Good Start

I can do this, I can do this, I can do this.

 

Today was a big day.  Even though I didn't start work, there was a lot happening for us today.

 

Mom and Dad left and headed back to Wisconsin (by way of Council Bluffs, IA, tonight)...

 

My friend, Angela, who also drove out with me and the girls, headed out with her sister today...

 

The girls started their first day at Goddard School.  Raven was an "easy" drop off and Julia started out well, but when she realized I wasn't staying, she wasn't very happy.

 

After Angela left, I went to the Licensing Station to obtain my Colorado Driver's License.  Holy cats.  I took #497 at 11 am (they were serving #472) and at 11:30 am, they were only on #475.  So, I decided to leave for a bit.  For starters, I was concerned I didn't have enough cash to pay for my license, and I figured that if my number came up while I was gone, I would just go back in the morning... rather that than sit forever.  So I went and bought a few more things and got some cash, came back to our apartment, and then went back to the station at 12:45 pm... and they were on #488.  FINALLY, at 2 pm, I was on my way.  I decided to drive over to work and get my badge taken care of -- the drive was 45 minutes (accident on I-270), but the badging only took 5 minutes and I was back in Westminster by 3:30 pm.

 

I came back to the apartment and relaxed for a little bit, and then I picked up the girls at 5 pm.  They both had a FANTASTIC day.  Raven's teachers really enjoy her; she is "soooooooo cute" and smiled a lot.  They asked if she had been in a daycare before because they were amazed by how well she listened and followed direction (way to go, M'Amy!).  She also started to make some friends in class and took her very first nap on a mat.  Way to go, Ravie!  Julia also had a good day despite the rough start.   She told her teacher when she had to go potty (No accidents today!  She has been potty trained for a while now.).  She ate all of her grapes at lunch.  And, she giggled and chatted with a little boy who was "napping" next to her instead of sleeping - ha!  She made friends, enjoyed painting, and overall had a good day, and she is very excited to go back tomorrow.

 

One sad thing... Julia kept saying on the drive home that she wanted to go to her BLUE house... NOT her brown (our apartment) house.  After some chatting about the mailbox, though, and getting to use Mommy's mailbox key to check it, she was excited about the new place again.  She knows how to get from our car to the mailbox and from the mailbox to our apartment.  She wants to be a big girl and use the key.  And she was very excited to play with her sister and eat pizza and bananas and play with her toys.

 

All in all... I would count today a success.  Tomorrow I will take the girls to daycare early and time my drive to work to make sure that I won't be late the first day, and then I will get my emissions test done so I can register my vehicle.  Then it's back to the apartment to do some more organizing.

 

Something fun... Adam's cousin Stacy is in town and called tonight to see if they could stop by to visit.  So, they should be here soon!

 

Ta ta!  Until tomorrow!

erin

Quick Note

Just a note to let everyone know that the kids and I (along with Mom & Dad & Friend Angela) are safely in Westminster, CO, we are moved into the apartment, we have most everything unpacked, the U-Haul trailer is back, and we even have internet.  It has been an amazing and good day.  The kids have done wonderfully as well and even went to bed lovely tonight.

 

So... all is good... one of these minutes when I feel like my brain is more intact, I will write out some more of the story.  Or... maybe when I feel like I'm not running at full speed for a couple of days...

 

love ya!

erin

All My Bags are Packed...

... I'm ready to go...

 

I think.

 

Wow, what a day.  Today I watched and participated in packing a trailer that is going to take me and the girls to Colorado tomorrow to begin our life there.  It is still hard to grasp that this is happening; I kept telling myself that "this will be real when..."... but it still hasn't hit me yet that this is real, and I'm not sure when it will.  Maybe the kids' first day of daycare this next week?  Maybe my first day at my new job?

 

I have so much to write about... So. Much.  However, it's been an emotional and busy and overwhelming and exciting and all sorts of things couple of weeks and so I'm doing my best to keep on task and on target and to get us out the door... I finally feel ready, but it is so hard to leave... so hard to say goodbye.  There are people I was really hoping to see last night or today and it simply didn't happen.  On the other hand, there were people I didn't expect to see today that I got to see so that was really wonderful.

