Grandma comes to visit!

We had such a great time when my Mom came to visit. She got here the day after Ainsley was born and stayed for 2 weeks. We sent her on a trip to Paris for the day since we can't leave the country yet since Ainsley doesn't have her passport yet. While she was here we also took trips to Gartenschau (Dino Park), downtown Kaiserslautern for some shopping (twice) :), Trier, Barfusspfad (Barefoot Park) and an antique market. It was over 90 degrees outside almost the whole time that she was here, so needless to say, we tried to do as much as we could but spent a lot of time inside. Brayden and Ainsley loved having their Grandma here!

Brayden Turns 3!

Hard to believe that it's been 3 years since this little ball of energy entered our lives! He's such a big boy now and so much fun to be around. He continues to love trains, cars, trucks and basically anything with wheels. He can count to 20, knows the alphabet and letter sounds, and can recognize all of letters and numbers 1-12. He loves to eat pasta, chicken, fruits and vegetables. He even loves to eat broccoli...crazy kid! :) His favorite movies are Toy Story, Cars and anything Thomas the Train. He also likes to watch Sesame Street, Handy Manny and Super Why. He is going to preschool this year on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 9-3 at Children's Learning Academy. It's so amazing how much he is like a sponge right now and picks up everything. We had a party at our house with his friends to celebrate. On his actual birthday, we took a trip to Gartenschau (Dino Park) with his Grandma!

Welcome to the world Ainsley Mae Keenan!

On August 10th (her due date), we welcomed Ainsley Mae Keenan! I went to the doctor on the 9th and the doctor said that basically I could show up to labor and delivery that day and they couldn't turn me away. I was already at 5 cm and having some contractions off and on. Luckily, I was able to come home, get ready, get my bags and go back to the hospital later that day. As we were leaving the housing base, we saw a lot of traffic backed up at the gate. After waiting a few minutes, Jeff got out of the car to go talk to the MPs (Military Police) that were at the gate. He was told that there was an incident on base and they had to stop all outgoing traffic because they were looking for the suspect. Apparently being in labor will get you out of the gate! :) After Jeff told them why we had to get out of the gate, the MPs immediately started telling all of the traffic lined up behind us to back up. We had to back out of the outgoing lane and they stopped incoming traffic so that we could go out the entrance. We received so many dirty looks from people that were stranded, but obviously I had a good excuse! :) I finally got admitted to the hospital around 7 p.m. after being in the triage room for a few hours. August is a busy time for babies and they didn't have a room available for me yet. Hours later, at 12:45 a.m., Ainsley finally arrived at 8 lbs, 2 ounces and 20.9 inches long. Everything went great and we were so happy to meet her!

Brayden came to the hospital the next day to meet his sister. He was very curious, but didn't really want to hold her or touch her. It took him a few days to get used to having her around. He randomly asked me "Mommy, I hold her?". I placed her in his lap immediately and he even gave her a kiss. He is proving to be a great big brother!

Sad day...

