The last day and a half in Budapest

Hello, sorry it took me a while to download pics from our trip.  Its been a busy few days here since we have been back from Budapest. I did want to share the rest of our trip with you.  So our last full day we took the metro to the parliament and worked our way back to the flat.  The parliament was under construction so my pic isn't that great. 

After there we walked passed Regan's statue, which was kind of odd for Budapest, but that is just my opinion. Then we went to Saint Steven's church.  Beautiful place.  I just posted one outside pic no inside ones since this is a long post.

We took a break and had coffee outside. Then headed over to the market.  I enjoyed seeing the market it was very interesting but a bit crowded.

 

Once we left the market we headed to the big Jewish temple. On the way I found a yarn shop and popped in. I didn't buy any yarn since they didn't seem to sell needles and I am not sure when mine will arrive.   After the temple we stopped in a pretty popular ruins bar, which I actually thought was pretty cool.  Basically, it was an apartment complex that was no longer in use the people bought it and turned it into a bar. Its pretty clever and unique with lots of history I am sure. They used old trinkets to decorate the place.  We stopped in for a beer during Ivy's nap. When she finished her  napped she found a seat her size.  They had cut an old bath tub in half and made a couch out of it.

The stroller you see above we named "the Ruff Rider". It was an old Norwegian stroller Agi borrowed for our stay. It was old but awesome.  Ivy loved it.  Look at  Ivy striking a pose.   After that we passed by the place where Drew and Agi met, on our way to the opera house. After walking by the opera house we stopped by another ruins bar near Drew's old place and had a beer before heading back, to the flat to meet Agi.  She had us over for a lovely dinner. Ivy fell in love with her rabbit loopey. Sadly, I forgot my camera. We did get some great pics with Kev's phone but he hasn't downloaded them yet.   On the day we left, we stopped by this really nice coffee house for lunch. Here are a few photos from there.

 

Well we have a busy day tomorrow and it starts early. Good night !!!

Back at our hotel in Saarbrücken.

Well we are back and its late. I though I had a way around the internet issues but my signal is still to weak to upload pics.  This week will be busy. We have to figure out how to get utilities set up in our new apartment, we need to buy light fixtures, buy a pack n play, and a futon or something. If we are really lucky we will get a couch, kitchen table, Tec for our apartment. Friday we have visa interview in the morning, so we have to get pics for that tomorrow. We move on Saturday, and kevin starts work on Monday. I will do my best to get these pics from Budapest and tell you what we did yesterday and today.  I hope to also get some pics of our hotel apartment in before I post pics of our new apartment. This is all assuming I get internet in our new apartment right away or figure out how to get the photos upload before we move sat. Sorry for the short post. I'll be in touch soon.

I just got my images to work so since I haven't uploaded my last set of pics from Budapest, you get the apartment we have been living in for 3 weeks now.  The first one is our street. They gray building is the one we are in.

 

 

The next is our lovely dining slash kitchen area. When you look to the right you see the kitchen table.

 

When you look straight there is the bathroom.

 

When you look left you have the bedroom and living area.

 

Well you have finally seen where we have been living the last few weeks. I will work on finishing up what we did on Budapest tomorrow or the next night.

 

Hello from Budapest

Hello. Sorry we have been busy and having a great time. There are so many great pic I will pic a few and see how it goes. Our first night we got on at 6:30 pm. Went our apartment and went to dinner. Came back and went to sleep. The first one is taken from Germany in our hotel. Ivy was worried we would forget her.

 

The second picture is Ivy on the train to Frankfurt airport.

 

 

Yesterday we walked around Buda (that is what Drew calls it any way). We saw the city and walked around the castle. Then we went to dinner and hung out at the apartment. Ivy took multiple naps and went until 11:30pm. She had a great day.

 

In Budapest they celebrate mother's day a week before we do and they don't celebrate father's day. Instead they have a children's day. Today was children's day and so it was fun to see what they do. So today we went to hero's square and there was a little festival going on.  Kevin and Drew were the two big kids that got on this crazy ride. I'll try to download the video I took. Here are some pics from today.

 

Well its getting late and we have a busy day planned tomorrow. I'll try to post tomorrow as well. I hope you enjoyed this post.