 

By this time tomorrow, we will hopefully be snuggled into our beds in our hotel in Colorado, if not almost there.  We have a long drive tomorrow but we are determined to make it the entire distance so we're fresh and able to move in right away Monday morning.  I'm not thinking about the fact that the kids will be strapped in their car seats for a very long day tomorrow... there isn't much way around it, so it needs to happen, and we'll ply them with movies and fruit snacks and hope they nap more than normal.  (Why, oh why, didn't I take five minutes to pull out my sewing machine and stitch Raven's paci clip shut or buy a clip to clip her sheep to her car seat?)

 

I am so thankful for the family and friends I have in my life... this week my friend C flew out to Denver with me to help me find daycare and an apartment (Success!!!), my parents and friend Ang are here to help me move out to CO, and out of the blue, our friend Jane stopped by today and helped us load up the trailer for over an hour... completely unannounced, but what a blessing!  We also had offers for help from another friend and it was a good feeling to be able to tell her that we were okay that way.  It seemed we made quick work of what needed to be done.

 

For those that don't know, a 6' x 12' trailer holds A LOT OF STUFF.  So much so that I spent a bit of time just trying to figure out what else to take.  We ended up taking an end table and an extra dresser that weren't part of the original plan, and I am excited to be able to bring my sewing machine and some other fun stuff as well.  Our apartment will be well stocked, at the very least.

 

Yes... an apartment... we are moving into an apartment until our house in Pella sells and we're able to buy another in Colorado.  My new company provides relocation which includes moving of household goods, however, we weren't sure how long we'd have to store the goods so we opted to leave the majority of our stuff here until an undetermined future date.  Even though we didn't like to, we lowered the price of our house a good chunk again this weekend and it is almost as low as we were hoping to ever have to go, so this is a good lesson for us in a number of ways, one of which is accepting that we may not make much money on this house, if any at all, and it serves as a reminder that this move and all of these changes wasn't about money to begin with.  We both agree that it's more important to sell our house soon instead of holding onto it wishing for a higher price for a longer amount of time.  So we'll see.

 

I think the kids are doing okay but after a long couple of weeks that were out of the ordinary for them, they were both very clingy today, especially tonight at bedtime (though it was later than normal).  Julia near broke my heart when she cried and cried that she wanted to sleep in her bed and not with me... she is seemingly okay with the idea of moving to Colorado but I'm not sure she is handling the leaving of some things behind, one of those things being the lower part of her bunkbed set.  She seems to understand that Papa packed her "Princess bed" in the trailer tonight and that she'll see it again in Colorado, but that didn't keep her from wanting to sleep in her own spot one more night.  I guess I can't blame her... I'm sure going to miss the king-size bed for the next while here...!!!

 

Anyway... that is what I know for now... a lot of randomness, I guess.  We are moving into our apartment on Monday and should have internet sometime Monday afternoon.

 

lots of hugs to you all!

erin

Guest Post: Week 2 in Germany

Good weather = open bier gartens.

As you can see by the collage of mugshots (get it, "mug" shots?, I crack myself up) I frequented a lot of bier gartens this week. (Another shot of the Augustiner Bier Garten at night.) The two warmest days we made it to the English Garten which is HUGE and also hosts a lake, lots of trails and bier gartens. I didn't bring any shorts with me because I had researched the weather conditions for this month and, get this, the web was wrong! So I went looking for a pair of shorts. Germans must never wear shorts or something, I could find a pair of lederhosen for $99, but shorts, I had to pay $25Euro, which was the cheapest pair I could find. At least I got good use of them this week as most days got to the 70'sF or at least upper 60'sF (See pic at Ayinger, I'm wearing them here.)

