Mom's away, the kids will play, part 1

Joy and I have been going to a parenting class, and one of the things we need to work on is affirming our children, just as they are.  It was shortly after this lesson that Joy felt led to fly home to see Josh in the lead of his play at Armstrong Atlantic State University.  That leaves ME with the kiddos for a few days.  In order to preclude all the usual gasps of incredulity, I decided I should try to put up a few pictures of how we're doing.

Friday, after dropping Joy off at the airport, I took the kids to base for breakfast at JR Rockers.  We went home to rescue Bella from herself (she likes to sleep in, so she wasn't up when we left at 0600), and took her for a picnic at Burg (castle) Nanstein in Landstul, the largest town closest to the house.

We thought about exploring the castle, as it has been partially restored, but because there was a fee and we had Bella (who has no qualms about defecating on floors), we decided we could do that another day when Joy was around.

 With the castle at my back, you are looking north at Ellie over the town of Landstuhl.  Ramstein Air Base is off to the right about 4 miles, behind the tree to Ellie's right.

 Now, looking nearly west, the rest of Landstuhl is nestled in the valley, below.  The notch in the trees holds another small fort-like edifice that I presume was an observation post that could send signals to the castle.  Landstuhl Regional Medical Center and Ian's school is behind that ridge, farther to the left of the picture.

We did a 700 meter loop in the forest.  Ellie walked for about half of it.  Bella liked it a great deal.  Ellie never misses a chance to take her blanket everywhere!

After the picnic, we went back to base for Ian to get shots.  Otherwise, he'd be barred from school on Monday.  We were able to opt out of the flu vaccine, though.  Then, we bought a printer at the Exchange, so Joy can print her recipes and Ian can print his schoolwork.  I've downloaded the iPhone app to be able to print to it...I wonder if I'll ever use it?

For dinner, Ian and I finished the chicken curry Joy made last week, and Ellie had salami and crackers while we watched the original Lion King on VHS.  I'd really like to digitize the whole collection and be done with DVDs and VHS, etc.  But that will take lots of time.  Maybe after Air War College...