It's been a while...

Since Iv'ed blogged. So I'm still here just kinda busy. Well today we leave on vacation for 5 days. The church has a vacation get away for all the leaders & we are going to have a blast!!

There's alot to do at this place where were going. Hiking, swimming, kids playground, lake & a small town down the mountain, if we need anyhting. Sounds good to me. So I'll see ya'll on Sat.

Thrifty, thrifty, thrifty

That's right. I havne't posted any thrifty items because I haven't found any. But this week I went on Monday &..."BEHOLD"....I found something. Get ready to fall out of your chair friends. Okay I also went to the IKEA in Salzburg today. I'll explain, where I found the rest of my thrifty thrifty buyings.

Ok this beautiful brown picture frame 20x20 I got it for: 3.95. (I looked for a second one in both stores but couldn't find one :(
Tody's purchases were a total of: 8.79Euros equivalent to $8.79 plus 30% if you pay in $$$'s which we didn't. hehe:

Plastic Silverware tray: .30 cents
Kitchen towel holder: 1.99
Decorative Spheres: 2 for 1Euro so ofcourse I got 6, total of 3 Euros, YEAH baby!!!
Alarm decorative clock: 3.50

I tried to take a picture of the receipt but it was to white. Oh well. So here you have it!

Thanks a million

you guys for your encouraging words. I am not usually a nut case like that, really, to all of you who know me. But I'm glad I was mad 2 days a go and not today. Today is a brand new day. I know that at times one can feel overwhelmed as I was, stressed, in need of different airs & conversatiions that involve adults.

So here it is. I hope for the best, move on, there is still tomorrow. Can't avoid mom (oh the pressure sometimes) but inspite of all. My mom is a wonderful mom & more than willing to do more for her fam & my kids than I could imagine. She wants & desires the best for each one of us. She has gone far & beyond without us asking of her. So inspite of, I still honor her & respect her.

To the final outcome. Be happy. NO worries. After all, things might turn out and I wouldn't want to ruin it by being mad, not because I din't get my way, but because one has to be optimistic. What a waist of 2 days. That sure din't accomplish anything. But I know that I needed the 3rd day to snap out of it. I did & I'm glad. You know that saying, "If momma ain't happy, no body's happy". Well I want to be happy & want my kids to be happy....oh & my wonderful husband. Love you all!!!

hmmmm...

Not nuch to blog about. Kids a re better.And I'm bored..hmmm, would anybody like to come over? We can play games. Grill??? Oh wait I don't have a grill, but somebody could bring one. We have plemty of desserts & many apples to use....but what I really want is something with chocolate...mmmmm...choooocooolattteeee. Okay, I can't think of anything els else to blog about. Maybe 2-nite.

Rough nite!!

It started again, yesterday evening. This time it was not Andre but Audrey. I notice she was just staring & getting kinda lithargig, on our way back from the grocery store. She had a temp of 101.smething. She didn't eat dinner & went right on sleep. She wasn't throwing up , until midnight. I gave her some fever reducer & threw that up. She's been running a temp all night & crying & waking up all night. So I'm exhausted.

In spite of her not feeling well, she still smiles & finds to be comic. I took her temp sometime in the middle of the night. The measuring thing that i have, beeps after you run it thru their forehead. She wakes up, hears the beep & says with a smile...Beeep. It was soo funny.Then went back to sleep. Funny. She is still running a temp. I have a headache & am going to eat breakfast. Well that's a quicky for now. Until later mates!!!

Better day!!!

So Andre has stopped throwing up. I figured it was a 24hr virus. He threw up a couple of x's at night bt none the next day. Whew!! Exhausted? Yip!!! He did have a temperature until the evening, but at least he was feeling better. No more seizures!!! Yesterday he was way better & was eating 7 beeing the goofball that he he is. hehe

Thanks alot guys for your prayers. Ireally appreciate that. Until later. I shall post something interesting...hmmm..I'll think about that.

My Weekend!!!