I found a brewpub in Munich. Here is a pic of me at the Unions Brau Keller next to their wooden fermentors. The copper kettle and system was old and wicked cool looking. The beer wasn't as pure as the big breweries Helles, Dunkel, Bock, etc, but it was cool to drink it in the ambiance of a brewpub/keller (basement).  I bumped into a flight attendant from Sully, IA (meerly 16 miles from Pella, IA)  when I was dining here.

This week at school we covered a lot of topics like chemical analysis, yeast flavors, brewing operations, acidifying mashes and studied the German Reinheitsgebot (which is a lot more complicated than saying just malt, water, hops and yeast, btw) To give you an idea: hops cannot be used after boiling, so no dry hopping. But minerals and bacteria can be used to treat the water ahead of time. Rye and Wheat can be used with top-fermenting yeast, but not with bottom-fermenting yeast. Apparently there are dozens of loopholes but functionally it is very restrictive and the brewers at Doemens wish it was opened up for more innovation. Before 1987, only beer that was made according to the Reinheitsgebot could be sold in Germany. That means that Belgian beers weren't allowed to be sold here, nor most American beer. The European states complained and they passed a law  that allowed beer to be brought into the country, but if it is made in Germany it still needs to follow  the purity law. The country wasn't (and still isn't) ready for it, you have to look extra hard to find any beer that isn't German, Austrian or Czech here. The distributors do not want to chance that they'll sell these other beers and most Germans would be too set in tradition to try them so there isn't much available. I saw a Guinness the other day, that's like finding a four-leaf clover!

Styles tastings this week covered the history, brew techniques and flavor profiles for ales: Kolsch, Alt, Weiss, Dunkelweiss, Berliner Weiss, Kristallweiss.

We had a group project that split the class into four groups. Our group needed to describe our fictional brewery and our flagship lager and how it was microbiologically stable. Then we needed to describe our "functional beverage" which is like an alcoholic drink that provides something else (eg. caffine) as a benefit to consumers. We chose a milk lager that would be rich in vitamins and chemicals so it provided retardants for hangovers and tryptophan causing sleepiness so you can "sleep it off." Totally ridiculous, but our group had fun putting together our presentation. I think we called it Drunken Cow Sleepytime Milk Lager. We then had to make changes to the product such that it would be microbiologically more stable. After two days, we presented and the instructor told us that it wouldn't be graded, but if it were, all four groups would have gotten A's.  Oh, and in case you were wondering, our product was made according to the Bovineheitsgebot.

On Thursday we had an in depth tour of all the equipment in the filling room. We will be bottling our wheat beer that we made last week this coming Thursday (16 days later) and so this was a way to introduce us to the equipment that we'll be using and subsequently cleaning.

This weekend was pretty awesome for checking out new places. A bunch of us took the train to Aying after school on Friday and walked into the Ayinger Brewery (pic at the brewery and my new shorts!). They were closed but the receptionist let us walk around a bit. It was a very new facility, modernized and very clean.  Afterwards we walked into the center of town and found a bier garten that sold only Ayinger and relaxed in the sun.

On Saturday, Cade (from Birmingham, AL) and I rode the train up to Freising to visit the historic Weihenstephan monastery (see pic), brewing school and brewery. It was on the top of this ridge that overlooked the town of Freising and was really gorgeous (this pic doesn't do it justice). There were flower and tree gartens all around and a bier garten, of course. I tried a barley schnapps (distilled barley liquor. It was sweet, not dry like a whiskey).

We then visited the original Paulaner brewery which is still brewing on a pub level. Afterwards we headed to another Paulaner biergarten where they held Starkbierfest, which was a large biergarten and fest hall. Starkbier is another word for "strong beer", which is what they call their doppelbocks. A liter of Salvator is all I needed. Wow, this was like a mini Oktoberfest, but in contrast, 90% of everybody was dressed up....I regret not bringing my lederhosen now. There was a 14-piece band that really got the crowd going inside the hall, and outside the temp was perfect and there was plenty of Gemutlichkeit going around.

