Moving Day

Today we spent most of the day packing up and cleaning our home in Záchlumí.  Mirka made Gabriella's and my favorite meal for lunch before we left.  We didn't finish packing up though, until almost 4:30.  The little boys were being just a little uncooperative which delayed the process.

Gabi & I agree, we could eat Svickova 4 times a week!!!

After we got back to Žamberk, we were waiting to hear from our friend, Nate, who was flying in from Rome that afternoon and then taking a train to come and visit us.  Martina & Karolina drove with me later that night to pick up Nate at the train station in Ústí.

An Afternoon Surprise

We went to Mass this morning, there were more people here today than last time we went to daily Mass...counted 37 today...that's a pretty fair number.  After Mass we were going to rake the church grounds, but it was pretty damp, drizzly weather so it had to be postponed.

This afternoon Mirka had a surprise for the kids.  One of her colleagues took the kids to see her horses and give them a little ride.

Two beautiful horses.  Bella is a Welsh Part Bred and Shenny is a Czech Warmblood.

One happy horse lover!

What a beautiful animal.

Another happy horse lover.

I made Chicken Tetrazzini tonight for Marketa and her parents.  We tried to skype with Petr & Katja during dinner but we just couldn't get a good connection.

After dinner the girls went to their room and I overheard them practicing their Czech.  For over 45 minutes they tried to speak only Czech to each other.

Dřevo a Dřevo a Vic Dřevo

Today we went back to the rectory to do some more volunteer work.

Our mission, should we choose to accept it...to stack some wood

our first pile of wood

just beginning

Anni & Seb working together so nicely

Luke cutting down the boards that are too long

Tobiah helping out

and Gabriella too, even though she only has one good arm

first pile taken care of

and semi-neatly stacked over here

onto our second pile of wood

After all that hard work I had to reward the kids with something they have been wanting to do for a long, long time...go to a monster truck show!  And there just happened to be one in Zamberk this evening, so we went over to take a look.

It was advertised as a monster truck show, but it was really more of a stunt show.  The kids still enjoyed it though.

Here are some of our favorite "stunts"

trying to shake off the passenger

man riding on top of car through fire

on two wheels

finally the monster trucks make an appearance

One again going to an event like this in the Czech Republic is such a unique experience for us overly protected Americans.  We were right up there in the front row just 2 feet from the cars going past us at some points.  It was just like the circus we went to years back.  If we had wanted to we could have reached our hands out and touched the animals as they performed in front of us.  If we had stood up our head would have been knocked off by the acrobats swinging overhead.  It is definitely a "take responsibility for your personal safety" type of mindset here!

Hradec Králové

Tuesday morning we woke up early and went to Hradec Králové which is about 50 minutes away.  It is the town where Vendula goes to school.  We met her at a shopping mall and then drove to a swimming center.  We had a great time.  There was a really fun wave pool and a water slide.  Gabriella was even able to go with her cast wrapped up in plastic bags.

After swimming we went to the square for lunch

Walking to the square

Rob...we wanted to go up the tower to see the enormous
bell that you saw, but unfortunately it was closed!

Lunch underground

After lunch we walked over to one of Vendula's dance studios to pick up some discount tickets for the place we were headed to later in the day.

At one of the dance studios...can you tell
that is a poster of Vendula behind Sebastian?

Next we went to another dance studio and Annika was able to participate in a Street Dance lesson with some other kids her age.

Vendula had to go to a class for school during this time and after her class the kids went to Tongo with her and I went grocery shopping.  Tongo is an indoor playarea with huge ball pits, trampolines, a giant labyrinth of tunnels, climbing walls, etc...

"Czech" out this page for some more pictures & a video... http://www.tongohradec.cz/fotky-a-videa

Cheddar Cheese - a rare find
These tiny 3 slices cost  $1.60.  Can you believe it?
That's $7.56 per pound.  Boy do I miss Wisconsin right now!!!

Woohoo...gas prices were down a little bit today...$7.96 per gallon!!!

After we got home and I got the kids to bed I watched the 3rd Presidential debate.

Just Another Monday

Not too much to report today.  We just did school in the morning.  Luke went to Matej's class again.  I attempted to make Šunkafleky like Martina had made for us when we were at the cabins.  It is a pasta dish with onions & ham.  It turned out pretty good.  After dinner we watched an episode of Secret Millionaire on youtube then the kids went to bed and I worked on my online real estate class.

Jana, Matej's English teacher, was at our house with Corale in 2006.

Drakiáda & Fotbal

After the concert last night it was so, so foggy and late that I was worried about driving home, so we stayed overnight at Libor and Martina's house.  Sunday morning we woke up and went to Mass.  After Mass we went back to the Kainek's.  They made us a huge breakfast while we were gone.  Bacon, scrambled eggs, donuts, yogurt with M&M's, brownies, cake, hot chocolate, rolls with soft cheese or marmalade.  We stayed and visited there for a while after breakfast then we went back to Marketa's house for a yummy lunch  made by Mirka.  One of the kid's favorites - Ptáčky - thin cuts of tenderized round steak with hard-boiled eggs, pickles and little bits of kloubasa served with rice and a stew like gravy.

Later in the afternoon we went to an event organized by Petr's church called a Drakiáda which basically translates to kites party.  We met at a big field behind one of the parishioners homes.  Everyone brought kites and sausages to cook out over the campfire.  The hosts provided lots of warm drinks, snacks and sweets.  Unfortunately it wasn't very windy that day, so we played volleyball, soccer and frisbee also.  I was able to talk for a little while with a few of the parishioners.   

Anni & Luke were able to get the kite going for a little while at least.

Later in the day we went to watch Marketa's brother, Milan, play soccer for the Žamberk team.

Not too many spectators

Žamberk scores!

Milan, #10 makes a quick stop

Later in the game Milan scored a goal for Žamberk, but apparently the 

opposing team didn't feel the goal should have counted.

The opposing team is in the striped shirts and their goalie is in the green shirt.  

They were pretty angry with the refs. At the end of this video the goalie is shouting

to one of the spectators, "Come on, let's go!" - as in let's take this argument outside.  

Žamberk ended up winning 4-2.

Corale Celebrates 20 Years

Saturday night we went to an anniversary concert celebrating

20 years of beautiful music and some amazing people.

We had the privilege and honor of having Corale stay at our home for a few days in 2006.

We have such wonderful memories of their visit and hope they will be able to come again soon!

You can watch the the first half of the concert at the following website:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=13mpXVwOsiU#!

Make sure you don't miss these highlights if you don't have time to watch the entire show!

At 12:44 Karolina sings a beautiful duet version of "The Rose" in Czech

At 21:25 Corale sings a song "just for us" with an amazing solo from Karolina 

(Petr, you'll want to watch this one starting at 20:12 to hear the dedication in Czech)

Thank you so much, Corale!  You couldn't have picked a better song.  You had me in tears!

At 29:27 Talk About Suffering - I've never heard this one before but really liked it

At 1:17:07 We Go Together (from the movie "Grease") in Czech