So the BB-Q was cancelled due to the rain. It has been prosponed. Kinda nice that it was, we'ved actually have had a full weekend with Steve being home..well except for taking our pastor't to Munich Germany Sat @ 6am. But it was nice none the less. Sunday we went to church & the Sunday evenings services have been cancelled for the summer. YESSSS!!!

Today is Steve's day off. So we went & shopped for short for Andre. Next week we will shop for Jeans. We ate, came home put the kids down for a nap & then it began......Audrey didn't actually take a nap, probably b/c she fell asleep in the car on ur way back & Andre actually wanted to go to sleep. He is getting out of his naps so I try to give him one every other day. So we tried to wake him up so he wouldn't sleep past 4pm. Knocked out...we could not wake him up...so we tried 1/2hr later & he was burning up. I took him to the living room laid him in the couch took his temp. It was 100.08. As I was taking his temp, he got a fever cramp known as febrial Seizures... This has happened to him 3x's.

This happens when the temperature rises quick. It's scary seeing your child have a seizure, eyes turned up, sking turning blue, reg color, foaming a little bit. It's awful!!! It only last a couple od seconds that seem to be min. So I called Steve...well Yelled his name since he knows what to do. Basically you undress them put them on their side or back & let the cramp take it's course & then he passes out. Or falls asleep immediateley, in this case Andre started snoring. I can't handle seeing this. I left the room & took Audrey with me & Steve let some cool air come in so his temp would go down. When we woke him up to make sure he was ok we gave him so fever reducer & voila!! If he gets too cold then he can also get a cramp. So he fell asleep for another hr. His tem did go down but then the hurling begun...Poor Andre his miserable. So I am sitting here on the couch with him as he throws up & sleeps. I do have a bucket here with me. Hope he can sleep at night. Until later, hope for the best & a good night.

Help!!!

This Friday we will be having a B-BQ for all the children's workers & volunteers & I have been chosen to come up with games for this event. I have no Idea what to plan. It has to be outside games. For all ages...well teenagery & up.

I have the water ballon one where we have a partner & we thow the ballon back & forth as the gap between us is getting bigger & bigger, we did this one in the youth outside 2wks ago & they got wet..I mean they loved it. haha. Any suggestins???

I'm soooo bored!!!

It's not like I have all this free time...no we have soemthing going on like every other day. But it would be nice if we could just be with our friends, like old times. Bored? no problem just come over to the guru's. Never a dull moment there. We didn't even have to do anything, Just being with our friends made it so much fun.

Saturday I really wanted to be with people & play cards or something, Monday, Steve's day off, yah bored, well not really, but after the kids went to sleep I had nothing to do. But watch German boring TV. I really was bummed & wished I could be with my buddies. We need a sattelite dish desperatley. I watch my American movies over & over again. I can probably quote them. haha.

Good thing is...sometime in the summer they will be showing "MYTHBUSTERS" dubbed, blah, but I'll watch it regardless. Funny, b/c I was thinking & telling Steve that I really missed watching that show. Then Steve told me he saw a commercial tha they were going to show it on Thursday's. SWEET!!!! not to mention it's one of Steve's favorite shows. So we're excited to watch it when it comes out. I love America

Unfortunateley we can't watch american shows on line. We'ved tried but there's some kind of band. Probably b/c some of those shows..well whatever dubbed shows & shown here are one season behind. So there u have it. My life in a nutshel.

Romania pic's

Romania Trip

It's been a while since I'ved had the time to blog. I hope I can get all in here withing 20min.

The trip was an experience. We traveled 24hrs straight. Left Sunday at 4pm arrived to Bucharest Monday at 4pm. We sort of got lost in the city, but even yet it was a 45 min drive to our final destination. We got to campus at 6pm. Got instructions/ schedule of what we were going to be doing for the rest of the week.

Monday morning we ate breakfast frpm 7-8am. OUCH!!! We had praise & worship for about 15min. Then to work. We stayed at Max & Becky Dahm's Ranch. This is where Rhema Romia is & they have dorms for the students & are building more dorms. They had very high grass that needed to be cut. Unfortunateley the part that mows the grass on the tractor was broken. They are stilll waiting for the replacement part. As u knnow things in romania take forever to arrive. So we cut gras with sickel's (is that how u spell it) Then we raked the grass & made piles.

