European Adventure

Season 6 Episode 5

2014-12-10T19:00:00.001+02:00

This is always a busy time of year for us no matter where we live. We started off our "Holiday season" with a small Thanksgiving gathering at a friend's place where we had the FULL menu! I split the menu responsibilities with one other girl and it worked out great! I made the Turkey, gravy, green bean casserole, pumpkin pie, apple pie and taco dip. Gotta throw the appetizer in there because there clearly won't be enough food... My friend Ally made the mashed potatoes, sweet potato casserole, stuffing, and covered hosting, providing champagne with frozen berries and lots of appetizers! It was a success and was so nice to get together with friends and eat great food and visit. We even got a little bit of a football game in and the kids were all pretty well behaved (minus Eli's pre-party drama of getting ready to go...) But all-in-all it was fun and we have a lot to be thankful for. It was probably also the most healthy Thanksgiving I've ever had since everything here is so fresh- got my turkey the day before from a farm... and everything was made from scratch because of a lot of the things we would use in the USA to cook aren't available here- (pumpkin pie filling, pie crusts, cream of mushroom soup, french friend onions, evaporated milk... just to name a few!)

The weekend after Thanksgiving was so much fun- we cleaned and put up the Christmas decorations which is always fun, especially watching the excitement through a 3 year old's eyes. We also headed downtown Dornbirn (10 minute walk) to check out the Christmas Markets here. They are so magical, I say that every year for every city but it's really true. It feels so good to see the city all lit up and with people out gathering together, visiting, having hot chocolate, or wine and enjoying each other's company. The weather has been great here too so that helps. Today was probably the coldest day we've had and it was in the 30's. Our favorite part of the market so far is a small area with little stands all lined up in a circle with a fire pit in the middle. There is also a stable with a donkey and some sheep and the kids can also ride a mini horse around this circular area. This is the first Christmas market area I've been to where there are more eating/drinking areas than shops. Every time we go wander around downtown for a walk it is completely full of people out and about.

Speaking of the weather here- it's amazing how no matter what the temperature or if it's snowing or raining, people are out walking. They walk their kids to school, walk to work, go for bike rides or runs.. I've even had enough ambition to go running a few times the last few weeks in the "colder" weather. I try to imagine if everyone at home in Coleraine would walk to the post office, or the bank every day, or even to the Locker Room (might be a bit safer ;) what our town would look like and if there would be more social interaction that way. There are so many great things about Europe that I wish we would adopt back at home (health care, maternity leave, vacation times, work hours and Christmas Markets to name a few) but there are also MANY things I wish Europe would go about differently too (make dryers the norm so my clothes aren't crispy every day, get things done when they say they will not when they feel like it and a wider selection of foods and products at an affordable price.) We are lucky enough to spend time in both parts of the world throughout the year so get to enjoy the perks of both before you get sick of one or the other.

The last 5 out of 5 Sunday games for Andy have been home games which is awesome- these games are at 5:30pm so Eli and I are able to stay for the whole game AND I don't have to cook dinner since we eat our dinner in the VIP room after the game (fancy.) Eli and I generally don't do Friday home games since they start at 7:30pm and that would be pushing it for the little's bed time....and mine. ;)

I've officially hit the 2nd trimester mark and am feeling really great still. Looking forward to the experience of having a baby in the USA vs. Croatia. Let me tell ya it will be hard to beat; I had an awesome experience. AND my experience in Austria so far has been absolutely amazing. I have seen our baby 5 times so far in ultrasound and I am 15 weeks pregnant. We are really bummed to find our our family doctor at home no longer will be doing OB so we will have to so see a different doctor for my pregnancy and delivery. Oh well, it will all work out just fine.

Ok well I think that brings us up to date on our happenings- I hope you all have a nice Christmas surrounded by family and friends!

Now onto the part some may not like- Stop reading here if you don't like hearing other's opinions.

There are some MAJOR issues and accusations flying around at home in Coleraine that everyone has an opinion about. It's a big deal that is affecting our community. I do not know all of the facts (neither do you) but I can tell you what I know and my general thoughts on it.

What we know:
There was bullying that happened at Greenway High School in 2012.
The bullied reported the incidences to authority figures and they were not documented and the bullies were not punished.
The bullied committed suicide in 2014.

What we don't know:
If the bullies are going to be punished.
Who exactly knew about this happening and did nothing about it (principal, teacher..ect?)
How do you figure out who knew and didn't do anything about it?
The reason for suicide (do we every really know unless there is a detailed documented reason left?)

My thoughts:
The family of the bullied should press charges against the bullies if this is what they wish.
The authority figure who failed to document the report and make the student feel comfortable in his learning environment should be fired.
There needs to be more information on what happened between 2013 when the student left the school and 2014 when he committed suicide.
The lawyer in charge of this case for the family, needs to be careful with her outrageous posts on local community member's Facebook pages and newspaper articles and realize she is a professional. And if she wants to be taken seriously, remove the word "lawyer dog" out of her website name and get some real photos of herself for her professional website, not selfies taken in her car.

As for people's Facebook posts- I really don't care what you post because it's Facebook and you have the freedom to write what you want. I have seen quite a few posts lately about people complaining and saying things like "I'm not on Facebook to see your posts on political views, to be invited to games, to see negative news articles, or to buy something from your home business." Well newsflash people- Facebook was NOT created to cater to YOUR specific wants and needs. Quit being so self centered. People can post what they want when they want, that is the joy of Facebook. Each person likes Facebook for different reasons. I love it for staying connected with my family and friends that are on the other side of the world and posting pictures and videos of my son for them to enjoy. I don't expect everyone to enjoy my posts or videos. Remember they are not specifically for you unless I say so.

We need to remember we have SO many choices in life- we are lucky enough to live where we DO have choices. So I choose to ignore your terrible, negative posts on the school and community I love. I choose to not play your games or buy your product unless I want to. I choose to scroll past your negative posts on how horrible your life is. Instead I choose to smile at the photos of my friends and their kids, to like the posts of the great things GHS and Vandyke Elementary are doing for our community (Greenway gives for example) and to surround myself with positive people and posts because we all know the more positive people you are around, the most positive you will be and vise versa.

Your Choice.

Season 6, Episode 4

2014-11-21T14:33:00.000+02:00

I have to set the scene for today because it was a feel good morning: I dropped Eli off at school (he is going to school FOUR mornings a week now, such a big guy!) Then came home to see Andy off to pre-game. I cleaned up the house a bit as you have to do about 6 times a day with a 3 year old, then I loaded up my backpack with my computer, ipad and my trusty Erin Condren life planner and hopped on my bike and headed downtown. This bike ride probably takes about 4 minutes but it’s still really nice- the mountains are covered with snow, but it’s still nice out here (currently 50F at 10am). It’s so liberating riding your bike places- I imagine it’s kind of what people who ride motorcycles feel, to some extent. I locked up my bike and headed into Toys-R-Us in search of a Doctor Kit for Eli for Christmas and didn’t have any luck, then I walked into another store for a few small gifts for him to finish up our Christmas shopping. That’s right folks- we’re done! I feel so organized and put together for this holiday season! I think it could have something to do with being pregnant (Yup!!) and starting to feel that giddy organized/nesting feeling you get. plus I’m a pretty organized person to begin with so top that off with a lot of time on my hands and voila- shopping done. I ordered our Christmas cards and all of our gifts to be shipped to my rock-star mother-in-law & mom who takes care of all the dirty work for me (wrapping and distributing). Thanks Moms! Now I am sitting in a cozy chair at my favorite little cafe, Cafesito sipping a decaf cafe Americano and starting my writing that is a bit overdue (maybe I spoke too soon on the being organized thing!) Time to jump back a few weeks to mom’s visit! (my cue to grab my planner and see what we did when...)

Mom arrived on October 23rd at the Zurich airport and Eli and took the drive to pick her up. The border of Austria/Switzerland is about a 10 minute drive away and Zurich is about an hour from there. Very easy drive- not mountainous at all. Eli was really excited to pick up Grammie and was great in the car. (I still have vivid images of him from birth-1 years old being a terror in the car so sometimes I still can’t believe he is so good in there now! In his defense, he was rarely in a car from birth to 1 since we lived in Croatia and walked everywhere.) We arrived WAY too early to pick her up because I’m always early for everything- which sometimes isn’t the best thing with a small child.. so we played games and wandered around the airport while waiting. Right after Grammie came out Eli and I went to the bathroom and from there he ran out to Grammie and told her “mama has a baby in her belly!” He sounds excited but we’ll see about that! On the drive back to Dornbirn, Grammie sat with Eli in the back seat visiting and playing some games. The following day Andy had a home game vs. Salzburg and it was a Friday night game- 7:30pm and we decided to stay the whole time with Eli even though he was up way past his bed time. He had a blast and was exhausted after. We lost by 1 but it was a really good game.

The next couple of days we spent showing Grammie our Dornbirn routine. We had a team Halloween Party on Monday night where Andy was Forrest Gump and I was Jenny. It was very loud but fun considering I didn’t get to drink anything with spirits.

The next day we decided to take a trip to Lake Como, Italy to spend Mom’s birthday so we booked our room and packed our bags. The drive was pretty uneventful until we came upon a mountain pass that for some reason my GPS in the car took me through. Later I come to find out this is one of the top 10 scariest drives in the world. When I told friends from here I took the Splugen Pass their eyes got wide and they couldn’t believe we drove it. It started off in Switzerland with hairpin turns in a lightly wooded area until we reached the top of the mountain then the landscape changed once we hit Italy. It was a very rocky mountain with NO trees (meaning nothing to stop your fall...) These hairpin turns literally had ski slalom sticks to navigate your turns.

Splugen Pass- Switzerland.

The pass ended in a forested area in northern Italy until we finally wound down to the bottom- almost 3 hours later. At the time I wasn’t really scared while driving it- but thinking back on it- it was really really scary and dangerous! When we arrived in Griante, Italy to our hotel I looked up an alternate route home so I could have peace of mind while we were there that our drive home would be less eventful. We arrived in the afternoon and had a quick lunch at the buffet at our hotel which was right on Lake Como. After this we ended up hanging out in the room for a while where I tried to get Eli to settle down for a short nap. Mom went wandering for a while during Eli’s nap. He was amazing in the car for the 4 hour drive- not one complaint. I think he was bottling it all up for us for the rest of the trip because he was terrible the whole time. No joke. Tantrums and whining and not listening..you name it- he did it (Happy Birthday Grammie!!) After we convinced Eli to go outside and wander around we ended up walking along the water and came to some small shops and restaurants where we sat down for dinner. I ordered some Bruschetta and onion soup, Eli had a margarita pizza and mom got Spaghetti. All the food was excellent. Which hasn’t been my experience with food in Italy surprisingly. We headed back to the hotel after this with more tantrums and complaints from the peanut gallery and I needed a mom time-out so spent about 20 minutes in the lobby people watching and taking deep breaths while mom played with Eli in the room. After gathering my nerves I went up and mom took her turn wandering the hotel and people watching while I got Eli to bed. There were vendors set up in the lobby selling handmade crafts and quite a large group of tourists staying at the hotel.

Quick break in Switzerland to check out this view!

Bellagio, Italy on Lake Como

The next morning we got up and headed to the breakfast buffet (is there anything better than a breakfast buffet?!!) Well actually this one wasn’t that great but usually they are amazing. If you ever go to a breakfast in Europe, be prepared for runny scrambled eggs, warm milk and fatty bacon. And lots of bread, cheese and deli meats. After breakfast we checked out of our room and I packed the car up. After that we hit the streets and finally convinced Eli that the ferry ride across Lake Como to Bellagio would be fun. Thank God I decided to leave the stroller in the car because Bellagio is NOT stroller friendly. The ferry carries cars and people so Eli thought that was pretty cool. The ride took about 10 minutes. Bellagio is a quaint town built into the mountain and right on the tip of the “wishbone” of Lake Como. We wandered in and out of this town for a few hours and had a great lunch there next to some other Americans from Wyoming. I ordered soup again (I have a thing for soup, both making and eating it.) And ordered mom a spicy Italian sandwich on foccicia bread while she finished up her shopping. The monster child got our scraps ;)

After lunch we headed back to the ferry and from there got in the car and headed back home. It was nice having a different drive home than on the way there- not just because the mountain pass is a death trap- but to see some new things. This drive took us from Griante, Italy to Lugano, Switzerland which was about a 30 minute drive. This road was narrow and wound around the edge of Lake Como and went through some small towns- it was amazingly beautiful. Once we got through Lugano it was a FREEWAY for about an hour- now THAT was relaxing. Eli was snoozing the minute the car was on that smooth road (after a quick pee in a bottle in the car, don’t judge.) After about an hour of freeway you come upon another mountain pass in Switzerland but this one is a wide 4 lane....with guardrails.. and AMAZING views. After this pass it’s again freeway until Dornbirn. The drive home took 3 hours. The drive there took 4 hours 15 minutes and 3 years off of my life.

Back in Dornbirn we headed to Andy’s game then the following day we had Eli’s school Halloween party. He was a fireman or “Fighter Fighter” as he calls it. It was such a nice party. Eli’s teachers did an awesome job decorating and making fun Halloween snacks. We ended up painting pumpkins at home one night and Eli made it into a body painting experiment. He had paint in his ear for a week that I didn’t see. Painting pumpkins is so much more efficient than carving them with small kids. How can a small child control a knife to carve?! I can barely do it.

On the Saturday before Mom left we decided to take the gondola up to the top of the mountain in Dornbirn. It’s about a 5 minute ride up and I felt worse on that then I did on the drive through the mountain pass- maybe because I was the one in control on the mountain pass. Probably the same reason I don’t do “rides.” I mean really, how do you know those fair rides are up to code and safe to ride on? You don’t.

The top of the mountain had, as you can imagine, amazing views! You can see 4 countries from there. Austria, Switzerland, Germany and Liechtenstein. There is a really nice restaurant at the top and a play area for kids so we sat down and ordered an early dinner. Eli ordered schnitzel (his favorite food). And Mom and I got... you guessed it- Soup! We got pumpkin soup and a beef soup that were both AMAZING. We went to the top of the mountain at the perfect time- about 3:30pm. This way we got to see the views in the daylight and we got to see the sunset and the view in the dark! After we ate we walked some of the mountain trails. The ride down wasn’t as bad as the ride up since I couldn’t see anything. I highly recommend taking the ride up or even better- walking up since it’s pretty expensive to take the gondola (about $20 per person round trip). If I didn’t have Eli with me- I would walk up and take the gondola down...or maybe vise versa ;)

On the ferry leaving Bellagio, Italy. Lake Como.

The next day was time for mom to go home already! Once again we were early to the airport (better early than late!) And we got mom shipped off safely from Zurich to Chicago. The family visits always go too quickly.

The next day was the beginning of Andy’s time off. Once or twice a year they get about 4 days off. We decided to hang around Dornbirn and take it easy instead of travel which I’m really happy we did. I had my first Doctor’s appointment this week too. We did a lot of walking, biking and lounging which is a dream for a gal in her first trimester! On the last day of break we went to a birthday party for Eli’s friend/Andy’s teammate’s son. It was at the indoor playground and was such a blast. After break we settled back into our routine and decided that we would send Eli to school 4 mornings a week from now until Christmas break. Hopefully this extra day will help improve his sharing...and his tendencey to speak in the 3rd person. That Friday Andy was on the road and then Sunday started their 5 in a row home game streak. And they started it with a win which was awesome. I had my 2nd Doctor appointment this week- I know, seems so close together, and it is compared to home. At this appointment, my doctor determined that I am 12 weeks pregnant, not 11 like we had thought previously. I have had 3 ultrasounds and will have another one next week at the specialist where they send you when you are 13-14 weeks pregnant to have blood work and other tests done. The care here is absolutely amazing. It will be interesting to see the difference in giving birth in Croatia vs. the USA. I will definitely write about it.

Well that about covers it for now. Next up for us is Thanksgiving next week then starting our Christmas decorating and planning for our next visitors- Papa and Grammie Carol right after Christmas. I’m heading back on my bike to pick Eli up from school- with Christmas markets, trees and lights being set up as we speak! It’s been a good morning!

Now to end it with my usual topics of controversy! The fun part! So- as we all know there has been a ton of posts and conversations about Kim Kardashian's huge ass all over the internet- and for some reason it is not censored. My favorite thing about this was on Instagram- Chelsea Handler was making fun of her and of Instagram's censorship policies by posting a photo of her own butt, and of herself topless, which were of course taken down by Instagram, but Kim's were allowed on there. What the heck? Finally Chelsea posted a photo of herself all dressed up and ready for a night out in a nice black dress with her underwear around her ankles with the caption, "Don't worry Instagram, I would never post a photo of my pickachau 1.) because I have a family and 2.) Talent." It was great. NOW Alyssa Milano was also in on these comments talking about how she got so much backlash for posting a photo of her breastfeeding her baby but Kim K's photo was fine being online. Ok here is what I have to say about that:

I do not want to see Kim Kardashian naked on my newsfeed, but guess what- I don't want to see pictures of you breastfeeding either. I am and will be a breastfeeding mom until I feel is an appropriate time to stop BUT that doesn't mean that I need to post pictures of myself feeding my baby for you to see. Yes it's obviously natural blah blah blah BUT it makes people uncomfortable to see your naked breast in public it's just the way it is. Until it is socially acceptable to walk around comfortably topless while NOT feeding our babies, it will make people uncomfortable. Have you ever said to yourself "Man, I hope we see a woman breastfeeding her baby when we're out eating dinner tonight!" No you haven't. When I fed my baby and will feed this one, it is a private thing and the world doesn't need to see. If you happen to see a little bit when I'm feeding him, oh well- no big deal; but I will not purposely hang myself out there for you to see OR post a photo of it. Unnecessary- I'm just going to focus on feeding my baby. That being said- if you want to breastfeed your kid till he's 4 or if you want to post photos of your butt implants all over the internet that's your choice but don't expect to have society not have an opinion about it.

Have a nice weekend!

Season 6 Episode 3

2014-10-22T12:29:00.000+03:00

Once again time got away from me and it's been a while- but that's ok because we haven't been up to a whole lot! I thought it would be a good idea to do an update before tomorrow when my mom arrives! Then I can do a new post when she leaves.

We have had an amazing fall here in Dornbirn. The weather has been so nice; perfect for sweatshirts (some days t-shirts!), running, biking and having the windows open. Since the last post when Andy got his new bike, I was also given a bike! And now I know that I was a terrible biker only on a much-to-big for me, male bike. I'm a rockstar on mine :) Which makes me feel better because coming from an athletic person it was hard to take that I couldn't ride a bike very well! The bike store decked it out with a basket on the front that is removable so you can take it into the store or market with you and use that as your bag, and a child seat on the back, which I haven't convinced Eli that it is safe or very fun yet. One day I bribed him with a half of a twix bar to get on and we rode for about 4 miles. I followed the river trails and we came upon some people horseback riding and he thought that was really cool and we stopped at a park and played. I had to reiterate to him that I would not drop him and he was safe several times throughout our ride. He prefers to ride his own bike or go in the stroller, which is fine too. He is looking forward to getting a bike with pedals when we get home to Minnesota. Eli has adjusted to his school routine and finally is participating in the group activities such as group singing and counting and he seems to enjoy school (even if he says he doesn't). It took a while to adjust to going but he's finally at the no-tear drop off (has been for about a month) and that makes running errands for me much more relaxing and enjoyable.

Andy has been busy and in the full swing of the regular season, his team has been struggling a bit lately but that seems to happen to everyone at some point in their season. He was gone on a 5 day road trip last week which never happens so Eli and I kept busy with lots of walks and park dates. We also spent a Saturday morning at the indoor playground; a kid's dream come true! This place is amazing. We have had one in every city we've lived in in Europe but this one is my favorite and seems the most sanitary. That is the hardest part about these things- the germs... But we make sure to do lots of scrubbing halfway through and when we're done playing there. This time I was actually able to sit down and have a tea (I did bring my book too, but ended up just watching Eli play.) We ended up eating lunch there and having a really great morning. Leaving there is always tricky! I usually have to tell him that they're closing for nap time.

A few weeks ago we were invited to go to the Dornbirn Indians Baseball game. We were amazed they had a professional baseball team here since you very rarely see Baseball in Europe. We headed over to the field and it was a HOT fall day, perfect for a ball game. It was a playoff game vs. Vienna and they won. It ended up that the following weekend they lost in Vienna in the finals. It was so interesting and fun to watch. I sat next to one of Andy's Austrian teammates and explained all of the rules of baseball since he had never seen a game. This field was something else. The entire field was gravel and there was about 20 yards of grass in right field, otherwise the entire outfield was made of hard, chunky gravel. If a ball was hit just right it could hit a rock and bounce off in the other direction. The team's uniforms are an exact replica of the Cleveland Indians. It was entertaining and fun and felt like home. Minus the sunflower seeds.

One Sunday Andy had a home game and we had friends come to watch the game and visit. They are living/playing hockey in a town in Switzerland not very far away from us so it was fun to see them and catch up.

There is nothing quite like the smell of fall and of pumpkin spice. It's all the craze this time of year; pumpkin everything! I needed to get a fix and hopped on the pumpkin spice bandwagon. Since they don't sell canned pumpkin here, I made my own. It is much easier than you think. You need to buy the small "sweet" pumpkins, not the large carving ones (the large ones are more hollow and don't have as much "meat") I cut it up into chunks, removing the seeds and set those aside for roasting. Next you place them face down on a baking sheet drizzled with a little olive oil and bake for about 60-90 minutes on about 400F. This smell is glorious. When they are finished, they should be soft. After cooling, scrape off the goodness, cut into chunks and puree. I pureed about 1/4 of mine with some spices (cinnamon, cloves, and all spice) then added that to the other 3/4 and voila. We ended up baking pumpkin, oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and they were probably the best cookies I've ever made. I'm usually not the best at baking- I prefer to cook but man they were tasty. Eli took some to school to share- we ate the rest :)

There was one random day at the beginning of October when it was over 80 degrees out. We just had to spend the day outside so I made a picnic dinner (chicken wings, potato salad, and an extra large deli sandwich on ciabiatta bread.) We biked down to our favorite spot along the river and enjoyed our dinner then Eli swam and rode his bike in the water.

When the team was on their 5 day road trip, Eli and I went with a friend her her daughter to the neighboring town, Bregenz to walk around and find this jumpy house carnival for the kids. Bregenz is beautiful, it's about a 10 minute drive or train ride from Dornbirn and sits right along the water of Lake Constance. I forgot to grab the stroller so it was a little tiring for Eli but he survived and we found the bouncy house place which was super fun for the kids but a parent's worst nightmare. It was dirty and there were carnies everywhere and snotty coughing kids bouncing their germs everywhere. A few days later I was sure Eli had the chicken pox but it wasn't. Anyways, we had a nice time and it was nice to visit with another adult when Andy was gone.

We also spent some time at the train station when he was gone- Eli loves just sitting there watching trains come and go. A few days later we took the train to Bregenz and walked around there and ended up eating dinner there at a Mexican place. Not recommended. But it was fun and the restaurant is in a great location for people watching.

That about sums up our last month or so here in Austria! I did mark down a couple things I wanted to write about so I will do that quick!

The garbage/recycling system here is just amazing- I may have talked about this already but I need to again. You have yellow plastic bags for all plastics. These bags get picked up about every 2 weeks. We have a calendar that says which days what gets picked up. There is also a compost bin where you put ALL food scraps this is picked up about every 10 days and we have one of these right outside our building, along with a bin for paper and cardboard. You have to bring your aluminum and glass to the proper bins which are randomly placed throughout the town. This leaves you with "garbage" which comes about every 3 weeks or so. This time around we don't even have a full garbage bag to put out! Which is great because these garbage bags cost about $20 for 4 of them. Can you imagine in the USA having your garbage picked up once a month?! But really there isn't much that goes in there. When we first got here Eli was still in pull-ups overnight and those went in there but now he's out of those and we barely have any garbage at all AND your garbage never smells because you take the food out. I have a small "food garbage" under my kitchen sink and I empty it every day or two. It's really inspiring and now I will work harder at home to keep my garbage to a minimum (we do compost and recycle at home too but still fill that bin almost every week!)

