Jasmine Enjoying Her Gift

Bryan's mom sent us several packages the other day and she put in a few gifts for our kitty. So thoughtful! Jasmine loves this gift. I don't know what you call it but she loves it. She likes to get in it and then when one of us walks by she jumps out and attacks us.


Here she is waiting to pounce!


She has gotten spooked and is going all crazy. You can tell by the way she has her ears.


She is not so sure about this one and neither are we! The kids love it though. You push some button and it starts singing. Bryan's mom loves to get us noisy things.

Great Gift

Bryan showing his great gift from some friends of ours. He is enjoying it ALOT!! Thanks Paynes!

Decorating the Christmas Tree

Here we are decorating the Christmas tree. The kids really enjoyed it this year. Ethan was a big help wanting to put up all of the ornaments. He got really tired waiting on Bryan to put on the lights.


Mikaila putting on her "name" ball ornament. This was given to her on her first Christmas (I think) by her great grandparents.


Ethan and Bryan putting on another ornament.


Mikaila and Bryan putting our angel on the top. She really was waiting for this the whole time.

Thanksgiving 2006

This Thanksgiving we got to spend with several of our friends and colleagues here in Poland. We traveled up to Northeast Poland and spent several days sharing, laughing, encouraging and just having a great time with 3 other families who are with the IMB. The kids really had a blast playing and getting to speak English with other kids and we enjoyed sharing and learning from each other. We had the most ginormous turkey! It was 37 pounds! We were all amazed at the sight and prayed that it would fit in the oven.

We missed getting to spend the holiday with our families in the states, but we had a good time with our overseas missionary family. We pray you all had a great "Turkey Day".

Here is the turkey. The biggest one I have ever seen! It took two guys to get it out of the oven.


All the food! We had stuffing, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes and the turkey of course.


The two huge pies! One pumpkin and the other pecan. Where was the chocolate? Nie ma - there wasn't one! So sad. It was fine though - I had my fill of buckeyes. Thanks Lid!


Mikaila and Rebecca are just really picking at their food. At least that is what Mikaila did.


Here are Ethan and Maciek enjoying the meal at the kids table.


Here are 3 of the guys (including Bryan) leading us in a time of worship. We were able to share the things that we are thankful for as well.


Here are some of the kids playing on the gamecube. All of them had turns the whole weekend long.


It wouldn't be Thanksgiving without watching football! Some friends brought a tape someone had sent them of a football game from the states. The guys finally got the kids off the gamecube so they could watch a little bit of it. I think they fell asleep, which is also typical!

Geocaching!

We had a fairly free Saturday a little while ago and decided to go search for a geocache. We thought that we might not have many more days of decent weather that we could do it. We all had a really great time. The kids were tired after the full day of hunting, hiking and exploring.

Ethan is leading the way! He was making sure that we were going the way it told us to go.


Mikaila is on the hunt. She sees it and is going after it.


Mikaila showing off her find! She found this one. It was great.


Stacey with the kids after the big find.

Zamek Lipowiec

After our hunt for the geocache we decided to go up to the castle and look around. It was really neat. At some point it was a prision for clergymen and later ruined by fire.

I don't know if you can really tell but, here are the tons of steps that we had to climb up to get to the castle. It is way up there! It was a great view and we all had a blast exploring the ruins of the castle.


This is Bryan explaining to the kids what parents used to do to their kids when they misbehaved and that they should be thankful that we only have them sit in time-out or some other "light" punishment.


This is the outside of the castle ruins.


View from the top of the tower.


This is another great view from the very top of the tower. It is a bit hazy. Bryan was the brave one and went up all the way to get the great picture.

First Snow! November 2nd

We have had our first and only snow so far here. It is cold but so far we have had only a little bit of snow - once. Quite disappointing. Here is a picture I took along the road as we were leaving our friends house up in northeast Poland.



Here are the kids bundled up for the winter weather! We are on our way to school.

Biggest Ant Hill I Have Ever Seen!

We saw this (and several others) along a road in northeast Poland. It is a huge ant hill! Can you believe that? They had to work a long time to build that I am sure and I would not want to be the one to disturb it either. People have come along and put a fence around them as you can see to make sure people beware.

