Update from Bob

Hey Julie!  How are you??  We haven't heard from you for a while.  How was the bike trip??  Di your butt survive??  I bet it's ssssssoooooorrrrrrreeeeeeeee.  All is well here at Bob.  They did al to at the house this week.  Let's see, they poured the driveway and front porch, framed the basement exercise room, built and installed the main staircase, installed the windows in the hearth room, patio door and the FRONT Door!  Electricians kept working and the HVAC man did a little bit too.  It's coming along nicely.  Can't wait to see you in a week!  Do you want to Skype any on Sunday??  Here are some new pictures.

Love you, Daddy

Results

There is a huge update with the book. I've gotten one response back from the four publishing companies I sent the manuscript to.

The results are in...

































































From Publish America...



































































































































































































I AM A PUBLISHED AUTHOR!!!!!!!

Publish America has accepted my manuscript!! If I choose them I will receive an 8% royalty every time someone buys my book! After 500 copies, it'll increase to 12%, then after another 1,500 copies, it increases to 25%, then after 5,000 copies sold I'll receive 50% of every purchase after that.

Still waiting to hear what the other three will have to offer (if anything) but at least I know I've made the transition from writer to author!

Finally a new post! Short and Sweet

Hey everyone! I know I haven't posted in a while so I just wanted to check in and see how everything is going at Bob! Things are good here in Vienna! We have been busy with visiting people and seeing sights and hanging out and such! I will try to post a long one in the next couple of days. I really miss your cooking mom! I'm getting bad withdrawal haha

Matt, what's the deal with your book?? Any updates?

Talk to you all soon!! Love you!

Sunday afternoon at Bob

Hi Julie!

We've been lame on posting to the blog! Sorry but we were wiped out from the hectic week. Anyway we are settled in and still unpacking and organizing a bit. But everything is fine here and sounds like you are having so much fun in Salzburg, the opera, museums, design studios, etc.... The violin maker sounded cool! Illattach some pictures of the house. Basically they put the windows in and did some more of the plumbing rough in. Also they framed the bathroom in the basement and started the electrical rough in. We will meet the electrician on Wednesday to do our first walk through and pick outlet locations and light fixture locations so that should be fun. We also decided to go back to laminate countertops and sinks on the secondary bathrooms. It was going to cost us $4000 todo cultured marble so be bailed on that idea! (sorry but it will be nice don't worry). We did agree to do the pot filler in the kitchen ($1400!!)

What should we do with lights or ceiling and in the great room??

Let's skype tonight. We are all set up to do it. Just text me when you want to do it.

That's all for now. Love you sweetie.

Daddy

Ps there is one picture of Erin Smiley and the guy that did the closing papers. She is so young!!!

I always forget these titles!

Hi everyone!

Here I am, in Salzburg! Thought I'd give you all an update on what I'm doing :) And I've been waiting for detailed posts on what you guys are doing with pictures... so chop chop! Haha

So I don't believe I told you about anything that we did yesterday except my morning trip to Starbucks! But after that we realized we had about 45 mins before we had to meet up with our group so we decided to stop by this place called Ring King. It's a shop of a jeweler that were are hoping to get to go to on our trip, but at that time Tate hadn't scheduled it yet. We were worried we may not have time to go so we wanted to go by ourselves to check it out and luckily its about a block from our apartment. So anyways we checked it out and told the man there, Max (he's the owner and designer), that we were with Tate's group and we wanted to come early. He showed us his rings merchandise and they are all so cool! He is a custom designer too so he makes rings, mostly, for his clients and can pretty much make exactly what you want! Anyways of course I found one that I love! And I can't think of a more perfect souvenir from my trip! I won't tell you which one I like (I haven't bought it yet... turns out we are scheduled to meet him on Thursday), so you'll have to wait and see! It's a surprise!

Anyways after that we went to meet up with the group in front of St. Stephens. Tate had a surprise for us! So we went around the back of the building and into this little door and up a couple of stairs and... around the corner.... was more stairs... and more stairs... hahaha okay enough of that! The surprise was that we were going to walk up the spiral staircase to about halfway up the steeple to see out over the whole city of Vienna!!! It was amazing!!!! We could see so far and it was sooo pretty! However walking up and back down was not fun. The steeps were very steep, and in a tight spiral and they were stone so when your going up, if you look up you see the underside of a stone spiral staircase and its only a couple feet above my head. I was definitely getting claustrophobic and nervous. Oh and did I mention? There was 400 steps to the top. Wowwweee! But it was so nice at the top :) There was a little store so you could buy ice water and such in the room at the top (which by the way wasn't all the way at the top but about halfway.

