Kid Art

We bought Aidan a kid's camera for his birthday. He seems to take a lot of inspiration from the dog, his toys, and holiday decorations. There is an obvious need to work on his composition, but there does seem to be some evidence of an inate eye for photography...

Here are some of the pictures he has taken, just for kicks.

Bob Like You Mean It

So, we went sledding this weekend in Asiago, or, as they call it here it Italy, "bob." I mean, I get it- like bob sledding, but it is so wierd. I have no idea how you would talk about sledding in Italian, since they conjugate their verbs. I bobo, you bobi, he/she boba? More on that later...

We had heard about this place from some friends, and they were really talking it up. When we got there, it did not disappoint. There was a really nice sledding hill, with a "magic carpet" that you rode on to get back to the top of the hill. I have never been skiing, so I conceed that it IS possible, but I have never heard of such a set-up in the U.S. Do we even have sledding hills?

Kids on the magic carpet:

My ignorance about sledding was just about immediately obvious, as I was the absolute worst sled driver there. Eight year old kids were flying by me, with excellent control and steering. On the other hand, I felt like I could crash or possibly defy the laws of physics and flip my sled at any moment. Joel said, "I could pick you out right away- you were all over the place." Thanks!

For his part, Joel managed to make a spectacle of himself by wearing some Army cold weather boots that, based on performance, were possibly made out of solidified Crisco. On top of his many, many near misses, he fell right on his ass at least four times. At least he had boots on- the rest of us (including our friend and her two kids)were in jeans and running shoes, amid a sea of ski pants, ski coats, designer sunglasses, "Moon Boots,"and mid-length fur coats. We might as well have had Toby Keith t-shirts and American flag bandanas on.

Check out this Italian Nonna (grandma) enjoying her day at the slopes in style:

Of course your big question is, "Did Aidan have fun?" I think his expression in this picture says it all:

So, no, he didn't. Fortunately, we found a small playground with the equivilent of a bunny (sledding) slope that he and the other kids we were with could handle much better.

And maybe your next question is, "What did you do with the baby?" Here is your answer:

Close up:

No Mr. Bond. I expect you to die.

A couple of posts back I wrote about the grappa tasting that we went to in Bassano. It was at the Nardini grappa factory. In that post, I wrote about how the building itself deserved it's own post. And here it is.

The building was designed by a "high-art" Italian architect named Massimiliano Fuksas to commemorate the company's 200th anniversary of being in the same family. The story goes that it the design was drafted on a dinner plate while the architect and the boss were discussing the plan over dinner. I don't know how true that is, but it's a kooky story.

There's not much that I can saw about the building that is going to better than the actual pictures, so here they are:

External shot

Another external shot, closer to the building. The whole building rests above a reflecting pool. The small glass domes that you see in the water are windows to a concrete and wood basement.



View from inside the upper-most dome.



External shot, reverse angle.



As we were touring this building, I couldn't help thinking how this looked like a Bond villain's hideout. Maybe from Dr. No? At the very least, it looked like it could belong on Buddy's island from "The Incredibles".

The two glass bubbles are made of glass and steel. Apparently, it took months for the builder to find someone that is could make the special curved glass to fit the complex shapes around the corners and edges. The glass rests on a cushion of special rubber spacers on the steel frame and the whole building expands and contracts with the heat. For heating and cooling, there is an underground artisan spring that they use to cool the building in the summer and the sun heats the domes like a greenhouse in the winter. Clever.

By the way, all these pictures were taken by me with my awesome N95. Take that, iPhone! pwned!!!11!

It's Alive

After many months, my computer is finally back up and running!

As long-time readers may recall, there was an incident with Jessica and my "big computer" back during the summertime. Due to a number of conflicts (work, Christmas, trips), I was not able to diagnose the problem, order parts, and troubleshoot all the issues with the computer. Only this month have I been able to really look at it. And it was a doozy.

