Farewell to the Hoopdis

Today we took the cars over to Peter’s to see about selling them. There was a couple there--with a little kid--who arranged to buy Guitarman’s. That was fast!

Mine didn’t go today but hopefully will before Guitarman leaves. Wow, it’s weird to think that our time here will be done soon. I know there are things I will miss about being over here. But I’m excited to get home, especially with Schatzi coming. I think I’d be a bit nervous delivering here. With the complications we had with Wee Laddie it’d make me pretty nervous to have that language barrier to worry about.

The Cake of Pure Evil

We were maybe going to have some play time with Starfruit & Cutiebug today but, after 2 days in a row without a nap, Wee Laddie woke up at 6 am. Ugh. And since he was in a time-out before 8:30, I decided this was not such a good day to try it.

We went to meet Guitarman for lunch (he was on shift the last 2 days so couldn’t eat with us). Wee Laddie was happily eating his kuppelkuchen (some kind of German cake) when he suddenly announced he didn’t like it and wasn’t going to eat it. Huh?? Then he started acting a little weird, like he had a bad taste in his mouth or something. Then he’d put his hands over his ears, then out to the side and shake them. We tried to get him to eat/drink something to get rid of the taste he didn’t like but that didn’t seem to work. Then his face started turning red and he got some welts on his chin & cheeks. Aha, allergy of some kind. Then he puked.

So while Guitarman went & helped him rinse his mouth out, I went to find out what was in the cake so that we can avoid it in future. Took a little while ‘cause they get their cakes at a local bakery so they were calling to find out but could only get the answering machine. Their baker said it was chocolate Bisquick and buttercream, which sounds so innocuous (and like something Wee Laddie had likely had before) but then they said also hazelnuts and marzipan. He may have had almond before but I don’t think he’s ever had hazelnuts. I’ll have to ask the pediatrician about it when we get back. I’d like to actually know if he’s allergic, but that seems best tested at the doctor’s office in case anything goes wrong.

It was a little scary, as I kept worrying about his tongue swelling up or him having an anaphylactic reaction. (*see update below) He had one allergic reaction to something once before but I don’t remember the circumstances... and I think we decided it was a contact allergy.

Anyway, I thought we’d best hang out on base in case we needed to head over to the clinic, so we went to the ACS (Army Community Services... they're the ones I've been facilitating the sign language class through) offices to say our goodbyes. Wee Laddie seemed to get back to his normal self pretty quickly. So we chit-chatted with our friends over there for a bit & took a few photos to remember people by. I figure that’ll help Wee Laddie adjust since the photos of people from back home seemed to help him so much while we’ve been here.

*Update: Turns out that this reaction actually was an anaphylactic reaction. Contrary to the popular notion that it always involves compromised breathing, anaphylaxis simply means that it's a severe allergic reaction, often involving more than one body system. And since he had vomiting (GI) and hives (skin reaction), that means two systems. We are lucky that the reaction didn't get any worse. The ones that come on fast like that sometimes get dangerous very quickly.

Last Kids’ Club

Today was our last Kids’ Club and we said our goodbyes to Jeannette and Ashley. I have sort of mentioned to a few others, just in passing, that we were leaving but we certainly didn’t make a big production out of it. Partly ‘cause there aren’t many people that we’re that close to... partly because this population is so transient anyway that it would feel weird to call attention to it.

I've been taking some pics around the base. Not sure if that's legit or not--security issues and all--but I want to have a personal record of it (I won't be posting those anywhere) so I can show Wee Laddie when he's older in case he remembers any of it. But he's starting to get annoyed and doesn't want me to take pictures of certain things. Like the gym where they have Kids' Club. Not sure what's up with that.

We did also pop into Kristen’s office to say goodbye. She’s one of the first people I met when we first got here... her son, Ben, is a year older than Wee Laddie and we were all at Hotel Yogurt together back in January.

Today was the 2nd day in a row with no nap. 15 minutes in the car doesn’t count, despite what my son might try to tell you.

Strawberries in December

Went back to the Weihnachtsmarkt in Nurnberg… this time with Starfruit (this is the moniker she suggested for herself, by the way) and Cutiebug. It was very fun. We did a little bit of actual shopping then played around at the Kinder Weihnachtsmarkt.

Starfruit took this first picture.





And here's Starfruit and Cutiebug.



Cutiebug was quite enamored of the fabulous strawberries I bought. The whole way home in the car she kept asking, “Mo’ tawbay, peese?” (More strawberries, please?) It was adorable and I’m quite impressed by her full sentences, Little Miss One-and-a-Half. It got dark while we were driving home and Wee Laddie started playing a Peekaboo game with Cutiebug to entertain her. And himself, of course. Those two are very cute together.

Definitely gonna miss them.

Lifestyles

After this experience, I have decided that it is a far bigger adjustment to go from city living to rural living than it is to move to a foreign country. (I’m sure that’s not always true, but it is as far as moving from the US to Western Europe.) The truth is that the lifestyle differences are more of an issue for me than the language barrier. I mean, you can get quite a bit accomplished just on gestures and smiles and a friendly attitude.

The big problem for me, here, is how to entertain my son. Sure, we’ve got all the playgroups & stuff but we do the same stuff week after week. After week. And as fun as they are, they get old. I used to be able to pop him in the car on a rough day and just run over to the Children’s Museum to let him run around for a couple of hours. Or we could meet some friends at the zoo or a play area somewhere. I just don’t have those resources here and it’s very wearing sometimes.

The New Tenant

I’m a little sad about leaving Germany. This part of it is clearly not for us, despite the fact that it’s lovely, the local food is great and the people have been incredibly friendly. I still think we might have had a totally different reaction had we been living nearer a big city. And there are a few people from here that we will definitely miss. Not many, but a few. Hopefully we’ll be able to stay in touch with these people and maybe reconnect geographically sometime in the future.

A woman came to look at our house tonight. She was here with another woman who appeared to be her assistant, as she was doing a lot of “ma’am”ing. She seemed to really like the house and is planning to call the housing office tomorrow. Get this: It’s going to be just this one woman living here. She’s a GS employee and apparently gets a really large housing allowance. This place seems pretty big for the three of us, since Wee Laddie can ride his bicycle and/or motorcycle around in the living room... it seems enormous for just one person!

Wee Laddie too a reeeeaaaalllllly long time to fall asleep. Maybe he’s anxious about the move? (It probably was weird for him to have someone looking at the house and us talking about her living here.) Maybe I need to re-think the nap thing. I should do a nap log to see if no-nap days are always quick-to-sleep nights.

I scheduled a hair appointment for right after we get home. I’ll have to wait to see about an OB appointment. We’ll still be on the out-of-network insurance until Guitarman’s back at his old office, so the coverage will be weird.

Nürnberg Weihnachtsmarkt

Went to the Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas market) in Nürnberg. Before Guitarman and I moved here, we’d read about these markets and planned to one day take a holiday cruise down the Danube and stop at all the markets.

I didn’t do a good job of looking up directions or anything online, so we totally lucked out that my randomly selected GPS destination was pretty close to the whole thing. There’s a little artisans’ market in one section,



then a few blocks away is a Kinder Weihnachtsmarkt with carousels and things in addition to booths with gifts, ornaments, food, etc. Then there’s the main section, the Kristkindlemarkt. They were all absolutely JAMMED with people! We took the stroller in case Wee Laddie got tired of walking (or if we needed it to keep track of him in the crowd), so that made navigation a little tough. It was too insane to actually shop, so I’m hoping to go back during the week to get a few little things.

We also completely lucked out with the weather. It’s very grey here and has been raining & snowing pretty often lately. We felt a couple of sprinkles, but did not actually get rained on. Hurrah! It wasn’t even actually that cold, although we were pretty well bundled up. Not that Wee Laddie looks like it here:



I decided that I just couldn’t be here at a Christmas market, in Germany, and NOT try Gluhwein. It was different than I expected. I was expecting it to be cinnamony, but it was more of a fruity/sweet taste. Maybe that’s just ‘cause I got the Heidelbeere (blueberry) kind. But now I can look up online how to make it and that can be one of my “life souvenirs” from our time here.

Thanksgiving, part Deux

When Wee Laddie woke up this morning he was talking about a dream he’d had with a fire alarm at the movie theater. (Fire alarms have been a frequent topic of conversation around here since this one and this one at the PX in Graf.) And he said that his mommy got him out, but I wasn’t his mommy in the dream. So I told him that dreams were weird that way. It’s incredible to me to have someone this age be able to talk about his dreams and kind of understand (at least by appearances) that they’re just stories in your head and not things that really happened.

In the late afternoon we went to Charlie and Telise’s for a late-Thanksgiving/early-Christmas dinner. It was lovely and Telise did the whole thing... turkey, stuffing, potatoes, the whole shebang. Yum.

She also gave us a copy of her painting of Wee Laddie, which is just such an awesome thing to have. What a treasure.

Best Playroom Ever

Went to play in Cutiebug’s playroom this morning. The original plan was the aquarium (Sea Life) in Nürnberg but they’re closed for relocation. Starfruit looked into a couple of play areas that looked really fun, but neither one opens ‘til like 2pm. And that doesn’t fit with nap schedule for any of us.

Happily, Wee Laddie loves Cutiebug’s playroom as she has practically every toy known to man in there. (And here I’ll mention that Starfruit told me she’s a bit embarrassed at my descriptions of the playroom and feels that she should clarify that most of those awesome toys were gifts or purchased secondhand. In other words, she’s not insane.) They played with some doctor toys and the kitchen for a bit, then they painted and played with Play-doh. Fabulous time.





