Around the House & Cottage - Video 2 of 4

Thats our clothesline, and then the rain barrel that collects water from our ducts (which Daniel just built).

Midwives :)

Wendy Pinter Christa Bartley

So there is this lady in town who has long dredlocks pulled back in a nice ponytail and she is always babywearing her newborn daughter. Every time I pass her in the car someone points and says something about how she does the same thing as me. I actually asked more specifically about what they meant and they said she is a Hebamme. Said, "Hey-bomb-eh". This is the german word for midwife. Super cool! She apparently had all three of her kids at home. Cool huh? Wendy and Christa would think so. I think. :) Wink wink. I hope to get to talk to her about her work here someday. And since DONA is DONA INTERNATIONAL now I might just make it a point to go to something in Europe. Wonder who I could meet?!

Wendy, Christa, I miss you guys. Thanks a lot for letting me work and learn with you for so long. Hopefully again someday.

More around the house

To pretty up the outside of our cottage...

Bea's rose bushes

Bumblebees pollenating Bea's flowers

I am growing Basil (Basilikum) & Chives (Schnittlauch). Here they are looking ever-so-stunned after repotting. I am excited to have these :) Hopefully they last all year.

There are wild strawberries all over our yard.

Columbine that I dug up aroud Bea's yard and replanted in front of our cottage. I hope they will take well here. They do not seem to mind the acidic soil from the many pine trees. I am wondering if they will get enough morning/afternoon sun in this spot? The one on the far left is not a columbine. It is some kind of varigated vine/groundcover thingy. Mom, help please?

Last, but not least, this is a radio made from trash from South Africa. Bea & Cord lived there last year for 6 months while studying English. Apparently people take all the rubish and turn it into "stuff". It actually works. We listen to german radio on it.

Our Place and Theirs

Like I said, we live on a dirt road. Thats their house with all of the stacked wood, big windows, etc. Those are not solar panels on the roof rather those are more windows that line both sides of the roof upstairs. Its really bright in their house. Thats our cottage across from their house and near the kids Baumhaus (treehouse) and the chicken coup.



Here is our home.

Behind their house is a pond. They consider it a lake (der See). I will upload videos of the house and pond slowly. Here are some photos for now. Plenty of frogs (FROESCHE) here :). Just the way I like it.

Columbine by the pond/lake (DER SEE).

My finger points to where the Bansemer's house is. Thats their neighbors house. They are rarely there. Maybe its a vacation house?

More pond views. It is very peaceful here.

Elia

Here is Elia, the youngest of the three boys. He is two. We were riding on a train and he was trying to say "eisenbahn" (eyes-en-bah(n)" which is a railroad. :)

Front Door, Dining Area, Kitchen, Bathroom

Our front door with the new screen daniel built for Heidi to look out from. My Eckhart Tolle calendar from mom :).

our curtains

Dining area behind the front door.

Flowers I am trying to grow.

I am attempting to grown an avacado bush :)

Our bathroom. Kitchen sink is to the right behind the bathroom door.

Little details...

Oliver and Lulu have made themselves right at home. Apparently Oliver is good to go wherever he is as long as he can crawl into a little bag and snuggle up. :)

We now have a new screen door on our cottage so they can look outside and watch the two geese walk around the yard and listen to the chickens.

Look! Heidi & Ollie are in our German childrens book!

And apparently so is Cougar! Check out this sweet little photo that teaches us to do verbs in german. We found a funny part in the lower left-hand corner. The kitty cat is uebergeben. Aka: vomiting. :) Funny!

This says...

Fuer Dich: For You :)

Bea made us cafe au lait for a mid-day pick-me-up while we were still adjusting to the 6 hour time difference. Here is our little cafe/bistro table outside our cottage.

Haarlem

In two weeks will be the kids Sommerferien and we are taking a trip to the flat in Amsterdam. Daniel is super dooper excited since Bea told him that you can get PB there for uber cheap. We are going to be able to get it for 1/4 the cost and so, you know what that means!

PEANUT BUTTER FINGER TIME! PEANUT BUTTER FINGER TIME!



The beaches on the North Sea:

White Asparagus

Through our kitchen window in the cottage:

We are living on a dirt road in a small village in the country where we are surrounded by woods and wetlands. Its very green here. Thats the road behind the fence.

In the village we have an adorable market where we can get "Frisher Spargle" which means fresh asparagus. In Germany it is far more popular to get white asparagus than green. I think its delicious. Especially when we eat them like we did on Day 1 when the family came over. I made a soy-cream sauce with herbs and we drizzeled it over steamed asaparagus. Side: boiled potatoes.

Every morning Bea stops by this market to pick up fresh made Vollkorn Broetchen. These are beautiful whole wheat rolls that are topped with Kurbiskern (Pumpkin Seeds) or Mohn (Poppy Seeds).

The cool bread slicing machine in our cottage!

Looking from outside the house into Bea's kitchen. Those are some of the veggies delivered to the house in a crate every wednesday.

Monday - The first day/Der Erste Tag (excuse my poor german)

So, our flights were not so bad. I felt pretty stressed about the cats because we kept having to give them more medicine to make them sleepy so they wouldn't scream. I was so worried that they had to go potty but couldn't, or would go in their crates and it would be so offensive to other passengers noses. But, nothing happened and we made it to Germany fine! This flight definitely felt shorter than my other two flights to Europe but maybe that was because it was not as scary to me knowing what I was in for. Daniel seemed to enjoy it too. We watched Marley & Me, Desperate Housewives (not daniel), and part of Twighlight. We only slept about 2 hours. I apparently became extremely dehydrated despite my excessive water consumption. I had the worst headache!

Anyway, we left around 6 on Sunday and arrived in Frankfurt around 8:45 where we connected to another flight to Hannover and finally arrived at 10:45. Suprisingly, we weren't nervous to meet our new family at all and when we did finally see them at baggage claim it was like seeing old friends. The kids were there and so were both Bea & Cord. It was a really nice start to a growing friendship.

When we got to our new house, this is what we found. :) Here are a few pics of our new cottage. Bea put these lovely roses and pink flowers in there and after 1 week i still have them and they are beautiful! Check out that sweet fruit and veggie assortment! :) I'm at home here already!

This is part of out little kitchen. Right outside that window is a chicken coup. We are surrounded on three sides by a chicken coup with three little guys running around inside it. A white one, a black one and a stripped black/white one. It suprisingly doesn't stink at all and we get to enjoy a view of the little cluckers while they run around the pine trees, pinecones, and bushes outside our window.

Here is chicken numero uno.

The Bansemer's also have a beautiful pond outside their house with a huge sandy beach where the kids build sand castles and go swimming. Its surrounded by woods, mostly pine. So day one was a holiday in Germany and family came over and everyone laid in the sun on the beach while all the little kids played in the water.