Getting Down and Dirty

I know it has been a few days since my last post, but we have been quite busy with the movers coming and doing a few things in the yard. I hope this post will help you see just what we have to tackle to to be completely settled in. 

This past Friday our household goods finally arrived! I am looking forward to settling into the house, but I am not very excited about emptying these boxes and trying to find places to put things.

There are two more rooms with stacks of boxes.

 In Germany it is uncommon to have closets because they are considered rooms and cost the builder/owners more money. What they use instead are wardrobes. This is not too big of a problem for me except when it comes to linen closets or a coat closet. In Wyoming we were blessed to have a coat closet and a linen closet and we have come to love having those available. We have nothing of the sort here...This is when things start to get interesting and creative. We also don't have the same type of storage in our kitchen and so we had to pick and choose a few items that we never really used and put them back in the box. I have one box that is for holiday and I filled it with extra pie pans and serving dishes and another box contains some of the appliances that aren't compatible with 220 voltage. I still kept a few of my favorite 120 appliances out (blender, mixer) and we will have to buy a small transformer for the kitchen. It just isn't smart to go out and buy a whole new set of kitchen appliances that are 220 then not be able to use them in the states.  

 We also went to our first German grocery store, Toom, and is Walmart-ish in the fact that there are clothes and toys and groceries. Daryl and I had a good time looking at things and laughing at a few. I am sure that some people were looking at us as we were pointing and giggling! We bought some fresh eggs and a local sweet wine, but that was it. 

As you can see by the feather on the egg I really did mean "fresh". haha

Hela is another store we decided to visit. It is just like Lowe's and had lots of fun home decor things to see. Our main goal was to visit the outdoor section; we bought some beautiful, blue pots and plants to put in them.

 Our house is white and I thought it was in a desperate need of a splash of color.

The fence that goes around our yard is hideous (I think the landlord was being cheap) and so we decided to buy some vines to cover it. Our neighbor owns a flower shop and she is bringing us some other ones that will grow much faster than these, but I am happy with them so far.

Weeds, weeds, and more weeds

So for those of you who don't know, I LOATHE weeding. LOATHE IT! It was punishment back when I was in high school and we did quite frequently to just keep the place spruced up. The house that Daryl and I have picked out has this wonderfully, large, stone terrace, of course it is covered in weeds. Not just little bitty weeds, but the ones that grow an inch a day! (slight exaggeration). The landlord said it was supposed to have been cleaned before it was even showed, but that just didn't happen...I'm really not that surprised. And of course the one to pull the weeds is the one who is at home, and of course that happens to be me. Of course! And of course the only gloves available to me (at the moment) are ones left by previous tenants and there are two gloves to choose from...both for the left hand! Of course! So I choose the one that is leather and not full of  spider webs =) I decided it would be in the best interest of my fingers to spread this chore between a couple of days. As of now I am a little more than half way through! You will see a final product picture in a few days.

Here is one of the many ginormous weeds!

We had a lot of rain right after we moved in and the weeds seemed to multiply and grow in just a matter of days.

  

The weeds are not the extent of adventures in our new yard; we have moles...moles! The dogs have decided to take it upon themselves to root them out, which I am not too happy about. We now have several holes to fill. Sigh.....

I know my photography isn't too good, but at least you kinda can see the hole.

On a lighter note we do have some pretty wild flowers...only they are behind a wall. Oh well, they make me smile =)

Check back soon! I will try to post every other day. The movers are going to be here tomorrow (hooray!) so you will get to see the house unfold from boxes to decorating and eventually painting. I LOVE decorating and have several wonderful ideas in mind, so keep checking for new things. 

Lots of Love!

The First!

As some of you may know, Daryl and I went to London this past weekend to see the final installation of the Harry Potter movies! All I have to say about the movie is AWESOME! We saw it at a BFI IMAX theater in 3D. The screen was the largest in Great Britain and it was huge. We had a great time seeing some of the sites in London as well. Obviously, as you can see this is the Big Ben. We were very blessed to have amazing weather the first full day we were there.

 We went to King's cross and got a pic in front of this display. If you are unfamiliar with Harry Potter it is a train station where they have to walk through a wall.

 Daryl and Sherlock Holmes :) He has always been a fan so we had to go to Baker St.

 The London Bridge

 We also had the chance to see the musical Wicked! It was amazing! The acting was great and so were the voices. It is kind of like a prequel to the Wizard of Oz movie. If you have the chance to see it in the States you have to!

 A required picture to have from London. HA!

We loved our trip, but have decided that London needs to be visited during the off season because it was so crowded! And everyone was pushy and didn't care if you were in their way they were going to walk right through you, so I decided I wasn't going to be pushed either. You have to have quite a backbone to walk those streets. Other than that it was so much fun. we traveled by plane, train, and the "Tube" or the underground transportation. It was so easy to get anywhere you wanted to go with the Tube and it only took a few minutes. We stayed at a Hostel that was pretty central to transportation. It wasn't all that bad, hotels would've been twice the price or more, especially in the area we stayed. The food was awesome and there were so many choices! We had some amazing Chinese food and Italian food. The choices for restaurants were endless. We also had some baguette sandwiches, they are pretty popular in Europe and they normally include ham and cheese or tomato and cheese, those are always delicious.  We were going to take a red bus tour, but saved money by just walking to all the places we wanted to see. Since we were only there for two days we didn't get to see any museums so that will be in the plan for next visit. 

Some guards along Parliament St. Don't ask what they were guarding...I have no idea 

In Trafalgar square

 Our yummy Italian food

That is it for now, I don't know how often I will be posting yet, So I will let you know

Lots of Love!

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