So after replacing 1) the power supply (didn't fix it), 2) motherboard (half-way fixed), 3) the hard drive (better, but needed optical drive to load OS), 4) the DVD drive, I finally have a working computer.

Since I was ordering parts anyway, I upgraded a little. There were some really great deals after Christmas, so I now have a hot new video card and upped my RAM to 2 Gb. Now, my machine smokes, but in a good way.

Europe: Not for Religious Fundamentalists

I forgot to put this picture in the last post. Around Neptune's Fountain are four bronze statues of women, representing the four known continents, lactating water. Is that even still called lactating??

Which reminded me of something we saw in London. In this case, it's what is not there that is indecent:

We haven't even been to Florence to see David yet. I have a feeling updates will follow...

Hey, we've been busy!

Well, thank god Joel and I both got posts up tonight. I hate to go longer than a month without posting- not that exactly a month is doing awesome. Anyway, thought you'd like to see what's been keeping us away.

First of all, we went to Bologna. At least, three of us went to Bologna; Aidan got to stay with a friend for the day, which I'm sure he MUCH preferred. It was really fun- it is the gastronomical center of Italy, home of tortellini, and also the site of the first university in the WORLD. Crazy. We went to the anatomy room, marble slab and all, where the medical students did human disections hundreds of years ago. Here I am at a Neptune fountain in the city center:

I also broke my toe, so I was a little laid up. I stress "little," because with my two kids, there is no way to relax. Here I am at the Italian hospital, waiting to get an x-ray to make sure it wasn't anything serious. Check out my hot slippers!

Thanks to Uncle Justin and the Build-A-Bear store, Max has a new purpose in life:

Even Aidan has been busy; here he is running his "toy store." He talked me into buying some of those cool knights on his "desk" for my son. Wonder how he knew he'd like them??

Ava's just been busy looking cute. I have been trying to take her picture in her Christmas gifts, but it is a full time job.

Anyway, we will try to make up for lost time. Hope you enjoy!

Grappa Tasting

It's been awhile since I last posted... blah blah blah.

Last weekend Jessica and I went to the Nardini Grappa factory and took le grande tour. For you non-alcoholics, grappa is a fragrant grape-based pomace brandy of between 38% and 80% alcohol by volume (75 to 160 proof), of Italian origin. Think of a whisky, but made of grape skins and seeds instead of grain. It's hella popular over here.

So this Nardini company is one of the oldest producers of the stuff. How old? Try from the late 1700s. For the tour, we went through their facilities (which deserve their own post. More later) and got to taste some of their wares.

Now, I'll preface this video by saying this: their grappa is actually very good. It's smooth and goes well after a big dinner. But they had other varieties for tasting beside the regular grappa. I can't remember the exact name of the liquor that Jessica is sampling below, but the host there said it's made from star anise and some other Italian mountain herb and is the bitterest digestive available in Italy. As you can tell for her reaction, they just won over another convert.

A Very Lethal Christmas

We got some great gifts this Christmas. Thanks to everyone that sent us some goodies. I know it can be a hassle to send things overseas to us, but your efforts are appreciated.

There was one gift, however, that was unintentionally funnier than it was intended. It came in a box that Aidan got which had several other toys in it. This one toy immediately stood out from among its peers.



It's an old-style G.I. Joe; the 12-inch tall variety. He's got on a real fabric uniform and he also came with a hat. He also has what appears to be a fatal chest wound. The view from behind shows that it was a "through and through."



Now everyone knows that some soldiers die, but does this fact have to be so clearly illustrated on Christmas morning? Not to mention that this particular guy is wearing a 101st patch. That's the same patch that I wear on my right sleeve. Is this like one of those voodoo dolls? Maybe its a mob message? I better start checking my brake line before I got to work in the morning...

Knights of the Round Radio

For Christmas, we got Aidan a set of knights and a big castle for them to rule/overthrow. I have to admit, they're pretty awesome. The castle did take a good part of the morning to set up, but we had a good time putting it together.

