Cast is off - almost there

Well Michael was a trooper, but it was painful.  Taking the cast off he was in tears, cleaning the wound--tears again.  Luckily the nurse was nice enough because he said he was supposed to make it bleed when he cleaned it, but he didn't do that to Michael.  Thank goodness!!  The pins were really stuck in his arm and they literally had to twist and pull them out one at a time.  One of the nurses had to hold him down so the doctor could take them out.  It was hard on him and me.  He is now in a splint for two weeks and hopefully after that he will be all done!  Afterward we stopped for a milkshake and then bought him a new toy at the BX.  He deserved it.  I was also introduced to my first Stau (traffic jam).  It took me an hour and a half when it normally takes me 10 minutes.  It was awful and the worst part is I didn't know another way to go.  The other way that I knew was worse.  Note to self, don't drive from Ramstein to Vogelweh at 4:30 in the afternoon.  :-)  Albert finished his first week of school and he said it was fantastic!!!  I am very happy about that!  I can't wait for Michael to start school so I can start volunteering in the classroom.  He still has until 9-10-2012 before he goes to pre-school.  Albert says his favorite part of the day is specials, which include Art, PE, Music, Host Nation and Problem Solving.  He likes all of them so far.  We have another busy weekend planned.  It is a four day, so today we did a few more errands trying to figure a few more things out.  Tomorrow is to get our internet set up for the new house and possibly cell phones and a BBQ, Sunday friends are over and Monday possibly head to see other friends in Wiesbaden.  Only about 10 more days in a hotel!!!  I can't tell you how glad we are going to be when we get into the house!!!  It will be nice to get settled!

Busy Week

Well it has been a busy week.  Poor Michael has been stuck with me running errands but we have found time to play at the park most days and hang out.  He is such a great kid!!!  Albert said school was fantastic yesterday!!!  So I think he is starting to make some new friends.  I have talked to one of the moms in his class and she seems really nice!  I have talked to the teacher a bit more and am liking her more and more, so I hope Albert learns a lot from her!  I am starting to find my way around a little bit.  Good thing too because this morning the GPS ran out of battery and the power source in the car doesn't work so I had to find my way.  LOL  Michael was proud of me!  I am finding a few things for the house already and storing them until we get to move in.  September 10th is our move in date so we are very excited to get settled in and get our stuff back.  Only 2 months being homeless  :-)  We have a four day weekend this weekend, but Albert has school on Friday.  So poor Michael will be on errand detail with us again.  Good news Michael gets his cast off today, bad news is they take pliers and actually pull out the pins, so not looking forward to that at all.  Also I hope I can make it there, last time I tried to get there by myself I got totally lost!  It was funny, but I finally found it.  I am leaving really early that is for sure.  We went and saw a movie over at the Ramstein BX yesterday and it was a really nice movie theatre and cheap!!  I like both aspects.  Michael was scared half way through so we left and then he decided he wanted to go back, it was Paranorman.  Luckily no nightmares last night!  They both slept soundly.  Last night the FRG had a BBQ, so I was able to meet a couple of people (I was a little late) but it was good and there are some nice ladies who are going to see if there is an opening at a German kindergarten in another town that is close by for Michael.  So we shall see, he might be talking German soon!  Then he can teach me :-) 

Al's first day of school

Well we had a little adventure today before school.  I had to take David into work and this was my first day of driving in Germany and I got lost on the way back.  I could find our hotel, but not the entrance into the other side of Vogelweh, so I had to park and have the kids run over the bridge to the school.  Was late, but they were all really nice.  I really like Al's teacher so far!!  She is very inviting, wanting us to volunteer and be in the classroom!!!  He said he had a good day except he didn't make very many friends.  I told  him it would take a little time.  Mikey and I had a good day though, we spent the first part at Al's school doing orientation and then went back for lunch.  After that was wrestling and a tickle fight, which in the middle of that he wacked the bottom of my chin with his cast completely on accident, but it hurt all the way up to my ears.  Oh man that cast is hard.  I can't wait to get it off so I stop getting hurt.  :-)  After that playing at the park, where I still have yet to see many kids out and about.  Back to get Al and then off to get David.  Been a good day.  I also found out that Michael made it into the pre-school on post!!!!!  Yeah!!  I am very excited!!!  It doesn't start till September 10th, but it will start!  It is up in Landstuhl which is about a 15-20 min drive, but it is something.  I think it goes from 8:30-11:30 am.  Tomorrow I get to pick up one of my friend's son to play with us and am very excited!!  I forgot how hard it was to entertain a child all day.  Without Al here to play with it was Mommy time, which I have to say was really nice also!  We haven't gotten a lot of time just the two of us so I am going to make the most out of the next couple of weeks with him!!!!

