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2/17/2003 2:55:00 AM
Boulder Creek, CA
In the Santa Cruz mountains and the redwood forrest

December 2002 / January 2003

Robert had his last 3 weeks at his Chevron project and was able to take a few days off so that we could go skiing

Hallo, it's me again....

The last month of the old year 2002 was rather quiet besides the usual Christmas preparations like baking cookies, doing art projects and make my self-made Christmas ornaments that I give out to teachers and close friends... as well as playing Santa Claus. Robert had his last 3 weeks at his Chevron project and was able to take a few days off so that we could go skiing. Our present to each other was a season pass for Kirkwood (about 4 hours, close to Lake Tahoe) and Grandpa gave the kids their first new skiing equipment, what a treat! The first two days we took Benjamin on the baby slopes strapped into a harness with long leaches. This really works wonderful and is so much easier than holding him between my legs or on the poles (I very well remember my back pain when I did it with Sebastian!) With this device he found his balance very quickly and got the feel for the speed without running into things. On Sunday we tried the next step and took him on a blue run, NO PROBLEM! We all went together and Sebastian has great fun as well. It is his 3rd year on skis and after the first couple of warm up runs he quickly gets into it, he is going much faster this year and works on his "Hot Dog" style. He loves to race down the last hill to the lifts, tucked in his knees and screaming for joy.

We went together with our friends Fiona and Graham and their kids Ella (10) and Oscar (5). Fiona is from Australia (Brisbane, just like our friend Catharine - what a small world!) and Graham is from England. They both have moved around quite a bit as well and moved to Boulder Creek little over a year ago. Sebastian and Oscar went to pre-school together last year and are now at the same Elementary school, but different Kindergarten classes. We have been hanging out with them quite a bit the last half year and we all, kids as adults, get a long very well. We had a great skiing weekend and since they all started skiing only a year ago we also got to hang out on the same slopes. We went back the weekend before Christmas and on that first afternoon Benjamin (and Robert) decided he can stop now by himself so he does not need the harness anymore! WOW!!!! It is amazing how quickly kids learn a sport. He speeds down in a perfect pizza pie, moves his hips left and right and if he is in a really good mood will try to jump over little snow hills ;-) Robert has started to get back on skis again, which is wonderful because now we can all go together and since the boys are already quite speedy we hardly have to wait for them. Once in a while one of us will have a couple of runs by themselves, but otherwise we can enjoy this activity as a family. Last time we went for Robert's birthday, early February, and had every type of weather in those three days - Friday warm and slushy snow - Saturday cold, cloudy and snow storm in the afternoon and night - Sunday windy but sunny, no clouds and 6in. of fresh powder - what more could you ask for!! We hope to be going 1-2 more times, because we all enjoy it so much.

Christmas and New Years we spent at home and had wonderful two relaxing weeks with absolutely nothing on our agendas. Robert's project ended December 20th and he was able to stay at home for the whole time. On Christmas eve we celebrated with our friends Maura, Bob and Manuel again. The boys had received a Foosball table from Santa and were busy while we enjoyed a marvelous Fondue dinner (again..) The weather those days were absolutely miserable which we did not mind at all, because we wanted to enjoy the cozy house and our finally finished home theater. On Christmas day we were invited at Fiona's and Graham's (short "The Tooms") for a traditional English feast (what a good Christmas pudding and Brandy sauce they have!) and the next day they joined us for a full day of movies (3 in total!) and lots of X-Box games. They also joined us for New Years as well as a colleague of Robert's, who had to work and could not go home to Seattle. We also had to celebrate Ella's birthday that evening and later on Bob (Maura was too tired) and the whole gang - their 4 kids plus spouses and friends (we were a total of 14 people) - came to watch a movie and "jump" into the New Year. Robert managed to have the "Pummerin" (the big bell in St. Stephen's cathedral in Vienna) ring into the New Year on the computer and I made a traditional Gulyas soup to keep us going into the early morning hours....

The next birthday was Sebastian's on January 2nd, he turned 6 and is very proud of it! Since that day always is during the holidays and most everybody is not in the mood to celebrate I took him out to Chucky Cheeses, like last year. It is a pizza restaurant with lots of games and prices - perfect for that age! The weekend after we had a all boys party - 11 of them! - for "Ice Age" in the movie theater - what a blast they had! He is also very excited at the moment because his baby teeth are starting to wiggle and his first one came out only 2 weeks after his birthday - I guess he really is a BIG BOY now! His next one came out during gymnastics and now he is pulling on all of them waiting anxiously for the next ones to wiggle. We really don't have the tradition of the tooth fairy in Austria so when Sebastian told his grandma about it on the phone she told him that she had kept all of "Daddies" teeth, so guess what - we have invented a new version for him - The tooth fairy will bring his teeth back once he lost them all.... don't you just love traditions...?!?!

As mentioned earlier, Robert's out of town project ended in December and started his new one right away on January 2nd. He is working down in San Jose and technically is home again every night. Unfortunately he has a lot to do right now and never is home before 8-9pm. So the boys don't get to see him that much more but it is nice to know and a good feeling to have him home gain. Once in a while he will sneak under Sebastian's blanket and spend the night with him, which makes Sebastian very happy! Benjamin still is in a toddler size bed and desperate to get a big one so that "Papa" can stay with him too!

We certainly hope you all had a good start into a happy and healthy year (knock on wood, we have not had any bad colds or illnesses in a long time!) and let us know what is going on on your end. Attached a few more pictures and because there were so many this time I will send some more in a separate e-mail. Please stay in touch - for now big hugs and kisses from

The 4 Schmids and zoo (the frogs are back!)

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