Trip to Spain

Took a week in Marbella, Spain. Really nice to get away and just hang with the kids. Spent about 60% of our time in the pool and the rest drinking sangria and eating oranges.

In other news, Ethan had his tonsils and adenoids removed and tubes put in his ears. School also started this week. He's doing OK, still recovering from the surgery. Zaza (as she calls herself) has started at a new creche and will be there until January when she'll start going to Ethan's school. Ethan turns 4 in a couple of weeks - nuts!

Summer (or what tried to pass itself off as summer) is officially over. Leaves are changing colors, heat is on every night... we're a LONG way from LA. The heat was on a couple of different nights in July and August... craziness. Let's talk about the weather. Exciting stuff. No energy to do anything else.

Hope all our friends and loved ones are well.

Photos from Spain.

6 month break

I'm getting worse with this blogging stuff. Like to say it's just because we're really busy (we are), but it's also because I'm lazy. And because we lost our camera charger for several months and so are missing out on months of photos.

All good here, same theme as normal - kids growing up, all enjoying Bxl despite the shite summer weather we've had, work going well, really feeling settled now. Made some new friends, social lives getting better, casually shopping for a house, either as a primary residence, or taking advantage of how low the prices are in the South of Belgium and buying a vacation place - can't figure that one out at the moment for certain reasons.

Dad coming to visit in a week, then we're going to Spain for a week - my and the kids first time - looking forward to it and then England for Halloween. That's about it. We miss all of you. Hope you're all well. Photos of the kids and a link to a couple of random videos. There's probably a very easy way to post videos on here, but I'm clueless, so here's a link to my You Tube page.

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=astubing

2 months

2 months since I last posted - how lazy and undisciplined.

The honeymoon with Bxl is over and now it is becoming home. We miss all of our friends and always will probably, but the comfort level is much higher than it was 6 mos ago, and the careers are going well, the kids are settled. We've had a really mild winter and are now looking forward to a few months of spring and summer, with trips to Malta and Paris already booked and trying to plan another, thinking maybe Greece or Spain, somewhere hot, resort-y, with a steady supply sunshine, popsicles, ice cream and swimming/lounging with the kids.

Kids are good, overall we're much healthier than last winter, though Ethan was home all week last week with the flu. His vocabulary continues to grow, and he has us cracking up almost daily with his innocent, blunt observations.. An example: One evening a couple of weeks ago, she goes with Ethan to pick up Sonia from the creche, and while Sara is putting on Sonia's jacket, etc. Ethan has gone exploring as 3 year old's do, and he comes back and tells Sara, "Mommy, I saw a BIG BOTTOM!" Sara says, "what?!" "That lady, I saw her big bottom. She's got a big bottom!" Turns out one of the large-posterior'd women that works at Sonia's creche had unfortunately bent over right in front of Ethan, and he gave Sara (and another couple of women who were there a full report). While they all bit their lip and tried to get out of there as quickly as possible without cracking up, Ethan kept talking about the big bottom, and I'm sure the poor owner tried to pretend she didn't understand, but who doesn't understand a 3 year old kid yelling "big bottom!" over and over.

Assorted recent photos:













The nice big brother:



















The not-so-nice big brother:

























Ethan with his first go on the drums. At his friend, Leon's place. Gorgeous Art Nouveau house in the backrgound.

Video of the same: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bP4UOTQCZkw