Christmas Eve

Tonight we went to the Candlelight Christmas Eve service at the church. It was a goodtime, but I felt bad for Kyle the entire time. He had to have been so comfortable, but he put up with it all. Gunnar actually sat quietly on my lap the entire service...and he wasn't sleeping. He just played with about every toy I could fit in his diaper bag and he was impressed with the fire from the candles, as he would say "ooooo."
Here is a picture of the family before the service...Merry Christmas from our family to yours.

Gunnar in his Christmas PJ's from Poppa and Grandma Rodstol. He is anxiously awaiting Santa's arrival for tomorrow (to bad all his presents are already under the tree).

Here is a sweet picture from earlier today. I needed to cook dinner and Gunnar was taking a nap on me. I didn't want to move him because all day he had only taken little 10 minute cat-naps. He was a cranky kid, and needed a nap, so Kyle took over the holding while I cooked. So sweet, what a lucky kiddo to have his daddy here for Christmas, even if it is with a badly broken ankle.

My two favorite boys on Christmas Eve 2009...

Christmas Gift

Gunnar (and I) got the best Christmas gift...

Kyle is home. He got to come home from the hospital until Tuesday and that is when he will be having his surgery. They then anticipate him being home from 3-5 months before he redeploys.
While we are thankful for this extra time we have together, but we feel so bad for Kyle and are sad he had to break his ankle to be with us. He is in a lot of pain, and keeping him comfortable is not easy. The pain meds make him itchy, and without them he can barley move. We also have a curious little guy who I have to keep away from his one leg and crutches (a fun new toy).

Santa and his little reindeer

Here is Santa and his baby reindeer. We couldn't get him to smile, but at least he wasn't crying. :) (Sorry for the poor quality, our printer/scanner is causing me all sorts of problems, so this is the best I could do).

Just to let our friends and some family (most already) know, Kyle broke his ankle in two places and is being sent to the Army Hospital either here in Germany or to Walter Reed in the states. I was able to talk with both him and the doctor that is treating him in Afghanistan this morning. I will not know until morning which hospital he was sent too. His ankle is requiring surgery. I am hoping that he will be sent to Germany so that Gunnar and I are able to be with him. Please keep him in your prayers as I know Kyle won't be very happy about all of this.

When no one is watching

This is what it looks like when I am not paying attention to Gunnar. How did he gets his pants off? I also would have loved to see him climb in there.

I did get to see him climb out. He came out of the shelf very gracefully.

Apparently yesterday Gunnar was feeling fat and thought he needed to weigh himself.

This is Gunnar tonight after his bath and in his jammies. However, he doesn't look ready to sleep, he is checking out the Christmas tree lights.

Kyle was able to put a few pictures up today. I ask if they were okay to share and he said "yes." There are none of him, sadly he was taking the pictures not smiling for them, but this gives you an idea of what it looks like where he is.

Side Note: Plane tickets were picked up today, we leave Jan. 7th!!!

5 minutes with Gunnar

I thought it would be fun to take pictures of all Gunnar does in 5 minutes. So this morning, I chose 5 random minutes....he keeps me busy.
Notice all the bruises on my poor abused baby? Well, apparently I am incapable of stopping him and catching him every time he falls. He needs to wear hats when we go out in public.
He starts with a book of CDs.

Haha, my mom told me "no"...

Moving on, I think this book looks interesting

Boring, let's go over to the stuffed animals

Not as exciting as I hoped for. I think I will chew on this plastic toy mom hasn't blown up yet

Hmm...what to do next???

Beat the hedgehog up...poor guy.

Hey, look mom, I found some cords!

I am having so much fun!

I prefer to climb the bouncer and not sit in it,

The desk looks more exciting...

It was bound to happen, I fell and bumped my head

Amazing, sitting on mom's lap and eating her cell phone made it all better.

Ready to play some more now.