Lastly I want to talk about some of the stupid words that people are saying lately. Number one on the list is "Bae". Please stop saying/writing this. It's annoying. And it means "Before anyone else". So you really should only use it for one person, not EVERY single friend you have- it's making them seem less important the more you use it. One more is the phrase "I can't even." Please finish your sentence, we don't know what you're talking about.

I will end with my most recent books read with my ratings

The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey- 3 stars
The Silver Star by Jeannette Walls- 3 stars
The Road by Cormac McCarthy- 3 stars
The Color Purple by Alice Walker- 4 stars
Dark Places by Gillian Flynn- 5 stars
Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup- 5 stars
Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry- 4 Stars
Currently Reading: The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America by George Packer

Have a great week! More to come in a couple of weeks!!

Season 6 Episode 2

2014-09-18T18:23:00.002+03:00

First of all I need to say that this is where I am writing from today. Pretty awesome. Eli is in school today so I’m taking this opportunity to relax a little bit and enjoy this awesome weather (high 70’s today!) and to take in some “me” time.

Basically the entire month of August it was cloudy or rainy here and now that September is here, it’s been sunny and nice almost every day! I’ve been doing some running and finally feel like I’m progressing on that in both speed and endurance and I've been doing a LOT of reading. Here are the books I’ve read since we’ve been here followed by my rating out of 5 stars:

Currently reading: The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey

Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell (4 stars)

Where She Went by Gayle Forman (3 stars)

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr (5 stars)

We Were Liars by E. Lockhart (3 stars)

If I Stay by Gayle Forman (4 stars)

Me Before You by Jojo Moyes (5 stars)

In the Woods by Tana French (4 stars)

The Sea Glass Sisters by Lisa Wingate (3 stars)

Room by Emma Donoghue (4 stars)

If you want to see more of the books I’ve read and what I’ve rated them, check out my profile on Goodreads.com. Also I’m always looking for new book suggestions so feel free to let me know your favorites!

Andy’s regular season has finally started after a very long pre-season and the Bulldogs are 1-1 with a loss to Graz and a win vs. Ljubljana. Tomorrow is a home game vs. Vienna and Sunday in Salzburg. For more info check out www.erstebankliga.at

We have really been enjoying this new city, it is So beautiful and the people are really friendly. We recently took a short drive (20 minutes) to Feldkirk to an outdoor park/animal sanctuary. It is basically trails through the mountains with random animals throughout. Some of them you are able to pet (goats) and some you can watch from afar (deer). This is a great, free activity that is good for all ages.

Andy got a team-issued bike and he has been using that to get to the rink every day and I took it out for a spin one day. I will tell you right now I am not a very confident bike rider! Do you squeeze both breaks at the same time or just one? This city is FULL of bike rides and outdoors enthusiasts and I have my wobbly self trying to fit in the river trails screeching to a stop when I come upon a mom waking with a stroller and someone running. I have no idea what the protocol is. And I don't have a warning bell on it. I should have been wearing a helmet. My butt was sore for two days after. I think I will stick to running.

We took Eli to the outdoor swimming pool at the very beginning of the month and it was amazing! The location couldn’t be better. It’s a 5 minute drive, at the base of the mountain and it’s nestled in between the river and the foot of the mountain. It was a Saturday at about 4pm and it was about 70 degrees out and there were 5 total people there. It was only 3 euros for adults to get in and Eli was free. I talked to one of Eli’s teachers and she said it’s always empty, even in the summer. I have also taken him to the indoor pool two times and it’s a really nice place. We haven’t been back for a while since he decided to have a tantrum there, I’m not brave enough to go back quite yet. He has been acting like a “threenager” and it’s been a very challenging month! But thanks to some great advise we’re working on some stuff.

Last night I had a parent informational meeting at Eli’s school- it was all in German. So that was really informative for me ;) I did actually understand about 50% of what was said and the other 50% was translated to me by one of Eli’s great teachers. One thing I thought was pretty cool was that since Eli is 3 years old, part of his schooling gets paid by the Austrian government. Also, they do not take the money out of your account until the following month because they mark daily the amount of food your kid eats and if they don’t have snack, they don’t get charged for it. This morning when I dropped him off, the snack was strawberries, grapes, apples and blueberries. They really do a great job making sure they have healthy snacks and that they get a lot of activity time. His school just moved locations from a small house to a school building with a large play area. He’s still pretty reluctant to go to school but once he’s there he has a good time.

There have been a few things since my last post that have happened in the world or in our community at home that are topics of controversy that it seems everyone (including myself) has an opinion on and I thought I would write about a few of them.

Andy and I recently watched the documentary Food Inc. Watch it. Our industrial food system in the United States is outrageous and we are working in our family to stay away from mass produced anything and to by local (MUCH easier in Europe as there are markets with local farmers much more often than where we live at home.) It inspired us to start a garden (Mom, I need your help.) and to re-think some of our food choices. Monsanto is evil and too many of our government workers work for them.

One thing that really bothered me was the way a certain controversial topic (prostitution) was portrayed in our local media. First of all I need to say I do not condone this even a little bit. BUT I also do no agree with the way the local papers handled the situation at all. The article was like reading the National Enquirer- it was slanderous, unprofessional and unnecessary. And finally- those that shared the article on Facebook really disgusted me too. There is all this talk lately in our community about bullying and to me that is a form of bullying, except you’re not just targeting the person in question but smearing their family’s name. Bullying isn’t something just tteenagers are doing, seems like a lot of it is adults being passive-aggressive on Facebook. Have some common sense, and respect. Just like I tell my softball players in our pre-season meeting about social media, use the T.H.I.N.K acronym before posting is it True, Helpful, Inspiring, Necessary, Kind.

Speaking of the bullying topic and the recent suicides. This is a really touchy one too. I feel like there are a lot of fingers being pointed and not enough positive activism going on. I do not believe there will ever be ONE certain thing or event that can be pinpointed in these circumstances it is a compilation of many things. We need to come together as a community to educate everyone about it and work on POSITIVE ways to make our community a “safer” place for everyone. I will end with saying I had an amazing experience growing up where we did, so did my husband and our siblings. And so did the majority of our family and friends. I love the Greenway community and me, Andy and our families (Court, Dan..Rhea..) will do anything we can to keep making it a positive experience to grow up there!

Disrespecting the President. It drives me NUTS when people or the media critique EVERY move the man does. First of all- it does NOT matter what color suit or tie he wears during a speech or press conference, he is not trying to send a subliminal message. Let the man take his wife out to dinner and have some fun without saying he should be spending every waking second making a plan to fight ISIS. Not everyone is going to agree with his choices, I don’t agree with all of them. The man has a tough job and needs some support. If you disagree, write to congress.

Ok I think that’s enough controversy for one day. I should probably pack up my things and head to pick Eli up at school! Have a nice day- until next time! I will end with a few pictures of this beautiful country!

Season SIX episode 1

2014-08-29T22:38:00.003+03:00

I'm going to start off by saying that I really can't believe we have been living in Europe for 6 years. Well, six hockey seasons, but close enough. Each year has brought a million memories and a few life-long friendships that I will forever be grateful for.

A little recap- Years 1-4 we spent in Zagreb, Croatia. Last year we split time pretty much 50/50 in Graz, Austria and Szekesfehervar, Hungary.

This year we are in Dornbirn, Austria. For you curious hockey fans out there, all of these teams have been in the same league; the Erste Bank Eishockey Liga. www.erstebankliga.at

Andy arrived in Dornbirn at mid/end of July which is way too early :( Eli and I stuck around home for a couple more weeks while he got things organized. This gives me a chance to get things in order at home for leaving for 8 months. It's always bitter sweet leaving as we love our Coleraine home, family and friends. But after a hectic spring and summer it's always nice to get to a little bit slower European pace. It's all about balance!

I won't go into the terrible details of me and Eli's travel day because it's just depressing. All that matters now is that we are here, with Andy and jet lag is OVER. It gets worse every year. Andy experienced it for the first time this year and mine took 2 weeks to fight off. Eli was good to go after 2 days, thank God. If you think it's bad flying to New York or LA I've got news for you. Although I know it's hard no matter the time difference... Seven hours though is a killer. Here is my jet lag cure that I'm told works but I never apply: Treat the day you arrive like it's a normal day, follow the hours of the time where you are..even if you are eating breakfast when your body is telling you you should be in the deepest of night time sleep. Do not nap for more than an hour (this is the tricky one!) Get outside in the afternoon sun. Stay positive! Well I guess I do some of these but it still doesn't work. At least I've rallied through 5 great books in the 3 weeks I've been here! There is an up-side!

Andy's team hasn't started regular season yet, they are away in Germany playing their 5th pre-season game and they don't start regular season for 2 more weeks. Talk about a drawn out pre-season. I'm looking forward to watching some hockey and having Eli yell "GO DADA" at the top of his lungs and clap whenever anyone scores (including the other team).

To fill our days we've been spending a lot of time outdoors in this beautiful city. We live right near a river that has walking and biking paths along it on both sides so every day Eli and I walk and throw rocks in the water, stop at parks, and just all in all enjoy the fresh, mountain air. Every direction you look in this city is gorgeous mountain views. But with the mountains comes a lot of crazy weather. One minute it's raining, the next perfectly clear. I know my Utah friends can relate to this. Kinda cool we got to live in the Rockies for 3 years and now the Swiss Alps!! Speaking of Swiss, we are just a few minutes from Switzerland and not very far from Germany either. We are, however, not very close to my dear friends who are in Zagreb, Vienna and Hungary. I need to figure out a way to make some trips though to see them! This summer I met up with my friends Krystie and Suzanne in New York for a long weekend and we had an amazing time of course; great city, great company-can't beat that!

I'm looking forward to my mom visiting in October, so far on my mental list of things to do we are going to go to Munich, Germany, ride the gondola up to the top of the mountain here, do some hiking, lots of Eli time and of course a few hockey games.

My life has been: Walks, runs, cooking, reading, playing with Eli, spending time with Andy and mentally preparing for Eli to start "school." He will be going in the mornings for 2 days a week. We went and met the teachers and checked out the school and he enjoyed it because there was no other kids there. As he says "I don't like people." haha Hopefully that changes! He has adjusted really well being here and I think after a few weeks of school he will be just fine. It's just the initial start of it! I'm hoping it's harder on me- being a stay-at-home mom with him since birth, it's going to be really weird having a few hours alone each week.

Stay tuned for more updates- I know this one is short and sweet but not much else to say except we are enjoying a simple, fun life in Dornbirn so far!

Soup Club & the end of the hockey season

2014-03-02T22:44:00.003+02:00

Hi again! I promised my next blog would be about our Soup Club with our recipes listed so I will follow through with that, but realized now it would be way cooler if we would have taken pictures but oh well each of the links show pictures so you can get an idea. I can assure you that all of these soups were amazing and worth trying!

Quick run down of Soup Club- Not sure whose genius idea this was but it was in full swing when we arrived in Hungary in November and I just jumped right in. We try to meet once a week (skipped this rule in December) and each week a new girl is the hostess. This girl makes a huge pot of soup of her choice usually served with bread. We all meet at that person's house at about 10:30am and visit and eat lunch together then everyone takes a Tupperware home with them. We did soup club on Thursdays usually because either our husbands are gone on Fridays so we don't have to cook or they have a home game and they eat together as a team for lunch at a sponsored restaurant and they are gone to the game before supper. I'm sure a lot of you know how annoying it is to cook for one adult and a toddler (s). It's much easier to have soup to heat up! Plus it's a great way to get your veggies in! Ok here is a run down of the soups we had and who hosted. Click on the name of the soup to get to the link.

One final note: soups, as with most recipes can be altered to your liking, don't feel like you need to follow the recipe exactly! I have learned this lesson from living abroad for 5 years and finding all the ingredients you need may not be an option, so have fun with it!

hosted by Alex: Coconut-Ginger-Carrot

2 tablespoons coconut oil

1 medium onion, diced

3 tablespoons minced ginger

1 clove of garlic minced

4-5 cups diced carrots

3 cups vegetable broth

1 cup coconut milk

salt and pepper to taste

Heat coconut oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add onions and garlic and saute until onions are translucent, about 4 minutes. Add ginger and saute for another 4 minutes, until softened and fragrant. Add diced carrots. Stir to incorporate and make carrots tender. Add the vegetable broth, reduce heat, and simmer mixture until carrots are completely softened, about 30 minutes. Remove from heat and allow to cool for 20 minutes.

Use a hand blender to make the soup smooth in the same pot. Then stir in coconut milk. Add salt and pepper to taste.

hosted by Jaime: Cream of Zucchini and Rice

hosted by me: Tomato Soup

Cream of Vegetable & Chicken Noodle (2 separate soups) hosted by Kim but she didn't use a recipe for either, she's just that good!

hosted by Sadie: Beer Cheese

hosted by me: Minestrone Soup

hosted by Jaime Beggar's Chowder (similar to chicken tortilla, and my favorite soup club soup)

Boil a small chicken in 4 cups of water and use half of the meat and all of the broth. (I used a pre-cooked rotisserie chicken and used all the white meat from that with 4 cups of water and 1 bullion cube).
One large diced onion
2 diced red peppers (I used one red, one yellow)
2 cans of diced tomatoes
1 can of corn (or creamed corn)
1 cup of whipping cream (or half and half)
1 cup of milk
salt, pepper and garlic salt to taste
Boil for 40 minutes
I served mine with crushed tortilla chips and sour creme

hosted by Sadie: Buffalo Chicken

hosted by me: Corn Chowder

Ok I really hope you try some of these as they are all fairly easy (most soups are!) and delicious.

In other news, Eli and I will be flying home to Minnesota in 2 days! Goodbye sunny 60 degree weather, hello -20 temps and 3 feet of packed snow in my yard! We are looking forward to seeing family and friends and I am anxious to get my fastpitch season going, even if we don't play a game outside until May ;) This will be my first year as head coach of Greenway High School fastpitch and I'm really looking forward to it.

Andy's team won tonight so they are officially in the playoffs!! WOO HOO!!!!! He has been playing great and I'm very proud of him and the team and I look forward to cheering on Szekesfehervar Alba Volan19 through playoffs even if we will be an ocean apart.

Ok I'm off to do some final cleaning and packing while Eli is in bed so tomorrow can be a nice family day before Eli and I make the treacherous journey home... if you've ever flown with a toddler, you know this treachery I speak of. Even if they are perfect angels it's still stressful and lucky me, we are going to be clocking about 12 hours of time in the air and hitting not one but two of the worst airports on the planet: London and Chicago before arriving home to Minneapolis (then driving 3 hours home!) Ok that seems like I'm being really negative, really I'm not that worried about it, it's part of our life and we're used to it, just gotta prepare for the worst and if your day isn't that bad, then congrats to you, now go catch up on your jet lag..

Ciesto! (I'm not even sure if that is how you spell it, this language is ridiculous).

USA vs. Canada Olympic hockey game- singing "God Bless America!"

Holiday recap & family visit!

2014-01-24T22:36:00.001+02:00

I'm overdue for a holiday review! Last I wrote my mom had just left to head back to Minnesota and we were taking our 4 days in between visits to rest up, relax and plan for our next round of visitors. On December 19th I hit the road for Graz, Austria to pick up the Sertich & Mell clan from the airport. When they first booked their trip, we were living in Graz so instead of changing their flights to a closer airport (Budapest) they decided to just keep them the same since it's not that far of a drive. They landed a little after noon and everything went smoothly! We hung out at the airport for about a half an hour lining up their rental car and rental car seat. During this time Court and Danny and I manned the bags and visited. I decided to load my car up with one of the big carts of bags (picture a Harry Potter carriage with bags so high you can't see over) so I wheeled them out the doors to my car which was parked right out front in free 30 minute parking. Little did I know there was a curb there that I couldn't wheel over smoothly.... Courtney had a great view of me pushing this huge cart over and eventually got to see all the bags fly off of the cart into the road. I had to pick them up one by one and wheel them to my car. Luckily there was no traffic and we got a good laugh out of it!

We headed to Hungary right from the airport and made it back to the house they rented at about 6pm. They rented a house outside of our city about 15 minutes into the country. It was the best house! It was in this cute little summer vacation neighborhood- Hungary is abundant with lakes (not quite as many as Minnesota...) but there are a few big ones that are tourist attractions so there are a lot of empty, summer homes. If you're ever visiting Hungary in the summer, do some research on Lake Balaton, it's gorgeous.

The house was two stories with a bedroom, a living room a half bath and sauna upstairs and two bedrooms, a bathroom, living room and kitchen on the main floor. The patio was amazing, with a hot tub and great view of the cute fenced in yard. We were definitely comfortable there!

Two days after they arrived Andy had a home game and something happened that almost never happens in hockey... a penalty shot... And of course it was Andy! He scored (duh :) what an amazing first game for the family to see!!

We decided to get our Christmas shopping done in those first few days they arrived since it was coming up quickly. We picked up a tree, decorations, a few (cough, cough) gifts for Eli and Danny and our food for our Christmas Eve and Christmas Day meals. The stores were crazy, but I'm guessing not as crazy as at home! We decided on steaks on the grill for Christmas Eve with salad and potatoes. I made a french toast bake for Christmas morning, and we did a "Thanksgiving" meal for Christmas Day.

Back to the shopping- the money here is so confusing at first since it seems like you're a millionaire when you have 100 dollars in your pocket (about 23,000 Hungarian Forint). But everything is SO cheap here it's so great!!! Example on the cheapness- I've been having some back issues so I went to get a massage and it was 10 dollars for an hour!!! Needless to say I've had 4 massages in the past 2.5 weeks and more scheduled!

Ok moving on- On December 23rd Court, Dan and Andy and I took a trip to Vienna. It's about 2 hours from Szekesfehervar. We stayed at the only hotel I've stayed at in Vienna and I've been there 3 times.. creature of habit? We checked into our rooms then hit the streets and took in the most magical Christmas city you'll ever see (debatable I know, but I think it's amazing).

We went to get some Weinerschnitzel at the famous Figlmuller restaurant that I took my mom to and we split up waiting in lines at both locations to see which one we could get into quicker. Well we ended up getting sat at pretty much the exact same time so Courtney and I left our location and went to the guys'. Needless to say we probably should have stuck with our location since we were seated at a table with another couple (awkward.) and this location only served wine, no beer. Haha, but the schnitzel was amazing and we had a great time. From here we wandered the Christmas Markets looking for gifts and enjoying the Gluhwein. Finally we ended up at a bar that I went to the first time I went to Vienna 5 years ago. I wanted to go here because it's a brewery and had buffalo wings, and somehow I remembered where it was... so we found it and parked there all night visiting and having a few laughs. We headed back to our hotel at a decent hour and drove back to Hungary fairly early since it was Christmas Eve!

Christmas is the best thing in the world when you have little kids around. You don't, when you're a kid, think about how much fun your parents could be having....But I guess you wouldn't since you don't at that age know how awesome it is to be a parent. Seeing the excitement and joy and feeling the love of family all around really is priceless. Not to mention skin tight candy cane PJ's to ring in Jesus's Birthday.

Eli was spoiled rotten (Papa, Grammie and Santa's fault). His favorite Christmas gifts were his train track that he plays with most of the day, every day. Blocks, the book Goodnight Goodnight Construction Site and his Dusty Crophopper boxer briefs. I got new hockey skates so that was pretty awesome, we have been able to go skating a few times this month as a family which makes my heart happy.

Court, Carol, Dan and I headed into Budapest one afternoon while Andy was on the road. We left Papa home to babysit! We wandered around the city, ate an amazing lunch at Vapiano and did some sight seeing. It was nice to get out of the house after a few days of staying in and get some fresh air. Budapest is a strange city to me. I can't quite figure it out. It's huge and the roads are extremely confusing, but the sights are great; I really need to buy myself a city map and do some studying.

A few days after Christmas we had our family photo shoot that we've been planning for about a year!! We were lucky enough to have my good friend and wife of one of Andy's teammates, Jaime take them. She is a up-and-coming photographer and we couldn't be more happy with how the pictures turned out. Please check out her website and like her Facebook page! www.naglichphotography.com

The next day Andy was on the road and Courtney and Dan and I headed to the bathhouse for some relaxation. I guess you wouldn't exactly call it relaxation as much as people watching... we ran into a few doozies. We ended up checking out each of the amenities (baths, steam, saunas) before heading to the bar to have mojitos and hot dogs. The perfect meal. :)

On New Year's Eve we were set and ready to head out at about 6pm. We decided to go to the Bowling Alley/night club for the night. We arrived and it didn't open until 8pm. Whoops, a little early! So we wandered around town looking for ANY restaurant that was open. Literally the only one was a small Mexican place, McDonald's wasn't even open! But we hit the jackpot with the Mexican, great food, strong drinks (gag reflex held back successfully). And we got all loosened up for our competitive games of bowling ahead of us. We ended up bowling two games, and I'm guessing you can already infer who won those games. Me the first game with a 140 and Court the 2nd with a 148. I won't post the guys' scores to save them some face.

Who has the best form?!!!

The next morning I hosted soup club for the week out at the rental house. I made tomato basil and grilled cheese. We had mimosas and sat in the hot tub and discussed our last book we read: The Goldfinch. So soup club doubled as book club which was great. The book was alright, I recommend setting a good chunk of your life aside to read it though since it's around 800 pages. I have a hard time with my book ratings since I love almost everything I read. I tend to rate them by how they make me feel which isn't fair to the author since if you're writing something strong enough to make me feel depressed or happy, then obviously you're doing something right. I need to re-evaluate my rubric I think.

The next day Carol and I hopped in the car with Courtney and Dan and Danny and headed back to Graz to bring them to the airport to fly home. The two weeks absolutely flew by!! Danny wasn't a fan of the time change the entire time he was here, but he was a happy smiley teething baby!!! Lucky for them he was back on his home time schedule right away!

Andy's parents stayed for an additional 10 days. During that time we did a lot of playing with Eli, eating out at great restaurants and visiting. They road tripped to Klagenfurt for the game and were able to explore that city a bit which is always fun to do. We also made a trip to the Zoo which was really fun!

Their rental house became "home." Andy and I stayed out there every night with Eli so he was able to wake up there and play right away with Papa and Grammie! He loved every second of it. We are blessed to have such an adaptable sleeper, he napped at his normal time every day and bedtime was a little bit later than usual because we were having too much fun, but that just meant he slept in a little later too!

Soup Club this week was at our friend Sadie's house. Her husband Braden is on the basketball team here in Szekesfehervar. We had Beer Cheese soup and she did an amazing job; one of the best beer cheeses I've had! We finally made it to one of Braden's basketball games last week, it was really fun, Eli had a blast too! ps- I will be doing my next blog post on our soup club and post the recipes for you all!

I headed to Zagreb for a quick visit with my best gals Krystie and Sue before Carol and Steve headed back to Minnesota. I arrived in Zagreb and met my friend Ivana, Eli's babysitter when we lived in Croatia. We had a coffee and a nice catch up before I headed to Krystie's. Krystie and I took a cab and met Sue at the sushi place in Zagreb and from there headed to the tent where we chatted and drank our night away as we usually do. We topped off our night at the Bulldog Club with a completely unnecessary and unfinished round of beers. These girls are such gems; just wait to see what we have in store for our summer 2015 girl's trip. That will be a blog worth reading ;)

Carol and Steve headed home on January 13th. They had rented a car in Graz so we didn't need to drive them back to the airport. The entire time they were here it was above 30 degrees out. Some days in the 50's! It has actually been like that most of the month until today... January 24th, the first snowfall of the year! They were lucky to escape the arctic -40 degree days in Minnesota while they were here but from the looks of it, it's not getting much better. I'm hoping by April when we get home, the negative temps will be long gone!

The week after they left was pretty quiet, we got re-situated back into our apartment, went through Eli's toys and bagged some up to give to the school. I started taking Eli to "preschool" one day a week for 2 hours. I say it in quotations because I'm there the whole time. There is 30 minutes of English songs to start the class then free play time after that. Eli is NOT a fan of the singing part. He just wants to play. Both times we have been there, there has been tears shed during the singing time because he doesn't want to be there, then when it's time to leave, he's on the verge of tears because he's having too much fun. And when I say too much fun, I mean he's playing by himself in a corner hoarding toys and books because that's his style.

This week the guys had a day off, so what do we do, but make them watch the kids while we wives go into Budapest for sushi and shopping. Ha! Why not. It was a great day of wandering, shopping and chatting!

