Way back in November, my friends came to visit!

Jennifer and me.

Eileen and me

Way back in November, my friends, Jennifer and Eileen, came to Belgium for a visit. We had so much fun! I realized three things...(1) I have very few pictures from their visit. (2) We had a really good time. (3) Good friends cannot be replaced! We did so many fun things. Our biggest adventure was a day trip to Venice! It is hard to believe, but you really can visit that beautiful island all in one day. Granted, we started the day at 5am and didn't get home until after 11pm, but who cares? WE WENT TO VENICE, ITALY!!!

I never put myself on the blog, but I really like this picture. The background really shows Venice and a glimpse of Europe in general. Jennifer and Eileen had a great visit. They saw Paris (remember the post about getting robbed?), Ghent, Amsterdam, Venice and all the little stops along the way in Brussels.

Eggs for Breakfast

This morning I made eggs for breakfast. Please don't be too impressed. I don't always go to a lot of trouble in the morning but once or twice a week I do make something more than cereal, toast or fruit. If Bob is home the breakfast is even more exciting because he cooks. Egg in Basket or French Toast are his specialties. I stay more in the egg category so today we had hash browns and a fried egg. Doesn't that sound good? The hash browns were easy and made the house smell like good food which made Leah yell down from the upstairs, "Something smells good!" When I got ready to cook the eggs, I couldn't quite get the egg in the picture below to come out of the carton. It broke as I pulled it out making a mess. You can see in the picture below that the egg broke but look what else you can see on the egg...

Yes.
That is chicken poop and is probably why that part of the egg was stuck in the carton. Here in Belgium we have learned a few things about
eggs:
1. All eggs are brown.
2. White eggs can only be found at random times in random places at
random high prices.
3. No eggs are washed or cleaned before they are boxed.
4. You can buy eggs at the grocery or from the market.
5. At my favorite Sunday market there is a man who only sells
eggs. If you get there too late the eggs are gone. You have to bring your own container to take home your eggs. He sells eggs from all types of birds and in all sizes. His eggs are the dirtiest I have ever seen, covered in feathers and chicken poop. His eggs are also the freshest and tastiest.We usually wash our eggs after we buy them. I was a slacker and didn't wash this batch. What a mistake!

Game Day at Purdue

Saturday was ESPN Game Day at Purdue.

The red bus in the picture below brings the well known ESPN announcers right to the University. The basketball game actually started at 9:00pm but the Game Day festivities began at 10:00am. Maria and her friends went to Mackey Arena on the Purdue campus to take part. It was like a huge pep rally pre game. She said it was lots of fun and at the end, she and her friends stayed behind to get some of the free hats, signs and maybe even meet the announcers (see the pick above).

As the crowd thinned out, an official from ESPN asked Maria and her friends if they wanted to tour the Game Day bus. Of course they said yes and got a tour of the place where much of the ESPN activity takes placeThe items on the table above were the souvenirs the kids got. And here is the crew of kids. I know the picture is really bad but it was taken with Maria's phone. This is a really really bad picture. Everyone has glowing eyes and they look possessed but you get the idea. They got to go into the bus and it was cool!

Oh no. How did that great picture get in there? Shhh I don't think I had pre approval to use this one. Don't tell Maria!

Some Stats

After 3 years of blogging, it's time to take some stock. First of all, looking at the pictures, the girlw have grown so much! Take a look at some of my beginning posts from 2008. The girls look so young!

My blog also has a nifty button that show me the stats for usage. For example, since the beginning, 18,341 people have stopped by to view my blog. That is an average of 20 hits per day. Some days there are just 2 hits (my mom and Bob's mom of course!!!) But other days, like yesterday, 57 people read my blog! Of that 57, only some were from readers who actually landed on the blog on purpose. Those are people who know us and check in frequently to see what is happening. Most of them are friends, family or other people who are expats too and want to know more about life in Belgium. I can't tell exactly who stops by just numbers of general readers from different areas. The other readers are accidental ones. For example, if you Google "moving to Overijse" you will be given the option to go to my blog entry where I mentioned those actual words. If you Google the words "goat market Sicily" in images, the 4th picture you see is the girls and there isn't even a goat in the picture!

Sometimes it is hard to come up with things to write about. I promise to write more this year. That goal along with about 49 other things are all part of my huge New Year's Resolution. My plan is to get a lot done this year!