On August 5th, the world lost a very special man. I feel so fortunate that I was able to spend time with him in June when we went to Ohio to visit. At 93 years young, my Grandpa continued to do the things that he wanted to do. He watched Fox News, listened to Rush Limbaugh on the radio, watched the Pittsburgh Pirates, kept up with the latest news on Ohio State football and played Words with Friends with most of the family on his iPad (and won almost all of the time!). His mind was so sharp for his age and he still told me stories from his times living on the farm when he was younger or when he spent his college days at University of Cincinnati. I always laughed a little when he'd ask me, "Is that big building still there on campus?" or "Is the Pi Kappa Alpha (his fraternity) house still on Clifton Ave?". He would have been amazed to see how much campus had changed since he graduated in 1941. My mother-in-law introduced him to Sudoku and he had a huge book of puzzles. It didn't take him long to solve every puzzle in that book and start making up his own puzzles. He spent every day for as long as I can remember beginning the day by doing the crossword puzzle in the paper. He even made up his own crossword puzzle and submitted it into the newspaper. Unfortunately, they didn't publish it. He loved to make bets. He often had weight loss challenges with our family. He'd say that if he didn't lose 10 lbs by a certain date then he'd have to pay my Mom or my aunt a certain amount of money. When he would go golfing every morning, he would make everyone guess what his score would be that day before he'd leave. When I was younger, he'd often say "Steph, I need a volunteer." I would often respond with a groan because it usually meant that he needed someone to crawl up into the attic or into a crawlspace in the house. I was usually relieved when it involved an issue with his computer because I could typically fix the problem quickly and he'd respond with "Now how did you do that?!". He had so many quirks and he always wanted to be as independent as possible. He was known to eat shredded wheat and a banana for breakfast, fix mustard and cheese sandwiches for lunch, eat large amounts of popcorn at random times of the day (sometimes for a meal) and eat lots and lots of chocolate! He loved the German chocolate that I would send home to him. They never lasted very long in his hands! I remember when I was younger he would try to take everyone's plates before they were done with their dinner because he just wanted to hurry up and get on to dessert. A "Gee-dunk" was my favorite which was basically a Coke float. He also smoked a pipe which I hated, but no one could tell him not to because you can't tell a 93 year old what to do. :) Every year at Christmas, he would send my cousins and I on scavenger hunts throughout the house. He would make up little poems for us and send us in search of clocks, TVs, the car, the pool table and we'd make our way through the house following the directions in the poems in search of the final prize. It was always amazing how an envelope with our name on it and some spending money would magically appear in the Christmas tree when we completed our hunt. All of these things were some of my favorite things about him. I was very fortunate to have him in my life for so long and have so many great memories. Although he will be missed so much by many people, it is reassuring knowing that he lived the way that he wanted up until the very end. (There are a few things that I love about the picture above. First of all, you can see the eye chart. He told me that he keeps that up so that he can look at it every so often and he can tell if his eyesight is getting worse. I remember at another time during this day, we had him hold Brayden for the first time. Brayden hiccuped and Grandpa said "Ohhh I better give him back now". He thought that he was going to make Brayden start crying or something. Last of all, most people would assume that there is coffee in that coffee cup. It's not coffee. It's melted butter that he had just taken out of the microwave to pour onto the popcorn that he had just popped.) :)

Where did Summer go?!

Well, I have fallen wayyyy behind on this blog. Where did our Summer go?! We have had an unbelievably busy few months with a trip back to the States for Brayden and I, 3 trips back to the States for Jeff, trips to Amsterdam and Croatia, yet another move and getting things ready for the arrival of the newest Keenan! Here are some Summer highlights! In May we went to Keukenhof which is an annual tulip festival in the Netherlands. It was beautiful! We also visited a wooden shoe and cheese factory. I'm pretty sure that the highlight of the entire trip for Brayden were all of the horses and sheep that we got to see. Later that day we had time to travel into downtown Amsterdam which we absolutely loved! Such a cool city to visit!

Over Memorial Day weekend we traveled to Zadar, Croatia. Instead of taking another trip where we rushed to see everything that the city had to offer, we took a trip to just relax! We stayed at an all-inclusive resort called Falkensteiner Hotel Fumination Borik which was very family friendly and Brayden had a wonderful time also! We used the 3 day vacation to lay by the beach, swim and relax! It was wonderful and we couldn't have asked for better weather!

In June, Brayden and I took a trip to Ohio for 2 weeks. I decided to give Space A a try which is where you take a military plane over and only get on the flight if there is room. On the first day that I tried to get on a flight, I got on a plane heading to Charleston, SC. I was so relieved that we were able to get a flight to a major city and I could easily get a flight from Charleston to Ohio. After the long flight (over 13 hours since we stopped for about an hour in Jacksonville, FL), we finally made it to Charleston...or so we thought! Due to bad weather in Charleston, our pilot decided to stop and refuel at a small Marine base in Beaufort, SC before heading into Charleston. After refueling, our pilot informed us that the duty day for the base in Charleston was done and they were not able to fly us there until the next morning (It was a 10 minute flight and it was only 3:00 in the afternoon!). After much frustration, we caught a shuttle to the local lodging facility, walked in the rain to Subway for dinner and stayed the night in Beaufort. The next morning, we were 2 of 6 people on the flight to Charleston because the passengers with us found other ways to get to there the night before. I wasn't able to rent a car because I didn't have a carseat with me and the company didn't provide them at that location. :( The shuttle that was supposed to take us to the terminal from the lodging facility didn't show up so a very nice Soldier offered to drive us. When we arrived at Charleston Air Force Base, I called multiple cab companies to try to get to the International Airport. A Soldier that worked at the terminal was nice enough to offer to drive us after every cab company said that they couldn't pick us up. Thankfully the Soldier got us to the airport in time to make our flight to Akron. To top off our day, our flight out of Charleston was delayed due to mechanical difficulties causing us to miss our connecting flight in Charlotte. After a LONG day, we made it to Akron about 3 hours later than we had anticipated, but WE MADE IT! :) We had a wonderful time visiting with family! We got to see my cousin Erik get married and saw a lot of family that we hadn't seen in years. It was a great time!