Today, Aidan had some of the knights out at the kitchen table during lunch. They were "fighting" each other, or at least squaring off for a fight. Just for kicks, I asked Aidan what the knight's names were, expecting something like "Aidan knight, Daddy knight, etc." Instead, he rattles off a slew of names for every knight and their dragon. We tried to write them down, but some of the names changed after he said them the first time. Here's the snapshot, with labels:



Just to re-iterate, that's Strongeo, Red Radio, Black Radio, Grey Radio, Blue Radio, and Frick Freyio (the dragon). I can't tell you where all the "radios" came from, but when we asked Aidan to clarify that he in fact meant radios, he held his hand up to his mouth to pantomime talking on a CB. Red Radio, it is.

Baby Terminator

Let's face it: Terminator 3 was a flop. A girl terminator?? What kind of horrific dystopia are we facing in the future?

I think this is a much more plausible scenario...

And let me save the grammar police the trouble by acknowledging that I spelled desperate incorrectly. I admit it, I'm not Daniel-effing-Webster. Get off my back.

Merry Christmas!

Today we want to wish a Merry Christmas to all of our readers, and thank you for pretending that our blog is cool. That is the best gift you can give us.

And to our Jewish readers, ahem, Heller and Linda, we wish you the more generic, non-offensive Happy Holidays.

Danger: Christmas

I hate having a real tree, because we always have some moronic problem with it. Jenniferpants wrote that she and her husband forgot to cut the bottom off of their real tree, so it's not absorbing any water and might not make it to Christmas; I was not even aware that you needed to do such a thing. This year, we got a cut-off tree (no roots), but couldn't find a stand at the Italian store. Joel bought a bucket and some dirt, and we "planted" it. So far, so good, but it is getting pretty dried out.
Also, we never know what to do with it after Christmas- one year we threw it in the woods behind our house, and it turned purple. I think it was possibly related to the anti-fire treatment they put on it, but what do I know. Last year, we put it out on our balcony, where it kept all of its needles as a perfectly preserved, dried-out fire-hazardous porch decoration. A few months later, we dropped it bucket-first over the edge en route to the dump. As soon as it hit the ground, 1000000 needles dropped off and the tree was totally bare. It was actually really cool, and we might try to replicate it this year, if just for the photo op.
Any other horror stories, or is everyone else on earth capable of keeping and disposing of one tree a year??

The Cold German

Last weekend, we went to Berlin for a few days. Our goals: Check out the Christmas markets and the remnants of the wall. Long story short, check and check. Read on for the long story.

We stayed at a hotel that was decorated in the style of the DDR (Socialist East Germany). It was pretty cool, but Aidan was MAD because the last few hotels we've stayed at, in Pisa and London, have had bunk beds for him to sleep in. Apparently these hotel owners were still waiting in line for their bunks.

We went to three markets. Each had its own personality, but there were lots of constants: large gingerbread hearts made into necklaces, wooden ornaments, hot spiced wine and 1/2 meter "wursts," wooden huts full of things to buy, and kids' rides. Aidan gets so excited about the rides, but as soon as they start, this happens:

The kids did OK, but it was very cold. For one of the first times in my life, I experienced weather that required coats, hats, gloves, and scarves; everyone but Joel was wearing tights under their pants. Still, cheerful faces were all around:One of the markets, at Potsdamer platz, had a large hill constructed and you could ride down on inner tubes. Aidan got scared and backed out, but here is a terrible picture of Joel going down:On the last day, we went to the wall. It didn't seem so intimidating, but the absence of guards and guns these days might have some effect on my impression.We also went to the DDR Museum, which was really fun and one of the few things Aidan liked on the trip, and the Checkpoint Charlie Museum, which I thought was overrated but did have some interesting things to look at, I guess. I thought the actual checkpoint was more interesting:

Hope you enjoyed these pictures. We have lots more and should be posting some more with more in-depth information, if you care. Which we hope you do!

Tiny Fashionista

Just a quick post to show off my cutie pie baby girl and her awesome outfit she was wearing the other day. Also, you might notice her boo boo on her nose- no worries. She had a little scrape but it is already gone. Kids are so resilient.

