Our Missionary Has Arrived!!!!~

Elder Engstrom arrived in the Czech Republic

on Tuesday, May 3rd, 2011.

We are excited he is in Europe "with us!"

This photo was taken today, May 4th, in the

Czech Prague Mission Home.  12 years later

from when we were attending church here and

also where Kent was baptized in April 1999.

 President David R. Irwin is the Mission President

serving with his wife Lyn.  They are from England.

They have previously served together as 

missionaries in the Czech Prague mission.

Elder Thompson is Elder Engstrom's 

first missionary companion in the mission field.

We are told, from inside sources, Elder Engstrom
is fortunate to be in good hands with such and
excellent missionary who is a great example.
We can't ask for any thing more! :-)

"May Day" Holiday of Labor or Love?~

My sweet and romantic ideas regarding "May Day" have 

been somewhat altered since living in Germany.  I have 

learned that the 1st of May, "May Day" as we know it, is

not only about May poles with festively dressed people 

dancing around a brightly colored May pole.  It also has 

to do with labor unions and marches in many European 

countries.  Originally a May Pole was erected in a village 

to celebrate a marriage taking place. Some of May Day's 

early history also tells of villages welcoming the spring

 season with May Pole dances.  Other tradiotions also 

include young men decorating a tree with bright ribbons 

and placing it at the home of a girl they like.  Since the

late 1800's May 1st also became the day to organize labor 

 marches and bring notice to their causes.  The holiday began

on this day when a union of world socialist parties wanted 

to show support to the striking Chicago workers at the time.  

Jointly they decided to recognize May 1st as a world wide 

holiday called "Labor Day."  This holiday has the history of 

special importance in many socialist and communist countries, 

which in part, is why the U.S. chooses to have their Labor Day 

holiday on the first Monday in September instead.  I am glad 

we don't celebrate Labor Day on May 1st in America so I can 

still enjoy my romantic ideas of May Day.  I  am going to enjoy 

the more colorful and festive element of May 1st and focus on the 

celebration of spring and love in the fun and romantic way!

~May Day celebrations occur in other countries such as 

England, Finland, Sweden and the Czech Republic.~

 I went around our neighborhood to look for signs

of spring in May.  Besides all the beautiful flowers

in gardens and pots there were several "Love Trees"

hung up by people's doors with names attached.

These two were a few houses away from us.

 This is the building across the street with a colorful

"Maibaum" (May Tree) attached for a girl who lives here.

 Jim and I ride bikes in the mornings and along

our route we saw a few more Maibaums.

 Just up the road from us, in the little

village of Pech, we saw other Maibaums.

I thought this home with the tree in front was so sweet.

 This is a store, but the building next to it seems to be
 an apartment, the tree was attached to the building.

 Further into the village was this really

 colorful one with lots of pink in it.

 This tree is attached to a pole in 

our neighborhood.

Here are two more in our neighborhood,

one is attached to the street light.

It's so delightful to see these festive

and cheerful trees around our homes.

Now to be able to see a Maypole dance!

Sunday Guests~

We always enjoy the opportunities to host 

Sunday meals for ward members.

 Hamed and the ward missionaries 

were able to join us this week.
Elder Reeve on the left is from Danville, Utah.
He knows our friends the Larsens.
Elder Jongajen next to Cody is from Sandy, Utah.
He met our friend Amanda Bush while they were
both in the MTC.  Amanda is in the Berlin Mission.
It is such a small world at times!

Cody decided to break into his 

Easter bunny chocolate.

We'll see how many days he can

enjoy eating it...

Cody's PPP~

Bonn International 10th grade class

~Personal Project Presentions~

 Cody and the other 10th graders at BIS had an 

afternoon to display and present the results of 

the work they did on their required individual

personal projects they worked on for 4 months.

 Enjoying a little snack before the presentations.

Parents, teachers and other students were able

to walk around to listen and view each of 

the students individual projects.

 Cody's topic, researched and produced,

displayed the process and video result 

of a information video about BIS.

Cody with Mr. Mehrotra,

BIS's Middle Years Program Coordinator

Easter Sunday in Germany~

We returned from our Spain trip the night before

Easter Sunday to enjoy the holiday at home in Germany.

 It was a simple meal with a roast and some delicious fruit. 

Of course we had to use some of our new Polish Pottery.

 Cody's Chocolate Easter Bunny!

It's a bit bigger than last years!

 Cody's pretending he's worried it's TOO big,

I'm not fooled.

He's gonna enjoy every bite!

Yum, yum!

BYU GRADUATES!~

~April 2011~

BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY GRADUATES~

 ~Bryce and Tyler~

On Friday, April 22nd, 2011 Bryce and Tyler

became official graduates of BYU!

 ~Bryce~

BYU Graduate with a
Bachelor's of Science Degree
in Business and Marketing
from the

Marriot School of Business.

 ~Tyler~

BYU Graduate
with a Bachelor of Science Degree
in
Exercise Science.

 ~Tyler and Chandra~

BYU graduates together!

 Bryce pointing to the Marriot School of Business

where he spent many, many hours...

The "Y" on the mountain is great!

 I wonder if Tyler will jump any higher when

he graduates from medical school?!!

A GREAT DAY!

Congratulations to you both!!!