After playtime we all went to Hotel zum Hirschen for lunch. Yum again. I tried the Wienerschnitzel this time (which was, indeed, very good) and Starfruit had Käsespätzle and we shared. And split with the kids, who both ate very well. And we still had food left over. Oh, don’t get me wrong... I’d have gladly chowed down on the rest of the Käsespätzle if not for the carb counting and the fact that I’d also had a small amount of the Bratkartoffeln (potatoes). My blood sugar was a beautiful 112 after an hour. (I thumb my nose at my goofball doctor.)

The Baby is How Big??

Another OB appointment today. It’s sort of weird to get an ultrasound every time. We ended up with another arm shot, ‘cause Schatzi really seems to enjoy facing backwards. He’s head-down now... facing a different way than Wee Laddie was when he was in there.

My belly seems absolutely HUGE to me (and, apparently, to Wee Laddie and Guitarman), but I’ve only actually gained 3.2 kilos (7 lbs, for those of you who are metrically challenged like me) so far.

The doc seemed concerned that Schatzi is growing too fast, and she made it pretty clear that she doesn’t believe me about my blood sugar numbers. That sort of ticked me off, as I take the health of my children very seriously. (It was Wee Laddie whose tiny presence got me to quit smoking, after all, and I also managed my blood sugar well with him.) I don’t get it, ‘cause my numbers have been really good. Like my one-hour readings are often lower than the goal for two hours after eating. I’m hardly eating any bread products at all and have been eating lots of salads and smaller portions of everything. I’ve had a few high readings in the past week, but other than that I usually get like 1-4 high readings per week (testing 4x a day). The doc was predicting a 10-pounder and telling me that not taking care of this now can lead to him having problems with diabetes later in life. So then she looks at the graph again and realizes she’s marked it on the wrong week... and says, “Oh, that’s not bad.” Grrrrr. Because at this point I’m all friggin’ stressed out about it (still, frankly, even though now she’s saying it’s okay… ‘cause I don’t know if she means REALLY okay or just semi-okay) and questioning whether or not I’m testing correctly or if there’s something wrong with my glucose meter. I’ll be so happy to get back to my regular doc.

After the doc, Wee Laddie and I ran over to Laaber to pick up Christina and Oliver and the four of us went to IKEA. I broke one of our bowls the other day and wanted to replace it before we leave. So we had lunch there and did a bit of shopping. Of course, they didn’t have the bowl I need. They have a similar one, same shape and very nearly the same color but it’s not exact. And they wouldn’t let me take the display bowl that WAS the right color ‘cause they’re getting more shipped in. Sometime. I’ve no idea when. Or how annoying it’ll be to replace one stupid bowl. And I should just let it go, but I suspect it’ll bug the crap out of me every time I look in the cabinet and realize that we only have 5 bowls but 6 of everything else. Like the spoon from our silverware set that went into the garbo. Still bugs me and it’s been like 7 years.

Weigh, not Organized

The movers came this morning to do an estimate of the weight of all of our stuff. Wee Laddie and I had Total Mom so Guitarman came home from work to meet with them. We are semi-organized, but there’s still lots to do. I guess it wouldn’t actually be horrible if things went as they are now... it’ll just simplify things a lot once stuff is in storage if we can get it more organized. I’m working on it in bits & pieces (partly so it doesn’t bog me down too much, partly ‘cause that’s kind of my only option what with a toddler to entertain).

Guitarman had a software group dinner tonight, so it was just me & Wee Laddie for the evening. Nap got off to a very late start, so we weren’t even back up until 6pm. (I usually wake around 5:30... must’ve been tired today.) We got up & had dinner and then I put him back into bed!

Aztec Dancers

To celebrate Native American Heritage Month, they had an Aztec dancing group perform in the movie theater on base. I’ve been waiting for it for weeks, so I was pleased to be able to take Wee Laddie to see it.

I was a little disappointed that a) there was only one dance demonstrated and b) the dancing portion was only about 20-30 minutes long… the rest was Q&A (but they didn’t tell us that, so we waited around a bit ‘cause there was a woman there in a dance shawl so I thought she might dance). Other than that it was great! And, frankly, I thought it was kind of cool that they even had something a little more esoteric than the kinds of dancing you might see on TV or whatever. This seemed even more culturally rich, in a way. Wee Laddie enjoyed it very much…up until the Q&A part, not surprisingly.

Oh, the Basement

Spent part of today working on getting things organized in the basement. I’d really like to be able to find things a little easier than I have been able to do over here. “I feel sad,” Wee Laddie told me. We’ve talked about how it probably seems scary since he doesn’t remember what it was like when we lived in Denver before. So I tell him that we’ll be able to see his Grandma-Grandma and his Denver cousins all the time. We’ll be able to go to museums and on playdates with our friends. I think he’ll be really happy there when he realizes how many more people we’re connected to there, but it is kind of hard to watch him feeling sad about it.

I finished the scarf Wee Laddie asked me to make for him and he wore it all day. :) Baby Spunky now seems to be his lovey. He’s been calling it a baby reindeer.





Tonight was my last German class. That was kind of sad, too. That class was probably the most connected I’ve felt to something that’s not connected to the base. At least our teacher is German! And at least the class isn’t only people from base. And I finally got to find out what Wee Laddie’s polizei (police) car says:
“Zentrale, bitte kommen.” (Central, please come.)
And something about “Verrückter Fahrer, um die ______” (Crazy driver going the wrong way.)



Note: Since I'm posting this so much later than it actually happened, I don't have my notes on what the car actually says. We tried to decipher it the other day and I managed to remember some and was able to look up some. But I posted it anyway.

Another Fire Alarm??

Ugh, more crappy weather here in Bavaria. I have this idea I’m working on that has something to do with illustrating just how crappy the weather is here. When I get it done, I’ll come back here & make a link to it or something. But seriously. It’s grey here pretty much all the time. Today there was a bit of blue sky and Wee Laddie looked up and exclaimed, “Oh no! The white is going away!”

We made another trek up to Graf and there was another fire alarm! I was waiting for our food (yes, of course, Taco Bell) and the alarm went off. So we all trooped outside to wait. Fire truck came again and the firefighters went inside. Not sure what happened, but it wasn’t long before we were allowed back in. I went up to get our food and gave them the receipt so they could see what we had. While they were working on that, the alarm went off a 2nd time! Ack. They rushed over to give me my food. I’m like, “What am I supposed to do with that?” They, not realizing that 1) I have a toddler and 2) I do not enjoy eating my food outside, standing up, in the cold, thought that I’d just take it & eat while we were waiting. Um, no. But I forgot to get the receipt. Luckily, the wait to get back in was even shorter this time, and our tray was still on the counter when I went back in. So I just took it & we went and sat down. Poor Wee Laddie is going to think there’s always a fire alarm when we come up here.

I’ve been thinking about the expat Thanksgiving and I realize that I’m a bit envious of the other expats. Don’t get me wrong, I’m looking forward to going home. But I’m kind of sad about feeling that way. This was supposed to be our grand adventure, our new way of life, our chance to be European for a while… to learn a new language and have our son get some great language learning in a foreign place. And that’s not at all what happened. I’m envious that these were couples who were both happy to be here, both learning the language and experiencing & enjoying the culture and who will probably spend more years here. We’ve talked about Germany for so long (and I’ve wanted to live somewhere in Europe for so long) that it’s kind of like giving up on a dream.

Best Seat in the House

Wee Laddie loves to watch TV like this...

Early to Rise

Wee Laddie woke at 5:45 am, after not falling asleep until nearly 10 pm last night. It doesn’t happen often that he gets up that early, but it always makes me wonder why my husband hasn’t gotten tired of co-sleeping yet. Don’t get me wrong, I like the co-sleeping, too. To a point. I suspect that we’d be making better progress with the nighttime potty training (the pooping in the diaper every night thing, I mean) if we had Wee Laddie in a bed with a plastic mattress. Like, say, the toddler bed phase of the convertible crib we bought… which is set up in Wee Laddie’s room, but goes largely unused. Especially since he usually now sleeps on the air mattress when he goes to sleep in his room (which is every night nowadays). Aaaanywho...

This morning while we were getting ready to meet Starfruit and Cutiebug for swimming, Wee Laddie fell on our stairs. Thankfully, he didn’t fall all the way down...but it scared the crap out of me anyway. He was trying to bring the broom upstairs and I have no idea what happened, as I was in the bathroom getting ready. I saw a flash of something (broom handle probably) and then heard the bumps. I came running out and he was lying about halfway down the stairs (just starting to cry) with the broom on top of him. God, how I hate these stairs. I will not miss them.

Now we went swimming despite my hesitations about it after last night’s lack of sleep. Lesson learned. Wee Laddie kept throwing toys no matter how many times I asked him to stop. He got a time-out-of-the-pool (sitting on my lap watching everyone else have fun) twice, and once I just took him back into the locker room while I decided what to do. One time-out was for not listening when I was calling his name (the circumstances were that he was headed down the steps into the big pool… I got to him JUST as his head went under!), the 2nd was for pulling Cutiebug down in the baby pool. (I know he didn’t mean to endanger her or anything but since we’d just had an issue with him grabbing her and them both falling plus the whole fact that it’s dangerous for him to do that in the pool, I felt I had to let him know that it IS actually a big deal.) And then he threw yet another toy… and we made our locker room trip. We ended up coming back out to have lunch and went home after that. I’d thought about trying to swim again after lunch but Wee Laddie wasn’t listening to me during lunch either and I’d told him that maybe we could swim again if he listened really well during lunch.

On the way home, he fell asleep… a bit too soon, as I’d feared. We got home right around the 20-minute mark. Our neighbor was out using the log-splitter for his enormous pile of firewood, Wee Laddie woke as I was loosening the car seat strap and was looking at the neighbor when I got him out of the car, so I thought it was all over. Took Wee Laddie upstairs and snuggled up and took slow, deep breaths right next to him… and (wonder of wonders!) he fell right back to sleep.