Our Unfancy Christmas

After seeing jenniferpants' beautiful tree, I wanted to post a picture of mine so she can see what a few years of kids means to your holiday decorating. It's not pretty.

I have just given up on anything glass on the tree, even though I continue to buy expensive, beautiful hand-blown ornaments over here. One day, I keep telling myself. Anyway, we decided to make a paper chain and gingerbread cookies for the ornaments, to supplement the one box of fabric ornaments I had from last year. We also stuck on the stockings. Here is the tree just after trimming:

Strangely, our cookie men developed some kind of gingerbread leprosy, because we noticed this on the tree:

Hmmm... good thing we didn't make that popcorn string that we had talked about, or some little mouse would have been too full for dinner for about a week.

Paperbot

One of my main reasons for having children was to have an excuse to do crafts. In that spirit, Aidan and I (mostly I) made this robot from construction paper one day, just for the hell of it. I made the body, cut and shaped the limbs, and glued on the sequin "controls." Aidan glued on the arms. Later, he brought it out to me and said, "I made a face on the robot." I was nervous that he had ruined it, but when I saw the mouth he had drawn, I thought it looked like a sound wave, which was really funny and appropriate for a robot mouth. Now that his arm has been damaged, and he is inching closer and closer to art project heaven (also called the trash can), it has taken on a nervous expression that I think is just perfect.

Justin is Back

After a long, tedious 15 months in Iraq, my younger brother Justin is back in the US. He arrived back last Tuesday to an icy Ft. Reiley, KS. My parents drove up to meet him as he got off the plane and return his car to him. He's getting out of the army in March (lucky prick) and is actually somewhat homeless from now to then. He isn't going to rent a place, since he's only going to be around for a couple of months and wouldn't be able to get out of the lease just because he's getting out of the army. So he's crashing at someone's place who's away at a school and let Justin stay there out of the kindness of their heart.

Justin is an aspiring filmmaker and is trying to film a documentary about Iraq/Afghanistan veterans who have post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) from the war. He's got a couple of guys with PTSD who have agreed to let Justin film them as they make their way along the road to recovery. If you have PTSD, or know someone who is effected by it, and are interested in being a part of this film, drop a comment and we'll try to set something up.

While you're at it, send a "Welcome back" message to my brother. justin.j.springer /at/ gmail dot com. While you're at it, show how much you really "support our troops" and send him some money to help finance his film.

Or maybe you can just buy a yellow ribbon magnet and put it on your car. I'm sure all the troops really appreciate that.

Jessica's Nerd Joke

It doesn't happen very often, but yesterday Jessica out-nerded me in a joke.


We were goofing on the fact that we both, for different reasons, were called "mole" as a nickname when we were kids. For me, it was just a goofy name rhyme: Joel the Mole. For Jessica, it was a name her Mom called her because she was a little bit of an inside kid and liked to stay in her room reading.


Then Jessica says at least she wasn't called "6.02 x 10^23". I looked at her in amazement and laughed my ass off. Is it possible that she just made a molarity joke? As it turns out, she did.

For those in the know, enjoy the nerd humor. For those that don't get it, sorry. Maybe you should have paid more attention in school.

Crazy Judges

I was wasting some time here at work, surfing the internet while I wait for the next asinine request to come down the pipe. I saw a story while I was browsing around about a “fog shower” that some kid in Brazil designed for a contest sponsored by Electrolux. Nothing too crazy; it’s a shower that makes a warm fog instead of a stream of water for you to wash off. It’s supposed to be “more environmentally friendly”, or some crap.

It was interesting enough for me to look at the Electrolux site http://www.videonewsmanager.com/electrolux/download.html to see what it was all about. Pretty blah for the most part… until I got to the section about the judges.



Holy crap. What a motley crew this lot is. They look like James Bond reject villains. Especially ol’ Matali Crasset. What’s with that haircut? Jason Bradbury isn’t too much better. Wasn’t he Le Chiffre in Casino Royal?



