Anyway...Here's the skinny on our trip to the States as well as the past 2 1/2 weeks here in Essen.
Drumroll, please!
Before flying out to the states, we got to go to Bavaria to teach workshops for the folks who introduced Sidonie to Deutschland a year ago! It was great to get to meet them and their cutie pie of a son!
Lucas' first time drinking from "stem ware!" Too cute!
One of the views from beautiful Kiefersfelden!
Once we arrived in Miami, we got to visit Sidonie's grandma (mom's side) who turned 97 while we were there!!! When we asked her how old she was on this birthday, she said "a hundred and somethin'!" in her great Jamaican accent! It was wonderful to get to see her and laugh with her again!
Look at that pretty smile!
Three generations of thumbs ;)
Next, we got to visit with Sidonie's little cousins. The two older ones (Conner and Carson) played a violin duet for us - adorable!
Us with all three of Sid's cousins' boys (Chad is the little guy!) We also got to visit with Aunts, and grown up cousins, but the kid pictures were just so cute I had to share those ;)
We also got to meet Sidonie's highschool friend Nicole's little guy: London. He didn't care a bit that we were trying to get him to smile - he was like "WHAT!?"
Next, we went to the Miami Beach Botanical Garden where we had gotten married three years prior!
Next door to the Botanical Garden is the WWII memorial - it's really breath-taking.
The monument itself.
After that, we, of course, had to go to the beach!!! We were so happy to be playing in the beautiful sun, sand and waves of a FL beach once agian! :D
Other beach-goers were taking in the sand in other ways (in his case, literally ingesting it!)
Our Miami Beach PUBLIX!!! Where Shopping is (indeed) a Pleasure!
Publix is THE BEST grocery store - we need them here in Deutschland!
They even have FREE carts (OK, so ALL American grocery stores do, but Publix is still the best!)
Miami Beach Bayside at night!
More of the same!
While in central FL, we got to visit some of our "nephews!" Wonder where Iain gets that dimple?
Isn't he just too cute?
Cory wanted to play too, but just not right after nap time...sleepy eyes =)
Some more adorable "nephews!" Here Joshua is warming up to Uncle Ryan whom he hadn't seen in over a year (by the end, we were fast friends, playing blocks together!)
Isn't he a doll? Little brother Landen (now big brother Landen since little sister Lydiann was just born!)
When we got up to Tallahassee, Sid hosted a jewelry party at Mom and Dad's house (and got TONS of free jewelry too! Re-packing for the trip home was interesting!)
My cousin's daughter, Faith, came to the party and showed me all the jewelry she liked in the catalogue as well as what everyone had worn when "Ain't Eeeeedrus" (Aunt Edress) had her party a few weeks before that! (Faith has picked up her Mom's Southern accent!)
Couldn't get him to keep still long enough for a good picture - but this is Jared (my brother) setting up for his band's last concert in Tallahassee before moving to Orlando (which we helped them do later that week.)
Sidonie, Mom, and Dad waiting for Jared's concert in the NON-AIR-CONDITIONED warehouse in the middle of the FL summer heat! They were patiently, and warmly, waiting!
Nanny (my Grandma - who has 22 years before she catches up with Nana, Sid's Grandma!) seeing her latest great-grand for the first time!
My cousin, Tara, her husband Justin, and their baby daughter, Brionna.
She has the same stick-up hair that her mom had when we were kids! So cute!
In addition to all the wonderful things that you've seen through the pictures, we also sorted through all our things that my parents had been storing for us and had a massive yard sale! I got to go with Jared to his job (he teaches music at a school for developmentally disabled adults) and meet all of his awesome students - He's a great teacher, and I'm filled up with big-brother pride! We got to see Sidonie's brothers, both of whom are doing well - her little brother is in Tallahassee at FSU, and her older brother is in Miami. We got to visit with Sidonie's Dad and his wife in Miami. We also got to see lots of our church family in all three cities!!! We got to minister at my parents church in Tallahassee both Sundays we were there. On the Saturday morning we were leaving Tallahassee to head back south, we all got to go "garage sale-ing" together - one of my favorite activities which DOESN'T happen in Deutschland! In summary, we visited LOTS AND LOTS of great friends (not all the ones we had hoped to, but they can always come see us ;) and loving family members (ditto ;), we ate far too much yummy home cooking/cooking from restaurants we don't have here ;), and THOROUGHLY enjoyed ourselves!
Since we've been back, it's been a whirlwind of activities! We got back on Tuesday, the 11th, and began to settle into our new apartment (which is only a 10 minute walk from Sidonie's theatre - big change from last year, huh?) There was A LOT to do with the apartment - the former tenant thought it would be nice to leave things for us... Some of the things were helpful, like a bed (with no crack in the middle of it!!!) and two wardrobes!! Some of the other things he left (like seafood in the freezer, and dirty dishes in the dishwasher, among many other things) were NOT so helpful! On Thursday, we rented a big moving truck (too big because I couldn't decide in Meters how much space we needed without seeing the truck...) and drove from here to HH!! Yes, we had an adventurous time! To begin with, the GPS was set to take us on no major highways - who does that!!?? Then, once we corrected that, we found that the highway was under construction. The WHOLE way to HH! Oh well, we made it safely, and on one tank of gas - praise the Lord! We got our things and came back to our new home in Essen!
As for Sidonie's job, all is still well - nothing really new to report - everyone she works with is super nice, and she's having a great time!
As for my job, I've sent a couple emails to various different potential employers, but the only thing I know of at this point is that I will have an audition next week sometime for Tom in Glass Menagerie - I'll keep you posted on that!
Here are some pictures of our new apartment. It's HUGE in comparison to our flat in Glinde. We're really enjoying it, and are working slowly and steadily to get it set up!
We decided to go with orange and midnight blue.
It's hard to see in the picture, but I dyed the lamp shade midnight blue. I also painted the wall - we decided to have a 2" white border around the orange, and we really like it!
This is the other side of the living room...
...with the lamp that inspired the color scheme - it's a great Tokyo night time city scape! There are throw pillows that I also dyed midnight blue, but it's too dark to really see them...
The rest of the sofa... (you can kind of see the throw pillow here...)
Our bedroom - we decided to go grey scale and Royal Purple.
The grey scale was inspired by the white wardrobes...
...black night stands, and white bed we were "gifted!"
The entry-way "Schuheregal" (shoe shelf) - very common here.
Our dining room - we don't have any dining room furniture yet, so it's just a nice big open addition to the kitchen at the moment!
1/2 of the kitchen...
...the other 1/2 of the kitchen! Boy, did God answer my prayer for a bigger kitchen or what?!
Our bathroom...
...we have a BIG window that looks over our downstairs neighbor's back yard...from the shower...
Speaking of "shower," there was no real way to shower when we moved in because there was no shower curtain, and no normal way to hang one... I ended up buying a kit that mounts to the wall and fans out in a 180ยบ semi-circle of shower - not huge, but at least we don't have to mop after showering now!!
OK, now that I've taken up your entire afternoon, (if you even made it this far ;) I'll let you go. I promise that I'll post more regularly now that we have internet at home again. Love and hugs to all!
