Where O Where Has This Blogger Been?

Hi, faithful readers!Perhaps you’ve been thinking, “Where’s Ann? This isn’t her usual pattern to let things sit for days on end. Why isn’t she posting?”Or maybe you’re summer-busy with swimming pools and sprinklers, and haven’t really wondered or cared.Well, whether you care to know or not, I’ll explain.I’ve been busy getting ready to go here.Every few years, a big event of some kind is planned among The Belgian Wonder’s relatives, all of whom live in Europe–we’ve attended a few family weddings and one Christmas celebration together. Family reunions are a rare and wonderful treat. When we all gather, it includes 17 cousins (including my kids), six siblings (including The Belgian Wonder) and their spouses (including me) along with Grandma and Grandpa (who started it all)–a big jumble of people related by blood or by law.This time, we’ve saved up to attend the 50th wedding anniversary of The Belgian Wonder’s parents!In just a short time, Lord willing, we should be sitting among the rellies eating Belgian waffles, Belgian chocolate, Belgian fries (frites), dipping freely from jars of Nutella and spreading it on fresh Belgian bread, drinking Belgian coffee…and adjusting to the Belgian greeting (generally a kiss on one cheek), the French language (bonjour!), and the fairly robust euro (in exchange for my puny American dollars).I was telling someone yesterday that the experience is wonderful, but not in a touristy way.It’s about family, not sightseeing. After the 50th celebration, we’ll be spending a lot of time just hanging out and talking while the kids run through a back yard sprinkler…except the yards are tiny and the conversation will be in French.And I’m not fluent.So it gets mentally fatiguing to follow the flow of conversation.But in spite of my linguist limitations, it’s fun to reconnect with everyone and see all those cousins finding common ground with Playmobil and swimming pool antics.My to-do list leading up to this trip, however, has been all-consuming.While there, someone is staying in our house. So we’re cleaning more than we normally would.And we put in a garden, so we’re preparing it to resist major weed explosions while we’re gone.Oh, and it’s VBS week.And a friend unexpectedly flew in from out of town, so I squeezed in a short visit with her.And I’ve been errand-running to pick up wish-list items to distribute to family members.So I’ve been on the go.No computer time available.But I’m dropping in for a few seconds to reconnect with you and thought it would be fun to toss out a cross-cultural quiz:What food items do you think our relatives who have had cross-cultural experiences to America would ask us to bring?To help you out, most of these people placing their requests grew up in Belgium, came to the United States for college, returned to Belgium and married a European. Over the years, most of them have traveled several times to the States with their children to visit.Post your best guess in the comments, and I’ll let you know their requests tomorrow.