Oh, sorry Mads Mikkelsen. I’m sure people make that mistake all the time.

Have a good look at these folks. Can you imagine how exhausting it must be to be one of these people? To have to get up every morning and fix your hair that like? To have to find some haute couture fashion to wear everyday? To have to be stuck with a name like Henrik Otto for your whole life?

"Hello, this is Henrik. Are you available for our backgammon game this afternoon?"

Yech.

Even Celine Cousteau, arguably the most mainstream of the lot, has a crazy picture. Look at the lighting. She's not outside in front of a cloudy sky. That's a studio photo that they put that background behind. What's with that? In fact, she might be the wackiest of the bunch. A little bit "tries to hard" perhaps?

Anyway, moral of the story: designers are bizarre. Especially European designers.

Cheers from Jolly Old England

We went to London over Thanksgiving. In a word, it was OVERWHELMING. There were literally a billion things to see and do there. Literally, a billion. Or more. We saw all of the cool Egyptian things that the Brits have plundered, including amazing mummies, huge busts of kings, and enormous iron city gates. We also went to the Tower of London, where we could have easily spent all day. Crown jewels, thrones, Tower Bridge, Beef Eaters, prisoner cells, museums- what's NOT to love?

We also went to Westminster Abbey. It was kind of expensive, so we decide to skimp by attending an evening service (free!) rather than taking the regular tour. As we went in, Ava was asleep and Aidan was really sleepy, so we hoped he'd take a nap on my lap. Instead, Ava pooped all over herself and then screamed and screamed and screamed. Due to the way we were positioned, we couldn't get out of the door without walking in front of everyone, right in front of the priest. Finally, a priest came over and asked Joel if he'd like to take the baby outside. On the bright side, Aidan did take a nice nap on my lap. Good boy.

Buckingham Palace was also on the itinerary. It wasn't quite what I pictured- we saw guards march in, but we didn't see the "unveiling of the colors" as promised by Rick Steves. November is typically very low tourist season; I can't imagine the crowds in the summer.

It wouldn't be a Springer vacation without some Asian tourists taking our picture. This time, I turned the camera on these paparazzi monsters to see how they liked it! (Answer: they didn't seem to mind... and neither do we.) I got this picture of some Japanese shutterbugs outside "Buck House," as the locals call it, taking our picture. We were also photographed at the Portobello Road Market, although I somehow doubt our dumb white faces were the biggest attraction in sight.

While doing some pre-travel research, I saw that we could visit Father Christmas at one of the large department stores. Harrod's was sold out, but Selfridge's had a cool train through an indoor "forest" and then we had a nice long visit with Santa. Here is Aidan looking over the "Nice" list for his name.

It was a really full trip for just two full days (and two travel days... but that's another story). We could have easily spent another, oh, I don't know, six months seeing all of the sights. We agreed that next time we'd have to leave the kids at home- we barely saw any other children while we were there. Either they were all at boarding school out in the country, or London is where all of the adults from Logan's Run end up. I'm betting on the latter.

Land of Plenty

I really like pictures taken in the grocery store. My mom has one of her shopping in the bread aisle in the seventies that I found really fascinating as a child (and still do). I think it's really cool to see such a mundane task immortalized through photography, and it's interesting to see the overwhelming amount of food and products in American grocery stores that we overlook when we're actually in there, shopping.

This isn't a great picture, but here's my baby girl posing among frozen meats and bottled water.

Soccer Season ended....uh, six weeks ago

I am behind, but here is a picture of Aidan on his last day of soccer season. He did OK... he really wasn't into it this year, but he is only four (three for most of the season) so there is always next year.

Take this job...

