A Dodo Bird

Calvin participated in a Children's Theater camp all week this past week, preparing for his role as a dodo in Alice in Wonderland. We went to the first performance last night and thoroughly enjoyed the show. It was a wonderful production with 82 local kids filling all of the roles.

Amazing what they could put together in one week of intense practices.
Today, they will do an afternoon performance and then be finished. Calvin has had a great time. Quincy had a big team bonding experience with his soccer team last night. They all played paintball out at a team member's farm. They had a great time and came home, hot, tired and worn out. I ran into Indy yesterday morning to get my oil changed and my brakes looked at on my car. Spent a very enjoyable morning having breakfast with my friend, Teresa and her youngest daughter. Our summer is winding down. The kids have just one more free week before school starts on the 9th, 10th, and 11th. Hard to believe, but true.
Our exchange student will arrive one week from today! I am busy today, refinishing a dresser that we picked up for Leo's room at a local resale shop. Leo emailed this picture of his family to us today.

He is on the far right with his parents behind him. He is an only child with a couple of younger girl cousins. Sure hope he is mentally prepared for the hustle and bustle of our family!

Running Cemeteries

Quincy finished up his drivers ed today. He still needs lots of practice and experience but in the thirteen months before he gets his license, he should be able to manage that. I am just happy to have finished up all of the driving that it took to get him to and from his classes!
Quincy and Tabitha continue with their daily conditioning practices for their soccer teams. They are sore and worn out but getting some good exercise. It is so funny to take them to practice. Their school soccer field is actually located in the Catholic cemetery behind the convent. You actually drive in the cemetery gates before veering off to the field. So, during their conditioning runs, they are actually running sprints on the hills of the cemetery. Small school, small town... you do what you need to do...

Riding to Town

This afternoon, we finally had several hours that were uninterrupted by soccer practices, drivers ed, my job, and/or everything else. So, Max and Calvin and I decided to bike into town and hit the library. For those of you that know Batesville, you will know that despite it's small size, it is not biking friendly and it is actually quite difficult to get from our little outlying neighborhood to the center of town without some danger. Well, finally, the city just finished a sidewalk that goes 98% of the way with only one major intersection to cross. So, we took off on our bikes to town. It's about a 2 mile ride and was so nice on the new sidewalk. We had a great time! We hit the library and the bookstore.

The boys then talked me into a quick ride to the pharmacy before heading home. They have just discovered the joys of our small town pharmacy. Just like in the old days, the pharmacy still sells bulk candy by the single piece so that for just a nickel or a dime, the kids can get some much loved candy. We headed home in high spirits that were not even damped by the rain that fell on us for the last ten minutes of our ride.

Getting in Shape

Soccer has begun... Quincy and Tabitha had a couple of hours of running distances, sprints and drills today to begin their season conditioning exercises. Max and Calvin will start practice this week so we were stocking up on shin guards, cleats, and balls today. When I wasn't running the kids to either practices or to the store, I was trying to get a handle on the weeds in our garden and flower beds. Whew! Certainly have my work cut out for me. Calvin tried out for Alice in Wonderland today and got a small part. He will practice with the children's theater camp all week this week and then put on two performances this weekend. He is quite excited. Josh took off for Orlando today. He claims that he is not going to Disney but the kids are awfully suspicious!
Pictures from Tunisia...

The Older Generation

We drove up to Fort Wayne and Van Wert this weekend to visit the older generations! Josh's mom just had her shoulder replaced and we wanted to make sure that she was faring okay as she recovers. She is doing great of course, and other than the sling, you would never know that she so recently had surgery. We had a nice visit with her and with Josh's grandmother before driving over to Van Wert to see my parents.

Another nice visit and finally a break in the hot, hot weather so that we could get out and play some shuffleboard and enjoy the outdoors. On Sunday, my very good, American friend who is married to a French man and lives in France, happened to be in Detroit, visiting her family.

She drove down to Delphos where I met her and we enjoyed a great lunch and a super time catching up. Very, very fun!
These pictures are from Ibiza, Spain...

Just Too Hot

It has been ridiculously hot and humid these past couple of days. No one wants to do anything outside! So, we have been hitting the library, doing lots of reading, playing Legos and just fooling around inside. My weeds continue to dominate my garden but they are just going to have stay put until it cools off a bit. Max has been keeping himself occupied by making cool and fruity drinks for everyone. He makes a smoothy of his own design and then decorates every glass with a piece of a fruit and an umbrella. Strongly influenced by his love of virgin drinks at the ship's bars!




Pictures from Valencia, Spain

Tennis and more Tennis

Calvin, Max and I spent the day just sweltering in the hot and humid weather under the unbearably bright sun. Calvin had a tennis tournament to end his tennis season for the summer. It was a double elimination tournament so unfortunately, we were there for almost 6 hours before Calvin lost. He had a great time and played well, especially when playing singles but it was so terribly hot...
Quincy and Tabitha were left at home to hang out. Tabitha decided to take the initiative and not only read her summer reading assignment for school due at the beginning of the year but to also finish it. She not only read the book but also wrote the two papers that went along with the assignment! Hurray! Quincy had his first session of driving with his drivers ed instructor this morning. He drove for two hours and was exhausted by the tension and stress of it all by the time he was finished. He did just fine but now realizes that true driving is not as easy it looks!
The following pictures are from Monte Carlo...