Project 365: Weeks 18 and 19!

Day 127: 5-6-2012 I've got a very sick husband today and our counter looks like a pharmacy!

Day 128: 5-7-2012 Spinach Artichoke Pasta...yum!

Day 129: 5-8-2012 Jeff found a website today called "The Art of Manliness". This manual actually was something that I wish every guy had and followed! Lots of great tips on being a gentleman...haha!!

Day 130: 5-9-2012 Made a trip downtown this morning and I wasn't leaving without this! :)

Day 131: 5-10-2012 Haircut time!

Day 132: 5-11-2012 Lucy had her first trip to the vet since we've been here. She was a good girl considering they drew blood and gave her 4 shots!

Day 133: 5-12-2012 My favorite picture from our trip to Amsterdam. My boys!

Day 134: 5-13-2012 I knew that I'd find my maiden name somewhere in this country! This street is about 5 minute from our house!

Day 135: 5-14-2012 This is the face of a dog in trouble! :)

Day 136: 5-15-2012 We were getting ready to read a bedtime story then someone thought it would be a good idea to sneak downstairs and get an apple!

Day 137: 5-16-2012 Found a recipe for Texas Roadhouse Cinnamon Butter on Pinterest! Soooo good!

Day 138: 5-17-2012 Planted flowers in the backyard this week! Feels like Spring now!

Day 139: 5-18-2012 We went to a Farewell for some of Jeff's Soldiers at an indoor go-kart place. Brayden loved the cars!

Day 140: 5-19-2012 Someone came into bed to cuddle with me this morning. Who wouldn't love waking up to this face! :)

Project 365: Weeks 16 and 17!

Day 113: 4/22/2012 Pizzeria Milano makes me happy!

Day 114: 4/23/2012 "I need to tackle Daddy!" This is heard almost every night when Jeff gets home from work. He loves his Daddy!

Day 115: 4/24/2012 Ok, so here in Germany you rarely see Polizei pull people over for speeding. They have speed cameras set up around everywhere to get you instead then you receive something wonderful like this in the mail! Some of them (like this one) have a picture of the license plate and driver on the ticket for you. There is no such thing as letting you get away with going 5 mph over the speed limit here either. I have gotten 2 tickets over here so far...one going 6 km over and this one going 11 km over. That's like going less than 5-10 mph over the speed limit. Luckily each ticket is around 10-20 Euro ($15-25) instead of an $80 ticket in the States.

Day 116: 4/25/2012 He put himself back to sleep reading a book.

Day 117: 4/26/2012 Shower time!

Day 118: 4/27/2012 I had such a great time tonight with MOMS Club friends! We had an event called Brushstrokes and Bellinis where an artist came and walked us through painting a picture. It was so much fun and everyone's pictures turned out great!

Day 119: 4/28/2012 I think we'll have a baseball player on our hands someday. He's already mastered running around the bases, but we need to work on hitting and catching first. :)

Day 120: 4/29/2012 25 weeks! New haircut and bigger belly!

Day 121: 4/30/2012 Ohhhhh my child....

Day 122: 5/1/2012 This morning he was watching Thomas the Train with the xBox controller in his hand and he was thinking that he was controlling the TV. He said "I need to move the train. Go Thomas! I need to make Percy go over there!"

Day 123: 5/2/2012 A friend let me borrow this book since we are clueless on a baby girl name. We've narrowed 60,001 names down to 3...I think! :/

Day 124: 5/3/2012 One of my favorite things about Germany is driving out in the country and seeing the rolling hills. Everything is so green (especially with all of the rain that we've had!), but it is just so beautiful out there. I was driving to a friend's house today and loved the view! Bad quality with my phone, but the clouds look kinda neat!

Day 125: 5/4/2012 Today, Brayden's preschool had a Mother's Day picnic/walk to the pond. Everyone had such a great time! It's so cute to see him interact with the kids in his class. This is his class with his teachers, Ms. Ary and Ms. Andrea.

Day 126: 5/5/2012 One of my favorite things about Germany are the windows! We have rolladens on every window and sliding door in the house. It's so nice to be able to black out the rooms, especially in the summer when it stays light out until 10 p.m. and the sun comes up at 6:30 a.m.!