Sometimes even the strongest fighters succumb to the lure of a good nap.

The Expat Thanksgiving

I think I've only been away from home for 3 Thanksgivings. The first was during my student exchange to England during high school. The People-to-People group (their part of the Sister Cities Int’l group) threw us a Thanksgiving dinner which I find very funny, since it seems almost an anti-England holiday. The second was just a few years ago when Guitarman and I went to visit his parents in Florida for the holiday. And then this year.



We had a very lovely dinner at Christina’s. It’s an annual tradition for them to invite local Americans & other assorted friends to the Expat Thanksgiving Dinner. It was an interesting collection of people... about 1/2 American and about 1/2 other, I’d guess. I had a nice chat with the German neighbors, who were talking about how Germany doesn’t really have an equivalent holiday with a celebration & food and all of that. They seemed to really enjoy our holiday.

And the food was fabulous. Everyone brought a dish to share. And far from being a replica of all of the traditional American Thanksgiving foods (green bean casserole, sweet potatoes with marshmallows on top) it was a fantastic spread of all sorts of international flavors. Yum. The stuffing was made with apples & sage, for example. I brought a curry-butternut squash soup that was yummy. I overheard a couple of remarks about it, one of which was a wife to her husband, “Here, you’ve got to try this soup,” which was followed by a brief chat about how he’d have never thought to put cilantro with it but that it really worked. So yay me. Or rather, yay Allrecipes.com.

I’ve learned that my kid is a natural problem solver. Ok, I already knew that. But isn’t it much more fun when I make it seem like you’re along with me on this journey of learning fun things about my son? Remember, he's just shy of 3. Anyway, he was trying to get a container of toys through the baby gate but it wouldn’t fit. So he tries again and still no luck. So he slides the container up to the top of the gate and reaches over to grab it. Genius, I tell you. ;)

Cutiebug's Playroom

We were invited to spend the morning in Cutiebug’s playroom. Wow, I thought we had a lot of toys! It’s amazing. She’s got a kitchen, a medical cart, a Bob the Builder workbench. And all the toys that go with each. An art table & chairs. Playdoh tools, paint, toy food, scarves, books. Just a ton of stuff, really. The kids had a wonderful time.



After playtime we went to have lunch at Hotel Gastof zur Post. I would definitely recommend it if you need a place to eat in Velburg. The food was good and the waitstaff was very nice.

We were letting the kids kind of walk around in our section (we were the only ones back there). There was one section of floor that was higher than the rest and Wee Laddie and Cutiebug were right by the edge there and I think Wee Laddie was trying to snuggle Cutiebug or something and he fell and pulled her right down with him and she bonked her head on the edge. Ugh. I felt horrible, he felt horrible and Cutiebug felt pretty horrible, too, although for a completely different reason. And she ended up with this big goose egg on her head. :( Forehead, of course. And right before they’re getting some professional pictures done. Of course.

This evening after nap, I went to the commissary solo to get a few things for my contribution to the expats Thanksgiving “do” at Christina’s. I really like shopping in the local stores and it would’ve been more convenient timewise except that I don’t know that they’d have everything I needed (and I know they don’t have frozen waffles, which are worth their weight in gold to my son). Plus it’d probably have cost a small fortune.

When I got home, Wee Laddie came over and hugged me around the legs and said, “I’m glad to see you.”

Friends & the Almighty Dollar

Went for lunch with Christina and her little Oliver to Hotel zum Hirschen. Even though we don’t eat there often, I will miss that place. I miss the Käsespätzle already. After we’re home and I’m able to be off the gestational diabetes diet, I am going to have to start doing some research and trying to replicate that meal. I’m not a “signature meal” kind of gal, really, but for that meal? For that meal maybe I’ll become that kind of gal.

Anyway, it was a nice lunch. Everything’s starting to have that “last time” feel to it. (Have I said that already?) We will see Christina & Oliver again, as we’re going to their house for the Expat Thanksgiving Dinner, but that may be the last time.



We went to Möbelhof after lunch and Wee Laddie was admiring the sling Christina was using to carry Oliver. When we got home, Wee Laddie used a pair of pants as a sling to carry Baby Spunky. And he was carrying him around in his jacket like this:



And the dollar is now worth .6535 euro. Ouch.

Wiggly Worm

Our little Schatzi is getting really wiggly. I love to feel him moving around in there. :) I know some women don’t really enjoy pregnancy so much... I love it. Parts of it suck, sure, but it’s just such an amazing time. I feel so lucky to be able to experience it.

In German class, we’re still working on past tense (vergangenheit… How’s that for an easy word?). It’s hard, but I’m glad I chose to keep working on my German even though we’re leaving soon. It makes me feel like I’m taking a bit more out of this experience to have at least tried to learn some of the language.

Wee Laddie didn't want me to go to class tonight and was really clingy at bedtime. He wanted Daddy downstairs & me by the computer (just outside of his room). We usually switch off, so this is Guitarman’s night to be upstairs. Sometimes we indulge Wee Laddie, sometimes not.

Big Belly Goes Shopping

Went to the big PX today for our usual Taco Bell fix. Happily, the weather was clear enough to drive up. It’s a long enough drive that we don’t like to go if the weather is iffy.



I actually found a few maternity tops I liked. The selection there is very limited so I usually find one shirt, max. And I tried on a few jackets ‘cause mine is already barely fitting me. There’s a brand here called Jack Wolfskin, that is sort of like the European version of North Face. They make some really good technical jackets & stuff. The jacket I ended up with is one of theirs. It’s fleece, but it’s some type of fleece that’s supposed to block wind 4x better than regular fleece. And it’s water resistant & all that, too. And it may actually be useable post-partum, too. Early Christmas present from Guitarman.

There was no line at the Taco Bell when I went to get in line. It was so awesome to be able to just go right ahead and order without having to wait 20 minutes! (Oh, how my standards for quick Mexican have changed!)

A Bit of the Mundane

Guitarman was on shift today. Wee Laddie and I went to Burger King breakfast, but it’s not as much fun without Daddy there. We go anyway because it’s our weekend tradition and sometimes Guitarman can at least swing by and say hello.

When we got home we played for a while, then ate lunch & had a nap. And Wee Laddie didn’t even fight it too much today.

Believe it or not, that does actually happen sometimes.

Swimmin’ with the Girls

Wee Laddie and I met up with our friends Starfruit and Cutie-bug at the pool in Burglengenfeld this morning. We splashed & played for a while then had a picnic lunch in their dining area. (It still seems weird to me to eat our own food there, but they really don’t seem to mind.) The kids had a wonderful time.

The interactions between the kids is pretty fun to watch. Cutie-bug is more than a year younger than Wee Laddie but they get along smashingly.

I really like Starfruit and Cutie-bug. They’re maybe the only people from the playgroups that we know well enough and see often enough that I can honestly say I am going to miss them. They leave here next summer and Starfruit said that Hawaii’s first on their list and Colorado is 2nd, so there’s a chance they’ll end up in our neck of the woods. (They spent 6 years in Hawaii prior to coming to Germany, so I don’t know if that makes it more or less likely that they’ll get sent back there.) It’d be fun to have some friends from Germany turn up in Colorado.

In a month from now, we’ll be back home.

These Boots

Today while getting ready to leave the house, Wee Laddie pulled on his boots and stood up.

“You just stomp them on,” he told me. “That’s what Grandma says.”

The Downside of Potty Training

What do you do when you’re in the car, with a ways to go, and there’s nowhere to stop? Wee Laddie had to pee on the way home from base. It’s too cold to stop anywhere outside and there’s not really anywhere convenient where we can stop inside. We had to go home for him to potty, which means I couldn’t drive around ‘til he fell asleep… and that makes for a tough naptime.

And then, my darling Guitarman wouldn’t go pick up a döner kebap, which is what I really, really wanted for dinner since the nearest Chipotle might as well be on another planet. I’m on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

Wee Laddie has been saying some pretty funny things lately. Well, they’re not really that funny unless you think about the fact that they’re coming out of a two-year-old’s mouth:

“Maybe, but I'm not going to do that right now.”

“Stay there. I'm just going to go play by myself.”

“I'm just going to look. I won't touch them.” (in regard to the babies at Total Mom)

Memos & Morning People

Ugh. This morning Wee Laddie woke at like 5:30 or something (I’m not even sure what time it was, I was in such a stupor) and did not go back to sleep. It’s moments like this that make me wish my hubby wasn’t so pro-co-sleeping. But I don’t argue ‘cause it’s his one kind of crunchy, granola “vice” and it’s also a great connector for those two, I think, to have that time just being close. But anyway, Guitarman isn’t the one who ends up trying to keep Wee Laddie quiet and in bed until at least 7 am. I’m not sure whether he goes back to sleep or not... although he's mostly very attentive, he has been known to sleep through the sound of a crying baby before.

My child apparently did not get the memo: Mommy is NOT a morning person.

This pretty much set the tone for the rest of the day. Add to that the fact that Wee Laddie was completely squirrelly from waking up early himself, and you can imagine how friendly a bunch we were today. The trip to the grocery store was sort of a nightmare, although there weren’t any tantrums or anything... just a constant barrage of “no” and then, once he’d been banished to riding in the cart, trying to keep Wee Laddie from grabbing everything within reach.

Then tonight, it took until nearly 10 pm for the child to fall asleep. What is going on??

My Little Helper

Wee Laddie very much likes to dress himself so I usually let him… mismatches and all. Two different socks? Boots when it’s warm out? Whatev. So today, no big deal that he put his pants on backwards. At lunch Guitarman commented on it. I said that yes, I knew they were on backwards. Wee Laddie makes a remark about taking them off and putting them back on sideways. I laugh, ‘cause I’m trying to picture sideways. My son jumps up & drops trou right in the middle of the mess hall! Guitarman jumped up and stopped him… I was laughing too hard to be of any help whatsoever.



