Another One Bites the Dust

"Baow, baow, baow. Another one bites the dust!"

(Did you know I really LOVE Queen?)

Soo yeah, another week is done. Thank goodness. It was long and stressful. I started out Monday morning crazy tense due to our rather terrifying drive home from Holland on Sunday night. So as promised, here's that story...

Here in Germany there is a gas station called "Esso" which is a super happy place for those of us Americans with military registered vehicles, because we can get an Esso Card. The card allows us to purchase gas at America prices, rather than pay the 1,50 euro per liter. What that means for us is that it's only $40 USD to fill the gas tank, rather than about 60 Euro ($80 USD!)

 Quick aside- we just found a little hedgehog out in the backyard! He was sooo cute!

Okay, back to the story. We drove from Amsterdam, down through Belgium, and into Germany. We'd calculated our mileage and knew we would get to Germany with enough gas to get us to an Esso. Which was great- no paying Euro for gas! Money saved. 

Money saved. Sanity lost. 

Sure enough, we made it to Germany just as our car started telling us we had 55km left in the tank. No big deal, we had seen tons of gas stations off the side of the road all the way through The Netherlands and Belgium... Fun fact about Germany though: once you cross the border, there is literally nothing, including gas stations. It is pitch black as far as you can see, for miles on end. I started to get a little nervous here, as I reached for our GPS to locate the nearest Esso: 34km off our route, which added an hour to our trip home. Not happening.

So I searched for just the nearest fuel station: 3.4 km off the autobahn. We exited, and started making our way through a tiny, winding road that took us much further from the autobahn than we expected. Into a small, sleepy town, in the middle of nowhere, Germany... at 10:30 at night... did I mention I don't speak German?

Did I also mention gas stations close around 8 PM out here? Small town living, it's not my thing. 

We got to the gas station, and miraculously there was a machine to take cards (truly a rarity, all our gas stations by home require you to go inside to pay, no card option!) Unfortunately, this machine, for whatever dubious reasons it had, wouldn't accept our cards. At this point, I broke down in tears. It had been at least half an hour that we'd been looking for a gas station, and I really didn't think we would make it back to the autobahn from this tiny village. 

Ray gave me a firm hug, and told me we needed to get back in the car and keep going. We drove further into the town to another station: closed, and no card readers. Back through the town, back up the terrifying, winding, dark road, and back onto the autobahn at 11 PM. 

I searched for gas stations again and limited options to those that were indicated to be straight ahead on our path. There was a Shell about 20 km ahead, so we set our sights on that. I began praying like I had never prayed before. I was convinced we were going to run out of gas on the autobahn (which you will be ticketed for), in the middle of the night, in complete darkness, with little to no traffic actually passing in either direction. 

Me freaking out is an absolute understatement. I can't even begin to describe the anxiety attack that ensued. 

Ray kept his cool and asked me to check the GPS again for fuel stations. When I did, I noticed a new station had popped up, it was only 8 km ahead, and said it was straight on our path. We took the exit, despite the fact that we couldn't see the station. Through a quick glimpse between hills I did see the station though, and we decided to risk it. We both knew that if this didn't work, there was no way we'd make it back to the autobahn. At this point, we had already gone about 20km+ over our car's 55km warning. We coasted into the abandoned gas station. Lo and Behold there was a card reader! I jumped out of the car in my socks (that's how distressed I was, I walked outside in socks, despite years of my mother yelling at me and my brothers we'd ruin all our socks that way), and made my way up to the card reader. I blindly followed the German prompts and just hoped I wasn't locking my card out. Somehow I managed to enter the correct pump number, and an amount to charge my card. I gave Ray the signal and he pulled the pump to see if it would deliver. 

Thank Heaven, it did. I swear to you I could have collapsed right there in the middle of the gas station from sheer relief. I really can't remember the last time I was stretched so tight. We put 30 Euro worth in, and clambered into the car, rattled and ruffled. We said a humble prayer of thanks to our Father in Heaven for watching over us, and then returned to the autobahn for the final hour of our journey. 

Even writing this now, my shoulders and back tense up. Argh, I need a spa day to unwind from that one. 

What I learned most from this experience is my greatest fear: darkness. Even when I thought we'd run out of gas on the autobahn, I wasn't afraid of the ticket or oncoming traffic. I even had three back up plans in my mind that I knew would get us out of the situation. But none of them fixed the fact that I would be sitting in the dark for an extended period of time. I was terrified of the absolute darkness we'd be in: no street lights, no lights from surrounding cities, and no lights from our car. Not even the stars were out in cloudy Germany.  I am so grateful I did not have to go through that long wait.

