Painting Day 1- with added bonus of Hail, Bugs and a Lake! (quick update with pics)

Today we took possession of our new apartment!  Woohoo!

We met the landlord, did a walk through, signed paperwork, went shopping, and started painting!  Ok, that project will not be a quick one, and honestly I am now too tired and sore to blog much.  But folks asked for photos, so here are some pictures of our adventures from the last couple days:

Why we need to paint- apparently there was furniture there.

Bringing up the Big Bucket of Paint

Phew, Made it!

How not to get paint on your shirt according to DS

getting set up

She claims it will eventually look like a forest

I didn't bring any scungy clothes, so the oompa-loompa look is sposed to keep my stuff clean

 A few other interesting tidbits from the last couple days.  DD says that "Germany is just generally pleasant".  I think she may be right about that!

Cool Bug DS found

DD is still the bug whisperer, this damsel fly needed a hand out of the home supply store

View from our new kitchen window.  Could do worse than a corn field!

There is a lake 2 blocks from our current abode in Auenheim- who knew?

Hail- during 80 degree Fahrenheit weather.... in case you need some refreshing?

Sunday Drive

This damsel fly tried to hitch a ride on David's pants.

Saturday Recap

So, yesterday was all about shopping.  Since he works pretty standard hours,  Saturdays are really the only days when I can take advantage of David's superior German abilities and show him the wonderful places that the kids and I researched during the week.  Yesterday, we went to a local furniture store "Möbel SB", and down to Obi, an enormous Home-Depotish place that also carries auto supplies, art supplies and bicycles.  We bought paint and assorted paint-project-oriented goods then spent some time debating our respective ideas and assumptions about decorating the new apartment.  Oddly, I discovered that my husband believes that if you have beige walls you must also have beige furniture.  Also, until I showed him the price of colored paint, he thought painting one wall an accent color was "weird".  Who knew?  The kids, on the other hand, really like bright/dark colors.  We talked them down from the most garish tones, but DD will have a bright green wall, and DS will have one in ocean tones.

Sunday Outing
 
With that debate under our belts, we thought today would be a great day for a family drive to further explore our area.  I printed up a quick map, we picked a direction, and away we went!  As we were leaving our house we happened to glance over at the space in front of our landlords' house.  Check out the tractor!

Bearnt had mentioned owning a tractor, but I was surprised to see it here today.

Off to the Black Forest
 
Then it was off into the Black Forest (Schwartzwald).  In may ways, the area reminded me of some of the back roads in Santa Cruz- like driving up Highway 9.  Motorcyclists were plentiful, as were biergartens and the like catering to them.  The whole zone is sort of a Historic Drive through timber towns.  At one point our route took us up into a more hilly region, and the narrow winding road was a little less comfortable- but still aesthetically gorgeous.  I can see why the motorcyclists love it.

It was difficult to take photos while we drove, but, eventually we got to an even more picturesque burg  than most and we went ahead and got out of the car.  Oberharmersbach seems to be a pleasantly touristy town.  It has a large, lovely church called St. Gallus, some tasty and whimsical public art, and a couple historic museums.  There are also a lot of too-spendy-for-us gasthaus and biergarten establishments that were even open on Sunday.  Here are some photos from our explorations:  

(Reminder- photos can be enlarged by clicking on them)

Bears seem to be the mascots of the town.  I think this was a town information center of some sort, but I liked the statue.

We looped through about 1/2 of this region

Black Forest sites

May pole and civic organizations

There really were a ton of bikers around!

DD stopping to smell the flowers- these large blooms are common.

I enjoy all the flowers

This historic building had been transformed into a museum.

 Here is a labeled tree trunk with historic events on it.

Bringing history alive

Water wheel

The museum itself was closed, but many exhibit items were just outside with labels.  You could touch at will

I really loved this fountain 

No clue why the bears and man seem to be carrying cooking implements....

He seems to be holding a fork

Club or spatula, you decide...

 Here are some photos of the beautiful church:

Her inscription says: tut was er euch sagt.  Doesn't seem to translate well, though. 

St Gallus from the street

St Gallus from the front

Alter area- vibrant!