Marshmallow Fields

They have them here too! We have a funny thing from Estonia that has carried over to here. While in Estonia we saw alot of fields that had these "marshmallows" in them and Bryan made a comment about them to a bus load of people while out with the mission group. They thought it was funny especially Mel. Anyway we were out with some friends up north and their volunteer team and Bryan pointed out these "marshmallow" fields to them. They enjoyed the comment. Thought you might enjoy especially those who know what we are talking about!

Silly Kids

Here's a picture of the kids making faces because they really didn't want their picture taken. They just wanted to play in the water fountain. We liked visiting this mall while we were in Warsaw. We found a store that had Dr. Pepper and a box of Rice Krispies in it.

Do You Want An Apple? How About A 100?

We went to a retreat for the SC's and families in the Baltic Field the last weekend in October. We went to the Baptist Seminary just outside of Warsaw and along the way we passed tons of apple orchards. It was really neat to see so many. We passed alot of trucks carrying the apples as well. This is one we came up on that I could actually get a picture of.

Windy Fall Day!

Here is a picture of Mikaila and Ethan on a Sunday afternoon. We had just finished eating out after church. It was really windy and it was also pretty chilly. I had the kids take off their jackets so they were a little cold and that's why they look it a bit. It was a nice fall day and reminded us of Oklahoma with all the wind!

Busted Lip Again

Please be in prayer for our little guy! This morning we got the dreaded call that no one wants to get. The school called and said that Ethan was hurt and they wanted us to come up to the school. They said he bumped his lip. We were not expecting it to be so bad. Anyway, he busted both of his lips pretty bad and got his nose pretty good too. This time he is closing his mouth and swallowing and he even ate some dinner and drank from a cup without a straw. So...this bump isn't as bad as the one that happened at camp back in August but it looks worse. Pray that it will heal up quickly and not leave huge bruises for too long. Here is a picture of Ethan taken tonight. Alot of the swelling has gone down. He has been a trooper!

After School Snack

Here we are with the kids at one of our favorite places - Coffee Heaven!
We had several errands to do so while we were out this day we decided to stop by and get the kids a muffin and we got our Latte/Mocha fix.


Chocolate Muffins - the best.


Here is a little bird that got in some how and lives in the mall I think. It was out looking for food while we were there and we decided to give it a little piece of muffin.

Our Apartment

Here are some pictures of our apartment. I thought some of you might want to see our place.


This is our living room. The windows above the couch is where the cat fell out. Just in case you don't know the story behind that statement just know that the cat is OK!


Here is our dining room and office.


This is a view of our balcony and our cat really loves to go out and sit on our grill to see everything.


Here is a view from our living room looking towards our kitchen and Ethan's room. On the left side is the door to our bathroom and on the right is the door to our laundry closet.

Mikaila's Room

This is Mikaila's room! It isn't finished yet. We are planning on painting it this winter and then we plan to hang stuffed water animals on the walls to go along with her fish theme. She picked this theme over princess stuff! We were kind of surprised but she really likes it.

Ethan's Room

This is Ethan's room! It is not complete yet. We are planning to paint it this winter and then hang some things (stuffed animals) on the wall. We tried to get a theme going of animals and such for his room but he loves cars so much that we had to get him a road rug. Once it is finished we will post new pictures.

Our Kitchen

Ojcow National Park - near Kraków

We went and visited this national park a couple of weeks ago with our old language teachers and their son. We had a good time and got to take some really neat pictures. I haven't gone through all the pictures yet so I might post some more later.


Mikaila and Ethan with Bryan. This is by a little waterfall that went into a special area of ponds where they breed/grow fish.




Miakaila and Ethan with Maciek.

Dzień Pieczonego Ziemniaka

Day of the Baked Potato!

The kids school had a party at the end of September and the theme was Potatoes. They had different games and things to do - all having to do with the potato. Unfortunately, the battery in my camera died after only a few pictures so I didn't get many. The kids are wearing hats with potatoes on them that they made in art class.