After St. Stephens, we went to meet the violin maker, Cai. He has a last name too but I don't know how to spell it. Anyways that was wayyyyy cool. He has this little shop on the second floor of a building in a small courtyard. The courtyard is actually owned by the monastery around here (don't know what that's called either) and when you stepped into the courtyard literally all the sounds and bustling of the busy streets disappeared and it was completely silent. It was so cool and eerie and holy and many other things haha.

So we went inside and got to talk with Cai for a while. He told us all about how he makes violins and cellos and violas. It was so interesting. He said it takes him 5 months to make each one and they sell for $17,000! He also let us each have a bridge... its the small wooden piece that holds the strings up. He had over 2000 of them so we each got to pick one!

After that Deanna, Christina and me went back to this one bookstore so I could get a book I had my eye on. It's a logos book thats very nice. However I may end up returning it if i want to get the ring. I have to decide. But after that we headed home and just hung out for a little bit until we had to get ready for the Opera! We all met up at Tate's flat before the Opera for h'ordeovres (sp?) and champagne :) And we got a little background on the story. We saw Tosca, it's a tragedy by Puccini. I thought that was really cool too. We had nose bleed seats but we could still see pretty well and it was all in italian, so we had these small screens in front of our seats that would translate it to english for us. Plus it was in the Vienna State Opera House which we pass by everyday and it's beautiful!

Anyways, after the opera, we headed home to pack for Salzburg and get to bed early. Today is Saturday... and I haven't yet told you about Friday, but I have to go because we are starting our second day in Salzburg! I think were going to some museums. I'll try to write more later, maybe one post about the Salzburg trip.

I want to try and skype tonight with you guys! I hope you can have time around dinnertime ish? I'll text you.

xo Julie

P.S. don't text me during the day because if you text me when I don't have wifi, then you will be charged a lot for the text. So just wait for me to text you :)

Thursday - almost done packing

Hi! Loved reading your recent posts. So glad you are having lots of fun and seeing cool sights. I was pretty sure you would love it there!
We are almost done here. The guys are loading the truck, the house has been cleaned, the landscapers were here yesterday & cleaned up all the weeds - so things are happening!! The guy is coming later today to deliver the base cabinet I ordered for the pantry. Can't wait to see it. Hope I like it.
Don't buy a camera. I think your iPhone pics are great. I'd rather you spend your $ on art books. :)
Dad will send more pics later.
Love, Mom. xoxo

Hello family! I'm writing a new post from Starbucks on the Graben! That's a road that's like the 5th avenue of Vienna! I was really tired last night so I didn't finish my post about what I've been doing the past few days so i decided to do that now!

So on to what I did yesterday: We met up with our group at 11:15 to go to lunch at another authentic Viennese restaurant. And yet again we were missing 4 people. Gahh. The place we went was called Reinheld, I think. I would equivocate it to a greasy spoon diner in America. But it was good! I had chicken and a knoedel! Haha it's like a dense ball of potato, and it reminded me a little of Turkey Ball Soup! hahahaha but it wasn't gray. Anyways after that we walked to Beethoven's apartment! It's a museum now and we got to walk through it and see cool stuff like his piano and a "death mask" its a cast of his face that they make after a person has died. Creeeepy! But it was cool because he wrote "Fur Elise" there and that's like my favorite piece of classical music!

After Beethoven, we went meet a photographer and graphic designer named Gerhard Rihl. We met him at his flat/office/studio and got to talk with him about his work and see some of his photographs and stuff. The photos were amazing!! They were all pictures of different abandoned places in Vienna and some of the U-Bahn and like bridges and stuff. He made a book out of the pictures and that's how we ended up getting to meet him - Tate found the book in a book store and called him up and got us invited! So he had the books there for us to look at and towards the end of the talk I asked where we could go to buy the book. Gerhard said that they cost 30 euro at a store and his royalties come out to 18 euro per book so he would sell it to us there for 18 euro! So I bought it on the spot!! And he signed it!!!!! Sooooo cool!! I am sooo excited for this book it's so cool I can't wait to show you it!!

We ended up leaving Gerhard's flat and walking around with him and he took us to places where he shot some of the photos, which was really cool! I also got to talk with him about what I'm studying and stuff while we were walking around and he said I could email him and he would send us his new books as they come out! Obvi I'd have to send money but yayay!!! Anyways Tate's going to set up a dinner with him next week sometime with the whole group again which would be so cool! It's really interesting about the people we visit... they all are so eager to meet up with us again and talk with us more and take us here or there or whatever. I feel like that's so different from America, everyone at home is always too busy or has better things to do.

So after we saw the photo locations, me and Christina and Deanna went out to eat and for some reason most of the places we found werr closed or not serving dinner! So we ate at an italian restaurant and our waiter was from italy and spoke to us in italian which was cool. We've been hearing that most people here also are fluent in italian because they all vacation in Italy.