Busy busy

Hi all, I am so sorry I haven't posted in over a week.  Things have been busy as we are prepping for our move, getting set up for visa appointments, getting ready to go to Budapest, and searching for furniture etc.   As for the move date, Kevin is actually emailing the landlord as we speak.  We would like to move in a day or 2 early.  Thursday or Friday.  Just to give us time to get some what together before he starts work on Monday the 3rd.  That Friday we finally got an appointment for our Visas.  So it will be a busy end to the week right before he starts work.  In addition to that we are leaving here this Friday the 24th to go to Budapest to visit Drew.   I will be dragging along my tablet.  If I can get a good signal I will attempt to download some pics and see if  can't post them here finally.  So there may be a flow of posts over the weekend.  Just to get you up to date.  So keep checking if I haven't already lost you since its been a while since  I have posted.  If that is the case I will try to also post pics of Budapest each day.  In other news we have a renter for our place that may finally workout.  What do they say 3 times is a charm.  Yes this is our third potential renter and on our end everything looks good so tomorrow we will head to Kev's school to print and sign the lease and send it to the renter.  This means if all goes well in the next 36 hours our house is rented!!!!  Yay!!!  In the afternoon we head to Ikea finally. We have been busy looking at apartment furniture.  We decided to look at local places first then Ikea and see what works best.  We have seen some really nice pieces.  We can go either way, get the nice pieces and bring them back to the states or go cheap with Ikea and sell before we leave.   One possibility is to go really cheap at Ikea and then buy some nice authentic German pieces before we leave.  We found an antique shop that we are in love with.  The things in there are so pricey but there are at least 1-2 items we may consider buying down the road when we have some money saved.  So tomorrow its off to ikea which is 30-45 min bus/train trip.  Its crazy to us that here its common for apartments to not have lights.  So in addition to furniture we are on the lookout for lights.  Actually its a priority since you need lights at night to see.  I am more focused on Ivy's room. I have a vision for her room every other room not so much.   I am looking at one of those lantern lights that are popular in the states.  In town I found the cutest shop where I could go nuts if I had the money.  I love the stores here.  I have never loved shopping but I do here and so far all I have done is window shopped except I did buy myself a waterproof jacket since its  must here. Plus I bought Ivy some sand toys ( german made) and a ball that she loves.  I found this cute little German toy store where all the toys are made in Germany.  They are all expensive but are well built and have a warranty or here its called guarantee.  Yes, even Ivy's sand toys have a 3 yr guarantee.  Kind of crazy but they are really well built sand toys.    We are also in search of a washer. Our apartment has a hook up and a spot for one in the basement we just have to get one but its not a priority at the moment.  So as you can see its a busy time so we can get settled and organized.  I am currently looking into cell phones and home phones.   I am hoping to find a company that has US calling so I can soon touch base with some of you.  I miss talking with many of you and it does get lonely in that aspect.  So far I really do like it here and I do enjoy my walks and the places I visit often. I am meeting some nice locals who own smaller shops that are helping me learn the language.  The nicest people so far are in the bakery, the meat shop, the bank, the ice cream shop, and the local produce stand.  In other quick news.  For those of you who don't know.  I have been struggling with diastasis recti.  Its basically a tear in your abs after you have children. It was keeping me from losing weight and making me look bigger and bigger.  At one point I was at my lowest weight since having Ivy but I looked 6 month pregnant. I had a 3 finger gap in my abs at this point. Well weeks before we left I bought a splint and got the info to do the tupler technique.  I just wore the splint. This past week was my first real week doing the exercises and following all the rules.  So far I am down to just a 2 finger gap now and my belly has gone down considerably . I don't know if I am losing weight as we need to get a scale.  I do think wearing the splint worked well weeks before and now the exercises are doing what they need to do.   I will need to do the exercises and keeping a certain form while doing certain activities the rest of my life.   I do think it was worth the money I spent on the splint, dvd, and booklet.  Kevin even commented this week on how he notices a huge change.  So that makes me feel good. I know I have so much more to share but its getting late and I have a few important emails I have to send to get things together for the move. Check in this weekend I hope to have luck with my pictures.  Until then I hope you all have a wonderful memorial day weekend!!!

