Saturday, August 30, 2008

Catching up just a little...

We've graduated from flooring to cabinets... need to get them in this weekend as the counter guy comes Tuesday!

Our contractor painted Reese and Carsten's room--the lower 1/3 a nice orange (thanks Callie for helping with which orange to pick)

...and with a little help from Reese... (I wrote the message on it for the contractor--we thought Carsten did it and then found out Reese was quite guilty)

Saturday, August 16, 2008

Where we've been...

We've been MIA--see the picture above...

Laying the last board! We did our whole house in IKEA laminate flooring and we just finished up today... whew.



We did not end up doing this all alone... we had Alicia, Callie, Papa, Mark (a friend), and a man from Jim's work helped one night... I just have to put in that Alicia and I (the mom) put in the whole living room/kitchen/dining room! We were pretty proud of ourselves as you can tell. I must also mention OMA who cared for three children all week while the parents were missing/putting in floors--Saint Oma.

Thursday, August 07, 2008

This one is for you Uncle Tom...

Carsten's souvenir T-shirt from our trip--Thanks Oma!
Uncle Tom for those of you who don't know...

Tuesday, August 05, 2008

Tidbits from the rest of our trip...

This is backwards, so start at the bottom for the correct time line.

On the third day with our good friends we went swimming and had dinner with some Swiss friends--I didn't get any pictures, so go here to see some. A great time.
Fourth day we went home... We intended to leave at 9 and didn't get out until 11.
Funny story about our time with Extrems... Carsten adopted one of Siena's stuffed cats and wouldn't let him go. When we left for our trip from their house he cried and cried that we had to leave the cat behind. When we came back to their house he had not forgotten and quickly became attached again. Siena was quite grown up and bribable (a word?), so we bought her another cat and Carsten became the proud new owner of a stuffed cat--he hasn't let it out of his sight yet.

On the second day with C & H Jim and I took the four kids to visit our friend Bryan at his fire station... Fun was had by all. It was very informal and so the kids had a chance to become comfortable.





Upon returning to Con & Heidi's we decided to stay a couple of days with them. Actually as each day came to a close we would decide to stay just one more day... It turned into four extra days. We had a great time--just like old times! We went to a park on our first day there and Carsten enjoyed the slide. The boys then took all four kids on the paddle/pedal boats. The kids thoroughly enjoyed it (the big boys not so much--it was a lot of work). Of course the only one to get hurt was Carsten. Right as they were pulling into the dock Carsten fell off the seat and banged his lip on the pedals. Nice bloody/fat lip. I decided not to take a picture this time as the poor guy is only going to have pictures of his injuries... We then went to a discovery/science center which we all enjoyed.




Getting directions and advice on the best route at a McDonald's in Montana. Jim and Andrew asked six old-timers... We followed their suggestions and it worked good...

Our sleeping arrangements... Please notice Reese's bed up front. Opa and Unc built a bed to go over the two front seats. I should mention that Opa and Oma were in the luxury suite in the back on a queen size bed. We were all comfortable and really only spent three days all sleeping in the motorhome. In South Dakota we had a hotel for some of us.


A great one of Unc... I'm sure he'll appreciate it.

Reese enjoyed combing hair on our trip... he did Oma's and he spent hours (literally) on his own. Just a cup of water and a comb.

More Birthday...

I cannot take credit for these four photos... www.ryanstahle.com