After dinner we rode the U-Bahn to this bar where we were going to meet up with the group to watch the soccer game, but it was so packed and we couldn't get in. While we were waiting in like some guys came up behind me and asked me in german what was going on or something haha so I just looked at them for a while and said "Sprechen sie english" haha and they were like oh okay! Everyone here speaks english pretty much. So we all found out that they weren't going to let any more people in until halftime so we just decided to leave. As were we walking away though the guys were leaving too and they asked us if we wanted to come with them to another bar. And they weren't sketchy because if they were we would have said no, but we said sure! And I realize it could have turned out really bad but luckily they were both really nice and we hung out with them watching the game at a different bar for a few hours. They were teaching us german and we were teaching them english ahha german speaking people can't say the "juh" soung or the "wuh" sound haha so we were trying to get them to learn it haha and we were teaching them american slang ahha anyways it turned out to be perfectly safe although I know I probably should have been a little more cautious. Not everyone in the world is nice and genuine.

Anyways I have to go but today we're going to the Opera and the violin maker so I'll be sure to tell you how that goes! Talk to you later! I love you!

Hi everyone!! I'm so sorry for my delayed posts... I have been busy and by the time i've gotten home at night, I've been really tired. I'm glad the packing is going well! Thanks for the pictures... its sad, but I'm excited for our new house and adventure in Cleveland! I cant believe how much stuff they still had to pack! haha i thought we had cleared it all out already haha

Well since I haven't written in a couple of days this may be a long post so prepare yourself haha

So this weekend was kind of boring... on Saturday we kind of went shopping, but I didn't get anything. Then on Sunday, since all the stores close on Sunday, we went to some museums. We went back to the Art Museum, the Kunsthistorisches. They had an egyptian exhibit which was pretty cool. We also walked really far to go to the authentic Viennese restaurant and I got these like fried dumplings and they were nasty. That was the first thing I had here that I really didn't like. They were like these spongey squares that were like the consistency of soggy french toast and they had a really eggy flavor haha they were gross!

So on Monday we met back up with the group again. We had gone out with everyone a little over the weekend but since none of us really have phones (btw I never actually ended up buying a phone at the airport... I didn't think it was necessary) we have a hard time communicating about plans and such. We met at noon and had class for a little bit at the Institute. We just practiced drawing for a little bit haha and then we talked about stuff we'd do this week and such. We had a pretty relaxed day after that. We rode the U-Bahn out to the Volksoper, which was where we later went to the Ballet... they just wanted us to know how to get there. And we also rode to the train station so we know how to get there for Friday when we go to Salzburg. A couple people actually weren't paying attention and lost the group that day... 4 to be exact. It's just ridiculous because were all adults so none of our chaperones really turn around while walking places to see if we still have everyone, because you know we're all capable of following without getting lost. It's just amazing how out of it some of the people in our group can be that they don't seem to pay attention at all! Anyways so they missed some of the things we did.

After we saw where to go, we went to this place called the Postsparkasse. Its a post office designed by this famous architect named Otto Wagner. Its a huge building and I took pictures so they'll be on Facebook soon. After that, we went home and changed for the Ballet then rode the U-Bahn back to the Volksoper stop! The ballet was really cool! I was kind of nodding off in the first act though. But at intermission, we all went to the bar and got a wine haha so that was cool! So then the second act I was a little more alert haha I really liked watching the dancers! They were amazing! So graceful and so talented! I got a program for you guys to see when I get back... by the way, I've been picking up brochures and programs for almost everything we've been to. Some are in german but a lot of them are in english so you can read about them too!

After the ballet, we all went to this small bar to watch the soccer games. Apparently its the Euro Cup here now so every night there are games on TV, and we always go to the bar to watch. Soccer is so big here and everyone gets soooo excited when there's a goal haha

So on Tuesday, which was yesterday obvi hah, we were on our way to class at noonish and as we were passing the Albertina (a famous art museum across the street from the Institute) we see this camera man and a boom and a small crowd... as we got closer I realized that Jason Segel was there! They were filming him trying a sausage from the stand! Hahah!! It was so crazy! So obviously we took pictures of him like celeb-crazed fans haha

Anyways once we got to class and the excitement died down, we had a small history lesson and practiced drawing some more and then headed over to the Succession, another small museum around the corner from the Institute. We went there to see the Beethoven Frieze which is a large mural done by Gustav Klimt and it has just recently been permanently installed in the Succession. It was cool but I can only look at art for so long before I start to lose interest hhah I swear my favorite part of these museums is the stores ahha they always have the coolest books and small trinkets in them! I am becoming quite the art book freak... I've decided those will be my souvenirs from the trip and I don't want to spend money on clothes or whatever while I'm here.