On Sunday, Cade and I took an another train up to Dachau which is the site of the very first concentration camp in 1933. (see pic) This was preserved and turned into a free museum for anybody to walk the grounds. All the placards were in at least German and English, but sometimes in 6 different languages. We hit everything pretty fast but still spent nearly 3 hours walking the grounds and reading the literature. Very interesting and I appreciated the fact that this was put together by Germans....they respectfully tried to give the history of everything that happened even though it was pretty much self-damning. I suppose a parallelism would be the Americans and slave-trading though.

Will have to put more effort into studying this week as our written essay final will be this coming Friday. If we pass this, we'll receive our brewing diplomas!

Prost!

ADAM

ps.

An added note... Adam actually just finished his second week in Germany... that is how far behind I am!  I will try to do better this week of posting his post as soon as I receive the email!

 

Have a good night!

 

erin

Guest Post: Adam's First Week in Germany

Yet another poor attempt to blog Adam's posts, but at least I am posting them for historic value's sake!  *grin*  It's been a busy couple of weeks here since turning in my resignation and readying ourselves to move.  So, please excuse the late posts and the lack of trying to put the pictures in any discernible place/order.  -erin

Munchen. Munich. (see pic of downtown Rathaus)

This week was full of a lot and I don't have enough room to share it all here. I think I may include more pictures this time and less narration.

There are a lot of big breweries in Munchen including: Spaten, Paulaner, Hacker Pschorr, Augustiner, Lowenbrau & Hofbrau. We have been to several of the Augustiner Brauhaus's as well as Lowenbrau (see pic of outside at night) and the most famous Hofbrau Haus, of course (see pic of live band that plays nightly). The beer at these places is quite expensive aound 8 Euro or $11 for a mass krug (liter). We did find a local grocery that has cheap beer in PET bottles and even sells pre-mixed Radler. (see pic, 0.25 euro deposit per bottle!) Radler is beer (lager/weiss) and lemonade mixed together and is quite popular in Germany because you can drink several without getting tipsy.

Doemens is actually in a suburb called Grafeling and which we commute by train which takes 20 minutes and another 13 minutes to walk. It is much larger than Siebel and some days there will be 25 staff and 200 students there. Doemens building (see pic) has a 6 hl brewhaus, small malthouse, full bottling/kegging, fermentation (see pic of 9 mini horizontal fermentors & open fermentation), filtering, laboratories, classrooms on site. Also a cafeteria with really good food that we can purchase daily.

We had a full week of content and they like to mix it up a lot here. Nearly daily we are doing a styles tasting, but in a much more detailed format that covers: history, characteristics, how to make that particular style and other important information for understanding it, then we taste. On Tuesday we split the class and my half went to the 3rd floor for microscopy. We looked at nearly two dozen different yeasts and bacteria that were pre-grown on agar. We got to prepare our own slides which was good practice. Here shows a yeast that was grown and deliberately stressed so that it started to sporelate (4 acrospores circled in red...can you believe this pic was taken with an iphone looking down the gullet of  microscope...luck shot!). The microscopes we were using we wicked cool, but probably way too expensive, I had a lot of fun preparing, smelling and viewing the cultures. Megaspherea and E. Coli were probably my least favorite to smell (vomit/rotten feet and feces, respectfully).

On Wednesday our groups switched roles, so we got our turn at brewing a German Hefeweizen. The system was nearly fully automated, so with the exception of putting the grains and hops in, and turning one or two valves, most of the valves and all the heat and pumps was controlled via the computer console. This setup is mostly for teaching brewers how to control the BIG systems and they just have it all the same on a small scale. The only thing that went wrong was the mash mixer stopped working and the expert was on vacation that day, so I got to scoop out the lauter tun by hand. We then ran out of empty tubs, so Andy and I (our instructor) went 1 mile down the road to feed a dozen cows at a small farm in the city....yes, in the city, then I could re-use the empty tubs.

Thursday and Friday had more lectures on styles and tasting as well as chemical analysis and yeast flavor contributions. After class on Friday I bought a train ticket and headed up to see my uncle and family up near Meitingen, Germany.

