WEEKEND!

Awwwwe, Saturday! I love Saturdays, why becasue it's cleaning day. It's such a good feeling to know that in just a few short hours our house will smell like Mr. Clean. I know what you all are thinking "Windi is so weird" why would she want to clean on a Saturday? Well, since we are never home M - F, Saturday is the only day of the week where we are home for more than two hours of the day. I refuse to do any work on Sundays! That is Mom's day OFF!!!! I don't clean, I barely cook, no driving anyone anywhere (Kaylin), no softball, and no stress.

Anyway. . . . I thought I would throw a little braggin' rights in here about our daughter. Last weekend they had their tournament for the High School softball teams. Which by the way is called "Europeans". Kaylin's team as a whole lost all three games in the round robin. Boo Hoo! That was sad considering all of the parents really thought they had the talent to make it to the Championship game. Lack of coaching and that was very frustrating. But. . . . Kaylin on the other hand had a great weekend in softball. She played outstanding defensively and offensively! We found out last night at a meeting for the All-Star team that she was voted as "All Tournament Player" for her Team! Yeah, Kaylin!!!! This is the second year in a row that she accomplished this award for her dedication and outstanding ability. We are very proud of her and I just wanted to share this with all of you. I wish all of you could see her play. Our dream is for all of you family members to see her on TV someday playing softball. If this All-Star team wins their Regional Tourny in July (came close last year, lost the Championship game by 1 point) they will play in the "Little League World Series" in Sussex, Delaware in August. Then all of you who live in the states could watch that on TV. How exciting is that?! Okay, I will stop bragging now. Sorry, we are just so very proud of her.

CRAZY people!! :D

Okay. . . . . . . . I know that these pics are a lil on the weird side but this is what happens when mom and I get bored. LOL :D Not much is going on here. I do wish that we could of joined the family at grandmas b-day party but oh well. Maybe next time!!I hope that everyone had fun thats all that matters. :P

My other softball team starts in a few days. I am pretty excited about that. If you are wondering I do play on three softball teams. Hey I am use to it by now but I LOVE IT!!! This is my 12th year playing and I have enjoyed for the most part every year. LOL There has been some iffy coaches here and there but you are going to have that. :D Well I hope that you all have a great rest of the week and a wonderful weekend!!!

Love
Kaylin

Job Title

So once again my cuz Laurie brings something to my attention. Gee, since I live way over here in Germany a lot of our family members don't know what I do for an occupation. Great guess by the way about me being a teacher. My official title is "Para Educator" or better known as a " Teacher's Aide". I absolutely love it! I think I love working with 4th graders really more than the job itself. My responsibility is to shadow a student with autism but there are 3 other students in the class that were in need of a teacher's aide. So I ended up with four students that I help with language arts (grammar), any subject where there is a lot of reading, and math. My workday starts at 8 a.m. and ends at 12:45 p.m. and I have a 45 minute lunch in there. The hours are great since we home school Kaylin. She does her studies while I'm at work and then we go over her homework when I get home. You would think that I like teaching or something?! LOL I remember that I really didn't like school all that much when I had to go but now I just can't get enough of it. HA! Well. . . . that is all I really have for today. Man, I am getting good this is two days in a row that I've blogged.

L-o-n-g Weekend!

Okay, to all you family members who keep sending messages through my daughter (Sherri & Laurie) about me NOT blogging. . . . LOL How do you find something to write about everyday? I just must have a really boring life compared to you two, that is the only thing I can figure out. I am lucky if I can sit down and write up something once a week. I go to work for about 5 hours, come home take a 45 minute power nap, take Kaylin to softball practice, go to the gym, and back home again. Usually nothing to crazy exciting happens within those events of my day.

I guess I could blog about my 4th graders and some of the things they say to me in the course of a day, I call them "humorous one-liners." Like. . . . Teacher: Johnny do you know what it means to have "general knowledge?" Johnny: Well, I think it means that it is knowledge that a General in the military has. Teacher: Trying not to laugh hysterically because it might hurt Johnny's feelings. Says "NO, it means to have knowledge about everyday stuff that happens around you or in the world." Johnny: Then how does a General in the military get to be a General if they don't have a lot of knowledge? Teacher: I'm not saying that a General does not have a lot of knowledge, I am just saying that is not what it means to have "general knowledge." Johnny: Well, I guess I will go home and tell my dad that he might not want to become a General. Teacher: Okay, class it's time to get out your MATH! This conversation could have went on and on and on so we just deterred them (him) in a different direction. So that is what kind of conversations I have during one of my workdays. It is rather refreshing some days but others are very frustrating.

