Adwoa und Ama

Hi everyone–

The truck drove away with our container at about 6 PM yesterday. It will go to Antwerp, Belgium and will travel by ship to Philadelphia. Our air shipment is expected to head to the US over the weekend. It looks like our air shipment and our things from storage will be delivered to our new house next Friday. The packing and moving process went very smoothly. Michael and I often think of our NYC-Davenport move and laugh… Remember?…… truck arrives at 11 PM with 6 cardboard boxes for all of our stuff. “Know where we can get some tape?”….. that move has many more unbelievable details… this move was the exact opposite. Smooth, easy, professional.

After the truck left, we had a really nice pizza party hosted by Annegret and her kids, J & C, and Elke and L. Both dads were out of town for work. But it was a really nice going away party and the kids played so well together. We will miss them all.

It is nice to be back at the Rosengarten where we started our Zweibrücken adventure. The girls slept better last night than they have in months. They are both generally healthy finally, and I think they like being in the same room.

I decided to finally get this stomach bug on Sunday, but this morning I feel fine. So besides E’s cough, we are all very well.

In fact, the girls are so well that I was shocked a few minutes ago to see Kinderkrippe calling on the phone… I get a feeling of dread when I see their number pop up. But it was sweet Frau Deiler just calling to let us know that we can use their washing machine if we need to! That is the kind of place we live in and the people we know… and we will miss them.

Here is a video that I don’t think I spent enough time on. I thought it would be better if it was up before we left though. Things have been a little rough because of illnesses. J has been sick for two weeks. She had bronchitis, a stomach flu that made her throw up throughout the night (like E’s a week before). The stomach flu then gave her diarrhea for several days. When Liz took J back to the doctor, he found an ear infection too. Now her last teeth are coming in. E now has J’s chest cold. We had to post today since tomorrow I have to pack up the computer.

In the video, you can see lots of great fun that we had before illness and packing took over! There is video from Fasching (Carnival) with our friends Bernhard, Yulyia, and Dennis. And we fed some deer and sheep at the local zoo. And you can see the 3rd birthday party of E’s best friend at Kindergarten, L. L’s parents, Michael and Elke, hosted a really nice party. Also at the party were J and C, and their parents, Annegret & Roland. We will definitely miss these families!

Also in the video is some footage from our time when Aunt Deb came to visit. The weather was beautiful, and we all enjoyed a bit of exploring even though the time together was short. We are really grateful that Deb took the time to come and visit before we left. Thanks, Aunt Deb!

So, Tuesday and Wednesday the movers will be here. We will move into the hotel (The Rosengarten, where we stayed when we first arrived here) from Tuesday until next Wednesday (March 5) when we leave for the US.

March 6 we close on our new house in Urbandale, Iowa! Hopefully our shipment of storage items (what we left in the US) and our air shipment from Germany (which will leave this Wednesday) will arrive on the 6th or 7th. We will be able to move into the house as soon as we have that stuff. Our sea shipment (couches, books, most of our clothes, etc.) will not arrive until end of March or early April.

The next few weeks will be a whirlwind… we are looking forward to getting settled into our new community.

But we will really miss it here. We have had a truly wonderful 2 years in Zweibruecken.

As for the health update… J seems better, but will need another day or two to be back to herself. Michael is almost completely recovered. I have still avoided all this mess ’til now (knock wood). E, who I thought was pretty much finished and at 90%, had a recurrence of the stomach bug today, after about 3 days being seemingly fine. She was really miserable around 2 this afternoon, but was doing much better by 6. This stomach thing is all over Zweibruecken. We were supposed to go to dinner tonight with the two German couples we have become friends with here (through our children being in Kinderkrippe together, of course). But… since each family had at least 2 sick members, we will have to reschedule. And when we called to cancel with our babysitter, Thelma, she said that her son (about 17 years old) has it, too. So… it’s a dangerous little town to be in these days.

Before E had her relapse, she was in a fine mood this morning and accompanied me to Globus while Michael stayed home with sick J. E has been collecting coins here and putting them in her piggy bank. Her father has a tendency to lose coins out of his pockets in couches, on the floor… or just leave them around in all sorts of places. So E actually has ton of money she has found… probably close to $20 since there are 1 and 2 Euro coins here. I told her she could take 2 Euros with her today to Globus to see if she saw something she wanted to buy. When we got there, I asked her what she wanted to get. She said, “A pretzel for Daddy, a pretzel for Mommy, and one for J.” I asked her if she wanted to get one for herself too (she loves them), and she said no. Just for us.

So we came home with the groceries and 3 pretzels bought by E for the rest of her family. All of us gobbled them up… and Daddy shared with E.

We were really proud that for her first purchase ever, she chose to give gifts.

Good night– may tomorrow be all good health!