Apartment update and other tidbits

Hello, Its been  a few days as we have been extremely busy.  I am not even sure where I left off but I'll do my best.   We looked at 4 apartments Thurs- Sat.  The first apartment was my favorite just by the online pictures.  We applied to look at 14 apartments but since we were from so far away I think it scared many and they just were not interested in us.  So we only had 4 to start.  Out of the 4 the first 2 were our favorites.  In a perfect world, if we had more time and  more interest we would have really liked to see more.  As you can seen from my last email, beggars can't be choosers in Germany.  The last two apartments were very far away from Kevin's work and he wanted to leave the 30 minute commute behind when we left CO.  Also, we just didn't get the right feeling from either of them.  One was on the first floor facing a busy road and very run down.  The other, was just all wrong and I'll leave it at that.  It was nice, but it wouldn't have worked for us.   The two we did like.  Were actually the first 2 we saw. The first one is not to far from the hotel, 10 min walk.  It was residential and Kevin would have preferred a more city like atmosphere but I was ok with it.  It was a 9 min bus ride to his school/work and a 25-30 min walk to town.  There are restaurants, a butcher, 2 bakeries', and Ice cream shop, clothing shops, and our bank with in a short walk.  The grocery store would be the same as the one we shop at now and it was a little further.  If we get bikes that would be the best way to go or just a long walk up the hill each way.  The second apartment was very nice , very big, and we loved the landlord.  She was English speaking ( german native)   but it was her dad's apartment and he apparently passed away.  She was emotional about that as it had only been a year.  She is such a sweet kind person and we hope to be friends with her.  She is going to meet up with us at the end of the week and introduce us to some locals.  The negatives for this apartment were that it was like living in a high rise in the US and lacked character, it was 30 min to Kevin's school/work, it was at least 30 min from town.  We could walk to the zoo but the nearest shopping grocery and all was a huge mall.  So it lacked the experience we hoped to get.  On top of that we only saw senior citizens walking in and out of the building.  Honestly, if it were closer to town or his school we would have been sold. Its not often you get a landlord like that.  Sunday, we had a nice day.  I had a wonderful mother's day.  We went to brunch, thank goodness the rain stopped just in time for lunch.  We went to this wonderful place in the town square.  We started outside but when Kevin took Ivy in to the bathroom the wind picked up I did my best to catch his beer glass, my wine glass, Ivy's hat and crackers.  The server asked me if I wanted to move inside ( not in English but I figured out what she was asking) and we went inside and had a lovely lunch.  So Monday we finally opened an account at a bank.  Today was the big day, we signed a lease on an apartment.  Drum roll please!!! If you tried to guess it was apartment 4.   Just kidding it was the first one.   After much discussion we chose that one.  Honestly, its very nice just more then we need or were planning on.  With the  lack of interest in showing us apartments it was what we feel is the best.  It has a living room, dining area, kitchen , 2 downstairs bedrooms, 1 1/2 baths.and a balcony.  Up these steep stairs there is a hobby room (which we will use as a study and for extra storage etc) and another bedroom.   When certain guests come we will go up the stairs and give up our bed.  We have a keller ( or cellar storage space and a place to put a washing machine). We misunderstood and thought there was a washer in the basement, but  Germans don't like to share much. So there are 2 washers down there but they are not communal . We have an empty space for a washer if we want one.  Kevin has a friend from the University who helped translate the lease for us today.  He said you can find really cheap washers in the classifieds that are practically brand new.  Also the kitchen has a dishwasher that is ours if we want it but when we leave we either have to get rid of it or give it to the next tenants.   As for the move date. They told us today we could move in on the 20th.  It sounds great but we have to figure out if we can get things like internet and such set up by then and if we can go to Ikea and at least get a futon to sleep on until our bed arrives. The futon would likely go up to the extra bedroom.    So I will let you know what we decide when we figure it out.  It would be nice to have bought furniture and be some what settled before Kevin gets to work. Although I emailed today to figure out where our stuff is and it hasn't yet made port in Los Angeles yet. So who knows when we will get that.  Probably July.  Makes me wonder why we shipped kitchen items and so forth. Now we have to wait for them.  In Ivy crazy news today.  There was an itty bity bug crawling along the wall today and she was so excited about it.  She was so excited she had to show dada. The next thing we noticed was she bent down to apparently kiss the bug and we tried to stop her but we were too late.  Never saw the bug after and to this moment are still thinking or wondering if she swallowed him up which is very likely.  Seems like Saarbrucken is giving us great Ivy stories. Well its getting late and I am very tired and this ended up being a book.  I will update you as soon as I can on what is going on here.  Talk to you all soon!!!!

