Bonn Zentrum

The center of Bonn is a beautiful, thriving, hustling-bustling sort of a place. Sort of like NYC but without all the cars, honking, hotdogs, tall skyscrapers, and weird smells. (Don't get me wrong, I love all of that about NYC).  I absolutely love the look and feel of this type of City Center as well though. There are just streets and street intertwined of these beautiful buildings of shops, bakeries and everything in between. Too bad this lady has zero spare money to go on a spree with.  Memories over clothes right?? Maybe?? Maybe there's a German version of "What Not to Wear" with Hans and Heidi who can surprise attack you with 5000 euro visa card.  Who's going to vote for me??

It's so nice because it takes 1 minute to walk from our house to the tram and then one 10 minute tram ride to get to here.  Convenient? Ja!

Anyways, the captions below will tell you what you see.  Don't miss the last one!  

What I call a "fastle" (fake castle) right outside Mark's building.  If you squint your eyes you can see Mark and the stroller by our cheap 50 cents/slice pizza place.  It's no Grandma slice but it's well worth the 50 cents.

Where Mark gets to go every day to learn more Math.  At least that's what he tells me.  Maybe he's shopping.

Lots and lots of canopied areas like this to sit....likely to drink beer.  There is also no shortage of bikes in this city.  Also, a random flea market to the right.

Me.  Henry took the picture.  He has now been designated as my 2nd photographer as I would like to have one or two pictures of myself in this country...and we're never with Mark...except getting 50 cent pizza.

Kids jumping over the "Rhein", chasing birds and almost getting their noggin's bonked. 

I LOVE THIS!!  This is one of the first things I really noticed once we parked and started walking to our new apartment.  I thought "Wow, that's SOO pretty.  I wonder what holiday that is for??  Maybe is in memory of someone passing??  It's just so pretty! I want to take a picture of it to be my facebook profile picture."  (something like that).  Then as we started to venture out more we saw more and more of these.  Like one or two on every block.  I still thought it was from a recent religious holiday or something.  Most of them (not this one), have a big red heart attached to them with the name of a person on it.  Well...what these actually are, have nothing to do with any sort of holiday, or memorial.  I was wayyyy off.  Mark found out from our Landlord Berni, that these are sort of signals to the outside world that inside the residence behind them lives a non-married woman of age that's up for grabs.  The name on the heart is the woman's name.  Isn't that so funny?  Embarrassing?  Desperate? Interesting?  All of these above?  What is a guy supposed to do?  Just knock on the door with a ring?  I love it.

Schools Out for Summer

On Henry's last day of Pre-K, his teacher let me come in and bring a snack for the kids and read Henry's favorite story to the class.  I've just loved everything about this school year and it makes me so sad that it's over for us.  Why can't the whole class just move up together? Who needs mixing and diversity?  This year all the moms and kids became really close.  The moms had a few girls nights and we saw each other daily at drop off and pick up and that won't happen next year as Kindergarten kids are eligible to ride the bus.  Mrs G. said it's been a VERY VERY long time since she's had a class that's been this close.  They all just love each other so much. 

Henry with his teacher (pink) and teacher's aide (white pants).  Such great ladies.

Good-bye group hug!  Henry is somewhere in the the middle there.  If oxygen wasn't necessary, I would have let that hug go on forever.  

Moving Up!

One of the many things we crammed into our last few days before leaving was Henry's first belt test. He's been in karate for two months now.  This school is soo accommodating and let us do his test a week before the rest of the kids so we wouldn't miss it.   I'm guessing they do the belt tests frequently at the beginning to keep the kids excited and feeling like they're making progress.  Henry's excitement has been dwindling for karate (I think because of the large class size), but he had a lot of fun doing his text one on one with Master Johnson.  Henry remembered a lot of what he was supposed to, but the thing Master Johnson loved about Henry the most was his obedience and respect. He loved how Henry would make eye contact with him when talking to him.  He may not be the fastest or most aggressive, but he has a lot of great qualities that make him very teachable.  He focuses on technique.  It was really sweet and semi-emotional watching him during this.  Although it doesn't take much to make this momma emotional.

