Tues, June 30, 2009

Well, we got word today from YFU that we can contact one of our 2 students coming in August! Tiia, from Finland, has been confirmed and informed she now has a host family!! YEAH! One down, one more to be confirmed..hopefully completed by tomorrow! Keep fingers crossed!

5 BABIES @ 1st DAY OLD 6-24-09

I took individual pics of all babies this afternoon while Vaike was sleeping out of the box. They are about 18 hrs old in these pics and have distinctive markings to be able to tell them apart very easily!
#1 Baby Born @ 9:45pm - Smallest born - Black mostly
#2 Baby Born - Black with Orange and White

#3 Baby Born - White with Black "baby cow"

#4 Baby Born - Largest born - White with Orange

#5 Baby Born @ 1:20am - Black with White on underside

VAIKE'S BABIES June 23, 2009 9:45pm to 2:10am

Ok, Vaike went into LABOR last night about 9:00pm! Miguel's family was over for dinner and we all went outside to go swimming for a while....Jenny stayed in the house cause Vaike was following her around and wouldn't lay still. Finally, Miguel came outside and said Jenny thought Vaike was in labor and she wanted me to go inside. Sure enough, Vaike was! The first baby was born at 9:45pm and about 15-20 minutes between each baby after that for the most part. Finally at 2:10am, #5 baby was born! Each of them look totally different from one another too. #1 is baby is BLACK with tiny WHITE markings...#2 baby is BLACK with ORANGE (reminds us of Marble)...#3 baby is BLACK with lots of WHITE (Jenny said it looks likes a baby "cow")....#4 baby is ORANGE with WHITE....and finally #5 baby is BLACK with some WHITE!! They are all soooo adorable and appear to be healthy and Vaike is doing wonderfully as a "NEW MOMMY"!! We kept her in the family room (tv room) with the door closed so none of the other animals could disturb her for the rest of the night. She was exhausted and needed rest too!! SHE WILL BE A GOOD MOM TO ALL OF THOSE BABIES!!

VAIKE AND HER BABIES!!!!!.......

(Left to Right): #3, #5, #2, #4, and #1

ORDER WHICH THEY WERE BORN AS THEY LAY IN THIS PIC.

6-23-09 MISS YOU INGRID!!

JUST WANT TO SAY THAT "BLUE" IS THE COLOR WHEN SOMEONE IS SAD!! IT'S SAD TO SEE YOUR ROOM EMPTY THIS MORNING ALREADY.....SAD TO NOT SEE YOU WHEN YOU'RE JUST "not totally awake in the morning!".....
(Purple just for you).......HAVE A GREAT TIME REUNITING WITH YOUR FAMILY AND MAKE SURE YOU KEEP IN TOUCH OFTEN! LOVE YA! PEG

6-20-09 FINAL WEEKEND IN USA!

It's Saturday, June 20th....This afternoon we are having a "going-away-party" for Ingrid, starting with an OPEN HOUSE for anyone to stop by from 2:00pm-4:00pm. Then we'll have a little break and have another "bash" with TEENAGERS coming and going (hopefully all evening)! Depending on the weather, we plan to have volleyball, crocket, swimming (no jacuzzi this time), a bon fire (if it's not too windy), all followed by a "MOVIE NIGHT"! The kids loved to do movie nights so we thought that would be a nice final touch to a great evening of fun for them. Hopefully lots of kids show up!

2-DAY SAN ANTONIO TRIP June 8-9, 2009

AFTERNOON AT THE ALAMO.....

The first thing we did was visited THE ALAMO. Our hotel room wasn't ready, so we went walking around the city. What a beautiful pic this is at The Alamo in San Antonio! I absolutely LOVE palm trees and wish I had some.

OLDEST TREE IN SAN ANTONIO (140 yrs old)....

Tim and I were sitting under the main trunk of the oldest tree. There was no way to get the entire tree in this pic and still be able to see us up close! The tree is AWESOME!

"HANDS OF WAX"....