Stained glass

Pipe organ

Vestibule

This little town (Zell Am Hammersbach I think?) fascinated me- it seemed filled with gingerbread houses, like San Fran:

Not sure the picture does it justice

On the way back home we made another discovery:

Hey, what is that up on the hill?

A castle!  I think I know where we will need to explore soon!

(We think this may be Schauenburg? stay tuned!)

Progress and Unexpected Anxiety

First things first: We got the apartment!  You remember, this one here with the cool Badenzimmer and the Küche:

David went down to sign the contracts yesterday, but since I have to sign as well, we will actually wind up completing them next Thursday.  We can move in on the 1st.  So, looks like we are moving again!

How do I feel about this?  Well, not surprisingly I am excited!  The apartment seems great.  The location, while less picturesque in the suburban way is much more convenient in a more urban way.  And, it means I get to go on a shopping spree.  So, that could be fun!

On the other hand, though, I was startled to discover how much anxiety I have over the move.  Doubtless, some was the result of the 13 pages of German legalese that David brought home for us to peruse, translate and generally check over between now and next week's signing.  No matter how good Google Translate is, some of it just really doesn't make any sense.  And some of the clauses are potentially troubling (for instance, does the fact that the buildings are "generally closed" after 8PM just mean we need our keys to get in or that we will be locked out if we have a late errand?  I never attended a college where the dorms would lock you out, don't want to start now!)

But, I think more of my creeping dread is simply the fact that after living here for a month, I was beginning to get just slightly comfortable.  I know how to find my way around town.  There are two families on the block with whom we are neighborly (not "Freunds" yet, but certainly social progress had been made).  The kids had even been playing with our landlord's sons and their friends.

DD and Lawrence, he is 2.5 and quite bright

DD & DS playing soccer with local kids, who do call it soccer- at least around us

DD walks a line in the back yard while Louis watches

Also, I have gotten better at using our current kitchen.  Latest triumph:  Challeh

Not quite as good as in the States, but pretty decent for off the top of my head with limited resources

Of course, we have only begun to meet some of the neighbors:

This guy is more impressive in RL, about 2 " long and fuzzy

So, I guess the short story is that the idea of relinquishing the minor amount of settlement that we have achieved has me all askew inside.  But, the opportunity to start building a more permanent home for ourselves is pleasing.

Today I will take the kids to the local Home Depot/OSH stores in Offenburg (Bauhaus & Obi) and we will pick up paint chips so we can decide on colors for the new rooms.  We apparently have to paint the apartment either before we move in or after we move out, so we are choosing to do it now.  We are not fond of some of the garish red and orange walls anyways.  I am not looking forward to the painting project itself (my shoulders are still a little sore), but I do like being able to personalize our space!  

I am trying to plan out the rest of the furnishings, but it is hard without exact measurements on the livingroom.  I am going off the estimate that it is 4 meters by about 6 meters.  If I am significantly off, things that barely fit on paper will almost certainly swell beyond capacity in RL.

Interesting things I have learned this week:

• When you order things online from Ikea in Germany, it is cash on delivery!  The drivers take your money, up to 8,000 €.  Cash transactions seem very common here.
• Our apartment requires you to be quiet not only from 22-06 Uhr (10PM-6AM), but also from 12-15 Uhr (12-3PM).  No one seems to know why.
• German mail carriers don't care about apartment numbers, they just deliver to the Family Name.  We will technically be apartment 12, but that isn't listed on our address.
• 30 € per month of our rent is for the kitchen (great deal as far as we are concerned!)
• Big stores don't always look like big stores.  There is a place next to a local supermarket that I assumed was just a littler market (for some reason markets here often come in pairs.  Like Albertsons and Safeway sharing a parking lot).  But, on advice of our landlady, Zybella, we went inside.  It is a HUGE furniture store!  Sort of a low-end Ikea clone.  Boggle.  It is even two stories- one of which exists entirely over the supermarket next door!
• Driving in France is even harder than driving in Germany.  I got lost both going To and From Ikea,  mostly, I think, because the streets seem to change names more often than Lady Gaga changes her wig.
• Graffiti does exist in Germany.  After getting lost coming home from Ikea, we wound up driving up to Kehl from a different direction than we had been before.  Each town we passed, while otherwise typically German Clean, had patches of colorful graffiti along the main route.