Weekend number 2

Well our second full weekend in Germany.  It was a full one and not sure where all the time went.  Friday was another errand day, I finally was able to register Al (AJ now wants to go by Al this year) for school which took awhile, checked in at CYS to see where Michael was on the wait list and let the boys play at McDonalds for awhile (do you know they charge if you want more ketchup?!?  I LOVE my ketchup and from now on will have to bring some of my own (LOL), took the boys to downtown K-Town for the first time but wasn't able to spend too much time there and finished it off with dinner at the Millers.   On Saturday we went to a USO function called fun in sun.  It had bouncey castles, face painting, balloon animals, segues, and more.  It was a great time for the boys.  I stood in line after line, but the boys had a blast!!  They even played some sand volleyball, tug of war and Michael really enjoyed listening to the live band.  I will post pictures later, David is downloading our new GPS which I am very excited about!!  We got it today and it is a military edition so it has some features that will be really great!  But back to Saturday.  After about 6 hours there we went over to the Millers for some card playing fun.  We taught them hearts and had a wonderful time playing and laughing.  The boys had a great time too playing Nerf guns, etc. with Austin.  Today we met Amber at the Ramstein BX.   We met them back at Fort Huachuca and it was soooooooooooooooooooo nice to see a friendly face and the boys were soooooooooo happy to play with Asher again.  I was also finally able to meet baby Tristan who is adorable.  We had a wonderful chat and were able to get caught up while the boys played in the play area there!  She lives around an hour away so it won't be our last visit!!!.  Al has his first day of school tomorrow and I think is excited because it is already 10 pm and he is still not asleep.  Neither of the boys are.  They have been laying in bed since 8 pm with lights out.  They have some great staying power, but Mommy will win out.  I just hope it is sooner than later because they are going to be really tired tomorrow when they have to get up early since we have to take David into work before Al goes to school.  Oh the wonderful joys of only having one car.  But soon we will have two, well another month or so before the van arrives, but it will get here.  :-)  David starts a week of training tomorrow and then the week after will start at his office doing his job, at least I think that is the plan as of right now.  We shall see.  But I think he is really glad to be getting back into the swing of things with work.  And I am glad that I will get on some sort of schedule.  Still hoping Michael makes it into the preschool here on post, every place is full but not giving up yet.  I think both he and I will go crazy if he doesn't have something to do.  :-)

We have a car!!!

Another day another thing checked off of our list!!!  David bought a car today.  It is a 1995 Audi A4.  It is a manual which is fun to drive again and it runs great!  It is German spec so only KM/H, etc. which is nice while we are over here.  We were able to get it registered today on post, so we have the plates and everything!!  We are mobile again!!!  Thank goodness! Our great friend's the Millers were letting us borrower their car this week, but it is nice not to inconvenience them also.  We also got the contract signed by the landlord today so I can go and register AJ at school.  Good thing too because school starts on Monday.  Still looking for a place for Mikey to go, on the wait list, but not looking good.  We shall see.  I knew I should have started looking earlier in the spring, but oh well.  I will figure out something.  So one of the pictures I am posting is of Mikey, who wants to be called Michael now, sleeping and his cast is upright, not laying down on the bed.  I thought it was pretty funny!  Tomorrow is David's last day off and then back to the grind for him.  Still not sure the day we get to move into our house, but at least we have one.  The hotel isn't too bad, but it does get small after awhile and the internet can be really, really slow.  A few more things and we should have most things settled I hope.  My van isn't scheduled to be delivered till end of September, but it is getting here soon!  The line for registration and getting your POV is CRAZY!!!  I knew people warned me, but wow, it was quite a line, but not too bad of a process.  It has cooled down here a bit, we are down to the low 80s which is much more bearable.  I have taken the kids to the park the last couple of days to run off some energy.  But it is kind of weird, there are no kids at these parks.  Hard to meet anybody when they stay in their apartments.  Oh well, school is starting and we are thinking about getting AJ into boy scouts.  He is finally old enough to be able to do it!  I am very excited about that.  Oh and found a wonderful German food called a Doenner.  It is YUMMY and they have the shops on every corner!!  Almost like Starbucks in Washington state.  :-)  We haven't been out too much, but will get there.  Now that we have our own car we can go explore a little more.  I guess there is a cool castle in Landstuhl that we want to go see, they have great hiking trails and such (great place when my mom comes to visit to go hiking - hint hint).  Well off to bed hope you are all having a great day!!!!

WE GOT THE HOUSE!!!!

