Unfinished Business--Teri Visits Germany

It is December first. The last month of the year. As far as I am concerned it is officially winter, yes I know winter officially starts on December 21st but for me Thanksgiving marks the end of fall and December first is the beginning of winter. I was looking back over the blog this morning and realized that I have been a bit of a lazy blogger. I know you are shocked. My plan is to use the first couple of weeks of December to catch up on unfinished blog business so I can start the new year with a clean slate.

The first bit of bloggy catch-up business is Teri's visit to Germany last summer. The kids love when Aunt Teri comes to visit because she spoils them rotten and we get to do lots of fun stuff. This time was no exception. It was go go go the whole time. We saw castles , lots and lots of castles, went hiking, played in rivers and swam in lakes. Visited Bavaria and Luxembourg. We went downtown to a kids fun festival and stumbled onto a gay pride parade (Mommy why is that man wearing gold underwear? Yeah that was fun!) visited the Alps and took a ride to the highest peak in Germany, rode a luge, toured Mad king Ludwig's castle, celebrated the Forth of July and so much more. I could do lots of posts on her visit and I really should have been posting like crazy when she was here but I just too busy having fun. Yeah I like it as much as the kids when she visits. What can I say? Any way here are some pictures from last summer.

Taking a break from hiking in the Taunus.

What visit to Germany would be complete without touring the most famous castle in Germany? Neuschwanstein also known as Mad King Ludwig's Castle.

A quiet moment on top of the world.

Burg Eltz

A view of Luxembourg from the top of the Bock Casemates.

This was not what we had planned when we headded downtown but it was fun to watch, although Colin had some interesting questions.

When we were just hanging out at the house Teri and Dave went head to head in a game of wii baseball.

MEOW!

Thanksgiving 2009

7:10 It is early Thanksgiving morning. I am the only one awake. The house is still quiet and dark. The apartments across the yard are dark except for the kitchen windows which glow with light and activity. More Americans working heard to make the perfect feast.

It is odd to be in a foreign country for this particular holiday. It is a holiday that only Americans celebrate. Well Canadians celebrate it too, but last I checked Canada was part of North America and they think Thanksgiving is in October. The last three years the kids went to school on Thanksgiving day, but this morning they are still sleeping upstairs as I make the pie dough for pumpkin pie. I decided to let them skip school today because this is Cody's last Thanksgiving at home. I want a true family holiday. David thinks I have lost my mind.

9:45 Everyone except the teenager is up. I personally think he is awake and hiding in his room because I don't see how anyone could possibly sleep through this. Good lord. Next year they all go to school in Thanksgiving. It is much nicer to cook without kids screaming, yelling, and fighting. What was I thinking? Dave just keeps looking at me and grinning. He is too smart to actually say out loud that he told me so, but that grin says it all.

It Lives! As I was typing Cody emerged long enough to announce he was going to take a shower and disappear into the bathroom. Colin is playing piano, Grayson is talking to himself, and Alonzo is playing an annoying percussion instrument in my ear while singing Moon Moon Moon shining bright. David is vacuuming and in the background the TV is running on BBC morning news. I am going back to the kitchen to check on the pies.

11:01 the pies are finally done. Someone, probably Grayson, turned the oven down to 280 while they were cooing so instead of taking 45 minutes they took well over an hour. I can only hope they are cooked all the way through. I am starting to understand why we were usually thrown out of the house on Thanksgiving. At least we lived in South Texas where the the weather is usually nice this time of year. Turkey is going in now and I am going to take a shower. Kids are being thrown out of the house since the weather is nice today.

1:48 Boys came back from outside with a fish for the snake's Thanksgiving dinner. Guess they went to the duck pond with Cody. Dinner seems to be on schedule, kinda scary. Usually I am not this organized, something must be wrong. Kids are quiet now. Dave put on Monsters vs. Aliens. TV as a babysitter is a lifesaver some days. Even the teens (the girlfriend showed up) are quiet. Nice.

3:03 Almost everything is ready the last few things are heating in the oven. kids are playing wii. I am glad they stayed home after all even if the morning a little rough.

8:32 The dishes are washed, the guests are gone, and the kids are in bed. All is quiet and I am still so full I can hardly move. We went the traditional route with roast turkey, green beans, cornbread casserole, sweet potatoes with marshmallows, mashed potatoes, stovetop stuffing, cranberry sauce from a can (yuck) and fresh cranberry chutney, homemade bread plus one of our guests brought Jamaican chicken soup and ribs YUM! Then there were the desserts: cheesecake, pumpkin pie, pineapple upside down cake, and apple brown betty. I ate some of everything, so did everyone else and still there are leftovers. Tons of leftovers.