We then got ready to built 3 military tents for them outside for a campmeeting event they have every year for 1wk. People come & camp out for the week. They show Disney movies for the kids at night outside on a huge screen.

We worked on the ranch in the mornings & did street witnessing in the evenings. The 1st night we went to a city called Giurgiu. We got split up in 5 teams. each with one of their translator. My team, the coolest team, were handing out tracks, inviting people to come to a church that is in this city, Rhema romania grad. Just my team alone got 16 people born again that night! I was so excited about this. That's just my team! Praise the Lord!

That same day before going to this city we visited Ceausesco's Palace. Which is now called the Palace of Parliament. It is the 3rd largest building in the world. It has 1000 rooms of which 465 are used. We had a very nice tour. This guys was not a nice guy. On their tours now, they talk more about how it was built & what they used, basically the beauty of it than how he tortured & killed people if things were exactly prefect or the way he wanted it to be built. You can read up on it on line.

The next night (wed), we attended a church & my team got 5 people born again. 3 of those were gypsies. We had some of our students give testimonies. etc.

Thursday night we went to a gypsy camp. Romania is poor, but his is even more so. I was asked to dress up as a clown, I guess I fit the profile, hehe! So I did & enjoyed it very much. My translator Niko was also the other clown since she was going translate for me. when we arrived at the camp you could see the kids faces light up. They were so excited to see the clowns. So we rode on this horsde buggies down the street waving & all this children out of nowhere starting comiing out. This was cool! There was this little boy who was so excited he didn't know what to do with himself he would just run & jump & scream! It was hilarious! Then we invited them to church where I gave them an object lesson. It was a success! We then gave all the children candy after church & did face paintings. I think Thursday night was my favorite night. I really enjoyed all those children.

Friday morning we finished putting up the tents & voila! We then headed back to Austria after lunch! It was good to go, but it's good to be back! Hope you enjoy it!

That's what we expect, no?

Hello!!

I'm still alive. Will post when I have time. Just got back from Romania. I will post pictures ;)

You will be missed Abel

It is with great sadness to anounce that one of our youth teenager has passed away. His name was Abel-Alin Gherasim, April 10, 1989- May 20, 2007 18yrs old. He drowned in a lake this Sunday as he was swimming with a friend. He will be greatly missed by his family & church family. It hurst to see the pain & sadness he has left behind, but we rejoice because he is in heaven. The viewing will be this Thursday & the funeral on Sat. Please keep his family in your prayers.

New Blog

Okay so I have been asked to post something new since the prev post kinda caught some people off guard. No worries! I hope that all you mother's out there had a great Mother's day! We didn't really do much. Church in the morning, eat after church. Yeah this turned out into a 3hr meal at the restaurant. We went with the pastor's & another family whom are moving back to Germany on Saturday. It was a very nice day, warm & relaxing since Sun night church was cancelled.

We rented a movie & slept in on Monday. Well I & Audrey slept in on Monday. We finally found a sroller. Wahoooo! went to IKEA for Andre's sake. He loves going there to play & eat SPILU (spaguetti) for 1Euro. Then later I bought me a dress & got the kids sandals. whew! Full day!

Today the funniest thing happened. Well it wasn't funny at the moment but I had to take a picture of it. I sent Andre to go potty like 3x's & he didn't want too. So I made him go. This was before his afternoon nap. He finally goes & closes the door. 3min pass by & I think..oh this is good he went stinky poopoo. When I went to ck up on him. He wasn't going, he was actually enjoying himself unrolling a brand new roll of tp. That's right. It was all over the floor. As soon as I walked in he jumps & sits on the toilet. He knew what he did was wrong. Of course we had a talk about this. Not cool at the moment but funny now.

I have been cleaning, did 5 loads of laundry..got 2-3 more to do 2morrow. You know what I wish there was? A thing like a vacuum that would suck up all the toys that lay around EVERYWHERE around the house. I swear I feel like that's all I do all day long. Even if I do it at the end of the day...it's amazing how many more toys I find in unexpected places & things. I think I will take pictures of all the places I find toys laying around. That should be my next post. :) Toodles for now.