I’ve figured out a new way to get a few minutes to work on a project: let Wee Laddie wash the dishes. He loves to do it and it takes him ages so it gives me time to actually do something, as long as I can do it close by… because it makes me nervous, him standing on a chair or something. (I’ve been using his highchair for it since it has kind of a step on it.) So today I got a little knitting done while he did the dishes.

Now THAT is a beautiful thing.

The Internet in Any Language

I’ve got a bit of a computer-related rant today. I know, I was just complaining about Microsoft dumbing things down. This one has to do with living in a foreign country where you don’t speak the language. If you’re not in that situation, then you probably don’t know that there are web sites out there that check your location and default to a site specific to that country. And in that language. I get that… it makes sense.

Unless they don’t give you an obvious way to be able to access the information in another language (when you know that the information exists in that other language). English, say.

I type in www.google.com and get sent to www.google.de. And there’s a link called “Google.com in English.” Perfect. Many sites will have either a little British or American flag icon that gives you English. But Samsung’s site doesn’t have any such link. (Nor does myspace, not that I actually need to go to myspace… I’m just saying.)

But Samsung. It sure would be handy to be able to get the driver I need to re-calibrate my monitor so Photoshop stops giving me error messages every time I start it.

Snow Big Deal

What I learned today: Do not stall about putting snow tires on when you live someplace like Bavaria. I suppose we got a bit spoiled last year with the remarkable lack of snow and the fact that our cars had the snow tires on already, it being January and all.

We got snow overnight so we took Guitarman's car to base this morning to have BK breakfast and check out the holiday bazaar. He said it was slippery and that he hoped we could get an appointment for the tires before we leave. I thought that remark was for dramatic effect since he has reminded me a couple of times about the tires...but no, the first available appointment at the car shop on base was December 8. Yikes. The woman there was unusually nice and suggested another shop and even called them for me. The guy said to come in an hour... they're in Parsberg. Readers who've ever tried to get anything done quickly in Germany (and especially on a Saturday, for goodness' sake!) are probably now sitting with mouths agape. But I swear this is true.

Anyway, we went home, Guitarman put the tires in my car while I shoveled the driveway... and off I went. Got stuck on the first hill up out of our neighborhood. Downside of living somewhere hilly. The upside of living somewhere hilly is that I was able to back down far enough to find a spot that went uphill, so I could get enough speed to get back out. Didn't get stuck anyplace else and, thank goodness, didn't run into any other cars at any corners on hills... but I was sliding all over the place. Not pretty. Been a long time since I've driven in snow in a rear wheel drive car.

Memories

We were supposed to go swimming in Burglengenfeld with Kelly & Kaitlyn but Wee Laddie had a little bit of the runs last night (after saying his tummy hurt), so I didn't want to expose anyone to anything in the event he is actually sick. He probably isn’t, but you never know. I wonder if he’ll one day be mortified that I’ve posted his bowel habits on the Internet.

This surprised me: Wee Laddie suddenly mentioned juggling balls today. Sometime in summer 2006, it must have been, we went to Wendy’s with our friend Rutabega and her mom. In Rutabega’s kids’ meal, the toy was a set of three juggling balls and her mom swore she was going to learn to juggle so that she could entertain Wee Laddie. I was so surprised that he actually remembered that!

Waiting for Waffles

Wee Laddie’s breakfast often consists of a waffle (you may have heard me mention them here before) eaten in the car on our way to an activity on base. For some reason, he has recently decided that he doesn’t want to start eating it until we get to the main road. I don’t know why. So the first part of our trip is always filled with, “Is this the main road?” “No, not yet. Soon.” Then when we get to the big announcement of the main road, he will finally start eating.

What this all means is that when we arrive at our destination on base, we have to sit in the car while Wee Laddie finishes his waffle.



My mother finds this very funny.

Anger Management

At Total Mom today we talked about stress and anger management. At some point in my life, I remember thinking of myself as a very patient person. These days, however, I’m embarrassed to say that I definitely have some issues with anger management. Particularly at naptime, when Wee Laddie will NOT go to sleep. Those are not my best parenting moments.

Actually, we're a houseful of hotheads and only one of us has a valid excuse: toddlerhood. Hopefully we can all chill out a bit when we're settled back in at home and Gman is back at a job he likes and I'm all blissed out on impending baby/post-baby hormones.

Halloween on My Mind

German class was just me and Kim tonight and I was clueless. It’s a little easier to BS my way through with more people there but it’s also that, since there were only 2 of us there, we had to participate more.

We talked a little about Halloween here and how it’s growing in popularity. How sad that it’s still shrinking in the US. Trick-or-treating used to be such a blast! I loved trying to think of a really unusual/creative costume and then seeing people’s reactions to it. One of my funniest Halloween moments was the year that two of my best friends and I went as coneheads. We’d made our cones out of cardboard (this was before they had ones you could buy) and they had holes in the top. We were at one house, and my boyfriend at the time went up on the stairs to look into the hole to see if he could read my mind. Pretty funny.

I’ve started to work on getting organized for the packing. We don’t have to pack our stuff (in fact, even if we did pack it, they’d have to unpack & repack it… I think because of customs and to make sure we don’t bring anything illegal), but I’m trying to get it organized so we can find things later. It’s a big job.

On the Wire

My “people” are so not wired. It drives me crazy sometimes, as it makes them difficult to get in touch with sometimes. And some of my closest friends have never even read this blog! I'm always trying to set up online "networks" between friends & family so we can communicate, share photos, etc. meanwhile, some of them never even check their email accounts. Oddly, despite her reticence about technology in general, my mom isn't on this list. She reads the blog AND checks/sends email.

What led to this rant is that I was sort of irritated w/Snapfish 'cause I got a notice that I needed to hurry & order something or they'd delete my photos. (Yeah, I know... I've got some nerve bitching about having to pay a tiny bit for a valuable service!) I'm not organized enough to order a photo book yet, but it hardly seemed worth ordering some random print for $0.12 when I can print them at home (and would much rather spend more, but get something cooler). Anyway, in one of those weird, serendipitous kind of moments, I'd gone to clean up a folder in my Yahoo email and found a link to playgroup photos that a friend had uploaded to Snapfish. So for about $2.50 I was able to download 50 high-res photos (there are more but the download limit is 50 at once)... and prevent Snapfish from deleting my stuff. Sweet.

Ah, Football Season

Made the trek up to Taco Bell in Graf again. The weather is grey & cold, so there’s really not much else for us to do around here. Wee Laddie kept asking if there was going to be another fire alarm.

It’s football season. Guitarman complains that he doesn’t get to watch much of it but, seriously, isn't it on like 4 nights a week nowadays?

Next is a LeCorbusier

Why does a suction cup suddenly stop suctioning? I’ve had a razor on one in our shower for months, and then it suddenly fell off a few weeks ago. I thought I’d gotten it well re-stuck but it came off again tonight (after my guys were asleep, of course) and went crashing down.

Here’s Wee Laddie in the chair we got him (a while back) that matches our IKEA pseudo rocking chair. Cool, eh?

He's a Playah

There’s an elementary school right near the PX, so we drive past it all the time. And the gates are always closed and locked, even when the kids aren’t in school. Today as we drove by it Wee Laddie said to me, “I’ll play on that playground one day.”

I said, “I don’t know if you will, ‘cause we won’t be here that much longer. But you’ll get to go to lots of playgrounds back home.”

WL: “Back to my ladies?”

Me: (laughing) “Your ladies?”

WL: “My friends.”

Me: (still laughing) “Where do you get this stuff?”

WL: (now laughing and shaking his head) “I dunno.”

Harvest Fest

Wee Laddie was completely obnoxious at Total Mom this morning. He was not listening to me at all, took off his shoes after I’d asked him to keep them on, was throwing his shoes, etc. He’d been given a tiny bag of candy corn and asked me if he could have some. I told him no, since we were about to go have lunch. (He has a bad habit of snacking too much right before lunch, then not eating once we’re at the mess hall.) I spot him a few minutes later, sitting on the sofa... eating candy corn.

We had lunch at the mess hall even though Guitarman couldn’t meet us, and Wee Laddie threw a bit of a fit because I had dessert and didn’t let him have any (I’d told him the candy corn would substitute for dessert). Then we took Guitarman to the sandwich shop to pick up something to eat and today, of all days, they handed Wee Laddie a cookie. I was pissed off... luckily, Guitarman took it so we could decide when Wee Laddie could have it.

Later, after nap, we went to the Hallelujah Harvest Fest on base. It was a pretty big party. Wee Laddie left his costume on for a bit longer this time (and we saw a kid dressed as Mater, but it was a store-bought plush costume… I didn’t manage to get a picture of them together). Wee Laddie didn’t seem interested in any of the games or anything, so we walked around for a bit, ate some dinner, chatted with the family who had been at the hotel with us when we first got here, and that was it. Wee Laddie did really well about seeing all the costumes—even the scary ones—except that McGruff the Crime Dog sent him into tears.

Feet in the Stirrups

Had an OB appointment today. They do things a little differently here, in that they’ve got you with your feet up at every appt. I finally asked why that is and she said they check your cervix and do a pH test, ‘cause apparently your pH levels change closer to labor. She asked if they don’t do that in the US and I told her that there are a bunch of appointments in mid-pregnancy where all they do is listen for the heartbeat and measure your growth. She seemed surprised.

In the bathroom at the doc’s office they had a poster advertising something... not sure what since it’s all in German, but it has a picture of two cute teenage girls on it. Wee Laddie said to me, “Look, it’s like you, mom. The purple one, not the pink one.”

