Alone again

So Joe headed out about 5 am this morning to get Matt to the airport in Hamburg. He has quite a long day ahead of him, of course for his destination I would trade him in a heartbeat! So once again it's just us 4, or just us 3 for the majority of the day.
I have been dying for Owen to pay the least bit of attention to the television for the past few months. Not that I want him to be addicted, (i already have 2 tv addicts in the house) but every now and then it would be nice to just put a show on and know that my kids are safe and entertained while I say, get a shower. Well, the other night I come up and see that Joe and Matt are watching a movie and Maggie and Owen are also watching it. I thought at first Owen just happened to be sitting because he was tired, but after 5 minutes or so he still hadn't moved...so what held his attention so well.....wiggles, dora, blues clues???


Nope, it was the karate kid!! Go figure ( I know, I know...why in the heck were 2 guys in their 20's watching the karate kid, see why we want to leave Germany!!:)






Our staircase is very open and the top floor has clear plexiglass all around it, I moved our couch away from the rail since Owen is climging onto everything and I didn't want him to fall over the rail. Well, since there is a small crawl space this is a new fun thing for the kids to do. The first time they went back Owen got stuck and I was in the other room so I came out and heard him crying but couldn't see where he was until I headed down the steps and saw him through the glass!


Everytime they get back here I can just hear my Aunt Bard telling me how dangerous that could be!! :)











It was really nice out when we got up this morning so I decided we needed to get out of the house a little. We loaded up and headed to Citi to shop around a little. I am also trying to get Owen to drop his morning nap since he isn't wanting to take a afternoon nap until 4 or so and it messes up my whole day so I figured getting him out would keep him awake.


Here is a picture of Citi, doesn't really look so different then our malls huh.



While I was taking this picture Maggie saw something in a candy store that caught her eye I suppose and when I turned around she was gone! I looked around me for several seconds before yelling at the top of my lungs for her and right about that time saw her with her face pressed against the chocolate counter. Talk about the longest 30 seconds of my life. I am sure everyone was wondering what was going on and even more so why i was taking a picture of the mall.





We walked around the mall a bit before grabbing some lunch and heading outside. There are fountains there by the eating area that the kids like alot so Maggie had fun playing in them and ended up getting pretty soaked. It was cool out today but not too terribly cold, still everyone around was looking at me like I was setting her up for pneumonia or something.













All the water began working on Maggie because just as I got everything/one loaded up to go home she announces she has to pee. So we all head back into the mall to find a bathroom. On our way there we find an interesting place...it appears if you want to bring your dog with you to the mall, but don't want to keep them along the entire time you can just let them hang out here in the puppy lockers??????















Or maybe it's for your kids. :)



















So after we found the bathroom and Maggie took care of things, we spent another 10 minutes in their because they had a little sink (not sure if it was for kids or handicap people) but anyhow she LOVED it and washed up enough times to last her the rest of the week.














On our way out to the car, the kids caught sight of these riding........haystacks I suppose.

Anyhow, we stopped and let Owen play on those for a few minutes before heading home to get naps in.


Oh yeah,,,,I forgot to tell you about our playdate we had here on monday with the German lady and kids from our music playgroup. They got here about a half hour late, which was no big deal since I had gotten a late start that morning anyhow. They come in and I notice that the little guy has definetly gotten some sort of nasty cold going on.....not that I am germ a phobic when it comes to my kids, but I prefer to NOT expose them to others green snot if possible. Well, I let that one go since they were already here and we headed upstairs to the playroom. she has 2 little boys, 2 and 4, who seemed pretty sweet. The kids began playing and we were "drinking our tea" and talking when I notice that the 4 year old is throwing punches in the air towards Maggie. He then begins to swing a toy at her like he's sword fighting. At this point, Maggie begans punching back at him and throwing toys across the room at him. I told her not to hit or throw toys, it wasn't nice, and she screams at me, "mom, i have to....my friend is being mean and trying to hurt me." She did have a point I guess. I knew by then that this was not going to work out since Maggie has NEVER hit another kid (other than Owen) in her life....this was definetly not typical Maggie and I for sure didn't want it to start being. Well, while the fighting and toy throwing continued in the corner, she proceeds to tell me, LAUGHINGLY, that her 2 years olds first word was "verflucht". I have no clue what this means....so she says oh, that is the word for dammit. Her english isn't totally clear so I thought I must have misunderstood her, as she says to me that he heard it from his older brother who says it all the time when he's mad. After she left I asked Matt if he heard that and he said he did and that is what she said, as though it was not a big deal. So in hopes to keep my kids from hitting, throwing, and cussing in German I think we won't have playdates with them anymore. We will see them tommorow morning at music group and I am hoping she doesn't try to set up another get together!!