Its really hard keeping up with a blog... I will blame it on the fact that we just moved across the world! :D Its been quite busy here in the Childers home.
We have been enjoying Germany. It is very nice. We like it a lot. But it is very different than what we are used to!
The town we live in is quite small. Not much going on here. There are a few bigger Cities with more to do about 30 minutes away. The closes bigger city is about 1:30hr away. We haven't visited anything big quite yet, but we did get the chance to go to a few fest. :D It is fun.
Life is different here. Drinking age is 16 and driving age is 18. Its nice. It does make sense. Let the kids have some crazy partying before they are allowed to drive. Less teen deaths and deff less DUIs. It is definitely weird seeing "kids" drinking. Although they are only allowed to drink beer and wine. None of the strong stuff.. Although beer here is pretty strong Shawn says, but he loves it!
Driving is also different here. Of course we have the Autobahn, which has NO speed limit. However if you get into a car accident over 130 Kmph (80mph) insurance wont cover anything. Our instructor was telling us how this German got into a car accident and caused quite a lot of damage to the city. Well yea, he is in debt.... 2Million Dollars.... ouch. There are 30 different speed limits, The small streets which are 30 Kmph (18mph), City 50 (30) and 100 (80) outside city limits! And they don't really always mark them. You just have to know. What drives me crazy the most is the "right of way" streets. they are not really marked. Its weird cause the streets leading into our housing, which one of them seems like a main road, i would have to stop and give the right of way to whoever is on my right coming from one of the off roads!!! yes, i almost crashed a few times cause i forgot to give the right of way :/ Germans do tend to stop, since I do indeed have a BIG car.
The food here is definitely delicious. SOOOOOOOO good that my body is showing it. A very nice 10lbs addition in the last few months! haha... yea.... where is the gym again?
You know what is crazy about life here? How people treat their pets. Pets are allowed practically ANYWHERE. We went to the mall the other day. yup dogs were walking right among us. Some of them weren't even wearing leashes! A lot of dogs around here do not use leashes. They just walk right along side their owners. It is quite cute. I love it. Sadly to say, there is a lot of stray cats. There are quite a few around my neighborhood.
Housing was troublesome. I think I was just being a little bit of a drama queen when we were going through the process. They wouldn't let us rent in the economy because he didnt have enough rank. (BS.. cause there are lower enlisted renting) and he was ranked too "high" to live on on post housing. So we got stuck with an apartment.... 3 bedrooms. 1. i wanted a yard... 2. i would have liked to have extra rooms. It was quite a challenge trying to fit a 4 bedroom 2 level home into our apartment, but i think we got it. I think we would be able to live here comfortably. :D
All in all, we really do like it here. It is a lot of fun. and always something to do. Its starting to get a bit chilly so not much walking to the grocery store. But I do hear the chritmas bazaars are around the corner, so I cant wait!!!
Thank you for reading!!!
Sunday, October 21, 2012
Saturday, August 11, 2012
Enroute to Germany!
Traveling was CRAZY!
First we had about a 12 hour drive to Illinois to drop of the car at the port! It was not much fun, but we did it! It was funny when were at the gas station and only bought 1 gallon of gas! We could only drop of the car with and empty tank. It was sad to see our car gone. We will see it in no time and then the traveling around will start happening.
Then we had a short drive to St. Louis MO. It was about 30 minutes. A little confusion with my passport and my ticket. :/ My Bolivian passport has my single name on it. But with a little talking and wedding certificate they said they will let me travel. Germany made no problem out of it. But the people at St. Louis wanted to! CRAZY. We went to the USO at the St. Louis airport since we had some time to kill. It was a nice little place. The kids got some free hot dogs and mommy and daddy got some free Monsters! They got to play in this awesome little kids room. Got to burn off some steam before the flight.
Our flight to Chicago got delayed which was really scary since we only had about a 45 min layover before our flight to Frankfurt. The flight to Chicago was nice and short. We all slept! Once we got to chicago it was a RACE against time. We had 2 strollers, 2 car seats, 1 diaper bag, 1 computer bag, and one of those little luggage bags with wheels (the carry on ones) and 2 very tired kids! and stupid airport in chicago has bus as shuttles from gate to gate... but they DO NOT have elevators to get down to them. only about 2 flights of stairs. Guy told us the only was to get from gates F to C was a 45 min walk, but with our plane boarding and only 15 minutes to take off... that was an option for us. Luckily some airport workers decided to help us after I yelled at someone :/ LOL But we made it to our flight so thats all that matters!! :D
Shawn got Lucky for his flight to Frankfurt. He got to sit a row behind us and I had two crazy children for a 10 hour flight! But no in all honesty they were great! Jr did obviously get a bit fussy! But thank god for car seats! I was able to keep him buckled in the whole flight! They both ate their dinners fast and watched Lilo and Stich on the Airplane TVs.
