Who are you???

Eowyn tells us who she is...

Cruising

Asher's been doing this for about a month now, walking behind this toy. Laminate flooring causes it to get away from him a bit.

New Kite

I bought a kite yesterday. If you bought a six-pack of 1.5 liter pepsi bottles, you got a kite free. So, of course! I had to! Free kite! With a Pepsi logo! And Eowyn loves Mary Poppins, and she loves "lets go fly a kite".

So, we're walking to the field, and she had 0 patience. We weren't going fast enough for her liking, so she kept trying to grab the kite. "Daddy, fly a kite?" was asked about 200,476 times.

When we got there, of course there wasn't enough wind, and since I'm about as fast as an 85-year-old with a walker, we couldn't get much lift, but she was still excited to see the kite "fly". I even insisted she run with the kite and followed behind her, because I'm still fast enough, holding the kite as if it were flying.

Asher video

New video, starring Asher, as he shows off his 3-pt offensive lineman stance, does the splits, and low-crawls. Amazing sequence and show of flexibility, all in the first 15 seconds.

With cameo by Baylor and voice by Maren.

Renewed interest in blogging.

I don't know why that's the title. It just is. After being in Germany for a year, I think its time we de-Facebookize for a bit. Give blogspot a renewed chance at life. So here we go.

Asher is a big dude. He's strong. He's cruising. He crawls with a limp. Seriously. He's never quite learned anything but the army low-crawl, and so he's always only pushing himself along with his right leg. It gives the impression of a limp. And he growls as he scoots. And not even 1 years old, and Eowyn being almost 3, he can out-wrestle her for a toy he really wants. A couple of weeks ago it was a balloon in the car. Amazing it didn't burst. He's also been able to pull himself up into a standing position and walk around the coffee table for a couple of weeks now. Dude's pretty cool.

Eowyn's getting close to her 3d birthday. She's still very tall for her age. And very much a daddy's girl. I was home for 3 weeks taking vacation time. That only made it worse. She's into wearing dresses now, for some reason. Her German is improving rapidly, and she still translates for me. Its amazing to see her catch herself speaking "the wrong language" to either myself with English, or to Maren's side of the family with German, and say the same words in the "correct" language. She's in "Kinderdargen" every day until noon, though they're about to take a 3-week break.

Maren's also well. We're trying to figure out how she's going back to school in the fall and make sure the kids are taken care of. We'll get it figured out, but Maren's going to study to teach biology and English at the high school level in Germany. It'll be another 3-5 years?????

Here's a video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8vLE3MPk_M

Sickness

Last week was a bit of a rough one for us. On Sunday (my 1 day that I took off from work in the month of February) the 21st, Asher started getting very fussy around the time we got home from church. By the evening he was running a fever. Turned out he had Strep throat & bronchitis. The next day Eowyn came down with a bug, and Maren started feeling it too. That night the dogs even took turns throwing up. I lasted until the weekend, when I was opening Noises Off at the theater. Kiddos are mostly better, but Maren still has a sinus infection.

She went to the doctor for that today. Without even looking at her (read: glanced up at her once from typing on his computer, and that was it...no examination or anything) gave her a prescription. She's going to an E-N-T on Weds.

Hopefully today, March 1, isn't the only day I take off this month...

Translations

Eowyn has really begun to fully understand both languages we're throwing at her. She's always picking up new things, repeating what we say. Sentences still aren't full, but then again, she's learning two at the same time.

The other day, as we were driving, an airplane flew over. Eowyn said excitedly: "Mama, ein Flu-flah (Flugzeug)." Then, in the same breath, but in a condescending tone: "Daddy, airplane."

New Car (to us)

We splurged. We bought a new car. We've been thinking of getting something a little roomier for the family, dogs included. We wanted something that'll handle the small German streets (our Taurus has the turn radius of a school bus...check that, one of those Semi trucks pulling 3 trailers you see out West...), fuel efficient-ish, and of course, we could all go to Oma & Opa's in. Of course, w/ dogs, we have to get a topper, but that shouldn't be an issue. Here are the ones we considered.









Its a 2008 Opel Astra Caravan. German-spec station wagon. Now seriously, why can't these sell in the US? Oh, right..."We don't like station wagons. We'll just get a bigger SUV."... *ahem*...you mean the station wagon of pickup trucks????

Long time no post...

So, if you forget your user name & password, does that mean its been too long since you've last posted? I say yes!

Well, for those of you who don't know, *someone* turned 29 last week on Wednesday. And we're not talking dog years, so you can exclude Jetta & Baylor, and my birthday is February, but thank you for suggesting it was me. I look younger, don't I.