I pray all of you had a great time at Grandma B's party.

Kaylin's B'day Sad and Exciting

Well our daughter is 17 now and boy is that hard to cope with. She is all grown up and 17, I just can't believe it. We spent her birthday which was Saturday, at softball games. I think every year since she was around 10 she has had to play softball on her birthday. It is usually a tournament or a really important team. Like Ramstein High School which in this case is Kaiserslautern's rival school. The kiddo did very well! She treated herself to an over the fence homerun, double (which hit the fence and was only a double because the person running infront of her was a bit slow), and a single just in the first game. She ended up driving in four out of 11 runs that game. NOT BAD! Chad says that the fence at this field is about 250 feet (it's a men's league field.) WOW, what power she has at age 17. Better not let her know that she might think she could beat her ol' momma up or something silly like that. LOL All and all she had an awesome weekend at bat and defense. Hey she even got something really cool for her birthday from us a new camera. I don't think she has stopped snappin' that thing since she got it. Of course I did not get Kaylin's homerun on video. The reason being that every time I set my camera up to tape her she gets walked or something unexciting. It happened to be drizzling on Saturday so I didn't want my camera getting wet. What happens she has a slammer of a hit. Go figure! I guess I have boasted about our daughter enough for one blog. Happy Birthday, baby girl and we are very, very proud of you.

Here I COME!!!

Okay so I hope that this works. If it does you will just get a KICK out of it. This was a few weekends ago when the girl up to bat hit a foul ball. I jumped up from catching ran over dove and caught the ball. If you cant tell my face was about an inch away from eating the fence. LOL It is really funny once you watch it a few times. I hit the fence I beileve with my arm but the I fell off it to catch the ball. So now you know how aggresive I am when I am playing the sport I LOVE!!! This year or shall I say in two days I will have played softball for 12 years. WOW that is a really LONG time. But what can I say I love the game :) But anyway I though you would enjoy watching me catch a foul ball. Oh ya almost forgot you like moms taping job. LOL she never moves the camera for the good shots she always is watching them and not taping. Well whatcha going to do? LOVE her.

Love you all and hope you enjoy
Love
Kaylin

Ending story on BRAT dog. . . . . .

Well I don't have any pictures again. LOL I am sorry about that, but you do get to hear about my boring life. :) I talked to you guys about the brat silhouette thinkin that she had to have fun in the bathrooms. We tried to put her in her cage when mom left. But of coarse she new that I was still home in bed.(where she wanted to be) She was not having that. What does she do???? You got it she barked, howled, and whined pretty much did everything possible to get on ones nerve. I had to get up "SIGH" and take her out of her cage and bring her into my room. After that I shut my bedroom door so that she couldn't go anywhere. Yes, I have two bedrooms. One is really just for guests and or friends. So, that is what situation we are in right now with brat dog.....

I have a game today!!! I am excited. I wasn't able to play in the games last week cause I wanted to take a week off cause of my wrist. Man alive was that hard!! I am excited to play even though I now that we will get our rear ends KICK!!! :) That is a fact. I might be mistaking but, I doubt that. :D We are playing Lakenheath, England. Which is a very good team and it is a 16 hour drive including the 4 hour fairy. We had to go there last year so I KNOW. It was NOT a fun ride. With two softball teams that are girls, German bus drivers that don't speak a lick of English, a 17 year old kid that is asking my mom a question every 5 minutes, and coaches. LOL Long story short we had to fill up on gas which was 1,000 Euro in gas. They tried "KEY WORD" tried to use a debit card. HA HA HA they didn't speak English and when it was asking for a pin code they didn't understand and they didn't know what it was. So we spent 2 or so hours at the gas station. The cops also had to show up cause we couldn't pay for the gas. he he he:) Anyway after 2 very very looooooong hours they got it all figured out. But 1,000 Euro is roughly 1,546 DOLLARS for GASSSSS. I thought you guys might want to know how expensive gas is here for the Germans. But anyway it was a trip that one will never forget.

well I think that, that is all i have for today. I will get back to you on the games. Probably in a few days cause we have games tomorrow too. But with a team named Alconbery. I will have to post some of the softball pics that mom will try to take this weekend.