Barcelona, Spain Day Five- "Last Sights"~

After our tour of "Palau Musica Catalana"

we walked through a few more blocks of

the city to enjoy some last minute sights.

 One sight we would frequently see 

throughout Barcelona was apartment

buildings with colorful flower boxes on 

window sills and balconies or just as 

often clothes hanging on clothes lines.

 ~Museum de la Xocolata~
The Chocolate Museum!

We wish we would have known about this

yummy looking place earlier in the week.

 Across the way from the chocolate museum

is the beautiful park with the

"Arc de Triomf."

 It was built in 1888 for the Universal Exposition.

 Artists enjoying the beautiful weather

to create their work in.

 For a few minutes we had fun watching
these men playing Bocci ball in the park.

 The competition got a little testy, so 

they had to bring out the tape measure!

We loved our visit to Barcelona, Spain!

We would enjoy spending a few more days here.

Barcelona, Spain Day Five-"Palau Musica Catalana"~

The last morning in Barcelona we spent touring

The "Palau Musica Catalana"

It was an AMAZING concert hall.

Opening day for the hall was 1908.

The idea of building it began with those

in the community beginning a cultural 

movement to appreciate Catalana music.

 Unfortunately there is no picture taking inside the hall.

But it was so worth the tour we took to see first hand
it's beauty and to learn of it's history.

The highlights were the gorgeous glass ceiling in 

the performance hall.  This is the only facility in
Europe that has natural lighting of it's facility during day
time performances. The hall seats 2,200 people. When the
 guide asked our tour group to guess the number of seats-
Jim's number of 2,000 was the closest. :-)

I would strongly suggest googling this Music Hall

to see photos of this beautiful structure.

 On the performance stage are several three
dimentional ancient Muse's coming out of the wall
 holding various instruments, the lower parts of their
bodies are done in beautifully tiled mosiac patterns. 

The muses with their various instruments portrays
that all types of music are performed in the hall:
Contemporary, rock, folk, classic, etc.
The only music not heard is Opera,
maybe because of the glass ceiling.....

 The view of the double rows of pillars looking out
of a second story room, we see it from the outside,

is to give the perception of depth, or of being in
a forest.  The other window, in the same room,
only had one row of pillars and therefore it did not
give the same impression of depth as the view above.

Note that all the columns have a type of mosaic rose
in their designs.  There were rose designs throught
out the interior of the hall.  The reason is related to the
traditional holiday talked about in the last picture
below where Jim has given me a beautiful red rose.

 The hall is "owned by all who contribute to it's upkeep."

So even if you contribute heavily to maintain and
support this music hall and it's activities you still have
to purchase your own tickets for any performances.

 Some famous artists, orchestra's and groups have 

visited and performed in this Music Hall such as

Julian Lloyd Webber, Israel Pholharmonic, Chicago

Symphony, New York Philharmonic, Woody Allen,

Norah Jones and many, many others.
There are over 300 performances staged each year.

The traditional holiday for April 23rd each year in Barcelona is
"St. George's Day."  It is the day a woman receives a rose from
her husband, boyfriend or son.  It represents the day St. George
slayed the dragon to save the King's daughter.  When the dragon
was pierced the blood, from it's wound, sprouted a red rose.  In
1923 the holiday expanded to women giving books to a man of her
choosing.  We saw roses and books being sold all over the city.
After our tour of the music hall Jim surprised me with a rose.
He was okay with me not buying him a book...
 since they would all be in Spanish anyway :-)

Barcelona, Spain Day Four-"Pick Pocketers" and "Fountain Show"~

PICK POCKETER ALERT!!

Be extra cautious while using the metro in Barcelona.

We had a few unwanted "run ins" with pick pocketers

during our five day visit.  One happened when an older 

man was pick pocketed by a group of young men while 

getting on the metro.  A young father, traveling with his 

family, saw the incident jumped off the train grabbed the 

men and retrieved the wallet,  all within seconds before 

the train left.  The father was applauded as he got back 

on the train.  Before this incident I had a young couple 

behind me try to sneak into my backpack, I prevented it.  

Another time I walked passed an older woman going the 

opposite direction and saw someone reaching into her back 

pack, I was able to run that young man off before harm was 

done.  So the week held some unsettling adventures in that

 regard but no further incidences occurred the rest of our week. 

On a good note our Friday evening visit to the

"Magic Fountain" show was so delightful! 

The components used were 

water fountains, music and colored lights.

 The idea was first conceived to be created for

Barcelona's Universal Exhibition Event.

 The first debut showing was on May 19, 1929.

 Cody ready for the front seat view!

 Jim climbed up and joined Cody.

 Some facts-

Pool dimensions:  50x65 meters

Pool capacity:  3, 100, 000 liters

 Set in front of the National Art Museum.

Number of Pumps:  5

 Shows on Friday's and Saturday's

Total volume of water in circulation:  

2,600 liters per second

 Number of water jets:  3, 620

 The view of the twin towers looking 

down from the museum.

Smaller fountains lined the walkway

up to the main fountain at the museum.

 Number of water arrangements:  29

 Number of hydraulic valves:  29

 Number of main colors:  8

Number of electric motors:  134

 Number of lights:  4, 760

 This was one of our favorite activities in Barcelona!

Of course there is always food on the agenda for Cody.

I thought this little wooden sandwich holder was cute!