Amazingly in these five minutes he avoided the shoe rack, dog water, and climbing any shelves.

EXCITEMENT

See how EXCITED these people are?

Apparently they got the news that my EROD has been approved!!! I was busy changing the light bulb in the projector when the phone rang. I almost didn't answer because I was being very careful with the projector light bulb, but I crawled down the latter (that Gunnar was attempting to crawl up) and got the phone, good thing! I was so excited, but then I said to the poor guy on the other side of the line "well, now what am I suppose to do?" He heard my worry and concern and said it was all explained in the paper he sent and I could call anytime I had questions (he probably shouldn't have said that last part, I do have his cell phone number, poor guy).

So, the Army now says I am no longer welcome to stay in Schweinfurt after, January 16th. I called transportation and I attend a briefing on Monday and make appointments for getting the car and our household goods picked-up and shipped! Tomorrow I will go see about getting a plane ticket home. I am shooting for the first week in January to be home, but we will see. Since it is the holiday time, getting things picked up and a ticket home will be interesting. Keep us in your prayers as I am praying for everything to smoothly. My excitement quickly turned into being overwhelmed with all the things I have to do.  Luckily the Army takes care of the packing...I just have to make the arrangements and do the cleaning (I am hoping they don't make me paint, yuck!).

Mr. Curiosity

Today, Gunnar has gone through about 6 outfits (no joke). He spit up so many times, found the dog water, and we made quite the mess with dinner. Oh well, what's more laundry? I got to the point where I didn't even want to put clothes on him. So for about 10 minutes he ran crawled around in a diaper. In these 10 minutes he had fun exploring in his undies. After 10 minutes I felt like a bad mom for letting him be in only a diaper in the freezing cold weather, so I decided I better get him dressed, which he of course hated.
He thinks he is so cute. I think he is trouble.

On a side note, Gunnar is in bed sleeping. I heard him start fussing and I went into check on him. He looked up at me and goes "ooo," gave me a quick smile then was fast asleep again. Such a sweetie!

Zeil Christmas Market

Today Gunnar and I had a great afternoon with Regina, Daniela, Udo, Sina, and Helena. We all met and enjoyed lunch at Daniela's place in Zeil. We then walked into the town to visit the Kids Flea-Market (the greatest idea ever), the book flea-market and then the best part the Christmas Market. This is my all time favorite part of Germany, the Christmas Markets. They are so much fun, and really help get you in the holiday spirit (which I need a lot of help with this year). We saw St. Nickolas, visited the many booths, saw the Nativity and enjoyed the great food and drinks. Gunnar was a great sport and put up with it all.
Here are some pictures....

Udo entertaining Gunnar at the book market.

Helena and I...she has become a great friend.

Sina and Gunnar. Sina has been great about sharing her family with Gunnar. It has to be hard when she is used to getting all the attention.

Saint Nickolas giving out candy. He even put some in the stroller for Gunnar...I enjoyed it.

The only things I bought, cute knit baby booties.

The cute little reindeer and his mommy.

Some of the shops.  Most of the shops were crammed on this one street. With a few more in the market square.

This is what happens when Gunnar hangs out with Sina so much...he plays with dolls

 

and more dolls. I have never seen him get more excited over a toy. He loves dolls!

Big Boy Tub

Gunnar has graduated from him tummy tub to the big toy tub. He got in impromptu bath today after a lunch mishap. Since he can sit up and has pretty good balance the big bath tub works out great. He loves the big boy bath, it is like his personal swimming pool. I put just a little water and he loves laying on his belly and splashing. He also tries crawling in the bathtub, which surprisingly he isn't to bad at. My all time favorite is sitting him up at the back of the bath tub and watching him do a sort of slip n'slide to the front to the tub, he keeps his balance the entire way. Apparently Gunnar thinks the wash cloth tastes good because it is in his mouth the entire time. He is a funny kid, but bath time has to be one of my favorite times of the day.