Andy's team was eliminated from the top 6 teams which are guaranteed a playoff spot. Now they have a 10 game "playout" with the bottom teams to see who will get to be in playoffs. It's the most ridiculous system ever since you could be the worst team in the league all season and still make playoffs if you pull it together for 10 games. They are doing well so far in the playouts, half way to go still so I will keep you posted on that. We beat Graz and Dornbirn last week and tonight they are playing Klagenfurt.

I will end with a re-cap of my day today. We woke up and drove Andy to the rink this morning at 8:15 so we could have the car while he's gone all day. We came back home and had some waffles, played trains and watched Nemo. We got ready to head to Jaime's for soup club and made it about 20 yards in my parking lot before realizing I had a flat tire. So I pulled into the nearest spot, parked and headed back into the apartment. Leaving that one for the husband to take care of tomorrow :) So Eli and I played for the rest of the morning, had some lunch and while he napped I caught up on my Nashville episode for the week and Pretty Little Liars (don't judge). After his nap we mixed up some banana bread, put it in the oven and headed outside since it was the FIRST snowfall of the year!!! We played and rolled around and had the best time. We came back in to take the banana bread out then went back out for another hour! He loved it. He has never been in Minnesota for the winter (I guess I kind of count last spring as a Minnesota winter) But I can tell he has it in his blood. I sat on a bench in the park with snow falling in my face while he was running around and had a moment of calmness and happiness and deja vu-

esque feeling of my childhood playing outside in the winter. You know how a smell can provoke a memory, well the snow did that for me today and it. was. awesome. We finished off our evening by eating some amazing Cream of Zucchini and rice soup that Jaime was kind enough to send over to my house via Kim since I missed soup club today. And we had warm banana bread for dessert. Heck of a day. I even did an upper body dumbbell workout (Eli driving cars between my legs during of course) because I felt so great and rejuvenated from the snow!!

Ok that's long enough. Have a great weekend. Soup update to come!

Mom's visit to Hungary

2013-12-17T22:04:00.001+02:00

Well it has been a very busy hockey season for us with our big move to a new team then my mom came to visit about 2 weeks after we moved into our new place! She was here for two weeks and we had such a great time! She was a jet-lag warrior (I'm a huge baby and can't fight it..takes me at least a week to get back on track). I drove to Budapest to pick her up while my friend Jaime watched Eli (thanks pal!). The airport is in-conveniently located on the opposite side of the Danube river as our town is so you have to cross it in a very big, very busy city to get there (apparently there is another way, where you don't have to go through the city..haven't figured that out yet!) Anyways, it takes about an hour to get there. I arrived and mom was walking out of the doors at the same time! So it worked perfectly! When we got back to our place, Andy was home from practice and he and Eli were outside the front of our building waiting to see Grammie Sue!! He was so excited and hyped up all day, telling her all his stories and talking a mile a minute.

Grammie brought Eli a Charlie Brown doll so he was obsessed with that. Later in the day after naps we wandered around downtown (about 5 blocks away) and checked out the Christmas markets before heading home to relax and unwind.

The next couple of days we checked out the grocery stores, always a visitor favorite!! And played a lot at the park! Well mostly mom and Eli played at the park while I showered and cleaned...things I normally don't get to do without rushing! We also drove into Budapest one afternoon and walked around there, checking out the Christmas markets and actually found some gifts there! I had my first gluhwein of the Christmas season there too! We got stuck in traffic on the way home but at least there's lots to look at while you are sitting there! I have yet to figure that city out; it feels so huge to me!

We hit up a little bit of each of Andy's hockey games but went home early since it was Eli's bed time on one night..and the next night Eli asked me to go home, he wasn't feeling well and it wasn't until I actually typed this that I realize now I think he must have had an ear infection or something because he woke up 5 nights in a row crying...the kid who sleeps 12 hours. So I was thrown off... but anyways..no one probably cares about that. Moving on!!

Mom and I booked a hotel in Vienna and hit the road there on a Sunday. It's a little over 2 hours to get there. The drive is 1 hour of back country roads and small Hungarian towns and an hour and 15 minutes of freeway with about 10 million wind turbines. Not the best scenery for a drive. But Vienna makes up for it... We were checking into our hotel and I look over and I hear "Sertich!" and there is one of Andy's old teammates standing there checking in too... he now plays in Italy and was on an overnight trip to Vienna with his wife. Such a small world. Out of all the cities and all the hotels to be staying in!!

Mom and I got checked in and hit the streets of Vienna right away. It is officially my favorite European city. Actually might even be my favorite city anywhere! It is SO beautiful and well kept and organized. And to top it off, the Christmas markets are some of the best in the world! We made it to all but 1 of the markets in the city and had a little gluhwein at each one.. and we collected the mugs. When you buy the drinks there you pay a "deposit" Of 2.50 Euros and you can either keep the mug or return it and get your money back. Ok fine we only stole 2 mugs off of a table, there I said it. Well actually I did because my mom told me to then she ran away and hid while I did it! After successfully finding some Christmas gifts, we wandered over to this restaurant that was suggested to me to get the world famous weinerschnitzel, but at 3pm on a Sunday (Sunday's in Europe are notorious for everything being shut down, not a whole lot of people out and about) there was a line out the door and around the corner at BOTH restaurant locations we went to. So we headed to Vapiano and got some pasta and Caesar salads instead! After our late lunch we went back to the hotel for an hour re-charge before heading back out to more markets. We went to both of the big ones near our hotel and got some soups in a bread bowl before deciding to try the schnitzel restaurant one more time! So we walked over there and decided you're only in Vienna how often? Gotta try the best schnitzel in the world! So we waited in line for about 25 minutes...and it was SO worth it. I would have waited an hour. If you're ever in Vienna. Go to Figlmuller and get the weinerschnitzel. You will not be disappointed. After our dinner we were both falling asleep trying to walk back to our hotel!! So much walking, food and gluhwein makes for a good night's sleep! We headed home in the morning.

Aside from our two trips, one to Budapest, one to Vienna, we stayed in Szekesfehervar and played with Eli most days. We did venture out to dinner at a traditional Hungarian restaurant and got some goulash and other fun meals. Mom watched Eli one evening while I went into Budapest with my friends Jaime and Kim to watch our guys play in an outdoor classic game vs. Salzburg Red Bulls. We won and it was such a fun mom's night out! I had a slight headache the next morning but that's beside the point.

On the day before mom left we tried out a Hungarian Bath House. It's just a few blocks away so we walked there. It is a really neat looking old building; looks like a church and inside there are several different rooms with different "baths" or pools that are warm like a bath (I prefer scalding hot so I was actually cold haha) but there were also steam rooms and saunas to toast me up! It was relaxing and fun and cheap, like everything else in the country!!

We had a great time playing, cooking, baking sugar cookies and enjoying our evening ritual of watching Parks and Recreation during mom's stay here. She had a slight hiccup on her way home; a delayed flight in Munich, Germany which caused a missed flight out of Chicago (top 3 worst airports in the world on my list... yes I have a list). So she had to spend the night there, but she is home now is toasty northern MN (the day she left I looked at the weather report and it said -15F, feels like -56F) W...T...F. BUT she did luck out and missed the 40 inches of snow they received while she was away hahahaha Oh dear Minnesota, you are a cruel but wonderful place.

Mom left on Sunday, and I have been doing some cleaning since she left and took a couple trips to the grocery store preparing for our next wave of guests on Thursday! Andy and I took Eli skating for the first time yesterday. It was the cutest thing ever. He was a wet noodle at first but really loved it.!! He kept asking to go again! Tomorrow we are having our girls cookie exchange, so I made some pecan turtles for that which are so good! Also I successfully made my first pot of Goulash this evening to have for the family

when they arrive. It is basically stew with peprika. And finally I got some gifts wrapped. It's been a productive couple of days! Tomorrow afternoon we get to go to check out our family's house they're renting and get it all situated for them. Then on Thursday I'm heading to Graz to pick them up!!

Have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!

I'm still here!

2013-11-29T21:40:00.000+02:00

Andy and I in Graz 2011 touring the city

Ok so it's really been an eternity since I've updated! A lot was going on with us (career wise) that wasn't really supposed to be mentioned until things were taken care of.. and now that they are, I'm ready to write again!

Last time I wrote, we were living in Graz, Austria and I was training for a 10K and Andy was at the beginning of his hockey season there. Flash forward about 6 weeks and we are now living in Szekesfehervar, Hungary, I haven't ran since the 10K (oops) and hockey season is about at it's mid-way point!

Graz was a beautiful city, and I loved being close to my Zagreb friends and was just falling into our routine there, but hockey-wise, it wasn't the right fit for our family and we are happy to say we were able to move to a new place and are fortunate enough to have two sets of friends on this team that lived in Zagreb with us at one point or another!

Andy and Eli and I went to Zagreb one late afternoon while still living in Graz and brought a car-load of our stuff there and spend the night with friends. The next day a friend from the Hungary team was "visiting" Zagreb (Anyone who has every played for Medvescak or knows anything about them... knows what this "visit" was all about :) So Andy hopped in the car with him and our stuff and went to Hungary. Eli and I headed back to Graz and finished packing and cleaning our apartment. Andy drove to Graz in our new car (team issued) and picked us up. We made the drive to Hungary and were packed in our car like sardines but it was a pretty harmless 3 hour drive, all freeway.

When we arrived in Szekesfehervar (Pronounced Sheck-es-fair-iv-ar) they didn't have a 2 bedroom apartment ready for us since our arrival was pretty sudden. So we stayed in a 1 bedroom for about 2 weeks while apartment hunting. The 1 bedroom wasn't bad, it was in a great location and we were just happy to be somewhere new so it all worked out. We finally found a great 2 bedroom right near downtown with parking, a park in the back and a few other pretty cool features I'm excited to have: a garbage chute outside of my front door and a futuristic shower!

We are about 2 miles from the rink and maybe 6 blocks to the main downtown area, which is pretty small, but really cute. There is basically one main walking street (no cars allowed, all cobblestone). There is a small mall and lots of little shops and cafes in this area also. Across the street is a big open park and in the winter they flood it and make it into a huge skating rink with a gazebo in the middle and serve gluhwein and other Christmas-y beverages. I'm pretty excited to get Eli out there for his first time on skates. I may need to brush up on my skating skills too...pretty sure I haven't been on the ice since good old Greenway High School girls hockey my senior year! I'm sure Andy can cover the basics with him.

I was surprised at the grocery shopping here vs. in Croatia and Austria... I expected things to be hard to find and smaller scale stores... but I was very wrong. There is one grocery store about 2 blocks away and it is an Interspar which they have in both Croatia and Austria. This store is very large and has pretty much everything I could want in it. My friends Jaime and Kim told me I had to check out Tesco, and it is basically a Wal-Mart. Huge grocery store and has other stuff in it too... then I found the mother load... Auchens. It is like Super-Wal-Mart. It is bigger than any other grocery store I've ever been in at home and you cannot beat the prices in this country!!

Ava, Eli and Harper enjoying their Thanksgiving meal.

The currency here is the Hungarian Forint. It is roughly 250 forints to 1 dollars. Having several 10,000 bills in your wallet feels extremely strange! Andy and I hosted Thanksgiving on Wednesday with the help of the Naglich's and while buying my groceries for that I realized just how cheap things are here. I bought a huge turkey leg, an over sized turkey breast and 4 turkey necks and my total was just under 2,500 forints... so all my meat for a Thanksgiving dinner serving 7 adults and 3 kids was under 10 U.S dollars.

We are about a 45 minute drive to Budapest and I'm looking forward to exploring there a little more when my mom arrives on Sunday! Two more days! Also while she's here we will be hitting up the Vienna Christmas Markets (amazing...google them) and spending LOTS of quality Grammie/Eli time. Andy also has 2 outdoor games in Budapest this month, which are always fun. (Seriously what an awesome job, sometimes it just hits me how great it is and how lucky we are!) We are also looking forward to the arrival of my in laws Steve and Carol, sister-in-law Courtney, brother-in-law Dan and Nephew Danny just before Christmas! We are so excited to have visitors during most of the holiday season, it's going to be so much fun! Lots of hockey games to watch, and lots of quality family time.

Alba vs. Olympia

The hockey rink here in Szekesfehervar is not in the most desirable location.. for visitors anyways. You drive up thinking where am I?! It's in an industrial area, right along railroad tracks and not attractive at all. BUT after walking in the rink, I felt right at home. It's really cold in there and it smells like popcorn and the fans are loud. It feels like an Iron Range hockey rink- with the addition of free drinks and dinner for me and a play room for Eli! Perfect! Now let's just keep cheering on our team Alba Volan19 and hope we can get on a winning streak and move on up in the rankings!

Andy's 1st goal

One final thing I need to mention is I was lucky enough to come to a new team with great girls and right away we had a book club AND a soup club meeting. Soup club is my new favorite thing. One of us hosts a lunch each week while the guys are at practice and makes a big pot of soup. We eat the soup and visit then everyone takes home a Tupperware of soup for the next few days. It's genius. The latest soup I made wasn't my favorite..it was roasted red pepper and cauliflower, but if you're interested in the recipe.. check it out here at Katie's Pinterest Boards under "Soups, Salads and Wraps."

I will end with Eli's conversation to to me tonight while putting him to bed. "Mama I get in crib AFTER read books...Read 2 books. Read 5 books. Read 8 books!" After laying him in the crib "Mama sing Sunshine song AFTER prayers to God and Jesus. No prayers to Jesus only God." Ok Eli what do you want to pray for "Pray for taking toys away from Harper and for Charlie Brown and for going to the grocery store to buy nola bars. Jesus name Amen." And finally I said I love you Eli, who do you love? "Eli loves Mama and Chachie."

Eli decorating the tree :)

A little bit of everything

2013-09-29T15:32:00.000+03:00

A great reminder for anyone with 1 kid or 10 kids!

Well today is another one of those rainy, cloudy, cool days! Andy hit the road this morning to Bolzano, Italy for an away game so Eli and I got bundled up after breakfast and headed out to our friend Melanie's place to take a walk with her and her baby Sophia. Eli and I walk every day at some point, but we live in the city so our walks are "urban". Where Melanie lives out in the country so our walk today was much different than we're used to and so pretty and peaceful!! We walked from her apartment around some winding roads until we got to a path that was surrounded by trees and ran parallel with a brook. We saw chicken farms, cows and people horseback riding. We also saw a lot of people jogging and people walking their dogs, everyone we passed said "Guten Morgen!" People are so friendly here! It reminded me of when you are on a boat in Minnesota in the summer, no matter if you know the person in the passing boat or not, you wave! After our walk we came home and did some cleaning, now after nap we will be baking some muffins, and preparing an egg bake for a brunch tomorrow. Eli likes to bake with me, he loves to dump the ingredients in and stir; and especially loves licking the spoon...(who doesn't!)

These past couple of weeks I was thinking about how I should write more, maybe every few days just some random thoughts, not sure if people will read, but it's almost like a journal just a more public one! I've had some "thinking time" as I've been running the past week quite a bit preparing for a 10K. I just found out about the Graz 10K last week and decided that day to sign up. I have been running a little bit here and there for a few years now and have done a few different races but never as much as a 10K (6.2 miles) So I did some research on 10K training and and jumped right into it. I'm on my rest day today but did 5 days of running last week and each day felt better and better. It's a great way to see the city too! I try to take a different route each time. There are a lot of runners in this city! The race is October 13th, so I will keep you posted on that.

About a week and a half ago Eli and I packed up the car and drove to Zagreb (Croatia) to visit friends and have our first book club meeting! It took us a little under 2 hours to get there, there was quite a bit of construction which is always annoying, but usually necessary! He was great in the car, slept about half of the way. We hung out at Krystie's and visited while Eli and Aiva played and later our other book clubbers, Leah and Sue joined and we had some yummy appetizers Krystie whipped up (You will never go hungry OR THIRSTY at the Letang's house). After Eli went to bed we headed down the street to a cafe for book club. (Eli was babysat/ supervised by Krystie's kids, relax!)

Our book club is probably the best book club on earth. We all bring something to the table each meeting, and it's so fun sharing our take on things and that unravels an entire night of great conversation and laughs that I will forever remember, and be grateful for because people that you can be yourself around and laugh and spill your guts to are few and far between, and I've got a WHOLE CLUB of them! Jealous? Well don't be, everyone at some point in their life will have that special connection with friends, just have to figure out with who! I am headed back to Zagreb this upcoming weekend for Book Club round two. Minus Eli, he will stay home with Dad this time!

Eli & Dad waiting for the tram.

The other day we went for a walk around downtown and we found the store we've been looking for that sells "American" products- I bought brown sugar and muffin mixes and Andy bought a Mt. Dew and a Miller Genuine Draft. The guy working there said "You realize that is the worst beer we have in this store right?" haha Not that we love MGD, but it's just nice to have a little "taste of home" every now and again. After we left the store we walked down to the river where Andy and Eli sat on a rock and watched the water. Next we made our way to an Irish Pub for some cold glasses of Guiness, onion rings, cheese burgers and fries! This was one of the days that I did a long run for training and was famished and all I could think of was a cheeseburger. So that's what we had and it was awesome. Eli had a ham and cheese toast, he's not much of a red meat eater! We sat out on the patio which is one of my favorite things to do. People watching is the best, so many different stories behind each person walking by you.

Eli reading instead of watching hockey :)

Andy has had a few games since I wrote last, Eli and I usually go for 2 periods and come home since the games start at 7:15. He is usually in bed by 7:30 but game nights I try to get home no later than 9 because wouldn't you know it...no matter what time he goes to bed, he still wakes up at the same time in the morning! He does really well at the games and loves to see the "Mascot" and "Zanzobi" and he is especially fond of going upstairs in VIP before the game to get orange juice. He is a creature of habit that's for sure, each game we do the same thing and if we miss a step in our routine, he reminds me.

Here is a little Eli update: His potty training is going great, I guess you could say he is fully trained during awake time. The other day he went #2 on the toilet and said... "Big huge turd is nice, and cute too" I didn't know what to say. I just said yeah it sure is! One of Eli's quirks is he doesn't like babies. He gets a scowl and says "No baby_____ watch you" or "No she's nice" Then he looks at me an asks "Hit baby?" So I'm not quite sure how to change this... I'm hoping he just grows out of it! One of his current favorite songs is "Charlie Brown" by the coasters which he calls "The Fe Fe song" Click here to listen and visualize a 2 year old dancing and laughing to this song... it's so cute.

YouTube Video of the Coasters "Charlie Brown"

I've been doing a lot of Pinterest searches lately to find some fun Fall crafts for us to do together as a family. I've found about 8,742 different ones I want to do. I've narrowed it down to a few and we went searching for an art supply store downtown (I knew I had seen it before while walking around) and we found it and it was great!! {SUZANNE, you MUST go here, so many things in this store were yelling SUE...BUY Me!!!} I got some paper, paint, paintbrushes, stickers, glue and now all I need is a few leaves and pumpkins and we are all set for some crafting. We are also going to be painting rocks. Eli has been working on a rock collection for a couple of weeks now. I've also been saving the toilet paper rolls to do a Thanksgiving Turkey project with that and half of a paper plate. Follow me in Pinterest if you're interested in any of these crafts!

Katie's Pinterest Boards

Speaking of Pinterest, wow is it not the best resource ever?!!! I've found so many amazing recipes on there! Tonight for dinner Eli and I are making Quinoa Pizza Bites

I've also decided that Sunday is my "no pin" day. This is where I just go back through my boards and read through articles I've pinned or write down recipes or re-organize boards. Sundays are the best day in Europe. It's rare to see any store open so you have to get your groceries or whatever you need on Saturday- we spend our Sundays usually cleaning (Eli likes to help scrub floors, thankfully!) and baking! Today we are making cinnamon strussel muffins- no recipe needed because it's the Betty Crocker mix I bought at the "American" store!

Ok I should stop writing for the day and get some reading in before Eli wakes up from his afternoon nap. Krystie picked this book for book club and it's a scary one... we haven't really ready a scary one yet except for Gone Girl but this is different. It's called Heart Shaped Box and I'm going to read it now while it's light out and read my other book when I go to bed since Andy won't be home until late!! Here is my Goodreads page to follow, I suggest you join, it's a great way to find new books to read and to keep track of the ones you have already read!

Have a nice Sunday!

New Season in Graz, Austria!

2013-09-17T14:34:00.000+03:00

I know, I know, it took me forever to post this entry!! But here I go- I've come to terms with Newton's law of motion- Objects in motion stay in motion; objects at rest stay at rest. This applies to people too, not just objects!! I'm sure you have all gotten into the "workout routine" where you do awesome for 2 weeks then you stop... and you don't start again. This is me when it comes to writing. Once I start I could go forever, but if I stop... I need to be motivated somehow to get started. Not sure what my motivation is today, I think it's been dreary out for a few days now and I've been fairly lazy so I need to kick something into gear.

I will start from the beginning, which is always a good place to start.
We decided after 4 years of living in Zagreb, Croatia that it was time for a change for us. There were many factors that lead us to this decision, and it actually wasn't that hard of a decision to make to be honest. We love the city of Zagreb and we both made friends there that we will have for a lifetime, as well as memories that are priceless to me. Everything there, however wasn't ideal for us such as corrupt business practices and being lied to repeatedly to your face. We were both raised with strong morals and these types of behaviors wore on us. So farewell to the best hockey fans in the entire world (I'm not joking, they are the best) and to an amazing city- and hello to a new adventure in Austria!

Graz, Austria is less than a 2 hour drive from Zagreb and the team, the 99ers, was in the same league as Medvescak, so Andy has played against this team for 4 years and I have been here a couple of times to watch games and shop at Ikea, so it wasn't a completely new experience for us, but pretty close!

We left the USA on July 29th after another amazing spring and summer at home. Our travel was extremely long as it always is, but went really really well. We flew out of Minneapolis in the late afternoon and had a short flight to Chicago. Here we had a 5 hour layover then got on our international flight to London. Eli slept almost the whole time which was awesome, but we didn't sleep a wink, we were too worried about him waking up or falling off of the seat, which he almost did about 5 times. This is the first year Eli got his own seat since he was 2 years old (or close enough to 2) so that was a huge relief for us!

We had about a 6 hour layover in London and it is an awful airport. Paris, London, Chicago, top 3 worst airports. Theres your warning.
You are not allowed to sit right by where you board like at most normal airports. You have to hang out in a huge open area with overpriced shops and food stands OR pay a fee to use a "lounge" which I'm guessing is what most people do. Luckily, while on a bathroom break I saw a sign for a "family" lounge which was free! So we found that and hung out there for about 4 hours! It was really nice, it had an area for 3 year olds and younger with soft mats and blocks, a bigger kids area with a jungle gym type thing and a teenage area with tvs, board games, ping pong and bean bag chairs. Oh and a quiet room with padded walls and floors that was dark and played soft music. I wanted to lay in there and sleep the whole time but Eli was all about jumping around and playing for the entire 4 hours. So Andy and I took turns taking small cat naps.

We finally boarded our flight to Vienna and that was a pretty easy flight too, under 2 hours. We arrived in Vienna and gathered up all of our baggage which is always stressful and someone from Andy's team was waiting for us with a car to drive us to Graz which is about a 2 hour drive. Eli slept the entire drive. We arrived at our apartment at about 10pm and we all slept pretty well.

The next week was pretty much terrible- I'm really bad with jet lag and Eli was also feeling the effects. He would go to bed at 8pm then get up from midnight to 3, wide awake crying and wanting to either lay with us (which he has never done so I was shocked) or to be held. We ended up letting him sleep with us for the first time in his life, then the next night we moved his pack and play next to our bed and slowly moved it back into his room. It took him a week to get back onto his schedule.

We were both also feeling a little "homesick" for both home and the familiarity of Zagreb. I took longer to get adjusted than Andy did. Eli seemed fine right away. It was 90+ degree weather the first month we were here and air-conditioning isn't something that people have here. So we ended up buying some fans to help with the air flow a bit.

A week after we arrived here Eli turned 2. We had a nice but quiet time that day with a few gifts and cake. He has grown into such a sweet little crazy boy. Every day there is something new that makes me laugh and smile. We are very lucky to be able to spend so much time together as a family while we're here.

