This Day Each Year

Happy Birthday to Me.

Thirty-five.

 

Yep.

Here's something more interesting:

We have a ninja living in our coat closet.  You?

Germany and Beyond

So I was hoping Paul would take on this post of telling you about his trip since he was the one who went on it.  But he is spending his free time with one of the many Steves we know.  Drinking coffee and playing cards.  Sweet, huh?

So I'm going to do my best to interpret the pictures for you.

But alas, as I was editing the photos he has returned with a love/peace offering of a piece of ice cream cake.  It's got that middle layer of cookie crumbles.  Yum.  I shall let him post.

So...Here's Peter doing homework in an airport.  It's always an interesting experience when you help a third grader with his work and end up learning stuff.  Kind of like you could go back and re-do third grade and it might benefit you.  So on this trip I learned about the design process, I'm less convinced that Peter did though.  The important thing is that we got all the homework done, but it was pretty raggedy looking from all the travel.

We had an extra-long layover in Munich...to the tune of 11 hours...after a 9 hour flight...that we didn't sleep on...so we did our best at site-seeing.  This particular picture is just opposite from St.Peter's Cathedral.  Instead of taking a picture of said Cathedral, I got a picture of Peter standing in front of a street sign that if you look very closely says "Peter's Street" (in German).  Sorry about that, like I said, we were tired.  The Cathedral was neat too though.

Just down the street from the Cathedral is the "Neues Rathaus" the new townhall.  It's only 137 years old, the old town hall is 701 years old (thank you wikipedia).  And thank you Europe for reminding us of how short our history is on this side of the pond.  The townhall features a clock with a bell chime and dancing figurines that go to work at 11 am.  Tons of people turned out to watch, and we were two of them.  In hindsight it was kind of like going to Disneyland and riding "It's a small world after all".  You feel like you should do it to get the full experience, but at the same time it's a bit lame.  I'm sure it was mind-blowing in 1874.

 After the clock tower we headed to the art museum.  My newest sister-in-law, Coleen, recently told me that my favorite artist would likely be Peter Paul Rubens...because...you know...Anyway, it turned out that the Munich art museum has a massive collection of works by Mr. Rubens.  I was only vaguely familiar with his work before, but he is probably in my top 5 favorite artists at this point.  His paintings contain some interesting religious themes, the art work is great, but mostly I like him because his paintings are so huge that I don't know anyone who could fit them in their house.  

Several of them wouldn't even fit on your roof.  

Alas, my favorite artist is still Rob Gonsalves.  

...but I digress.  The picture above is not from the art museum.  Rather, it comes from the Technology and Science museum (the Deutches museum).  It was pretty awesome.  

And here's Pete playing a giant xylophone made out of 2x4s.  

After that we were pretty well beat and so we headed back to the airport.  

Interestingly, of all the things we did in Munich, Peter's favorite was riding the subway.

We had lunch one day with some new friends.  I asked for the chicken, and they gave me chicken...gizzards. 

This is called the House of the Seven Sleepers.  Peter immensely enjoyed climbing all over the ancient ruins.  Here he is featured walking in front of some tombs.  

Here is a traditional breakfast.  It's what you get pretty much everywhere.  

An egg, tomato, cucumber, bread and tea.  

Peter ate the bread.

Here I am at the ancient city of Ephesus.  Just behind me is the most magnificent and famous structure in Ephesus, the library of Celsus.   But you can't see it...because I'm standing in front of it.  

Trust me though, it's great.

 This one is especially important to me (Stacey)

because it has palm trees.

Hinting that the weather is warm and the beach is not far off.

Peter ordered the potatoes because he thought they'd be a safe bet.  

It didn't work out so well, they were cold 

and drenched in vinegar.  

So I ate them instead.

Ruins at St. John's church in Selcuk.

If St. John's basilica were standing today it would be the 7th largest Cathedral in the world.

The building was completed in 565 AD.  

And thank you Asia for reminding us of how short our history is on this side of the pond.

Fresh squeezed orange juice For The Win!

I kept trying to get him to climb up there and lay down in the tomb and close his eyes.

I don't think he knows what fun is.

What's in T you ask?  

Only the tomb of the Apostle John.

You mean THE John?

The one who wrote the gospel of John?

The beloved apostle? 

Yep, that's the one.

And that deserves a special sort of pose.

No apostles buried here, but it still got a special sort of pose.  

That column just looked like it needed a statue on it.

Roman Aqueduct.  

Place where I kind of got a little bit lost with Peter.

