Mother's Day

I live with the best boys in the world! And yesterday they went out of their way to make me feel special and loved! What a great day!
They let me start the day by sleeping in! I slept until 8:15!!! I was awoken by Owen wishing me a Happy Mother's Day, followed by presents! Owen got me a bracelet that he picked out all by himself and a picture frame that he painted at school. But the big surprise was a waffle maker!! They are pretty hard to find here and we haven't had waffles in 2 years. So we were all really excited for this great present! Thanks Tchibo!
We all got ready fast and hurried out the door to beat the Mother's Day breakfast rush. Not too hard to do since Turks are extremely predictable and don't leave the house on Sundays until 11am.
We had a wonderful breakfast at a little outdoor restaurant right on the Bosphorus seaside in Kanlica. We enjoyed watching the boats float by while drinking our tea and Owen had a blast chasing the cats all around the cafe.

After breakfast, we headed to Anadolu Fortress at the mouth of Black Sea. We climbed around the old fortress ruins and strolled through a cemetery.

We ended our outing with ice cream on the seaside in Beykoz.
When we got home, we ordered pizza and cuddled up to watch AstroBoy before heading to bed. All in all, a great day!

A visit from Grandma and Grandpa

The highlight of our spring has been a visit from my parents! We did lots of things in the city that we haven't done before and really enjoyed just spending great family time together. It's a long trip over here, so we are always so incredibly grateful that our families are willing to take the time from work and spend the money to come see us. We are truly blessed! We must have taken a lot of pictures with my parents' camera, because I actually don't have many to share. I'll post more when I get them.

Chilling on the couch with Grandpa!
Just what every little boy needs... a fur Eskimo hat and a space gun that shoots a laser and makes a REALLY loud noise! Thanks Grandpa!
Grandma and Grandpa brought a bag of treasures that Owen got to pick from each day. These silly masks provided lots of laughs.
Months before Grandma and Grandpa came to visit, Grandma and Owen starting planning the Slumber Party they would have when Grandma got here. Grandma taught Owen the elements of every good slumber party: nighttime, jammies, snacks, flashlights and a movie. Grandma brought all of the party supplies with her and one evening they climbed to the top bunk for the Slumber Party of all Slumber Parties. They cuddled in their jammies eating jelly beans, oreos and peeps while watching Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and making designs on the walls with their finger laser lights.

The Slumber Party was so much fun that Owen got to do it with Grandpa the next night while they watched How to Train Your Dragon.
Owen is so lucky to have such fun grandparents who think of special ways to connect with him even though they live far away. Even though he doesn't see them in person very often (he sees them on skype every week), he knows that they are special people who love him lots and he talks about them daily!

First Trip to the Dentist

Owen went to the dentist for the first time a few weeks ago. We read the Berenstain Bears Visit to the Dentist book to prepare us for the visit, so Owen was excited to go when the time came. The dentist was really nice and spoke great English. He counted Owen's teeth and told him to make sure that he brushed everyday with Mommy and Daddy's help. The best part about going to the dentist...Owen left with 4 balloons and a huge sucker. Yep, a sucker from the dentist. And not the sugar-free kind either. And since the dentist thought it ok to give him a sucker, we didn't feel too bad taking him for a sweet treat to reward his bravery and good behavior at the dentist :)

He had his mouth open and ready before the dentist even said open up. Very cute!

Apology and Update

I'm a loser, I know. It's been more than 2 months since I've blogged. I don't know how 2 weeks turned into 2 months, but it did and I'm sorry to our families for not providing you with up to date pictures and stories.

Ok, now that that's said, here is a brief update from the past 2 months.

Important things first. A new Tex-Mex restaurant came to town! It's called Moe's, and it's similar to Chipotle. AMAZING! It's on the other side of town, so it takes a good hour to get there via bus, metro and walking, but we have already made 2 journeys over there so it must be worth it!
We've spent lots of time with our friends Gamze, Bars and and their little boy Berke. Owen has really adjusted well to playing with his national friends and he and Berke are having a good time together these days.
They love getting in these buckets and playing train!
Bucket-heads! Sorry, I couldn't get this picture to turn for some reason.
During one of our many rainy day weekends we've had this spring, we borrowed our friends' Wii and had a Wii weekend. Here's a picture of Ryan and Owen shooting targets on Zelda.
We've learned lots of new letters these past weeks. Owen's favorite letter so far O. I wonder why?! Here are the adorable octopus cupcakes we made that week.
Daddy even joined in on the cupcake making fun.
Most Fridays, Owen's school has some sort of themed party. One party was funny hair and accessories day. So we spiked Owen's hair and he wore sunglasses and one of daddy's ties. How cute and silly is he?
We've had crazy weather this spring. It's been so cold and rainy. But on the few weekends that we've had sun, we've headed to the park for a picnic and bike riding.

rainy day fun

It's been cold and rainy here for several weeks now so we haven't had many opportunities to be outside lately. But we have had some fun inside activities while we wait for spring to get here.

