Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego...

View Taipei, Taiwan in a larger map

Maddie and Christian left for Taipei, Taiwan (north side on the above map) on Sunday. They were joined by Geoff (an old friend) and Danika. They will be overseas for five weeks teaching conversational English to a group of graduate students. Although I am not quite sure what all they will be teaching, I do know that they have to teach the group a skit and a song. And I sure hope they take video of each, as I would love to see that! I hope they teach them "Hollaback Girl" by Gwen Stefani - wouldn't that be great?!

Before they arrived in Taiwan, they spent a few days in Tokyo, and they will spend their last two days in Hong Kong.

My family is comprised of world tavelers...excpet me, the little Iowa hombody! Mom just got back from a week in Ireland, and a week before that she spent three weeks in England in Scottland with Roger, Grandma and Grandpa. Ike, is in Iraq (although not really by choice) but has also been in South Korea and Germany, and traveled a bit from each of those bases. Roger - well he always goes to Taiwan, and about 50 other places during the year, with Mom most of the time. Me...I have been to Duluth, MN, Minneapolis, MN, Chicago, IL...very exotic I know!

Back to Maddie and CKE - I hope they have a wonderful time, and I hope Maddie takes some time to update her blog. (Bring me back to pearls!!)

Do you remember the Carmen Sandiego game/tv show...? :)

More from Memorial Day

These are my cousins Amelia and Gabe. They are visiting the States for a while, taking a break from the concrete village of China. They spent what seemed to be hours feeding Sam and Emily's horses, but they were having fun, the horse were happy, so it was all good!

This is Sam and Emily's dog. Nic and I could have had one of its siblings, but noooo...it was not a hunting dog...! Nic admitted that they were cute and we should have gotten one. Sshhh, don't tell Maia!

Trampoline fun. Oh what fun - especially after a few drinks.

Remember those bunnies I told you about? This is one of the fortunate five that made it out of the massive fire in the last photo. Thank goodness Maddie did not want to take the little fella home. I wonder how they are doing... (one of the families at the party were going to try to nurse them into toddlerhood, or at least that's what they told us!)

My cousin Jake. He is awesome and agreed to run a 25K in September with us!

Med-City Half Marathon & WINNER!

It is now Tuesday, and Maddie and I are both alive - which means we survived the Med-City Half Marathon that we ran on Sunday. We had a very ambitious goal to finish in 1 hour and 57 minutes (9 minute mile pace) and wouldn't you know - we were so close! We stuck to that pace for the first 8 or so miles, and then a few hills got the best of me. We ended up finishing in 2 hours, 6 minutes and 29 seconds - pretty awesome (considering we both got less than 5 hours of sleep!)

You know what we were trying to figure out at every mile marker? Who is going to win our bet? At first, I knew it was going to be Leah, with a guess of 2 hours 2 minutes...but then those hills dang it! As we approached our last 3 miles, we knew Christian had it in the bag. With a guess of 2 hours 6 minutes and 34 seconds, he was a mere 5 seconds off our actual time! Holy Crap! Way to go Christian - spend your $5 wisely!

ISU Graduation

Well, we certainly had a fun time in Ames last weekend! Maddie and Christian [finally] graduated from Iowa State University each with a degree from the College of Design.

On Friday, we all met at The Cafe for a late dinner and drinks. And boy were they needed! The following day, Maddie and Christian had two graduation ceremonies. One for the College of Design and one for ISU as a whole.

Here Maddie is receiving her fake diploma from the College of Design. Sorry CKE - the photo I have of you is totally blurry!

The College of Design ceremony was by far the most interesting/entertaining! It even had its own fire drill!

We were all surprised by a call from Ikey right before Maddie and CKE had to be at the ISU graduation ceremony. Maddie, Mom and I all tried to sneak in a few moments talking to him before: Maddie had to rush to her ceremony, and Mom, Roger, Gma & Gpa had to head back to the TC to catch their flight to England...lucky ducks!

After the ISU ceremony, all of us, including CKE's family headed out to a park for a BBQ! Quite frankly, this was probably one of the most interesting BBQs I have ever been to with a family I hardly knew...

Nic and I ended the night pretending to be in college again...

Fun Fun Times!

Oh the Places You'll Go!

Congratulations Maddie and Christian! You finally did it! You're done with school FOREVER if you so choose! Now it's time for the real world...HAVE FUN! :)