 

Cute little dolmus rider. (that's Stacey's comment)

This is our room in the luxurious Hotel Paris.  Peter kept asking why it was named Paris...

There's the library of Celsus.  Peter was less than impressed.  

It wasn't that good for climbing on and it was thick with tourists. 

See the "C" he's making with his hand?  That stands for "Corinthian", because that's the kind of column that it is.  Which I didn't know.  But he learned last year.  Thanks home-school education.

You know you're in a great place when the coke comes in a glass bottle.

And...here's this thing.

Okay, so thanks for reading. I apologize, I realize now that I am much more long-winded than Stacey when it comes to blogging. 

Yesterday I was woken up before the sun with an automated phone call from United airlines.  They wanted to tell me that Paul's flight schedule had changed and instead of arriving at 6:35pm he would get in at 10:01pm.  And they said I should confirm this online.

So I went online later in the day and Paul's flights were all fine, scheduled to arrive here at 6:35pm.  I had no way of contacting Paul but I knew he would call me if his flights had changed.  So what do I do?  Wait until 10pm or go at 6:35pm?

I called United to ask them which flight Paul and Peter had gotten on.  Mr. United said to me, "Even if I knew I wouldn't tell you."  Thank you.  So I asked him his advice... Should I go with Paul's original flight info since I hadn't heard from him, or go with what the automated call person said?  He said to go with the new information.

But I couldn't.  It just didn't seem right.  Surely Paul would have called me if he was coming in on the later flight.  And if they arrived at 6:35pm, I hated the thought of them waiting for hours in the airport wondering why I didn't come for them.

So I packed drinks, snacks, and the baby carrier (and the kids) and we drove the hour to the airport hoping to see the boys at 6:35 but planning to camp out until 10:01.

Guess what?  They arrived at 6:35.  I was so glad I went with my intuition.  It was wonderful to see them.

We came home and gifts were distributed and all boys under age 30 went to bed.  But not for long.

Peter and Reuben were up at 4am wrestling in the dining room.  Paul got up and sent Reuben back to bed for a few hours, but Peter's internal clock was done sleeping.

At 7:00am Reuben re-awoke and the wrestling match continued.  It was fun to listen to them laugh.

And this was their Good-Bye Hug

when it was time for Peter to go to school.

He was wide awake and full of exuberant energy (sorry Mrs. Keck) and ready to go.  Paul went in and talked to his teacher to inform her that by 3pm his internal clock would be registering 10pm, so good luck with that.

Pictures and narrative of their trip to come henceforth.  Tomorrow maybe.

More Pics From Paul

Oct. 18 

Here are a couple pictures from St.John´s church.  One is me in front of the tomb of John and the other is Peter in the shape of an x.

I bargained a little bit today, but not well and didn´t enjoy it.

We got some meat at a restaurant today that wasn´t quite cooked through, and in honor of you I thought, ¨we probably shouldn´t eat this¨, but then we did anyway because we were hungry and we´re tough like that.  I had a good conversation with Peter today about doing things that are hard and who has the better life, the person who avoids hard things or who does hard things.

I think that´s all I´ve got. 

Yo tengo besos para ti!

Pablo

ps. you can´t have the pictures as it turns out because the computer won´t attach them, but you can imagine how awesome they are.


So, really, no pictures.  But we got a postcard from him from Munich today.  And he called me via Skype this afternoon.  Sweet man.  During our call I asked about Peter- Paul said he was watching Beauty and the Beast in Spanish.  They are staying at the home of a Mexican family tonight.  A family with two daughters.  Thus.

We go to retrieve them from the airport tomorrow evening.  They start their travels at 10:30pm tonight, our time.  5:30am their time.  Long day.  Will Peter go to school on Thursday?  Possibly, but we're not pushing it.

Speaking of missing school... The principal sent out an email yesterday imploring parents to not schedule trips and vacations during school.  Oops.  We are homeschoolers at heart and couldn't pass up this highly educational experience.

More Emails

Oct 15
Hi Mom,

We saw many Peter Paul Rubens paintings in a museum in Munich, let's see, what else...we also saw some very big paintings.  Tell Reuben I got him a special shirt for the local soccer team.  It is called G____ (with two dots above the "o").  We bought some T Oreos called "Negro".  We have been having a good time so far.

Your son,

Peter

ps: we also got Reuben candy.