My job stinks. I know I've probably said that in some form or another to everyone I know, but I want to re-iterate it. Every day that goes by, I get a little dumber and I loose a little bit more of my faith in humanity. Today I sat in on a briefing on my organization's plan to "transform". I've sat in on many, many, many briefs like this one, but this one was the biggest waste of time that I've ever been a part of. No one in that room benefited from anything that was said. Nobody. Not even a little benefit. Two hours that I'll never get back. Two hours closer to my death. But as I'm sitting there, I thought that it would be a good idea to illustrate my progressive disillusionment with my job over the years. So here's what I cooked up:



Finally! Something useful that I've created with all my Powerpoint skills! Of interest is how as time has progressed and my job satisfaction has decreased, my satisfaction with the place that I'm living has grown. In fact, I'm ecstatic about living in Italy now. Now if I could only get a different job...

Lack of Time

I know it's been almost a month since Jessica and I have posted here. What can I say? It's been a long month for us both. After Halloween, I was sent to Germany for a business trip. Following that, there was a helicopter crash near Aviano on the 8th that killed six soldiers; two army and four air force. My organization selected me to provide assistance to the surviving spouse of one of the army casualties. So for the past month, I've been heavily involved with that and not had a lot of opportunity to post to the blog or anything else, for that matter.

We also went to London over Thanksgiving, so there's lots of pictures and stories from there that need to be posted as well. We've got our work cut out for us.

Meanwhile, last night Jess and I took the kids over to a friend of mine's house to watch the Army Navy game. Army got destroyed, in case anyone is interested. The game was just a pretense for us to get together with some other adults who had kids and let them run wild while we could enjoy ourselves. The guy had a great basement set-up that included a fantastic bar. We were drinking and talking there when Aidan hops up on the stool behind the bar and starts "taking orders". After minimal instruction, he started pouring beers from the tap like an old pro. Check it out:



Eventually, we had to pull him off barkeep detail because he started filling any empty glass he could get his hands on, whether someone wanted a beer or not. That's what I call service!

That's it for now. I promise that we'll get back on the blogging horse and get some more posts out for everyone. So you got that going for you... which is nice.

Optimus Prime: Destroying Decepticons, Winning Contests

First of all, who loves Joel's videos?!? Answer: Everyone!!!

Here is a montage of Aidan kicking everyone's costume-clad bottom the Halloween contest, including a close call with a mustachioed knight. Enjoy!

I don't even want to talk about it.

After much discussion and many failed efforts to fix some behavior issues, we decided to take Aidan out of his Italian school and send him to school on post instead. He had been having tantrums almost every day, and it just came down to it not being fair for Aidan to be so miserable and frustrated, or fair to the teacher and the other children for him to take up so much time and attention every day. Although the American school is farther away, cost three times as much, is shorter, and has a less healthy lunch, it just isn't possible to continue in the asilo. So, here we are.
I was so upset I cried. A lot. At the school, in front of the kids, teachers, and other parents. Humiliating. But, I think it's just the first of many times that I will have to face a situation where what I want to happen for my child just WON'T happen, despite my best efforts or my strongest wishes or my best laid plans. He may not make sports teams. He may not get into a school. He may be rejected by some girl who is not even good enough for him in the first place. And it's really humbling to know that even as the mommy, who has to make and enforce so many decisions on a daily basis, I can't always ensure that it works out the most perfect way (as imagined by me) for him.
When I was pregnant, I read something about genetic engineering and wondered if I would choose to make my child "perfect" or allow them to have whatever quirks they would normally have in order to face challenges and build character. I thought at the time that I'd opt for "normal" kids, but after having children, I know that I would totally do anything to save them from any sadness or pain- forget character.
So, I'm trying to focus on the positive, which is how excited he is to start "American school," and the fact that we were fortunate enough to get him a spot in the school- there is often a 6-month waiting list. His extremely social personality was pretty cramped by the language barrier, and I'm sure he'll enjoy talking with the kids in English and them understanding all of his stories and jokes and questions. And, although it sometimes feels like I want to believe this more than I actually do, I'm sure that this will all work out for the best and that it's all with God's blessing. I just wish he'd let me know ahead of time when these big changes were coming, so I could prepare myself...and not cry in public.