Waiting while Master Johnson goes to get his new belt.  He didn't move a muscle.

Taking off his old belt.

Receiving his new belt.  M.J. was saying a sort of ceremonial type speech to him as he was putting it on.  It was so cute.

He did it!! 

German Fahrts

This may show a little immaturity on our parts, but Mark and I (more me) have to laugh every time we see this word come up...which is A LOT. 

 

Go ahead, read it again.  It means "exit" in german.  Even the translation is funny.   Ausfahrts are literally everywhere.  On highways, signs on stores, parking lots, etc... Then there are the "gute fahrts" which are extremely rare but even more hilarious to me.  (gute = good)  I think it translates as "good drive" sort of like Bon Voyage.  Next we've seen the "Abfahrt" which sounds excruciating, but means "departure" (another funny and fitting translation).  

I love this picture below because for the average American, we all know what happens every time we have that Big Mac...or any Rotten Ronnies to be exact.  Yet we always go back???  

 

This "Ausfahrt freihalten" sign is on a lot of people gates to their driveways.  It means "keep exit clear".   

We've just seen so many fahrts here so far in our first week.  I'm sure it will wear off.  

 

I was taught to say "gas" growing up, which never felt right to me.  Gas is the LEAST funniest word you could think of for that act, and all kids want is a good laugh...and I was no different.  My mom would have my hide if I ever used the word "Fart" in front her.  I even feel a little guilty writing it as I know she will read this one day.   Being a parent of two potty mouth machines myself now, I too will scold them if I hear them start using it.  Right now "doody and poopy" are quite enough.  

But, for Mark and I, we will have this secret inside fahrt term to use when the time is right...or wrong.

Germany, We have arrived.

It was about a week ago exactly when we locked up our house and said auf wiedersehen to our place in NY.   Packing and wrapping things up for a 7 week trip like this was making me loco.  My head was constantly racing.  The travel day went relatively well.  The only hiccup was getting out of NY.  Our flight was being delayed on the tarmac and we were getting a little (okay a lot) worried that we wouldn't make our connecting flight from Toronto to Germany.  But, somehow the tower cleared our plane sooner than the pilot had originally estimated and were cleared for take off.  Sweating bullets, we made our connection after the "last call" or whatever they do when they're about to shut the doors. 

Mark and I have traveling with kids down to almost an art.  The way we book our seats allows us a full row for one kid and one adult nearly every time we fly.  It was so nice because the kids were able to stretch out and sleep for most of the long flight to Frankfurt.  I on the other hand have major sleeping issues and can only seem to get some shut eye if my body is angled past a certain degree.  Call me obtuse....for many reasons.

We stayed the first night at a hotel in Dusseldorf by the airport.  It was crucial to just get somewhere to sleep.  The next day Mark went back to the airport to rent a car.  It was also really nice to have a set of wheels so we could get all our luggage to our new place, hit up Ikea (I just couldn't use the sheets and pillows here) and a grocery store the first day we arrived before relying entirely on public transportation.  But Mark was soooo done with that car!  It was a standard, which he can drive, but this particular car and his foot were just not n'sync and there were a "few" stalls...and we MAY have smushed into another car's bumper while trying to get out of a tight spot on a hill.  Don't fret, a baby wipe made the marks almost disappear.  Oy.

So a few things we love/hate or just have noticed about Germany so far in our whopping one week here.  The houses are awesome and an eye full everywhere you go.  Grocery stores are close together.  Tons of bikers (cute bikes with baskets on them).  Tons of smokers.  Hasn't the memo made it to Europe about cancer??  (They offer cartons of cigarettes like candy. Bins full of them in the check out line, vending machines on the streets...so gross).  Hardly anyone makes eye contact or says hi on the streets...but good customer service.  Cars park half their cars on the sidewalk.  Great bakeries.  Awesome recyclers and generally way more concerned about conservation than North America - we're so lazy and convenience hungry!!  (Our landlord purposely chooses not to own a dryer because nature can dry clothes.  Us Hughes are used to crispy towels so that's okay.  He also purposely doesn't own a freezer - it sucks up tons of energy and the grocery stores are so close that you just go buy something fresh if you want it. LOVE IT!)  Our hall lights are on timers.   Haven't really noticed any obese people (despite the great bakeries).  They love their scarves and tennis shoes.  So far it's been cloudy every day.  It rains a lot but in short spurts.  (I hope this changes, I'm cold).  