Oct. 15

Peter has been really good, although he started coming out of his shell and getting more comfortable today which included a little more running around.  Everyone has been really nice to him though.  We just got back from dinner.  Peter had lentil soup last night, but he said it wasn't as good as yours.  Tonight I chatted with a lot of people.  There are a lot of nice people here, but not anyone that I would guess to be your bosom friend.  There's one cool guy, Jack, that I've been getting to know.  He has 4 kids, their oldest son is 7 and is into all the same things as Peter.  But Jack is the only one that came.  They live in an area by themselves and would like some partner friends.  I'm not sure that they're the ones for us though.  

We're heading to bed now.  Peter slept through the night last night while I stared at the ceiling until about 3.  But I feel good now.

Good night blossom,

Paul


Oct 16 

Dear Mommadora,

Peter Paul Rubens is not Dutch, he is Flemish.  Negros taste a little bit of Oreos, to find out we ate a Negro and then an Oreo.  The weather is very nice, it's only rained during the night.  I like it here.  I can't think of anything to tell people that have asked how we are.  

Today I went to the Penalosa's house while dad was at the conference.  They are from Mexico.  They have two daughters, Amanda and we can't think of the other girl's name.  They also have a two month old baby.  We have had a good time so far.

Your son,

Peter 


Oct. 16

...Peter was kind of shy the first day.  I think it was being in a new place with so many adults.  When he and I go for a walk he is normal, but around the hotel he mostly talks to me and hasn't interacted with the adults a lot.  Although he and Georgia had a nice conversation tonight at dinner that covered a variety of topics.

Tomorrow we're going to head down to S after the conference is over.  It's that little town near E where we stopped.  We're going to spend the night there I think and then come back to I Tuesday night.

Peter spent the day at the Penalosa's apartment and had a nice time.  I'm looking forward to having a good conversation when we get home and unloading all sorts of thoughts that are starting to bounce around about T.

The time is flying by so quick, I wish we could stay another week.  We're trying to get Peter's work done, but we may be a bit behind in math.  Oh yeah, one of his social studies projects is to memorize all the states in the Midwest.  I don't have a list of which states those are.

I love you a bunch.  I mean a BUNCH!  

Paul 

ps - did you work out again?


Oct. 17
The adventure is on!  I'm writing from the P Hotel in S, just north of E.  The conference was more like a business meeting today as we discussed a lot of financial issues, so I sat in the back and helped Peter get through two math lessons.  That was a good thing.  Then we had lunch at a little hole in the wall with Jorge and Raul.  One cool aspect of the conference was the diversity.  I counted one South African, four Mexicans, two Brazillians, four Germans, twelve Americans and four locals .  The meeting got a little exciting at a couple points and one guy said "Damn", so that was something.

We found some neat ruins already in S, the church and tomb of John the apostle are just a few blocks down the street from the bus stop, you and I should have gone there.  There was also a Byzantine castle next to it, but it was closed for renovation.  And there was this old mosque that we went by too.  We happened to be there for call to prayer, it was the first one that we've heard this week, oddly, so that was neat.  Three guys showed up to pray.

We also bought a soccer pencil for all the kids in Peter's class.  So there will now be a three way war between the 3 main soccer teams in the 3rd grade class. 

I've also seen a number of great belly dancing outfits that I'm super tempted to buy you, except I'm way too embarrassed to walk into a shop and buy one.  Maybe you can get a pencil instead.

Oh, and for lunch, we had our choice of several entrees in buffet style pans.  One of them looked like chicken and potatoes in a sauce.  So I asked what it was, and he said, "Chicken and potatoes".  I'll have that then.  So I did, except as it turns out it was chicken gizzards.  But, as one would expect from T, they were the best chicken gizzards I've ever eaten.  

And Peter finally spent a little bit of his money today.  He bought a rubiks cube.  He's mentioned every rubiks cube that we've seen throughout the trip.  It cost two dollars.  And one of the cubes just fell off.  Next time we'll buy the five dollar version.

Yeah, it'd be fun to stay longer, but we won't.  We did what we came to do, it's been a good trip.  And I'm almost out of money.  There will be plenty of time for seeing and doing everything in a few years, and then you and the other boys can join us!  

On the ground floor of Jorge's apartment is a Christian tae-kwon-do studio, pretty wild huh?  I didn't go into the tae kwon do place, but Jorge's son is almost a black belt there.

It's been colder today, but it's supposed to warm up tomorrow.  Sorry I can't send more pictures, I left the cord in I.  The Penalosas are keeping our big bag while we're traveling.  We're spending the night with them tomorrow.

Please tell Reuben, "Yes, I'll be home quite soon.  Are you standing on your head?  I like you so very incredibly much too.  I'm coming back soon, I have something secret for you too."

 

I miss you a bunch, but not in the sort of way that I can't function and get weepy throughout the day.  More in the way that...

