Two days in Basel

The girls were given permission to take Thursday off from school so they spent the day in Basel with Allison. They thoroughly enjoyed themselves! Then on Friday the school had an activity in Basel so the girls enjoyed another great time in "their" city.

After the rain

This is the normally very tranquil creek that runs right beside the school. It seems that the rain has stopped for now and that the forecast is somewhat more positive, so that's encouraging.


The flowers are still beautiful even after days of rain.

A different angle

Our garden is full of slugs. So, this year instead of planting the seeds and waiting for the slugs to eat everything off as soon as things start coming up, I decided to start all my little plants inside. It has actually been a very fun and exciting project for me! However, now I have another problem. This spring has been so cold and now wet as well, that I can't put out my plants and some of them are almost outgrowing their little pots. This project is quickly becoming a predicament!

Scooter dude

Just a random picture (that Katy took) of a pretty serious biker... If you look closely (or click on the picture to enlarge it) you can see that gas is Euro 1,48/litre, which today is about Cdn $2.35.

Happy Birthday Allison!

Our sister-in-law, Darlene and her daughter, Allison arrived from Canada yesterday afternoon. As it was Allison's birthday, we had a bit of a celebration. Her waffle might look a bit bare, but she could have enjoyed it with strawberries, whipped cream and homemade maple syrup!

As you can see, there's a bit of happiness going on here as the cousins are reunited!

Sam Rotman

Tonight we attended an amazing and inspiring concert given by Sam Rotman. This was the third time Mr. Rotman has given a concert at BFA. Tonight he gave his 1900th concert since starting his concert career. Even more inspiring than his incredible musicianship is his testimony. Mr. Rotman, who was born a Jew, was saved while studying piano at Juilliard in New York. As you can imagine, the impact this life-changing decision had on his family and friends was devastating. Mr. Rotman was literally cast out of his family and told to never come back. His commitment to his faith, however, has never wavered and what a joy it was to hear him tell his story again (and to listen to him play the piano!).

Daffodils

When I was in grade 8 I memorized the poem "Daffodils" by William Wordsworth and to this day I can still recite it. Over the years I have often wondered what it would be like to see "a host of golden daffodils". After living here, it's not hard to understand why he was able to write "Daffodils" and why they gave him such pleasure. They are lovely little flowers and in the spring, they are everywhere.

Back to Brazil

A year ago this week, we were coming to the end of almost 3 incredible weeks back in Brazil. We had a wonderful time as a family and have so many great memories of our days there. Here are just a "few" pics of our amazing time. After going through these pictures again, I now have a very serious case of "saudades" (longings)...Paddle boating on "Lago Negro". This lake was just a few minutes walk from our house, and a real tourist attraction. We seldom rented the boats but this time there was no question. This lake called "Black Lake" got its name from the Black Forest here in Germany as trees from this region were taken to our little town and planted all around this lake. Pretty crazy.
A great day of fog!
Special, special friends. Werner (on the left) was the person in Howard's program in seminary who invited us to come to Brazil. Raf (on the left) was about 12 at the time and I gave him piano lessons. He is now married to Joanita (a Brazilian Mennonite) and their daughter Alana is about 4 I believe.
No visit to Brazil is complete without taking some pictures of the famous "Fusca". These bugs are still everywhere!

A little taste of Germany.

The amazing pinheiro trees. There are still several on the mission's property.


A visit to our house.
We love Brazilian grass.
The local waterfall called "Caracol".
Our favourite Italian restaurant IN THE WORLD!
A view of one of the valleys around Gramado.

A really BIG tree!

A few days in Rio.