We were supposed to be playing dress up, but this looks more like undress.
These homemade Bathtub Finger Paints have given us more than one day of fun.We made these Marshmallow Martians during M week.
Last weekend we took Owen bowling for the first time. Funny and a little bit scary would accurately explain the event. We didn't notice until we got home that we didn't get any pictures of him actually rolling his ball. I think it's because we were too busy "taking cover" as he launched his ball down the alley. He was a wild man and totally loved it.
He chose a different color each time.
It took awhile for the ball to slowly slowly roll down the alley. But he stood and watched it go until it hit the pins. Thank goodness for bumpers. Ask Ryan how many strikes he got using the bumpers!
Here he is giving me some advice on how to roll my ball.
Fun family outing!
Noodle painting during N week.
Amongst all of our busy activities, I managed to squeeze in a tea with a good friend that I hadn't seen for awhile. We ate and drank tea while Owen and her son played trains for hours. If you're curious what I served to my Turkish friend during tea time, here was the menu:
Chicken salad made with yogurt
Bulgur and Lentil meatballs
Deviled Eggs
Kiwi
Sesame Tea Cookies
Banana Bread
And of course lots of Tea

Germany Vacation

Wow, it's been awhile since I've posted. Sorry about that. January was fairly uneventful until the last week when we headed to Germany for a week of vacation. Ryan had a school break, so we took advantage of the opportunity to get away for a week and enjoy some cold weather and snow. Ryan's parents met us in Munich and we spent the week touring Bavaria. Here are pics from the week.

Saturday- We spent the day seeing the sights of Munich including Marianplatz and the glockenspiel and Viktuelienmarkt. We ate at the famous Hofbrau Biergarten sampling the delicious Bavarian cuisine and listening to the oompa bands play.
The characters dance on clock tower at 11 and 2 each day. They danced to the music of the bells for a good 10 minutes. Very cool!Since it was so cold outside, we had a nice excuse to stop for hot chocolate and pretzels most days.The band player invited Owen up on stage to touch his horn. Owen loved dancing to the oompa music.We stayed at a nice Hilton Hotel while we were in Munich. It was great because there was a metrostop in the basement of the hotel with a direct line to the airport. Pretty convenient! Each floor of the hotel had these shoe shiner machines. Owen found it essential that he shine his tennis shoes everyday before leaving the hotel.
Sunday- We spent the day at Dachau which was the sight of one of the largest concentration camps of WWII. It was horrifying to say the least and experiencing it during the frigid winter made it even more somber. I wouldn't say it was a fun day, but if you ever have an opportunity to visit, you will not leave unchanged.
The words on the gate to the camp say "Work Makes Free". A sample of the terrible lies propagated during the war.
Sunday evening we drove to our farmhouse B&B at the foot of the Bavarian Alps. Since we are city dwellers these days, we were very anxious to have a vacation in the countryside where we could play outside, enjoy the clean air, and sleep at night in pitch dark silence. We found this farmhouse online that was all of these things and more. It was actually a working farm, complete with cows, goats, bunnies and chickens. And we had a sledding hill right in our backyard!
Monday morning we woke up bright and early ready to spend a day playing in the snow.
Here Ryan is giving Vallie a push for her very first sled ride ever! She was a natural!
Owen had his work cut our for him trying to push Papaw down the hill.
But Papaw was also a natural. Owen took advantage of the free ride back up the hill.
Our friend, Chico

That evening we helped the farmer feed the animals. Owen god to feed hay to the cows, apples and carrots to the bunnies and collect eggs from the chickens. He was a little afraid at first, but he warmed up to the animals very quickly.
Tuesday we took a little road trip to visit 2 of crazy King Ludwig's most famous castles. His most famous castle Neuschwanstein Castle, was the inspiration for the Disney World Magic Kingdom Castle.
This is the picture of the castle that King Ludwig grew up in before he became king. You should google this guy, he really was crazy and completely obsessed with building magnificent castles.
Hohenschwangau Castle- we toured this one first

Then headed to his famous Neuschwanstein Castle. We took a horse-ride to the top of the hill.

Owen was allowed one souvenir from the trip and chose a sword!
This castle really is breathtaking.

Wednesday- visited Oberammergau and Garmisch
Oberammergau is the sight of the most famous Passion Play. In 1634 the town's residents vowed that if God spared them from the effects of the bubonic plague ravaging the region, they would produce a play every ten years thereafter for all time depicting the life and death of Jesus. The most recent play was last year, 2010. So we didn't get to see the play, but the town is still worth visiting. It is also famous for it's wood carvings. The whole town if full of nativities and cuckoo clocks. They also have 2 houses with the stories of Hansel and Gretel and Little Red Riding Hood painted on them. Since we read these storied before visiting Germany, Owen was especially excited to visit these houses.
That evening, we eat at a traditional Bavarian restaurant in the ski town of Garmisch. This restaurant was complete with yodeling, boys dancing in lederhosen and apple fritters.
There's not much better than food smothered in gravy :)
Thursday was our big sledding adventure day. Ryan found a sledding mountain near our farmhouse. So we bundled up, loaded up the sleds and headed for the mountain. A ski lift took us on a 15 minute ride to the top of the mountain. And we spent the next 40 minutes sledding back down. Now, I'm from Iowa and have done my share of sledding through the years. I've even done some big hill sledding in Colorado. But this, my friends, was sledding like I have never seen. Fast does not quite describe the way we flew down the mountain hanging on for dear life. It was EXTREME! And it was FUN! We all took 2 trips down the hill, and that was ENOUGH! Owen let out squeals of shear delight the entire way down. I, on the other hand, had other words running through my mind as I tried to avoid the steep drop offs on the edge of the 8 foot wide path :)
Friday we packed up and headed back to Munich for our final day in Germany. We spent the day at the Deutches Museum, which is like the Smithsonian of Germany. They had a kids' kingdom in the basement which Owen ran around for 3 1/2 hours. Our city doesn't have anything like this for kids, so this was a really fun thing for Owen. I love watching him explore and see his little mind learn and discover new things. Just last night at dinner he was recalling all of the different exhibits in the museum and discussing how he is going to build a museum like this here in Istanbul.
We were at the airport bright and early Saturday morning to catch our flights. It was a great vacation and especially great because Ryan's parents were there to enjoy it with us!

And just in case you were wondering, I think I ate my weight in sausage.