On Saturday, Maren's sister's boyfriend (no, that's the end; going no further) took some photos of us 4 (plus some of the 2 dogs) with his "fancier-than-point-&-shoot" camera that we have. They're nice. Even the ones with me in them.

pictures of Asher

Eowyn & Asher

Asher Records (John Asher Records)

...was born at 10:33pm local time in Germany. Mommy was in labor for about 4 1/2 hours or so with him. He was a big boy, 4310 grams, or 9lbs 8oz., and 53 cm, or about 20 7/8". His head was 36cm, or about 14 1/8".

Maren wanted to name him Asher. We were looking at Hebrew, Greek, and Roman names mostly and settled on that. We decided on his "second" name as John, after my dad, but we thought it flowed better as John Asher, rather than Asher John.

Comparatively, Asher is about 450 grams, or 1 full pound, heavier than Eowyn was, and 1 cm longer.

Asher slept a good part of the day, and didn't even eat from about 1am or so right after birth last night until almost 1pm today. He & mommy are doing well. I have pictures on facebook, and will load some here later.

Eowynisms

We're celebrating today. No, not because a baby's been born, in fact he hasn't been, but because Eowyn is finally saying her name correctly. No longer is she "Eowa", but now "Eowyn", and sometimes "Eovin". But she's dropped the final "-uh" for "-in".

So here are some other words that she says, first word, then the translation:

Oma--Oma
Oma--Opa
Ani--Annika
**kissing noise**--Kirsten
Nate--Daddy
Moo-ma Auto--the movie Cars
Moo-ma Poppy--Mary Poppins
"Oonie"--Uri, or Ur-Oma (great-grandma)
Bodish--fertig (finished)
**happy surprised gasp**--Nutella (as in, walks over to the cupboard, points, and *happy surprised gasp*)

Last blog Pre what's-his-name

Maren was at the doctor today. The Lad (who shall remain nameless...since Maren & I don't have a name for him yet) is already bigger than Eowyn was when she was born, is still 2 weeks from delivery, though the doctor tried to help "jump start" the process for Maren. We'll see if that works. I was just going through and reminiscing about old photos of Eowyn. Hard to believe that's been over 2 years now.

We like the area we live in, very pretty and our cameras don't do it justice, but far from work, and we'll be looking for something else in the springtime.

Here's some recent photos.


This picture was in a German Burger King. I thought it was awesome they used a photo of Green Bay Packers. I was so excited about it I told them I played for Green Bay before I realized what I was doing.


Jetta, 16 months. And now much faster than Baylor.


Eowyn found some wild black berries.

Another new video

We found Eowyn walking around in her mommy's shoes...notice how she reacts when she realizes she's being filmed...this cannot be a good sign of things to come.

New video

This was a couple of weeks ago after not seeing me for about a week.

more pictures

Update

Well, we've been in Germany for about 5 weeks now and haven't posted very much...so here it goes !
Eowyn has been having lots of fun getting to know her Oma and Opa (grandma and grandpa) and her aunts Kirsten and Annika.
The weather has been nice and sunny even here in Germany so we've been playing in Oma and Opa's yard a LOT ! It was warm enough today to pull out a brand new little pool that Eowyn was supposed to get for her birthday (Thanks Oma and Opa! ). She was ok with wearing her new swim suit bottom but refused to wear the top...Even though the water was pretty cold Eowyn had a blast playing and splashing in the pool and playing with her new buddy, an inflatable penguin that came with the pool
Later in the day she "helped" Opa water the flowers in the yard and had to be changed again...
A couple more big announcements. I had another ultrasound this week and the dr. is now 100% sure that the baby is a boy ! He was not shy this time around. In other news, Eowyn used the big girl potty for the first time today ! She has been pretty proud to announce that "I pooh-pooh" but usually it has been after the fact...until today. I got her on the potty really fast and she actually went! Then she wanted to sit there forever. I kept asking her if she was done and she kept telling me NO! I finally had to pull her off and distract her with something else.
So, it was a big day for her.

Nanny

Maren's screensaver has random pictures that we've loaded onto the computer. Today, Eowyn saw cousin Natalie's picture on the screen and called out "Nanny!" (not because she's stupid. she just can't say "Natalie" yet.)

It's a boy?????????

Maybe? Frau Doktor today was pretty sure, but not 100%. He(?) had his(?) legs tucked under, the umbilical cord was there, he(?) was sitting at an odd angle...the whole thing looked like doppler radar to me. Maren's convinced, but I could see Eowyn was going to be a girl, this just look like a massive blob.

If its a boy, we'll name him Winthrop Norbert. Anyone with that kind of name is bound to be rich. Picked on, but rich. If its a girl, it'll be Natalia Rosa. But why does that have such a familiar ring to it.......oh well.

By the way, it was hotter here than in Marshall, TX, today. Probably much less humidity.