Definitely been too long...

However, without internet access what choice do I have???

Here are the "deets" for my "peeps"...

We did the walk-thru for our quarters (for non-military folks that is our house) on Tuesday the 16th. On the 17th we finished moving from the hotel into the house. I made 3 trips on Tuesday and James made one later that night. Then we each made a trip on Wednesday. I went to the house early on Wednesday morning to sign for the temporary furniture. Very "practical and utilitarian" I think and not at all comfortable. However, the closets (or schrunks) are really cool and fold-up until they are practically flat like a box. And, wonder of wonders, they are made in Vermont of all places.

On Wednesday morning while waiting for the 2nd delivery (first one was for the appliances - washer, dryer and refrigerator) James calls the Transportation Office to check on our HHG. They said they can make a partial delivery tomorrow. So on Thursday we accepted a partial shipment of 10 out of our 15 crates. Not sure how they got separated as I have been told they aren't supposed to be separated. Everything is supposed to go into the same shipping container. But that did not happen. We are still awaiting word on the arrival of our last 5 crates. It has been over 2 weeks but they still have the until the end of the month before they are "required" to be here in the warehouse ready for delivery.

The crates are packed in a totally random manner and so of course we have a weird assortment of items that have arrived or not! Here is a partial list....
Boys bedroom - complete except for bookcase (technically wasn't in their room)
Books - the ones that go on the aforementioned bookcase
Basketball backboard and rim, base but NO Pole to mount it on
Master bedroom bed - complete - lampshade for lamp completely crushed though the box looked undamaged, did not receive the bench in front of our bed, though.
Beautiful antique German bedroom set - night stands - check, bed, matresses, frame - check, lamps on night stands - NOPE, German schrunk - only part of it came so we just have panels and hardware, no bottom or top.
Large antique schrunk that was in the living room - only parts of this arrived
Less than 1/2 of my polish pottery arrived but the china cabinet it was in arrived as well as most of the other items in that room.
Most of my craft room arrived - still need to finish going through boxes to see what I am missing other than my little tv and THE LEGS TO MY CRAFT TABLE. Yep, got the top but no legs to stand on.
We also received the big pink chair but not the old couch or recliners for the taverna (basement living room). And we received the big leather chair and foot stool but not the loveseat or couch for the living room.

There are a few more things I could tell you but at least you can see how totally random it is. Almost comical really...what else can I do but laugh???

I have no pictures to post right now because my other big issue is no telephone or internet yet at the house. When James signed up for phone and internet they made sure to request a transfer of internet service. However, it seems that was not done. Apparently here in Italy internet is a new thing and so it is not always available. And when it is available you sometimes have to go on a very long waiting list to get service. (Hence the reason for a transfer of service and not new service). Anyway, we received our message on Monday saying that our contact was ready to sign. James went to the Housing office (he was at work) while I was still trying to get boxes unpacked. When he went in to sign the contract they told him that we were unable to get internet service. Not available any more. He discussed it with the liason and they are currently working on the problem. Until the issue is solved however, we will not have phone service either. We may have to come up with another option like wireless which can be pricey or check on another company that I just heard about yesterday. Telekom was the only provider here for internet and phone service for many years and thus had a monopoly and didn't work to please its customers. TKS, another company just came in about a year ago to offer phone and internet services. We used TKS while in Germany and liked their service. When we moved to Garmisch we had to go with Telekom and had numerous issues with them, including one 6 months after we left Germany.

So, anyway, right now I am sitting here at the library computer typing as fast as I can to get some words down as an update for all of you who are following our saga! Thanks for sticking with us. I only get an hour here before I have to relinquish the computer to someone else. However, the USO Center has free wireless so I may bring the laptop (after taking house photos and loading them up) and go to the USO to blog. The only problem there is it is also the BOSS Center which is for single soldiers. Not really a problem except that it is just full of young boisterous soldiers relaxing while watching movies, playing games etc. Sometimes the conversations they have or the movies they watch aren't ones you want to accidently overhear language wise. I will try to "catch" my wireless from outside at the picnic tables first. They let us know at inprocessing that the wireless in always on and that you can usually get a signal from outside at the tables in case the center itself is actually closed for the day (around midnight I think).

So, don't give up on me - I will "git 'er done".

Love and miss you all...

P.S. We have started an English bible study on Sunday evenings with the church. All of the Americans attend (all 6 of us adults plus our two boys and the two little girlies) and then any of the members of the Italian church that want to better their English. And on Saturdays, Titus & Pam (missionary intern for the summer) have started an English bible study for the young Italian kids at church. The boys are going to start attending that so that they can contribute and help the Italian kids who will be able to now understand a bit of what the boys are going through. So that is really great news!

Ciao for now. Have to run to my Italian class now.

Got to LOVE Ryanair!

Good friends of ours still live in Germany. We have been friends since 1997 so the boys have all been friends since birth. (Well Caleb was 15 months old when E came along). Anyway, ever since learning that we were moving back overseas the boys have been asking when are we going to see E & A? I wasn't sure when we were going to be able to make it to Germany to see them but I knew that at some point we would.

After speaking to Di several times we finally decided that the boys and I could come visit before they go back to the US for the summer. So James and I got online and checked Ryanair for flight information. We were able to find flights from Venice to Frankfurt for 9,99 Euro per person. Of course, after taxes and fees, it amounted to 233,99 Euro. But that is still pretty cheap. I think it converted to about $380. Not bad for a round trip flight for 3 people.