So we left the Succession and we went to this small furniture store called "das moebil" which literally means furniture. they sold really seriously modern stuff from local Viennese designers. They actually have a small cafe here too where they put new furniture and let people try it out before they choose things for their store! So that place was cool and the best part was I found a book I wanted to buy for 27 euro on sale for 5 euro and the lady there gave it to me for free!! Yayy!

When we left das moebil we went to meet this architect named Juri Troy. He has this really small office here and it was filled with models and drawings and cool projects that he's working on! He gave a presentation about his work and most of it looked similar but it was really cool. He does these small rectangular  houses and other buildings and uses mostly wood so that they are entirely environmentally sound. I took some pictures which should be up on Facebook soon.

Me and my roommates though had to leave early because we were having dinner with our family. Maria made Wiener Schnitzel! Soooo good! And of course she made tons and tons of food again haha we had vegetable soup as an appetizer, then salad, potato salad, rice, schnitzel (which is basically fried meat... we had pork and turkey), fried cheese (basically flat mozzarella sticks but it wasn't mozzarella... i dont know what kind of cheese it was actually!), and fired zucchini. Then for dessert we had apricot and chocolate ice cream again but this time we had pureed fresh strawberries as a topping. Sooo good! And the funniest thing happened! Deanna accidently spilt the bowl of strawberry puree on the table and we were all scooping it off the table and onto our ice cream, but we couldn't get it all. So Mogi (the 7' tall hippie with dreads son of our family) LICKED it off the table!!! hahahaha we were all laughing so hard!

Okay so I haven't yet told you what we did today, but I'm getting tired so I'll have to finish tomorrow. I really am having a good time. I'm not spending all of my money, I'm meeting new friends and learning a lot about Austrian culture! I wish the whole family could come here!! You all would love it. Everyday I find something that I think one of you would absolutely love. Like a restaurant or cafe or museum or store. Vacation next summer maybe???

Good luck with packing and such tomorrow and when you get to Ohio lets skype some! Headed to the violin maker tomorrow and the Opera tomorrow night... so excited!!!

xox Julie

p.s. I really wish I had a camera here like Matt's. I feel like all of my pictures are crappy because I'm using my iphone! Turns out my camera that I brought with me is dead and I brought the wrong charger.  I may look for another one while I'm here but I don't know. I don't want to spend my money on that. I'm saving my money for awesome art books and Matt's graduation gift!

Move day #2

Well, day 2 complete and more packing. The whole house is now packed except for the attic which they will spin the morning along with the last of the stuff we are taking to Bob. Landscapers are coming tomorrow to clean up the mulch and pull weeds and also we are taking Matt's car to sell at Carmax in the morning. Got new tires on mom's car today and made a couple trips to dump and goodwill. uncle Jeff and aunt Carol came and got the garage fridge and Matt's bed. We've been buying the mover guys lunch every day and I'm taking them to an O's game tomorrow night (the weather was bad tonight so we postponed it). Everything running on schedule like clockwork! Are you having fun sweetie? Hope you are well!!! Love, Daddy

Move day #1

Julie, mom said you called! I hope you had a good talk and kept her company while Matt and I were at the movie! I don't know how to post pics from my iPhone because our Internet is off at home and I think the cloud doesn't work anymore. Anyway I'll just have to text you the pics until we get back to Bob. There are two guys and they are very nice and professional. I think they will take good care of all our stuff. They will pack all day tomorrow and then start loading the truck on Wednesday. I'm going to take them to the O's game tomorrow night for a treat! Theyre very excited and it will also be my last O's game before the move :((. Anyway it's all going well. Hope you are having lots of fun exploring Vienna! Mom said you were going to Salzburg this weekend where "the hills are alive with the sound of music"!!! Love you sweetie! Daddy

Graduation Night

Hi, Julie:  It's about 9:00 p.m. and we just got back from Kate's Graduation party.  We're worn out from the days events, but they all went very well!  The graduation ceremony was a little longer than I expected because they read a comment about each boy & there were 85 boys graduating!  It was very sunny and we got sunburned on one side.  Tara's a little crispy!  And even Nancy & Teresa and I got sunburned. 

It sounds like you are having a wonderful time from your posts!  I really enjoyed the pictures you put on fb.  Aren't the buildings fabulous?  I loved that black & white mosaic floor in the one building.  And your room looked very nice, too.  Great view out the window.  So glad you are trying the new foods.   It really helps you get immersed in the culture.