Coming Up for Air

I don't expect to get any real sympathy but... I'm exhausted! Jet-lagged and literally buried alive in laundry, mail and everything else that didn't get done while we were on vacation. I am finally starting to emerge from this mess and making some headway in returning to a normal life. Calvin had a tennis match this afternoon and Tabitha had basketball practice while Quincy had to work at his lifeguarding job, so we are all getting there...
I have uploaded and labeled all of our 500 pictures from our trip. If there is anyone out there that wants the links to Kodak Gallery to see all of these pictures, just let me know... I will send it to you. For the others... here are some more from our trip....




There are all pictures from our beautiful little town in France and the house that we stayed in while there.
We did find out today that our exchange student from China (His name is Leo) has gotten his Visa approved and will arrive in mid-August. We are very excited!

We are Home!

We made it.... Lots of driving from Pisa to Paris, lots of flying from Paris to Cincinnati but we are now home and very happy to be here! I will have plenty of pictures for later but for now... Here is just a taste from our trip...

Camels and Ruins

I cannot even begin to describe all that we have seen in the past couple of days... You will just have to wait for the pictures. We all absolutely loved our time in Tunisia. Such beauty and history. Gorgeous architecture, amazing Roman "technology", beautiful views of the Med... The temperatures were very hot but we managed to see the baths and ruins of Carthage. We also saw the wealthy homes and modern life of this part of Africa. Tunisia has an amazing literacy rate of 87% and equal rights in all things for men and women. Nice to see. We explored the traditional fisherman village of Sidi Bou Said, haggled with some very pushy merchants for a few souvenirs, drank some minty native tea, and explored a private native home. Just fascinating. Yesterday, we were in Sicily. Catania is yet another big, busy and crowded Italian city so we were not too impressed. We enjoyed a very nice day however and then today, woke up as we landed in Naples. Yet another crazily crowded and busy Italian city but we took a bus out of the city almost immediately for a tour of Pompeii. Incredible!! 66 acres of this big, wealthy and extremely well-organized city have been unearthed and open to us. Amazing. We all loved it and could not take enough pictures. We also took a quick tour of a cameo factory and drank some incredible lemon ices. The temperatures are in the 90's with 80% humidity so we are now dusty and sweaty and hate to think of our cruise ending in the morning. We have had yet another great family trip. We will be in Paris by tomorrow night and home by Sunday night. Pictures to follow...

Valencia and Ibiza

Well, while Spain was winning the final game in the FIFA World Cup, we were making our way to Spain. We arrived in Valencia in the morning and spent the day exploring this big and busy city. Valencia is most well-known for the oranges that they produce for the world. They also have a huge, modern city full of science, art, crazy architecture and thousands of scooters. We went out of the city a short distance to take some boats through the longest navigable subterranean river in Europe. The caves were gorgeous and definitely something to be seen, even by this claustrophobic woman. The kids loved it. After getting back on the boat, we headed out to the Balearic island of Ibiza just off the coast of Spain. Ibiza is well known for it's discos and parties that run all night, through the night. Apparently, it is a huge party place for young British people and flights to and from England are amazingly cheap. The beaches and countryside were beautiful but the all night partying is not our style and the cities were very dirty. We did enjoy some shopping and some walking however. We are now back on board the ship and heading to Africa. Can't wait to see what we will see tomorrow!

Sipping Drinks by the Pool

After boarding the boat in Livorno, Italy yesterday, we set sail for Monaco. We had a wonderful dinner, a relaxing walk around the boat and a very entertaining magic show last night. This morning, we got off the cruise boat in Monte Carlo. We took a guided walking tour around this 2 square kilometer principality. It is absolutely gorgeous! Amazingly clean, well run, beautiful, and EXPENSIVE! Real estate sells for more than $50,000 per square meter. This would put our current house at more than $21,000,000! Wow! I guess we would live in a medium sized cardboard box if we ever move to Monte Carlo. We loved every minute of our tour though despite the heat and after coming back on board the boat, we spent the rest of the afternoon lounging by the pool. Love this life!! Tonight, we will all get gussied up for the captain's dinner. Pictures to come when I have more time. I already have loads of them!

Friends, Food, and France

Our three favorite things all came together this week in perfect harmony. We had the most wonderful visit to France. Even better than we could have hoped for since the weather was a gorgeous 80 degrees every day, all day. We were able to hang out at the beach, do some walking on the coast and have many meals outdoors. Our friends loaned us a gorgeous gite in half of their longiere and we could not have asked for more comfortable living arrangements. The kids managed to see all of their friends and spend some quality time with each. I did lots of driving them around but didn't mind a bit as it gave me time to visit with the parents of their friends as well. We were invited to at least a dinner, sometimes a lunch and dinner and even a snack on each day that we were in France so we ate plenty of good food. It was wonderful! After a sad good-bye to Vannes today, we drove all the way down to Genoa, Italy where we are staying for the night. We will then drive 2 more hours to Pisa tomorrow before getting on our cruise. Can't wait!!

Ready to Depart!

We are busy, busy, packing our bags and getting our house ready to be loaned out to our Australian friends while we are gone. I took Coco to my brother today where she will be babysat during our vacation. I then took our two French kids to the airport for their departure. They got off without mishap. Hopefully we can do the same tomorrow... Back to packing... First a week in France, then a Western Mediterranean cruise. Can't wait!
We did find out today that Quincy has a broken tail bone! He was fooling around with friends at the swim meet on Monday and got a knee in the tailbone. He has been complaining about it all week so I took him in this morning for an x-ray. It is broken so our long travels are not going to be comfortable for him. Hopefully, it won't be too bad, however with a donut pillow and some Aleve!