While walking around the city, we stopped at a place called "HANDS OF WAX" where Ingrid had her hand waxed. This pic shows her hand after being dipped down into the warm wax. She wanted to hold onto a star so that star was made with the yellow wax on the table top. Once they were done dipping her hand down into the warm wax, they removed the wax hand to prepare putting the RED/WHITE/BLUE AMERICAN colors onto the wax hand and removed the white wax that covered the yellow star. It was really a cool process to watch!!

BEAUTIFUL SCENERY DOWN ON THE RIVER WALK!!....

Everywhere you turn there is something very amazing to see!

FINALLY GETTING CHECKED IN AT THE RIVER WALK HOTEL....

Murals are on the walls of the building, even in the parking garage!

THE RIVER WALK HOTEL where we stayed!!...

This is the view out of our balcony! Awesome!!

Dinner at HARD ROCK CAFE down on the RIVER WALK in San Antonio!

What a gorgeous place to be...eating outside by the river, watching the river boats tours go past, and watching people WATCH US EAT! So much FUN and so much FOOD!

RIVER WALK...NIGHT VIEWS!!.......

Totally awesome and relaxing!

SURPRISE HORSE CARRIAGE RIDE!!......

We were able to pull off a "surprise for Ingrid" during the evening hours! Tim managed to find out the cost for a carriage ride and where we go to get on, all without Ingrid finding out! We just pretended to keep walking around the city sites until we arrived to the location where the team of horse carriages were there waiting for us!! HA! GOTCHA INGRID!! SURPRISE!! Hope you enjoyed this surprise. Nice way to end an evening of fun!!

SEA WORLD ADVENTURES!!!.....

Ingrid had a choice to go to either Six Flags or Sea World. She had already been to roller coaster places before, so she chose SEA WORLD! She has never experienced Sea World before. What a gorgeous day weather wise and all other wise! We had soooo much fun! Left about 6:00pm to start the 7 hour drive back to Frederick..got home about 2:00 AM, yes you are seeing the correct time!

THE SEA LIONS SHOW.....

Sea Lions are really FUN to watch, and this was no exception! Pic here has two sea lions (one sitting at the desk and the other on the floor). They are doing a "skit" about a sea otter stealing fish, but come to find out it was really a walrus stealing the fish. It was really cute.

THE ACCUSED WALRUS!!!!.....

Here's the walrus that really stole the fish in the skit!

KILLER WHALES!!! ....

No Sea World experience is complete without seeing this show! They are massive and awesome to watch!!

"JOURNEY TO ATLANTIS".....

Of course even Sea World has one of the BEST rides! It's called "JOURNEY TO ATLANTIS"!!

It's a coaster ride as well as a water ride! Totally awesome!!

"STEEL EEL"....

Even Sea World has a couple of roller coasters! We had such a wonderful time and GREAT weather!

Sunday, June 7, 2009

Well, today we went to church, came home and got lunch over with....THEN...I started MOWING! On the riding lawn mower, it takes me 3 1/2 hours to 4 hours to mow..depending on how things go. Today, was 4 hours cause I had several large tree branches to pick up and move cause of the last wind storm. Finally got mowing done and now it's cloudy and another small thunderstorm is coming our way.... GLAD I GOT MOWING DONE!
Oh yeah...Tomorrow Tim and I will be taking Ingrid down to San Antonio, TX! We'll leave about 7am and it takes about 7 hours of driving time to get there. We are going to take her to The Alamo, which is a very historic event where the Mexican lost in the war and the USA gained more countryside. Tim and I have both seen this magnificant site with our high school band/choir trip a few years ago, but I'm ready to go see it again! It's that awesome! After going to The Alamo site, we are going to take Ingrid to HARD ROCK CAFE down on The River Walk! She will be totally amazed at what all of this looks like! It's really cool and we have a hotel with a VIEW of the River Walk! So that will be sooooo cool! Can't wait to go...we really need a little get-away trip with all the "stress" here at our household (with Tim being laid off work)!
I'll blog again once we get back....and Ingrid will too, so we'll have pics too.