Thanksgiving

Canadian Thanksgiving was a little late around here, but we sure did celebrate with our little family of ours. Since we has only been back from our trip a few days when we had our Thanksgiving dinner, things we pretty simple, but we had fun.

First off, we headed to market to get a few things for dinner.

There was no shortage of gorgeous fall weather to enjoy.

Then we enjoyed all the sights and sounds of a busy market day. We love market. Seriously. With all it's colors, produce diversity, sounds, smells and tastes...it's awesome.

The kids got to pick some veggies to roast for dinner. It was unanimous - a bundle of multi-colored carrots - yum!

Then we headed home, marveling at all the golden leaves on our street, of course.

And then everyone pitched in to set the table and put up a few decorations.

The kids had decorated napkin holders the day before and were pretty excited to get to put them on the table. 

Then the kids played while we finished up making dinner. Milayla had crawled up to Atticus to give him cuddles. It was adorable and I ran to get the camera just in time for Milayla to point out that I was taking a photo. Thankfully, she did give Atticus another adorable cuddle before proceeding to devour one of their cars (I sure wish we could find her a teether that she likes).

Then it was time for a small lesson on being thankful. Daddy and Milayla were in charge of teaching us a bible lesson. They chose to teach about the 10 lepers.

Then Atticus and I were up to show our Gratitude tree that we had been working on for the last week each night at dinner.

The leaves all have something written on them that we are grateful for. We could have easily kept going when we wrote out all the leaves but we ran out of time. After all the leaves were attached we kept a pile of "apples" next to the table and each night at dinner we each shared some way that we served someone (the "fruits" of our labors).

During our little lesson we added on one last batch of apples.

And Milayla thought the apples were literal...

We will definitely be repeating the tree (or at least some version of it) next year as it really helped all of us to focus on what we have and to always be mindful of ways that we can serve others. Even the kids understood how it worked and, as adults, it really helped to remind us how simple (and easy) service can be.

Then we wrote out a few thank you cards and headed to the table for dinner.

I must say, it was a nice meal. We experimented with a couple dishes that we probably won't be doing again, but it was fun to try something new. Besides, the most important part is that we enjoyed the meal together, remembering all the incredible blessings that we have to be grateful for and there are many. I feel so blessed to have this wonderful little family. They're awesome. I love them and I feel incredibly honored to be a wife and a mother to them.

Road Trip - Day 3 (Driving, Freiberg Temple, Kutna Hora)

Today consisted of driving, driving, and moooooore driving. Throw in a healthy dose of car sickness, getting lost a few times and having our car searched by the police for a bomb and you have a pretty good idea of how our day went. Thankfully, we arrived safely and still smiling at our hotel in Prague and Prague is beautiful. I already love it.

We began the day with another breakfast that took us much longer than planned (there is something so alluring about a nice, long, relaxed breakfast together that we just can’t seem to break free of) and then headed off for the Freiberg LDS Temple in Germany. Before heading out of Potsdam we crossed over the Glienicke Brücke, also known as the Bridge of Spies. Sounds exciting, doesn’t it? While the bridge itself is not one of the most spectacular, it was the location for several high profile exchanges of prisoners and spies between the west and the Soviets during the Cold War. I will spare everyone the small details, but if you are interested there is a nicely detailed synopsis of the most notable exchanges that can be found here (http://www.history.com/news/prisoner-exchanges-across-the-bridge-of-spies-from-powers-to-shcharansky).

The kids slept nearly the entire way to the temple. They were still pretty tuckered out from our day in Berlin (can't say I blame them).

After just shy of a few hours (and a session of General Conference via podcasts) we arrived at the Freiberg Temple. Boy, did it feel good to get out of the car and walk around the small temple grounds there. We attempted a family self-portrait. Our attempt did not result in a family picture but it did result in some laughs and that’s worth plenty. 

The only photo of about 5 that we are all actually in the frame

The kids were pretty ecstatic about getting a picture in front of the temple. Atticus was first up with Jason on the temple steps. 

Then it was Milayla and myself at a vantage point where we could get the Angel Moroni in the photo as well.

We talked about the temple with the kids on a fairly basic level; about how we were married there and how that means that we will be together forever. We talked about the peace and stillness on the temple grounds and the opportunities they would have to go inside the temple one day. Whenever we talk about church doctrinal things with the kids I always wonder how much is actually absorbed and understood, but when Atticus proceeded to serenade us for the next hour of the drive in the car with all the things we had talked about set to song (for example, "I loooooove the temple. Jesus looooooves the temple. Marriage. Promises. Leaaarrrrrning.") , I knew that at least some of things we talked about had settled in.

Before we left Freiberg, we snacked on our packed lunch and jumped in the car to listen to more conference and set our sites on the Czech Republic. That’s when the fun started. Shortly after leaving Freiberg, Milayla got sick - car sick - badly and multiple times. All those beautiful, winding, forested roads are not so beautiful when they make your little one motion sick. We pulled over, cleaned up, changed clothes and headed back on our way. We would repeat this same process three more times before finally arriving onto a smooth, paved, fairly straight high way that would take us the remainder of our journey. If we had not gotten lost on two or three occasions while in the pursuit of said high way it probably would have happened sooner, but road closures without detours are hard to navigate around when your gps does not seem to realize the road closures are there. Thankfully, for our little lady, arriving on the high way also meant she was able to finally enjoy some much-needed rest and fall asleep.