The receptionist gave Wee Laddie a lollipop (also known as “woollypops” around here) while we were there and I let him keep it in the car since I wanted to stop at a store a few blocks away on the way out of town. When we got to the store, Wee Laddie asked if he could take his lollipop into the store. He looked at me very seriously and said, “I won’t drop it or spill it or spit it out.” As if.

Dear Microsoft

Am I the only one who gets seriously annoyed by software’s assumption that I do not know how to properly use a mouse?

I’d love it if I could, say, select a bunch of text in Microsoft Word and NOT have Word add extra letters or words to my selection without my okay. I’m constantly having to retype parts that it cleverly deleted along with whatever I actually wanted to delete. It seems like I have reset this in the preferences and yet it continues to happen. It’s as if Word is also correcting my preference settings.

It’s like when they took away the keyboard commands for doing form letters, so instead of just being able to type a command in for my fields I suddenly had to go through like 10 menus to do what I wanted. I realize that lots of people don’t bother to learn keyboard commands, but for those of us who do, the least they could do is not take them away.

Bill, are ya listening?

Fall Colors

The trees look quite beautiful around here lately. I’ve never seen the fall colors on the east coast in the US before, but I’d guess it looks something like this.

Night Owl

Wee Laddie didn’t fall asleep last night until just before 11 pm! Sheesh. When Guitarman was on shift a bunch of times recently he was sometimes going to bed early and would just snuggle in with Wee Laddie, so now that’s what Wee Laddie wants. Or he’ll screw around for an hour or so and THEN ask to be rocked, at which point I don’t because I don’t want to start any bad habits (we have so been down that road). I finally did a couple of 4-minute checks on him (whenever you give him a timeframe for something, he tries to get you to switch it to 4 minutes... not sure why), then a 6, then he was finally asleep.

We went up to the “big” (it doesn’t seem to be any bigger than the one they had at Wurzbürg) PX at Grafenwöhr. While we were there the fire alarm went off. It freaked me out a little. I was sure it wasn’t really a big deal but for some reason (maybe hormones?), it made me very anxious about Wee Laddie. But I was trying to stay really calm, especially outwardly, so he didn’t pick up on anything. It did occur to me that a military community is probably one that you could expect to remain pretty calm and clear-headed in an emergency situation such as a fire.

Wee Laddie spent the rest of the day talking about the fire alarm. Every protrusion on every wall is now a fire alarm to him. I’m sure it’ll take him a bit of time to process this one.

We got Guitarman a birthday gift... headphones. (His birthday’s in a couple of weeks.) Wee Laddie picked those out over the “Rome” DVD set. We’ve been trying out different routes to Graf, and most of them are on B roads, meaning not the main (and straighter) autobahns. They don’t work so well for me, what with the motion sickness thing. I was feeling pretty crappy by the time we got home so I went to lie down on the sofa for a bit. My sweet, sweet boy came over to check on me and to ask if I was going to eat some dinner with them. What a doll.

Halloween Party #1

Went to the Halloween party at Little Troopers. We were planning to get there earlier than usual this time (we always miss the majority of it… so hard for us to get to base by 9 am!) , but I had Wee Laddie try on his costume before we left and the wheels came off! (Grandma-Grandma made them, but I glued them on.) Got that fixed and snapped a few photos just in case the costume didn’t last, but by the time we got there it was the last half-hour of the party.

I put Wee Laddie in the costume and we walked in. I went over to a table to set our stuff down and he followed and asked me to take the costume off. Less than 2 minutes. Oy. A few people saw him in it when he put it on again to go back out to the car. I think he was overwhelmed and self-conscious. So now I’ve really got to try to take him to the harvest fest thingy next week so he has a chance to actually wear the costume!

Missing the Fun

I was working on the Lightning Mc Queen costume, and Wee Laddie was trying to help. Sometimes that makes things a lot harder to do, as much as I appreciate his great attitude! He told me he was excited about his costume.

He’ll wear it first tomorrow at Little Troopers and then on the 31st at the harvest fest they’re having on base. Guitarman switched days with someone at work so he’s on shift on the 31st, so it might just be me and Wee Laddie. Not sure exactly what they’ll have at the fest, but it’s worth checking out.

We had an appointment at the ID office at 10:20 this morning so I tried to get us to Kids’ Club early. No dice. Wee Laddie wouldn’t put away the toys I’d asked him to put away before we left, so we ended up not going to Kids’ Club at all. Things went well at the ID office… SO much faster than the last time we were there. And now we’re good through the rest of our stay (it seems like this is about our 3rd set of IDs, which seems a little disorganized). And I got them to correct my info that said I was 60 inches tall, since that is a full 8 inches off!

On Her Way

Wee Laddie and I took Grandma-Grandma to the airport in the morning. Wee Laddie was bummed but didn’t cry or anything. It was easier on me this time since I know we’ll be seeing her again soon.

Wee Laddie wore the new outfit his Aunt Kaffee had sent… we just got it yesterday and he insisted on wearing part of it last night even though I tried to talk him out of it so he could wear it all day today. He went for another ride on Lightning McQueen, then we headed off for Total Mom. Tina did sort of a plug for the baby signing. A couple of extra moms stayed for a little bit but I couldn’t tell if they were really interested in it or not.



On the way back from the airport, Wee Laddie and I had a chat about Denver. He was saying he doesn’t want to go there, but I don’t think he knows what it means completely. Later, he was talking about missing his friends from here. He does have a couple of friends here, but the only one he really has seen in like a one-on-one situation is Kaitlyn. And I think we may actually manage to stay in touch with them, if only occasionally. And we don’t spend that much time together that he’ll miss her that much…especially now that she’s going to Kindergarten. I think he feels sad about leaving, just because this is what’s familiar now. He probably doesn’t really remember our daily life in Denver very well.

Here are a few shots Wee Laddie has taken with his new camera.

One Last Day of Fun

Today I told Wee Laddie that Grandma leaves tomorrow. He hung his head down and said, “Oh, man.” Then he was snotty & upset for a little while. So I said, “Since today is Grandma-Grandma’s last day here, why don’t we have fun all day today and then we can be sad tomorrow, after she leaves.” And it actually worked! I was also sure to mention that this time it won’t be so long ‘til we see her again, and this time it’ll be in Denver and we’ll be staying there.

Guitarman and I had spotted a toddler-tough digital camera at the PXtra several weeks ago. I’ve been wanting to get him one for Christmas or his birthday, and when we saw this one we talked about that and then decided maybe we should get it before we leave so that he can take some pics of stuff here if he wants to. So Guitarman brought it home with him from work tonight. Wee Laddie was pretty stoked.

Tonight Guitarman volunteered to handle the whole evening with Wee Laddie so my mom and I could go out for dinner and have a toddler-free conversation. We went to Gasthof Zum Schwann (it’s my German teacher’s fave Bavarian-style restaurant) but they were closed for a private party. They told us we could go to Il Cigno (the Italian place where we’ve gotten pizza a few times) and get the same food as they have in their dining room. They’re sort of connected, I guess. The food was decent but the restaurant was really smoky, even though we were in a back room where nobody was smoking. I wish we’d stuck with Hotel Hirschen. Oh well. It was nice to have an adult conversation & get some time to hang out just with my mom.

The Big Test

Went to the Klinik in Regensburg for our level II ultrasound. The doctor said something about the concern about Downs and I said they’d told us 1 in 405. He said, “That’s not bad.” Dork. Then why the heck were they leaning on us about the stinkin’ amnio?



Everything looks great, the doc said. No soft markers for Downs, no club foot, no cleft palate... all 10 fingers and all 10 toes. Heart looks good & normal. Near the end, the doc said something about this being much better than last time, when he gave us the info and I cried. Big fat liar. I never cried. My mom, however, got a bit teary when we told her that everything looks great.

Oh, and… it’s a boy!! How's this for odd: We have a regular playgroup back home. There are 8 families in it, and we're the 6th to get pregnant with a 2nd child. We are also the 6th whose 2nd baby is the same gender as the 1st. Isn't that strange?

Anyway, here's a closeup of our Schatzi's face.



We tried to go to a Kurdish restaurant that a friend had recommended, but they weren’t open for lunch. We ended up at some random doner shop. The food was good and I had my best conversation so far with someone in German. It was stilted, but not horrible.

Of course, then I went to German class tonight and it was a bugger.

I am so dreading telling Wee Laddie tomorrow that Grandma leaves on Wednesday. Poor thing, it’s going to break his heart. He loves having visitors, especially people who love him. And from spending so much time with Grandma since he was a newborn, they are very close. He’s seemed so happy during her visit... it’s like I haven’t really realized until now that he hasn’t been laughing and stuff as much as he used to. I love that sound.

Mother Worship

Have I mentioned that my mom is the coolest? Today she offered to help with any unfinished projects around the house, then ended up volunteering to watch Wee Laddie while Guitarman and I went out for dinner. We didn’t do dinner, but we went to see a movie (The Heartbreak Kid) on base. Niiiice. I thought the movie was silly & fun. Guitarman said it was entertaining, but the script wasn’t very tight. Whatever... it was great to have a night out without our little guy.

And even better to see him when we got home.

He did great for Grandma, though he wasn’t asleep when we got home. Guitarman went up ‘cause Wee Laddie was calling out, “How the movie was, Daddy?” And I followed to give hugs & kisses. When I got upstairs, Wee Laddie had his sad face on so I asked if he had fun with Grandma. He said he did and that he’d had a bath… but he had that look where he’s trying not to cry. That one really melts my heart. It’s like he knows there’s no reason to cry and he’s trying to be “strong,” but he really wants to cry. He must’ve really missed us… he’s not used to us both being away. Especially at bedtime.

