Justin and I had a really fun day out in Amsterdam yesterday! We needed to talk about some things for the future and really just needed some time together, so we just walked across Amsterdam and had a blast together!  Here are a couple pictures from our little outing!

Okay, so not really, but sort of. In the states I have certain rules that I follow because they are the rules. Like car seats. Anyone who is my friend in the states knows that I can be a little crazy when it comes to Maisie’s car seat being installed properly. No way would I ever have it any other way. Well, I get to Europe and right away (the first day in Amsterdam) she is riding in the middle seat with a seat belt, no car seat or or booster or anything! And for some reason I tell myself this is okay because the cab driver is allowing me to do it and I don’t know the rules/laws anyways for this sort of thing in Europe. We now have a car seat, but I still don’t have the piece to it that makes the seat belt really tight. :s…

… we moved from Paris. The last year has been absolutely crazy in every way possible.  Here are just some of the things/decisions/highlights of the last year. We stayed in more than 10 DIFFERENT places in the last year.  Eight of those being for at least two weeks at a time.  Paris to Denver to Virginia to Portland to Sacramento to Portland to Sacramento to Southern California to Sacramento to Portland to Sacramento to Denver and back to Europe, where we stayed in Hungary for a week, Den Haag for a week, and now we are in Amsterdam and have been here for just over a week.  CRAZY!!!!! A year ago, we had made plans to move to Amsterdam after a SHORT (which turned into a year) time in the states. Plans to Amsterdam fell through, so we decided to stay in Portland and start a cafe, something we always…

There is always excitement at the Graf house! One of the boys found a cat the other day and brought it into the house, asking to keep it.  Of course Laina agreed to this because she knew the cat would probably just run away anyways as cats are always coming in and out of their yard.  Well, Justin and Sydney (one of their daughters) are allergic to cats and began to get really bad allergies.  They weren’t pleased with the cat.   So yesterday Sydney and Maisie and I were doing dishes outside (the kitchen is still in the process of being remodeled) and I spotted the cat going after one of the chickens!  NOOOOOO!  At least it wasn’t the baby chicks, but still.  Once the cat gets a taste for chicken, it will only want more!  This freaked me out, so I took it upon myself to pick up…

Would you believe that I am experiencing farm life in the middle of Amsterdam?  How freakin’ bizarre is that?  Chickens, mice, fruit flies (do fruit flies count as farm life???), and then to top it off, I have been washing dishes outside for the last couple days!  Phil and Laina (the people whose home we are staying in) are in the middle of remodeling their kitchen and are without a kitchen sink.  So I have been busy heating up water in the electric water heater, transferring it to a bucket of soapy cold water, and washing dishes for a family of 8 (including us and not counting the visitors).  It has been SO fun though!!  Maisie has LOVED it.  Laina took some pictures of Maisie playing in the soapy water that I will try to get from her.  It has been sort of a fun thing for us to do…