Miss you - but glad you're having a great time!!  Love, Mom

Yes I'm getting the posts! If you check below each of your posts, there is a link where you can post comments. I've posts a couple comments on things! I've been trying to get down everything I've been doing here in my posts and unfortunately I'm short on time so I forget to address your posts!

Matt looked great!! I love his hair :) I learned today that I can text you guys so I'm going to try to do that more :)

Also, I'm excited about the progression on the house! The pictures look great :) I hope its going to be more done when you all get there next week. Keep sending me pics though!

Just got home from a night of bar hopping! Haha it was fun but I was ready to come home and go to sleep! Museum hopping tomorrow! I'll post more pictures when I can. Love you guys and good luck this week with everything please keep me posted!!

Are you getting my posts?

And all the pictures from Matt's graduation and the house??

Ahhh CONGRATULATIONS MATT!! I'm so proud of you! I'm so sorry that I couldn't be there for your special day, but I've been thinking about you and I'm searching for the perfect gift for you!

I'm sorry that I haven't posted in a few days, I've been pretty busy! On Thursday, we went to see some museums! We went to the Albertina, which is near the Opera House, to see an exhibit of Gustav Klimt and some Monet and Picasso and others! We also wen't to the Kunsthistorisches Museum, which is verry famous here. We saw Pieter Breugel's paintings which was pretty cool. Even better than seeing the art though is seeing the museum itself!! They're so ornate and have such crazy old architecture! There are pictures up on Facebook now for you to see :) Also while we were at the Albertina, I saw one of Anderson's friends from VMI! Hahah! So random that he was here in Vienna at the same time that I was and we were in the same museum!

Anyways, that day was also a national holiday here, Corpus Christi. It's a Roman Catholic country so on Catholic holidays all the stores closed and they have a huge parade through the city from church to church. So we saw that and it was sooo cool! I got some pictures of it and they're on Facebook too I think. So because all the stores were closed we used that day as time to go to the museums!

That night we went to Schoenbrunn, the palace of the royal family, I think the king was Franz Josef? So we went there to see the Summer Night Concert or the Sommernachtkonzert. It was the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra performing outside at the Palace for a free concert. There was about 150,000 people there, if you check the pictures on Facebook you can see just how crowded wand packed in we were. It was really nice though! I had fun but we had to sit on gravel and my butt hurt!!

So on Friday, all the stores were open again so we spent the morning at the government registration office. We had to register as residents of Vienna. We'll have to go back and de-register before we leave. After that we all met up at the Amerika Institut for a german lesson!! We learned some more things to say when ordering at restaurants and such. And after we learned some german, we all got kaese kreiner which is basically a hot dog but its with bratwurst and the hot dog bun is like french bread!!! Soooooo good!!!! Then we set out to soem shops and cafes that were designed by this well known designer/architect named Gregor Eichinger. He's good friends with Tate and we had to buy one of his books for this trip. So we went to a flower shop that he designed, a coffee shop, and then we met him at a wine bar that he designed! All of the places were so cool but the flower shop was my favorite. I have a lot of pictures of it that I'll try to post on Facebook soon. I want to go buy a cheap set of water colors and paper and go back there and paint. It was so nice :) Then when we met him at the wine bar we all got to ask him questions and talk with him for a few hours and at the end he signed all of our books!

Then that night we went to a bar/club with everyone which was okay... I'm not all that interested in clubbing here. I don't really love walking far distances to just buy a beer or whatever, I usually don't think it's worth it.

Now here it is on Saturday. We woke up at 1:30pm!!! Omg I don't know why... we just were catching up on sleep I guess. We spent the day window shopping and such and we ate at a small cafe for lunch haha, but it was at like 3 hahah it was a rainy day so its been kinda eh but now were about to head to a bar and such for the night!

By the way, I found out that I can text anyone else with an iPhone when I'm using wifi for free!! So I may be texting you all :)

Graduation!

We're done Matt is a graduate!!! Here are some pics. More to come!! Beautiful day but a little warm in the sun. Love, Daddy

Graduation Day!  Mom and Dad are up early; can't sleep, too many thoughts buzzing through our heads!!!  Pictures and details to come later today!  Hope you're having fun Julie, sweetie pie!!!

Vienna Day 2

Hi everyone! So I realize this is a day late, but last night I was so tired, so I just went to bed haha I'm going to try to remember what I did yesterday and relay that to you guys then I'll post again for what I did today!

So yesterday we got up and Deanna and Jessi had showed up! They got in early in the morning and so Tate brought them over to the house. So we all got dressed and Maria fixed us a wonderful breakfast of like bread and nutella and yogurt :) We started the day off by walking to St. Stephen's Cathedral which is basically in the heart of Vienna. It was packed but we got to go inside for a minute just to look around, but its very close to our house so I think I'm going to come back for mass sometime before I leave. Vienna is a Roman Catholic country, so the churches and catholic holidays are recognized and businesses close for the day and such.