More adventures soon!

66 meters to glory

Today was Saturday.  Saturdays are a more significant day for us here than in the states.  This is because here, it is really the only weekend day that counts!  Sure, Sunday is a day of rest.  But, really, it is a day of forced rest.  Shops aren't open.  Buses barely run.  Only a few pizzerias and ice cream parlors are even available for emergency food- oh, and McDonald's.  This Saturday we had a long agenda.  First into Strasbourg to see the cathedral & town center, then over to Ikea, then down to Offenburg to check out that electronics store of the difficult directions.


Getting There:  The trip to Strasbourg was a little stressful, but eventually uneventful.  Our directions were filled with turns and street names that never really materialized.  Luckily, though, there were huge signs all over directing us (and the main flow of traffic) into the City Center and toward the great, Gothic, Strasbourg Cathedral de Notre-Dame which had dominated the local skyline for the better part of 1,000 years (the first version of the church on that site was started in 1015- in the place of a Roman temple).  


First Impression:  My first glimpse of the cathedral itself threatened to send a chill down my spine.  Its ornate, dark spire is passingly reminiscent of some vampiric castle from those unsettling tales that predate the fluffy undead so popular with the teens of today.  My next impression (and many of those to follow) was of simple awe.  The structure is immense.  We read later that the spire reaches 142 meters, making it the tallest building in "the modern world" for 4 centuries after its completion in 1399!


Photos:  The rest of this part of the story is probably best told through pictures.  So, without further ado:

[reminder, enlarged photos can be viewed by clicking on them-they will open larger, and if you click on them again you can see more details]

A taste of Alsace on the way to the cathedral

First good look

The main doors

Entrance

Some nice statues

More

DS learning the history of the saints- the other door had virgins being tempted by the devil!

66 meters to the panoramic view just beneath the main spire

First Balcony

View from the first balcony.  Already not too shabby!

This appears to be some OLD graffiti

A neighbor building

View from a bit higher

Dizzying Heights, but not at the top

The top is filled with carvings like these- we think they may have been patrons?

The kids & me in front of the main spire

See, there we are!

The main spire- close up!

Lovely city

Yeah, that is a 15€ view alright!

DS peeping out one of the many windows along the stairwells

This pigeon had built its nest on the stairs down- I suspect she built it during non-peak hours!

 A few interesting features:

Flying buttresses

er...

Even the gutters are ornate

 Once we got down, my legs were actually shaking.  We stopped for lunch at a creperie and splurged on the usual 3.50€ sodas and waters for every parched one of us (that was more per drink than most of us spent per meal).  The fellows below played lively music throughout.  David and I managed to order our food in three languages- all of which the waiter spoke.  Upon pressing, he admitted to speaking a 4th: Greek!

French Mariachi?  They mostly played jazz standards, Dixieland and show tunes.

On our way out, we splurged one more time- on a few special cookies and a lollipop for DS

We didn't go on the carousel, but we did admire it.

Cookie Trove (and a lollipop)

We hit the top of the spires just about at noon and got to enjoy not only the panoramic view, but also the pealing of bells from all around Strasbourg.  I have included a very brief video to give you just a taste of that experience.

Offenburg, briefly:


After the trip up the cathedral, we decided to cut our visit to Strasbourg short and head down to Offenburg instead of continuing on to Ikea.  It made sense at the time, but I am not really sure why.


For the record, the directions to the Media Markt were just a big a headache as we feared they might be!  In fact, things got SO bad, that we actually drove all the way back to Kehl (in the rain), printed out new maps, confirmed our orientation and went AGAIN.  In the end, we did find the store and a couple others that will be useful in the future (a Home Depot clone called Bauhaus with a built in backerei was of particular note).  We also found the correct path to our (looking likely, knock wood) potential new apartment.  So, despite the frustration of the drive, it did prove quite educational.