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I updated the banner image with some photos I took after church today.

Calvin builds a Lego truck

Calvin built a small Lego car a few weeks ago.  I had to help him press a few of the pieces together and he needed help putting the tires together but he did the rest of it by himself.

Sara plays with BuckleyBoo

My mother sent Sara a BuckleyBoo toy for her recent birthday.  Sara really likes it.  I took some photos of her playing with it.

Oscar's baptism

Mormon children are eligible to be baptized when they turn eight (see here for an explanation).  Accordingly, Oscar was baptized on his eighth birthday.  Oscar spent several months preparing for his baptism.  We talked a lot about what it means to be baptized.  We also we discussed answers to questions that were in a "Baptism Book" that the ward Primary Presidency provides to each of the seven year-old children.  We are grateful that Oscar made the choice to be baptized.

Cirque Dreams at Ramstein Air Base

After Oscar's birthday party, I took Oscar and Calvin to Ramstein Air Base to see Cirque Dreams.  The show was free (compliments of Armed Forces Entertainment).  A performance stage had been constructed inside a large airplane hangar.  The seating was just removable benches that had been set up on the floor of the hangar.  It was really crowded and we got there right as the show was about to start so we had to hunt to find poor seats in the back.  Because the floor of the hangar was not sloped, we had a hard time seeing much more than the backs of the people sitting in front of us.  Lots of people were standing in the aisles because it gave a better view.  Initially I thought we should just give up and go home but we had driven over an hour to get there so I decided to just wait and see if things improved with time.  In fact they did improve -- but not until lots of other people sitting near us left early (because they were also unable to see).  Once people started leaving, our view improved significantly.

Oscar turns eight!

Oscar's eighth birthday was last Sunday.  We had a birthday party on Saturday afternoon.

Beyblade overload

When I came downstairs last Saturday morning, Oscar was watching YouTube videos on the laptop.  I wondered how long he had been there so I checked the browser history:

Sara turns two!

Sara's second birthday was on Valentine's Day.  Tina had a small birthday party at home during the day and then we had cupcakes and opened a few presents in the evening.  After she had a bath, Sara talked to some of her grandparents on Skype.

A small car accident

A few weeks ago, I was driving to a morning meeting at church when my car slid off the road, hit a guardrail, and bounced back onto the road.  I was not driving very fast so the damage is not too bad -- the rear light housing on the driver's side is cracked and there are some minor scratches and dents that run along driver's side of the car.  The mechanics at the Army's do-it-yourself auto shop looked at it on Friday night and said they think they can bang out the dents and buff out most of the scratches.  They also had a junk E39 BMW waiting to be crushed so they are going to pull the light housing off and sell it to me for $15.  It could have been a lot worse...