Summer 2012

Hi everyone, I just wanted to post an update on how we are doing.

We had a really great summer which included a long fun road trip to San Diego to visit Maria's family. We stopped in Arizona on the way out there at the Petrified Forest and the kids loved seeing and learning about the beautiful desert landscape and how the petrified wood was formed. We also got to drive next to a brush fire east of LA after driving through the Mojave Desert. Our family in San Diego was so exited to see us and spend plenty of time with us at the beaches there, Sea World, The San Diego Zoo, and a bunch of other local places. We really had such a great time with all the cousins and siblings so it was hard when we had to get ready to head back to Minnesota. When driving back through Arizona we stopped at the Grand Canyon to witness one of the world's greatest natural wonders and had an unforgettable experience. We decided to drive along east right next to the southern rim of the Canyon and the view was spectacular. After leaving the Canyon we drove on through the Navajo, Hopi and Anasazi Indian Reservations. It was very peaceful seeing the vastness of the desert there and the many ranches and native homelands. By the time we reached Minnesota however you can imagine how happy we were to get back to our house and pets and to be able to rest in our own beds again.
The kids and us just really had such a great time and made so many new memories. We still are showing pictures and talking about our many experiences from this trip. Wanna know more? Just let us know and we would love to share more!
Maria

Petric Christmas Photos

Hi everyone!
I just wanted to share some great pictures of our family enjoying Christmas with you all. Enjoy!

Petric Family Christmas 2011 - picture slideshow

It has been quite a while since we posted on this blog but Rastislav and I have decided to keep family updates here as well as our Slovakia updates. This way we can keep things organized for our family and friends. If you would like to see more specific updates or art and craft updates by Maria you can visit her personal blog here. So, happy 2012 everyone. Our latest update is that in 2011 we had a new baby, a little girl named Teresa. She is growing strong and healthy and as of January 26 is 6 months old. We now have 5 children and love every minute that we spend with them. Rasty is the senior Master Technician at IOT where he has been working for the past 7 years. Maria is at home taking care of baby Teresa and getting Nikolas (4) geared up to go to Kindergarten in the Fall. Susanna, Jonah and Mariana all go to L'Toile Du Nord French Immersion School were they speak French all day while learning their other studies. We just had a bunch of work done on our house to waterproof the basement and are still planning on several more projects for the beginning of this year.
Last summer Rasty's parents came to visit us for a few weeks. We had such a wonderful visit with them and had plenty of time to do real all-American things with them like celebrate the Fourth of July and even go to a couple of parades. They really enjoyed themselves but ended up having to leave before the baby was born. This Christmas they sent us a bunch of goodies from Slovakia including chocolate Christmas tree ornaments and homemade Oblatens.
Already this year is in full swing for us and we are busy again with the kids schools, work, knitting and swimming lessons at the YMCA. We love and miss all of our friends and family and always appreciate any contact or visits!! Hopefully we can plan on a little traveling this year to see some of the many people we care about.

Running behind

We apologize for the delay of this post.
We are back safe and sound. The trip back was fine. we will write about it but instead of one big post we will do couple of shorter ones.
After getting back from the castle we finally settled down a bit. Kids were helping Babka and Dedko ( grandma and grandpa) feed animals. I do have to mention that it was quite early in the morning. Sometimes as early as 6am. They fed goats and chicken and then they went to have breakfast. Our taste buds were a bit challenged ( Rasty was used to most of the stuff) some kids handled it pretty well, some not. They also started to get involved in Slovak language.
Along with us there was Rasty's cousin visiting next door with their little son Lukas. The kids had a Lot's of fun together. Babka bought a kids swimming pool so whenever weather permitted they played in water. The weather was OK almost like in MN morning warm, noon hot, and afternoon showers and T-storms. Well this much for now. We will do some more later

Tank you for all your prayers. God's blessing to you all.
We will be posting pictures on our web site soon

Slovakia

Hi everybody, we have arrived. Sorry for the delayed post, we have been a bit busy.

The Tolo reunion was great. It was very nice to see all of the family, meet new people that we knew were in the family but have not met before. We also got a chance to meet some of our Norwegian family. After a first bit cooler day we had beautiful whether and we all got sun burn. We are good now.
The flight from Seattle to London was quite pleasant. Nikolas got to sleep in his own bed. He had sort of a car seat attached to the wall and that’s were he slept. It was a bit harder to Vienna because he had to be on the lap for the whole flight. (2.5 hours) and then we drove over night to Rasty's home town. Came home about 5am and we thought that kids would still go to sleep but NO. They were so excited, went to see all the animals, and start playing outside. Although about 11 am all of us crashed and slept till about 4pm that day. Now we are used to local time.

Over weekend we attended Rasty’s family reunion in Myto. It was also fun to see all of the family members. There were about 133 people all related. The local church was full. We stayed the night in the local hotel that the original building belonged to the family. (we got 20% discount on stay) . From there we did a small road trip to High Tatras and we also stopped at castle Stara Lubovna. It was a lot’s of fun for all of us, especially kids. They loved the castle.

Kids are doing great in communicating with their grand parents. Rasty has to translate a lot but we are also having them to use some Slovak words. We all are having great time.

I would like to thank all of you for all your prayers. We also are praying for you.
Gods Blessing and see you later.

Getting ready to go

Well it's been while since we did an update. so here are some updates on our trip.

First of all, we would like to thank all of you for all of your prayers. Things are coming together for both trips, Washington and Slovakia.
After hours of talking to the passport agency and visiting them personally, today (satureday) we received them in the mail. We needed to expedite them and there is a cost to it by for some reason we did not have to pay for that (Thank you Lord). We only paid for shipping so we could get them before we left. We got confirmation that the car in Slovakia is ready for us. Tickets are ready, now we just have to pray that there will be a seat available on planes for Nikolas. Because he is under two and is not paying full fare price he is not assign the seat. So if there are seats available we might get a sit fot him. If not, he will sit in our laps.
Our dog situation is solved. our friend Lynn will be staying in our house while we are gone. It worked out perfectly. Her rent was up so instead of finding something really fast we offered that she can stay with us and even after we come back and that way she can find something in peace and also help in our need of taking care of our home and pets. Some friends also offered walking London. THANK YOU, THANK YOU.

Rasty has recieved an invitation to share at a camp "KECY" in Slovakia. Its a youth camp that is organized by the youthgroup in Bardejov and its also English speaking camp. That is something that we needed to support our misionary fare. Please pray that God will use him there.

We would like to thank all of you that helped us financially. We really appreciate it and we will be praying for you.
Please keep checking on updates while we are in Slovakia.

Will You Please Feed Me?

For those of you who haven't meet our dear little friend, we proudly introduce London. He is an 11 month old Cockapoo who couldn't be sweeter and more lovable. If you like dogs, or know someone who does, please consider helping us out this summer while we are in Slovakia. Sadly he is one of the loose ends that we haven't been able to tie up yet. Can you believe that no one has volunteered to feed this cutie and walk him while we are gone? If you can help let us know, and tell your friends too! We can afford to pay a reasonable amount for your troubles... (as if he would be any trouble). London is very friendly and lovable, sweet and gentle with kids and just eats up all attention. The only problem is that he get so lonely easily. The ideal situation would be if someone could stay in our home to keep him company or take him to their home while we are gone, however we are getting desperate so people who could do drop by visits at this point are wanted too. It is possible even that some people would be willing to share duties with others. Again if you would like to help, or know someone who would, please let us know ASAP!