We had eleven people for dinner this year. I really prefer Thanksgivings when we have a full house. To me Thanksgiving is a holiday to share with others. I am glad I let the kids stay home. They enjoyed playing Wii with our guests while waiting for dinner. Then after dinner we all flopped down in the living room and watch Scooby Doo the Mystery Begins. Not the best movie ever but the kids liked it so it was a good way to end the day.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. Hope your day was as good as ours!

Wordless Wednesday- Moose, Maybe

LOL! Wait my kids would do that.

My Malawi guide book is here! I have been flipping through it tonight and some of it is funny reading, unless you have a kid like Colin. Some important gems of safari safety advice:

• Don't sleep with your head sticking out of a tent or you risk being decapitated by a curious predator.
• Don't stand between a hippos and the water. Hippos will panic and mow down any person standing between them and the safety of the water, usually with fatal consequences.
• Don't bathe in any potential crocodile habitat.

I thought these all seemed pretty obvious until I thought about Colin the kid who with in hours of landing in Texas last home leave managed to get bit by a snake (not a rattler thank goodness) and stung by a scorpion. I can totally see him with his head hanging out of a tent so he can see all the animals walk by.

Heavy On My Mind

Today is Monday. I am doing the same thing I do most Mondays, that is I am cleaning house. After a weekend of the boys being penned up in the house by the soggy cold weather the house looks as if a tornado swept through. This week though, I notice I am being a little more ruthless than normal about throwing things out. Generally I am a bit of a pack-rat. So what has changed? Well as Dave announced we are going to Malawi this summer. The catch is the State Department imposes a weight limit on our house hold goods, 7200 pounds to be exact. Everywhere I look I see something else that needs to be thrown away or given away.

I have yet to meet another expat (other than FS) that ships by weight. Everyone else seems to ships by container size. If you think of those pictures of the big ships with all those big containers that look like a box car minus the wheels, those are the containers I am speaking of. In fact I know of at least one woman who was excited about her husbands promotion not due to any monetary increase but because now they were alloted a larger shipping container and she would be able to ship some antique Javanese furniture.

So far today I have thrown away several Burger King kids meal toys, a couple of t-shirts with small holes, a couple of blue kitchen towels that had gone all frayed on the end, a kids book with some torn pages and a ripped batik cicak. Nothing big or heavy but if I can manage to throw away a couple of items every time I clean house it will (hopefully) all add up to quite a lot of weight by the time we pack out in June. Maybe I should start weighing what I throw out each day and keep a running tally to see how much I weight I eliminate from our shipment.

Forgotten Sun

Late fall/winter weather has settled in here in Frankfurt. It overcast, drizzly, cold, and gray all day everyday. This morning as we were driving to school the clouds thinned just enough to allow dim outline of the sun to barely break through through for just a moment. Alonzo noticed it and blurted out, "Look the sun! I forgot what it looked like. I thought it was a lot brighter."

It’s Official

We will be going to Lilongwe Malawi for our next assignment.



I have received my assignment notification, so we can start planning our departure from post. There is a lot involved with planning a departure, like when we will leave our current post and arrive at our new post and what we will do in-between. At a minimum I have to do a mandatory 20 work days of home leave. Then I have to figure out what training I will need to take before I arrive at our next post and see if I can fit it into our travel plans. It is important to remember that we have no home in the states so when we go on home leave we typically stay with family. If there is no family to stay with we would have to fork out an awful lot of money in hotel bills for the home leave.

If all works out we should be in Texas to start our home leave around July 2. It will be good to be home and see family that we have not seen in two to three years. The kids are really excited about seeing their friends back in Mainland Square as is Shannon.

Until then, keep visiting our blog and keep some dates available for the month of July!

Soup For Dinner--Baked Potato Soup

This is a family favorite. It is true comfort food. There is not much healthy about this soup but it sure does taste good on a cold winter afternoon. Just to be clear, there are no baked potatoes in this it simply tastes like a baked potato with all the toppings. My sister-in-law Teri made this for us when visiting one year. I have been messing with the recipe every since. Since I didn't write it down and can't quite resist tweaking the recipe it has probably changed a bit since she made it but here is the recipe as I make it.

Baked Potato Soup

• 2 pounds potatoes (I don't care what kind, in fact I often mix types)
• 1 large onion
• 2 stalks celery
• 3 cloves garlic
• 1 box chicken stock (or vegetable stock if you are going veggie)
• water
• 1 cup milk
• 1 bay leaf
• bacon I use half a package but you can use less or more depending on how much you like bacon. Can even omit if you are doing vegetarian
• cheddar cheese
• sour cream
• Green onions or chives

Dice bacon and fry it until crispy in a big soup pan. Remove bacon and let drain on a paper towel and pour out most of the bacon grease leaving only a tablespoon or so, if you are going veggie skip the bacon and just use olive oil instead. Finely chop celery and onion and cook over low heat in the bacon grease until tender and transparent. Add in diced garlic and cook a few minutes more. Add in peeled, diced potatoes, bay leaf, stock and enough water to cover the potatoes. Simmer until the potatoes are cooked. If you like it rustic just stir it a bit to to make the potatoes fall apart some. If you like it smooth, fish out the bay leaf and run the soup through a blender or use an immersion blender, remember fish out the bay leaf BEFORE running it through a blender. Add the milk and cook about 15 minutes or until thick. When serving top each bowl with cheddar, sour cream, bacon, and chives.

