Happy Halloween!

They have only celebrated Halloween in Vienna for the last few years. So really, there are not a lot of people who participate. In fact, one lady that I talked to said that on Halloween night, she turns off all of the lights in her house and pretends she is not home. I went to Toys R' Us the other day and I found out why. The Halloween that has been brought to Vienna from the United States, is very dark and scary. All of the costumes are witches and vampires and lots of blood and gore. We were so upset because we wanted the Austrians to see how much fun Halloween can be. So instead of going trick or treating, Alisha had a Halloween party for our kids. We went over to their apartment and she had it all decorated and the kids watched It's a Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown and decorated pumpkin cookies. They had a blast!

Kürbisfest

We have decided that Austria loves to celebrate! One thing that we love about Vienna are all of the festivals. My parents are here visiting and we decided to go to a pumpkin festival just outside of Vienna. It had to be the coolest festival I have ever been to. It was in an area of Austria where there are a lot of vineyards, so there were rows of grapes as far as you could see. The leaves are all changing colors and so the trees are absolutely beautiful. When we got to the festival, there were pumpkins everywhere! There were booths set up and people were selling anything and everything pumpkin. We ate chocolate covered pumpkin seeds, pumpkin strudel, pumpkin hot dogs, pumpkin bread, pumpkin cake, pumpkin cream soup.... and the list goes on. There was a parade and the kids got to get their faces painted and ride on a zip line at the playground. So, as you can see, we really enjoyed the pumpkin festival!

Bratislava

A few weeks ago, we decided to take a short day trip to another country! The closest country is Slovakia and so one Saturday, we hopped on the train and rode for about an hour and crossed the Austrian boarder. We sat next to a nice couple from Brazil and Carli immediately started drawing them pictures. When we arrived in Bratislava, we really had no plans other than we knew there was a castle that we wanted to see. So we found a really good pizza shop and ate a good lunch and then with a mixture of English and German, we found directions to the castle. It was a beautiful day so we walked around the castle, took a few pictures and then got back on the train and came home. It was a great day!

Surprise

I came home the other day to the most beautiful bouquet of flowers sitting on my dining room table! It was a very nice surprise!

Visitors

We have been blessed to have our first visitors! Jack and Wynona Skaggs and Charlie and Joy Cleek we here for a short visit and we were able to spend some time with them over lunch and over coffee and apple strudel. We were so thankful to see some familiar faces and their encouragement was greatly appreciated.

Then Dudley and Vicki Chancey came to Vienna during their fall break, and we were able to have pizza together and we really enjoyed our time with them as well.

And then, Bart and Tamika and Izabela came for a quick visit. We were able to spend some really good time with them.

I know that these visits have really helped me during a time where reality is really hitting hard. German is getting harder and harder for me and I keep thinking that it should start clicking soon, but it doesn't seem to be. I look up the same word in the dictionary 20 times and I still can't remember what it means. Josh is doing a really good job at encouraging me and helping me form simple sentences in German. I know that in time, I will be able to communicate with those around me.
The kids continue to amaze me in their ability to learn German. Carli is able to form sentences that I am learning how to do in my German classes. She went to her first Austrian birthday party and had a blast!

Drawings

Here is one of Carli's latest drawings that she made for Caleb. It is Spiderman, Batman, and Superman with Goblin in the cage on the top.

Here is a drawing that Caleb did of Thomas the Train. I was really impressed!

And here is Cotter's latest drawing. It is hard to see but he drew all over his sheet on his bed! He must have thought that it looked like a huge white canvas!

Is there someone else?

We have a pizza shop that our team is keeping in business. It is close to our house and it is super cheap! We can get a large pizza and a can of Pepsi for 5 Euros. Kari and Ira and our family go in there pretty often so we have started to get to know the owners of the store. One night, Josh and I and the kids went in there to get a pizza to go. It was getting late, so after we ordered, the kids and I went home, while Josh waited for the pizza. After I left, the man making the pizza asked Josh if I was his wife. He asked it in German first and then in English to make sure that Josh understood what he meant. He assured him that I was his wife. He acted very confused and then finally asked, "Well who is that other girl you are always with?"
Josh thought about it for awhile and said that I was the only one he ever came with. The man said the other girl is shorter with dark hair. After awhile, he figured out that he was getting Ira and him confused! They look a lot alike to someone who doesn't know them very well, so the pizza guy got them mixed up. Josh then explained the mix up and there were no more questions asked!