We finally arrived in Frankfurt at about 10am in the morning! We got completely LOST at the airport. We had no idea what we were doing. No idea where we were supposed to go. The USO was not in any map or info stall at the airport! :/ After about two hours of just walking around a guy approached us asking us if we were military and yes! He was one of the in processing people that works at the USO. So it all went well from there!
We saw some weird fashion at the airport!!! Man either wore capris or really short shorts... really short shorts.... cannot emphasize enough on how SHORT this shorts were.. and I'm talking in bright colors too! wish i would have gotten pictures :(
Anyway! We had a nice bus ride into Vilseck it was 5 hours long, but we all passed out! Especially the kids. I woke up to some of it and snapped a few pictures. From what I did see.. Every car was either a Mercedes, BMW or Audi. Very rarely you saw 1 or 2 toyotas! and this cars were TINY. Once we got closer to the military bases Vilseck and Graf (which are only 20 min apart) you started seeing the Dodges and Fords. We saw quite a few Mustangs and chargers! but my car is still cooler ;)
Anyway! Ours Sponsor wasn't very punctual or prepared. He even admitted himself at being a bad sponsor. He showed up about 30 minutes late. Not only was he late, but he showed up in a Dodge Challenger. Which he then proceeded to tell us why we brought so much luggage. Anyway he had to call in a different guy who had a truck. We arrived at Vilseck at 6pm... didn't check in at the Hotel in Graf until 830. (remember how i told you its only 20 min from post to post?)
ANYWAY! haha The hotel is really nice, we have one room and the living room has a couch that pulls into a bed. The bedroom has its own TV! its pretty neat. We also have a stove with 2 burners. a nice size little fridge and a dishwasher! :D Its really nice! Way better than the hotel we stayed at in Colorado Springs. I actually wouldn't mind living here for 3+ weeks. But hopefully we will find housing soon!
Shawn should be going back to work on Tuesday and then start in processing on thursday. we can both cannot drive anything until we get our drivers license. which can be anytime for me and 2 weeks from now for Shawn. Which SUCKS! Cause they told him he is fully responsible to get to work on time everyday. But he cant drive? and cant get a drivers license? AND is 20 minutes away :I They said they would help us. So hopefully everything goes alright.
That was our traveling Experience to Vilseck! (Technically Graf since thats where we are staying :) )
Will be writing again soon!!!
First we had about a 12 hour drive to Illinois to drop of the car at the port! It was not much fun, but we did it! It was funny when were at the gas station and only bought 1 gallon of gas! We could only drop of the car with and empty tank. It was sad to see our car gone. We will see it in no time and then the traveling around will start happening.
Then we had a short drive to St. Louis MO. It was about 30 minutes. A little confusion with my passport and my ticket. :/ My Bolivian passport has my single name on it. But with a little talking and wedding certificate they said they will let me travel. Germany made no problem out of it. But the people at St. Louis wanted to! CRAZY. We went to the USO at the St. Louis airport since we had some time to kill. It was a nice little place. The kids got some free hot dogs and mommy and daddy got some free Monsters! They got to play in this awesome little kids room. Got to burn off some steam before the flight.
Our flight to Chicago got delayed which was really scary since we only had about a 45 min layover before our flight to Frankfurt. The flight to Chicago was nice and short. We all slept! Once we got to chicago it was a RACE against time. We had 2 strollers, 2 car seats, 1 diaper bag, 1 computer bag, and one of those little luggage bags with wheels (the carry on ones) and 2 very tired kids! and stupid airport in chicago has bus as shuttles from gate to gate... but they DO NOT have elevators to get down to them. only about 2 flights of stairs. Guy told us the only was to get from gates F to C was a 45 min walk, but with our plane boarding and only 15 minutes to take off... that was an option for us. Luckily some airport workers decided to help us after I yelled at someone :/ LOL But we made it to our flight so thats all that matters!! :D
Shawn got Lucky for his flight to Frankfurt. He got to sit a row behind us and I had two crazy children for a 10 hour flight! But no in all honesty they were great! Jr did obviously get a bit fussy! But thank god for car seats! I was able to keep him buckled in the whole flight! They both ate their dinners fast and watched Lilo and Stich on the Airplane TVs.
We finally arrived in Frankfurt at about 10am in the morning! We got completely LOST at the airport. We had no idea what we were doing. No idea where we were supposed to go. The USO was not in any map or info stall at the airport! :/ After about two hours of just walking around a guy approached us asking us if we were military and yes! He was one of the in processing people that works at the USO. So it all went well from there!
