Monday, November 16, 2009

Our Crazy Little Family


In an effort to take a Christmas photo, the troops ended a little restless. This is the best photo we have to offer! I keep waiting for a sunny day, but once November hits, they are few and far between.



I thought I'd share about our weekend. It was pretty typical, and shows a little more what our life is like. On Friday, we went over to Fabio and Alyssia's for dinner. They invited us "early" this time--7pm. We had the typical Italian meal. The first course was soup with homemade broth (a staple in most Italian cooking) and homemade pasta that were short little pieces about as thick as speghetti. The texture was similar to dumplings. So, so yummy. The second course was the shredded meat that came from making the broth, mixed with garlic, capers and yellow peppers. On the side were the potatoes and carrots also used to make the broth. Afterward, we opened some dessert wine and ate hot castagne (chestnuts), right off the stovetop. Castagne are everywhere right now and are a typical merenda (snack). Again, so yummy.

All was followed up by ripe clementines. The kids began melting down around 9:30, so we headed home. The highlight was Fabio's excitement over the Italian Bible Cody gave him. He had been thinking a lot about their conversation the previous week--even talking to his co-workers about it. Please keep praying for the time they will get together to begin talking about what he's read.

On Saturday morning, our tradition is to make homemade pancakes. Before importing syrup, we topped them with Nutella. We also recently discovered real American-style bacon, which is also greatly enjoyed with our pancakes. Afterward, the whole family spends the morning cleaning our apartment. This past Saturday, we went to our local McDonald's for lunch because we saw that Happy Meals are Star Wars themed right now. Such a little thing, but it's amazing how much fun that little treat was for the kids!

Saturday afternoon is spent working on homework for Hannah. Often her homework can take 3-4 hours. It's an event. This weekend, it wasn't too bad. That night we made homemade pizza and it was an early bedtime for the kids since we were out late the night before.

On Sunday morning, we have church together as a family in our home. Because of the lack of space available for protestant churches, our church here is not very family-friendly. So we have church at home and then Cody or I take turns walking the four blocks down to church to worship. This week at home church, we spent the majority of our time together writing a letter, color pictures and praying for the Compassion child we sponsor in Rwanda.

We finished homework in the afternoon and played the Wii a little. We got the Wii last winter when we were stuck inside for months. It has been so much fun for our entire family, and it provides a little exercise during the months when it rains for days on end.

Finally, we made cashew chicken (from a packet I imported) and egg rolls last night for dinner. Yum, yum, yum. We ended the weekend with extra reading before bed and an episode of Battlestar Gallatica for Cody and I after the kids were tucked in.

We turned in early, in preparation for a long week. A good weekend.

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