First Trip to the Hospital

Well, with three kids (two of them boys, one of them Caleb) it was bound to happen. This was just a little sooner than I had hoped. So here is what happened...
Caleb and Cotter have bunk beds in their room. Caleb sleeps on the top and Cotter sleeps on the bottom. One day during naps, Cotter climbed up onto Caleb's bed. There was a blanket that was falling off the bed and Cotter tried to catch it and fell head first off the top bunk onto the wood floors. I don't think that he was able to break his fall at all. Of course he cried harder than I have ever heard him cry, and then he became very tired. We tried to keep him awake but we had a hard time. So we started going straight to the hospital and then within about 15 minutes, he woke up and wanted to play. It was so strange. He was not quite himself, but he was very alert and was walking and talking fine. So instead of going to the hospital, we took him to a pediatrician. We got right in, and she checked him out and said that he looked fine, but based on the fact that he was falling asleep earlier, she thought he needed to go to the hospital and stay for one or two nights. We went home and packed some clothes and some diapers and went to the hospital. When we got there, we waited in the waiting room for awhile and then we saw a doctor who was so nice. She spoke in German to us, while Josh explained what happened in German. Then she started talking in English to Cotter and to me. She said that he did not need to stay the night at the hospital and we needed to make him sit still for 48 hours. She said no running or jumping or playing, just sit still. Has anyone tried to keep a two-year-old still for 48 hours? It was difficult. He also had to sleep with us for that same amount of time, which meant that I did not get any sleep because I was listening to every breath he took. By the next day he was fine but we continued to keep him still and he has had no problems since, except for a black eye.
We are so thankful, it could have been much worse.

Public Transportation

The public transportation in Vienna is amazing. It is so different than the public transportation in the States. Here, everyone rides it. Since we have spent so much time on the U-Bahns and buses and Strassenbahns, we have had the opportunity to do a lot of people watching. I have learned that if you ride the U-Bahn in the morning, you have to read the newspaper. I was the only one not reading a newspaper and I got some weird looks. So lately, I have been picking up a paper and looking at the pictures so I can fit in!
No one really talks to each other on the U-Bahns either. An occasional phone will ring and someone will whisper into it. But this is not the case for my kids. They view an U-Bahn ride as a great opportunity to meet people. I should take notes!
The other day we were coming back from church and Josh and I were standing up with Cotter in the stroller and Carli and Caleb sat down right by us. There was a man sitting across from them and they immediately said "Hello". He said hello back and they asked him if he spoke English and he said that he did. They were so excited! They asked him if he was coming back from church and he said "no". They asked him why not and he said that he didn't go to church. Carli asked him if he knew God and Jesus and he said that he did. So then, Caleb said "If you know God and Jesus then why didn't you go to church?!" He just smiled and said that he didn't know. Then he got off the U-Bahn.
This was a great reminder to me of how easy it should be to share our faith. Why do we make it so hard?

Potty Training

For all of you parents out there who have shared in the joys of teaching your child to use the toilet, you may well have realized that bribery is sometimes the most effective method. In Vienna, we have excellent ice cream (as some of you know). Our children's favorite part of Vienna is the ice cream. Therefore, ice cream is clearly the best bribe for Cotter. And as you can see from the pictures, it seems to be working!

Erntedankfest (part 2)

This festival was amazing. There was a parade with floats and marching bands and instead of throwing candy from the floats, they threw flowers and bunches of wheat wrapped in ribbon. There was a fashion show with all of the authentic Austrian clothes and there were lumberjacks that were carving animals out of tree stumps with chainsaws. And there was no shortage of food. We tried three different Austrian dishes and for dessert, a man walked around with skewers full of chocolate-dipped fruits and nuts. I, of course, got the chocolate-dipped raspberries. They were amazing! The theme of the festival was "So schmeckt Österreich" which means so tastes Austria. All of the food came from the different regions in Austria, so you could get a "taste" of the different foods in Austria. Es war wunderbar und lecker!

Erntedankfest

Here is the one and only picture we were able to take at this most splendid festival because the batteries in our camera died soon after. More information about this festival to come soon, so check back later and look for an article about Erntedankfest in our September newsletter coming out soon as well.