God Bless and I love you all,
Kaylin <><

Learning a Different Language

So. . . . . after much demand from my cousin, I guess I still need to keep blogging. I do apologize (LAURIE) we are just never home long enough for me to actually type more than a three sentence email. This kid of ours keeps me hoppin'.

Anyway....................................Continuing on from my last blog about "Culture Shock" we have since then started to learn German. After about 6 months of feeling like we stuck out like a sore thumb here in this foreign land we started feeling comfortable enough to shop on the economy. Mind you only being here 6 months we still did not know a lick of German. Going shopping in the German stores is always an adventure. You know how when you go to look for a new car and you dread seeing the salesman head in your direction because you really just wanted to look. Well, when you are in a foreign country and try to go shopping in places where you can't really ask questions or communicate with sales people. It seems to attract sales people even more when you have this dumb founded look on your face trying to figure out what a product is for or what it costs. So when these very polite people approach you all that you can think of at the time is " Can I please just hide in a hole now?" When this person starts talking you have no idea what they have just said to you and don't know how to respond. Daaaaaa! We got very good at using the expression "Nine Deutsch" or "Sprechen sie English, Bitte?" Which means " No German" and " Can you speak English, please?" Something interesting we found out is that all Germans have to take English in school. So most Germans can speak some English or enough that they can make out what we are saying. We are very fortunate of that, I don't think that some of the Americans over here get that. The German people are very considerate of the fact that all of us Military people are over here and DON'T speak their language. Kaylin and I have been trying to learn enough German to have small talk or at least go shopping and not feel intimidated by not knowing how to communicate with them. They actually appreciate you a lot more when you try to speak their language but sometimes they just revert to English because we completely enilate theirs.

So for a quick lesson in German (Deutsch). . . . . .
Good Morning ---------- Guten Morgen
Good Afternoon -------- Guten Tag
Good Evening ---------- Guten Abend
Good Bye -------------- Auf Wiedersehen
Til' later --------------- bis bald
Good Bye ------------ Chews!
How are you? --------- Wie gehts
Very good! ------------ Sehr gut!
Thank You! ----------- Danke Shane

Ich Liebe Disch! Windi

Just a lil something!!!

Hey everyone,

I don't have any pictures to put on here today. SORRY :'( We did here back from the doctor about my wrist and thumb a few days ago. The X-Rays didn't show anything. That is always a relief. We are just thinkin that I bruised my thumb and sprang my wrist some how. I am back playing just not to the fullest extent. Which is okay cause I don't want to hurt it anymore then it already is.

We have had really really pretty weather lately. It is suppose to be in the 70's the rest of the week. YIPPEE The sun is finally out and I got BURNT. That felt good. OUCH!! :S

Oh ya forgot to share this news with ya. . . . . . The brat which is Silhouette got into some trouble this morning. Mom lets her loose in the mornings cause she normally goes back to bed with me. Ha ha ha not today. She went to both bathrooms. Daunt daunt daaaa....... what is she up too. She felt the need to have fun with the toilet paper and a few other things. That dog about lost her head. What was she thinkin???? :D Mom will get this news and Silhouette from now on will be put in her cage in the mornings. Cause especially today since I had a head ache I am not going to clean that up every single morning. You now know that if that door is open and she is unattended she is going to go and have some FUN!!! But that is all I have for today. I hope that you guys enjoyed reading about the brat dog. HA HA HA HA :)

Love,
Kaylin <><

Just another day?!?!?!

The water picture at top is pretty cool also. That is approximately a mile away. The sound is very peaceful and calm. You can see the little creek that is flowing into a bigger portion of water. The bigger area of water actually is pretty deep when you get close to it. But other than that it is just nice and quiet there.

Okay, so the dogs in the
picture to your right would NOT get in the house. They were making me so made cause they still wanted to play ball. I was like Shugar you better get in this house right now and look what face she gave me. LOL What??? WHY?? That little stinker. Then you have Silhouette that is just going along side Shugar. LOL They are characters that is for sure.


Then you see Shugar and I. We are in a little hole next to these huge holes that the miners use to mine in. But this one is just on flat ground not actually in any certain hole or anything. The end of the hole (meaning coming towards you) is a small drop off to a bigger hole. That is why we are so far back in this little passage way. Not to SCARE you or anything. LOL :D Well I hope that you enjoy the rest of your week and God Bless <><

Love,
Kaylin