It was more hours than I can even remember before we arrived in the town of Kutna Hora to check out the world famous, UNESCO heritage site, chapels there. There are a few to check out but with closing times fast approaching (due to the longer than expected travel time) we were only able to see one. We chose the Ossuary. 

Yep, we went inside the Bone Chapel. Really not going to sugar-coat it here, it’s a tad creepy. The name of the chapel comes from the fact that it is decorated with bones complete with a large chandelier consisting of at least one of every bone in the human body being the crowning glory of the church. Myth says that the monk went mad a began stacking and shaping the bones of the bodies that were stored here, but all the fine decorating found in the chapel is actually the work of a woodcarver that was commissioned in the 1800’s by the family that owned the chapel to create reminders that death is something that besets us all. Personally, I think I could come to that understanding without needing to view a room full of bones but to each their own.

We took the approach with the kids to view it from a learning experience. Since Atticus had just done the unit on the Body in Joy School, he was pretty excited about seeing all the bones and asking what each one was called (Yay for Mommy and Daddy's Biology classes!). Though, even with the learning experience in mind, we did not spend much time in there. 

With the conclusion of the bone chapel, all the churches were closing which meant we were heading to the car and on to our hotel. We were all very tired and were not too crazy about our driving experience in Czech Republic until we pulled into downtown Prague and -  WOW -  Prague is beautiful. Narrow, cobble-stone streets barely large enough for your car. Beautifully detailed molded buildings swirling around you. Gardens peeking through rod iron gates and ivy escaping around buildings. People milling about, eating at cafes with tables spilling into the streets. We were all sitting with our heads gawking out the windows (except for Jason, who is a responsible driver :) ) when some kind police officers pulled us over and asked to search under our car hood and in our trunk, to look for bombs, of course. I didn’t realize we looked like the bomb sorts. All joking aside though, the police officers were truly very pleasant but it was a procedure that we certainly were not expecting. Shortly thereafter we arrived at our hotel only to be greeted with even more security measures that I did not realize were necessary here. It is certainly the most extensive measures that we have yet to encounter (passport numbers of everyone, information forms on each occupant etc). When we clambered up to our room we were greeted with a gorgeous, large room with a king size bed (albeit, with a rather lumpy uncomfortable mattress), couches, beds for the kids and antique wood furnishings and simple candle chandeliers. We were all very happy to throw our bags down, order room service for a late dinner, throw on our pajamas and cuddle up on the couch to watch some more of General Conference before tucking the kids into bed. And now I see that 11pm is quickly approaching and I have a lovely little girl who is lying awake in her cot next to me singing softly to me (as I am sure my typing and computer glare is keeping her up) so I better shut things down in order that we may all get some rest to prepare for a full day of exploring this beautiful city tomorrow. 

Pumpkin Carving

I know this is a little late, but I am still playing catch up with getting all of our trip photos online as well so things are in a bit of a jumbled mess.

Seeing that Halloween isn't really celebrated here, we have typically endeavored to do our own little family activities. Since last year's pumpkin carving was a lovely success we decided to give it another go this year. The day started off heading to market to pick out a pumpkin.

Milayla has been quite in love with this puzzle for the last few weeks and trying to get her out the door without it was an interesting feat. We probably would have let her take it if she would have been able to hold it while wearing her gloves.

Once bundled up and out the door, it was off to market. (check out Milayla's wonderful smile in the photo below. It's her most recent smile and we love it!)

 Despite the weather being a bit chilly (we nearly ran to market just for the sake of warming up) the sun was shining and we had gorgeous blue skies. It really couldn't get much better for end-of-October weather.

BRIGHT!

There was no shortage of squashes but pumpkins seemed to be in a strange minority since the last time we were there. We ended up finding one, smallish pumpkin and headed back for home.

Once home, Jason got the table ready while Atticus set to work trying to find some inspiration for our pumpkin. He consulted a very reputable source :) .

Then it was time for Mommy and Milayla to draw on the face.

Then the boys happily went to work cutting open the pumpkin...

scooping out the insides...

(they certainly enjoyed themselves.)

And while Jason took over for the cutting out, Atticus eagerly snuck nibbles of raw pumpkin while Milayla and I snapped away with the camera. 

And in no time, the pumpkin was finished! (there are certainly some advantages to picking a smaller pumpkin)

 We headed into Atticus' room to light it for the first time as it was still extremely bright out. The kids could not wait to see it lit up.

 TADA! Did we do a good job matching the inspiration from the book?

After we finished ooing and awing, Atticus gave his best attempt at blowing out the candle before he had a little fatherly assistance.

 It was sure a fun activity and we displayed our pumpkin proudly until he started to go the way that all jack-o-lanterns go. He at least made it to Halloween Day for our little get together with friends (more on that later).

Hope everyone had a great Halloween!

Half Birthday - Milayla

Happy Half Birthday to a wonderful, adventurous, intelligent, ambitious, beautiful little girl! We are so blessed to have you in our family. You're awesome. We love you, Milayla!