Traveling, Part Two: California Part One

Either I hardly blog for years or a manage a bunch of posts at once. (The "books I finished" posts don't really count, I think.) And for the week we were in California, I can EITHER write a sentence or two ("We stayed with one of my sisters at the beginning and end and went camping with much of the rest of the family in the middle, and it was cool that Marie was able to join us for that, too.") or write way too much. I'm opting for the way too much. Oh well, nobody is obligated to read this.

So we arrived late Monday night (September 25th), California time, in San Francisco. My sister Erin lives in San Bruno, ten minutes from the airport, in the house where my dad grew up, and in fact, where I lived from when I was three and a half until I was nearly six. The first couple of times returning to that house without my uncle and Grandma there were really strange, and even now, I half expect to see Grandma walking out of the kitchen, asking us what we want to eat while already preparing half a dozen things and sending Uncle Rich across the street to 7-11 to buy something else. Uncle Rich died in December 2007 and Grandma in August 2008, so it's been awhile now, but we don't go that often, either. (Katie and I visited Grandma in May 2008, our whole family went in December 2009/January 2010 to celebrate my parents 40th wedding anniversary and my brother's wedding, we went again not quite a year later in November/December 2010 for my sister's wedding, and then in November 2015 for my mother's 65th birthday.)

Anyway, Erin came to meet us, taking half of the family to the house and then going back for the rest. It was well past midnight and we'd been traveling for well over 24 hours by the time we arrived, so the only thing on the agenda that night was to collapse. Jörn and I got our own room and the children distributed themselves over the living room.

Tuesday, the main thing on the agenda was to Stay Awake. Erin and I took the girls shopping for underwear (that's the one thing, after 26 years of living in Europe, that I still regularly buy in the U.S. when I can...in Europe, I can EITHER pay for it OR buy sufficient numbers), and as usual, I was way overwhelmed by the sheer quantities and varieties of EVERYTHING. Oh, and we got Elisabeth shoes, too. In Germany she informed me that her shoes were too small, and I had a look, and sure enough, they were. It would have been nice to know that before leaving Cyprus, as she probably has at least a dozen pairs of shoes. Oh well.

Then we packed a picnic and walked to the park.

When I first moved to Germany, the U.S. was in a phase of freaking out about dangerous playground equipment and they were taking out all the merry-go-rounds, swings, and fun slides. So for many years, I've thought of German playgrounds as being awesome and U.S. ones as being pretty boring. However, they've apparently come up with compromises in safety and fun, and we got to visit several pretty cool playgrounds in our short time in the U.S. Still no merry-go-rounds, but swings are back, and big climbing things.

We kept them awake as long as possible, but at some point, the battle was lost with Elisabeth and Helen...

Lukas was the only one who didn't fall asleep and didn't even doze, and he also slept through the first night and every night and was never up early. It was like he didn't have jet lag at all. (My sister-in-law told me that my brother doesn't believe in jet lag. I guess Lukas doesn't, either. I'd love to not believe in jet lag, but I'm not convinced that I can just "choose" not to...)

 Lukas and Jörn made, and all of us ate, dinner, and then my parents arrived. I don't have a photo of my mom, but here's one of my dad, with the girls awake (but ready for bed) and Jörn nearly asleep.

Shortly after, Katie succumbed:

And finally, Marie arrived!

She was shocked to see how much all the girls have grown, but that does happen when it's been a full year! Marie spent December 2015-June 2016 living with my sister Erin, just for a "different experience," including taking one psychology class at the community college, and working in a pretzel store in the mall. Then after the summer in Cyprus, she returned to the U.S. last year in September to help take care of my other sister's daughter. In August she moved out, to a shared apartment in Rocklin, and is enrolled full-time at Sierra College, where my dad got his AS degree when I was a child, and where I took a few classes during high school and an over-full load between Mexico and Germany (1990-1991), but never finished. At least one of my siblings, possibly two, also took classes there.

So here we are, still not the whole family, because Jacob stayed in Cyprus. Lukas trying hard to look tall...

Without a spirit level, it's STILL not conclusive if Lukas has quite passed up Marie in height yet. I think the book slants slightly to the right, but it also appears to be angled slightly back, so...I don't know. His shoulders definitely seem higher, anyway. By Christmas, the next time we see Marie, I'm sure that Lukas will have gotten another half centimeter or so and it won't be a debatable topic anymore. He's been slow to take off growing, but has grown quite a bit in the last year, finally.

And...one last photo, of the girls coloring. They spent a LOT of time doing that, both in San Bruno and while camping, and it was such a peaceful activity that my sister even lent us some nice pencils and a mandala book, but they unfortunately haven't been as interested here in Costa Rica.

On the Wednesday my sister took Helen and me to Target again, to look for socks for me (unsuccessfully--I was annoyingly picky, because I don't need socks in general, I wanted some specific running ones like I've found at Lidl in Cyprus occasionally), and to get more underpants for Helen, since the first ones we got were too small. (So now Elisabeth has a very large supply.) I also fixed the insides of my walking shoes with duct tape, which worked very well.

