Christian's Baptism

At the end of July, we had Christian Aaron Beilman baptized at church.  It was the first baptism to be held at our church.  It was a beautiful visual and tangible reminder of God's love for His people and His children.  It was a beautiful Sacrament reminding us that God loved us before we loved Him.  It's a blessing to claim His love for our children among our fellow community at New City Wien.  

We explained to the older boys about baptism and even showed them pictures of when they had been baptized.  (They all love to see pictures of themselves as babies!) I must confess, I was a little intimidated about taking all four of our kids up front.  They all did rather okay.  Actually, I think Christian was the fussiest, but only because he was hungry.  

We're so thankful for Stacey for capturing the moment on film to be able to share with our friends and family.    And she even took some family shots for us as well.  

Our "blooper" reel

Christian Aaron Beilman 

Baptized in the Name of

the Father, the Son & Holy Spirit

Thanks be to God!

English Camp 2012

Finally, school has begun.  I've missed the regular rhythm of a "normal" schedule.  Most days here seem to have an irregular cadence to them.  So, I have a semi-quiet house - two kids are in school and I'm functioning on more than 6 hours of sleep.  Let's see how my memory works :)

In the beginning of July we had a group from our former-home church, Seven Rivers come to Vienna to lead an English Camp for kids.  First off, it was SO encouraging and delightful to have a group from our church here to minister to us and the kids.  We knew (almost) everyone rather well and just having familiar friends and faces around for the week was uplifting.  

Most of the Seven River peeps

They came in and ran an English camp for the local kids here.  One of our goals at New City Wien (our church) is to minister to the community outside of our walls.  This team came over to help make that happen!

It's difficult to sum up months of prep time and a FULL week of camp, but I'll see what I can do. 

We had 33 kids. Only 4 or 5 of these kids attend our church.  They were full days with lots of playing, singing, crafting, dancing, teaching and sweating. 

The kids seemed to have a fantastic time.  And all of us adults were completely spent by the end of the week. 

One of the girls that came from Florida was a very talented face painter.  Worthy seemed to get a new Star Wars face each day.  Jenny was amazing! This is Worthy as Darth Maul.

One of the very sweet parts of this trip is that one of the families that came had a son that Worthy was friends with while we lived in Florida.  It was so fun to see them get to spend time together and it was definitely a highlight of his (and ours)!  

All in all - a fantastic and blessed week.  We were SO grateful... and SO tired!

Strassenbahn Riding

We spend a lot of time getting around town via Strassenbahns.  

some are older - and difficult (if not impossible) to get a stroller onto

The new ones are much more stroller friendly

So during our time spent going around town - sometimes we sleep, play games or just watch the sites. 

Special Delivery

This past week has been filled with much anticipation.  Grampy had sent the Lego's Star Wars Millennium Falcon to Worthy and he has been eagerly waiting for it to arrive.  Every day he would get home from school and say "Did it come?"

Well finally... it landed.

 Worthy quickly began to assemble it while William enjoyed the minifigs. (yeah - I know my Lego Lingo!)

Here it is fully assembled.  I must say it is pretty cool.  

It opens up to the ship interior with all kinds of neat Lego gadgets.

 And today he got to enjoy it with his friends - making it all the sweeter!

Lainzer Tiergarten

This past Monday was a holiday here, not Memorial Day.  So we decided to go out and visit a great park/playground in the area and enjoy the beautiful weather outside. 

The boys thoroughly enjoyed the playground - lots of climbing, swinging, sliding and rocking.

Worthy is such a great big brother... especially to Calvin.

William did some bike riding.  

I have a feeling the training wheels will be off by the end of the summer.

Worthy also did some bike riding, but he was so fast, none of my pictures turned out :)

And lastly - the three boys loved riding in the "bedswing" together.  

We threw Christian in there for the pic - he's still too young for the ride. 

Grocery Duty

I go to the grocery store a lot.

Seriously... a lot.

By American standards, we have a small fridge/freezer and very little pantry/storage space, so I only get what we need at the store for the next 2-3 days at the most.

Thankfully, our apartment is above a grocery store, Hofer (rhymes with gopher). Hofer is the European Aldi.    

Most of the stuff that we eat we can get from downstairs.  They carry all the essentials at a great price.

However, sometimes I need other things that Hofer doesn't carry.  And then I have to go to our other store... Spar.  It isn't very far - just two blocks away.  They have the bagel chips I love, cheddar cheese, Mexican foodstuffs, Coke-a-Cola, soft American sandwich bread, yogurt, peanut butter, the jelly we like and cranberry juice.  So once or twice a week, I make the "trek" down to Spar to pick up some of our favorites, keeping in mind that everything I purchase I have to haul back (uphill) those same two blocks... with a little help.

William loves to shop with me... especially pulling the cart.

Sweet Calvin

Many people have asked us how Calvin is handling the arrival of Christian.  It's only been a month, but so far Calvin has nothing but love for Baby Christian.  He's constantly bringing him a pacifier if he hears him cry.  He likes to sing to him too.  So basically, our sweet Calvin is still our sweet Calvin. 

I'll come back and read this in a year when Christian is crawling and swiping - to remember the Good Ole Days.