Apa and Blaise

Apa and Blaise enjoyed their time together. Here they are one morning looking for bunnies in the backyard and listening for cardinals.

Feeling at Home

Blaise and Apa have a fun game of building towers and knocking them down.  It is great fun.

We saw Elmo!

Elmo and friends were visiting in Chicago a few days after we arrived.  We had only been in the US for one full day before going to see Elmo live at the Rosemont Theater. Blaise really loves Elmo, so we had to go see him in person.  We prepped him a little bit, but I think I was more excited than he was. I love going to the theater and I hope that this was one of many productions that Blaise enjoys.  And enjoy he did.

Giving Daddy some love before the show as he takes it all in

I love the way Elmo is peeking around corner

Love this!

First Day at Gma's and Apa's

It's hard to remember exactly what we did so long ago (6 weeks is a long time when you travel with two kids!), but I think we spent the first day relaxing, playing with our new toys and saying hi to Grandma Sco.

These pictures were taken with my ISO up too high, hence the noise :(

At the Park

I have some mega catching up to do with you all and my blog.  I had some minor technical difficulties which aren't completely rectified, but we're working on it.

Here are some pictures of Blaise at a playground near our house.  We have a little yard area behind our building, but we haven't really taken advantage of that all that much.  It is convenient to have a play area about five minutes away, though!

The Unveiling

My Mom has always enjoyed baking and making my birthday (and wedding!) cakes.  We have given her the honor of baking Blaise's two birthday cakes.  Last year's was a fish based on his love of swimmy fish and this year's was Elmo based on his new found love of the little red monster.  She is very methodical in her ways and it shows in the outcome.

Those of you interested in children's birthday cakes in Germany, I can highly recommend the online service of Backformenladen.  Not that it is impossible to find cake pans here, but the selection leaves something to be desired.  Backformenladen has (at least what seems like) hundreds of pans for many occasions available for rent (also some to purchase).  The price is fair and I liked the idea of renting so that I don't end up with 40 pans by the time my kids move out (less stuff!).  I found them very easy to deal with and accommodating.  They ship cake paraphernalia (food coloring, icing, baking soda, etc.) along with the pan and you pay for whatever you use.  We actually didn't use this service, but it was good backup should we have run out of something (which we almost did - Elmo's fur needed a lot of coloring!).