Monday, October 13th

Wow - I can't believe that Dustin and I celebrated 6 years of marriage yesterday. How the time has flown by. We didn't do a whole lot - I took the dog and then Brenna for walks in the morning. We tried out some new bread from the bakery - our favorite so far is the Pretzel sticks. After Brenna's nap, we went to Baden-Baden and walked around. We got a chance to walk around the grounds of the Casino - very impressive. Brenna had a lot of fun and got out some of her energy which is always a good thing. Dustin tried the Spaghettieis - this is just vanilla ice cream that has been made into noodles with strawberry sauce and white chocolate.

Today, we had German class. Brenna got a chance to show off her new table and chair set to the German teacher. Brenna and I also ate our lunch together on her table. We walked around Bühl before dinner - I think I'm starting to get somewhat familiar with how to get around there.
Dustin travels to England tomorrow and back on Wednesday, but at least it is a night flight so he will be home for dinner tomorrow night, just not on Wednesday.
Take care!

Saturday, October 11th

I can't believe it is the 11th of October already :-) (I started this post yesterday, but was booted to put Brenna to bed :-)

The trees are really starting to change. I'm going to try to capture some pictures of it (and you guessed it, probably Brenna) tomorrow. We had music class yesterday - I think Brenna is really going to enjoy it. She was a little wired for class yesterday - not sure if I got her to hyped up or what. They let you dance around in the class and it was pretty small - all good things for her and me.

We drove up and finished our shopping at IKEA today (at least we hope we finished :-)

The store that is on the A5 (in Mannheim) was really nice (nicer than the one in France - cleaner and many more options). Although - we were impressed by the one in France too :-) We couldn't resist getting a table and chair set for Brenna. She loved the one that Patti loaned us in the states, that we just had to get her one here. I will have to get a picture of (hopefully) her using it - it is really cute. She seemed to really like the chairs at the store - hopefully, she will like it as well here.

After IKEA, we went to Heidelberg. The Altstadt (Old City) part is our favorite destination part so far. They have a really cool walking area there with tons of shopping. It is very tourist oriented - but we think it is neat. I resisted the Hagen Daas today, but I'm sure we will be having some soon :-) Here are two pics from today. Brenna wasn't so sure about the performers, but they looked pretty neat. The other was from the end of our time in Heidelberg - Brenna was pretty tired.

Take Care!

Video posting

I'm going to try to put a video post up today - I loaded it on youtube - not sure how much we will do this, but thought we would give it a shot. This was made on our webcam. Brenna really enjoys playing with them - only thing is she wants to type on the keyboard.

We took a nice walk today - about 30 minutes - this worked really well in tiring Brenna out before her nap. Unfortunetly, Justice didn't get to go as I wanted to wear Brenna out. Brenna and I have her first music class tomorrow - I'm really looking forward to it. Hopefully, this will be something we both will enjoy and will help with my language - that is coming along painfully slow....


Almost everything is put away now - just a few more items to go - we love IKEA over here :-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpApO8Jq2U8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ln0MhhSI6uw

Take care!

Chestnuts

So, I found on-line that the nuts that are all over here are Chestnuts. From what the neighbor said, this area (specifically the village we are living in), has the most edible variety here. Crazy to think that I have never had a fresh Chestnut...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweet_Chestnut Here is a link with pictures and the information on them.

Wednesday, Oct 8

Our neighbors and landlord have been soooo friendly. Everyone we have met here has been super nice. I got a chance (thanks to the nice neighbor) to try fresh fig today - interesting flavor. I never actually had one before, so I did have to look up on-line how you have to eat them (turns out you can pretty much eat them right from the vine). Brenna turned her nose up at it, but she did try a bite. The nice neighbor woman also gave us a bag of the nuts that grow around here. I'm going to have to find on-line what they are called. They don't really have very much flavor. Brenna really enjoyed stuffing them in her pockets.
The dog actually got to go along for a walk this morning - we took the jogging stroller out and he did really well with it. We didn't have kinder group this morning, so we just stayed around the house.
I keep wanting to post that I am sooo glad that my parents sold me their truck while I was in college. Thank goodness that I don't have to learn to drive a manual transmission here :-) At least Akron prepared me a little bit for driving a manual with hills too - nothing compared to the ones here, but something is better than nothing.
Well - gotta go finish my German homework :-)

brenna by herself

Ready to shop :-)

Thought everyone might enjoy seeing us this morning before we get ready to shop. Brenna enjoys the timer and getting a picture with mom better than just taking a picture by herself. No dog participation this morning, which was probably good since Brenna and I managed to break the couch all by ourselves (oops... - at least Dustin can fix it, as it is the 3rd time it has came out of the pegs since we have been here).

We also made crepes the right way last night and had them - very tasty and alot easier to make than I ever thought (although quite time consuming).

Have a great day!!