Okorn Family

Hi you all !
Just finished reading your posts (since there has been no e-mail recently, for me to find out what's going on) - thank you for the info on the blog pages (I had trouble figuring out how to do a posting, I hope this works.)

Dobrina and Ian, I'm excited about your great news. Congradulations and best wishes for a sucesful and happy forthcomming event. I hope to be with you at the time.

Greg, I bet you are bussy right now with your move and I hope it is not too stressful - I always hated moving, packing, relocating and again setling in. I'm proud of your achievement on the test scores and am sure that you will soon get offers from some outfit close to the DC area. Enjoy your stay at Jaki's in my old room until you find a place of your own, and take advantage of soaking in his hot tub while you are there (be careful of the squirels above).

Jaki and Peter, I know that you will all enjoy being together for the Christmas holidays, and I will see you all later in the year - but this year I am looking forward to seeing some snow (here in Ljubljana) to strugle through on my way to the midnight mass while the church bells are chimming in the cold.

There is still a possibility of my visiting Australia in Jan. or Feb. next year prior to returning to the USA.

Since returning to Ljubljana I have been bussy painting and am now attempting to have a showing. Next week I have an intervue with the person that invited me last spring to have it at her institute. I now have over 20 paintings (aprox. 1.5 x 3 ft in size) that I am not ashamed to show to the public.

My health is good (sorry for the falls alarm) and am doing good on the diet Dobrina put me on.

Love you all always.

Ata.

11 weeks' pregnant

Quick update here: had my first OB appointment yesterday which makes me officially pregnant. :) They did a quick ultrasound in the office (it appears I'm going to have many of those) and I was really surprised by how much the little tots have already changed. 10 days ago they were little gummy-bear shaped creatures, with little arm and leg buds. Yesterday they obviously had arms and legs, hands and feet -- and they were moving around a lot! It seriously freaked me out! To see them moving around so much on the video screen and to think that they are IN MY BELLY, well, it just doesn't seem real. Ian and I were both stunned by how alive and active they were. I guess we're having twins. Holy cow. Big sigh. They are positioned one on top of the other, like bunk beds. Better get used to it! My doctor and I talked about trying to go naturally versus having a planned c-section; I've decided to schedule a c-section which she recommends doing around 37 weeks, which would be mid-May. There are a lot of health advantages to doing the c-section, most of which would affect me later in life (like keeping my uterus from falling out and maintaining the ability to hold my pee); so call me selfish, but those seem like important things! :)
That's all from here; Ian's in San Diego today until Sunday for a conference, so I'm on my own for meals. He spoils me rotten. I had a huge craving for a cheeseburger on Saturday morning and the only place that was open was Denny's -- they actually make pretty good cheeseburgers at 9:30am!!

2 days to go

Hi Everyone,

As I type this, two guys are packing the contents of my house. I suspect I'm going to need a larger storage unit. :( I got one hour of sleep last night; I went to bed at 6:30 this morning, and the packers arrived at 8:10. I was up 'til 6:30 because I've been trying to reduce the amount of junk that I'll be taking with me, so I can reduce the weight and the cubic footage overall. Whatever I've left lying around is being packed, so I was up trying to separate the junk from the useful.

After seeing all the boxes that have been packed so far, I don't think I'll be able to fit it all into a 9x10x20 storage unit - even given the fact that the couches and dining table will go to Jack's. I just asked one of the packers and he thinks otherwise - so maybe the 9x10x20 will be big enough. We'll see. It looks like the forecast is indicating that Wednesday on the east coast is supposed to be dry, so if that holds true, then I'll be driving my pickup down first, and will have it to help transfer some stuff directly from the moving van to Jack's house.

The packer says that the movers will stack the storage unit from floor to ceiling like they do with their trucks, so I hope I've correctly chosen the limited items that are coming down with me else it'll be a nightmare simply trying to reach everything that's in the storage unit. As they're unloading, I'll try to generate a map of the unit to remind me where they put everything.

Can't wait until it's over and I'm finally relaxing with Pete, Jack, and Sophia watching a good show or movie.

Hope to see all of you for Christmas.

Lots of love,
Greg

7 days to go

This week, I'm heeding Dobrina's advice and trying to identify any junk that I really don't need to take with me. There's a lot. I've already gone through the basement and thrown out the obvious junk, and gave away the rest of the useable stuff to my neighbor, but now I need to really investigate all the junk that I've had hiding in boxes that I really don't need to hold onto. Any weight I can eliminate will reduce my moving cost, and any cubic footage I can eliminate will reduce my storage costs.