We slowly started to get into our daily routine of walks, grocery runs, cooking and playing. Eli and I started taking the tram right away and exploring different parts of the city in search of a new park! We ended up finding several and we rotate going to them each day. He has them named "yellow slide park," "motorcycle park," "park by water fountain," and "red slide park." He lets me know each day which one he wants to go to! I've been running in the evenings either right before Eli goes to bed or right after, and this has been a great way to figure out the city, I've pretty much gone every possible route you can go around our house, so that has been really helpful!

I also have had to adjust to grocery shopping every day. In Croatia I meal planned for 5 meals and went shopping once a week and at home in the summer about once every week and a half or 2 weeks! Our fridge here is so small you can't fit much in there and the freezer is the kind that is inside of the fridge (a bar or camper fridge) so daily grocery shopping it is! It has actually become a pretty easy and fun part of our routine. Although I feel like we spend way more money by going every day.

The week after Eli turned 2 I decided to start potty training. For 4 days we stayed home and he ran around naked and we worked on him going in the toilet. He slowly caught on and now after about 3 weeks he is fully trained during the day. He wears a pull-up at naps and overnight and I have NO idea how to stop that. He naps for 3 hours in the afternoon and sleeps for 12 hours at night. I can barely hold it that long.. so I will just keep going with the pull-ups and when I feel the time is right we will work on the sleep times.

Andy was on the road for training camp playing some pre-season games so I decided to hop in the car and drive to Hungary to visit my friend Jaime who was in Zagreb with us the last 2 years. It took us about 3 hours to drive there. We stayed 2 nights and had fun watching the kids play, even though Eli was a bully to baby Harper. All he said the whole time was "no baby Harper watch you." We took the kids to Lake Balaton which is an amazing huge lake that looks like the ocean with shops along the boardwalk. The first night we were there after the kids were in bed we went out for some drinks (Jaime's husband Adam was home with the kids..relax!). The second night after the kids were in bed we stayed up way too late chatting on her porch over some wine! It was a really fun trip! Minus me backing into a huge sewage pole thing and bending the axel of the car.... BUT that's another story.

We made it home safely and got the car in the shop right away to get fixed. We have a really cute brand new white VW Tiguan and I just go right ahead and ding it up the first month we're here.... nice.

Since we have been here we have had 3 girls nights which have been really fun, we meet at a restaurant for dinner and get to know each other and usually bar hop after that for a little bit. The food here is really great and I look forward to trying out a new restaurant every couple of weeks!

I've been trying to stay on top of my coaching duties while we are here in Austria too which can be quite a challenge. I got the head coaching job at Greenway High School for the fastpitch team and we had a boat load of fundraisers that just happened to fall in August when I wasn't there! We organized 2 different 5k's and helped host a family fun day and a cake walk. Luckily and thankfully we have an amazing Booster Club that made sure everything was organized and taken care of!! Makes my life a lot less stressful knowing there are willing and helpful people out there!

Last week 2 of my best friends, Krystie & Sue, came to visit me from Zagreb!! They drove here and we met at Ikea then came back to our apartment so they could visit with Andy and Eli then I took them downtown where we had dinner and drinks and wandered around a little bit. I am so thankful that Zagreb is so close and we can get together a lot this year-

Eli and I are headed there on Thursday actually to spend the night and us girls are having our first book club meeting!! Pretty pumped about that! I've been doing a lot of reading since we've been here... I always do in the fall but, even more than usual. Here are the books I've read since we've been here-

The Secret Garden- Frances Hodgson Burnett
The Time of Our Lives- Tom Brokaw
Wonder- RJ Palacio
Sarah's Key- Tatiana de Rosnay
Educating Esme- Esme Codell
The Prayer Box- Lisa Wingate
Currently reading- Just Kids- Patti Smith

So far Andy has had 3 regular season games and they are 2-1. He didn't play last game because of a back injury. This is the first game he has sat out in over 260 games- he is usually very healthy. So he was a little bummed out, but he's slowly getting better and hopefully he will be able to play on Friday.

That basically brings you up to speed- We do a lot of walking, playing at the park, riding the tram to the mall to walk around, grocery shopping (we have a store right next to our apartment building which is awesome!!) cooking, baking and reading! Oh and Andy and I just finished watching the series "Parks & Recreation" a must watch if you're looking for something light and cheerful! Next we're onto catching up with "Suits"

Have a good rest of the week and I will write again soon!

Season 4, Episode 6

2013-02-13T20:42:00.000+02:00

It really has been ages since I wrote last. With no excuses here really, just didn't feel like it! Now today, I've decided it's time to get back in the groove. Eli just went down for a quick morning nap (a rarity these days but he's sick so he needs the rest!) and Andy left this morning for an (unnecessary) 3 day road trip, but I don't make the schedule or pay for the trip so I guess it's not my choice! SO with having a little time I thought I'd take out my handy-dandy (erincondrin.com) planner and backtrack to all of the things we've been up to the past two months...I really can't believe it's been since before Christmas that I wrote! Wow!!

We continued to stay busy after Christmas; Andy had a home game and the next night we had book club followed by a weekend of hockey games. The team headed to Vienna on New Year's Eve day so Eli and I went to my friend Sue's place to "celebrate" A few of us girls brought appetizers and wine and the kids played. I ended up leaving around 7pm since Eli is in bed shortly after that. I spent the rest of my "quiet" evening at home reading and having some wine. I quote the word quiet because on New Year's Eve here there is constant fireworks being shot off pretty much all afternoon and throughout the night. I can't even describe to you how loud or how often these are going off, it's one of those things you have to see to believe. I was on edge the whole evening thinking Eli would wake up and he eventually did around 10pm. I went in his room and picked him up, he was basically just scared of the noise,he kept pointing to the window while crying and saying "that?" So of course I took advantage of this rare moment where he wanted me to hold him while he was sleepy. So I ended up sitting on the edge of my bed with him "bear hugging" me with his head on my chest, blanket around him and his thumb in his mouth. I could have sat like that all night long!! He ended up falling asleep on me after about 5 minutes and I marked that one in the book as about number 5 in the times he has fallen asleep on me in his 17 months of life. I layed him back down shortly after and he didn't wake up after that even though at midnight the fireworks were outrageous.

One thing that kept me busy throughout December-beginning of January was the Jillian Michaels 30 day shred- it's basically a 25 minute workout where all you need is hand weights. I highly recommend it for those who either do not like going to the gym or those who do not have time to go to the gym. It's quick, effective and actually pretty fun. I, however ended up having to stop doing it at day 20 because it hurt my knees so bad. There is a lot of jumping and moving from side to side and my poor old crappy knees couldn't handle it. But I plan on doing it again, in modified form starting next week! If you are wondering, I bought it on itunes but it's free on youtube (I bought it before I realized this...).

After the New Year, I started to buckle down and get the apartment cleaned up and organized for the arrival of Andy's parents on January 11th! I did have one night out though where I wasn't feeling the best and was dragging the next day, Eli and I were in our PJ's playing when Andy calls and says this magazine wants to take a family photo.... in like... 10 minutes. I panicked and said I could have Eli and I to the rink as soon as possible... but NO they wanted to come to OUR place. GREAT. So I had about 10 minutes to throw everything into a closet, cupboard, dishwasher, get Eli dressed, light a candle, sweep the floor, find an outfit and last... look in the mirror at my last night's mascara. Real nice. Luckily I curled my hair the night before so it sort of looked like I did it- I washed my face threw on some eyeshadow, bronzer and lipgloss and got my hair in a low pony just as they were walking in the door. And I'm NOT even exaggerating a little bit. Ask Andy, he still apologizes to me about that day. Well I have yet to see the article so who knows, maybe they took a look at the pictures and said "Maybe we should toss these ones and put a family in there that showers.." Ha! Keep you posted on if I ever see it!

Ok back on track- Carol and Steve's flight was supposed to arrive Friday the 11th at 11am....well turns out they didn't get here until 9:30pm because they missed their flight from Paris to Zagreb. There was a medical emergency on their flight while still flying over North America and they (not sure who they is... the guy who was sick or the pilots..?) had to make the decision to turn around or keep going, so they circled over Canada for a while while making that decision...and decided to keep going and this put them back just enough time to miss the flight at the dreaded Paris airport (avoid this Airport if at all possible, it's a mess- always.) They arrived safe and sound and I picked them up at the airport while my friend Jen sat at our apartment while Eli was asleep (Andy had a home game that evening). I dropped Carol & Steve off at their awesome rental apartment and left them to finally get a little rest!

The next day was the day they had been waiting for! The reunion with Eli after 5 months! Crazy to think that they hadn't even seen him walk yet! He was very excited to see them and it was as if there was only 5 days separation not 5 months. We played and took him to the park, and this was the only day when they were here that it either wasn't snowing or wasn't snow on the ground- which in my experience in 4 winters in Croatia, is a rarity. Then....the snowstorm hit (They brought Minnesota with them and kept it here their ENTIRE trip!) And it didn't stop. Luckily their rental apartment was only 2 tram stops away or about a 10 minute walk! They had a little Christmas for Eli; bringing him presents from home and I think his two favorite gifts were his Greenway Raiders Zamboni and his tent!

We spent most days in the same routine, Eli would wake up and I would text them to let them know, then they would come over and visit and play, Andy would come home from practice and we would all have lunch, usually something we picked up at the market that day or leftovers from dinner! Then Eli would take his nap and they would go walk around the city or go "home" for a few hours, then when Eli woke up they would come back for more visits, coffee, playtime and usually dinner here! We only went out to eat all together 1 time in the 18 days they were here! I cooked most days which was awesome since I like to cook and it's fun cooking for bigger groups of people. We did of course order our favorite, Viva a few different times too!

Andy ended up having 4 or 5 home games while they were here visiting and these home games were held at "Arena Zagreb" which is not his team's home rink. They have games here at this "big" rink every year and call it "Ice Fever" and basically try to sell out and get as many people in that arena as possible. It's a fun time, but we all miss his regular home games at Dom Sportova by the end. Arena Zagreb (holds maybe 16,000 people?) is out of the city a little ways and has more of a North American, corporate feel to it, like an NHL rink, where Dom Sportova (holds 6,000 people) is right in our neighborhood, it's not really all that nice (not meant to be offensive to my Croatian friends) it's just a rough little building that is stuffed to the gills with loud crazy fans and it just has a different feel to it, and it's the feeling we know and love.

While they were here visiting we had a girls night out, which worked out great having built in babysitters! We went to sushi and out to a nice little cafe/bar called Khala after. We played some pretty funny games and had lots of laughs! My friends Jenn & Andrea joined us since Andrea lives right down the street from the place we were at, and a new friend Lois who works at the embassy also joined in on the shenanigans.

Carol and I had a couple of different ventures down to the center for coffee and shopping then one night I decided I would take her to dinner and surprise her with sushi, since she had never had it before and was a little skeptical about it. So we headed downtown, and walked around checking out some of the vendors selling stuff (kind of like Christmas market stuff). Our first stop was to get a nice hot glass of gluhwein; since it was pretty chilly out, hot wine sounded like just the ticket. Then I thought it would be a good idea to get Dan (my brother-in-law) a bottle of rakija (a homemade Croatian liquor, usually made from berries or honey and generally tastes like gasoline) to put in his new bar he is building in his basement. So we go up to the booze vendor and this man is visibly wasted. He hears us speaking English to each other so he speaks English to us and I ask him a few questions about which bottle to buy and he doesn't really have a straight answer for me, and he said well you have to taste test to see if you like it, so he pours 3 shots, one for me, Carol and himself... Carol respectfully declines and he and I take the shot, it's just what I was looking for, not too weak but not initiating the gag reflex immediately like most Croatian shots do to me. I tell him I want that bottle and he says "Ok, you tell me how much." I was confused because the price was on the shelf where the bottle was was, so I just give him the amount that was listed and he gives me the bottle in a paper bag and says, "I don't even work here, I'm just watching this place for my friend for a few minutes" haha that made my day. Next we headed up to my favorite street in Zagreb and here I told Carol that we were going for sushi, her response was "I knew it!" We got there, sat down and ordered wine, spring rolls and a nice platter of Age-Ebi Maki which is a tempura battered shrimp roll- it was delicious as usual and she actually really liked it!!! After dinner we headed back down to the main square to the tent...which is surprisingly still up and had a coffee (Carol) and beer (me) before heading home.

This tent is haunting me the last month I swear- From mid-November through December it is SO much fun, the live music is always so good and the atmosphere is unbeatable. But after the holiday season it's still up.... and still up in February and every time I walk by it's like it's screaming "Come in here and drink and party!!" haha So I've successfully avoided the tent for most of January and all of February....so far.

That about sums up our visit with Andy's parents, we did a lot of playing with Eli and a lot of people watching out our window at the crazys during the snowstorm and a lot of eating and laughing. I'd say it was a successful trip!

After they headed out we spent a couple of weeks not doing much- back to our routine! Andy recently had their "Outdoor Classic" game here in Zagreb and I got a babysitter and headed there with my friends Jenn & Andrea and it was a blast, we lost in OT to Vienna but I was over it pretty quickly...

After the game we hung out at a fun little bar right next to the outdoor rink for the night. This was the beginning of Andy's "break." Their league, and probably every league in Europe had a break for National team play so he had 4 days off of practice. {side bar- Andy's team's goalie, Robert Kristan was away at this national team play, playing for his home country Slovenia- they were the underdogs and ended up winning and are now officially in the Olympics so watch for Robert in Sochi, Russia in 2014!} Saturday he spent with his team "bonding" Sunday night we went out to dinner and drinks with another couple (babysitter twice in one weekend, yee-haw!) and Tuesday we took Eli to the water park in Slovenia which he loves!

That week, actually on my sister's birthday, February 7th, my dad was inducted into the Greenway- Nashwauk-Keewatin wrestling hall of fame. I was able to "attend" the ceremony via skpye. It was held at our high school gym and they dedicated the mat to him and the whole family was there, it was really special- I know he was smiling down from heaven saying "alright!" In his funny little voice.

Saturday I had another skype date- this time at my sister-in-law Courtney's baby shower! Andy was gone at team bowling get-together and Eli was in bed by 7:15 so it was just me relaxing and getting to see friends and family and watch Courtney and that baby bump open her gifts! It was really nice to be able to be there!

Monday night I had an impromptu sushi date with my gals Krystie and Sue- I was feeling a little cooped up and really needed a night out for a bit so it was really great. They are just what the doctor ordered when you need some girl time! Seems like I've eaten a lot of sushi lately...really it was 3 times. In 3 months, so not that much!

Yesterday Andy had a Husqvarna photo shoot (for those of you who don't know, its a chainsaw/lawn care company) wish I could have been a fly on the wall there...full hockey gear with a chainsaw... He brought home a nice sweatshirt that didn't fit him so it's all mine!

Today Andy headed off on his road trip so Eli and I were playing and noticed out the window that Krystie was across the street at the salon so she came over for coffee and a "playdate" which is always great, time sometimes drags when Andy is on the road so it's nice to have company to fill your day! Eli is sick so we've had a hectic evening but he's bathed and tucked into bed so this girl is going to find a book to read- Book Club is on Saturday night!! We read Bossypants by Tina Fey; I highly recommend it, she is one sarcastic witty lady that can write! I picked up a John Sanford book after I finished Tina Fey and finished that last night, he writes murder mysteries based in Minnesota, the book was called Phantom Prey and I really liked that one too!

I sometimes post recipes but I haven't made anything new and crazy in a while- our most recent menu was: Philly cheesesteaks, chicken noodle soup, meatloaf, tacos and stuffed shells... but I will post some new ones next time!

Have a great rest of the week- until next time!

Season 4, Episode 5

2012-12-23T22:53:00.000+02:00

Well I just realized today after looking at my calendar that I haven't written a post in a month!! I decided I should do it now instead of after Christmas otherwise it will be just way too long and you will probably lose interest! So here goes nothing!

We wrapped up last post with my mom leaving and having Thanksgiving! After Thanksgiving Andy was on the road for the weekend so a fellow hockey wife had a Sunday brunch at her house and everyone brought something, it was really fun! Monday we had our 3rd book club meeting to discuss our AWESOME book "Gone Girl" by Jillian Flynn, I highly recommend it, it's a crazy thriller that is sure to keep you on your toes.

This is how much fun we have at Book Club!!

The next night the guys had a home game and I got my lovely babysitter Ivana to come over so I could go then after a big group of us went to the Mexican restaurant and enjoyed some guacamole and Coronas...among lot of other food! The next day I was pooped from having such a busy week of gallivanting...but little did I know that was just the beginning of a crazy month! The next night I went to the Twilight movie with my friends Krystie and Sue and I really enjoyed it! I liked the books a lot and thought the movies were pretty good too. The guys had another weekend away (every weekend in December....gag) So I baked on Saturday...made some puppy chow, but they don't have Chex cereal so I improvised and used basically frosted mini wheats, pretzels and corn flakes. It turned out really good! Sunday we had a cookie exchange with all the girls so that was nice to come home with lots of delicious treats!

Andy got home Monday and had the day off which was nice! I can't remember what we did but I'm sure we went on walks, went to the park and cooked dinner! Two nights later I went out to dinner with Krystie and Sue at the Sushi place and it was amazing as usual! Then we headed to the beloved tent for a night of fun listening to music and chatting. My friends Jenn & Andrea met up with us there then we went out to a bar and sang karaoke and danced and had a great time! I decided it was time to leave when this guy that was talking to us started talking about and defending North Korea.... Anyways....

This is our favorite hangout from the end of November to the beginning of January! Live music almost every night, a variety of sausages, hot wines, regular wines and beer

The next day Eli turned 16 months old! Holy crap, when did that happen?! He's just amazing and makes us laugh every single day! The next night was another away game for Andy so my friends Jen & Andrea came over and Andrea made us her amazing beef stroganoff, I definitely wrote that recipe down! While they were here we noticed it started to snow... and later in the night after a little more wine and laughs, we noticed it was still snowing... and it just kept coming. The girls walked home around 2am and it was a full on blizzard. By morning it was basically impossible to go anywhere in Zagreb. Snowplows can't fit down most of the streets, not very many people own a shovel and the trams couldn't run because they would get stuck.

This is the view from our window in our dining room area... the tram you see is being pulled by a big tractor.

What you see in this picture is exactly what that street looked like for about 4 days. It was still cold out so there was no melting and there was no plowing and very little shoveling. Two days after the storm Andy had a home game and I really wanted to take Eli since it was 5:30 game and those are the only ones I can take him to. I debated putting him in the baby bjorn and carrying him but I was afraid I was going to slip and crush him.. but I ended up trekking through the snow with my SUV of a stroller and made it just fine... there were a few spots where I thought I might be stuck here forever, but we make it to the game and of course I was sweating bullets by the time we got there. Eli made it through the whole game without needing to go home to sleep so he was able to go out on the ice with Andy after, which he's only done once before when he was 7 months old. The next day we bundled Eli up and took him out in the snow for the very first time.. he was not impressed at all. Could be that little kid's snowsuits are impossible to move in! All the girls told me at the game that he looked like a starfish. :)

The next night was my friend Krystie's "23rd" birthday and a few people went to a cooking class, but we stayed home then my friend Sue and I went and met everyone out at the tent and it was such a fun time, the music was amazing and we had a nice little sing-along! And surprise surprise..the next night I went to the tent too, I met my friends Brittany and her husband Sean there and we hung out and visited then headed up to a small bar to end the night there. If you're wondering where my son is during this time I go out... haha he is in bed. He goes to bed around 7:30 and I put him to bed then go out from there. Andy is a trooper and stays home when I have plans with my friends, when we want to go out together we get a babysitter obviously. Well the next night once again.... I was out with friends, but this time it was for Book Club, we meet every two weeks. We read "Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Book Store" It was a fun book to discuss because non of us really liked it, but it still brings up good conversations.

Andy had to leave the next day for an away game and was away for two days and the morning he got back we had the team Christmas party to go to. (Well the party was that evening) It was at a nice restaurant/club called Peoples and the food was delicious, everyone got their choice between homemade tomato or chicken noodle soups to start then dinner was a choice between a Truffle pasta with steak or a steak fillet with mashed potatoes and beets. I got the pasta, Andy got the steak. Both were amazing. We had a fun night chatting and dancing and getting dressed up!

Me, Sue, Erin, Krystie & Sue's husband Donald

The next day, Sunday we had another little Christmas get together thrown by the management at a cafe downtown, so we took the tram (it takes about 10 minutes to get downtown by tram) We got there and had coffee and cake and visited then headed home pretty quickly to put Eli to bed. After that last week I was so tired out! I used the next few days to clean and organized the house, grocery shop and catch up on some shows. We are watching Homeland right now... what a nail biter! Oh and if anyone is looking for a good drinking game, I made one up, watch Homeland and every time Carrie cries you have to drink...
I also started watching Parenthood and I cry every episode.. I'm such a sap. I still have to catch up on Revenge too, I also kept really busy this past month with reading- I read our book club book- Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan, Bringing up Bebe: One American Mother Disovers the Wisdom of French Parenting by Pamela Druckerman, The Hours by Michael Cunningham, The Fault in Our Stars and Paper Towns both by John Green and right now I'm finishing up our book club book for this week: Scar Tissue by Anthony Kiedis. I was on a reading kick this month...

Well I did make it to the tent a couple of times this week too... Andy and I took Eli to meet Santa in the center..but we couldn't find him, so we just listened to music and ate and had a nice time.

Actually I made it to the tent twice in that same day now that I think back on it... we brought Eli there then we went home and after he went to bed I went back down there and met my friend Jen and we listened to music on the outdoor stage then moved inside. Our friend Andrea met us after her class and brought a friend with from her class. Her name is Jenny and she's from Dubuque, Iowa. we exchanged numbers and planned to get together over the weekend to bake cookies. Turns out she lives about 5 minutes away from me! She came over on Saturday evening, I made Swedish meatballs and we ate and played with Eli then after he went to bed we baked sugar cookies and had fun chatting and frosting them.

Today Eli and I went for a nice walk and got a few last minute things at the grocery store, it was total chaos in there- I mean it is every day so now that it's right before Christmas it's even more heart rate raising. The snow is completely melted now (It has been for about a week) and everyone was out getting their Christmas trees. They have a little stand near the grocery store, the market and the church which are all about 3 blocks from our place. I noticed a really cool thing they do with their trees, they have this large funnel looking thing and after you choose your tree, they put it through the funnel, trunk first and the branches bend up and as it goes through a netting goes around it so it's nice and compact to take home. Most people are carrying it and walking or taking the tram so this idea was genius to me. There are some things here that I'm like holy crap that's an awesome idea and other things where I'm pulling my hair out saying why the hell don't they do this/have this here?!! After our walk we went home and napped and then after he woke up we picked up dinner at Viva then headed over to our friend Jaime's house to see her and her new baby girl Harper, who is a week old! I thought Eli was a little shrimp, but after holding a newborn again I realize he's not so little anymore :(
We hung out for a while then Eli and I came home and I baked my banana bread muffins, finished up the laundry and dishes while watching the end of Andy's game (in Vienna) online. Now I'm ready to watch an episode of Parenthood, read Scar Tissue then hit the hay and get some rest for our busy Christmas Eve and Christmas!!

Hope you all have a great Christmas with family and I will write again in a couple of weeks!!

Sretan Bozic!!

Season 4, Episode 4

2012-11-24T23:38:00.002+02:00

I've been lying here on the couch all snuggled up repeatedly checking Facebook, my email, pinterest, and wanelo and I've finally decided to buckle down and start writing and quit wasting time! When I left off last, we were awaiting my mom's arrival so that is where I will begin....

Mom was due to fly in on Monday November 5th around 1pm- and luckily Andy had the day off because I was asked to do a "photo shoot" for a magazine... I was as surprised as you are. We had no idea what any of it was about except they wanted to know what it was like being married to a professional athlete and had sent me some interview questions ahead of time to fill out. So Monday morning comes and a guy that works for Andy's team drives me to the "location" which ends up being a store called Kika, which is basically Ikea but more expensive. So I get there and there is another girl standing outside looking like she doesn't know what she's doing either so we start talking and she's the girlfriend of a water polo player and she filled me on what she knew about the photo shoot. It was me, her, a basketball wife, 2 soccer wives and a handball wife doing a Christmas shoot- we were going to get our makeup and hair done and given clothes to wear. So the "set" people show up and show us where to go- it's 9:30am and there is nothing set up, and there is no hair or makeup person there yet. I was not one bit surprised.... but eventually they got there and set up stations in a fake living room of the store and I got my makeup done first- I looked ridiculous by the way. They gave me extremely full eyebrows and barbie pink lipstick. But I didn't say anything because I had no idea what I was doing. Next was my hair which turned out nice. Hair and makeup for me took 1 hour and there were still 5 more girls to go!!! Meanwhile, the set people were walking around the store picking out things to use for the set- it ended up being a really nice Christmas themed dining room scene. Ok to sum this up- we all had our hair and makeup done, then they gave us outfits... (outrageously priced clothing, shoes and jewelry) and we each had individual photos then a group shot at the end- we finished around 5:30pm! It's a rough life being a model.. hahaha Did I mention they that also offered us no food or drinks? Not surprising once again. So I was starving as you can imagine!

