December 10th, 2015
I have appreciated our family and friends who are checking in with us beyond the Facebook posts and pictures. Life is full, especially in this season, so thank you for reaching out! We have been asked some wonderfully honest questions ranging from the state of our hearts to the realities of school and home. Here’s a little Q&A to help answer those of you who are wondering how we are doing over here.
How are you and the boys doing with some of the tougher emotions of moving? Have you experienced any grieving?
The tougher emotions of loneliness, discouragement, and frustration are present and seem to ebb and flow with feelings of hope and possibility. E awoke our first night crying about missing his friends back home…not easy on any of our hearts. One of my hardest moments hit about a week and a half ago. I was studying for my Driver’s test and feeling overwhelmed. I wasn’t understanding all the Right-of-Way rules and got really frustrated with how hard everything felt. All the things I use to take for granted…seeing the sun on a regular basis, using household appliances, driving, recycling, talking to folks on the street, grocery shopping, going to church…seemed difficult here. I was also struggling with soreness in my back from sleeping in a different bed. Tears welled up in my eyes as I shared my frustrations with Danny. He was so good to listen and love me. Its his struggle too and I’m grateful we are in it together. We took a walk with the boys in the nearby forest. The trees kept the rain at bay and lifted my spirits with the beauty of their vastness and the rich smells of the forest. A few days later, the sun appeared, I got my driver’s license and we made headway in figuring out the trash and recycling system here. Simple things yet HUGE. My back has also been feeling a little better. Thankfully, we are surviving as we figure out how to do life with the stresses of moving to a new land.
Are you settling in to listening to a foreign language everywhere?
Yes. It is becoming more common now to hear German spoken around us. However, we also hear English because of the amount of Americans here. There are many Germans who speak English to varying degrees depending on how comfortable they feel to practice. We have been told that English becomes less common as you travel further out. Its good to be here as a training ground. We are learning to recognize a few items on menus to order in our extremely broken German. We order a lot of the same things right now! Thankfully, a few waiters have spoken to us in English once they heard us struggling…an extension of grace.
Have you decided on a school for the boys?
Unfortunately, not yet. After talking with a few folks here and a good friend that just returned back to the States from Germany, we are now toying with the idea of putting S into a German Kindergarten. We have heard so many GREAT things! From our understanding, each village has its own Kindergarten and Grundschule (Elementary school). We are still thinking of putting E into a Department of Defense school in light of the language piece but not completely sold. They may be on different schedules if they go to different schools. We drove by one DoD school. It looked a bit sad from the outside but we heard positive things about the school itself. We are really trying to figure out our permanent housing so that we don’t need to switch E between two different schools. Our temporary housing is on the west side and we are wanting to be on the east side. Your housing location determines your school zone. Its our impression that exemptions to this are rarely made. We feel an urgency to get our permanent housing figured out or at least move our temporary quarters to the east side so E can start school come the New Year. We do take the boys to a couple of different play areas for them to interact with other kids. They get really excited when they meet new “friends.”
How’s the house-hunting going?
Its a process! There are three different websites that we check daily to write down any possible homes we might be interested in. Our current criteria includes three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a sense of light (to help on the incredibly cloudy/foggy days), German feel (vs. American), close to work and school and in a village with a train station. We also would love a yard for the boys and to not be right on a road since folks drive soooo fast here! We feel like this list may be a tall order and wondering what we need to hold more loosely. Last weekend and this week, we toured a few homes with wonderful landlords but none of them seemed to work for various reasons. We struggle wondering how picky to be on the front end. Perhaps we need to watch House Hunters International for perspective. (We’ve never seen it!)
Have you found a church?
No, but we are looking! Our first two Sundays, we visited a non-denominational church we heard about from a friend. Its located in a nearby village. We tried out two different services. Though it seems like a nice place, it didn’t feel like a fit for us. The boys went to the Sunday school the first Sunday but stayed with us the second time. Our third Sunday, we ventured a little further out to find a Nazarene church that Danny read about online. Even though we were using our GPS and Google maps, it took us three attempts to find the place! 
One of our dead ends was near an abandoned building near the woods. No one objected when I refused to leave the car. Needless to say, we were pretty late when we finally found the pub the church shares a space with. They meet in a large side room off of the pub, not at the bar (just in case you were wondering). The boys wanted to go to Sunday school so we caught what seemed like the second half of the sermon by a guest pastor/speaker. We enjoyed the complexity and depth we found and may try to return for another week sometime soon if we can find it again! The boys learned about the Nativity and received big chocolate St. Nicholas’s from their Sunday school teacher so they were pretty happy. Both of these churches were English speaking.
Are you finding some people to connect with?
Yes, a couple here and there. Danny has been in classes since we first arrived to help him transition well. I was able to join him twice allowing me to interact with some of his co-workers. I also met a kind, Slovakian/American woman who cared for the boys at the childcare center while we were in class and taking the driving test. She will be moving back to the States in May. It was helpful to chat with her about adjusting to life here.
I’m thankful for the opportunity to join Danny in a couple of the trainings. The German culture class was excellent! We learned some tips about the language, German customs, geography, greeting people, visiting German friends, traveling, eating in restaurants and much more. This past Tuesday, the boys and I joined Danny for a guided tour of downtown Kaiserslautern as a part of his training. We learned a little history of the city, saw a few sights, learned where to go when you are in need of help, ate at a restaurant, visited the train station and enjoyed a little free time to get all three of my boys warm hats. At the end of the tour, our guide gave all the children…chocolate! At this rate, our children will be on a sugar high until next summer. If you come visit, we will share our bounty!
What do you like about Germany so far?
The people, all the villages in the middle of green pastures, the practicality, the quiet hours on Sunday and emphasis to spend time with your family, the Christmas Markets, the heating racks in the bathroom, the yogurt, and the woods. We also like this lovely coffee house we found in the village we think we would like to live in. 
