Anja’s 6th Birthday Party

This week our little girl, Anja, turned over a new year and yesterday we celebrated her 6th birthday in style. I think it was the biggest birthday party we’ve hosted to date. In all I think we had about 20 kids of various ages but mostly Anja’s age from school. We were extremely fortunate with the weather; we had a warm sunny day with clear blue skies. We had our usual fruit, grilled meats, drinks and assorted sweet items in addition to cake and ice-cream. Lynne and Brooke organized several party games which went down really well. An additional bonus feature this year was Brooke’s face painting which was very popular. 

Many did lots of work to make the day go smoothly; however, as always Brooke and Lorraine seem to always go a little above and beyond what would be considered normal. A big “Thank You”, to each of you. I must also thank all who came to make it such an enjoyable occasion for Anja and ourselves.

As usual, many photos were taken, the highlights are shown below with many more available here for the intrigued reader.

Welcome Anton Webb

From the Owens-Taylor household, we all welcome Anton Webb into the world. Yes, Kaisa and Kevin have added another to their family and Anton arrived last Friday, a full 9lb 6oz. We understand that both He and Kaisa are doing well, they arrived home yesterday. A heartfelt Congratulations to all of you.

Mum Gone Home

We were all a little sad to say “Farewell to Granny Owens” today. She is travelling back to Ireland as I type and will be home very early tomorrow morning. We all had a great time for her four and half week visit. She was a huge help to us in watching the kids, particularly when Lynne was in the UK and even in the evenings and weekends. Of course the kids really bonded with her given that the stay was sufficiently long for them to get really acquainted with her again. They loved waking her up in the mornings, the attention she splurged on them, their constant gifts and the many knitted items she did for them. Connor and her spent many many hours roaming the back yard.

Mum: - We thoroughly enjoyed your stay, you were a huge help, an easy guest and many thanks one last time for all you did for us all. 

Water in the Basement

We had a frustrating Friday last week. As normal in Indiana, we have had a lot of very heavy rain this Spring (indeed it seems like this year has been particularly bad). Although I did manage to clean our rain gutters this year, they still managed to get blocked which resulted in an overspill which unfortunately was right next to our basement window. We had a good amount of water come in which resulted in us having to remove our laminated floor. Arrgghhh !! We are now in the process of determining the best option for a replacement, a work in progress which I’ll report on later!

The Girls Show

This Saturday, Anja and Isabel (and I) were in a Dance Show at the Loeb Playhouse down at Purdue University. Since January, on Tuesday afternoons, the girls have been taking dance lessons or rather they partake in a fun dance class. There were several classes to choose from, Anja did ballet for beginners and Isabel did a mixture of dance styles. 


The finale of these lessons is a 1.5 hour Dance Show each spring with dancers ranging from 3 up to about 18 showcasing their skills. Isabel was actually in a Dad’s dance session; hence I was up on stage helping her do her stuff. Lynne, Connor and Mum all attended and all had a great time, particularly the girls who were fully dressed out for the occasion and were even instructed to wear a little make-up. As you can imagine, they really hated that part :))

Weekend Update

We are back to normal again here in West Lafayette, well as normal as we get anyhow!! Lynne arrived home safely late last night so we all took it relatively easy today. Still managed to give the lawn its first cut for the year, Connor also got another cut and we put in some peas and parsley!!  Hope you all have a great week!!

Happy Birthday Marissa

Yesterday we continued our Spring Birthday celebrations, this time with Marissa who turned three. The girls and myself spent a very relaxed few hours hanging out eating lots of goodies including quite a few cake varieties!! Mum watched over Connor who was napping! It was great to see Steef and Ginette, we’ve not seen them in a while, something we need to fix over the summer!! I took a few photos, unfortunately not many turned out that well (must have had a shaky hand:)). They have a blog so I'm sure they will post a few soon. Thanks for a very enjoyable afternoon guys!!

Lynne Home Tomorrow

Lynne arrives home tomorrow. We all missed her very much; the house seemed a little empty these last two and half weeks, like there was something missing not surprisingly. Of course we all got along just fine, we ate, slept and had a lot fun at times, however, we will all be very happy to see her travel weary self emerge from the bus tomorrow evening.

I have a few additional photos from the last week shown below. Mum took Isabel out for a “special hot chocolate and ice-cream trip” last weekend when Anja was at Reina’s birthday (only fair right?). I also have a few pictures from Randy and Lorraine’s visit for dinner the other night.

Honey Locust

Whilst on Brad and Lisa’s farm last week, as we strolled by their little creek, I couldn’t help but notice that they had several trees, some quite big, that had these extraordinary spikes. I had seen these before but each tree had sprouted these new spikes over the spring and they looked pretty impressive. These spikes were as strong as nails, you could not break them off but were as sharp as needles. I had never seen anything like them in Ireland. The tree is a Honey Locust and they are native to this part of the USA. I took a few pictures.

Happy Birthday Reina

Last Sunday was one of the best days of the year thus far, a beautiful sunny day, clear blue sky, 80F and a warm breeze sufficient to keep one from boiling up. We were very lucky that it was actually Reina’s 7^th birthday so we spent the afternoon and evening sitting on Brad and Lisa deck celebrating her birthday, eating great food, relaxing with friends and really enjoying and the arrival of Spring in earnest. We had a great day. The girls spent a lot of time in their little creek. Happy Birthday Reina!!

Mum Visit Update

We got through the weekend and our usual Monday night swimming class chaos just fine here in West Lafayette. Mum is a great help with the kids and they in turn love playing with “Granny Owens”. They were very good at “helping” her out of bed quite early each morning over the weekend. I managed to take a few pictures of various activities thus far, somehow poor Isabel was never in Granny’s area when the camera appeared. Even Daddy managed to get in a picture with her. Lorraine and Randy were kind enough to offer to come watch the kids for a few hours on Sunday night so we got out to dinner, just the two of us. The timing was perfect since it was actually Mothers Day in Ireland (Mothers day is a different date in the USA).

Lynne is doing well in the UK. She had a good weekend with Dave and Pat. Her brother Keith and his wife Sam and four children (some young adults) all came over for a gathering and a family meal. Lynne then Skyped (if that’s an actual verb?) the kids yesterday evening which they got very excited about. Thankfully Connor enjoyed it and didn’t get too upset.