Dubuque, Iowa

Although it's not as pretty as Austria, Dubuque is the oldest city in Iowa and boasts stunning bluff views of the Mississippi River. Dubuque borders the states of Wisconsin & Illinois. Just last night, my husband and daughter stood atop what's known as the Fourth Street Elevator and overlooked the downtown area of Dubuque. Enjoy my part of the world. (Click on photos for a larger, more detailed view.)
The bridge you see connects Iowa & Illinois with the Mighty Mississippi flowing between.
The tall clock towards the left forefront of the photo is the Town Clock . . . the heart of downtown Dubuque. It's also a few blocks from where myself and my husband work. The taller building with the gold-covered dome to the right is the courthouse, and off in the distance is Wisconsin (my birthplace).

Continuation of Boo! & Pictures of Salzburg

Ok, so I could of taken more pictures of Salzburg & of Mozart's birth place etc but my battery went dead & our guest took most of the pictures. I guess I could of taken pictures of all the bunches & I mean BIG groups of tourists that were visiting. haha! Maybe next time.

The picture of this beautiful park goes back to the meadevil times (is that how u write it?). Interesting that it still exists & is well kept. They had the most beautiful landscaping & tulips.

Boo!

Couldn't think of a title for this blog, specially since I haven't blogged in like a week. So here I am sitting down in my kitchen table. All is quiet. aaaahhhh so nice when the kids are sleeping & you can actually take a shower, go to the bathroom & blog without any interruptions, screaming, crying, & fighting.

It has been a gloomy rainy 2 days in a row. Lord knows we need the rain here. Farmers are freaking out here cuz it hasn't rain. But now we have it.

This weekend we had some friends from Norway come to vist. It was nice having company, friends that we've known for a while. They came on Thursday & left yesterday morning. We really enjoyed having them here. It was also a very busy go go go weekend. It seemed that we were doing something left & right. Besides running a few errands in between naps & so on. Friday we went to Gemund. It is a really nice small city or town. It's right by the lake. There is a playground for the kids & ice cream & a beautiful view. Then we had Pizza & salad for lunch right accross the street.

Pizza story: So we sit & order & the food came. As we are all eating I find a hair in my pizza. You know the feeling that comes to your throat after that. So I took it off, remove that piece & said...wel it's 1hair, yip still grossing out..but I'm really hungry & I have to eat. So then I start with my salad & guess what. Another hair was in my salad. About to htrow up. I cannot belive that I found 2 hairs. 1 ok, but 2. So I did not continue to eat my salad but I did my pizza & then a 3RD!!!!! hair I found in my Pizza. Yah! That was the nastiest, grosses experience I have ever encounterd...3 HAIRS!!! What is up with that. do they not belive in hair nets for crying out loud. So NO I did not eat any or the rest of my food. How bizzare is that. Only me, mua, yo had it. We did tell the waitress when we were about the pay & we did not have to pay for my pizza nor my salad. A miracle here in Austria. You see most of Europe is not customer service oriented but the lady was nice enought to not charge us.

What I mean by not being customer service oriented is by this other incident. Not the first in this Mc'ds by our house. So this couple don't have a Mc'ds in their town. The closest is over an hr drive. So they really wanted to sometime go to Mc'ds. We ended up doing that for dinner. B/C kids were hungry. we had a lady's meeting that evening & Steve had to open the church do p&w & teach his & mine class. So we ordered. I order a Mc Chicken meal w/ curly fries. I get a Quarter poundewr with Cheese & reg. fries. So not what I ordered. It's not the 1st time. Same with salads. Complete morons & idiots. Steve goes back & tells them that they got the order wrong & they started argung with him. 1st of all they supposed to read the order back 2u. Something that I will have Steve have them repeat back 2 him. They did not want to give me my mc chicken, finally they did. But they did not give me my curly fries which I paid x-tra for. This is like the 4th time they do this. N-ways. So that's what I mean by CS oriented.