My love is for you,

Paul

Yes Pictures

Paul has very kindly supplied us with some photos...

A Lego vending machine in the Munich subway.

Wow, what a great way to start

a big trip for an 8-year-old boy.

Did they make a purchase?

I don't know.

 

 This is mystery pic #1.

I think it's in Munich.

Do you know?

Naturally, this would be mystery pic #2.

Neat maze pattern on the ground.

Do you know where this is?

I don't.

This is the only picture they have taken in T.

The chandelier in their hotel.

Thanks for the pictures, Dear.

Very thoughtful.  Take more.  Thanks.

Email Excerpts

Emails from my traveling boys, with comments inserted by me...

Oct. 13

Dear Mom,

We found a street with a lot of stores on it.  We went to a few museums in Munich.  The Deutches Museum was very interesting, the gift shop had many kinds of dice, even hundred sided.  Tell Reuben I said "hi".

Your son,

Peter

Oct 13

We made it to I. Peter is a little sick today and our suitcase got lost.  But we're in T, so it will be ok.  See you in a few days.  I love you, you, you.  Paul

(*Do you know how many suitcases they brought?  One.  And it didn't make it there.  Ha.)

Oct 14

After a soda and cracker combo Peter started feeling better.  We went walking and found a neat shopping street with a bookstore that we enjoyed and our new favorite soccer team, I think it's the local team.  Peter and Reuben are now fans though, because they have shirts.

I found S, he's sleeping next door.  Peter and I had pide (*like pizza) for late lunch which he seemed to enjoy and our missing suitcase is supposedly going to be delivered around 7:00.

Munich was really neat, St.Peter's Cathedral blew my mind, but the whole city is very picturesque.  I wish you were here, but having a screaming, out-of-control baby on the flight here reminded me that not everyone in the family is necessarily good at traveling yet.

Love you,

Paul



Oct 14
From Me to Paul

How great that your suitcase didn't make it.  You love hard situations. And you're a guy, so it's not even that hard to be without your clothes and whatnot.  Has it arrived yet?

Glad Peter is feeling better.  Glad Munich was interesting.  Were you guys so tired arriving there at 2am our time?

So what have we been doing, you silently wonder?  Um, I took out the compost.  That was a highlight.  We've raked a lot of leaves and watched the leaf truck suck them up.  Charlie slept so good Wed night - until 6am then had a bottle, then slept till 8:30am.  It was bliss.  Last night was paybacks.  Reuben woke up screaming because he was wet, which woke up Charlie who felt he should also scream.  Ooo, I went to the bar Wed night (Emily came over after the boys were asleep) and I won third place in the poker game.  Except really I didn't at all.  But I could have, if I had thought of it. 

I'm glad you're there.  I hope it's fabulous for you both.  I look forward to hearing about what you think of the org. and its workers and if it's a good fit for our family.

Reuben cried and cried after you left at the airport.  Bawled.  He finally consoled himself with the fact that if you didn't go to T then you couldn't bring him back a candy/treat.  He would start to cry again and say, "I miss Daddy" then try to stop when he remembered you were bringing him a treat.  So, please bring him candy.  And pack it in your carry-on so you can give it to him right when you see him.  He talks about you and the treat all day.

And, you should know that I have exercised twice.  Yes.  And if my chili and cornbread dinner will digest, I'll workout again tonight.  I am amazing.  And I got voted off Survivor this week...  If I was a black female mortician named Stacey.  Don't ever secretly sign me up for that show.  I would never be the same.  In a horribly bad bad way.

Charlie can say 'night night' and he's been eating a ton.  He has also mastered riding Peter's scooter.  He stands on it and holds on while I push him down the sidewalk.  Reuben can now do a headstand and hold it.  And I did 4 real pushups.  What have you mastered lately?

And I got the trash to the curb.  Aha.

Love and prayers,

Stacey

Oct 15

Hi Sweetie,

The suitcase got in and I had the bellhop teach me how to say "fantastic", but I forgot it again, but I think it sounds like "Erica".

Peter is coming out of his shell and got to play with a little hispanic girl today.  (*They're with a multi-national group of people.)  I made about half my videos.  (* Paul is making promotional videos for an organization.)

I'm glad that you exercised.  I have candy for Reuben and I almost bought you some awesome chocolate tonight, but then I thought of the child labor thing and didn't buy them. (* He's referring to this article at Rage Against the Minivan.)

I have a couple questions about Peter's homework...

It's time for dinner, so we're going to go eat dinner.  

Love to you!

Pablo