After we checked that out briefly, we walked to lunch, which was Tate's choice, a kebab place called Sababa. It was like greek and Mediterranean food which was delicious! I got some chicken pita thing that was only 5,40 euros! But funny thing, the girl who is extremely picky, Natalie... she ordered something and when it came she looked at it and turned her nose up and refused to eat it. So she was sitting next to Tate, so he offered to take her to get pizza... which I'm now realizing is THE ONLY thing she likes. SO that was stupid we were all looking at her because she's being ridiculous! She didn't even try it!!!

Anyways after we ate, we walked to the Amerika Institut which is where we usually meet for class or whatever. There we had a little orientation to the program which was so boring... we learned about transportation around the city and what we are supposed to be provided food-wise by our host families and a bunch of other random rules of thumb for our visit. We also have to fill out this paper that establishes residency in Vienna, and we have to go turn it in to some office on Friday.

So after we got out of that boring thing, we got on the trolley which is basically a slowish tram above ground that runs on rails on the road. Like next to the cars. It's kinda interesting actually I've never seen anything like it and I'm not quite sure how it works with the traffic patterns and stuff. We rode that to a U-Bahn stop and went underground to then ride that to Simmering which is on the outskirts of the city. Did I mention that the U-Bahn (the subway or metro of Vienna) works on a honor system? Like you buy a pass for the U-Bahn and you don't have to go through any turn styles or anything you just get on it and ride whereever you want as often as you want and as long as you have that pass on you, your fine! But if your caught without your pass, and people with badges come around and will ask you to see it, then you have to pay a 100 euro fine right then and there!

So we rode to Simmering to go to the art store called Boesner's. Tate and everyone from every other year of this trip hyped it up so much for the awesome sketchbooks and pens, but I was kind of let down... I didn't think it was that great, it was just a huge art store. But I did get a sketchbook, planner and a few pens that I really like.  I don't know I guess I just thought it would be nicer or have a huger selection but it didn't haha

Anyways, after that we were all pretty tired, but we still had to go to the grocery store to get food for dinner tonight, because we are going to an outdoor concert and we needed to pack a picnic but the stores are closed today because it's Corpus Christi, which Mom you should know about... its a Catholic Holiday and so Austria views it as a national holiday. So we rode the U-Bahn back to near our house then went to the grocery store (you have to pay to use a cart here and for the bags to carry your groceries!) then we came home finally!

When we got home we had a few minutes to rest (at this point it's about 6:15) then Maria had dinner ready! All four of us ate with her, her husband and one of her sons Moke (his name is really Franz but his nickname is Moke, pronounced Mee-o-kee) and he is a character! He is about 6'7" tall and he has these longgggg dredlocks that he said he has been growing for 12 YEARS! He's basically a hippie but very nice and friendly and speaks english pretty well. Maria made this HUGE dinner! We sat down and  she brought over a vegetable soup that was really good :) so we all ate soup and bread for a while and it was really good and I was just about full... but then, she took away the soup and we realized that it was just the appetizer!! She then brought over peas and corn, some kind of baked pumpkin, potatoes, salad (all these veggies are from her garden!) and pork!! So we all ate that and then after we were done the main course... her husband poured us all shots of vodka!!! Apparently, here they drink schnopps or vodka after dinner and it helps burn off the food in your stomach so you don't feel as full and can eat more food!!! Then we had chocolate and apricot ice cream and these cookies that are made in Austria! hahah So basically it was the biggest meal ever and it was all sooo delicious!

So by this time its like 9 or later so we went to bed hhaha

phewwwww another post about what I did today coming later tonight or maybe tomorrow... I have to go now so we can go to the outdoor Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra performance!! I love you look for  another post from me soon!

Oh and congrats to Matt on having his Senior Project chosen for him to present!! Yayy Matt!!

I just realized something!!

Mom said the book cover background looks like trees. I realized why Dad and Mom both said that!! Because the static lines are vertical rather than horizontal. If you get a chance can you rotate them pleaseeee? My presentation has been chosen to go in front of everyone. Also I'm presenting last!! I will be displaying the image on the screen in the ward center so it has to be perfect!

I have to have my presentation all set by 4PM on the 7th, so if you see this after that time then don't worry about it.

Hope you're having fun and I wish to hear more from you!

Thanks, MATT

EEEE

Hi Julie I'm really tired and loopy so this will be short but I just wanted to say hope you're having fun! Hopefully you will get to see more pictures of my haircut!! Prom was really fun. The DJ was great this time and the after party was fun because everyone laughed at my jokes and stuff! Also there was one drunk girl and I was making fun of her.