So the boys and I are here in Germany visiting our friends. The boys (there are 4 of them) are doing a great job of getting along. They do get a little loud at times but there have been no significant disagreements. Thank goodness! They spend a lot of time have Yugi-Oh card battles, playing on the WII, watching Myth Busters, etc. We took them to the Schwimmbad one day and they loved that. And we sent them out to the park as well. Yesterday, they went out to the park on their own.

It has been a nice visit for me as well. Lots of time just spent visiting. Very laid back days with little "scheduled". No stress that way. We were even able to go by our old house and visit with our neighbors - Ulla, Rolf and Nadine. I will post pictures of that later (I don't have my cord connecting the camera to the computer). And yesterday, Di and I picked up pizzas from my favorite pizza place. Da Nicos has moved since I lived here but it only moved around the corner. This was the place that James and I walked to at least once a week during the summer months to get pizza. So good and inexpensive and only about a 2 minute walk from our house. Man, kicking myself now because I should have taken pictures. Oh well, maybe we will go back and I can get a picture of the Italian pizza guys! Anyway, the pizza lived up to my memories. Perfectly done, no soggy spots!

Only 2 more days left here and then the boys and I will return to Italy. Upon our return we will have to start packing. During our absence James has signed lease papers for our house. We will start moving in on Wednesday the 17th. More on that later.

Ciao for now.

School Time

Well, this is a little late but I did want to report on how the enrollment process for school went.

I went into the high school and enrolled Caleb in the 9th grade. The counselor was not in at the moment so I was unable to sign him up for classes. We did however, get a list of the classes available. On the Monday, following this enrollment we went back to speak to the counselor to decide on Caleb's coursework for his first year in high school.

We decided that he would be taking Honors English & World History (this is a parallel course and neither can be taken on its own). He will also be taking Geometry, Biology, PE, Computer Apps and Italian I. If for some reason the Computer Apps class is full then Caleb decided he will enroll in JROTC. I wish this were offered separately instead of only as an elective. Our "requirements" for Caleb were that he take Italian I and be involved in some sort of physical activity.

The options for fall sports are Cross Country, Tennis, Volleyball and Football. Caleb decided that he would go out for the cross country team. Because the high school is so small anyone who tries out for the team makes it. (There are a total of about 300 students from the 7th through 12th grade). The counselor told us that the longest distance they run in Cross Country is 5K. So for the summer Caleb and I (and probably Jared and James as well) will work on a C25K (couch to 5K) running program. This way Caleb will be ready to run for the season. With his long legs and long stride he should be a natural at this. Even now when he walks with a purpose he can walk faster than I can. This is quite a feat as I usually have a pretty fast pace. I just can't keep up with him when he gets those long legs working.

James and I are very proud of the way he is adapting to starting public high school. He loves to be homeschooled but is accepting the fact that he will be in a public school environment next year. We made this choice for several reasons. One is that we believe that he needs more of a challenge, more competition for grades, etc. Second, I just don't think I can provide the best environment for the lab sciences in my home. Especially now that we are overseas - where am I going to get items for dissection or all the chemicals for Chemistry experiments?

Jared is now enrolled for 6th grade. He came with Caleb & I to Caleb's counseling appointment. He was very disappointed that he was too young for the Tennis and Volleyball team. He also seemed really disappointed that he will not be choosing his classes for the year. Once he realized that he will get to choose for 7th grade and that there will be more options he felt a little better. If I remember correctly there are no sports available for the elementary school. There may be track and field but nothing else. So Jared will be going through CYS (Child & Youth Services) to find a sport to participate in.

The crazy thing here because of the number of transitioning students is that we won't actually get a schedule for either child until the first day of school. So we will not know who their teachers are, what school supplies they need (besides the basics of pencils and paper) or even where to go for their first class. For Caleb, all the high schoolers meet in the school gym first thing to be introduced to the faculty and receive their schedules. I think there is an Open House so they can see where the classrooms will be about a week before school starts. Those poor kids will be very confused for the first week or so.

Another thing I find odd is that they do block scheduling. This in itself is not odd but they way they do it is. The high school students (and perhaps the middle school as well) take 7 classes plus one seminar (kind of like study hall but not). So this means they have 8 classes. This is broken into 4 a day. The days are then labeled A & B (but for the new school year they will be starting them as Black or Gold Days). Unlike college where you would have MWF classes and T,TH classes here you would have Black Days and Gold Days. This changes each week. For example the first week - Mon, Wed & Fri would be Black Days and Tues, Thurs would be gold days. The next week this switches and Mon, Wed, Fri are now your gold days and vice versa. Each class period is 80 minutes long and in the course of 2 weeks you would have attended each class 5 times. SO...for parents and student we have to remember what color day it is in order to remember what books and homework to bring to school. YIKES! Need to definitely keep a good calendar to keep track of that info. I do have to say that this schedule is better than what they used to do a few years ago. That schedule had them rotating every week which class was first. So week one you would have 7 classes and let's say English was your first class and Math was second. Then the next week Math would be the first class, English would move to the end of the day and whatever class was third then moves up to 2nd place. Oh my heavens, who thought that mess up? I think that would be very difficult to keep straight.

Better go for now.

Ciao.