Still no bites on the house. The website for it has been updated to include interior pictures though, so maybe that'll help generate interest. Here's the site again: http://realtor.com/FindHome/HomeListing.asp?snum=5&locallnk=yes&frm=byzip&mnbed=2&mnbath=2&mnprice=275000&mxprice=300000&js=off&
pgnum=1&fid=so&stype=&mnsqft=&mls=xmls&areaid=03051&poe=realtor&zp=03051&sbint=2&
sorttype=sbint&presort=sbint&typ=1&x=50&y=15&sid=078BED3B115BC&snumxlid=1070152716&
lnksrc=00002

and here's another site for it: http://www.nnerenmls.com/nne/maildoc/d0059U1760.html

More later,
Greg

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TINA !!!!

Hi Tina, Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear Tina, happy birthday to you !!!

And many more ........ ! I love you, and miss you. P

Jack & Sophia Nov 2006 update

Hi all. Just checking in and reading everyone's posts. I was way behind and missed all the posts since July. Wow- some of you have been busy. Glad our family is back on here.

First of all, congratulations Dobrina and Ian on your recent success. I can't believe you took what you call a "short trip" to Spain and just got back. I had no clue you two were even heading out and you are back already. I'm glad you both had a great time and are back safe.

Greg- congratulations on your test. I know those things are scary but you successfully kicked its butt. Way to go bro. I am so happy you are finally making the move to be down here with us. Sophia is very excited too. I hope you are ready to watch a lot of soccer, and play tons too.

Speaking of soccer. Sophia has her all star tournament this month on the 18th and 19th. Also, this weekend we have her end of season soccer party at Stacey's on Saturday and on Sunday we have her 12th birthday party at a roller skating rink in Manassass. November will be quite a busy month topped off with a very thankful Thanksgiving dinner to celebrate family reunited.

Job is fine for now. I am developing training programs for the State Department. The work mostly involves Adobe Photoshop and Macromedia Flash, along with some other lesser known software programs. I like it because the work is new to me. Like Greg however, I need to get back to earning certifications in programming to make sure I am employable in the future.

Well, that is about it for now. Love you all.
Jack and Sophia

Spain

Hello family! Ian and I just returned last night from our whirlwind 7-day trip through Madrid (2 days), Sevilla (2 days), Granada (1 day), and Barcelona (2 days). I'm still struggling with the time change. We flew into Seattle at 9pm but I awoke at 3am and couldn't get back to sleep. Then I was super-busy at work trying to catch up on all the stuff I missed while being gone, and had to see 33 patients! Holy cow! I'm utterly exhausted but wanted to check in with everyone and say hello.
Madrid was just a big working city; not too much to see there outside of the palace and the Prado museum, but we had a great hotel right on the main square of town where all types of rallies were being held. Very in-the-thick-of-it. Also the place i tried my first churros con chocolate -- think "donut tubes dipped in warm chocolate pudding". Yeah, good stuff. The pregnancy, if it indeed continues (as the ultrasound on Friday will confirm), did contribute to a few food aversions and cravings (at least, I'd like to blame the pregnancy), and Ian was a trooper about getting whatever he could to help satisfy me. Spain has a lot of bread and potatoes; I was surprised, actually. I expected a little more spice. It didn't go along with my South Beach diet, so I essentially burped and bloated my way across Spain. What a pretty picture. (By the way, I pulled a Peter by ordering boquerones off the tapas menu -- out came a large plate of tiny little whole fish swimming in oil! Disgusting!)
We headed next to the southern city of Sevilla, which was much quainter and more traditionally
"European old town" with it's narrow, cobblestoned streets, old cathedrals, gardens, more palaces, etc. It was more relaxing and laid-back; we learned a lot about Colombus -- all the Spanish cities have ties to him in some way -- and Ferdinand and Isabelle. We spent a full day in Granada which is known for it's Moorish inner city called Alhambra. That place was gorgeous!! Every surface was covered in intricate carvings or mosaics; all the gardens were lush and filled with water features. It was beautiful. Then we took the night "tren hotel" with our own private two-bunk room on the 12-hr trip to Barcelona. I was able to use a little bit of my highschool Spanish everywhere except Barcelona, where they speak Catalyan first and Spanish second. Barcelona had a TON to see; the whole city is really artistic. There are sculptures and gardens everywhere you look; tons of museums -- and especially interesting one was solely on Picasso's early development as a portraitist and landscape painter before he delved into cubism and then the crazy later paintings. Anyway, we spent our time seeing as much as we could see, exploring/wandering down lots of side streets, eating and drinking constantly, and taking advantage of the afternoon siestas. Seriously, EVERYTHING closes down between 1-4pm (except restaurants). Our only regret was that we didn't think ahead enough to book a soccer game into the itinerary; that would've been cool.
It's 9:15pm and I'm dead-tired. I'm off to bed to see if I can catch up on some sleep. I have my 9-wk ultrasound Friday morning and will post again when I have that news. I hope all is well with everyone!
Dobrina