We saw some weird fashion at the airport!!! Man either wore capris or really short shorts... really short shorts.... cannot emphasize enough on how SHORT this shorts were.. and I'm talking in bright colors too! wish i would have gotten pictures :(
Anyway! We had a nice bus ride into Vilseck it was 5 hours long, but we all passed out! Especially the kids. I woke up to some of it and snapped a few pictures. From what I did see.. Every car was either a Mercedes, BMW or Audi. Very rarely you saw 1 or 2 toyotas! and this cars were TINY. Once we got closer to the military bases Vilseck and Graf (which are only 20 min apart) you started seeing the Dodges and Fords. We saw quite a few Mustangs and chargers! but my car is still cooler ;)
Anyway! Ours Sponsor wasn't very punctual or prepared. He even admitted himself at being a bad sponsor. He showed up about 30 minutes late. Not only was he late, but he showed up in a Dodge Challenger. Which he then proceeded to tell us why we brought so much luggage. Anyway he had to call in a different guy who had a truck. We arrived at Vilseck at 6pm... didn't check in at the Hotel in Graf until 830. (remember how i told you its only 20 min from post to post?)
ANYWAY! haha The hotel is really nice, we have one room and the living room has a couch that pulls into a bed. The bedroom has its own TV! its pretty neat. We also have a stove with 2 burners. a nice size little fridge and a dishwasher! :D Its really nice! Way better than the hotel we stayed at in Colorado Springs. I actually wouldn't mind living here for 3+ weeks. But hopefully we will find housing soon!
Shawn should be going back to work on Tuesday and then start in processing on thursday. we can both cannot drive anything until we get our drivers license. which can be anytime for me and 2 weeks from now for Shawn. Which SUCKS! Cause they told him he is fully responsible to get to work on time everyday. But he cant drive? and cant get a drivers license? AND is 20 minutes away :I They said they would help us. So hopefully everything goes alright.
That was our traveling Experience to Vilseck! (Technically Graf since thats where we are staying :) )
USO at St. Louis Airport
Chilling and buying snacks before Airplane ride at St. Louis Airport
USO at Frankfurt Airport
Getting Ready for Bus ride!
Frankfurt Airport!
Some town during our bus ride
Very beautiful country Side
Super tired!
Kitchen and Dinning Room at Hotel
Kids Fold out bed :D
Bathroom!! Shawn and I finally figured why our toilet has two flush buttons! One for poop (lots of water) and one for pee (not so much water)
Our room! We get our own TV which is AWESOME cause we dont have to watch Dora the whole day! :D
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Over 2 years Since the last blog!
Wow! I havent kept up with the blog very well :/
The family is doing great! We found out a little over a month ago that we will be PCSing to Vilseck Germany. It is very exciting! There is a lot to do with the house, and we are doing major Spring cleaning! There are a lot of things that we have to throw away and sell! It is very stressful. We have decided to rent out the house. It seems that in the long run is the best. It will be a nice way to save money for a nice down payment in a bigger house when we finally decide to do a move to Minnesota.
Our plans as of now is to enjoy Germany and Europe and enjoy it to the fullest and see everything it has to offer for our family. I wish the kids were a little bigger so they could enjoy it a little more! But we will take tons of pictures, and pictures are worth more than a thousand words they say.
I will hopefully be going to school. Taking a long break (4 years) was fun. I got to start a family, buy a house, and do some growing up. But, it is time to go back to school and finish of this degree. The main goal is to become a psychologist with hopefully my own practice in teen and family psychology. To get there I will get a bachelors degree in Secondary education. I want to teach history since it always was one of my favorite subjects (other than math, but I don't think i have the patience to teach math). While I teach I will hopefully be working on my masters degree. When finished, hopefully I will be able to become a school counselor, which hopefully could lead into a principal :D. But once I get a Master in Psychology I will be able to treat people and counsel. The Ph. D will take a little longer and opening a private practice is far away. But there is nothing wrong with dreaming right?
Shawn will continue on studying and finishing off his business degree. We are both only two years away from our bachelors. I do believe that by the end of our tour in Germany we will both be able to finish off and get decent jobs to start a life in Minnesota where our families are. We decided thats where we want to settle down after the life with the Army. Whether that would be in 3 years or 10. It will all depend on how our situation will be at the end of our tour and whether Shawn will re enlist or get out. For now, our plans are to hopefully both graduate in the next 3 years. As much as I would like to go to a on campus university (and so would Shawn) It is hard to do so with the military and 2 small children. So online schooling will have to do. A lot of people do it. Right?
