Waiting for the bus

This year, I have started going out to the bus stop in the mornings with girls. Friday morning I got my camera out and took some pics of the kids before school. It was an awesome, crisp autumn morning!


Abby looks so grown up and beautiful!


Gracie with the sunshine on her face.



Abby, Grace and Tanna huddling together because it was a little chilly at the bus stop.



The kids started collecting "helicopters" from the maple tree near the bus stop and throwing them up in the air to watch them spin down.


Connor and Thomas finally show up to the bus stop, barely awake!



Good Morning Thomas!

The bus is finally here and the kids line up!

Bye mom, see ya after school!

Labor Day Camping and Fishing trip

Here are a few of our pics from our camping/fishing trip to Chinook and the Columbia River. Mike, Mariah and Christine joined us this year for camping and fishing. Unfortunately, there was only one salmon that we could keep! But we had a great time and not too much rain. Maybe we will have better luck next year!

Berlin

We went to Berlin in August, from the 12th to the 26th. We went to visit Andreas's dad and family! Here are a FEW of our pics from the trip! We took probably about 1300 pics in all... way too many for myspace or the blog!

Opa Uwe, Asco the dog and Abby and Grace going for a walk.

Daniella, Uwe and Andreas. Dani is Andreas's half sister. They met for the first time when we arrived in Berlin at the airport. This is a pic from Dani's house in her back yard.

Here are some pics from our camping trip in Zabakuck in East Germany. We stayed for 3 days. Andreas's family has a permanent camping place with 2 camping trailers and a covered eating area. The plot is surrounded by a hedge and fence so Asco can be contained. There is also a little lake there where the girls got to swim and play in the sand. Grace spent 98% of her time attached to Markus (Dani's husband).

Abby and Grace got to go horse back riding with Andreas's cousin Annette and her daughter Patty. They have several horses and Patty rides dressage. They got to brush the horses, feed the horses and then go for a ride!

Andreas and the girls on Kurfurstendamm in front of the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church. It had just rained!

Me and the girls on Kurfurstendamm in front of this cool Berlin statue!

Here we are at the Hard Rock Cafe eating burgeres and fries after a day of shopping and sight seeing on Kurfurstendamm! Damn, those burgers were good!

This is from the New Palace near Potsdam. It was the home of some German royalty in the 1700s. We got to go inside, but we could only take pics outside. Look how tiny the girls look in front of those statues! There were hundreds of statues around the palace. I think Andreas took a pic of each one!

These are pics from the Turkish Market in Berlin. A lot like Pike Place only more crowded and smellier!

Dinner at Utta and Dietrich's house.

Here we are at the Brandenburg Gate (raining again!)

Our brief visit to the Berlin Zoo.

We had a great time, but it sure was good to come home! I think if we visit Germany again, we might go for less time! I would also like to see West Germany and some of the Bavarian areas of Germany.

Charge Nurse

I'm convinced that no one reads my blog, since no one leaves me comments... except Erin, that is. Anyway, I am blogging about my night last night and my opportunity to be charge nurse at work. So, Monday I was off work. Spent the day with the girls doing laundry, etc. Work called in the afternoon and left a message that they were short a charge nurse on nights and could I come in and work a night shift and be charge nurse. I was excited at the chance to be in charge because I recently applied for one of the day shift charge positions and I was wondering to myself if that is really what I want to do, or if I could even do it. So, the night was really nice. In fact, it was DEAD in the ER. I think in 8 hours we only had 3 or 4 ambulances. I handled a little staffing issue, and helped the nurses as much as I could. I was relieved because after I agreed to work the shift and be in charge I was asking myself... what's the worst that could happen?... and then when I thought about it, there was a lot of really awful scenarios running through my head. Plus, I wasn't sure if I could stay awake till I got home at 8! All went well, I think (know) I can do a good job as charge, even if more challenging situations come up. I hope I get the opportunity to at least interview with the managers for the day shift charge postion. I didn't get to sleep much today with the girls being home, but it is almost their bed time and I will crash out, too!

McCord Air Expo

Saturday we went to the air show at McCord AFB. It was nice and warm, the planes were cool and the we had a great time! I got a little too much sun!

4th of July F U N ! ! ! !

Some pics from our day at the Tacoma Freedom Fair in Old Town. We took the bus from the Tacoma Dome down to Old Town. There was a nice air show, good food, lots of people and the rain stayed away for most of the day! After we got home we had a nice dinner and spent time with our neighbors blowing up a bunch of fire works and drinking at their house! Glad the 4th of July only comes once a year!

(PS Thanks Erin for telling me how to do the collages!)

Tacoma Tall Ships

This morning we set out from Zittel's Marina in Olympia to check out the Tall Ships coming into port in Tacoma. Here are a few of our pics of the many ships we saw. The weather was a little cool and rainy...c'mon it's July 3rd... where's summer?? After we started watching the ships come in and we sat in the boat, I started to get sea sick. The water was pretty choppy from ALL the boats in the bay looking at the Tall Ships. We took a little cruise north and saw the CGC Eagle, a really cool Coast Guard sailing vessel (Andreas' favorite)! Then we came back and saw more of the ships in the bay and I was really, really sick so we only stayed a bit longer and then headed back towards Olympia. My favorite was the HMS Bounty, it looks like a pirate ship and in fact was built for the movie "Mutiny on the Bounty" and also used in Pirates of the Carribbean II and Sponge Bob Square Pants! The girls had a great time, too! They are good crew members since their momma is a "land lubber!"