We had this on the last day of fall break except I stirred in a bunch of cheddar right at the end to make Potato Cheddar Soup. Everyone but Alonzo was happy. Alonzo hates potatoes (unless they are french fries) and this soup is loaded with potatoes. I served it with fresh corn muffins. Alonzo was somewhat pacified by the hot corn muffins with butter and honey.

Disclaimer: I am very much a cook that doesn't measure so these are approximations. I also sometimes change things like half and half instead of milk or more milk if I think it is too thick. If you are the kind that measures everything there are loads of good potato soup recipes out there on the internet. If you aren't sure which one to choose go with a site that allows reviews of the recipe and comments then pick a recipe with good reviews and make sure to read over the comments. Happy cooking.

Happy Halloween

Hope everyone out there is having a Happy Halloween. The boys just finished carving their jack-o-lanterns for tonight and are watching Scooby Doo. Alonzo was running a fever last night. This morning he woke up without a fever, but he still looked puny so we skipped the party at the field house in hopes that he will feel well enough for trick or treating tonight. It is a laid back kind of day. I think I like having Halloween on a Saturday. No rushing to eat and change as the kids get home from school just relaxing and having fun. I have a crock pot of 15 bean soup cooking away on the counter for a quick warm dinner after Trick or Treating tonight. Colin is heading of to a birthday party for one of his class mates. While he is gone Alonzo, Grayson, and I will make a bat cake for dessert tonight and then have a little Wii fun! I will post pictures of the costumes tomorrow of the costumes. This year we have one snake, two phantoms, and Dakota Fanning.

Wordless Wednesday--What's Wrong With This Picture?

A Handshake At Last

A handshake is the first official notice of your next post assignment you receive when in the foreign service. While it is not a done deal until orders are cut, it is very rare for a handshake to be broken. This morning Dave finally received the e-mail we had been anxiously awaiting. We have a handshake! YIPEE! We know where are heading after Germany. Oh, what? You want to know where? Well here is are a few hints:

This is a picture of one the many cool things we can see at our next post.


The handshake is for the capitol city of the country that is home to the 3rd largest lake in Africa and the 8th largest lake in the world. The country is known as the "warm heart of Africa." This country earned its independence from the UK on 6 July 1964 and one of the official languages is Chichewa.

Can you guess where we are going?

Soup For Dinner--Curried Lentil Soup

I have been a lazy blogger. Actually I have been a busy Mom. The kids have been on fall break for two weeks which means I have been busy chasing kids and cleaning up messes. On top of that we have hosted two birthday parties this month, been hiking with the cub scouts, sold sodas at Applefest with the cub scouts, and painted pumpkins up at the feildhouse all in addition to the normal cooking/cleaning/shopping/laundry/scout meetings that make up daily life. In short we have stayed pretty busy this month. Today is the last day of fall break. We are hanging out relaxing in our jammies and watching a Scooby Doo marathon on Boomerang, everyone except or Cody that is, he is working on homework since his school didn't have fall break. Poor baby!

I have continued with the weekly soup night although it hasn't fallen on the same night each week. Since my last post we tried the Curried Lentil Soup suggested by Planet Nomad in my comments from the last soup post. YUM! It rocked. Alonzo, who is my picky eater, took one bite and announced, "This one is a do-over." YAY! No complaints and it was even better the second day. I was so busy eating I forgot to take a picture. Darn it all! Guess that means I will just have to make it again. If you want to try it for yourself just click here.

Thanks, I think

The kids are on fall break this week and next. It is like spring break except, you know, in the the fall. They are destroying the house, running wild, and generally having fun. German weather being what it is the last day of school, when the kids were stuck inside, was absolutely gorgeous. The weather since then, not so much, so they have been basically trapped inside with me. This morning I was praying for more rain but of course it is totally dry, cloudy but dry. Why would I want more rain? Today is Tuesday. Tuesday means the Farmers Market is down in Dornbush.

The market is a short walk from our house. Short as in about a 15 minute walk, each way. The kids have been planning to go buy a pumpkin with their allowance. Generally I think it is great that they save and spend their own money BUT I know darn well who is carrying those pumpkins back home. Pumpkins are heavy. A 15 minute walk isn't that far unless you are carrying several heavy pumpkins and trying not to let 3 kids get run over along the way then suddenly it is a VERY long way. Still no rain so I eventually had to face facts and off we went to buy pumpkins. Colin of course picked out the biggest pumpkin he could find and negotiated the price. I reminded him that he needed to use his German. He did just long enough to ask "Spechren Sie Englisch?" then switched to English. Somehow that works better for the kids than me. I know darn well that same vender has told me "Nein!" to that exact same question in the past. Today surprise, surprise, the answer was "A little" followed by almost flawless English. GRRRR!