Saturday we just hanged, Sunday rush rush, Church, eat, quick coffee visti w/some friends, hurry rush home & church again. Monday, we went to Salzburg & saw more of the city. Maybe this summer I'll do the sound of music tour. A real American tour. haha! I hear it's real nice. Then we came home. Made dinner. fed the kids other stuff put them to bed b/c they were beat. I enjoyed the company, but I am glad to have some peace & quiet. Not only that there's the cleaning & overflowing of laundry to do. Again. hehe! So this is my adventures in Austria.

BTW, the blue table & chairs were a hit. And the picture with all 3 kids in the tub was that evening. They seem to have enjoyed it.

Stoked!!!!!!

Yesterday was a holiday so since yesterday was a holiday many people also get Monday off. Mondays are Steve's day off anyway, but having 2 days off it's great!! So we try to make the best out of that 1dy off. Yesterday however, there was a flea Market in the city, so we decided to go. It's amazing the amount of antiques that you can find. I didn't buy any antiques really, but would of loved to if I had more tha 30Euros. Ha! That was my budget to start. But now I am soo hooked on Flea Markets.

So I really have to save $$$ so I can go & find treasures for my home. Steve is not so much into the stuff that I like nor does he find & see the value of it, but he supports me by going. So I bought a couple of things. Well let's just say I spent my 30 Euros cuz that's all I had. Would I have had more I would of bought some really cool nifty things. But it's a start. So here you have it.

I bought this metal box. I don't know how old it is. It's somewhat rusty But I cleaned it up as good as I could. I believe it was some kind of candy that was sold in the 1900's. I did the research but the information was in french. Sorry I don't speak french. I love it!!!

I bought these pewter platters & these two small coffee milk jugs to go with them. Also I found this measuring metal cup. They don't make these kind of stuff any more, but I foun dit for 5Euros. This other lady wanted to sell me one for 30. yikes!! I like this kind of metal kitchen stuff anyway. My most favorite beside the metal box is this camera. So this was the highlight of my day. Steve loved the camera. That was his favorite buying of the day. I believe his dad has some really old ones as well. We'll see if he'll pass them on to us. cross our fingers. hehe!

Then we grilled in the afternoon & watched the end of 24 season 5. Plese can somebody videotape season 6 for me & mail it to me. haha, just kidding. I shall read it on line & then watch it when it comes out on DVD. :(

long time no blog

It had been a very busy week last week. I had no time to blog check my emails etc. I finally got to clean my floors yesterday. We had a wedding this weekend, so I was busy with that & the daily mandate things.

Sunday after church we went to this place called the Most Kost. It's a 1 day event. What it is is that in the fall they pick the best apples & let them ferment & then they make apple cider..with alcohol. They also have non alcoholic which is what I had. It tates like apple juice but better. It was a 1/2hr drive into the country side. In a big farm house. That is where this takes place. The sell 1 type of meal. Grilled sausages, sour kraut & 1 big slice of bread. The sausages are on the bottom, sour kraut on top of the sausages & the bread on top of the sour Kraut & the tiniest little fork that looks like the size of baskin robins spoon ice cream testers. Non the less it was good. The day was beautiful & warm. The also had different types of cakes & it was dirt cheap. We didn't pay for it. We went with a family whose family works in there & another couple.

They have contest on which farmer makes the best apple cider & then they give them some award. So that was cool. Then we went for a walk. That was very nice.

Yesterday was a reall bad day for me. As you can call it a real "pisser" let's just leave it at that. No details, just a real pisser, it still feels like it. I sometimes wish I could be back in America with what I know & with my friends & that's that. I hate me right now! I don'r even like to use that word but that's just the way I feel. I ahte the way I feel right now. bdah!!!

Today it's a rainy day. I hope it doesn't continue becuse I have some major walking to catch up too. We have watched the 4th season of 24. in 1wk. Whoah! that's alot of tv. But I don't feel that bad b/c I don't watch any TV. Haven't for a coulple of weeks. I should so I can learn & hear the language more. Oh well such is life. Well let's see what the rest of the day holds for me. ;)
I didn't take pictures of the Farm house only of the kids. So here u have it.