There ain't no "I" in "team"

Our World Harvest team had our first ever team retreat over the weekend.  It was fantastic!  We traveled to a little village outside of Prague called Okoř, about 30 minutes away.  There's a fantastic little hotel and nearby guesthouse, and the hotel's restaurant had some of the best food we've had in Czech in 3 years!  It was the perfect setup - the house was quaint and beautiful, and Mrs. Bulthuis (Clark's teacher at school) graciously offered to watch the kids while we had our meetings.

We spent good time together in prayer and talking through our team's vision and mission.  We also ate lots of snacks, played some games, and had fun.  The weather was beautiful all weekend (a welcome change from the recent gray-ness), so we hiked around Okoř's 14th century castle ruins.  That was amazing too. All in all, a great weekend! 

They're back!

Shanna and Piper made it back to Prague safely yesterday.  The world is as it should be...

It's 50 degrees, let's go to the pool!

That's right, nothing slows us down!  In fact there was a Barbie Princess Party at our favorite pool today - "Save the Diamond Castle," designed to promote the new video.  When we woke up and saw the cold, gray skies, I figured there would be maybe a dozen people at this event - boy, was I wrong.

There were at least 1000 people (no joke).  I thought all Czechs left the city on the weekends, but apparently all the desperate parents, like myself, had stuck around.  It was a major event for kids, and it just happened to be at the pool (there were a total of 2 people swimming today).  

The object for the kids?  Go around to 10 different tents, do a silly game, and get a stamp.  Get all 10 stamps, get a bag of free Barbie goodies.  Good theory, bad when there's 1000 people all trying to do the same thing in the same order from 10 tents (do the math).

Nonetheless, Lucy and Clark had a blast!  After an hour we had the 5 quickest stamps and then got overwhelmed by the remaining lines.  I would have given up but they really wanted the goody bags, so I brought myself to do something I can't believe I did - I found a bored teenager in charge of stamping one tent, and I actually offered her 100 crowns ($6) if she'd just stamp our remaining spots.  She was only mildly surprised, and gave us enough stamps to get our bags (and refused the money).

Pretty proud of myself at this point, I let the kids linger, watch the stage show, and play with some of the toys there.  All in all, a great day and I admit it was surprisingly fun.

Lucy online

Jan's pictures of Lucy and the whole gang at the race are also on the Prague International Marathon website, under the Photo Gallery:

http://www.pim.cz/index.php?action=main&subject=2296

Soccer, I mean, Football

It's criminal that I've been here over 3 years and finally went to see my first football match last night.  (Yes, Shanna even lined up a baby-sitter for me while she's away - amazing).  One of the two big Prague teams, Slavia, moved into a brand new stadium last spring, and they're consistently at the top of the Czech league each year.  They didn't make the Champions' League in Europe this year, but they came close.

Some observations from my first match:

- We had awesome seats.  The field, I mean pitch, is massive but we had great perspective.

- The Academy Awards should add a category for Most Ridiculously Faked Injury in Football.  It got pretty annoying.

- Wouldn't you expect the country that has the highest beer consumption per capita to serve beer at their favorite sporting event?  The most shocking insight from last night was that they only serve non-alcoholic beer in the stadium.  (You can drink all you want from the beer stands outside right before you go in, in case you're wondering)

- Halftime show? No such thing.

- My biggest fears were realized last night when the final whistle blew and the score was 0-0.  There were lots of great shots, intensity during the game, and missed opportunities, but we concluded that this is why soccer has yet to take off in the States.  (And if Chris had been there, he'd have been whining that the concept of "tying" in sports is completely un-sportslike.)

- The tram ride home was like a cattle car. (see picture)

- I will go again. It was a great experience, a beautiful stadium, and loads of fun.

One extra incentive for me was to see one of Lucy's classmates' dads - he plays for Slavia and is actually quite famous here.  He got into last night's game near the very end.  And then at drop-off this morning at school, there he was - so I got to talk to him about the game and hear his thoughts - I was slightly star-struck.