Friday night we just ate supper and hung out at my uncles motorcycle clubhouse. On Saturday I had asked if there were any local breweries we could visit, there was one nearby in Wertingen called Schwanenbrau (Swan Brew). Braumeister Carry is a 4th generation brewer that graduated from Doemens Institute back in 1980 and he took over the brewery from his father that has existed since 1416 (their family bought the brewery in 1880). It is a 100 hl (~80 barrels) brewery but the demand has been shrinking and he only brews about 17 batches a year now.  He also had a small museum setup that he created from items that he found around the brewery.  This was really cool too, he explained to me the process of wooden casks  (see pic) from a first-hand experience....anytime I've asked questions in America about this practice, little is known, but in Germany they still use actually wooden casks each year at Oktoberfest.

On Sunday I had 4 meals before 4PM. Pancakes for first breakfast. Weisswurst, brezen and Pils for 2nd breakfast (we went to neighboring town that had a motorcycle shop and was having a spring fling to stir up business for the cycling season). We went to my uncle's in-laws (who live in the same town as he) for bier and braun (we had cakes). Then we had an early supper at 3:30PM that was kartoffel (potato salad) and home rotisserie chicken. It was all good, I didn't eat much for supper, just snacks and more bier of course. I suppose 1/3 of my daily calories might come from bier. I definitely need to start a diet when I get back to the states. Until then I will enjoy the food and beverage while I can.

Prost!

ADAM

Night, Night!

Raven said, "Night, night!" to Julia tonight as I put her to bed... SO CUTE!

 

I was taking Raven to bed and I told Julia to say "Night, night!" to Raven.  Instead, Raven said it to Julia!  (She's growing up so fast!)

 

erin

Good Byes are Hard

In case you didn't already know that.

 

Today was Raven's 18 month checkup with our fave doc, Dr. C., and Nurse Joan.  It had been scheduled for next week, but I moved it up to this week because of all of our activities next week.

 

(Turns out that it was a godsend that I did because Nurse Joan realized that I would need a bunch of papers -- physical reports, vaccine reports, etc. -- to enroll the kids in a new daycare, and since that is my goal next Monday, well THANK GOODNESS that we now have those.  She is a rockstar and went and made copies of everything for me.  Yay!)

 

Raven is doing well, even though both kids have colds.  Raven was 24 lbs 8 oz (~45th percentile), 33 inches tall (~80th percentile), and has a nice-middle-of-the-road head.  Because she is super laid back, she was awesome with her weight and height checks and generally tried to tear up the doctor's office.

 

However... the point of my post comes to this... I had no idea that it would be so hard to say good bye to a doctor and a nurse.  While I love them both dearly, we don't see them that often -- I have maybe taken the kids in a handful... okay... less than a handful of times in the last 3.5 years.  So our main visits have included pregnancy checkups and baby/kid checkups, etc., but even those are only every so often.  But, they know us.  They have been a part of our lives for some time, they have known my children from the day of their birth... and it feels like the end of something good.  That part was very hard.  Knowing that.  Hugging and crying and saying good bye.  All of that was very hard.

 

And it is hard explaining to a 3 year old.  Julia is known for taking on my phrasing, and as late, she says, "See ya later!" a lot (because that is what I say!).  So she said to Nurse Joan today, "See ya later!" and I said, "No, you need to say good bye because we are moving."  Wow, moving is such a big concept for a kid.  Anyway.  I'm probably making a big deal out of nothing today, but suffice to say that my heart broke a little bit today and I know it's only the beginning.

 

erin

Hello, Old Friend

Last night my friend Janice and her daughter Hazel came over for a quick dinner and to hang out for the evening.  They arrived ~6:30 pm and stayed till ~11:30 pm.  It was great to watch the girls try to impress Hazel and to generally act nuts because Someone Besides Us Was In the House, Hallelujah! 

After we put the kids to bed (girls in their room, Hazel in a Pack 'n Play in the guest room), Janice suggested that she whip out her current hand project and that I knit. 

