Christmas 2013

I made the children pose for photos before allowing them to open presents.  They were not happy about the delay but they learned quickly that arguing about it just lengthened the delay...

Photos of Sara

I took some photos of Sara in the back yard.

Church activity at the park in Groß-Gerau

We had a ward activity at the park in Groß-Gerau -- good friends, good food, good times...  I brought the camera and took some pictures.

Norschter Kerb

Each year in late August the town where we live hosts a small carnival -- the Norschter Kerb.  We walked to the carnival and let the children play some of the games and ride some of the rides.  They each got a small treat as we started to walk home.

Sara at the food court

Sara does not like french fries.  Have you ever met a child that would not eat french fries?  She will, however, eat onion rings.  I took these photos at Calvin's end-of-season soccer party in June.

The Netherlands 2012

My father and step-mother came to visit during Oscar's spring break in April.  We scheduled a three-day trip to the Netherlands.  Of course we went to the Keukenhof (3rd year in a row).  The weather forecast called for rain each day we were there but it never rained once.  On the day we went to the Keukenhof, the sunlight helped me get some great photos.  My dad brought his fancy Canon 7D camera so I got to use that for the photos.

A day trip to Strasbourg

In 1977, my father was employed as a Visiting Assistant Professor at the Institut de Chimie, Université Louis-Pasteur in Strasbourg, France.  Strasbourg subsequently became the city of my birth.  When my father came to visit in April, he said he wanted to see the city again.  It was only a two hour drive from Wiesbaden so we drove there and back on the same day.  We visited the Strasbourg Cathedral (from 1647 to 1874 it was the world's tallest building), walked around the Grand Island (in 1988 it was named a UNESCO World Heritage site), had lunch at a French restaurant, and stopped at a pastry shop for desert as we walked back to the parking garage.

New banner image

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

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.

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.

Narula Family 2011 Year In Review

Tina made a 2011 memory book at shutterfly.com.  I made some small changes as I was reviewing the book for clarity and errors but the majority of the book is Tina's work.  We have not yet received the book in the mail.  Here is what it will look like:

New banner image

I updated the banner image with newer photos.

Christmas Day 2011

Tina let the boys pick their own breakfast for Christmas morning.  They chose a special holiday version of Cap'n Crunch.  Nothing says "Merry Christmas" like sweetened corn and oat cereal.

Halloween 2011

Tina made costumes for Calvin and Sara (Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse).  Oscar's costume (Harry Potter) was purchased.

Sara at the park

Sara at the park, 30 September 2011.

Jetlagged

I remember how hard it was for our family to adjust to European time when we first arrived in Germany in 2009.  We had come from the Eastern time zone in the United States (six hour difference) and it took almost a full week before all of us felt comfortable with the time change.

Separation of powers

Tina got home from her adults-only trip to Bavaria on Tuesday afternoon.  On Thursday, she left again -- this time to the States for four weeks (mostly with her parents in Las Vegas).  Calvin and Sara went with her but Oscar stayed in Germany with me (he still has two more weeks of school).  We looked at getting tickets after Oscar was out of school but leaving a few weeks later would have cost a lot more money.  So Oscar and I are by ourselves in Germany until the evening of July 6th.

Oscar's New Bed

We bought a twin bed for Oscar from my coworker Steve.  Tina wanted to use the mattress we got from Steve as a spare for guests so we decided to buy a new one for Oscar.  The Serta mattresses at the furniture store on the local military base were more expensive than we wanted to pay so I started looking online.  I found a mattress that had some decent reviews at Wal-Mart's website and selected the option to have it shipped to me.  I was a bit surprised that this was even an available option -- I knew that Wal-Mart offered free shipping on oversized items for customers who use their Site-to-Store pickup option but I wasn't sure how they were going to send a twin mattress in the mail.

I had to wait almost two months to find out.  Finally it showed up in the mail.  Except it didn't look like a mattress at all -- it was just a gray duffel bag...

I had been expecting a bed, not a bag.  Was this really it?  Sara was very interested in the contents of the bag...

I started opening the bag.

Lo and behold -- there was a mattress inside...

 Except it was rolled up and flattened.

In order to ship it, the manufacturer compressed the springs by sucking the air out of the bag and then they just rolled it up like a sleeping bag.  Breaking the seal on the bag causes the mattress to expand to its full size.

I took a video of myself opening the bag.  Listen for the hiss as air rushes in and watch as the mattress expand.

Sara liked sitting on the new bed.

 Oscar likes his new bed and the new Mario Kart comforter I bought him to go with it (also from Wal-Mart).

The Netherlands (again)

During Oscar's second week of spring break, we went back to the Netherlands (you might recall that we went last year).  We stayed at the same Eurocamp trailer park as before.  The trailers are clean, cheap, have a refrigerator and oven (so we bring and cook our own food), there is free wireless Internet at the shopping center, and admission to the on-site amusement park is built in to the price of the trailer.  We had two full days in the Netherlands so we spent one day at the Keukenhof and we spent the other day at the amusement park.  Oscar complained that the Keukenhof was just "walking and looking".  He found the amusement park to be much more tolerable.


Day One: Keukenhof
The Keukenhof is the world's largest flower garden -- over seven million bulbs.  I learned during this year's visit that every bulb is lifted and replanted by hand each year.  On the day we visited, the weather was really nice -- mostly sunny, high temperature in the upper 60s, and a light breeze that lasted the whole day.  In short, it was a perfect day for walking and looking.

Really great logo design.

As we were walking in, Oscar and Calvin took a detour to play with this penny crusher machine.  I looked away for a moment and the next thing I heard was Calvin crying.  Oscar had spun the crank around when Calvin wasn't looking and it hit him (Calvin) in the forehead.  So that explains the bruise on Calvin's head in all of the photos.

Last year we waited until the end of the day to try and get a family picture and it didn't turn out as well as I had hoped.  This year we did the family photo before lunch.  I found a grassy spot in relative shade right in front of some flowers.  The great thing about this spot was the bush in the background.  I had been trying to find a place where we would not have other people in the background and this spot worked really well for that.  I put the camera on a tripod, set a ten second timer, and ran into the frame.  We tried that five or six times until we ended up with a really nice photo.  I knew we weren't going to get anything better than this so we packed up the camera and moved on for more walking and looking.

This is one of my favorite flower photos from our Keukenhof visit.

If you look closely, you will see a single gray hair on my right temple.  I suppose there will eventually be more.  Maybe even on both sides...

 Keukenhof = 80 acres of this.  So beautiful...

 This gardener was dead-heading some early-blooming tulips that were done for the season.

 The boys liked watching people play a live chess game with large pieces.  I like this photo of the knight.  The pieces are two or three feet tall.

Day Two: Amusement Park
The boys really enjoyed the amusement park.  We were there all day...

The boys wanted me to ride the "big" roller coaster.

The boys remembered this slide from last year.  This ride was self-service -- no employee supervision.  That meant nobody was enforcing rules like "Don't go face first" and "Be sure to hold on to your bag on the way down".

Sara only went once. She did not like it.

Whatever happened to "Collect All 4"?

We all enjoyed anther trip to the Netherlands.  We still haven't been to Amsterdam; Maybe next year...