The vender told him the price per kilo then picked it up and estimated the price. I was trying desperately to tell Colin it was too expensive when Colin upended his little coin purse in the man's hand. The man helped Colin count out his money (Yes I let Colin deal with it on his own, he was the one who wanted the pumpkin not me) turned out that Colin was a little short. YAY! I almost did a happy dance but then the guy cut him a break AND threw in a second pumpkin for the same low low price. Thanks, I think. Colin can't stop talking about how he bought 2 big pumpkins with his own money, all by himself.

The other two boys did not bring their allowances so they were at my mercy for money. I only allowed them a small pumpkin or gourd. They were a little disappointed but got over it quickly when I pointed out their choices. Small pumpkin or No pumpkin. When put that way, small pumpkin it is.


Here are the boys with their prize pumpkins. In case you are wondering the boys weighed the pumpkins. The big one was 14 pounds. The freebie was 7 1/2 pounds and Alonzo and Grayson's were about a pound or two each.

I did end up carrying the big tan colored pumpkin home in my backpack and Grayson's little pumpkin because I was afraid it wouldn't make it home the way he swinging it around. Colin and Alonzo got to carry the other two pumpkins home. I had my hands full. In addition to the pumpkins I had several pounds of apples both for eating and making apple butter, pears, plums, grapefruit, a jar of white cream honey, and some flowers because after this I deserve them. Oh yeah and the boys got pastries. I stuck with the flowers. Less calories!


Here is the total haul from the market today. Whew! Getting all of that home counts as a work out.

Wordless Wednesday -I want those boots!

Soup For Dinner--Split Pea Soup

The weather has started to turn colder here in Germany, although thankfully not as cold as last year. The trees have just started to change color, and as I walk to the store the first fallen leaves crunch underfoot. The air is cool in the morning, warming in the afternoon. I love the crisp feel to the air, the colorful leaves, the anticipation of the upcoming holiday season. Fall truly is my favorite time of the year.

One of the things we have found about living overseas is that traditions are very important to keeping a sense of who we are, especially for the kids. No matter where we live I will find a pumpkin (or something pumpkin like) to carve for Halloween and later bake into pies for Thanksgiving. I will put up a tree for Christmas, fake or real depending on where we live and the availability fresh trees. We invent things that we do as a family that cement our togetherness, our belonging to each other. Dessert night on Wednesday, movie night on Friday these are part of our weekly family traditions, our family cement. This fall I am adding one more: soup night. At least for the winter. Once the weather warms again it may become taco night or maybe pizza night.

Today for dinner we had split pea soup with brotchen. It was yummy. Brotchen are small crusty rolls you can buy all over the place here, similar to bolillo rolls back home. They were perfect with hearty soup. Three out of four kids liked the soup, Grayson just like the bread. Even Cody liked it, which was a surprise since he hated it in the past. As I was cooking I realized that I really enjoy soup when it's cold outside. It is just such a warm, cozy kind of food. Why not add a soup night? Quick discussion with David and it's set we will have a soup night each week this fall and winter.

I realized one other thing. I really like soup and have often ordered it when we eat out, but I really only know how to make two kinds of soups: bean with ham (split pea is a variation on this since it is basically the same soup except with split peas instead of beans) and chicken vegetable soup. There are so many more kinds of soups out there I would love to learn to make. Indonesian Soto Ayam, spicy Thai coconut soup, caldo de rez, minestrone, the list goes on and on. As I try new recipes I will post each week and let you know what the kids think of the recipes.

The recipe I used (and mostly followed) tonight came from epicurious.com. If you don't know epicurious and like to cook you must go there now, go ahead this blog will be here when you get back. I have known about this site for a long time and used it frequently even back in the states, but after ALL of my cookbooks ended up in storage (please, please, please, let them be in storage) instead of at post it became a lifesaver. My favorite thing about it the user reviews. Immediately I can see what other people thought of the recipe and what changes they made.

I chose a very simple recipe tonight. To me split peas are a rustic kind of dish and should not be fancied up too much. To view the recipe click here. I followed the recipe, well mostly. I had some left over ham from a few days ago so I used the ham bone in place of smoked pork hocks. I also had saved the juice from the pan when I cooked the ham and used that and chicken stock instead of water. The only other change I made was to not puree the soup. I like split pea soup when it it is creamy with peas just falling apart but not perfectly smooth. There is enough left over for my lunch tomorrow. Life is good!