As I think about it now, it makes me more humble and grateful to a loving Heavenly Father who provides His light to me everywhere I go. Darkness cannot exist with Him in my life. Though I would have had to endure a small moment of physical darkness, I know He never would have left me and Ray, and I know that through our times of spiritual and emotional darkness, all we have to do is turn to Him to receive some of His Light. 

So with that as the start of my week, and some "sink or swim" moments at my new job... yeah, I'd say another trip to Baden-Baden is most certainly in order.

How do you deal with your major stress moments?

How did you see God's Light in your life this week?

 

The Perfect Date

 

No joke, this is exactly what I thought of today. The weather here was absolutely perfect on April 25th.

Hanover & Keukenhof!

Alright, this may turn into two posts. There is so much to say, what a weekend!

On Saturday, Ray and I drove up to Hanover for the 20th annual Hanover Spielt (spielt=games in German). You may ask: "Why Kailin? Why did you drive 4 and a half hours to a gaming conference?" Well, I'll tell you.

Because Ray has started his own game review website and is working on developing many of his own board games! We are crazy excited about this, and Hanover Spielt was an excellent way to get the word out about his website, and give Ray an opportunity to talk to others who designed and produced their own games.

See? Here we are wearing our snazzy homemade T-shirts that rocketed Ray's popularity at Spielt. Seriously, a random girl walked up and said she'd been waiting for the opportunity to shake his hand. Then she blushed like mad and ran off.

 You should all go check out Ray's website right now!
Go to: rayreviewsgames.com

Well, did you go? Did you love it? If you didn't go to it, seriously, go now. I can wait. It's cool. 

Okay, wasn't that great?! He's so funny, and yes it's true, I did kick his trash at that board game we played. (ha! I got all you people who didn't go read it! Now you wish you'd gone when I first told you, huh?)

Anyway, after Spielt, we spent the night in Hanover and slept a good 10+ hours. A long drive and a day of gaming can be exhausting. When we woke up in the morning, a thought occurred to me... 

"You know Ray, the Tulip Festival is going on right now, and Keukenhof is only four hours away. Want to go to The Netherlands today?"

"Yeah. Okay, let's go!"

So we did. We quickly got ready and hopped in our rental car armed with print out directions from Google Maps to Keukenhof Gardens and then from there to home. Our GPS only had maps of Germany and this diversion was taking us to Holland (obviously) and then home through Belgium. So we went old school, and didn't get lost once. Go us. 

We arrived in Amsterdam about 2:00 in the afternoon, and were at the gardens shortly thereafter. We spent the next 4 hours roaming the gorgeous landscape and taking in the amazing smells & sights of thousands of flowers. It's been a long winter so some of the tulips still hadn't bloomed, but fortunately they stagger the planting periods so no matter when you go, something will always be blooming brightly. 

Really the best thing I can do now, is just be quiet and show you the pictures. : )

Here's Ray, dutifully driving us into The Netherlands.

and then peacefully enjoying a quick rest in the gardens.

Crazy bridge! The gardens are full of people's fun and interesting outdoor designs.

I loved these flowers, I wish I'd known about them for our wedding.

"Desktop worthy"  -Ray

Ray's favorite tulips: "Big Smiles"

Gigantor tulips

We're in Holland!

I can't decide which was better: the smell of the flowers, or the smell of fresh, Dutch waffles.

The best may have just been this moment. Life Goal: check!

Ray kept trying to sing the "Alice in Wonderland" song about the flowers, but neither of us could remember it.

It was wonderful. One of my most favorite trips ever.

I loved the spontaneity of it.

I loved that we saved money (as opposed to an organized tour from Germany)

I loved how beautiful a day it was.

I loved that I was with Ray the entire weekend, just having fun.

At the gardens we bought a sampler pack of Dutch Cheeses so we could really get the full Netherlands experience. We enjoyed sharing them and refining our cheese connoisseur voices...

 Well, I prefer the Edam purr-sonally... 

Seriously though, Gouda's my favorite. (name that movie!)

I will save the rest of our driving home adventure for the next post. But trust me, it's a doozy. Have a great day! And go check out Ray's website!

Guten Abend!

Tonight we went to our first German class.

Dis is gunna be fun : )

Hallo! Ich heisse Kailin. Ich komme aus Utah.

 Ich bin seit Januar in Deutchland. Ich spreche ein bisschem Deutch.

Hello! My name is Kailin. I come from Utah.

 I have been in Germany since January. I speak a little bit of German.

Progress. Slowly but surely.

Okay, yes I had to grab my notes to regurgitate those sentences, don't judge. I said slowly, didn't I?!

