Recent Events, aka House Hunters International's Got Nothing On Us!

Life has been a whirlwind for the last week and a half. It started with Ellie catching a pretty nasty cold virus (hacking cough, snotty nose, the works -- you're welcome for that visual) two Saturdays ago. That night she was up until 1:30am, fell asleep for maybe 45 minutes, then woke up tired and angry, working herself into a state of complete hysteria. Only Nemo calmed her down enough to get back in bed. She did end up falling asleep again but was up at least twice after that. Needless to say, it was a rough night for all involved. Of course she was raring to go by 8:15am the next morning despite a still-runny nose and cough (how?!?). Meanwhile Brian and I existed in a zombie-like haze for what turned out to be a beautiful, sunny day.

This left me with little time to make the announcement that, two days after our fun-filled night with Ellie's cold, we moved into our new place here in Germany! Three cheers for no more hotel rooms! We ended up picking a smaller place closer to town and we couldn't be happier about our new home. Brian went to check it out one particularly frustrating day of internet house hunting and, over dinner later that evening after tuning out hearing me complain about hotel life for the millionth time, told me he was pretty sure it was the place. The next morning we all went so I could see if it really was the place and honestly it was the first property out of all the others we looked at where I actually envisioned us living day-to-day. We called the landlord an hour later and told him we were ready to sign on the dotted line. Just goes to show you never know what's waiting right around the corner.

The apartment itself is in a great location -- close to Brian's work, the train station and there are two kindergartens (which in Germany allow children ages 3-7) within walking distance. There are also a few bakeries and a butcher close-by and we can be downtown in a 15-minute train ride. We have a pedestrian/bike path right outside our door that provides access to all sorts of other pathways leading to other towns. The house itself is brand-new, built in the footprint of an old church. (photos courtesy of our landlord)

We have double-doors in the living room that can be opened to the terrace for fresh air!

Our landlord lives upstairs and is a brilliant engineer who designed the house to be as energy-efficient as possible. It's heated with a wood pellet system, one of the most cutting-edge methods of heating out there. And the kitchen, by European standards, is huge with lots of storage and lots of cool features.

Sometimes I still can't believe we live here!

Surprisingly, there were a few compromises on what we had originally hoped for in a home. It's a two-bedroom apartment (we would have liked three), but both bedrooms are quite large and Ellie's room is big enough to share with a potential sibling and all her toys. While apartments have underground parking (no scraping ice in the winter!), ours is outdoors. On the bright side, we have several spots reserved only for us and it's right next to our gate -- few places have reserved parking that close to your front door. All in all, I think we gained so much more for the few things we gave up.

We took possession of the apartment last Tuesday (September 24)... or should I say, Ellie took possession of the apartment.

Getting the lay of the land and very large yard.

The movers come the next day in a flurry of boxes and packing paper, but we made it through the day with only four or five boxes that still needed to be unpacked when the movers left. As with most moves, we did experience some damage. The piano that I was adamant on keeping AND moving to Germany did have a sizable gouge on the top of it and some furniture was scratched and dinged, but overall it wasn't too bad. I think that's the hardest part of this side of a move -- you just never know in what shape your things will be until they're unwrapped.

Enjoying lunch in the new house (just disregard the mountain of stuff that needed to be sorted and taken down to our storage room!).

Ellie adores her new room and the fact that all her toys are there when she wakes up in the morning. I also think she is generally loving all the extra room to run around. When we lived in Tucson, all of her toys were downstairs (where we spent the most time anyway), because her room was the size of a shoebox. Here, at the end of the day her toys (usually) go back in her room and Brian and I feel a much less frazzled/cluttered than when we had all her toys in our living room in Tucson. We've already had several mornings when we've woken up to find Ellie in her room, with the lights on, contentedly playing and we have no idea how long she's been awake. If it means a few more minutes of sleep in the morning, I'll take it!

We're currently waiting on internet service right now, another reason it's been a little quiet around the blog, aside from the obvious chaos of moving and finding places for everything. Our landlord (we really hit the jackpot with this one) is letting us borrow his connection for the time-being -- but it only works near Ellie's room. Naturally. Getting internet service here is notoriously slow and it could be at least two or three weeks until we have our own connection. How will we ever survive? :)