Andy had picked my mom up and then he came to get me while mom and Eli were napping at home! We all hung out and visited that evening then headed to bed since our next day's plan was to head to Budapest, Hungary for a couple of days!

Andy had 2 days off of practice so we decided to take advantage of that while my mom was here- we decided on Budapest because non of us had been there and it's only about 3 1/2 hours away. So we hopped in the car Tuesday morning and drove! Funny story- when we got to the Croatia/Hungary border the guy working in the booth saw Andy's name on the car and him driving and said "Sertich?" and Andy said "yeah" and the guy said "Where is your Grandpa?" haha turns out Grandpa Marko was in a few different newspaper articles recently- After Andy played in the 200 consecutive games they were talking to him about being in good shape and his longevity and of course Grandpa came up in the interviews so they were very interested in the 91 year old Croatian/American hockey player! So yeah we had a good laugh that Grandpa was asked for at the Hungary border.

We arrived at our hotel which was a water park too around 1pm, checked into our room and Eli and grandma napped (jet lag is the worst!) and Andy and I had a beer in the lobby bar..right in the lobby ;)

We headed back to the room after nap time and got Eli all geared up in his speedo and ready to hit the slides!

Oh my goodness was it fun, he LOVED the water and wanted nothing to do with us holding onto him... he would shove our hands away and try to walk in the water which was about waist deep on him and he would face plant of course... so we would grab him quick and he would just spit out a little water and smile and laugh! We spent about 45 minutes in the pool then my mom and I snuck off to the room while Andy and Eli continued to swim. Mom and I had booked a riverboat tour on the Danube which started at 6pm so we had to go get changed and grab a cab. We got downtown Pest to catch our boat a little early, but not early enough to sit down and have a meal.. so we walked into this Thai place and asked them if we could quickly get a meal in less than 30 minutes and they said yes- but turns out we were cutting it close on time so we had them box it up and we ate it while sitting on the boat waiting to take off- the Canadian couple in front of us liked the smell of our food but the girl to our right was kind of giving me a look- oh well I will never see her again! ha! On the cruise you have a head set and the boat goes along the shore line and you get the information about each building or bridge as you go by. They also served 1 complimentary drink- we had champagne! The tour was about an hour long and really cool!

After the tour we cabbed back to the hotel where Eli was asleep and then Andy and I left mom in charge of the sleeping baby while we cabbed back into the city (the hotel was on the outskirts it took about 10-15 minutes to get back downtown by car). We planned on meeting a few of Andy's teammates for some drinks that evening (4 other couples also decided to vacation to Budapest). So we met up and had drinks and a fun night of hanging out, and finished off at the Hard Rock..the only bar open at midnight on a Tuesday!

Wednesday morning we got up and had breakfast at the hotel which was delicious- then hit the pool again! Eli went down for his morning nap and when he got up we checked out of the hotel and headed into the city for a little sight seeing- We parked the car and just started walking around, but I didn't look at the map good enough and I didn't park in the most tourist friendly neighborhood...but we walked around anyways- we ended up stopping for lunch at Burger King- which reminds me of how crazy their currency is there- it is the Fornit and the exchange rate was about 300 Fornit = 1 Euro!!! So you feel like you're spending A LOT of money.

For example a whopper meal was around 1,500 Fornit. So after we ate we walked a little more then headed back to the car- it was around 2:00 and Eli usually naps around 1 so he was a trooper. We got back into Zagreb around 6pm and picked up some dinner at our favorite restaurant Viva on the way (we've got smart.... we called ahead on the drive when we were about 20 minutes out then just swung in and grabbed it so it was nice and hot!). So all in all our Budapest trip was a success. I would recommend 3-4 days in these cities to get a good look at all there is to see!

The next day we spent relaxing and recouperating from our trip. Friday after Andy got home from practice, mom and I headed to Plitivce (pronounced Pleet- veet- sa) Lakes National park. I have been here once before on a rainy day so I was excited to get back. It is out in the countryside of Croatia and takes about 2 hours to get there- it would probably only take 1 hour if there was a highway to get there but its mostly a very curvy mountain road that is basically impossible to pass on.. and we got stuck behind big slow trucks both there and back... BUT the scenery is beautiful so- well worth it. The park is open for hiking and wandering at your own leisure; we chose the 2 hour hike. Which takes you to see waterfalls, lakes, caves, woods and finally you come to a lake with a boat that takes you back to the other side. It is just so beautiful there and actually reminded me a lot of Minnesota.

The next few days we did a lot of playing with Eli, going on our daily walks to the park, cooking, and we made a trip out to the West Gate mall (Eastern Europe's Mall of America kind of) and Eli played in the Kid's Zone and we had some pizza and snacks. We had the team Halloween party on November 10th since there were no days around halloween that the guys had off. This worked out nicely for Andy and I since we had grandma Sue here to babysit! It was a really fun time! I was the Mad Hatter and Andy was Where's Waldo.

Finally Andy had a game on Tuesday the 14th so I got a babysitter so my mom and I could go and check it out. The game was at Arena Zagreb, which isn't the home rink for the team, but is the handball stadium (yes handball, the game you play in gym class where you can take 3 steps and throw the little mini dodge ball into the hockey net is a professional sport) This Arena is pretty huge- holds around 16,000 I think? Tuesday's game didn't sell out and the fans were not their usual chipper selves and we lost our first game in 9 games to a team that isn't nearly as good as us. But that happens sometimes! I was a little bummed my mom didn't get to see a very good game, but we had more hockey in our future... Friday night mom stayed home with Eli and I went to the game and took some friends and we went to dinner before hand.

Andy had the Flu overnight Thursday and Friday and still played in his game (trooper!) We won that game and it was fun to watch, and the stands were full and loud- Partly due to the most recent historical news that happened in Croatia earlier that day... To sum it up, 2 Croatian war generals were sentenced to 24 years and 18 years for killing ethnic Serbs in the war in the 1990's and their war crimes were overturned and the men were set free- I encourage you to watch and read the link!!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-20352187

My two friends that were coming to the game with me were running late to get to my house because the downtown center square was so packed with people rallying and cheering and the tram system was closed off about 5 blocks before you get to the center. This is a REALLY big deal here in Croatia- I found our more about it later that night when I went out after the game with my friends and we visited with some Croatians and got their stories.

The next day we did some more hanging out and visiting and that night when I went to bed I started to feel sick... so I had the flu overnight Saturday night and when I woke up Sunday morning. Luckily mom was here to take care of Eli so I could rest (Andy had another game this day so he was gone at pre-game) I woke up from a long morning nap and felt a lot better and decided to go to the game with mom and Eli since it was her last day. We stayed for 2 periods since that is about Eli's limit. {quick side story... we left and my 9 month pregnant friend Jaime took our seats... and....wait for it..... got hit with a puck. 16,000 people and it hits the pregnant girl. She got hit in the head, but she and the baby are fine!} And once again the crowd was crazy, this time with pride of the 21st anniversary of the Vukovar massacre- a city that had extreme damage during the war- the story I've heard from Croatian friends and then after doing some research is that a small number people (2,000) of the city got together to defend themselves against the Yugoslav People's Army (36,000) and they were able to stand their ground for 87 days! Again, please read and watch the link- it's SO crazy that this happened in the 1990's!!! One guy we were talking to downtown over some drinks was telling us about how he remembers having to hide underground, under the city of Zagreb during the war- he was 8 year old.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2988304.stm

Ok now that you're all up to date on your Croatian history- I will get back on task

We walked downtown one night and stumbled upon an outdoor expo and Eli loved walking in and out of the tents and climbing these stairs...

We stopped at the wine tent for dinner of hotdogs and gluwhine!

Mom and I had a nice dinner out before she left, we went to Black Rock which is steak place right near our apartment. You cook your own food on a hot volcanic rock, it's really neat! The food was amazing.
Mom flew out early
Monday morning and arrived safe and sound in Minneapolis that afternoon.

This week we settled back in really quickly to our life of just the 3 of us...not much changed when mom was here... we did the same stuff we do every day! Wednesday we went to a friend's place for a Thanksgiving meal which was amazing- then Thursday I made Thanksgiving for Andy, Eli and I. We had all the goodies- Turkey, homemade stuffing (thanks Krystie for the spices!) mashed potatoes and gravy and some banana bread muffins...WHICH I'm proud to say I made the recipe up myself! It is still going to be trial and error for a while with it but I will post it at the end for you to try out! While I was cooking, Andy was getting the Christmas tree put up and Eli was being his cute little self and wandering around the house playing. We watched A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving while the stuffing was baking and after our meal we decorated the tree. It was a great Thanksgiving with my boys!

Yesterday I had to drive my friend Jaime to the impound lot since her car got towed while she was at my house... for the 2nd time haha. So that was an adventure! Then last night I had 2 friends over to have a Thanksgiving leftover casserole- which turned into drinking too much wine. Ugh that always happens!

Today Eli and I had a nice little play date at the park with friends Shay and her daughter Emma then we both had awesome afternoon naps then we walked downtown (the weather is amazing here right now... sorry Minnesota!) We walked and stopped in a couple of stores to browse then hopped on the tram to get home- had some spaghetti which always coincides with bath night! And Eli is now sound asleep- also he thinks he's super cool now because he has a little mini pillow in his crib. When I go get him up he always points to it and says "That!" which sounds more like "datz"- Oh speaking of things he says- I have discovered that he is picking up Croatian..which is really weird since the only time he hears it- it is background noise when we are on walks or at the park or games... we figured this out because his word for zipper is "Zha-da" which in Croatian the Z would have an accent mark over it and is pronounced zha...which I can't really explain since we do not have that letter or sound in the English language!!! So yes he is learning Croatian for those who ask haha

Ok this blog is long. Sorry.
A few more things.. we had book club 2 Mondays ago and discussed our book "Wild" by Cheryl Strayed- I give it 3.5 stars and recommend reading it. Our next book we chose was "Gone Girl" by Gillian Flynn and we meet Monday (two more days I can hardly wait!!!) and I give that sucker 5 stars and you HAVE to read it.

Ok I will end with 2 of my new recipes I made up and tried both this week!! Have a great rest of the weekend!!

Banana Bread "muffins"
I put muffins in quotations because they are not actually muffins..they are banana bread, just in a muffin tin. SO if you decided to try this recipe in a bread pan, you may need to alter cooking time!!

24 muffins or 2 loaves
1 stick butter or margarine
1 1/4 cup sugar
2 eggs
4 ripe mashed bananas
1 cup sour creme
1 tsp vanilla (I never measure vanilla..I just pour it in!)
1/2 tbsp baking soda (this seems like a lot but its what I did..)
1/4 tsp salt
2 1/2 cups flour
Cinnamon and sugar mixed together

1. preheat oven to 300 (150c)
grease the muffin tins with a stick of butter then sprinkle a little bit of the cinnamon sugar mix in the tin

2. In large bowl with electric mixer, creme butter, sugar, eggs, bananas, sour creme and vanilla. With wooden spoon stir in salt baking soda and flour

3. Fill each muffin tin with two heaping tablespoons of mixture then sprinkle the top with a little bit of the cinnamon and sugar mixture

Bake 1 hour 15 minutes ( I have an oven with a Croatian brain... so keep an eye on yours after an hour just in case!)

Artichoke & Spinach dip

2 cans of Artichokes drained and diced up (I cut off the stringy part and use only the hearts)
2 small cloves of garlic- crushed, pressed or diced (everyone needs to own the Ikea garlic press, it is my favorite kitchen item!!!)
10 frozen spinach balls or 1 cup of frozen spinach-thawed
3 cups shredded mozzarella cheese
1 cup of real mayo
1 cup sour creme

Mix all of these together- put in a casserole dish (I mix mine in the casserole dish because I hate doing dishes) bake at 350 for 20 minutes covered. Bake 10 more minutes uncovered or until bubbly. Serve with ripped up bread (I used Tastefully Simple's Beer Bread!!) but a regular french loaf is delicious too!

Season 4, Episode 3

2012-11-04T15:47:00.000+02:00

We've had lots going on the last couple of weeks and a busy couple of weeks ahead of us so I'm just going to jump right in!

Today is an absolutely beautiful European Sunday. My favorite day of the week here in Croatia. Everything is just a little bit more quiet! Early this afternoon Eli and I walked Andy to the rink to catch the bus for their game in Graz. It was about 70 degrees out with a slight breeze, people were out walking and having coffee at all the cafes. The church that is right near our house that we stop in pretty much daily (even if we can't understand what is being said...we get the general point!) was plump full, there were people sitting outside the doors and windows listening to the service, I love that! You can come and go as you please. There was also a man playing the french horn at the tram stop right near our apartment, he is out there pretty much every day rain or shine! And my favorite thing to see on Sundays- 3 men playing cards right outside of the grocery store, using flipped-over banana crates for their table. I've wanted to take a picture of this for over a month now but I feel like it may be rude. so I've held off. Ok now that you have the beautiful picture painted in your head of the Sunday in Zagreb- just throw in a few random scraggly looking folk slamming bottles of beer or slivovitz while sitting on the ground or on park benches...because that is something I witnessed several times today too! Sunday Funday woo hoo!!!!

Today Eli and I are busy cleaning and baking in anticipation of my mom (Grandma Sue's) arrival tomorrow!! She gets in around noon and we will spend tomorrow catching up and resting- then it's off to Budapest, Hungary on Tuesday for a couple of days! Andy has 3 days off in a row (unheard of!!) so we're taking full advantage of that! My next blog will be about my mom's visit and our adventures while she is here.

I will jump back to where I left off last time- we had just finished the We Run Zagreb 7.5k and I realized my knees needed some major help, so I ordered some new running shoes and some patella bands to use while running (Mom is brining all of our goodies from home!!!) hopefully they won't hurt so bad now! I also joined the gym so I can start weight lifting for my legs to gain the muscle that puts the support around the knee.. I've been putting off the gym membership because it's been so nice out here, it's hard to justify working out indoors!

We celebrated Canadian Thanksgiving with a bunch of our friends here on October 9th. We had it at one of Andy's teammates who has a huge apartment so we were all able to fit! Everyone brought some food and we had a nice time, we left fairly early for Eli to go to bed but still enjoyed the delicious food and good company! I had brought over some Tastefully Simple stuff with us this year so I made Beer Bread and Let's Luau dip, and I made the Pioneer Woman's chocolate sheet cake. If you don't know of the pioneer woman... you NEED to check out her blog, she's my idol. www.thepioneerwoman.com

Andy had a lot of long road games in October...where they leave on Thursday for Friday's game because it's about a 10 hour bus trip- then bus home overnight Friday and don't get home until Saturday at about 8am. This was two weekends in a row, so he was pooped, and so I was I! Eli is not a difficult baby by any means, but having Andy around is so great, he is such a helpful, hands-on dad.

We had a girls night mid week- in between the two weekends of long road trips for the guys. We had dinner and a feeewww drinks at a restaurant called Secondo. It is Italian food, and really good. I had some sort of spicy veggie penne dish.

The next week there was a Tuesday night home game so I got my friend to come over and babysit Eli so I could watch the game! He was already in bed when she got here... sleepy little bugger. Then two days after that Eli and I got packed up in the car and drove to Alleghe, Italy to visit our friends Gino & Laura! I was a little worked up about the trip before we went...just because I wasn't sure how Eli would be in the car for that long... (google maps said 4 hours 46 minutes) But turns out it only takes 4 hours to get there. We left at 9:30am and drove for two hours. Normally Eli takes a morning nap at this time for about an hour but he didn't sleep in the car, but he just relaxed and watched his Neptune's Oceans DVD. After two hours we stopped in Trieste, Italy for lunch at a rest stop. He ran around and played and ate lunch and we were back in the car by noon. He fell asleep within 5 minutes of being back in the car (normal afternoon nap time is around 1:30) and he slept for about an hour... which isn't enough but sometimes you have to roll with the punches. At this point we were in Belluno, Italy and had about an hour left of our drive.

This is a beautiful winding mountain drive! The leaves were beautiful fall colors and there were clear blue skies. I kept hitting play on Eli's DVD because it's only 28 minutes long... and I kept feeding him pretzel sticks...he loves them...eats them like a rabbit eating a carrot, it's hilarious. He didn't cry the entire trip, I was very proud!

We pulled up to the Alleghe hockey rink, this is where I was meeting Laura- we got out and it was right beside a gorgeous lake! Laura met us and guided us back to their apartment. Once we got inside and settled, Eli and Lily (4 months) got to meet and play! I fed Eli dinner around 5:30pm and both kids were in bed by 6:45! I knew he was going to be tired after missing most of his nap time! Gino, Laura and I sat up and visited, drank wine, scarfed down some cheese and crackers and Gino cooked us spaghetti and meatballs with his Grandma's spaghetti sauce recipe! It was a really fun night!

The next morning the kids got up around 8:30 (thanks kids!!) And we fed them and they played, napped then got up and we decided to take them out for a walk- We drove for a few minutes up to the base of the walking trail then got out and started from there. It was absolutely beautiful!!! It was so peaceful- The background noise is a rushing creek- a slight change from my background noise in the city with trams coming and going and people honking their horns!

We continued our uphill walk until it started to rain on us- then we turned around and headed for home- the next day I had shin splints- Another mental note for myself to join the gym! When we got home the kids napped and we lounged- And that night after the kids were in bed, Gino babysat and Laura and I went out to dinner at a little pub. We ordered burgers and fries!! They were delicious!!

Everyone I tell this to thinks I'm crazy! But we had just eaten spaghetti the night before and I'm not that fond of food in Italy- I mean it's good but I prefer a thicker pizza with lots of toppings (picture Pizza Hut's supreme pan pizza...) and my mom's spaghetti over anything I've eaten in Italy the 5 or so times I've been there. That may sound snobby.... but it's true! Laura and I were discussing how Americans think Italian food is so much different than it is! The pizzas are very plain, almost no sauce and a very thin layer of cheese (they are good, don't get me wrong... you can fold them up into a few different pieces and eat it much easier that way!) also their pasta is very plain, not a lot of garlic or cheese like at home... and don't get me going on Garlic cheese bread...YUM! These are all things we Americans have done to authentic Italian food to make it "bigger & better"!

Anyways, we enjoyed our meal then headed home to have a little more wine then off to bed. The next morning we got up and had breakfast then Eli and I hit the road around 9:30 again. The drive back to Croatia took a little longer, and we also stopped for longer for him to play. But once again he was great! I was really proud of him!

A couple of days later, Sunday October 28th, we decided to bring the kids to the hockey game in their Halloween costumes! Sunday games are at 5:30 so it's much easier than the 7:15 games. So I got Eli all bundled up in his costume and we went to the first 2 periods of the game...that's about all he has the patience for right now. He looked so cute. All of the kids did! Then a few days later on the actual day of Halloween, the kids came over trick-or-treating! We had a houseful of families and they all stayed for about an hour- luckily I had a bottle of wine on hand and some cheese and crackers- I also had made some potato skins so everyone got a little snack.

Two days later, Friday November 2nd (it's November already!!!) I decided to go to the game and have my friend Ivana watch Eli... this time I had her come over before he was in bed. I was mentally prepared for him to have a meltdown and for me to feel guilty most of the night... but I left him at 6, in his high chair eating dinner and Ivana said he was upset for a little while then got over it! That made me so happy! It's hard to break that "mama's boy" thing when you are the only person he really has contact with every single day. Eli is great with Andy too, and our family at home, but he is pretty tentative around new people. I know he will grow out of it someday so I'm not too concerned.. as long as he likes ME then I'm ok!

I forgot to mention that a few weeks back I went into the center to get a birthday present for one of the little boys here and I heard a couple of girls speaking English (American English... you can tell the difference when you hear it!!) So I started talking to them and we exchanged emails. They are here on scholarships studying and doing some research. One of the girls is actually from Ely, Minnesota! Small world! The other 2 are from the Pittsburgh area- they all went to PENN State. I had them over the next week to hang out and I think they were here until about 3am... so needless to say we got along! I gave them tickets to a game last week then the night I had the babysitter I also got a couple of them tickets and we met before the game and hung out a little bit after too. It's fun meeting new people! I actually just met a Croatian woman today in the grocery store who started talking to Eli, then realized we speak English so started speaking pretty good English to us and walked with us all the way home!

Other odds and ends that have been going on here.... Andy played in his 200th consecutive game here in Zagreb. Quite the feat considering hockey is a rough sport and injuries are fairly common. The fans gave him a standing ovation and he got a jersey presented to him with Sertich 200 on the back. He has also had a lot of interviews about it recently. They are very interested in his Grandpa Marko too, the 91 year old hockey player! So there has been a few articles out there recently about him. And I'm next on the totem pole, they just sent me some interview questions and I'm off to do a photo shoot on Monday for a magazine... haha This should be interesting! My mom flies in at the same time so Andy and Eli will be picking her up while I get primped! Keep you posted on how that goes too.

Since my last blog I finished up 1984 by George Orwell- I think I gave it 3 stars on goodreads.com (follow me on there!) It was good but I think I would have liked it better if I hadn't read the more recent books of similar context like The Hunger Games. Next book I read was Wild by Cheryl Strayed. This is our first book club book, so I was really excited to read it (A few of us wives here decided to do a book club, first meeting will be next week!) It's really great, I definitely recommend it. And now I'm onto Casual Vacancy by J.K Rowling... she's got some big shoes to fill after her incomparable last series...but I'm being open-minded. Andy and I have also been keeping up with the four part TV series on History Channel- The Men Who Built America. It's been really informative and interesting. We're excited for the 4th part coming up this week.

I will end with a couple of the most recent recipes I've tried! Have a good start to your November and we'll meet back here in 2 weeks!

Beef & Broccoli- I don't have a crock pot so I just cooked it in a saucepan over low heat covered for about an hour and 20 minutes. It was really good but a little salty, I think I added too much beef bullion. Will definitely make it again!

http://www.bsrecipe.blogspot.com/2012/04/crock-pot-beef-and-broccoli.html

Egg Bake: I just made this up as I went and it turned out pretty good
Layer thinly sliced french bread in a cake pan (about 1/2 inch thickness)- lay your choice of cheese over the bread (I used the real healthy kraft singles... YUMMM! If I was at home I would have used Velvetta!)
Whisk together 12 eggs, about 3/4 cup of shredded cheese and mix in whatever diced veggies you want! I used:
red pepper
onion
garlic
spinach
mushrooms

pour over the bread, season with salt & pepper and add small chunks of cream cheese all over the egg bake.
Bake at 350F or about 200C for about an hour

I actually liked this better the next day!

Season 4, Episode 2

2012-10-09T10:59:00.000+03:00

Hello there- Happy Fall to everyone! It's slowly becoming fall here in Croatia- still a few hot days mixed in there though! Today is a perfect fall day, sunny but a nice crisp breeze!

These past few weeks have gone by really quickly considering it's been nothing but sickness in our household! I will rewind to where I left off last time:

We were just getting ready for our weekend away in Pula, Croatia which is about 3 hours from where we live in Zagreb. Andy's team was the host to two outdoor games in an old Roman amphitheater which is right along the sea in Pula. Eli and I got all prepared to go- this took me a week, no joke. I meal planned for Eli since I knew we had a kitchen and fridge in our hotel/apartment. So I picked up all the groceries for 3 days, diapers, milk, and packed clothes for the both of us for hot summer weather to cool fall evenings, because the temperature there at this time of year changes like that! I got the car all gassed up and packed while Andy was still home so I didn't have to do those things while he was gone. Which reminds me of a thought I've had- I can't even go down and take the garbage out while Eli is sleeping (when Andy is gone) because I'm too scared... and we live in a secure building BUT I have NO problem sitting around a fire all night in the summer or bopping over to the neighbors while Eli is sleeping... really weird how it's the same thing, but different. Moving on-

We left Friday around noon for Pula- We had 3 cars of girls and kids and dogs following each other there! Eli fell asleep about an hour in, but only slept for 30 minutes...but he was good, he just played and watched his movie the whole time. This 30 minute nap thing is SO not him so I knew he would be tired later in the day. We arrived in Pula around 4pm (we had to make a pit stop in the middle of nowhere since no bathrooms were to be found and we had 2 kids in our group, a dog and a pregnant girl!) But all in all the ride there went smoothly! We got checked in, unpacked and organized in our apartment. Eli and I shared with one other girl and her dog. It had 2 bedrooms, a living room, kitchen and a balcony facing the Adriatic Sea.

