3rd Annual Gingerbread Jubilee

Wow, the Gingerbread Jubilee was a fantastic success! The first year we made one house and it was hard for everyone to crowd around. The second year we made two houses which worked quite well until one house collapsed. This year we made three houses, baked them until they were rock hard, and the party was a smashing success!

We had 15 people working on three houses, creating completely different masterpieces from the American-style sprawling mansion with an in-ground pool (with diving board), Coca-Cola plantation and satellite TV, to the luxurious home with a private slalom course and ice-skating rink, to the European villa with an EU flag, sleigh full of gifts, and balcony overlooking the enchanted forest.

So now it's your turn! Check out the three houses (front, back, sides and close-up shots of important details) and vote in the comments! The winning house will be prominently displayed on next year's invitation.

House 1:


House 2:


House 3:

No you haven't

You have never seen her like this before

... seen her like this before.

Go ahead, click on the link and check out the gallery. I dare you!

Berlin is Fun

I've been lucky to be able to visit Berlin again this vacation. I've been blessed with an entire 2 days of vacation time that I am allowed to choose myself this year. I've originally chosen Monday and Tuesday, Oct. 29th and 30th so that Stephanie and I could use the time to go to Poland and finalize our European wedding plans. Unfortunately, a good friend ours needed to go to the hospital in Poland, so we'll have to postpone our little visit down there. Nevertheless, we were able to spend quite a bit of time around Berlin.

The Metro system in Berlin is a bit different from the rest of the world. They have U-Bahn ( underground mass transit ) and S-Bahn ( street-level mass transit ). Of course, there are problems with this because the S-Bahn sometimes travels underground, and the U-Bahn sometimes travels above-ground. After careful research into this matter, I have concluded that the only real difference between the two is that the U-Bahn has TV, and the S-Bahn doesn't. Long live the U-Bahn.

Our House

Yes, we finally have finished decorating and making out apartment look respectable. I've included some before and after shots of the apartment as well! This is my first time embedding Google Video in my blog! We were really proud of all of the food we made for the party, take a look!

Yes, I've finally seen the Church

Well, today we went, we say, and we were able to chat with the Bishop. I even was able to pour the English Bishop, Jeffery a glass of wine! It was quite a long service, only 1 hour and 45 minutes! There were 8 people confirmed, and 1 baptism, what fun! We had some cheese, and champagne and other snacks, yummy.

We will have our wedding here on July 12th, 2008, it's so close, I can't believe it. Wedding number two, here I come.

Do we love Halloween

How much do we love Halloween? Well, this is how a few of us look as we are on our way to a party. What do you get when you mix some Americans with a few Canadians and you meet up at a costume party? A great time! Nevermind that the Brussels trams weren't working. :)

Our first trip to Gent

We were quite lucky to take a spontaneous trip to Gent and have the weather turn out to be perfect! The inlaws were visiting for a few days, and Mikolaj was kind enough to drive to the other side of Belgium ( only an hour :)) with us packed in his car! How can you not have fun when they have a castle in the middle of the city with it's own torture museum? After some beer at the river-side beer garden and a final walk past the craziest shoe shoe ever, we headed home.