PS can you email me the picture of my book cover? You never sent it to me! mmoores@stpaulsschool.org

-MATT

Pictures of Sawgrass 6/5/12

From Daddy #1

Hi Julie! I hope I'm doing this right! Anyway good couple days here in Ohio with work and everything. Yesterday they started on the roof and also poured the concrete slab in the garage. Today they did more roof (it's about 95% done I think) and also installed the basement staircase. Also the plumber started roughing in. Basically he just drilled all the holes in the floor for the toilet shower and sink drains. I guess he'll do more tomorrow. Anyway glad you having fun and getting adjusted. I know you're a little homesick but that is normal at first. You'll gradually get more comfortable with the food, your surroundings and the language, etc... And then it will be a blast!!! Have fun. Love, Daddy P.s. I have to figure out how to upload pictures. Check back soon (I hope I can figure it out!)

Hi, Julie:  Glad you got there safely.  You did not miss anything at all today.  I went to get an allergy shot, took Miss Debbie her Vitamix (which she loved) and got my hair done.  Then I went to take pics of Matt & Kate before the SPSG prom.  I'll post them later when Matt is here to show me how.  Matt got his haircut short -- looks good!  A little gel to make the front sticky up and he's a cutie!!

Don't be such a worry wart!  Relax, and go with the flow.  Learn everything you can about the culture and your surroundings.  You will adjust to the culture shock very quickly.  And avoid the picky eater, she sounds like a real fun-sucker!!  Love, Mom

Still Day 1

Hey everyone! I saw the pic on Facebook of Matt and Kate at prom! Can you post some pics on here for me to see?? They looked great! I love Matt's haircut :)

Well I'm here at my new home for the next 5 weeks! Me and 3 other girls on the trip are staying with this lady and her husband and sons in her apartment in Vienna! It's a third floor apartment down a narrow pedestrian only street. Look it up on Google Earth! The address is Wien 1010, Ledererhof 2/7 and we got lucky because we have the best cook and the best location! We get to walk everywhere instead of having to ride the U-Bahn (thats the metro subway systems here).

So after I left off my last post, one of the other girls from my group showed up, Christina. She's the one from University of the Arts in Philly. The other two girls, Deanna and Jessi, who I'm friends with from JMU, had their plane delayed, and delayed, and delayed again, then canceled. Sooooo that sucks. They are flying out tonight and won't get here until tomorrow. So it's just me and Christina for now. She's very nice though and I think we'll get along great. Anyways, she and I took a shiny white new mercedes cab ride to our house :) When we got here we met Maria, she's very nice but really doesn't speak much english. She knows some but it's broken and hard to understand. We figured out that we need to learn some german fast! So as of now I know, "dunka" (sp?) which means thank you, "nien dunka" is what you say to people trying to sell you stuff on the corner haha it mean no thanks, "das waser bitte" means water please, "bitte" is please obvi, and some more small phrases, like "ya" yes and "nien" no. I spent today really working on my pronunciation and learning how to read german phonetically. I think I'll get the hang of some phrases soon enough.

Anyways back to meeting Maria, haha. She is an amazing cook, so we've heard and today she fixed us a lot of food! Surprisingly a lot. She makes everything with fresh fresh ingredients, like you said Mom! We had fresh bread, organic eggs, cheese, salad, she made us soup which we ate around 10pm haha we also had this thinly sliced sausage that we ate on bread like a sandwich sort of with mustard that came in a toothpaste tube haha. I've been trying everything! I told myself that I will not be picky. When in Rome, right?! But yea, I will definitely be eating a lot healthier here haha. I haven't had processed foods since I left America!

So now I'm just kind of hanging in my room with Christina. They have 3 cats and we just found one asleep on my backpack haha! Tomorrow we are going to St. Stephens, or in german, Stephensplatz (pronounced schtefenzplatz) and we are also going to this place called Bregners I think? They sell the sketchbooks and pens that are apparently the best.

Hope to hear from you soon! I want to hear about Prom and the house and stuff :)

xo Julie

Flight + Vienna Week 1, Day 1

Hi Mom, Dad, Tara & Matt,

I made it!! I have not yet been mugged or taken or anything! So yay me! 

So just as a prelude to this 1st post, I wrote the first part while on the airplane this at 10:03pm your time and 4:03am Vienna time. I was somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. The second part I wrote while waiting to go to my host family's house. I'm writing that now and it's about 12:50pm here in Vienna.

Part 1:

I’m writing this from the plane. And as of right now I am not having fun. It’s 10:03 pm in Baltimore and 4:03 am in Vienna and I’m somewhere in between. So far the trip has been ehh.