On another note, the babies are doing great. Sofia's speech is doing so much better. Doctors keep having different opinions. Some tell me not to worry about it that it will come since she is a very bright child. Others like to tell me she is way behind and needs speech therapy. For now, I am not worried because she does understand very well, and she just chooses not to talk. Once we get to Germany, we will decide if she is still to far behind then we will do speech therapy. Her interests as of know is all girlie things. She enjoys doing her nails! (oh boy!) She really likes to watch Dora in Netflix. She even knows how to set it up on the XBox all by herself! She really enjoys her games in her Leap Pad and has learned how to use it very well. I was scared to get it since the games are a bit advanced, but she has learned pretty quickly.
Shawn Jr. is doing very well. Stubborn like his sister, dad and mom! He amazes me everyday. He is a very curious little boy. He really enjoys teasing his sister! We had to put a child lock on the entertainment center because he enjoys shutting off the X-Box when his sister is watching her show. Those two always seem to fight. Sibling rivalry at its best! I guess it does start very young. This boy is also a monkey! He likes to climb into everything possible!
We recently did some renovations to the house. We put wood laminate all over the top floor except the rooms. I really like it. I was getting very sick of the carpet and having to shampoo it so often. Two kids and two dogs definitely wore down that carpet fast!
That is all I have for now. Hopefully I will be doing a way better job at keeping this blog up and running. Especially with everything coming up in this next few months!
The family is doing great! We found out a little over a month ago that we will be PCSing to Vilseck Germany. It is very exciting! There is a lot to do with the house, and we are doing major Spring cleaning! There are a lot of things that we have to throw away and sell! It is very stressful. We have decided to rent out the house. It seems that in the long run is the best. It will be a nice way to save money for a nice down payment in a bigger house when we finally decide to do a move to Minnesota.
Our plans as of now is to enjoy Germany and Europe and enjoy it to the fullest and see everything it has to offer for our family. I wish the kids were a little bigger so they could enjoy it a little more! But we will take tons of pictures, and pictures are worth more than a thousand words they say.
I will hopefully be going to school. Taking a long break (4 years) was fun. I got to start a family, buy a house, and do some growing up. But, it is time to go back to school and finish of this degree. The main goal is to become a psychologist with hopefully my own practice in teen and family psychology. To get there I will get a bachelors degree in Secondary education. I want to teach history since it always was one of my favorite subjects (other than math, but I don't think i have the patience to teach math). While I teach I will hopefully be working on my masters degree. When finished, hopefully I will be able to become a school counselor, which hopefully could lead into a principal :D. But once I get a Master in Psychology I will be able to treat people and counsel. The Ph. D will take a little longer and opening a private practice is far away. But there is nothing wrong with dreaming right?
Shawn will continue on studying and finishing off his business degree. We are both only two years away from our bachelors. I do believe that by the end of our tour in Germany we will both be able to finish off and get decent jobs to start a life in Minnesota where our families are. We decided thats where we want to settle down after the life with the Army. Whether that would be in 3 years or 10. It will all depend on how our situation will be at the end of our tour and whether Shawn will re enlist or get out. For now, our plans are to hopefully both graduate in the next 3 years. As much as I would like to go to a on campus university (and so would Shawn) It is hard to do so with the military and 2 small children. So online schooling will have to do. A lot of people do it. Right?
On another note, the babies are doing great. Sofia's speech is doing so much better. Doctors keep having different opinions. Some tell me not to worry about it that it will come since she is a very bright child. Others like to tell me she is way behind and needs speech therapy. For now, I am not worried because she does understand very well, and she just chooses not to talk. Once we get to Germany, we will decide if she is still to far behind then we will do speech therapy. Her interests as of know is all girlie things. She enjoys doing her nails! (oh boy!) She really likes to watch Dora in Netflix. She even knows how to set it up on the XBox all by herself! She really enjoys her games in her Leap Pad and has learned how to use it very well. I was scared to get it since the games are a bit advanced, but she has learned pretty quickly.
Shawn Jr. is doing very well. Stubborn like his sister, dad and mom! He amazes me everyday. He is a very curious little boy. He really enjoys teasing his sister! We had to put a child lock on the entertainment center because he enjoys shutting off the X-Box when his sister is watching her show. Those two always seem to fight. Sibling rivalry at its best! I guess it does start very young. This boy is also a monkey! He likes to climb into everything possible!
We recently did some renovations to the house. We put wood laminate all over the top floor except the rooms. I really like it. I was getting very sick of the carpet and having to shampoo it so often. Two kids and two dogs definitely wore down that carpet fast!
That is all I have for now. Hopefully I will be doing a way better job at keeping this blog up and running. Especially with everything coming up in this next few months!
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