We Made It

The first week in Munich was a lot tougher than I thought it would be. Jet lag has been the toughest than I can ever remember for myself and much tougher on Lily than last time. It took both Nate and I a solid week to get over our insomnia and Lily about 5 days to sleep through the night again. I would say the 3 best moments of our first week in Munich was 1) Seeing Lily pick up salmon sashimi with chopsticks and eat it and ask for more (she still doesn't even drink from a cup well so this was a miracle) 2) Seeing our friends Aaron and Ozlem on their daughter Zeynep's 2nd birthday 3) Getting my first digits from a nice mom with her daughter at the park.

Our cool new apartment feels like an island right now, more isolated from the rest of the world than a home I feel comfy in. We have a table with 3 chairs, sofa bed and Lily's temporary bed and that's pretty much it right now. We still don't have Internet or a phone so getting stuff done has been slow going. Here are a couple pics of what our place looks like right now.




The travel part was ok. The cats ended up being really easy to travel with; it's the pre-work that is a bit of a pain. They were treated a little bit like rock stars with all the nice attention they got. Our most stressful time in all of our travel was catching our ORD flight to MUC. Darn Chicago traffic got us to the airport over an hour later than we planned. We had to make a run for it across terminals (no checking out the cool multi colored lights on the moving walkway this time - NO TIME!). We were the 2nd to last people to board the plane just a few minutes before the door closed. Phew! Now that was stress. Introducing Lily to new snacks and letting her watch Elmo over and over again kept her from any serious crying but also kept her from sleeping -I just couldn't believe she was still awake at 1130pm when I was so incredibly exhausted.

Oma and Opa have been our guardian angels since arriving to Munich. I can't thank them enough. From picking us up at the airport to stocking our kitchen to just giving us those big hugs, all felt so good. We came to Oma and Opa's house for the long Easter weekend which has been nothing short of perfect. My mom went all out decorating for Easter. I wouldn't even say I'm exaggerating when I describe the house as Willy Wonka's chocolate and candy scene except all Easter decor. Wow. It looks really cool. Lily loves it here and has had no problem remembering where everything she likes is. We all got over our jet lag here and feel back to normal. We were able to connect to the Internet again and connect to friends and family. The biggest highlight was Lily's first Easter Egg Hunt. Oma went all out. Here are just a few pics from the fun weekend.

We'll be making our way back to Munich today (about a 3 hour drive) and even though I'm not that anxious to get back, I'm much more confident this coming week will go much better.

Packin' it in, in PDX

As I write this I'm wondering how long I have until the movers are ready to take the kitchen table apart, leaving me with nothing to sit on or set the laptop on. Probably about 15 minutes. They've been going for about an hour and they're running out of smaller things to pack.

It's been hard to step back and appreciate all of the "lasts" over the past week, and there have been a lot. There's been a constant long list of things to do, and now that list is getting pretty short, or at least not critical. We've been able to take the time to visit with a lot of good friends but have inevitably missed a few folks we wanted to say goodbye to.

As of now we don't own a car. I don't have a cubicle. We've spent our last night at 2021 NW Irving, and we'll take a little time this afternoon or tomorrow to clean it a bit so it's not disgusting when the new owners take possession Friday. I did manage to sneak in a nice bike ride over the weekend, and now I'll be without a bike for a couple of months while it makes its way across the ocean. Lily will be without a lot of her toys and books for a while, but some of her favorites are already waiting for her in the Munich apartment.

The favorite parts of the past week have been the fun times spent with friends, at Family Friday and out on Sauvie Island. I hope that's the part that becomes the memory of our final week in Portland. I know it's the part I'll miss the most.

Hopefully we'll have some time to check in from the road over the next few days. And hopefully when we do we won't be chronicling Pepe's escape while going through airport security... But for now, Portland, we bid you adieu.