We have great news!!  We got the house we wanted!!!  We just have to get the contract signed by the landlord and approved by housing.  Hopefully we will get that done tomorrow.  It is a three story house that is 3 miles from the DoD school on Volgeweh which is where AJ will be going and 5 miles from David's work.  The neighbors seem nice and we can't wait to move in.  Only problem is we have to wait a little bit.  The house won't be ready until mid September, but that is okay, at least we have it and don't have to look anymore.  Another great thing, David and I both passed our driving test!!!  We are now legal to drive in Germany!!!  Next step is to get a car.  David has been looking and a couple of good prospects, but nothing so far.  He is aching to get one so we can get ourselves places we need to go.  We signed the boys up for CYS and AJ's school is tomorrow now that we know were we are going to live.  He starts school on August 27th.  I am still looking for a school for Mikey.  Keep your fingers crossed I find something for him.  :-)  Other than that we are just finishing up in processing.  Once we get into the new house I will post pictures.  It has been HOT here.  They don't believe in air conditioning and it has been 98, 92, and 93 with humidity and not cooling down much at night.  I feel like I have been sweating for three days straight now.  Even going to Ramstein BX where they have AC, it was hot and sweaty.  Hopefully it will cool down here soon, at least a little bit.  It is so hot we can't even go to the park and no swimming yet since Mikey still has his cast on.  But soon! 

First full weekend

We had a busy weekend.  On Friday we went to housing to check to see if we were on the list and how long the wait time is.  For David's rank we are guaranteed a 3 bedroom townhouse.  So we are thinking about moving on post later.  The wait is about 5-7 months right now.  Then we took Mikey for his check up on his arm.  They said it looked great!!  They did take off the old cast and put a new one on.  I got to see the pins that were sticking out of his arm.  I didn't realize to get the pins out the just grab and pull.  So not looking forward to that because I know it will hurt.  On a good note, Mikey got a new cast and it is now camo and he loves it!!!  He will get his cast off and pins removed on August 30th.  I do have to say that cast does not slow him down a bit.  He was up on top of the monkey bars climbing, I think he is trying to give his mom a hard attack.  :-)  After that, we were able to see our good friends Vickie and Zachary!  Vickie and I had a great time chatting while the boys were playing away.  It was great to see a familiar face!  On Saturday we went and looked at another house and we LOVE it!!!  We are trying to get it and the current tenants are trying to help us get it.  So please pray and keep your fingers crossed that we get it.  It is in a great area, 3 miles from Vogelweh (where AJ will go to school) and there is a German Kindergarten right next door for Mikey if I can get him in.  And the house is perfect!!!  I will let you know how it goes.  We also looked at a few cars for David and did a little back to school shopping.  School starts Aug 27th and we have to get AJ enrolled tomorrow so he can start on time.  Last night we had a BBQ at our good friends the Millers, and then the adults went off into town and checked out a live band at one place in K-Town and then went to a quiet bar and played some pool.  David and I had our first shots called Applecorn and they were yummy.  I even beat the boys in pool a couple of games.  :-)   Only because they scratched on the 8 ball, but I will take it :-).  David and I are going to take our driving test tomorrow, so prayers please--we really want to pass the first time and be able to get a car to make things a little easier. 

Thursday

Well another day and few more things accomplished.  Yesterday, the boys and I spent about 6 hours for a commissary trip.  I know a long time but most of it consisted of playing at parks (found a really, really cool one!!!) and having a treat at Burger King.  The commissary is only about a mile walk, but it is nice to break it up and they were having so much fun!!  Good news is they didn't wake me up this morning, but were up when I came out at 6:30 to go running, which is totally fine with me!  I actually let them stay up way past their bedtime tonight because they were actually awake for once!!!  :-)  Well 9:30 pm so maybe not way past!  :-)  So we shall see how tomorrow morning goes.  I am keeping my fingers crossed because I don't have to be up for anything tomorrow.  David and I went to our orientation class for driving and are going to take the test on Monday, keep your fingers crossed for us, we really want to pass so we can get a car!!!  Have met some wonderful people so far and everybody is so willing to give us advice on many different things which has been fantastic!!!  Have to get the boys registered at CYS still so I can get Mikey into preschool.  I will get there!  On a good note our unaccompained goods are already here even if we don't have any place for them yet.  The weather has been great!!!  Sunny skies and around high 70so low 80s, a little humid, but not bad at all.  We are finding all the parks within walking distance, even if they do complain on the way home.  This will make them thankful when we get a car!  Michael was a little sad today because he said he doesn't have any friends here but I told him that he would soon have lots of friends!  So I am on the hunt for kids their age around here.  The people in the hotel stay to themselves a lot, but I know I will find a few.