Tomorrow is our big level II ultrasound where we should get more info on the odds of Schatzi having Downs and also about any issues about his/her heart. And we should find out whether it’s a boy or girl, too. I am hoping for a totally healthy (and “normal”) baby, of course. But I feel pretty much at peace with the idea of a Downs baby, too (I’m more concerned about the heart at this point). I’ve been picturing our family with a Downs baby so that I’m ready for it if I need to be. I just hope that if we do get Downs, we get to be at the healthy end of the spectrum.

Halloween Costumes

So my mom comes all the way to Germany to see us, and we haven’t taken her anywhere. Well, we did go to the mess hall today… we are such great entertainers! It’s a darned good thing we’ve got that cute kid to carry us.

I’ve decided on a Lightning McQueen costume for Wee Laddie. We haven’t really talked much about Halloween so I have serious doubts that he has any idea what I mean about “What would you like to dress up as?” so I figured I ought to just pick something that I think he’d like to see himself in. Second choice is Bob the Builder and, if I have time, I may make that one as well for an event we might try to go to next week.

The Scoop on Poop

I’m pretty sure that the question, “How is Wee Laddie doing on potty training?” has been keeping you all up nights. So here ya go...

He hasn’t had an accident or pooped in a diaper since Grandma-Grandma got here on Tuesday. He did pee on himself once while sitting on the potty, but he’d put off going (so he could keep playing with Grandma) and then he had to go really bad and that darned penis wouldn’t stay down when he pushed it down. He actually skipped at least a day’s poops in there, but he made up for it today... and all of them were in the potty.

Isn’t it funny how children are absolutely programmed for manipulation? Isn’t it also funny how they will totally rat themselves out ‘til they get devious enough to lie? Grandma needed to do a bit of laundry today and Wee Laddie really wanted to go into the laundrette on base with her (we never bothered to get a washer & dryer here since we won’t be staying long-term… my lovely husband does all of our laundry, aren’t I lucky?) and I told him we were just going to wait in the car so I didn’t have to unbuckle him & then re-buckle him into the car seat. A few minutes later, “clever Mommy” makes an appearance and asks, “Do you need to go potty again? There’s a potty in the laundry.” He says he doesn’t need to go, then asks again to go into the laundrette. I say no again. Lightbulb.

“Yes, I do need to go potty.”

“Wait a minute. Do you really need to go potty or do you just want to go into the laundry?”

“I just want to go into the laundry.”

“Then no.”

A few minutes later, he claims he really has to go potty this time. Grandma is back and says she’ll take him… and she does. Did he go potty? Nope. Did he have a nice wander around the laundrette, looking at stuff? You betcha.

Big Brother is Watching

Grandma-Grandma’s visit is going great so far. I’ve heard my son belly-laugh more in the past few days than in the last several weeks combined. It SO reinforces for me that the move back to Denver is the right decision for him, too.

We entertained Grandma by going to Kids’ Club today. Ok, really it was more so that Wee Laddie could run off some of his excess energy… he was unbelievable this morning. We got there on the early side for a change, so he got in LOTS of running around time, which he clearly needs desperately. I had to chase him around a bit to keep him from wreaking too much havoc. That’s not usually the case, but he was so very nearly out-of-control!

Wee Laddie spent some time entertaining babies again today. He is such a big sweetheart, it just makes me so proud. He’s so gentle and loving with the babies… he wanted to swaddle one, then made sure his paci was securely in his mouth. Another he tried to give kisses to, then was making faces and stuff to make the baby smile. It kind of makes up for when he nearly jumped on that baby’s head. (He was running over to see the baby and LOOKED like he was going to jump right onto the poor thing!)

Tonight after dinner, Wee Laddie wanted Guitarman to hide behind one of the concrete posts in our living room. Then he asked me to and while I did, I joked that my big belly was probably still quite visible, sticking out there as it does. Wee Laddie came over and wanted to see my belly, then was saying hi and giving snuggles and kisses to the baby. He’s going to be such a great big brother, I think!

No Sneaking Off, Now

Wee Laddie seems very worrried that Grandma-Grandma is going to slip off back home without telling him. He got up a tad early today to pee and when he didn’t see her in her room he said, “Maybe she’s in Colorado.”

Only two moms stayed for the baby signing class after Total Mom today. I just don’t get why there isn’t more interest. Of the two moms who stayed, one is new and she seems really psyched about signing and thinks her 6-month-old was trying to sign something recently. Yay!! Her hubby’s really into it, too, so that should help.

Wee Laddie does not want to go to bed. Lordy, that child hates to sleep! (And you can just imagine what it’s like when we’ve got a visitor!) It’s better if we get him into bed by 8pm, but even then it sometimes takes him ‘til like 9:30 to fall asleep. Sometimes he’ll play, sometimes he’ll keep trying to engage you in conversation, sometimes he’ll just lie there awake.

The other heating guy (the one that I called then tried to un-call but who couldn’t understand me very well) came by today to check on things. I keep being surprised that we’re getting this kind of customer care here in Germany, as it really doesn’t seem to be the norm.

Early to Rise

Grandma-Grandma is here! Since that meant an early pickup at the airport I had to wake Wee Laddie up, which is sometimes hard to do. Not today. I told him, “We need to go pick up Grandma-Grandma at the airport.” He said, “Oh!” and popped right up.

The power went off once again while I was trying to check that Grandma-Grandma’s plane was on time. So I called the housing office. There was an issue about getting a hold of the landlord, so I called the guy from last time in the afternoon. Shortly after that two guys (I think from a different company) came. I called the other guy to tell him there was no need to come since they’d sent someone… he seemed to have a very difficult time understanding me. (I find it rather frustrating when I try to use German, and a phrase that I know to be correct, and people seem to have a very difficult time figuring out what I’m trying to say.) Anyway, they got the furnace working, apparently by re-setting it. Later in the evening, one of the guys came back by in the evening to make sure everything was still working so that we’d have heat overnight. And they say there’s no customer service in Germany!

Wee Laddie and I ate PBJs in the car on the way to the airport (1.5 hours away) and chit-chatted about moving to Colorado, and how we weren’t going to Colorado today, but Grandma-Grandma was going to visit us here and then we’ll go back there in a few months. After they come take our beds & stuff first.

We did our usual routine (Do we know how to entertain or what?) and Wee Laddie fell asleep in the car (I didn’t think he would with Grandma there, but I didn’t even have to drive any more than usual!). He didn’t nap for long, but it was much needed after getting up so early.

Oh, but look at the surprise waiting for us at the airport...

Whole Much

While I was rocking Wee Laddie, he told me, “I love you whole much, Mommy.” I said, “I love you so much, too.” He said, “I love YOU whole much and I love Daddy whole much, too.” I was melting… what an awesome kid.

We’re all very excited because Grandma-Grandma arrives tomorrow for her visit! Wee Laddie has been talking about her whilst playing with his toys…I’ll hear him chit-chatting between toys and then say something like, “Oh, Grandma-Grandma’s not here yet.” I didn’t tell him that she’ll be here tomorrow as it’s so hard already to get him to fall asleep at night.

Tonight in German class we talked a bit about the challenges for Kerstin’s German students as they learn English. She said that one is that they don’t get the difference between “I speak” and “I am speaking” since “Ich spreche” would cover both in German. I knew it would be the case, but I find it reassuring to hear about some of their struggles and how there are things that are really difficult for them, just as there are for us. I also learned that my fellow student, Kim (whose German language skills put mine to shame, not that I’ve ever claimed that mine are any good), has been here for 3 years. That makes me feel much better, though he’s still got the whole different alphabet thing (he’s from Cambodia) to deal with.

After lunch today we made a stop at the library. While there, Wee Laddie pooped in his pants, so I had to use changing table to clean him up. He totally cried and I felt bad but don’t know how else to get him really clean. He’s such a trouper, though, and tries so hard to not be scared witless.

Went to the car wash (thank goodness they’re similar since I don’t understand most of the selections), too, and had a lateish nap. Tomorrow may be a little rough since we didn’t get any extra rest today.

Stinkin’ commissary closures on Monday trip me up all the friggin’ time.

Sunday Closings

5 pm & there's not a single grocery store open...not even on base. (For those who don’t know, stores are closed on Sundays in Germany.) I suppose, in some ways, this way of living is simpler than what I'm used to, but it's also much less efficient if you still want to accomplish the same amount of things. And I do. I think it's more of an annoyance to me now since our time is already so messed up by the nap schedule. I feel like I have so many errands/projects that simply remain undone. Will I someday feel nostalgic for the "simplicity" of this life? Maybe. But for now I would be more comfortable in my old life of convenience, of being able to run to Target after dinner (even on a Sunday), of having access to so many more projects I could be leaving undone. ;)

Sundays are pretty boring around here. Wee Laddie got up at his now-usual time of 7am, so we hopped to it so we could have breakfast at the mess hall (7-8:30am). It was too chilly for outdoor playtime, so Wee Laddie and I headed home and Guitarman went to do laundry.

We watched some “Thomas & Friends” and drew a little bit. Then off to nap… and I’m sticking to my no-whining policy, and that’s all I’ll say about that. Oh wait, our neighbors were being super noisy and woke us both up (though Wee Laddie went right back to sleep, thankfully). I don’t know what they were doing… it sounded like someone was dropping a wooden bat onto the concrete floor over and over again. I really thought about going over to talk to them in terrible German. It annoys me so much that they make that much noise… and I’m still sure they have no friggin’ idea how loud they seem to us over here.

Guitarman and Wee Laddie got some really good one-on-one time today, which is great because Guitarman is on shift tomorrow and Tuesday (he did 3 days last week plus all last weekend) so they won’t have much time together in the next couple of days.