What we eat and how we get it

Today I went to the grocery to pick up a few things. Our store in Overijse isn't the worst place to shop but it definitely has it's flaws. The picture below shows it in all its uncrowded glory. Believe me it is never empty unless it is closed. And speaking of closing, they shut down every day at 8 and open again at 8 in the morning and they are closed on Sunday along with every other business and store. No cleaning or restocking takes place during the night so all of that is done while us shoppers are trying to fill our carts. I would love to pull the manager aside and explain that by doing the dirty work during non opening hours, the shoppers would be much happier and could move those blasted shopping carts around much easier.

The cool thing is that you can park on top of the building and take an elevator down to the entrance.

Below is a picture showing you that we eat pretty good and have great fruits and vegatables. You can even get free samples of wine at 8 in the morning! I never do that. (wink wink)

My true complaint starts when I need something that is foreign to Belgium but not so foreign to our family. Today I bought pancake syrup in the "American" section of the store. The picture below is not from my store but it shows you a few of the choices I have when I shop. The Swiss Miss is around 5€ which is around$7 and the cookie mix can be as high as 6€ which is $8.
Knowing how much those other items cost, can you guess how much the Golden Griddle set me back?

It was 9.20€ or $12!!!!!!!! You have to really crave pancakes to buy syrup at that price!

But the best part of my shopping experience today was the music playing while I shopped. You can hear it in the link in the post below. I will have to admit, I quietly sang along!

Bee Gees- Jive Talkin'

One night in Sicily

One night in Sicily, we just had a long dinner. I think it was Christmas Eve so we must have just been to Mt. Etna. We were tired and worn out but we had to eat. We were in Taormina which was my favorite stop during the entire trip. Christmas Eve is more of a family night in all of Italy and our hotel told us there might not be anything open. I think they just wanted us to eat their overpriced 90€ per person meal. We found a gem of a restaurant run by an entire family - Grandma cooked, Daughter was hostess, Momma was waitress, Young son ran in and out of the restaurant with his friends and Father sat at a table reading the paper and texting on his iPhone. The food was delicious and we ate and drank at a leisurely pace. While we were there locals came in bringing the family gifts. Each of the groups shared a glass of wine, a laugh and lots of European kisses. We just soaked it all up and played with our camera.

So from all of us, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. If you were here with us we could share a glass of wine, a laugh and lots of Eurpean kisses.

Sicily-Mt. Etna

Mt. Etna IS Sicily. For us it was the landmark we drove around, up to and viewed from every direction. On Christmas Eve we set off to drive up to the mouth of the crator. We left beautiful weather and the coastline in the picture above.

We drove to the part of the Volcano that had erupted in 1986. Our plan was to take a tram higher up to the actual top of Mt. Etna.

Before we could even begin to start our hike, the weather changed to what you see below.

Then the hail came...fast and furious! It was so bad we couldn't even drive down the volcano to escape. We were forced to visit the only souvenir shop and restaurant to wait out the storm.

We saw and learned a lot. Active volcanos like Mt. Etna are a little creepy and scary and on the day we were there, it was cold and wet!

Sicily-more photos

After rereading my last post, I realized all the pictures looked the same! So here are some more pictures. I still have to create one more blog entry about Sicily. Hopefully I will get that done tonight!Stairs to an Art Studio Shopping Leah and Bob

We drove on unpaved roads to get to this spot.

Jenn

We loved this spot

WowFriends

Leah

Maria

A convent

Jenn

Sicily-Taormina

Of all the places we visited in Sicily, Taormina was the most beautiful. We were there for three days and visited the shopping street below over and over. All the good restaurants were there along with quaint churches, artist studios, magnificent hotels and fruit stands. Look at those lemons!And check out the orange trees lining the street.

This pretty Christmas was situated on a cliff overlooking the Ionian Sea.

And here is the view!!!!! Artist studios were hidden in every corner. We bought some very pretty tiles hand painted by the loviest lady.

That meaty looking lemon is called a Bread Lemon and they eat the entire thing. (That is what the seller told me. I tried to find out the real name of the fruit and how it is actually eaten. Google failed me for the explanation!)

A lot of the stores looked like this one selling pottery.

Bob was the camera man for these photos. Sorry he isn't in any of them~ Taormina was great!