Christmas

I hope everyone had a great Christmas!! We did. My mom flew in on Christmas Eve and the kids have been having a great time with her. On Christmas morning the kids were up way too early and got WAY TOO MUCH stuff!! They were very happy and crazy! We opened presents, ate way too much, played with new toys, watched movies and just generally had a fun day.

Now for the rest of the school break, we are planning on just having a relaxing visit with Grandma. We will go do some "touring" of Italy and play around a lot. Nothing too pressing. Brendan and I do have a few cub scout things to work on--he needs to do a science project and we are also going to the woodshop next week to make his pinewood derby car. Should be fun.

Well, I guess I don't really have much to say--just wanted to say we had a good Christmas and I'll write again soon.

Driving a Demo

I finally got the demo XC90 from the dealer. Mine was "promised" by today and it's not here (I knew months ago it wouldn't be) so he gave me one to drive until it comes in. I'm so happy not to be driving a Fiat Panda with 4 kids crammed in it anymore!!!!!! I did find out the delivery date for my vehicle is 4 or 5 January. It will be in Vicenza on the 3rd, but won't be ready for me to pick up for a day to a day and a half. (They have inspections and stuff they have to do on it first) So I will get it in about 2 more weeks!! YAY!!! I can't wait!!!

Italian Snow!!!!!!!!!!!

We got up this morning and discovered that there was a bit of snow last night. We got no snow at all last year and if you know my kids--that was not acceptable. Yes, I know when you look at these pictures, you will laugh at the amount of snow there was, but for children with snow withdrawls, it was enough:)

Italy is Insane!!!!!!!!!

This week we have been dealing with a truckers' strike. All truckers in the country went on strike for 5 days (Monday-Friday) this week. The biggest effect that it had on us was gas for the cars. When gas isn't delivered to gas stations, they run out!!!!! We were lucky and found a station with gas and were able to fill our tank, but some people were not so lucky and are basically stranded. I was also already stocked on what I needed from the grocery store, but I have been told that there are no eggs to be found and that milk and bread are scarce--basically anything fresh is hit or miss. I was also talking to someone who was driving on the autostrada a couple of days ago and said that there are trucks stopped all over and that the drivers' have tents set up and are having picnic lunches and whatnot. Crazy!! In Naples they had to close the schools and everything because driving is pretty much not possible because of all the roads being blocked by the trucks. What an experience!

An update: the strike is apparently over--it only went 3 days instead of 5 because they crippled the country (imagine that). So things are getting back to normal, but it will still take a while for everything to be restocked.

Short Post

My friend Cheri here in Italy shared her blog with me Keeping Up With HIS Plans and one of the things she had on her sidebar really spoke to me. She has a tribute to our Fallen Warriors. I was really touched by that and have decided to add it to mine as well. Unfortunately, it is a long list and I hope to not have to add to it. Please continue to pray for the families of these soldiers as well as all of our soldiers in harms' way. We must never forget the sacrifices made by them all.

Christmas Party

We went to the FRG Christmas Party today. The kids had a great time. The ate a lot of food, broke a couple of pinatas, sat on Santa's lap, and made some crafts. It was a great kid party.



Here are some pictures of the kids with Santa.

Can't believe it's been a month!!!!

Well, lets' see where should I start????

Halloween: The older 2 went trick or treating with some friends. They got WAY TOO MUCH candy, but had a great time!! The 2 little ones stayed home with me--I bought Meghan her own bag of candy, let her watch Halloween movies all night, and wear her costume all day. She was disappointed, but was fine. If you remember I had said they little ones had chicken pox--well it turns out it wasn't!!! I have no idea what it was, but it looked like chicken pox for the first 2 days, but never crusted over--they never had fevers--and it was gone in 3 days. So no chicken pox. Oh well.
Dillan the race car driverMeghan the mermaid
Katie the duck

I don't have a picture of Brendan right now, but I will try to update later....

Choir: Brendan is still in choir after school which seems to be almost daily. He really enjoys it (surprise to me) and they are putting on a big show for Christmas in a couple of weeks. Brendan is playing Rudolph and is all excited cuz he gets to wear a leather jacket and shades:)

Scouts: Brendan is still enjoying this as well--He just completed a Bowl-A-Thon a couple of weeks ago and has Caroling coming up soon in addition to all the Badges he is working on. Kathryn is in scouts also and she has been having a great time earning badges and she is gearing up for Caroling as well. The Boys and Girls do it together here and then have hot cocoa and cookies together afterwards--it's nice.

We hosted some friends of ours for Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful time!!! Our friends have a girl in Brendan's class (they insist they hate each other, but always play so nicely) A boy a year younger than Katie, and a boy in Meghan's class (who Meghan insists she is going to marry--of course he says the same thing) and they all love Dillan--so the 7 of them played together all day, their mom and I chatted, and we ate WAY TOO MUCH!!! It was a very nice day!

We did another 5K and Brendan improved his time again. This time he did it in 29:41. I'm so proud that he loves to do these. This one was actually competitive and he took 2nd for his age group. The boy who took first is the same one who beat him in the triathlon this summer--he's really good and a year older! They actually usually run part of the races together. The girls will tell you they also got 1st and 2nd in their age group--of course they were the only 2. And we got a trophy for being a family of 3 (didn't count Brendan or Dillan in the stroller)--again, we were the only family of 3. Anyway, we ended up with 4 BIG trophies!!! The next 5K here is on the 15th of Dec. But I think we are going to skip that one--they are starting at 6AM--I don't know what is wrong with them, it will be cold, pitch black dark, and we would have to be there no later than 5:30AM to get numbers--I don't think I'm doing that with my little ones--Brendan even agreed. Although if the boy who beat him is going, I might see if just Brendan can ride with him. We shall see.

Katie was in a Thanksgiving program for school--her immersion class invited the kids from the Italian school to come and share cupcakes and a program for Thanksgiving. It was nice to share the American culture with the Italians for a change. Katie actually had a speaking part. She thanked the Italians for coming and asked them to visit again soon--in Italian. I was pretty proud of her and she looked awfully cute as a pilgrim.

Katie lost a front tooth last night so here is her new mouth!!!

Brendan is going to be starting basketball and Katie is going to do cheerleading starting in a couple of weeks. I was really looking forward to an "off season", but they begged me so....

And the final thing I have to report is that we may have something constructive for Meghan's singing!!! When I dropped her off at school the other day, one of the ladies that works at the desk said, " Meghan is the one who sings right?" (understatement of the year) She said she is the vocal teacher for the youth services programs here. The beginning age for voice is 6 and the minimum age for the theatre is 8, but she said after watching Meghan "act" and hearing her sing, she doesn't want to wait that long for her so she was going to ask her boss to make an exception and see if she could give her voice lessons. Meghan really would love it so I hope it happens. We shall see...

Well, now that this has become a book I better go--we actually have a Christmas party for our FRG today so we need to get be getting ready to see Santa!!!

I'll try to do better about updating from now on--sorry about that. Have a great day!!!