We’re making great progress on the potty training front. I’m a little bit amazed that Wee Laddie’s taking to it so well. Minor incident tonight when Guitarman caught him stuffing the toilet with about half a roll of toilet paper. But he pooped in the potty 3 times today, all without us suggesting/asking anything! It’s funny, sometimes he’ll say to me, “Do I have a diaper on?” I’m like, “No, do you need to go potty? Did you go potty?” And he’ll say, “I have to go poop,” and go running off to the bathroom. And he’s already acting very independent about it some of the time. “Don’t look at my poop,” he’ll tell me. Or he’ll run into the bathroom and close & lock the door behind him. It’s awesome. As long as he’s not going to clog up the toilets with paper, anyway.

Cuckoo for Taco Bell

Wee Laddie woke up dry this morning! First time in a LONG time that’s happened.

Went up to the base at Graf again. God, we’re lame. These are desperate times, I’m telling you. I waited a full 1/2 hour for Taco Bell. Again. I do make Mexican food at home pretty regularly...there’s just something I miss about having Mexican food (yes, even Taco Bell) where we can all just order whatever we want and somebody else cooks it for us. It’s a beautiful thing.

The folks at Chipotle are sure going to be happy when we get back to town.

Sweetie

He’s not so much doing it anymore, but for a while there Wee Laddie was calling us “sweetie,” but in this almost sarcastic tone. (This is not the tone he was using the other day when he called me “sweetie.”) It’s so weird to hear things like that coming out of the mouth of this adorable little person you love more than anything.

“I don’t think so, sweetie.” If you put a Clueless spin on it, that’s about where we were. Good thing he doesn’t know how to do a head bob yet.

Those Baby Blues

Today was a big flirting day for Wee Laddie. There were a couple of women at the mess hall who kept watching him and talking about what a cutie he is. Then we stopped in the loo on the way out and there were two German women there and one of them was talking to him for a bit. People are always amazed at his language skills. Even as his parent, it’s sometimes easy to expect more of him cognitively just because he can communicate so well… it’s hard to remember that it doesn’t necessarily mean that he’s able to get the reasoning of things.

So you know we’ve been potty training since Saturday. Well today, Wee Laddie decides he’s ready to go in the bathroom stall all by himself. (Believe me, this made me a little nervous.) He actually did it twice today, including for a poop! And he did a great job both times, even emptied his potty and flushed and everything! And tonight was his first night w/o pooping in his nighttime diaper. Progress!

Went to the Möbelhof this morning to look for small comforters for our bed, but they didn’t have any at a reasonable price. Wee Laddie is still sleeping in our bed most of the time, and he hates to have the comforter on so he kicks it off. Guitarman, despite always being hot, likes to have it on. I’m usually chilly, so I like to have it on. That means it has to reach from Guitarman, then down to Wee Laddie’s feet, then back up to me. Doesn’t really work, and I’ve literally snagged baby blankets from Wee Laddie’s room to keep from freezing at night.

I doubtfully suggested a trip to IKEA to look for them there, as I want to have them before my mom comes so we can switch the fun blue duvet cover into the guest room & use our new duvet covers. I really didn’t think Guitarman would go for it after being on shift, but he did. So we had dinner there and scored on comforters… and a nice, red rug for my office area.

The shift days are tiring for me, as well as Guitarman. I don’t have to get up so early, but I don’t even get my half-break at lunchtime. It’s a lot of work keeping up with an active toddler all day!

Talk Hands

Earlier this week I was talking with our little friend Kaitlyn’s mom. Kaitlyn is about 19 months old and has been our one regular attendee at nearly all of the signing classes. Her mom is very consistent about using it, so Kaity knows TONS of signs and is, in fact, already speaking in full sentences! Today at Total Mom I heard her say to her mom, “Please put boots on.”

Well, apparently Kaity mentioned Wee Laddie and me recently and then said, “Talk hands.” Her mom said, “That’s right. We talk with our hands with O-tay.”

How cool is that? Kinda makes it worth lugging all that crap around for just a few people.

Long Day

Things didn’t go very well today. For some reason, our main breaker keeps tripping if we turn the heat on. Lovely. There were small things going wrong, too: got eggshell in Wee Laddie’s egg this morning, a bulb burned out in the bedroom, Guitarman got stuck on shift today because Dan (who is scheduled for it) is actually still in Greece on vacation. Minor things, but just one of those days where everything seems off.

Since Guitarman was stuck at the office all day, I went to the housing office with Wee Laddie in tow to see about the breaker. Since our landlord speaks very little English and we speak very little German, we figured it’d be easiest to go there and have them call him. They did and he was able to get somebody out to see what’s going on. (Not sure whether this is related to our previous power outage or not.) The guy was clearly in a big hurry and was very noisy, tromping through the house and talking loudly into his phone. At one point, Wee Laddie looked at me and said, “Is he shouting?” In the guy’s favor, he was pleasant and fast. Anyway, it seems to be working again.

Took a while, but I finally got through to the Klinik in Regensburg to schedule our Level II ultrasound. I tried to call in the morning but kept getting busy, busy, busy… then no answer. Ugh. When I did finally get to talk to someone I muddled through mostly in German, so that felt good. At least sort of. Our appointment is on a day that my mom will be here, so hopefully she can watch Wee Laddie and we can have our appointment without all the usual distractions.

Wee Laddie has gone poop twice in the potty today without me even saying anything! Guitarman rented him a Dora video as a treat so I told Wee Laddie that Daddy was bringing home a surprise.

Wee Laddie: Is it a new potty for me, at work?

Me: You need a new potty? What’s wrong with your old potty?

Wee Laddie: I don’t know, sweetie. It’s been a long day.

Burn, Baby, Burn

I’m a reasonably decent cook. What I also am is a kitchen injury waiting to happen. Okay, here’s the story: Saturday night I was cooking dinner. I believe I had two pans going plus the tea kettle for my tea. Our kitchen is tiny, so I keep my most-used spices on top of the vent hood, which hangs down from the ceiling over the stove island. (Please pardon the very messy kitchen in the photo.)



Often, when I walk around there to get spices, I just add them from there rather than walking back around front then around back again to put them away. (I’m not lazy… I’m efficient.) Anyway, I was doing that and didn’t think about the tea kettle and its--now boiling--contents. Stuck my arm right in front of the thing and got myself a nice steam burn on the inside of my arm.

Those of you who knew me in the Casa Bonita days may remember that I always had minor burn marks on my arms… and I once got some pretty nasty oil burns on my legs. And in my days since retiring from the restaurant industry, I’ve twice had to get stitches in a finger because of cutting myself whilst cooking. Have I mentioned before that I’m a clod?

Potty Training Day 3 went very well. Wee Laddie is still insisting on doing the majority of his pooping once we get the diaper on him for bedtime, but he did do a little one in the potty while I was at German class. And he did beautifully on base today when we went for lunch. Aside from the one time Sunday morning when he forgot he wasn’t wearing a diaper, he hasn’t had any “accidents,” and he hasn’t peed during nap at all in the last 3 days. I guess a little sheer terror was all the motivation he needed.

Diabetic Rant

Another excellent potty day. Wee Laddie seems to be getting the hang of this just fine, aside from the late-night poops. Not sure quite how to motivate him to use the potty for pooping… he still seems very uncomfortable about that.

So I know I’ve been whining a little about the diabetes diet. (I have a whole new appreciation for diabetics, especially in a country like Germany.) Last time it didn’t seem to be that big a deal. Once I figured out how many Chipotle chicken tacos I could eat, I was all set. ;) I have concluded that over here, for me at least, it means eating most meals at home as it’s very difficult to get the info you need from the food labels. You know, American food labels look like this:



German labels look like this:



So how many carbs is that per serving? How much sugar? Protein? Fiber? All things that are helpful to know when dealing with diabetes. I’m just saying.

Potty Weekend

Guitarman was on shift today (and is tomorrow, too) so Wee Laddie and I were solo. We decided to tackle potty training, since we can just stay home all weekend and practice. The need to do this has become urgent.

A few weeks ago, the changing table (a cabinet kind of thing) at the commissary suddenly became wobbly. Wee Laddie was upset by it, but I didn’t think it was anything major. The next time we went back it was still wobbly… Wee Laddie talked about falling off so I tried to use my foot to keep it from rocking. (Didn’t work.) He got very upset, and at his next two diaper changes on changing tables in other places, he came absolutely unhinged. We had one change at the mess hall that was so traumatic that I was also near tears and we were both exhausted. No amount of reassurance will convince him that it’s okay to stop clutching my neck/arms/hands/whatever he can reach… that I will NOT let him fall. He is completely terrified, and as my belly gets bigger it gets harder to bend over far enough to change him standing up. Not to mention that it’s not the best way to get him really clean after a change.

Day 1 went quite well. We’ve discussed it a lot, and I know he knows how to use the potty… it’s always been a matter of motivation. He didn’t have a single accident today, but saved his poop for after I’d put him in his nighttime diaper at “bedtime,” which is currently AKA “the 2-4 hours Wee Laddie spends winding down before he’ll fall asleep.”



We watched a new kids’ movie we got from the PX: “The Little Cars in the Big Race.” It’s an animated movie from Brazil. It was bad. Way bad. So bad that it was significantly overpriced at $5. I won’t even take it to the thrift store here, as this movie shouldn’t end up in anyone else’s hands.

My blood sugar was rather high after eating chicken-bean quesadillas. Waaaaah! I did use flour tortillas and I did eat a little more than I should have (for some reason I get full on smaller-than-normal-for-me quantities of food these days and that, combined with the fact that I loooove quesadillas, led me to overeat), so I haven’t given up entirely yet. Will try corn tortillas next time & see if that works.