What else.... well this post is getting long and I'm sure I will give many more specific story-centered posts soon. 

Wherever We Go

I did something today that I wish I had done weeks ago.  I finally contacted the bishop of the congregation (of the church we go to) over there in Germany.   Our church is world wide and very consistent with it's teachings, organization and purpose.  I can't tell you how much peace this brought me.  Immediately he asked me "what do you need?" I didn't want to sound too needy, so I just asked for a couple email addresses and told him that we have two young kids that may need to borrow some toys.   I also felt excited to offer my help for when we got there.  How cool would it be to be able to substitute for a class in Germany??  ..... But after a five minute conversation, I now know a few names, what the ward is like there - that they have English translations every Sunday, that they have a decent sized primary for the kids, and that they are expecting us and know OUR names.  Suddenly, I feel not so alone or nervous.  It's really special and unique.   And it's been like this for us everywhere we've gone and moved to.  A instant family....and one who's ready to help in anyway.

Do you think anyone has an extra king sized bed?  Is that too much to ask right off the bat?? ;)

I feel/felt so embarassed though with my sad sad attempt to begin the conversation with him in German.  I'm glad he was the only witness to that.   I definitely need to practice my greetings a lot more. 

Jane's Tattoos

Jane found a small sheet of cheap temporary tattoos that came in one of her 100's of Easter eggs they hunted for last weekend.  I'm not really one to promote covering one's body with art, but she had never experienced a t.t., so what the hawk!  (a term Henry coined).   She was great while I was putting it on - held still like a champ.  But as the afternoon progressed and parts of the tattoo started cracking and rubbing off, things went from okay to ridiculously NOT okay.  A couple times she whined for tape or a bandaid to cover it.  I tried to explain to her that this was normal.  These tattoos are not like stickers.  They don't last long, they rub off and they really don't hurt.  Well, this strong-willed lassie of mine had already convinced herself that the tattoos were really hurting her and that the wrinkling pieces that were rolling off were her actual skin.  I eventually grabbed a bandaid before bedtime to stop the madness, but made the mistake of trying to rub off the tattoo quickly with my thumb (to finish the job) before applying it.  Oh the shrieks and shrills that came from her!  You would think I just poured acid on her.   As soon as those two bandaids hit her skin of course she was cured and fine.  Magical. 

I wonder when my children's bizarre obsessions with bandaids will end.  I restock way too often and, I'm guessing 90% of them get used for non-bleeding, made-up, boo boos.   I wish "Mother's Kisses" worked better.  They're free and endless. 

Anyways, I'm almost hoping that this experience traumatized her in a mild way so when she's 16 and rebellious, she'll choose toilet-papering someone's house instead of getting inked.  

~~~

On a side note, today was also the first day of General Conference.  If there was one time where I sort of wished I had magical powers and could put my kids in a sleepy slumber for "x" amount of time, this would be it.   All I want to do is sit back, crochet or do nothing while listening to these prophetic speakers.  I was mildly frustrated today.  Actually scratch mild and make it a medium/hot frustrated.  I think it was the disappointment of Jane not taking a nap (maybe the reason behind world war tattoo), me being so tired, Mark being gone, my house always getting messier twice as fast as I can clean it, and me just not wanting to do anything but relax and listen.  I just don't want to be a mom during these 8 hours.  That sounds bad, especially given many of the topics of the messages.  But kids, I promise I will return being a better mom after if you leave me alone.  Still sounds bad...  

I love my children more than anything and I did get to listen to a few talks with the help of a laptop and movie in another room.  And, the night ended on smiles so that's a good thing.