In other news... Today was absolutely gorgeous. It was the first time I could walk the dog without layering on sweaters. So, today's post is brought to you by the color green. I'm so happy it's here.

Springtime

Well Germany, you've finally done it. This morning when Ray and I walked out to Forest, we paused... took a deep breath... and broke out in huge smiles.

There is seriously nothing like emerging from a long dark winter, into that first, freshly rained upon morning of spring. It pretty much made our day.

That, and that it was Friday.

And I finished training at my new job today (what a saga that was!)

And I got off work early and got to do some reading for work so I don't have to tomorrow.

And my private lesson got cancelled because of lightning (okay, this one isn't super great because the kid was adorable, but who can complain about getting home sooner than later on a Friday night?)

Tomorrow is a glorious Saturday where Ray and I plan to do some prep work for our trip to Hanover next weekend. More details on that to come.

In our year and a half of marriage, Ray and I have moved to completely new states or continents 3 times. Today I've finally accepted that breaking into that new community will probably take 3-4 months at best. We've just hit that mark here and I'm beginning to understand roads, military lingo, and what it's like to really live in Germany. That's a good feeling. Plus it's nice to know for future moves that I should prepare myself to be outta the loop for a good 3 months. Somehow I get the feeling there are still lots of moves in our future.

I leave you with this, because it has been stuck in my head, and now it should be stuck in yours too. Enjoy!

Meet Forest

Meet Forest. He's the kind of car you can buy with a tax refund.

We named him Forest because buying a used car is like a box of chocolates; the only ones left are the ones someone bit and put back. (Also, for obvious coloring reasons.)

The good news is that we are naming our new GPS "Jenny" so that he doesn't get too lonely. We had a good chat with Forest and he promised that he would try his hardest to work properly all next year with no mishaps. To be honest though, I am kind of looking forward to those times where he doesn't speed up enough on the autobahn or has trouble starting, so we can yell: "Run, Forest Run!"

Holy Smokes

So it started... and then two weeks later I surfaced again with an intense cold and no voice. What a harsh welcome back to teaching swimming lessons!

I spent just about everyday, all day for the last two weeks at the pool on base teaching private and group lessons. It was so much fun. Not only did I get some work outs in (ouch, quite out of shape), but I met some marvelous people in my coworkers and my students. Working with kids is always such a delight. Even when it's a challenging group, I always find myself smiling at the things they say and do.

Especially in the pool. I love watching kids try butterfly for the first time and then watching their faces light up when I tell them about when I learned, and not to worry because it takes years to get it down.

I love the cheers from parents the first time their child dives down to the bottom and retrieves a ring on their own, or passes the level they've been stuck at for months or even years.

I love the thank yous, hugs and high fives I get from my students after a great lesson when I can tell they really did enjoy practicing their skills. I love feeling like I was able to help them progress in some way.

After that quick two weeks, my transcripts finally showed, and I'm able now to start at the child development center at a local elementary school. I'm really looking forward to this job, and even though it will take most of my time away from the pool, I'm really hoping it will prove just as rewarding. After all, I'll still be working with kids.

It was flattering and humbling that I had several parents request me for their child's lessons again. It was hard having to say I wouldn't be teaching group lessons this next session. I'll never say never though. : )

*Sigh*

Alright, enough's enough. Time for more updates! Ray has also been working and seems to really be enjoying it. He works at a school age center that provides after school care for children ages 5-8. Already, (of course) the kids have taken to him and he's brought home a few drawings and crafts made specifically for him. It looks like his job will be very fulfilling.

I had a birthday and am finally 23! This birthday was weird in that I already felt 23 so having a day to celebrate it seemed superfluous.. But I got cake and my traditional Winger's copycat foods, so I won't complain. I had to teach all day on my birthday so my mom spoiled me and made my favorites. When I got home, Ray had decorated the whole house with balloons and crepe paper. We wore our party hats and had a great time around the dinner table together.

Ray wanted a picture of me celebrating my birthday with my favorite things... I think this is me trying to convey utmost excitement without actually taking my eyes off my food. I was really excited and hungry.

Ray the Birthday Dinosaur showed up. Thanks Ray.

Our last real update of note - okay second to last, but I'm not telling you the last one - is that our favorite local restaurant shut down :( Sad, sad day. We went there on the last night and got one final order of our favorite schnitzels. Delicious as ever. Now the quest is on to find a replacement restaurant. Wednesday night Schnitzel Abend (Schnitzel Night) must continue!

Schnitzel with noodles. It's one of Fraulein Maria's favorite things.

Mushroom Schnitzel

 I know you're dying to know our final update, but alas, Ray claimed writing that post.

So you will just have to wait : )

Oh yeah... Happy Easter! and Ray shaved his face!