36 weeks

Here's a cute picture of the boys playing together nicely. :)

I'm 36 weeks. Woo-hoo!


Some of my dear friends gave me a shower on Saturday. I got lots of cute girly clothes, diapers and other essentials, and the comforter set for Judith's room!! Here are some pics from the brunch.

35 weeks

The first pictures were taken at breakfast one day last week.

The thing next to Jonas is his puppy dog. It's kind of a little blanket with a head, but he uses it as a pillow. Usually it stays in his bed (it's not the kind of thing we let him drag around all day), but on this day, "Woof-woof", as Jonas refers to it, joined us for breakfast. Jonas took the liberty of feeding him some blueberries.

The pics of Ezra are just of him wanting to be in on the picture taking action.

In Ezra news, he's been going for about a month now to a childcare provider on MWF mornings from 8-11:30. There are anywhere from 3 to 6 children there at a time. It's at her house, but she has a room set up like a classroom with a book corner, market place, dress up center, cubbies for jackets, table and chairs, etc. We have there for socialization purposes and also to help him with structured activities and transitioning from

one activity to the next. Mrs. Leila (his teacher) said today that she's really starting to see improvement in his socialization. Today, Ezra asked another boy if he wanted to play cars with him. Huge! He also asked if he could play with the boy's airplane. Ezra has had speech twice a month for the past year, but was recently exited from the program when he turned 3. Now, he will go for speech therapy on base, and occupational therapy in the community (with an English speaker of course) to help with his delays. He's made many improvements, but is still a little behind where he should be for his age. Our hope is that he will be caught up by the time he starts Kindergarten.

I forgot to take a belly picture yesterday, so I had to do it today right after I got out of the shower. The one on the

left, is me with Jonas. The one on the right, me with Judith. Looks pretty similar I think.

Oh, how I miss Spring time in Italy...

Versailles and Paris

We left our B&B in Bellac, and headed to Versailles. We did tour the palace, but there was no stopping to listen to the history of every peice of furniture etc. We had to keep moving so we got to listen to the audio commentary for about 10 seconds in each room.

(Right) The gate and front of the Palace.

(Left) The interior (from the second floor) of the chapel.

(Left) This is the king's bed chamber. (Below) The queen's bedchamber where 19 children of France were born. Every birth was a public affair so there was no question as to the legitimacy of the child.

(Right) The outside of the chapel.

I think this is the drawing room in the apartments of the dauphin and dauphine. I think my Grandma will love this room. The fabric reminded me of her. :) Not sure why...

The Hall of Mirrors. >

Ezra and Jonas were pretty happy when we finally made it out of the Palace and into the gardens.

Out in the gardens. Mike and Jonas checking out the swans.

Ezra enjoyed the triangle trees.

The boys found a stump to sit on while Daddy checked out the map.

After we left Versailles, we headed for Paris to spend the night. We ate at Hard Rock again. :) On the way out in the morning, we swung by Starbucks and then got diverted through the city because many streets were closed due to the Paris Marathon. We ended up driving right by a lot of the sites (but not the Eiffel Tower).

Here is the Louvre.

And St. Michael's Fountain.

And a cool sun dial near Notre Dame that I had never seen before.

This is the back of Notre Dame.

I tried to get some pictures of the marathon runners, but they were pretty far away from where we sat in traffic.

Then we headed home. All in all, it was a really fun trip. The kids were good for such a lot of time in the car and being in a different place every night. We only had one day of rainy weather, traffic was really only in the cities, and we got to see so much! It was a great success!

After a soggy day, Thursday we were ready for some Spainsh sunshine. It was only about 2 hrs and 45 min from our hotel in Beziers, France to Barcelona, Spain.

I was oblivious to the border patrol eyeing me as I snapped these pictures before Mike ever so gently reminded me I should not be taking pictures as we crossed the border.

We took a double-decker, on/off bus tour.

This is Estacio de Sants. It's an industrial park built in the mid '80s on the site of an old textile mill. The crazy sculpture is actually a kid's slide and they call the other things lighthouse-style towers.

These were taken where we got off at Placa d'Espanya. The Venetian towers and the fountain in between them mark the gateway to the park of Monjuic: the setting for the 1929 International Exhibition and the 1992 Olympic games. The building behind Mike and the boys a museum on Montjuic hill. A key spot fr leisure, culture, and sport. Our friend Rachel said she attended a water/light/music show at this giant fountain when she visited Barcelona. I guess it doesn't run during the day. :(

Right across the street from the museum was the Olympic torch. I don't know if the picture accurately portrays how big it is, but it is huge.

Our hotel was in the neighborhood of "Gracia". It was an independent town until 1897 when it became part of Barcelona. It wasn't too far from a couple of Antonio Gaudi's works of art. This (left) is Casa Batllo`. Built 1904-1906 it was actually a house (the levels above the street). It is particularly colorful at night.

This (right) is Casa Mila` or "La Pderera". Built 1906-1910, it is now a musuem for other of Gaudi's works and a period apartment. We didn't go into either of the them. As you can see, they were quite crowded.

We couldn't really decide if we really liked this cathedral, called Sagrada Familia, or really did not like it. It is another one of Gaudi's works. His life's work. It was begun in the late 1800s and is still under construction. Upon Gaudi's death in 1926, only one tower was completed. Now there are 4 in the front and 4 in the back.

This is the front of the cathedral. >

This is the back.

There was a park across the street (in the front and the back actually) which proved handy for some photo ops with the kids.

Acting silly. As always.

We paid our obligatory visit to Hard Rock-Barcelona. Here's a video of Jonas hard rockin' it as he's eating his hot dog.

On our way into town, we saw a cool fort/castle on the ohter side of the highway a made a mental note to stop on our way back. This was a Spanish fort in Perpignon, France. When the French conquered this area of Catalonia, they turned the fort into a prison/torture chamber for those who were unwilling to accept French rule.

We walked to the fort on a path from a rest stop on the highway. We arrived just as they were closing (the story of our lives!). Mike and the boys are supposed to be making sad faces (left). We've been working on "faces". Above and left are their happy faces. Under that, shows what is supposed to be their "serious" faces. They are as unconvincing as their sad faces. :)


A windmill on the way to Limoges, France. We stopped for just about an hour in the porcelain capital of France. I was hoping to pick up some cheap porcelain, but I didn't have much time to shop around. I ended up heading to a factory (with 30 min until closing time) and got just a few items. It wasn't as cheap as I had hoped.

Then onto our B&B in Bellac, France. It was by far, the most charming place we stayed. It was run by a Brit/Scot couple and their teenage daughters. It was a town house that was about 400 ears old. As luck would have it, my camera battery died. :( So I didn't get any pictures.