Ladies Who Lunch

Went to Laaber to have lunch with the lovely Christina and the very cute baby Oliver. We ate at the Greek place again since we knew I could get a big plate of meat with some salad there, as opposed to ordering around pasta or potatoes. (She was going to cook a Thai meal for me—rumor has it she’s quite a good cook—but it was tricky to work around the sugar avoidance.) The food was very good this time, too. Oliver is very cute and very alert & interested in everything. Much like Wee Laddie was as a tiny person. He’s sure going to keep his mama busy as he learns all about this big world! Christina seems to have eased comfortably into motherhood. (When we first met, she wasn’t so sure about the whole maternal instinct thing.)

I always feel more like a “regular” person after seeing Christina since, even though she’s American, she’s not connected with the military base. That may sound weird, but she so actively chose to live here and has integrated herself well and grown to love it here. I think we probably would have become very good friends if I were living the life I’d planned to in Germany (or at least were staying longer), rather than having 90% of my social interactions on the base with many people who don’t like it here and probably didn’t have that much choice about coming.

Today’s bonus: Christina let me pick through her maternity clothes, so I got some much-needed long-sleeved shirts. Hooray! New things to wear without shopping… doesn’t get much better than that.

Bow Wow Wow

This morning, out of the blue, Wee Laddie asked to hear “the pink CD” in my car. It’s a compilation of ‘80s hits (re-recorded). He said he wanted to hear the candy song (“I Want Candy”). I’m so proud that my little boy is already requesting Bow Wow Wow.

Top Chef

I’m totally addicted to that show. Guitarman got major points for saying that I could be on the show, but to say that he's overstating my cooking skills would be an understatement. I’m a reasonably decent cook and have even prepared a “fancy” dish or two in my lifetime (souffle once—a microwave recipe if you can believe that—and some stew kind of thing in phyllo dough packets that were tied up all schmancy-like, biscotti—which at least sounds kind of fancy) but I’m so amazed by the things they come up with on that show! Even Wee Laddie likes to watch it, so I’m golden. I think we’re a season behind since it’s on the Armed Forces Network… I never have been able to convert Guitarman to watching TV in German.

I have re-adjusted pretty well to making most of our meals at home again. Actually, it’s a habit I’ve been out of since my old, single days. At first I was kind of grooving on the super-easy half-premade meals, but those got old pretty quick. I love to look up recipes, especially online, but I rarely follow them. I kind of use them more for ideas.

German food is good but it’s rather expensive with the dollar in such bad shape. Plus the gestational diabetes makes it difficult to eat out here since so many of the specialties are baked goods, noodles and potato dishes. Potatoes and white flour products jack my blood sugar up more than anything else… even ice cream!

In For a Scolding

I’m really going to have to stop mentioning minor symptoms to my OB, or we’re going to go broke from all the tests! I mention mild headaches and first she doesn’t say anything. Then I ask if there’s anything I should be concerned about, since I’m having mild headaches pretty much at least once a day. Then she orders a test to check for something. I don’t even know what… probably pre-eclampsia or something.

I had recently had a conversation via email with Kristin about the quad-screen results. She said her doc said they could do some checking on the quad-screen results to get an idea of the likelihood of a recurrence of HELLP Syndrome and/or pre-E. I’m not sure my doc got what I was talking about, but she did write a note for them to check on it when we get the level II ultrasound later this month. She wants me to take magnesium daily and to increase my salt intake. That seems counterintuitive to me as far as healthy diet goes (the salt part, I mean) and she didn’t say why, but she’s got the medical degree so I’ll try it.

I don’t think my OB thinks I’m taking the diabetes seriously. I mentioned to her that I’d had some readings that were a little bit high…like 10 points or so but that after a 2nd hour they’re pretty much always at or below 100, which is when they have you test in the US. She said she’s not an internist, but that she’s been told that the first hour is very important, too. Things went so well with Wee Laddie as far as the diabetes goes that I feel like I’m doing just fine if I adhere to the same guidelines as last time. And I probably should have explained something to my doctor: I’m kind of anal about some things, particularly if I’m “assigned” something to do. They told me that my 1-hour reading should be 140 or below, so although I play it off like, “Oh well, it’s only 152… that’s really close. And it’s the only time this week it’s been high,” it really does bug the shit out of me that it wasn’t where it should be. (I only got two B’s in college, so this is normal behavior for me.) So when I tell her that some readings were a bit high, I’m including the ones that were like 146… even though sometimes they’re like low 90s or even in the 80s after another hour. So it probably sounds much more alarming than it really is.

Aaaaanyway. We got another ultrasound and got to see Schatzi sucking his/her thumb. It was pretty cool… we could see the little jaw moving up & down and everything. And we again had the reassurance of seeing that heartbeat. :) The nose bone looked great to us… we’ll see what they say at St. Hedwig’s. The doc said the baby was still too small to tell gender. But everything looks good so far, healthwise.

Back to School

Tonight was our first night back in German class. Telise came by the house and I showed her where it is. Kelly was going to go too, but her hubby’s in the field and she didn’t have a sitter. She’ll try next week.

It was good to get back to practicing! It’s so hard for me to get opportunities to talk in German with Germans. My biggest chance is usually at the local markets, but we only go there once a week at most. And there’s usually a line. And it’s dinnertime.

Anyway, looks like there will be 7 of us in class. Some new, but only one of the asylum-seeker students is back. I feel so much better about my efforts while I’m at least attending classes. I sometimes feel like a slacker for how little German I can speak but, in my defense, I haven’t been able to take an intensive course (like I had thought about doing this fall if we were going to stay longer) and we have only been here for 9 months. That seems a shorter time when half your days are lost to naps & the related hoopla. I’ve been really lax on the CD listening lately, though.

Guitarman spotted this sight outside our bathroom window tonight. And yes, that orange thing on the left is the moon, partially hidden in clouds. The photo doesn’t do it justice… it was quite beautiful. (And since I’m posting this later, I can tell you that Guitarman will send a similar photo to his family with a comment that, as beautiful as this view is, we would both be much happier if our house overlooked a Chipotle instead.)

Not Actively Worried, but...

...there’s news lately about all of the terrorists in Germany who hate Americans. I think we’re probably lucky to be at such a small military base (although there was a suspicious vehicle there taking photos or something a few months ago), because I suspect it wouldn’t likely be too high on the target lists. There are times when there are a fair number of people on base for “rotations,” but they’re often not American and it might be hard to tell when unless you live in the area and see them driving the tanks & stuff onto base.

Still, it makes you think.

And it’s things like that that have made us try to be quietly American here in our neighborhood. You never know which neighbor might hate Americans, or have terrorist ties or whatever. So our “neighbors” a few blocks away, whose giant, wall-hanging American flag can be seen as you drive by their apartment seem rather cavalier to us.

In happier news, fall is shaping up to be quite a beautiful season here in Bavaria. I took this photo at the playground a few days ago.

How Long Will We Wait?

The mess hall sign was wrong again. We showed up at about 9:40 and there was nobody there to take our money. Three teenage girls walked in right after us. Guitarman went up to where the serving line is and asked… turns out they’d been on regular hours (6-8:30am). He made a not-so-gentle “suggestion” that they change their sign. The woman who runs the place (I forget her rank, which would probably be a more respectful way to refer to her) is friendly to us because she likes to play around with Wee Laddie, so Guitarman said he’s going to ask her about it next time we see her. She doesn’t seem the type who’d be pleased to know that her staff isn’t putting up the correct signage. (Not to mention that it seems very non-Army to begin with.) So it was a Burger King morning.

Then we headed up to Grafenwöhr to check out the new, big PX. It’s supposed to be the biggest one in Germany now, they’re saying. We’ve been to the base at Vilseck before (which is about 15 minutes from Graf, as it’s called around here… not sure whether that’s just by the Americans or the Germans, too), but never to Graf. It was packed. I don’t normally like crowds (and it did get to me after a while, but mostly just because I had a hard time getting down the vitamin aisle to get my folic acid). However, we’ve been living in the sticks for so long that it actually was kind of nice to see that many people in regular clothing all together in one place.

The line for Taco Bell took a little more than 30 minutes, but I wasn’t about to eat a sandwich or fried chicken just to get a shorter line. (These are desperate times, people!) Had a lovely chat with the woman behind me in line who’s lived in Vilseck for 25 years!

Overall, though, we were not too impressed with the PX. The maternity section was just two small racks (those ones that point out in 4 different directions, if you can picture them)… and I really need a few more long-sleeved shirts. Guitarman said the CD selection wasn’t that great, and neither of us were too impressed by the toys. Especially now that our Pxtra is pretty much completely a toy store! They had a few shops outside the PX… one was a Polish pottery (would love to get my mom something from there, except that the devalued dollar makes everything crazy expensive!), another was a Christmas & German gifts store (where I got a small gift for Schatzi, our friend the Squash and Wee Laddie’s Christmas ornament for this year… a small European-style Santa ornament. I tried to find something that was more relevant to our year in Germany, but couldn’t really find anything that applied to us personally.).

Wee Laddie, however, thought the toy section was pretty okay…



…and enjoyed his first ride on a chopper, too.



We headed back home, with a stop on base to get the Buzz Lightyear (or Buzz Wipeyear, as he’s known ‘round these parts) toy that Wee Laddie got for putting his toys away all week. We tried to pick it up at Graf, but they didn’t have it. He almost traded it in for some K’nex, and then for a Bob the Builder birthday set… but we talked him out of those. Actually Guitarman talked him out of the latter by finding individually boxed machines from Bob the Builder and talking Wee Laddie into one of those (he picked Scoop) and the Buzz Lightyear toy. So it seems we’ve already moved on from “Cars.” He still likes the characters and the movie, but he’s fixated on everything Bob right now. Could be worse.