The game that night was scheduled for 9pm so I had planned on staying back and watching it on TV since Eli goes to bed around 8pm and will ONLY sleep in his crib or pack and play...otherwise I would have attempted to take him in the stroller or baby bjorn. Turns out he went to bed at 7pm because he missed that afternoon nap and I was cozied up on my balcony with a bottle of red and my ipad by 7:15pm! I did some reading then realized that the hotel didn't have the channel that the game would be on so ended up finishing my book that night. The hockey game didn't actually get started until after 11pm that night because of numerous delays because the ice kept melting (no kidding...) but they played anyways!

The next day we had breakfast with Andy and got to spend pretty much the whole day with him since they had Saturday off. We walked the boardwalk along the sea, had some lunch, and just "vacationed!" It was really nice. Eli napped there like a champ so we just hung out on the balcony during those times, And that evening we went into the city to check it out. The next day we also spent walking around near our hotel before Eli and I hit the road to come back home. Andy's game wasn't until late Sunday night and Eli had started to get a cold so we were ready to head back!

I had a feeling Eli was going to get sick after the weekend- The day before we left for Pula I took him to this play place at the Mall... he absolutely loves it but it's friggin disgusting. The first time I took him, a grandma changed her grand kid's poopy diaper in the ball pit, and this time a 4ish year old girl, wearing a skirt stood up and peed right on the ground and the mom grabbed her and left....without cleaning it up. I realize these types of places are filled with germs and you just have to deal with it...but those two things are both unacceptable. Also the kids there are mean. Always pushing each other and throwing balls at each other and seeing what they can get away with while their moms are having coffee and not paying attention to them. So I'm trying to avoid taking him there, but to see that smile when he is there is priceless.

For about 8 days after the Pula trip Eli was coughing, snotty nose, red eyes and tired... so we basically hung out a home and nursed his cold. Pretty much the day his cold went away, he got the Flu. I thought he was teething.... he had a fever, runny nose and terrible diarrhea..I'm talking at least 10-15 diaper changes a day- This resulted in diaper rash which was heartbreaking. But he survived..and so did I. Two reasons I figured out he wasn't teething... 1. He got no teeth 2. I got the same flu the day he got better. It was terrible. And it lasted 4 days!! I've never had a flu last that long. But I talked to a couple other girls and they had the exact same thing! So...there's 3 full weeks of sickness in our house.. Except by some miracle Andy didn't get it!

Amongst all of that sickness we did manage to do a few fun things though! I talked last post about how I was training for the 7.5K..I stuck with my running every other day and felt better and better each run! One night I even ran downtown and met a couple friends at a bar for a glass of wine then ran home, haha I got a few looks! The run was Saturday September 29th and it was a lot of fun! It was really well organized which I was shocked by- since there were so many people I was expecting chaos! There were 5 of us that ran it, and my friend Krystie and I stuck together for the run and finished right around 46 minutes! We felt awesome and of course had to stay out after and celebrate.

The next day there was a home game so Eli and I went to that for the first 2 periods then back home to bed! I'm sure I've mentioned before how great of a sleeper this kid is (credit to a tiny bit of luck, lots of hard work and Babywise) Well with him being sick the last 2 weeks he has been sleeping 12-14 hours a night and taking his two naps a day each 2-3 hours long. Now that he is better, I thought it would change but he has been going to bed closer to 7pm and getting up between 8-9am! I think he is up earlier than that but he doesn't say anything...he just lays there..so I think I will just let him continue to do this..I honestly can see parts of his personality already, he really likes to be alone/have his alone time.

Monday night we got a babysitter for the first time (we've had family watch him, and we also had a babysitter last year twice, but he was in bed before the babysitter came over). So my friend Ivana came over and my friend Jaime brought her daughter over too. We left the house around 5:15pm... I was so nervous. I guess he did ok though; had a bit of a meltdown for a while but then realized there was nothing much he could do so he just stuck it out and played with Ava and went to bed around 8. We were at the casino for a charity poker tournament then to a bar after with some friends and were home around midnight. The next day is when I woke up sick... I just thought I may have had a litttttttlllleeee too much to drink but turns out I had the flu.

I think that sums up our past few weeks- of course there are the daily walks and me meeting with friends at the wine bar occasionally after Eli is in bed (it is conveniently located about 6 blocks away). I finished up the TV series Pretty Little Liars and am not very happy that there is only one episode in October then not another one until January!!! I also finished up the book The Pillars of the Earth and now I'm reading 1984 by George Orwell and I'm watching the TV series Revenge.

One thing that I really enjoy while here in Europe is cooking new things. I have a system down this season where I meal plan for 5 meals a week, bake once a week and grocery shop on Sunday or Monday for that week. I also keep track of money spent each week and figure out what meals are cheapest or most expensive. I'm trying to pair a couple of each of these meals together so each week's grocery budget is about the same. I'm getting pretty close to getting it down! It's kind of fun to figure out! Here are a few different things we've had in the past couple of weeks (photos aren't mine- I got them off of Pinterest. If you're interested in the recipes, just add me on Pinterest and look at my boards!)

This is a cheesy chicken and broccoli mixture over rice.
The recipe is for a crock pot but I just did it in a sauce pan

Cajun chicken and veggies with
linguini. I dropped the Cajun since Eli
eats what we eat.

Apple bread with caramel glaze.

Sweet & sour chicken

Zagreb- Season 4, Episode 1

2012-09-10T17:19:00.000+03:00

Well it's that time of year again... I can't believe this is our 4th hockey season spent in Croatia... time truely does fly. We have been here in Zagreb for 3 weeks now so I decided that was a sufficient amount of time before blogging; blog too soon, nothing much to write about, wait too long and I forget things.
Let's jump back a little bit for a summer re-cap:
We had a great summer at home with family and friends, it was such a joy introducing Eli to everyone! We spent most of our summer week days at home playing with him, taking him for golf cart rides and sticking to my neurotic schedule for him. (Hey, if it works, I'm sticking to it!). Andy and I were able to get away for the first time together in June, leaving Eli at home with all of the grandparents pitching in to watch him. We went to Moondance Country Jam in Walker, MN with my cousin Joe and his girlfriend Steph. Andy played in a softball tournament and I basked in the sun with a cold drink in my hand by day... and we listened to country music artists by night! It was so much fun, and we look forward to doing it again next summer! We also did some camping, weekends with friends for bachelor parties, showers, family get togethers and weddings. My favorite things about summer were being able to see family whenever we wanted, hanging with Eli at home and being able to celebrate his 1st birthday with family and friends and having backyard fires with neighbors and friends in the evenings. We also stayed busy "working"- I coached high school fastpitch in the spring, Andy did some hockey schools and private lessons throughout the summer and we did our annual workout camp for the high school kids together for the last 6 weeks of our time home.

Summer once again flew by, but I'm realizing that with having a kid, time absolutely blows by, leaving you wondering where the heck it went. Each day for us is pretty routine so when you have that planning of breakfast, nap, lunch, activity, nap, dinner, bath, bed.. it just seems like the day is over before you know it! So we really try to enjoy every second with Eli, and he makes that pretty easy- he's quite the character with his big 'ol toothy smile, his wiggle dance moves, and his constant curiosity about EVERYTHING. It's amazing how a 13 month old can actually understand what you are saying, even if he can't speak to you. A few words that Eli knows or things that he"gets" right now are: "Where is the light?" "Do you want to take a bath?" "Open the drawer". "Close the drawer." "Do you want to go for a walk?" "Are you ready for bed?" Train, car, hot, window, shoe, ball, milk, horse, book, nose, eye, belly button, toes, teeth, watch, puppy, bird....
Anyways.. I'm glad I just wrote those down on here because I forgot my baby book at home so I will refer back to this to write it all down! Ok moving onward!

Andy came over to Croatia at the end of July- Eli and I waited 3 weeks to join him. The anticipation of that flight was pretty hard on me.. just THINKING about flying with a 1 year old almost gives me a cold sore. Luckily I mentally prepared for it to be the worst day of my life, because it actually wasn't all that bad! My mom, Andy's parents and Eli & I drove down to Minneapolis to the airport and Eli did good in the car for the 3 1/2 hour drive. He actually slept for a little over an hour (this kid is basically a crib only sleeper..) We got checked in and through security, not before some issues of course.. we got sent to 2 different counters to get checked in.... WHY is this so difficult having an infant on the plane that doesn't have a seat... it's 2012 people, figure it out. Luckily the lady helping us was amazing and sweet. But not sweet enough to waive my $100 dollar fee on my 2nd bag and my TWO HUNDRED NINETY EIGHT dollar 3rd bag fee. That's a whopping almost $400 bucks for 2 extra suitcases... and I wouldn't exactly call them "extra" considering one of them was for Eli (he doesn't get a bag since he doesn't have a ticket, since he's on my lap) and the other one was clothes, food we can't get in Croatia & medicines for Eli for the year just in case. Three bags to me isn't outrageous for living somewhere for 8 months. I brought a roll-away with me to Moondance and I was there for 2 nights. I've become a master packer for Europe trips only, I'm still really bad at weekend trips; I take advantage of being able to bring whatever I please! I also had an epiphany while getting the house organized and getting packed- I don't need this much stuff (in general). SO my mantra while packing was "have less, do more." So I've been sticking by that for over a month now and it feels great!

Back to the flight-
We left Minneapolis at 3:30pm, and we were lucky enough to have not 1...but TWO open seats next to us! We were in the middle section of the big plane..so there was one guy on the other end, who was really nice by the way. Eli played in his own big-boy seat, read books, watched his Neptune's Oceans, played peek-a-boo with the people behind us... and was all-in-all a little angel. We ate dinner and I decided it was time to give him a little "help" to fall asleep so I gave him a little bit of benadryl at 6:30pm (side note here.. I confided in a friend who is a pharmacist before doing this) Another side note: This child sleeps only in a crib, never on me, with me or near me. Another side note; why am I explaining MY parenting to you? haha! Ok so long story short..he layed on the seat as the meds kicked in, looking pretty drowsy, I tickled his cheeks (meanwhile he is rolling, tossing, kicking, doing ANYTHING to not fall asleep) and he finally fell asleep around 7:00pm. Then..... he woke up at 7:30 and was good to go. I don't think I gave him enough..but it was fine, he wasn't cranky or too busy or annoying to any other passengers..so I just let him play and do his thing. He finally fell asleep at 10:15pm on the seat next to me and we were landing at 11:30pm... SO I covered him up with a blanket so the flight attendant didn't make me pick him up and buckle him haha. He slept through the landing and I waited for everyone to get off of the plane and picked him up.. he woke up a little bit, but only for a minute and they had the stroller ready right outside of the plane door so I put him in there and he slept our entire 5 hour layover in Amsterdam (which would have been 4am-9am our time, so he would have been sleeping at home anyways) Right before we got on our flight to Croatia he woke up and once again- God was watching over us and we had an entire row to ourselves. This flight wasn't even 2 hours so that is NOTHING after flying 8-9 hours. He played, read books and watched his movie again.. and we landed safely in Zagreb on Tuesday August 21st! Andy was there ready to pick us up, all of our bags and car seat arrived and we were in our car heading to the apartment within 20 minutes of landing. Eli fell asleep in the car before we left the airport, it was so cute!

We arrived at our apartment and let Eli sleep for about 2 hours in his room then woke him up. He was in great spirits and so happy to be with his dad again! He went to bed around 9pm and slept until 8am and wasn't really affected by the jet lag except about 3 nights of waking up at midnight for about 10 minutes. I took about a week to get adjusted.. I always do and it's so annoying. But if that's my major complaint than I will take it!

Our first week was busy with getting back into our routine here, keeping Eli on track with his schedule and getting the apartment in order. After week one I was able to feel like I was at "home" I had my things unpacked and my meal planning & grocery shopping done.

Andy was busy with pre-season practices and games- Eli and I went to his pre-season game and stayed for 2 periods since it went past bed time. Later that week we had a team/family get together out in the country at this great pizza place so we all got to visit and have some drinks- I didn't get a chance to sit down and get to know all of the new girls since I was chasing Eli around- so we decided on a girls night that next week. We met up at Wine Bar and had a great time chatting and getting to know each other.

Andy and I met up with some people from near our hometown that were in Croatia on a biking trip, we met them down in the center and had drinks and visited with them about their trip! That was really cool to have someone from home be here and just hang out and hear about their plans. We have 3 different groups of visitors coming this season that we're VERY excited about!!

Last night was the first home game of the season, we lost to Red Bull Salzburg in a shoot out.

Eli and I stayed the whole game! I was so proud of him for staying up so late! This weekend is the big outdoor game extravaganza for Andy's team in Pula, Croatia. It should be pretty amazing to see. A bunch of us got rooms right on the sea for the weekend..it should be a lot of fun!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3y7lwTUA3j0

Ok well I don't want this to get too long and for you to lose interest.... That about sums up what's going on here.. I've been watching the TV show Pretty Little Liars... I'm now on season 3.... it's a must watch. I'm reading The Pillars of The Earth by Ken Follett and I'm planning on starting the couch to 10k training on Monday Sept. 17th, just for the heck of it!
Ok-have a good day-Ta-ta for now!

Playoffs...

2012-03-13T16:50:00.002+02:00

It is already that time of year once again... seems strange to think that we have been here in Croatia for 3 hockey seasons already and will be back for a 4th next year!

First round: Quarterfinals
Andy's team ended the regular season in the number 2 spot which is the highest they have been in the 3 seasons we have been here. So, for the first round they were paired against the number 7 team from Znojmo, Czech Republic. This was great because we knew we could beat these guys, the only downfall was that this is the farthest road trip out of any of the teams in the league. I think the bus trip took the guys about 8-9 hours one way. This meant they guys left the day before the game resulting in two days away from home which for the mom's of multiple very active children can be exhausting. For me, it was just another day (missing Dad of course!) since Eli isn't mobile yet and is pretty easy to entertain. Luckily the Bears only had to go there two times as we swept them in the 7 game series- two of the games being at home and two away. The bears also set some sort of world record for sweeping in the quarterfinals and never being down by a goal the entire series. That's something to be proud of!

Semi-finals:
With having swept in the first round, we had over a week to wait until the next series started since the other teams were still playing out their series'. A week is a long time to wait around to play a game! And I'm just a spectator! So we spent that week like any other; playing with Eli, cooking yummy meals, going for walks... And finally Tuesday, March 6th arrived. We had a home game and boy was it a disastrous one. We ended up having to play Klagenfurt (KAC) in this round which is never a good thing. They are a highly liked (by the referees and the heads of the league...) team, and I'm not just saying that. Ask anyone who has anything to do with the EBEL (Erste Bank Ice Hockey League).
So here is how the game went: We played very well the first period but produced no goals, the second period we played like crap and tempers were flaring.... One of our players hit a guy in the head resulting in some blood and was ejected from the game and on his way off the ice, things were said which resulted in a "bit" of a fight. Meaning a good old fashioned bench clearing brawl which was not only number 2 on Canada's TSN highlights but also CNN worthy. Yikes. You can see bits and pieces of the fight on You Tube if you're into that kind of thing....
Anyways the guys ended up having to leave the ice to "cool down" and the Zamboni resurfaced and they had to finish off the last 2 minutes of the second period after that intermission. Then they started the 3rd and it was just about as ugly as the second- hockey-wise. We ended up losing 4-0 to a team that we beat 6 times out of 6 during the regular season. Glad that game is over....

Game 2 of the series was away in KAC and we ended up losing that one 4-1 with a grand total of 42 penalty minutes against us while the other team at 6 I believe. This is no excuse for us since we are a better team and need to put the puck in the net when we get the chance...but COME ON- Talk about frustrating to watch (even more frustrating as a player as I get the inside scoop from Andy). Also worth mentioning is that we outshot this team 40 to 38 I believe it was. Another small bit worth mentioning is after one of the many penalties, one of the KAC players (who I will not name) came up to Andy, shaking his head in embarrassment and apologized and said he was embarrassed about the officiating of the game....

Game 3 was back at the one and only Dom Sportova in Zagreb. With the crowd going wild and some lovely handmade signs that read:

"Mr. Safron, When you sold EBEL's credibility, did you say thanks Heidi?"

After some research and a phone call to a good friend of mine who is Austrian, I found out a little more about this Mr. Safron and Heidi. To sum it up, Mr. Safron was a past president of the hockey league and Heidi is an Austrian millionaire widower who contributes financially to the KAC team and rumored to the league itself...

This game was a LOT better when it came to us staying out of the penalty box and getting a little bit more of a fair game, we ended up winning 3-2.

Today when I logged onto Facebook there was a photo tagged of me and Eli at the game, I really like it; we both have our game faces on: Photo taken by Uros Modlic.

Well that puts us down 2 games to 1 in the 7 game series- Tonight (Tuesday March 13th) is game 4 which is away in Klagenfurt. Tonight's game can be watched on medvescakizbliza.com at 7:15pm Croatia time which is 1:15pm in MN!

www.medvescakizbliza.com

I will end with saying that it is unfortunate that a professional game could potentially be regulated by the shady referees or Austrian people of high political or social power...but with that being said I've seen a few shady Croatian business dealings too. What goes around comes around I guess- Let's just be good sportsmen and let the best team win!!

Ok enough hockey talk.
Lets get down to business- meaning Eli. He is growing like a weed and is still my happy, bubbly little boy with lots of smiles and laughs! He had about 5 days of "fussiness" last week when his two pearly whites were popping through his bottom gums, but now they are through and he's back to himself!

A few other new things he has been doing are:
Saying "Mama" which is huge for me!! Only downfall is the only time he will say it is if he is whining so this pretty much breaks my heart in two. He hasn't said it in a few days since he isn't in pain anymore from teething. Oh well it will come eventually.

Saying "Rawr" in a really deep voice when he sees a lion or a bear in one of his books. This also hasn't happened in the past two days but it was non stop for a while there! SO cute!!

Now that he has two teeth I think he thinks he's pretty cool and needs to "chew" his food, which is really funny and cute considering it is all runny or mushed up and chewing is completely unnecessary. I thought I would feed him this healthy spinach and potato combo the other day and he ate it sort of hesitantly... and after about 10 bites he had a little gag...and sure enough it all came flying out. Woops...sorry buddy.

It is absolutely amazing how much this 7 1/2 old loves books. He lays on the floor and we lay next to him and hold the books over him and read and he just lays completely still, eyes darting from one page to the next and he looks to me when he knows it's time for a different voice or a funny sound. I would say on average we read to him for 1 hour per day. We have about 10 books here and I just read them over and over and each reading session lasts 15-20 minutes and we do this 3-4 times a day. If he is fussy or if he just doesn't know what to do with himself, our solution is going to the books! He just loves them- takes after his Mom and Dad! Andy was interviewed a couple of weeks back you can find the interview here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gQCTEpHmaoI

During the interview they asked him what his hobbies are and reading was one of them.They asked him how many books he read in the past year and he said about 60. They didn't believe him... and that question is not in the interview...haha they must of thought he was lying.

I'm currently reading another Stephen King book believe it or not! I read Under the Dome earlier in the year and it was about 1000 pages and now I am reading 11/22/63 which is a book about time travel and the quest to stop the assination of JFK. It is SO good so far, I'm on page 800 out of 1000.

Other than playoffs, reading, and playing with Eli. I've been "training" for the 5K I'm doing with some girlfriends on April 21st in Duluth, MN. I guess my training isn't that vigorous, but it's training non-the-less. I do a 5k 3 days a week on the treadmill. This doesn't mean I run 3 5K's a week. It just means I complete 5K. Each day is different with different speeds, different inclines and longer or shorter walking/water breaks. It's going pretty good so far. Running still isn't my favorite thing to do but I'm hoping eventually it turns into a more frequent hobby of mine. Also I believe that the "runner's high" is something that people just say exists so you keep running to see if it actually happens. I do believe, however if I buy myself some nice new LuLu Lemon running pants and jacket, I will finish the 5K MUCH faster :)

I will end this post with a recipe I made last night for dinner which I found Via pinterest:

http://healthy-delicious.com/2012/03/baked-chicken-and-spinach-flautas/

I made a few adjustments as I usually do: I used a rotissere chicken- I sauteed 1/2 of an onion with about 1 cup of spinach until the onions were soft then I spread this mix on half of a tortilla, sprinkled some cheese on top then scooped some tomatoes from the last can of Rotel I brought over with us! Finally I topped it off with some of the shredded chicken and voila it was ready to bake.
Side note: you only need a little teeny bit of each ingredient since you are only using 1/2 of a tortilla, I learned this the hard way by overstuffing the first few

Have a good week and will update again soon!!

February

2012-02-20T11:24:00.004+02:00

Today is Monday February 20th and I sit here and write as the rain/snow falls outside and Eli naps! This past month has once again decided to fly by! We have been keeping busy with the usual hockey events, cooking and that one other little thing...raising a baby!

A couple of weeks ago Andy's team played in two outdoor games for the "Winter Classic" which is always fun- and I guess the Croatian weather decided it should cooperate with the event and put a blanket of snow down for effect.. But really, it snowed SO much here. We have been here for 3 hockey seasons and this was the biggest "snowstorm" we have had yet. It doesn't snow much here typically and there were about 4 days of constant snowfall adding up to over a foot of snow. This is all find and dandy when you are in a place like Minnesota where they are seasoned veterans of snow and have a clean-up system in place... but when you live in a country with palm trees and narrow streets and sidewalks, snow can make for quite a mess. There is no one to blame for this lack of clean up since A. I don't even think a snow plow would fit down our street and B. if they did plow, all of the cars parked on both sides of the street would be blocked in, probably forever :) I was however, a bit peeved at the lack of shoveling done around our apartment. I'm not sure if shovels are hard to come by or what...but everyone was stuck in our parking lot for a few days. This is when I decided to take the initiative. Since our car was stuck for 3 days and I couldn't get to the gym to get a workout in, I decided shoveling would be a great workout, so I just needed to find a shovel.... There is a hair salon across the street from our apartment and they had a shovel sitting outside of their door so I went over with 4 hockey tickets and asked them if I could trade them tickets to borrow their shovel for a little while! They had no problem with the trade! So I started my shoveling adventure... luckily there was an older man already starting the shoveling process so we worked together (without speaking one word to each other!) and got our entire parking lot cleared out!

The past few days it has been warm and sunny outside- around 50 degrees so most of the snow has melted thank goodness. I'm sure glad I packed my rain boots this year, because our daily walks have been pretty wet and slushy. Today it is raining which will help melt the rest of the snow which I am thankful for, but apparently it is supposed to snow again, I just hope for not so much this time around!

Well the Bears ended their regular season in the 2nd place spot and have now moved onto playoffs!! Last night (Sunday) was their first playoff game, at home versus the Czech team Znojmo. We won 3-1. Today the team travels to Czech and they play Tuesday for their 2nd game of the best of 7 series. This is the farthest road trip out of any of the other teams in the league (I think it is about 7 hours away...and add on that time it takes a bus to travel that far, plus border stops) so that is kind of a bummer. But hopefully the Bears will win 4 in a row and be onto the next round!

Playoff time is always exciting for us and for the city of Zagreb. Everyone is so fired up and the best hockey fans in the world are out in full force! Eli and I were walking to the game last night and the entire 10 minute walk was filled with entertainment from the Medvescak fans. Everyone was wearing a jersey or had their face painted, they were blowing horns and singing and there were vendors all down the street selling t-shirts and scarves. Eli enjoyed staring at all the people and was very alert and excited about all of the commotion.

