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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

More Playgroups for Us

Huge turnout at the Friday playgroup…9 (tot-mom sets), I think someone said. I talked to a few people about my plan to start up an at-home playgroup as well. Turns out a couple of moms (I’ve met them but they weren’t there) have been talking about doing that, so I’ll email them. A few of the moms I talked to were interested, a few not so much. I’m always surprised when people aren’t interested in that. It’s been such a huge thing for Wee Laddie & me. I guess I forget that not everyone is as social as we are. This child sure is his mama's boy.

We made a test run to the pool in Burglengenfeld (we’ll go to the swim group on Tuesday now that we’ve got our swimsuits)… I wanted to make sure I can find it in case I need to call someone for directions. It’s about 30 minutes away and a pretty drive. Too bad I couldn’t really enjoy the view because of the Bavarian driver 3 feet off my bumper.

Where the Hell Are We?

Went to the base at Vilseck (where my friend Kerri’s friend lives) today (an hour or so away). Vilseck is a very cute, quaint town so it was kind of a fun drive. This area in general is quite pretty. Not in that breathtaking way that Colorado is but in a gentle, rolling hills kind of way. The villages are picturesque, I think largely because the houses all seem to belong together… not all look-alikes like some areas in Denver (I won’t name them now that I’m in real estate, but you Denverites know the ones I mean), but there are certain colors that they all seem to use (white, yellows, sort of pale oranges) and the houses are all of a similar style. Somehow it comes off not as boring or mundane but as picturesque and charming.

The base at Vilseck is much bigger, like Würzburg (I think Würzburg is actually a bit larger but I’m not sure). Everything’s open later, too… Guitarman said the first time he visited one of those bases, he was like, 'Man, why are we stuck slumming it in Hohenfels?' I guess Hohenfels is different ‘cause much of the population there is transient. They just come in for a few weeks or whatever of training and then they’re gone. The permanent population must be pretty small.

Wee Laddie was busy flirting with a table full of women (plus one hubby) that were next to us. They just thought he was great. Not that I’m pretending he’s not an enormous flirt (which he absolutely is), but the real reason he was interested in them in the first place is that he thought one of the women looked like his Aunt Tam.