We miss our girls

Shanna and Piper have been in Charlotte since Wednesday, so that Piper could get her helmet checked out and make sure everything was rounding out, so to speak.  Lucy, Clark, and I have been holding down the fort here - it's been fun but we miss our girls!  Shanna was nice enough to make this as easy as possible for me, complete with a day-by-day list of things I need to remember (e.g. "Thursday - Czech class after school - bring snack and drink, popcorn and juice, for car ride. Pick up at 5.  Baths/dinner" etc etc).

Apparently things in Charlotte are going well - the doctor gave Piper a thumbs-up for her nice round head, so probably only another month with the helmet.  And we won't have to make a return trip next month, which had been a possibility.  Papa and Yaya came down to Charlotte to see them yesterday, and I imagine that Shanna has every free moment lined up with people to see and shopping to do.

Come home soon!

More race pictures

At the run last weekend, we ran into Jan, our personal paparazzi from the spring (you may recall he took pictures of us for the Charlotte Observer paper).  He was taking pictures for the race and was nice enough to send them to us afterwards.  Thanks, Jan!

Family Super-Fun Run

We know our kids like to run, so we decided to try out a race together yesterday.  It was the Tesco Run for Life race series, which featured a men's 10K, women's 5K, and family fun 3.8K (which is about 2.4 miles).  We registered last week, got our t-shirts and numbers, and headed to Old Town Square for the 6:30pm start last night.  Many of our friends, including Riverside teachers, Chris and Owen, and the Pokluda family were with us.  (Piper sadly couldn't join us - we didn't think she could wiggle her way over 2 miles of cobblestones)

This was one of those activities that could have been disastrous in other circumstances (kids getting run over, having meltdowns, etc.) but we had the BEST time last night!!!  Shanna and I were shocked at how much and how fast Lucy and Clark ran.  We kept saying to take a break and walk if they wanted, but they just kept going!  They loved being cheered on by all the crowds on the sidewalks, and they knew they'd get medals if they finished - talk about incentive after all the Olympics we watched!

It was also a wonderful way to experience Prague - running over the Charles Bridge, along the Vltava River, over streets that are normally full of cars and trams - all the time being cheered on.  Lucy and Clark got lots of cheers from bystanders for doing so well.Clark and Shanna on the Charles Bridge
Lucy and Vivi...

We walked a little bit near the end but ran across the finish line all together (in a brisk 31 minutes, if you're wondering) and got our medals - definitely their favorite part!

School Picnic

Riverside had their Welcome Back Picnic yesterday.  After a week of warm, even hot, days, it got officially crisp and chilly yesterday.  That didn't stop us from having a great time, meeting new families, hanging out, eating all sorts of international foods, and laughing at Piper's funny expressions.

dude where's my car?

So after pureeing today Piper and I were running out the door to pick up the peeps at school and I got outside, stood on the sidewalk and looked around.... I turned to Luara who was also leaving and I said "do you see my car?" as we both peered at a virtually empty street except for her car she said "no....maybe Phil slipped out to get them". Phil was on a conference call when I was leaving but I thought maybe some time warp happended and he jetted off while I was getting Piper dressed. I ran inside only to find him still on his conference call which I had to then interupt and ask..."ummmm where is the car?'' and he stared blankly at me for a few seconds which seemed like 5 minutes (because I was late to pick up the kids and had Laura waiting for me outside while she was watching Piper) when his memory was jogged, he was able only to say that he left it at the cafe this morning. So he then tried to explain to me where it was which sounded like the charlie brown teacher as the minutes were ticking by for an already late pick up..so I just ran out and had to get Laura to take me and Pipes to pick-up. All was well.
If Phil takes the kids to school he typically drops the car back off at home and then takes public transport. Today it seems that he dropped himself off at a cafe and then just walked on home leaving "Harry" (lucy's new name for our car) at the cafe. Harry was retrieved after bed time.