This is an exciting year for the Bears as they have quite a good chance to make it far in the playoffs! It is also the time of year where home is just around the corner and it is bittersweet because you are so excited for playoffs but also so excited to get home! This year is extra special for us because we get to take Eli home with us! I also get an itch this time of year for cleaning, organizing and remodeling. I have cleaned and organized our apartment here a few times this past week and we are currently working on a few remodeling projects back at home with the help of our Minnesota foreman- Andy's mom! We are finishing up our bathroom remodel that we started last summer and working on a few other projects. I can't wait to see the finished product when we get home!

Going through my calendar and filling in our spring and summer schedules has been one of my other projects the past week... and boy do we have another full one. Right when we get home I will start with coaching the fastpitch team and we have multiple wedding showers, bachelor/bachelorette parties, 5 weddings (3 of which I'm in!) camping trips, and girls weekends. Our quite 6-7 months with Eli are going to quickly turn into a hectic, but fun filled time at home. We are lucky enough to have SO many family members that live close to us to help us out. I never realized how lucky Andy and I were to have have grown up in the same place, this makes holidays and family gatherings so nice. We don't have to travel far to see anyone and we can all enjoy time together!

Speaking of remodeling and projects and cooking... Pinterest is just the best resource for all of these things. I have cooked so many new things and gotten so many new fun ideas for projects. It is also a great way for bloggers and small business owners to get some free advertising! Here is what I cooked on Saturday night for dinner:

http://www.thehungrymouse.com/2008/11/28/the-angry-chefs-garlicky-lemon-pepper-chicken/

It was SO easy and delicious and I didn't even have all of the ingredients.

Other than cooking and cleaning and hitting the gym, I've been busy with reading on my new kindle and introducing some food to Eli. He really likes cereal but isn't too keen on the veggies quite yet. He is hit-or-miss on the fruits too. It's a slow process and we're just taking our time with it and I've been researching recipes for homemade baby food and making notes on his likes and dislikes so far. He is still an amazing sleeper thanks to the book Babywise and some hard work from both of us. He sleeps 12 hours at night, usually from 8 to 8 and takes 3 naps a day. He just found his voice the other day and likes to hear himself yell really loud so that has been fun! A few other things he loves are his jumper, chewing on anything he has in his hands (no sign of teeth yet though!) and his absolute favorite, reading books!

Ok well that should keep you up-to-date on us! I apoligize for the lack of pictures, my camera died and I can't find my charger, I may have left it at home during our visit.... but luckily one of my friends here has the same camera and I am borrowing her charger tomorrow!

Flights, family time, Eli's first illness...and some hockey!

2012-01-24T22:45:00.013+02:00

Well after a half an hour trying to figure out how to log into my blog again.. Google saved the day and now I can get to writing!

A lot of fun crazy things have been happening in the past 2 months (not really but I have to get you to read this somehow..). Let's start where I left off.. we had a Team Thanksgiving party which was great and now lets skip ahead to Christmas! Christmas Eve Andy and Eli and I spent at home together then walked over to a friends place (the building next door) for some visiting! Eli took a nap on me while we were there which was awesome. I've mentioned it before but he only really likes to sleep in his crib so the rare time that he falls asleep on me I take pictures, and talk about it...a lot. Unfortunately these little naps are only about 20 minutes long compared to his 2 hours he would have in his crib, but sometimes you just don't have a crib with you! So we roll with the punches...

Christmas Day we woke up and Eli opened his 2 presents from Santa! We sort of figured he didn't need much more than that...well he didn't really "need" anything but it was fun to watch him fumble with the wrapped gifts and shove them in his mouth! After a morning together we headed over to one of Andy's teammates apartments for a team party. Everyone was invited and we each brought an appetizer and the hostess Kim made 2 huge pots of Chili and Potato Soup. It is so nice being able to spend the holidays with other families since none of us get to spend it with our own! It makes it feel more like Christmas thats for sure. We stayed at the party for a couple of hours then headed home to relax and get some rest since I was flying out the next morning to go home to Minnesota for a couple of weeks!

I was a nervous wreck on the inside but cool, calm and collected on the outside..(minus the sweating). We got to the Zagreb airport early..around 7am and got my bags checked then Andy and I had a coffee and played with Eli while waiting for some time to pass before my flight.. I eventually went through security and got to our gate (about 20 yards from where you go through security...small airport.) And Eli fell asleep on me in the baby bjorn for the rest of the wait.. It was finally time to board- And boarding in Croatia means walking outside, getting on a bus and getting bussed to your plane since there are no "terminals" so we got on our bus, and got on our plane to Amsterdam. Much to my surprise the flight was pretty empty..being the day after Christmas I was expecting it to be much busier. Pretty much everyone on the plane had their own row of 3 seats. During take off I fed Eli to help him with the ear popping, then he layed on the seat next to me and played for about a half hour, and once he got tired I stood up and held him until he fell asleep and he slept all through the rest of the flight (about a 2 hour flight to Amsterdam from Zagreb)...Easy breezy! He was so good and I felt much more relieved and prepared for the international flight.... We had a 3 hour layover in Amsterdam and I honestly can't remember what we did during this time.. I know that right before boarding I had him laying on the floor on his play mat that I brought along and he started to get cranky (preview of what was to come..)

I was SUPPOSED to get a bulk head seat with a bassinet attachment for this long flight but they told me it was full when I went to go check in...so long story short we got on the plane and I had a window seat- not possible with a baby. So I asked the guy next to me if we could switch. He spoke zero English. But he figured out what I meant and kindly switched me places.. thank the Lord above.. So to sum up my next 9 hours on the plane- Eli ate then cried then slept for 5-15 minutes...then cried...then ate then cried...I had to stand and walk with him for about 6 of the 9 hours of the flight otherwise he would freak out. I was a mess. Normally he is such a happy easy baby who rarely cries so I had no clue what to do... I did everything I could, including slamming an ice cold Miller lite. Imagine the looks I got while I was doing that. But I didn't care. I really only got the death-stare from one guy, everyone else was actually pretty good about it. Especially my friend sitting next to me. I helped him fill out his customs declaration card since he was from Kazakhstan and spoke only Russian. I would point to his name on his passport, then point to the name line on the customs card.. and did this for all of his required info. During this time Eli was only whining, not crying so that was helpful! Anyways...longest day of my life... I really don't even like talking about it, it gives me a stomach ache! But that's life.. its one of those things you just have to deal with and the pain of it lessens with time. Sort of like childbirth. Except I would rather go through child birth than that plane ride again to be honest! Ok moving on.

We arrived in Minneapolis at 6pm to my mom and Andy's parents Carol & Steve.

Eli was still crying and I was exhausted. We got in the suburban right away and headed for home... only a 3 hour drive or so...nothing compared to that 9 hour flight where you are TRAPPED in a little plane. Ok I'm done complaining. Eli slept the entire drive home because he was so exhausted. We got to my mom's house around 10pm and Eli stayed awake for a bit then we both went to bed! He got up at about 2am and was awake for about 45 minutes then went back to bed...so the jet lag wasn't horrible!

The first 3 days at home I was jet-lagged myself and tired and not used to getting up in the middle of the night with a baby since Eli has been sleeping through the night since 9 weeks old. But when you're home you just feel more relaxed and calm and things slowly but surely started to feel normal! We had lots and lots of visitors and finally after 3 days decided to stay at our own house instead of my mom's or sisters.

Once we got to our house I just felt totally relaxed! And I think Eli sensed that and he slept so well in his crib! He liked his bedroom :) So from the 4th day we were home until we left we stayed at our house and had our visitors come to us! Pretty much every day we had people over for most of the day! It was so nice to see everyone and to have Eli meet his loved ones! I even went out a couple of times without him. I went to Target 3 times while Grandma Carol and Grandpa Steve watched him. I've never shopped so quickly at Target in my life! I also went out on New Year's Eve for a bit. I left the house around 5:30, came home at 7:30 to feed him (I was just a few houses down at a friend's place) then I went back out until about 11. I came home and fed Eli and rung in the New Year cozied up in my bed fast asleep!

We continued to have lots of visitors and lots of good food! We had homemade quesadillas with all sorts of goodies to put in them, and a lot of Doritos and Beer. We also had 2 Christmas parties we went to, one at my sister's house where Eli met most of his family on my side including his almost 100 year old Great-Great Grandma

and the other party at Andy's parent's house where Eli met his 90 year old Great-Grandpa and 2 Aunts and Uncles! On the night before we left to come back to Croatia, we had our last hurrah at Mr. Roberts in Pengilly with more family!

I was dreading the trip back to Zagreb because of my terrible flight experience, but I was really anxious to get back to Andy and I know he was ready to have us back too! We drove to Minneapolis and Eli was great in the car, he played in the back with his Grandmas, watched his Neptune's Ocean DVD and snoozed a little bit even! When we checked in for my flight Carol had made sure ahead of time that I got that bulk-head bassinet seat so we double checked that and got my bags checked and we went to our terminal. There were probably 20 kids under the age of 2 waiting for this flight.. this made me feel GREAT knowing there would probably be other screaming children! I boarded the plane, got my seat and there was even an open seat next to me! The only one on the flight!! Eli ate during take off, then played on the seat next to me, and the flight attendant got the bassinet and set it up for me and I put him in there and he slept! This flight back to Amsterdam was 2 hours shorter than my flight to Minneapolis because of the jet stream. Two hours is like a lifetime when you're on a long plane ride so that was awesome news. Eli didn't cry once on the plane, he took 3 naps in the bassinet and otherwise layed on the seat and played with his feet!

Our layover in Amsterdam was a little over 5 hours since we landed early. So this was going to be a challenge... I walked around for a bit with him in the Baby Bjorn trying to get him to fall asleep (it was 6am, we lost 7 hours of time...). The Amsterdam airport is pretty great and accommodating for long layovers..they even have this new thing there...a hotel where you can rent rooms by the hour! GENIUS! The rooms look like cruise ship rooms, really small, no windows, but they have a bed and a sink and the really nice ones even have a shower! I tried to get a room for us so Eli could lay on a bed to sleep, but the rooms were full... and as I was asking about the rooms, the cops were escorting a very "hooker-like" woman out of the "hotel" and she was completely disoriented... Just my luck I would have gotten her room... so we moved on to try to find a place to hang out for a while.. They have this area with a bunch of lounge chairs all facing one way..sort of like if you were at the beach. And you can take naps on the chairs... so I walked with Eli until he fell asleep then I layed down on one of the chairs (with him strapped on me in the bjorn) and closed my eyes and tried to get some rest since I didn't sleep a wink on the flight. FINALLY it was time to get on the flight to Croatia... he was fussy and crying while we were waiting to board and everyone was looking at me.. like OH GREAT... but once we got on the plane, we once again had our own row, he ate during take off, fell asleep while eating, so I layed him on the seat next to me and he slept through the landing (this was an hour and 20 minute flight). He stayed asleep while we got off the plane, got on the bus, got into the airport and all the way through the passport check line! I saw Andy and it was a glorious sight!! So great to be back to him!! I gave him Eli while I fetched the bags and we headed home!

So that is my first travel story with a baby- 1 terrible flight and 3 good ones! Not so bad I guess! One of the downfalls of traveling with a 5 month old is the risk of them getting sick... and sure enough Eli caught something because the day after we got back he developed a terrible cough...so bad he would gag and throw up all of his milk. So we brought him in and sure enough he got bronchitis. So he was put on ventolin spray... 3 days later we went back for a follow up..and find out he had a bacteria in his lungs so he has to go on ammoxicilin. These were some LONG days and nights because he wasn't acclimated to the time change and I wasn't about to "force" him to stay awake to get it back on track when he was sick and needed the rest...so it took about 6 days for him to get back on track... and now... 2 1/2 weeks later, he is still on his antibiotic for one more day, and only has to take his ventolin 1 time a day instead of the 3 times per day he started with. We were at the doctor 4 times in a week and a half.. yucky. It is so sad watching a little baby cough and not being able to help is agonizing. BUT he made it through and has been back to himself for about 4 days now and he sure is smiley!

Andy's team had 7 home games in a row starting the day we got back from the USA. They played these home games at Arena Zagreb, which is a really big arena that the handball team usually plays in. They had a total of 105,000 rowdy fans total in those 7 games so that is pretty exciting! And.... 98,000 glasses of PAN beer were sold at the games... fun fact.

They are currently sitting in 3rd place in the 11 team league and have a guranteed spot in the playoffs. I believe they have 8 games left of the regular season then playoffs start already! If anyone is interested in following them, their team websites are:

www.medvescak.com

www.erstebankliga.at

Well that keeps you up-to-date on us... the next couple of weeks we have a girls night of hair cuts and wine planned (hopefully the cutting before the drinking..) and a 1st birthday party for one of the little guys here! Other than that, just lots of walks..it's been so nice here, it was 60 yesterday! I also just started going back to the gym yesterday... it has been a very long time! But my body needs to get back into my old shape. I'm currently lacking some major muscle mass I had before Eli was born and I desperately need it back! Wish me luck!

Here are some pictures of Eli and his first time meeting everyone!

Great Grandma and Grandpa Kessler

Great Grandpa Badavinac

GREAT Lori!

Cousin Jocelyn

Auntie Courtney

Auntie Rhea

Great Aunt Rochelle

Cousin Axl and more cousins Alex & Brady

Great Aunt Stephanie

2nd Cousin Ryan

Mom's best friend Sarah

Uncle Dano & Auntie Leah

Uncle Aaron

Great Uncle Mick, Great Grandpa Marko and Grandpa Steve

Grandma Sue & Auntie Rhea

2nd cousin Emily & Auntie Leah

Mom & Cousin Jocelyn

Friend Colleen

Blog Slacker.

2011-11-24T15:05:00.009+02:00

Hello from Zagreb! It has been over a month (almost 2 months..oops) since my last post and I realize it's long over due...but I've been too busy laying on the floor playing with Eli! This past month has absolutely flown by! We have mostly just hung around at home, playing with our little love and teaching him new things (we think he gets it...?) and just enjoying his laughs and smiles every day.

After my mom and sister went back home we spent a few weeks just doing our every day things; grocery shopping, going for walks, reading books, cleaning and cooking- It's funny how when you tell people "I live in Europe" they automatically assume your life is full of adventure and glamour. Well to be honest, whatever you are doing today, we are probably doing the same thing- wake up, eat breakfast, play with the baby, clean, go to the gym, do laundry, go to the grocery store, cook dinner, watch TV, listen to music, read, go to bed. Oh yeah...and work for some people :) It's pretty much as if we take our life in Minnesota, pick it up and drop it down here in Croatia and just keep moving on! Just with different scenery, weather and language in the background.

Being that it is Thanksgiving today back home, I feel that it is the right time so say that I really am thankful for our blessed life. We are very lucky to be over here in Croatia where Andy can do what he loves for a living and I get to stay home and raise this little baby! Can't really ask for much more than that! It is very rare to see that a working dad is able to get home by about noon each day to spend with mom and baby as a family. I'm also Thankful for our spring and summers at our favorite place in the world....Minnesota!

Ok back to about a month ago-

Andy's mom was able to come visit us for a couple of weeks and meet Eli for the first time so that was pretty awesome! We mostly just hung around our apartment and played with the baby- but ventured out a few times too!

Carol got the hang of the tram system and bravely went downtown by herself a couple of times! We also took a day trip to Graz, Austria where we hit up Ikea and Babies R Us before wandering around the city center there..(and grabbing some Subway of course..).

Eli did ok in the car on the trip... we brought along the DVD player which kept him entertained for a bit and he slept for a bit too...but when he's awake in that car seat... man look out. He absolutely hates it. I'm not sure what to do to cure this- We've tried the mirror, toys, DVD player.nothing seems to work for more than about 10 minutes at a time... so if anyone has suggestions, feel free to help a fellow mom out! Hopefully he just grows out of this phase.... it is hard for him to get used to the car seat too since we very rarely go in the car. We walk everywhere we need to go.... grocery store, tram, the rink ect...

After our Graz trip, Carol and Andy took a day-trip back to Stancija, Croatia. We went here last winter to check it out and take some pictures too. This is where Andy's grandpa's family was originally from. They took a few nice pictures then headed back home.

We also enjoyed a few nice meals out while Carol was here and lots of dinners in since I like to cook! Andy and I also went out for the first time together while Carol babysat! We went downtown to the wine tent for a bit then to a bar with a few of his teammates and made it home by about 12:30 I think! I still have a hard time leaving him for too long... And it's not because I don't think he will miss me too much.. it's just hard with nursing him still- He eats about ever 3 hours now and if I miss a feeding I have to pump and it seems to just throw off the whole rhythm of my body and it's just a hassle to be honest. So I prefer to just be around to feed him!

Andy had 5 home games while Carol was here visiting which was great for her to see! Andy played great and the team won all but one of those games I believe... Oh one little side note about hockey- Andy's team played Klagenfurt (ranked #1) in October and beat them (it was a home game) and Andy had 3 points that game- (I already know he's going to be mad at me for writing about this.) Well turns out they took the win away from us about 2 days later saying our goalie's paperwork wasn't turned in on time or something... so they also took all the points away from the players from that game... and if they didn't Andy would be the #1 scoring defensemen in the league! Darn it! Oh well... there's worse things in life... Needless to say I'm very proud of him- I think it's helped to have his little good luck charm watching and drooling from the stands! (Eli, not me).

Well after Carol headed home we once again got back into our normal groove of things- I sure do miss my 20 minute morning coffee and grocery run that I had while she was here though!

The past few weeks have been fairly uneventful except for Eli's milestones, which to some people may seem silly but you better believe I wrote on the baby calendar the first time he found his tongue!

He had immunizations done recently and at that appointment he was 13lbs. His favorite things right now are grabbing at a toy we dangle in front of him, laying on his back kicking and trying to grab at his feet, watching TV (I know this is terrible), and sitting in dad's lap. He is also starting to enjoy his Johnny Jump Up but needs a couple more weeks to be a little more steady with holding his body up. Every day he gets stronger and cuter in my opinion.

Last weekend I went out with a few girls for the first time since Eli was born...it was a Saturday night, Andy stayed home and watched Eli and I met the girls downtown in the tent for some gluwine (hot wine). And from there we went to a bar... I left the house at about 6:30 and got home around 12- The longest I've been away so far! And I drank too much of course and had a terrible headache the entire next day- aahhh the joys of alcohol.

Last night we had a Thanksgiving get-together with a few of the American couples here and it was also a 2nd birthday party so there were also some Canadian & European couples there that had kids that were at the party- It was a lot of fun and all the food was amazing!!! I made stuffing/dressing and it turned out pretty good. I had to put it in the baby bathtub because I didn't have a bowl big enough to carry it over to the Banham's place!! I obviously made too much... haha

We ate and visited and the kids played birthday games and ate cupcakes, fun was had by all!

Andy left today for Czech for their game tomorrow so Eli and I have just been hanging out today, I've done some cleaning and organizing of the apartment so we can put the Christmas decorations up on Saturday! Then finally a home game on Sunday! It has been 3 weeks since the last home game BUT they did have a bunch at the beginning of October and they also have 7 in a row in January at the big Arena Zagreb this year!

Well I think that brings everyone up to speed on our lives the last 6 weeks or so! Eli and I are coming home to Minnesota after Christmas for a 12 day visit! I'm VERY nervous about the long travel day, but excited to get home and have everyone meet him! On Saturday he will be 15 weeks old... almost 4 months already! Time flies when you're having fun!

2011-10-01T12:42:00.013+03:00

Well it has been almost a week since Mom & Rhea left us to head back home, we miss them dearly but had an awesome time while they were here! We filled the days while they were here visiting, playing with Eli and doing a little traveling & exploring.

They arrived on Thursday, September 15th in the early afternoon and I picked them up at the airport (left Eli at home with dad) and then we proceeded to sit in traffic for about an hour on our way back to our apartment! We stopped at the United States Embassy on our way home since it's right along the way and picked up Eli's passport since it was ready to go! It only took about 4 business days! OH how I love the efficiency of my fellow Americans, it's a breath of fresh air :)

When we got back to our apartment it was the first time Mom & Rhea met Eli, and the first time he met anyone in his family besides Andy and I, so it was really fun.

He was just laying on the floor playing when they got here so it was perfect timing for their introductions to each other! We spent the rest of this day just catching up and they spent it fighting the jet lag!

Friday Andy had a home game so we spent the day just wandering around our neighborhood before the game then we walked over to the rink before game time and got our seats.

I honestly don't remember if they won or not... but Andy scored a goal which was awesome since this was the only game they were able to see while they were here since his other ones were all away games. After the game we came home and picked up dinner from Viva to go and ate at home.

The next day we headed down to the city center to wander around and see some sights and they were able to pick up a few souveniers.

It was really hot outside and I had Eli in the baby bjorn so I was sweating bullets of course. It was Eli's first time on the tram and his first trip downtown and he did really well so I was proud of him :)

The next day we spent resting up and letting Mom & Rhea do some more catching up on the jet-lag. Each day we wandered around the neighborhood a bit and picked up some pastries at the bakery and had a coffee at one of the many coffee shops. We also drove up to the top of the mountain here in Zagreb, and went to the local park, Jarun and walked around there. We decided to plan a trip to the coast for the upcoming days so we got online and booked a hotel and packed a few things and got ourselves ready for our roadtrip!

We headed to Opetija (pronounced Oh-potty-ah) which is about an hour and a half drive away from Zagreb. I'm SO glad we chose this place A. because it was so close and B. because it ended up being so beautiful! We arrived there in the early afternoon and got checked into our hotel.

It was funny because I was all worked up we were going to get in trouble because we had 3 adults and an infant in a room that was only for 2 adults..so I checked in with me, Eli & Mom's passports while Rhea hung out by the car... and she came up and met us in the room after a few minutes... I don't know why I was so worried.

I'm pretty sure every hotel room is supposed to only be for 2 people.. but our room was a "junior suite" so why the heck would you get a suite for only 2 people...well I guess people do that, but come on, they are big enough for more than that! Well it turns out our room was amazing! It was on the 9th floor and on a corner so we ended up having a balcony on two sides and it literally felt like we were on a cruise ship, our view directly below...and all around us was water. It was gorgeous outside and everything was either lush green or ocean blue!

We quickly got settled in the room and headed out to explore. We were pretty hungry (weird..) so we stopped right away at a little cafe to grab some lunch. We ended up eating at a cafe called Pizzeria Andy! I got spaghetti, Rhea got a calzone that was the size of her head and mom got a spicy garlic pasta. Eli fell alseep in my lap while sucking on my hand! After we ate we started to walk and discovered a walking path pretty much all long the shoreline of the little city.

It was just perfect. This little boardwalk made it perfect for checking out the sights and slipping into the sea whenever we felt like it. Mom and Rhea spent lots of time collecting sea glass for their collections which was really cool. Eli continued to sleep while we walked...

We stumbled upon an outdoor theater and a few nice parks and gardens along the walking paths and took lots of pictures and just took it all in! Rhea ended up going into the sea for the first time about halfway through our walk and said it was a little cold but nice!

From here we headed back to the room so I could feed Eli and mom and Rhea headed down to the beach right below our balcony. I fed Eli out on the patio with the waves crashing in the background! After we played and he went down for a nap, I went out on the patio and was scanning the beach for mom and Rhea and saw them out swimming, which was a really cool view because I could see right through the clear water with all the rocks below them and thankfully no sharks.

Next, I layed on the beach chair on the patio and read a book and took a little snooze! After they were done swimming and collecting some more sea glass they came back up to the room and we hung out there for a bit then Rhea and I headed out to grab dinner while Grandma Sue watched Eli! We walked and found only 1 little cafe that had food at this time and we sat down and ate. Rhea had cevapcici (reminder: this is a meat that is really popular in Croatia, pronounced Cha-Vaap-Cha-CHee. It looks like a breakfast sausage and tastes like a garlicy, spiced meat. It's delicious). And I got a cheeseburger. We brought a hamburger back home for mom, and she said it was terrible!!

The next morning we woke up and had a great breakfast down in the fancy dining area then headed out to do some more exploring! We continued our walk along the seaside but went the opposite direction that we walked the day before. After our seaside walk we sat at a cafe and ordered some deli sandwiches and coffee before hitting the road back to Zagreb. Side note- Eli hates his car seat so that's fun for roadtrips...