And at some point, we loaded ourselves and lots of stuff into my parents' RV and my mother's car, and set off for Santa Cruz...and so the next blogpost will be about the camping trip, but yet again, I hear small people stirring, so it's time to close the computer.

Traveling, Part One: Germany

Jörn and Lukas left Cyprus way back on September 13th, to go to an art conference in Germany. The three younger girls and I then flew to Germany (via Belgrade and Berlin to finally arrive in Düsseldorf: exactly 13 hours of travel when a direct flight would be about 4 1/2 hours, but saving lots of money) September 21st, which is when I got the camera back in my possession. And here it's already nearly an entire month later, we've been in Costa Rica for over two weeks, and I figured if I'm going to blog about our trip at all, I'd better get started!

Jörn and Lukas had stayed with friends during the conference, then Tuesday (19th) they went to the Daniells' in Angermund, Düsseldorf, where another friend also visited them, unfortunately before the rest of us arrived.

Düsseldorf is where I lived for my first three years and a bit in Germany, just down the street from Margaret and Phil Daniell. It was through the house group that met at their house that Jörn and I met each other. :-)

Thursday evening was dinner and hanging out and bed, and no photos. Their flat/apartment has only two bedrooms, but is perfectly laid out for guests and we've stayed there several times for a night or two. The three girls and Jörn and I all slept in the upstairs guest room, and Lukas slept on a mattress in the living room. Friday morning the children and Margaret and Phil played outside (there is a huge back garden) while I did a major re-packing: Jörn had sold a couple of paintings and a sculpture, so suddenly had LOTS of room in his suitcase, and we also didn't want to take everything with us to our church retreat that weekend, partly because it simply wouldn't fit in a vehicle. Once I'd finished, we all went for a walk.

This bridge is right at the entrance to the woods, maybe a five-minute walk from where I lived as a nanny. Margaret and Phil have moved now, but not very far away and live nearly as close to it as they did then. We played Pooh Sticks, which Lukas pointed out happily that we ALWAYS do.

 In the photo above, see that moss-covered pipe on the bottom left? It's fairly wide and nearly flat, and I started to walk across it...and very quickly felt very dizzy and had to stand still for quite awhile before I could back slowly off of it. That was rather annoying and embarrassing, and then I realized the reason: a few days earlier, I had gotten new glasses. This is my third prescription of varifocals (progressive lenses), and the lower portion, for reading, was what had changed the most since the last prescription. So when I tried to look down at my feet, it was impossible, as they were just a big blur. Oh well.

Here's the only posed photo we took--Phil's head is just barely visible there behind/between Lukas and Jörn, but it's nice of Margaret. The only evidence there is that I was at the Daniells' was that someone must have been holding the camera.

 As we continued our walk, Elisabeth got upset about something, I don't remember what, and stormed off and sat down. Lukas was very sweet with her. And look at all that GREEN!!! 

Friday afternoon our friend Christian came, and we loaded all the luggage and all of us into his car and Phil's car, and drove to our church, where we stored all of the suitcases. Then the six of us and our carry-ons fit into the car with Christian, and we said goodbye to Phil and headed off to the church retreat, less than an hour away.

The retreat was in a hostel in the mountains, and it was beautiful. And for us, coming from Cyprus, a little bit chilly, as evidenced by Lukas NOT in shorts, but jeans, and Helen playing chess with her hands inside her t-shirt!

We did take more photos at the retreat, but all of them have photos of other people's children. We had a great time re-connecting with friends from when we lived in Germany as well as friends who were just acquaintances when we left but we've gotten to know better since, and meeting lots of new people.

On each of the mornings (Saturday and Sunday) I also went for a long walk, which was wonderful. It didn't occur to me to take the camera, however. I was also a little puzzled about my heels hurting the second day, and about having holes in the heels of both of my socks, which I'd only worn maybe once or twice before. When I looked in my shoes, I discovered holes on the inside almost down to the soles! The soles themselves and the entire rest of the shoe look practically new, still, so that was very strange. I've never had a shoe wear like that before.

Christian unfortunately had to leave on Saturday, but left us his car. Sunday afternoon Katie left with our friends Gary and Elisabeth, leaving five of us to take Christian's car to go pick up our luggage (which then fit in the car because there were only five of us, not seven), and then go to Neukirchen-Vluyn, where Gary and Elisabeth live. Once again, I spent a lot of time there re-packing, after doing laundry, which was a nice treat. And once again, we took no photos, but had a very nice time with them.

Monday morning at something like 6:00 we loaded ourselves and our luggage into two cars (theirs and Christian's) and drove to the airport in Düsseldorf. Our flight wasn't until 10:50, but security personnel were on strike, so we were told to get to the airport three hours before our flight. At the airport, it occurred to us that we ought to take at least ONE photo, and hey, I'm even in this one, as it was taken by Lukas. Katie and my Elisabeth don't look all that pleased about being awake, but Helen sure looks chipper!

So, Düsseldorf to London, London to Dallas, and Dallas to San Francisco: another 22 hours of traveling instead of a direct flight that would have cost three to four times as much.

To be continued...but who knows when, because I hear children stirring.