Happy Anniversay

Today David and I have been married for 13 years.  This is our first anniversary together in 3 years, so that was nice.  It seems like just yesterday we walked down the aisle in East Wenatchee.  What a fun wedding it was!!!  I figure next year we will be all settled and maybe celebrate in Paris or something!!  We didn't do much, just looked at a possible house.  It is one that we really like and the landlord would like to meet us this Saturday to make sure we are all on the same page.  The boys actually stayed up till 7:30 pm today so here is fingers crossed that they will sleep past 3:30 am.  I am getting really tired getting up that early, we shall see.  Tomorrow we are looking at another house, just to see if we like it better or not.  We found out our unaccompanied goods are already here so that is good, they will just have to stay in storage until we get a house.  I hope the car will get here quickly also.  We are hoping to be able to take the test next week so we can start looking for a car for David.  Then at least we will have one to drive around in. :-) 

Day 4 of Jet Lag

Well the last two nights didn't seem to get better with the boys.  They just can't quite make it to bed time when they get up at 3:30 am.  Yesterday they fell asleep around 4pm and we really tried to wake them back up, but to no avail.  Maybe today, I will keep my fingers crossed.  David and I went house hunting yesterday, we saw three different houses and one might be a possibility.  It was really funny, one of the landlords found out that we had children--he told me the house was too dangerous for them.  I guess I really didn't want that one any way.  LOL I had heard that some landlords over here would rather you have pets than children.  But the other landlords were nice and one house was nice and central with a couple of good parks within walking or biking distance.  So we shall see, we were told if we like something we have to jump on it quickly or it will be gone.  David goes back to work today, he will start in processing.  I can say that I really can't wait till we can get a car back.  I need to get a doctor's appointment for Mikey's arm and the taxi will be nice an expensive for that.  It is the little things you don't think about.  Mikey is doing really well though, he is climbing, jumping and playing--making Mommy nervous trying to break the other arm.  But I am glad it isn't slowing him down.  Our good friend Kevin came down on Sunday from Stuttgart and it was great seeing him.  He also took us to the Ramstein BX and oh my gosh!!  It is HUGE!!!  It is bigger than the mall in Sierra Vista and East Wenatchee.  It has four screens at the movie theatre and plays each movie like three times a day.  There are movies playing all week.  It is really cool!!  It is only about 15 minutes away also.  I did notice in the commissary that I can't get everything that I am used to back in the states.  I will have to figure out different options.  They have most everything so far, even Tree Top apple juice!   I am sure we will get into a grove with everything here soon.

2nd night of jet lag

So I kept both of the boys up all day so they would sleep last night.  Well it didn't seem to work as well as I would have hoped, Mikey woke up at 12:30am and was hungry.  So after a smorgasbord of food, he finally went back to sleep at 2am and so did I.  then at 4:00am AJ decided it was time to get up.  I really hope that this is almost over.  Lucky I went to bed around 8:45pm and was out like a light, but man these boys are trying to keep me with a lack of sleep  :-)  We are hoping to do some house hunting this week.  Mikey has already been asking when we are getting a home.  Luckily we have a hotel that is a one bedroom suite with a full kitchen so that is really wonderful!!!

First day in Kaiserslauten

Last night David and I went in to Kaiserslauten for the first time with two friends Jen and Jeff.  We had a great time walking around the town and not even seeing an eighth of the town.  It is HUGE and all walking, no cars allowed in the "platz" or square.  It made me also realize how much I need and want to learn German.  There are some who speak a little English but I want to be able to converse with them in German, in time I know I will.  There were also a ton of street performers.  There was one that was riding around in a bed, one in a baby carriage, a parade of people in all sorts of costumes marching to drums, a clown that had the crowd drumming and clapping, and more.  There is one of the oldest churches in town that is still in use.  That is one thing, I love the architecture and we haven't even scratched the surface.  David tried some brats and loved it and I had some of their tea.  I can't wait to get some of their fresh bread, etc... it smelt sooooo good!!!

Start of the adventure

We have now landed in Germany, the flight went really well except that nobody slept.  The last 30 minutes Mikey's arm and ears hurt really bad and when the wheels hit the tarmac he fell asleep.  He continued to sleep through everything, moving from one place to another, etc.  We finally made it to our hotel about 1 pm German time and some wonderful friends that David worked with at Fort Lewis invited us to dinner.  It was really nice to not have to cook.  Only problem is both boys slept most of the day and we did not.  So when it came time to go to sleep at 10 pm the boys weren't ready, but Mom and Dad were!  So we tried, they woke me up at 11:30, 12:30 and AJ woke me up again at 3:30.  That is when I gave up and AJ and I got up and he watched TV and I got a few things done.  We are settled into our hotel and David starts in processing on Tuesday.  We are going to try and look at some houses soon so we can find a permanent place to reside.  We are glad to be here and hopefully the jet lag won't last too long.  The boys I think are as glad to finally be here as we are. I am going to try and update this blog as much as I can.  When we start traveling I will make sure to post and tell you all about our adventures!!!  Hope everybody is having a great weekend!!!