The next couple of days we spent lounging around the apartment! We ended up going to Mcdonald's and picking up some burgers and taking them to Bundek park where we had a "picnic" and did some walking and talking and the next day Mom & Rhea went downtown all by themselves and picked up the rest of their gifts for people and went to the market and got food to cook all of us dinner! They ended up making Ribs with homemade BBQ sauce, a few different salads and baked potatoes with these amazing deep fried bacon fat cruton things! Sounds very Minnesota State-Fair-ish..and it was delicious!

Sunday we decided to road-trip again. This time we headed in the opposite direction to Slovenia. We made it through the border, which is always one of my least favorite things to do.. seems like I ALWAYS pick the wrong line to go in and my line ends up being the slow one.

Our first stop was Ljubljana.

We parked and walked to the city center. There was a lot going on here for a Sunday in Europe! There were people everywhere, bands playing and a parade of Bentley's. We sat down and ate at the Mexican Cantina which was of course huge portions of deliciousness.

After eating we made our way back to the car to hit up our next stop, Bled Slovenia which was about 30 minutes away.

Ok Bled is one of the cutest most magical little towns tucked in a mountain valley area. There is a crystal clear lake of mountain runoff water (very similar to the mine pits at home!) and amazing 360 degree scenery. There is a walking path all along the water here and of course little cafes to stop at along the way.

We walked the path for a while before stopping for the famous Creme Cake and a coffee. After this we hopped in the car to head home..and of course Eli was not happy about this!! He ended up settling down for most of the drive and woke up pissed off right when we got to the Croatian border! He does not like when the car stops!

Andy had an away game Friday night in Vienna and they won, for the first time ever in Vienna! Then Sunday his game was in Villach, Austria and they won that one too! We were going to go to the game after our stops in Ljubljana and Bled but it would have made for a really long day with a 7 week old baby! Andy scored another goal that night, I think when family comes it's good luck :)

After we arrived back in Zagreb on Sunday, Mom & Rhea got their bags organized and we ate dinner and went to bed! We got up around 5:30 to head to the airport at 6:00.

I came back home to our seemingly empty house and was pretty sad, but realized I should be happy and thankful that they were able to come visit and that Eli finally got to meet his Grandma and Auntie! And we only have 3 more weeks to wait until Grandma Carol comes to visit!

This past week has been mostly just hanging out at home and going for our evening walks with Eli. We did have a girls night on Tuesday that I attended for about an hour, Eli was with because Andy had already committed to helping with the youth hockey that night. Even if I was only out with them for a hour or so it was still fun, we have such a great group of girls here again!! The next day I met up with my friend Jaime and she filled me in on the night's events!

Last night the Bears had a home game that they ended up losing in OT. Eli was such a good boy at the game, he slept, then sat in my lap and watched the game!! We picked up Viva on our way home and had dinner at home.

Tonight a few of the girls are headed to the Britney Spears concert, and I think we are all going to meet in the center for a few drinks and visiting before they head out!

It has been a really fun month, with visitors and with Eli growing and changing so much! He just started smiling this week which is really fun...I love that big gummy smile!! We just love him more and more each day, he is truely a good baby and we are very luck to have such a little sweetie!

Ok well I think that keeps you up to date on our life here in Zagreb- more to come soon!

Here are a few more pictures from the past few weeks!

Random events in our crazy life-

2011-09-08T14:47:00.015+03:00

Well we're almost to week 5 of Eli being our lives! It's really funny going back and reading my previous posts about the stress and challenges we have gone through, and realizing now that it's just part of how things work with new babies! Things are going really well and he is just growing and moving and changing every day.

I'm still writing down everything daily on my little spreadsheet and it has helped tremendously for me to see the patterns of his day. He has basically eaten, played & slept around the same times each day which is huge progress for us! Oh side note... the fricking construction is STILL going on. I've given up all hope and have realized that these guys have the easiest life ever and have 1 job per year and just take all year working on that one job... that is what I tell myself anyways... oh and to top it off they are blocking me in my parking spot today and I have to bring my friend to the airport shortly so we'll see if they move or if I need to go up to the 4th floor and try to tell them to move (I really need to learn some Croatian...)! BUT I've actually calmed down quite a bit with the construction..it doesn't immediately send me into anxiety and rage, now it's just another one of those things that I say...."of course they're not done... why would they be?!!"

Well last weekend we took Eli to his first series of hockey games. I was a nervous wreck the first game of course... We got him all ready, loaded up the diaper bag, and walked to the rink. Andy had a minor groin injury so he wasn't playing so that actually helped me out a lot, being it was our first time taking him there. And what do you know he sleeps through pretty much the entire game, even though it's extremely loud (we had his ears covered with blankets in his car seat and had the headphones for when he got up).After that first game I was able to breathe a little easier for the next game, which he also slept through and then the third game I was realizing that I can actually do this and if he gets hungry, he will let me know and I will go find someplace to feed him... and if he's not hungry, he will sleep. Easy as that. It also makes it much easier knowing that if for some reason he has a meltdown, I can just walk back home with him and meet Andy there later. That is one huge perk of living walking distance to the rink.

This week we have spent most of our time at home, which is just fine with me! Eli prefers to be out and about, however. Anytime we are at a friend's place or on a walk he is a perfect angel and either sleeps or just sits there awake looking around... the second we walk in our apartment he decides it's no fun sitting at home and he lets us know- haha.

We live in the building next to our friends Joel & Kim and they have had us over twice and it is so nice; it's a way to get out, get some adult (am I an adult?) interaction and once again, we are so close to home so we can get their quickly if need be.

So basically, life is starting to fall back into a place where I can call it normal, and Eli seems to be adjusting to everything just fine! With each day I learn I can't over-analyze and freak out, I just need to roll with the punches and hope I'm rolling the right way.

We only have 1 more week to wait for Grandma Sue and Auntie Rhea to come visit!! It is going to be so much fun, not quite sure what we will do yet but we have a few ideas.. first of all they get in on Thursday the 15th and on Friday Andy has a home game which is perfect! Then I would like to take them around Zagreb to see the sights and then we will venture out and either go to Slovenia, Italy, or Austria. I feel much better knowing that these two experienced moms will be there with me on these little trips so I don't automatically jump into panic mode! I should add that we will only go to these places IF Eli's passport is finished by then... this is a story all in itself....

Ok so I go to the photo shop last Friday to get his passport picture taken, I make sure to feed him right before then head out because I know he is awake for about an hour after he eats. So I put him in the stroller and briskly walk down the street to the store.. The lady working luckily speaks English and we get Eli all set up for his picture. I have to hold him out to the side so I'm not in the picture and hold his head up. His big blue eyes are wide open and we get a great picture. While they are developing we go outside and have a coffee (national pass time) and they are done in about 25 minutes. So I check that task off of my list and head home. Next on the list is to get an appointment at the Embassy. This is pretty comical- they are only open for this particular service on Wednesdays from 9 to 3, but lunch is from 12 to 1:30. And what do you know, Andy has practice during these exact times. Both parents need to be present of course... so I email them explaining our situation and they say it's ok If I come with Eli, and all the paperwork and have Andy go there after practice and sign the forms. I had printed off all of the paperwork we needed back at home in the good old U S of A (actually Carol printed them off, who am I kidding). So I was ahead of the game there. I also had organized a folder with all the documents we needed which I later realized I forgot at home. SO Carol faxed us these necessary documents and I had everything I needed! You should see the list of criteria needed! Andy and I both needed our high school transcripts...which were pretty fun to look at.. and bills from our house in the USA, our marriage license, birth certificates, criminal backgrounds, blah blah blah... At first I was annoyed by all of this but then I quickly realized that I liked that America is so picky about who gets to become a citizen..because all you hear about is illegal immigrants and drama about us letting anyone in...

Ok off track-

I go to the Embassy which is just like any other outing I go on- need to time it so Eli is fed right before we go, hop in the car, hope to the good Lord that he sleeps the whole time and doesn't wake up hungry or fussy... Well he once again slept the whole time while I was there! What a little sweetie. The only glitch was that the passport photo size was too small, turns out the woman gave me the size for Croatian passports, which is my fault for not being very clear. So I decide to go back there right after leaving the Embassy and ask her to print me the right size. There is no where to park so I pull the ol' Croatian park wherever you please with your flashers on- and go in and she finds his picture and prints it for me, I tell her 2 inch by 2inch which she doesn't understand because they go by centimeters like the rest of the world... but she figures it out and has them done in 5 minutes. Meanwhile I look outside and my car is about to be towed, so I grab Eli's car seat and run out there and convince them to let me go (I think having the cute little baby with me helped!)

Andy got home from practice and grabbed the paperwork he needed to bring to the Embassy along with the new photos and headed over there. Well, it turns out this passport photo was also the wrong size... of course. But the lady said she could make it work somehow- SO now we wait and hopefully it will be done in 5 days (that's what they told me!) and Eli will officially be an American and be ready to travel the 7 seas with mom & dad!!

Last week the coach's wife made dinner for Andy and I and brought it over in Tupperware, it was the nicest thing ever. It just happened to be one of those days that was super hectic and I hadn't taken anything out to cook... she made chicken in a cranberry sauce, rosemary potatoes and a salad. Her timing couldn't have been more perfect! It was so delicious- It's nice to see that there are still caring people out there!!

Speaking of caring people, I have the sweetest husband in the world. Last week he got home late after being at a promotion and woke me up and apologized for being so late (I had no idea it was late..) and he told me he was walking home and saw an old lady hunched over pulling a bag of groceries across the ground tied to a string. He went up to her and asked her if she needed help and she said "yes" so he knew she understood a little English. So he carried her groceries and then ended up holding her up with his other arm and walking with her, and helping her up the stairs up to her apartment. He said it was about 5 blocks from the grocery store and it would have taken her about 3 hours doing it alone because she would have to stop and take breaks. She invited him to stay for a drink but he respectfully declined and let her know that he needed to get home to his wife and baby! Just melted my heart when he told me the story.

Two days ago I went for a walk with my new friend Jaime and her daughter and we walked to the pediatricians office that has been recommended to me. I thought it would be nice to walk there to figure out where it is and make my appointment for Eli's 2 month check-up and immunizations while I was there. Well we find it and after waiting for a bit I ask the lady at the desk if I can make an appointment for my son's 2-month check up with so-and -so Doctor and she tells me I need to come back in the afternoon when that doctor is in to make the appointment.... which makes perfect sense? So I just left and figured I'd give it a try another day.

Well Andy left today for an overnight trip...I thought these were OVER?!!! Actually I'm ok with this one...it's only 1 night, 2 days this time. They are headed to Linz, Austria to play there tomorrow. This will be the first regular season game. It will also be his first game back after his groin injury so lets hope and pray that he stays healthy! They will be back late after the game tomorrow then they have their first official home game on Sunday.

Here's to an injury free, successful hockey season to the Medvescak Bears! And to a fun-filled adventure with our 1 month old baby with many more ups and downs I'm sure but lots of love and learning to be had by all!

2011-08-23T12:06:00.009+03:00

Well I just put Eli down for a nap and realized it was probably time for a blog update! Things have been going fairly well and we are slowly but surely adjusting to our new lives together. Weeks 1 and 2 were a complete blur, when I look back I don't really even remember anything specific, just being completely overwhelmed and trying to tell myself this was the way things are and it's normal and pretty much trying to talk myself into being positive. This worked for the most part, but some days man oh man I was just a wreck; questioning everything I did and worrying about him constantly! After about day 10 things started to smooth out a bit and we have gotten to know each other and how we work! Now we are working on our routines together and they may not work every time, but for the most part we are learning together and it seems to be going well as far as I can tell!

This blog has quickly shifted from my "European Adventures..." to sort of our ordinary life stuff, but I guess that's what happens! And I look at my life as an adventure anyways, so if you are sick of reading about baby stuff and ordinary every day life happenings, feel free to log out. No feelings hurt here!

The first "outing" we had with Eli was on Friday, August 19th which was my 27th birthday. I didn't really know what to expect but knew I needed to be over prepared so I could relax and enjoy myself. So I pumped some milk, packed it in the diaper bag, along with diapers, a change of clothes, some formula just in case, blankets, pacifier... the list goes on. So we went about 5 blocks away to our favorite restaurant here in Zagreb, Viva. We sat outside on the little patio and 4 of Andy's teammates were there eating which was nice because we sat and visited with them. I fed Eli before we left to allot myself at least 2 hours of time to eat and visit. So we got there, ate, visited and I even had a beer! Eli slept this entire time, and woke up at the end to eat the bottle of milk I brought. We sat after dinner for quite a while after until deciding to go over to our friends place for a while. So Andy and Eli and I took a quick trip home, put on his pj's, did a quick pump (sorry if that's too much info..) then went over to our friend Ryan's apartment where Eli slept in his car seat for a couple of hours while the big kids played! He woke up and I fed him there then went right back to bed! He was a good boy for mom's birthday! We ended up getting home around 12:30 and I NEVER thought it would have went as smoothly as it did. Sometimes I forget how much he really does sleep!

Since the day we moved into our apartment (July 26th) they have been doing construction of some sort on the top floor which is the 4th floor and we are on the 2nd floor. I was relieved when we got here when they were working, thinking "Thank God they are doing this now and now, so it will be done by the time the baby gets here!" Well two things... Eli came 17 days early AND I forgot these workers are on Croatia time not normal time. Which means this job will probably be going on for a few more months give or take.

I'm not kidding its EVERY day. Drilling, and hammering... and it almost sounds like they are hitting a metal pipe with a hammer. In fact right as I was typing that last sentence the drill started again.... and if there is a break in the action...which there are quite a few throughout the day for coffee and smokes... it just happens to be when Eli is awake. Right when he goes down for a nap...the circus begins again...

One last note on this and I'm done.... If Ty Pennington and the Extreme Makeover Home Edition crew can completely demolish, rebuild, decorate/furnish and landscape a new home in 7 days, why the Hell can't these people finish ONE SMALL apartment within a month?!! It just blows my mind. Ok sorry to you Croatian readers, but you know what I'm talking about.

This reminds me of something funny that happened the day we left the hospital... I probably shouldn't write this but since when have I censored. We were leaving and we told the nurse who to contact for the payments for Eli's birth and our stay in the hospital, so she calls and is told some bs about the payments... and gets off the phone and tells us, "It's ok, you can go, we will eventually get the money, this is Croatia and it's how things work." I'm not joking this is what she said. I couldn't believe it. So we took our baby and ran.

Well as some of you know, Andy's team left Sunday night for an 8 day road-trip. This was devastation to me. I was JUST getting comfortable with everything (with MAJOR help from Andy) and this gets thrown in the mix. So I'm a mess once again Sunday thinking about this LONG week ahead. Well Monday went pretty well. Eli is doing so well and is so cute and sweet. It's mainly my own insecurities and loneliness that makes it hard to be here without Dad!

To top it off, it's about 100 degrees outside and I don't like taking him out in this weather because he overheats so easily (which we learned the hard way by taking him for a walk over-dressed last week and came home with him screaming and completely drenched in sweat and his skin all red). SO I try to keep our outings minimal...which makes for a really long day. Yesterday we went to the grocery store (which again, feed him then quick get going so I know I have about a 2 hour window...) I only got enough food to fit under my stroller, which thank God my basket is huge. And we were home by like 9:45am. Now what?!! So we play and sing and read and cuddle and watch TV and nap... which is all great, but being in an apartment for 22 hours a day can be maddening. Today we went on a quick walk at 10am to get diapers and laundry detergent, it took us about 15 minutes total and we were back. I was already showered, dishes done, laundry in and walk done by 10:30am!

I'm very high energy in the morning, feeling really motivated and positive....then after lunch it's like...ok what the hell do we do now!? I guess I'm just so used to an on-the-go lifestyle that I think Eli needs to be on the go or he will get bored...but I need to remember he is 17 days old and is perfectly content sitting at home all day with Mom!

I have found that if I give myself a few tasks each day it helps.... like sweep, do my nails, catch up on emails, write the blog, or clean the bathroom. I'm such a list person, you should see my log of Eli's daily comings & goings... it is pretty much an excel spreadsheet, but hand written of what we have done at what times during the day. This helps me remember when he needs to eat and how long he's napped and what "activities" we have done each day. It keeps me sane to have my lists!

Well overall things are falling into place and we are very luck to have a healthy, sweet little baby boy. We go to the doctor on Thursday to have him weighed and measured to make sure things are progressing like they are supposed to.

Andy will be home Monday....only 6 more days to go!! Then he will be home the rest of the season for the most part, except a couple of nights away maximum!

I don't know how working mothers do this. I can't imagine giving Eli to someone to watch during the day!! I'm SO very lucky to be able to be home with him all the time! Side note- Andy told me he read that if you look back in old Russia a lot men (and women I guess) have flat heads on the back from their mothers never picking them up! I don't know why I just thought of that but it's interesting, I can barely put Eli down, I have to remind myself he needs time to play alone and let that brain do its work!

One last note- whoever said breastfeeding is such a "beautiful" thing... ok I know it's a great bonding thing for Mother and baby and it's the most healthy thing for your baby (which is why I'm doing it) But oh my goodness it's not pretty, you should see how awkward it is for us. Pillows propped up everywhere, me holding his head in place... what a mess. Hopefully it gets easier! Feel free to give me pointers & advise because I have NO idea what I'm doing.

Ok that is all for now, (drilling in the background....) will write again soon!!

PS- Happy Due Date to Eli!!! I can't imagine just having him now, seems like he's been part of our lives forever now!

Countdown to my mom and sister coming to visit!!!! 23 days!!! I might make a construction paper chain-link countdown... if I can get out of the house to get supplies... :)

Eli's Story

2011-08-14T10:19:00.011+03:00

Well we barely made it over to Croatia..we were here for 12 days when our baby decided it was time to come 17 days early!

It was a Saturday morning at 9:30am and I got out of bed for the day in good spirits because Andy was coming home today after being away for a WEEK in Slovenia with his team doing some training. I went to the bathroom and apparently my water broke. (I didn't know this was what it was...) so I just went about my day.. I showered, did the dishes and bopped around the house for a bit when I finally decided to call the Dr. to see what's up since the water wouldn't stop (sorry... I will try to keep this more PG than documentary..) So the Doctor said you should probably come in so I grabbed my backpack and put my laptop in it just in case I needed to skype home for some reason. I also grabbed my kindle to read since I knew I would probably be sitting around doing nothing in the lobby of the Doctors office. I hopped in the car and made a quick stop at the ATM just in case I needed some cash for later then headed to the hospital.

When I got there they hooked me up to the machine that has two suction cups, one to monitor baby's heartbeat, one to monitor contractions. So they did that for about 45 minutes and said "Well it looks like you're having contractions, lets go do an exam and an ultrasound and see whats up"... so we went into another room, had an exam which told Dr. Podobnik (actually, they call him professor...) that I was dilated 2 cm. Next he did another 4D ultrasound and it showed that he was starting to move down and things were progressing. I still didn't believe them at this point because I literally felt nothing.

I grabbed my phone and quick called Andy and let him know I was at the hospital and going to have the baby and Prof. Podobnik said it would probably be about 7-8 hours so don't feel panicked that you won't get here on time. So he said they were waiting for the team bus to pick them up any minute and they would be back in Zagreb within a couple of hours.

So they tell me I'm ready to go get settled in my room so I grab my backpack and start walking out of the room and they take my bag from me and make me go in a wheel chair to my room... We get there and they tell me to change into this gown and lay on the bed and they would be right back.. So I did that...still a bit confused and not realizing this was really happening. I skyped my mom, sister and mother-in-law to keep them up-to-date then just layed there waiting..

Finally a nurse and another doctor came in and decided it was time to give me some medication to help start induce contractions... it was a syringe of lotion/gel which I thought was weird, I'm pretty sure at home it's a drip that went in through a needle..but what do I know. So anyways about 5 minutes after that the contractions came... this was 2:00 in the afternoon. So I spent the next 3 hours in my room going through terrible contractions that had no rhythm at all....alone (Andy's bus was running late, so one of his team's owners went and picked him up and was driving him back to Zagreb... turns out they took a back way and went through an emergency border crossing because the line at the border was a 2 hour wait!!) Thank God he was with a Croatian that knew his way around and could communicate with the border patrol!

At this point I didn't care that I was alone, it was actually kind of nice to just deal with it without Andy having to see me go through that pain and not be able to help! My nurse, Marina was great, she kept coming in to check on me and would rub my back. Finally at 5 they decided I could have an epidural, I was dilated between 5-6cm at this point. So they tell me I can WALK to the delivery room to get my epidural. SURE they wheel me into my room when I'm feeling nothing but when I can barely take a step and my knees buckle every 30 seconds I have to walk down the hall, up an elevator to a completely different building!

I got there and they gave me the epidural right away which was amazing.... I wish I would have got it sooner!!! I don't know how people do it without one. If that's what you want to do..Ok.. but man... my friend Laura Guyer said it perfectly.. "Would you get a tooth pulled without Novocaine?" HELL NO. So I'm totally for the epidural and don't for a second regret getting it!!

Well Andy conveniently arrived just after I got my epidural and was feeling nothing... haha how perfect. So we sat there and talked for a couple of hours and finally around 7 decided we should probably pick a name for this little guy. We chose Eli Marko Sertich and shortly after that I pushed 2 times (didn't really know I was pushing, but I figured I was...) and he was here at 8:15pm on August 6th 2011 weighing 6lbs 8 oz and measuring 19inches long. My nurse Marina delivered him!

From here they took him and put him on me while Andy cut the cord then they took him to the sink, washed him off and gave him back to us. After this they took him away to check him out and make sure he was healthy and they wheeled me back to the room then brought Eli to us and we skyped family and friends. Around 10pm they took him away for the night to sleep in the nursery. They did this for 3 more nights and finally Tuesday night we kept him in our room for the first time. I wish I would have asked to have him stay with us sooner but too late for that I guess. I think the nurses liked having him :) They have dresser drawers full of baby clothes in the nursery and they brought him dressed up in something new each time they "returned" him to us. We went down to the nursery to check it out and there were 3 other babies in there and there was one very hairy little Croatian named Armando that was screaming the whole time.. I think Eli was ready to come to our room and be away from him!

In those 3 full days (Sunday-Tuesday) and part of Wednesday before we went home, they took him for immunizations, and would take him randomly to test his ears and eyes and bathe him. Wednesday at noon we headed for home, I was a wreck. I sat in the back seat and Andy drove better than I have ever seen him drive in our 10 or so years together.

We got home and since then it has been a whirlwind.. The first night was a bit stressful just because everything is new and a bit overwhelming and scary. But since then things have slowly fallen into place and he is on a pretty good schedule of eat, play, sleep throughout the whole day. I'm following the book "BabyWise" and trying to see if that helps establish a routine for him. I have a whole bunch of friends that swear by it so I figured it's worth a shot.

Every day we try to Skype with Grandma Sue and Grandma Carol back at home! Grandma Sue and Auntie Rhea will be here September 15th to visit for about 10 days and Grandma Carol is coming at the end of October for a couple of weeks so that will be really nice to have family around.

I find myself doubting almost everything I do and looking up questions and answers online and emailing and facebooking friends for advise... It's pretty scary how much you care about this little thing. I was literally sick to my stomach for the first few days, anxiety ridden and had no appetite..but things are starting to feel a bit more natural and safe and Eli seems to be happy and healthy so what more can I ask for really.

Andy is the best dad ever. He is so good with him and we've been reading to him and teaching him things already :) Today Andy read him the news and we showed him pictures of his Grandparents, Aunts & Uncles and cousins (AND Great-Aunts and Uncles LORI) and explained who they are so when we get home in April he's all set and ready to spend lots of quality time with them!

I'm not as tired as I thought I would be, I could still be running on pure adrenaline though. But really newborns sleep so much throughout the day that I definitely have opportunities to get some sleep. He gets up one time in the middle of the night to eat for about 45 minutes to an hour then is back to bed so I get a few solid hours before that time and a few solid hours after (for now..) SO I can't complain at all, he has been a happy playful baby that seems very content. I'm the neurotic one that questions everything and worries myself into anemia.

Well it's been quite the week, words can't explain how I'm feeling or my feelings for him. We have been going for short walks each day to get used to the world (and help mom ease into feeling secure having him out!!) I could just stare at him all day... and I have. The little expressions while sleeping make me want to cry every time. Weather it's a smile or a sad face. He has changed SO much in 1 week it's just unbelievable. Some days he looks just like his dad, some days like me! And I love the changes, makes each day new and exciting.

Hope you enjoyed our story and we will update again soon~