friday and we went to the school to surprise Abby at parent reading time. she was really excited to see daddy there! :)

Then Friday night I made a cake that my friend ordered for her little girls 2nd birthday. Her mom bought a Strawberry Shortcake tablecloth to use, but it wasnt a SS party.. that was the only tablecloth with the colors she wanted. She had pink and green streamers and balloons. The tablecloth had some white with pink polka dots on it and of course SS herself. So my friend said to just do whatever for the cake - a simple one, and just use the pink and green colors. So this is what I did.

ok, so I tried to put the pics here and not up there but I dont know what Im doing. and that one wasnt sideways on my camera card, so who knows!?

Saturday the kids had bowling in the morning and then we came home and napped and then went swimming for an hour. to me, the water was chilly. But, Im always cold these days. and the SNOW outside isnt helping! I had enough snow in Maine.. dont want anymore of it. blech.

Saturday night, Robert went with me and Tyler to see Twilight at the German theater. (the movie was in English) I thought it was good. Sure, things could have been better.. but it seemed to be a small budget film and really, they had to put lots into 2 hours.. so, while it might could have been somewhat better, I enjoyed it.

Today was church, and then we napped again. Im liking these nap times! Robert being jetlagged isnt so bad! normally he wont take naps, but jetlag has his times off. lol

then we had dinner and watched some tv. Now its time for bed again.

seminary is cancelled for tomorrow because of the snow.. guess I better listen to the radio in the morning to see if school is cancelled. ugh.

Good Grief

so Im lousy at this stuff.

I *thought* I was pretty well hidden out here.. just in my own world.. never telling anyone where I am..

yeah, then I go and post a comment on someone else's blog and realize when its all posted that it somehow got linked back to MY blog!

so how in the world have I left comments before and not had it come back to me here? I have no idea.

Whatever. its here. its mine. and if I say something stupid on here in my own world, can I be blamed? ;)


today I did a 2nd Christmas card class.. have to say I enjoyed it, but working with kids is really not my thing. Would I do it again? yes. most likely I would. why? because Im just that way. haha

What is wrong with me???

yeah.. its been what? a month?
and Ive done it AGAIN!
open mouth insert foot. :(

and again, I cant go into details but what the heck is wrong with me?!

I am thinking its just time to stop talking.

on a positive note..
I did the craft fair last weekend and while there wasnt much business, I did sell more than I did the last time I did it. I still have leftover items, so I need to figure out what to do with all that stuff.
the big sellers? lip balm cards and jumbo paperclip bookmarks.

Been a busy couple of weeks and Im feeling super run down. Im also anemic- the Dr called tonight to tell me. so now I get to double up on the iron tablets. fun fun
Ill make an appt tomorrow to go in and chat with her about it more.

Always messing things up

Why is it that I cant seem to keep from putting my foot in my mouth?

I have a friend and I mentioned her to another friend that knew her from before and one thing leads to another and long story short.. now I just feel bad for mentioning the friend to begin with. :(

I cant even explain myself, because then that would really bring it all out in the open and then my whole leg would be in my mouth instead of just my foot. eeeek

other than that bit of mess up today.. lets see..

i sent in my absentee ballot thing today..and so did Travis- his first time voting! We finally got them in the mail and I just hope they arent to late getting back there.

and I went to a German store and picked up a couple items to help with my craft making for the craft fair in Nov. I have GOT to get busy with that stuff! Heck, I have got to get into the place and sign up for a space!

and I need to figure out Nov's projects for my classes so I can make sure I have all the stuff we need and if not, I can get an order placed in time.

really, all I want to do is lay down and take a long nap and forget about everything else for now.

Im just plain tired. of everything.

Addicted

so Im addicted to a new website.

its called Frontier Experiment. http://frontierexperiment.wordpress.com/ you can see it at that link.

Its basically a fake town in California. This fake town has fake residents that are doing a project for the fake town school. They are doing video blog things. (the people blogging on it are all actors)

so, you go on the site and you can click on individual people and watch their videos. They talk about everyday things that they do, etc.. but it ends up being like a soap opera. You get involved in their lives just by watching them, and you begin to hope for them to do certain things, or you cant wait to see what happens next, etc.. just like some soap you watch on tv!

I really didnt need another addiction.. but its too late- I got sucked in.

to be honest though, Ive only watched the women.. havent gotten into the mens stories yet.. dont know if/when I will.. they just dont seem as exciting to me as the women's stories.

My online friend is one of the 'residents'.. thats how I heard about it to begin with. so, I should blame her I spose. LOL

check it out.. let me know if you get sucked in too. ;)

Sunday

so today we got up and got ready and went to church. It was so foggy leaving here and I drove slower than I usually would since I couldnt see very far ahead of me. Then, we hit a certain spot and the fog totally disappeared. Its so weird how that happens.

Near church, it was clear and not too cold and with all the fall colors out there, it was a very pretty drive! I have told myself all week that I would take my camera and get fall color pics.. the one time I did take it, I didnt have a chance to stop and take any pics. I havent brought it since then and this morning I didnt see a point since it was so foggy. I was WRONG.

so this afternoon we got home and had lunch. then I took the kids and dog out for a walk. I managed to take a couple cute pics of the kids, but not a lot of the colors. Will have to remember to bring the camera with me this week just in case.

I have decided that I love fall! its not super cold, and the colors are just so pretty and bright. But, I also hate it because it means the dreaded winter is coming- way too fast. I hate winter. I hate cold and snow and ice. The holidays are nice, but the weather is awful. blech. and Im dreading it already. Its actually making me not enjoy fall so much since I know whats coming.

so, thats it from me today. random stuff about fall. its a post at least right?

Well here I am .. again

I cant figure this blogging stuff out. I went into OLD emails to find my spot out here and then when I found it, it wasnt this one. so I had about 5 posts on it.. figured I would start up again. But when I clicked on the edit thing to add more, it came up to THIS blog.

which is a 2nd one I made when I couldnt find that first one before.
what a messed up system. I dont even know the name of this one so how will I find it again!?

so a lot has happened since I started either one. Im so bad at writing in these things..I was always bad at writing in a diary or journal, and this online type is no different. Im online a lot and I could do it easily.. I just dont. I dont know if its the fact that I dont know what to say, or that I feel like nothing exciting happens to me, so why bother.. whatever it is, it keeps me from doing it.

so to catch up a little bit.

Travis graduated from HS this year. He is 18 and working on base. He has applied for the Disney Career start program and is anxiously waiting to hear back from them.

Tyler quit band this year and made the golf team. He is 16. works bagging groceries part time at the commissary.

Tanner is 15 and oh so tall. everyone thinks hes the oldest of the bunch. He *is* still in band and doing great with it.

Trent is 10 and still big into penguins. he has been for so long now that i wonder if he will have to go work at sea world when hes older just to get his penguin fix in. :)

Trace is 7 and is still in a German Immersion program at school. we dont get to hear much german from him, but im sure hes learning it!

and Abby started Kindergarten this year. shes almost 6 and seems so much older than the boys did at her age. she is loving school!

me? well Im not home all alone now since Travis is here when hes not working. which is fine, he keeps me company when i want it, and leaves me alone when I dont. I do a lot of driving taking kids back and forth to work and school. I like to nap still HAHA I sell Stampin Up! and enjoy doing that. I have a lot of fun getting with my groups and watching them make the projects I have for them and laughing and joking with them through the class.

thats all Im going to talk about this morning. if this works out THIS time, Ill be back at some point and will just ramble about whatever is in my head at that time. :) seems to be a good plan right?

we'll see...