 

Knit?  KNIT???  Knit.

 

Along with not blogging much for almost two months, I have only knitted ~4 rows on a hat in the last two months.  Much of this is due to being busy.  Okay, ALL of this is due to being busy.  Single mom, working full-time, but still taking Fridays "off", looking for jobs, working on resume, looking for more jobs, interviewing... that results in busy.  Whelmed.  Very much so.

 

What a great idea Janice had!  Knitting!

 

(Side bar: You should see Janice's project -- a super fabulous applique quilt with her own version of "Hawaiian" flowers and volcanoes... it is simply fantastic!)

 

So, last night I pulled out this fabulous royal blue/purple/somewhere in between yarn that Chrissy and I had picked up at Crazy Girl some odd months ago.  Like, MANY months ago.  I'm pretty sure the yarn is Malabrigo, something ridiculously expensive, to which I was drawn and could not remove myself.  I decided that such a fantastic yarn should be used on a project for yours truly, something I haven't done in a very long time.

 

I had found a pattern for fingerless gloves or wristlets or whatever you want to call them.  The pattern gave me the general idea, but honestly, after casting on the number of stitches required, I just went off on my own thing.  Today I need to count/figure out what I did so I can make a second one!  Ha!

 

I cast on 35 stitches, which was for a L/XL, but about 1/3 of the way up I decreased 4 stitches because it was obvious that the glove would be too big for me.  I'm still trying to decide whether I want to put a thumb "sock" on it; the original pattern didn't call for one and I didn't think I would want one, but I think it would make them look classier.  *grin*

 

The first one took ~3 hours while chatting and my stitches, while even, are a little rusty... time to get back at it!  :)  Looking forward to pumping out another one very soon so I have a pair.

 

erin

Packing

This was on my bed at midnight last night, and after considering picking all of the hangers up nicely for about a nanosecond, I started grabbing handfuls and depositing them on the floor next to the bed.

 

Wow, she has a lot of hangers, you might say.

 

Yes, my husband has a lot of clothes.

 

Yesterday began the multi-day journey of packing clothes and kitchen items and other things to move us initially to Colorado.

 

Yes, we're moving to Colorado.

 

I know, I haven't blogged in a while and this is probably backwards to start with a post about packing when I haven't even divulged here what has happened, but I realized this morning that if I try to post about that stuff first I might never find the time and for now you'll get what I have the capacity to post and hopefully that means I will be posting more.

 

As it is, we do have a relocation company that will be moving our household goods eventually, but dudes, our house hasn't sold yet.  So if you have put a hex on it, please remove it.  If you know someone in search of a cute 3-bedroom/3-bathroom older home in downtown Pella, send them our way (or really, the realtor's way, 'cause I have a signed contract, you know?).

 

However, because the house hasn't sold, we are moving ourselves into a 2-bedroom apartment in Aurora (or thereabouts) and the key to that is we are moving ourselves (or rather, my Dad, Mom, Grandpa, friend Angela, the girls, and I are moving our stuff to Colorado in mid-April).

 

So, that involves some packing, and some informative packing -- I only have so much room, can only take so many things, but also have an idea as to what we'll need.  Sewing machine going?  I hope so, but if there isn't room, I know I can at least fit a few balls of yarn in the back.  Adam's clothes?  We'll see, but he's following a few weeks later and may have to sacrifice clothes for musical instruments the first trip.  (That didn't stop me from packing up all of his clothes yesterday; ah, it is good to see a nearly-clean closet.  I don't want to put anything back into it ever.)

 

Part of my packing includes giving.  My goal is that for every tub/box that I pack, I pack up a box to give away to the thrift shop.  So far so good... we'll see if I'm able to meet that goal when it's all said and done.  There is a lot of stuff to go through in this house yet over the next two weeks, so I think it's doable.

 

Oh, yes, and two weeks.  We are leaving for Colorado two weeks from tomorrow... crazy, isn't it?

 

hugs,

erin