Mom and Anderson dropped me off at Dulles around 2:30pm, and I stepped out of the car and immediately saw 2 girls from my group! Jena and Cidney. They both just graduated and they’re very friendly so I was glad to be with people I knew from the beginning. We checked in and unfortunately the guy said my carry-on rolly suitcase wouldn’t fit on the plane so I had to check it… ughh. Luckily he didn’t charge me for it. I’ll probably get charged though when I come back if I have to check that bag. Oh well, too late to fix it now. We got through check in and security smoothly, and we were at the gate by 3. I got Starbucks and some decorator magazines and the 3 of us sat to wait at the gate. Gradually more of us showed up, turns out there are 7 of us from our group on my plane. One of the guys, Jacob, got there around 3:15 I guess and he was the one who told me about fixing my phone for Austria. He has an iPhone too and he said that he had to suspend his service with Verizon so that he didn’t get charged for roaming. So I decided to do that too, I just called Verizon and did it over the phone. I’m still going to be billed as usual, but I won’t be able to make calls or text from Vienna (obvi). And at the same time, my phone won’t be searching for service so the bill won’t get jacked up.

We really didn’t have to wait long because they started boarding us at 4:45ish. We got on smoothly and everything and took off fine. The served us dinner which I have never had on a plane and it was really gross looking, but didn’t taste that bad. I tried to fall asleep after dinner, but I somehow managed to end up on the flight filled with toddlers and babies. I can’t fall asleep and I know it will be killing me when I get there tomorrow. I decided to just start this post so that when we get there in a few hours I can just add to it and then upload.

Part 2:

So here's what happened after Part 1, after I put away my laptop and tried to sleep. I attempted to sleep and I think I got about an hour of actual sleep before it started to get light outside. In short the plane ride was miserable. I did not sleep, I was uncomfortable, my back hurt, I was hungry, I had to pee and it was wayyyyyy too long. However, I did learn some things about the girl sitting next to me while we were making our descent into Vienna. Listen to this: she works for the state department, she was deployed to Cosovo for 2 YEARS! she was on her way there and she would not be returning to see her family, boyfriend or friends for 2 YEARS! That's why she was crying most of the time (when she wasn't asleep). Wow... so crazyyy

Anyways, when we landed and got off the plane, we made our way through customs and got our bags (none of mine were lost :) yayy) then we met up with our professor, and the guy leading the trip, Tate. I changed my clothes in the bathroom and got some food (the one hour I was asleep was when they brought around breakfast so I missed it womppp), and we all piled in 2 vans and drove to the American Institute, thats the school where we will be half of the time while we're in Vienna. Since only 7 of us were here, Tate left us and went back to wait for the others flights to come in. Some of the people in our group had their host show up so they went home with them... but I am supposed to wait for the other girls who I'm staying with to get off their plane and we will all take a taxi to our house. So there ended up being 3 of us who had to wait for our rides back to our houses. It was me, this reallly super energetic girl also named Julie and this super awkward, quiet goth girl named Natalie. So we were a sight to see! So the 3 of us decided to kinda meander around the couple blocks around the Institute while we waited. BAD IDEA. Some beggar lady tried to get me to give her my euros and wouldn't leave me alone and I couldn't understand her and that's how i got roped in! Then we were just kind of walking around and i dont know, I felt weird. Like I felt like I needed to have a specific destination instead of jut wandering. I was sketched out! Plus awkward Natalie was weirding me out and it turns out that she is an EXTREMELY picky eater. And she was starving and wanted to find pizza. Really? We're in Austria and you want pizza?? and she said that she doesn't like SAUSAGE. We are going to have problems with her, I know it. 

Anyways, long story short, she and Other Julie's ride came so they left. Now it's just me hanging out by myself and waiting... Apparently the other girls in my house were all on the same flight and it got majorly delayed! So I won't have to wait for them anymore. Now I am supposed to take my own taxi to my house at 2. Which is in an hour and a half. Gahhh! But once I get there, I can unpack and sleeeeep! Thank god! We have no obligations until tomorrow morning. We will meet Tate at 10am and do a random assortment of activities for the day. I'm not sure what. 

I really miss everyone a lot. I’m sad that I won’t be there to move out and say goodbye to our house with the family. I’ve spent most of the trip so far being sad and homesick. But I’m trying to be more optimistic! Since I've gotten here it's been a lot better yet still a little strange. Definitely some culture shock. Brand new white mercedes are their taxis. No lie. It looks just like a normal city except the buildings are all old and gothic and beautiful and the people speak an array of different languages. Anyways, I’ll try to post when I can, all of us are praying we have wifi in our houses, which would be wonderful!

See pictures below! I don't know what building this is but it was pretty!

xoxo Julie

Hi Julie

Does this work?