cooking

These two really enjoy cooking and this week they have helped with a homemade Apple Pie with brown sugar crumb topping. I think they ate more apples than made it in the pie but that's the joy of cooking. Laura and I are trying this new way of cooking called pureeing. We both got this cookbook by Mrs. Seinfeld and basically you add different purees into your food to help you and your children get more veggies into your diet. This all is working perfectly since I am already pureeing food to make homemade babyfood for Miss P. why not for the rest of us too. So Laura and I spent the day making purees - we made sweet potatoes, cauliflower, and peas. Who knew I was going to turn into such a Domestic Goddess!

school

So we are in full swing for school and everyone is LOVING it. Lots of excitement and lots of excitement... did I say that already? Lucy and Clark love going to school, they have a great little community and really enjoy learning and being in the learning environment. Clark's excitment level has lead to falling asleep in mid sentence, with cracker crumbs all over him, his ever-raspy voice being even more scratchy that today we could not hear him. Lucy's excitement has translated into many different hairstyles before school and lots of quiet coloring time by herself to reenergize for the next day. It has also ment 6:45 bed time each day this week. Lots of routines to get use to and new responsibilites for them, which include laying out school clothes, and making thier own lunches each night before they go to bed. I think these new responsibilities have (un) fortuantly made them grow up just a little more and it really is amazing to watch them do it with such joy and excitement of what is to come next.

Piper Update!

Piper is so much fun we LOVE her! She is 7 months old and and we are starting to see more and more of her sweet personality come out. She loves to stare very intently with her long eye lashes ever so slowly blinking, which then either ends in a huge smile or an eye roll. (We think she is going to be the most sarcastic of the bunch). She also decided one day that she was going to start eating (if you know me you know we like to prolong that as long as possible, but she was ready,) so she now eats at just about every meal. Her favorites so far are diet coke, chocolate, oatmeal, applesauce and today sweet potatoes. Ok, so she is not drinking the sweet nectar of life yet but I do think she has found some chocolate crumbs on the floor. She is also trying to crawl, she was able to get up on all 4 a few times and when it has happend she has actually only moved backwards so we stil have a little more work to do, but she can roll like nobody's business... so we are in no hurry for the crawling. She loves Lucy and Clark and I think she knows when school pick up time is because several times she has been sleeping soundly and right as I am ready to run and pick them up while phil is working at home, she magically awakes and is raring to go...and it is just as well because they are just as excited to see her and show their baby sister. Her name fits her well she fills our house with sweet music from the Lord. We love you Piper!

...or is it crumping?

Click To Play

You are my sunshine

Lucy and Piper got decked out in matching sunflower pants (3 words I never thought I'd put together) last week-

Clark's First Day of School!

Clark is officially a big boy!  He started his Nursery class today, also at Riverside - one day after Lucy's first day.  He got his own uniform, backpack, lunchbag, bookbag... phew!  Who knew a 3-year-old needed so much stuff for school?Looks like they're about to break out in a rap...

Clark has been EXCITED about school for the last few days - he hasn't been able to sleep, he's been asking us lots of questions, and generally just jumping around.

His teachers, Mrs. Bulthuis and Mrs. Clarke (isn't that ironic?), are friends of ours and stopped by for a home visit last week to see if we had any questions.  They do that for all the nursery kids, which is so nice of them.  We warned them about Clark's enthusiasm, but we're confident that they can love him well and foster his wonderful energy.

Lucy's First Day of School!

While you Americans were celebrating Labor Day, we were celebrating Lucy's first day of Kindergarten!  Riverside calls it "Year 1," however, which can get a little confusing - but Lucy certainly doesn't care.  This is Lucy's third year (!) at Riverside, so everything is already fun and familiar to her.  She was SO excited to see her good friends again, and she's already made new friends too.

Check out her phat (and fat) new backpack-

Her teacher, Mr. Haig, a great guy from Scotland who periodically wears his kilt-

It's never too early

As much as Clark loves to play dress-up and do hair with Lucy, he's still very much all boy.  He wanted to learn how to shave like me, so we had our first lesson - up and down, not side to side, right?  No worries, we kept the plastic guard on Clark's razor.

So Southern

What better way to embellish Piper's new helmet than with a good ol' monogram?

Isn't she the cutest, toughest looking thing?

Here are all my girls...