Waiting out the Winter

The weather here has been miserable--nothing to compare with the cold of Iowa, but cold and slushy snow and the last time I saw the sun shine was last Thursday. Every time it starts snowing again we all groan--when is Spring coming? Friday was another yucky day. I took the boys and 2 of their friends, Andreas and Cristofer to a huge Home decor store that has the hugest "McDonalds Playland" in it upstairs that you can drop your kids off in and go shopping without them and the cost?--It's free! This concept wouldn't work in Utah for obvious reasons--too many kids and we're all too cheap to buy anything, but here with an average of 1.3 children per couple, I'm the exception to the rule. So, I got the perks of doing my "turn" of having friends over and they all played at the playland while I looked around and then found a comfortable chair and got my book out and read. Next confession: I'm reading a book entitled "Faberge's Eggs". It's about the Romanovs, Russia's last czars. You could call it my "Princess Di" obsession. I don't know why but I am fascinated by the Romanovs and Rasputin and that whole thing. I was telling Garrett about how Rasputin was poisoned, shot, beaten and finally drowned to kill him and Garrett's reply was classic if you've seen Disney's Anastasia--he asked "But what about the bat, did he get killed too?" Second confession: I bought a package of Cadbury Creme eggs from the army base and ate them all by myself while I read. I've always loved Cadbury Creme eggs, but I have to admit, I was so disappointed when I bit into it and there was no toy surprise in the middle. We are huge Kinder Eier fans. Kinder Eier are chocolate eggs with a toy surprise in the middle (the cheap man's version of Faberge eggs, I guess). We've bought little shadow boxes for each of the boys' rooms that they put their kinder eier toys in. The eggs are kind of pricey, so they only get them for special occasions. Still I have to admit that I get as excited as they do for the cheap plastic toys they have inside.

I've been pretty worn out lately and my patience level is dangerously low. I'm taking a German class every weekday from 8:30 to 11:45 and I really love it--I'm learning so much, but it leaves absolutely no personal time which I've realized I'd gotten very accustomed to. My class has 1 Syrian, 2 Italians, 3 Turks, 1 Tunesian, 1 Spaniard, 1 Peruvian, 1 Romanian, 1 Pollock, 2 Phillipians (that's a book in the Bible--I must have spelled that wrong!), 2 Chinese and 1 Hawaiian. The only language that 1/3 of the class has in common is broken English. It's fascinating that so many people around the world speak English. I finish class and hurry to pick up the kids from school. Mondays we do piano lessons. The first question people ask is "Is Garrett teaching them?" When I tell them that I'm teaching them they always respond that they didn't even know that I played, which is about right. I'm really not that good at piano, but for now they haven't passed me up, so I'll do it, since a good price for a piano lesson is $25 here--I get sick to my stomach every time I think about $75 a week for Sam, Jacob and Mason which would be $300 a month. My sister-in-law, Jennifer teaches piano in Utah and I'm betting it's not that lucrative there. I only wish I was good enough to teach other kids and make some money! Jen Fletcher taught my kids piano in Iowa and now that I know the going rate I think we royally ripped her off. Sorry Jen! A big thanks to Dan and Julie who got us the clavinova as a wedding present--the best features are the volume control and the headphone jack--wonderful inventions for frazzled mom nerves. All the boys are doing really well and loving it. We go pretty slow, but they don't hate it yet and that's huge.

On Friday we got a package from my mom--yeah! I've just gotten into quilting and my mom sent fabric and a quilt magazine. So exciting! Fabric here is about $10-30 a meter. Yuck! Everytime I start cutting fabric for a quilt I think about what my mother-in-law Julie said a few years ago while she was making a quilt for my sister-in-law Shanna: "It's funny that we take a perfectly good piece of fabric and cut it up in alot of pieces to sew it back together again." Too true.

The next guilty pleasure--listening to "Wicked". I've listened to it so many times that Jacob said this morning "Don't play that again mom. The songs just keep going around and around in my head!" The rest of us still like it. Garrett's favorite song is "Defying Gravity", Sam's favorite song is "Popular". I have too many favorites--definitely worth getting the soundtrack. I've already decided that whatever money I get for my b-day (yes, it's not until August!) is going towards seeing it here in Germany with Garrett. I'll have to work a little harder in my German class!

My final accomplishment lately is learning how to put pictures from the internet on my blog. Those of you who know me well know that I have a Technology Disorder. Just last year my friend Shayla taught me how to e-mail more than one person at the same time and how to "reply all" instead of just "reply". These were huge steps for me and I feel I can rest at ease knowing I have made my technological improvement for this year with these pix on my blog, pardon my smugness, but I'm a genius.

Hopefully this winter will end soon. The very first bulbs bloomed in my neighbor's yard and my sweet boys picked them for me. Do you think he'll notice?