Well, I still am not able to post any pictures as this time.  You may just have to wait until we have a new apartment and are all moved in and set up with internet. If I get time in the next few days I will take my tablet out with me and try to get a better signal.  I am finding it hard to find wifi here , even in busy areas, without a password.  In other news things that have been happening with us.  We are registered and in the process of setting up a bank account, as well as apartment hunting. I had no idea it would be difficult to find an apartment. We saw a really nice one today and are looking at 2 tomorrow and 1 on Saturday.  The hard part is that its not just you looking at the place. When we were at the apartment today in a time span of 1 hour there were two other couples looking at it . Who knows how many others were there today. How it works is, you fill out a form and the landlord decides who he best sees fit for the apartment.  I hope one of the 4 places finds us fit or we are going to have to do a lot of apartment searching.  We did really like the place we looked at today.  We were told by a gentleman who has been helping us , to go ahead and tell each place we are interested. That way we get our form and interest in. If we find and get a better place we can just tell them we changed our mind.  So we will see how it goes over the next few days.  In Ivy news, she is enjoying her daily outings and loves all the new sights.  The other afternoon on our walk back to the apartment, Ivy got crapped on by a pigeon.  Poor girl didn't know what hit her.  luckily it just hit the top of her head and not her face as she was snacking on a cracker at the time.  I didn't have my camera on hand or I would have taken  a pic.   The weather is nice here.  Its the rainy season so one day may be sunny and 2 may be rainy but we are enjoying the mild temps and the rain. We really didn't see much rain in CO so its a nice change. Ask me again after I have been living here for a while to see if I still feel the same about the rain.  I really am sad I can't post pics.  I really do hope to get it all worked out in the future.  We are slowly getting through the language barrier.  I should be studying right now instead of posting but I can work twice as hard tomorrow.  I may make some note cards tonight.  The food is delish.  I love the dumplings.  I need to find out how to make them or for now a sauce to make for them.  You can buy the dough and just make them into dumpling balls .  We currently don't have an oven so something like that would be easy I would think.  For now we have been indulging in brats(wurst), pasta, meats(Fleisch), cheese(käse) , bread (brot), and pickles.  The cheese is fabulous and the chocolate (schokolade) , wine(wien), and beer(bier) is delectable as well.  The problem is the wine and beer its so cheap here.  I think we will have to have 1 glass a night.  Not sure that is a problem, but we do enjoy it right now.  Ok well its getting late and I either need to read or make note cards.  I am not going to learn the language surfing the web.  Guten Abend  ( Good night)!!!

Having Issues downloading pics

Well we have been here for 4 days now. Sorry I haven't posted any pictures. I created this long post about our temporary apartment , however our connection here is awful.  So it crashes every time I try to upload my pictures.  I will have to try at a starbucks or something to see if I can get a better wifi.  Its frustrating because I want to share these things with you and it seems to be an obstacle and I apologize.  I just worry by the time this works this will be old news an we will be on to something else and you will miss out.  For those of you on facebook I have posted some pictures there.  It seems to be slow but able to process and blogger can't even do a spell check without crashing.  I hope to work out these kinks over the next few days or find a place I can get a good signal and free wifi.  I know of 1 starbucks in town and I assume they have what I need there.  We haven't been to starbucks as there are many local places that offer better cheaper coffee. I am starting to learn a few sentences in German.  I am trying to get Kevin more into speaking the language. We are also teaching Ivy some words.  She can say "no" in German "nein"  and thank you "danke" . So that is a start.  We are eating lots of gelato, cheese, bread, deli meats.  Its funny in the states Ivy loved fruit, only ate a few types of cheese, didn't like much meat, and didn't really like bread.  Here she eats and scarfs down all but the fruit.  She isn't much into the fruit.  She is enjoying our daily outings and is starting to get back to sleeping through the night.  The jet lag affected her so bad.  She woke up the first few nights and wanted to play for 2-3 hours.  She was sleeping in until 10 am so that was a plus I guess  She seems to be waking up at 6 am for a diaper change and bottle and going back to bed until 8.  We wonder what is going through her mind.   I think she really enjoys this place.  I am sure the language confuses her.  She has had a few children come up to her and talk to her, but its just jibberish to her.  All in all we have had a great time so far.  Tomorrow we need to get down to business and get registered, and start the apartment search.  Kevin has some work to do this week to get ready for his job, so Ivy and I will venture out on our own a few times.  The weather has been gorgeous the past few days.  I am not sure when the rainy season ends.  The first 3 days that is all it did but now it seems to be slowing down.  Well, I hope to find a wifi spot tomorrow and download pics of the apartment we are staying in at the Weller hotel.  I hope you all are doing well. Talk with you soon!!!
 

Guten Tag from Saarbrücken Germany

Hi everyone,  Well we made it to Germany in one piece.  I will have to say that was a very long trip and we were all exhausted.  Ivy did wonderful and we are blessed that she is a great traveler.  We got all our stuff through 2 airplanes and on a train.  Wouldn't you know we left the pack-n -play on the train. Thankfully the hotel had one.  Today the 1st was a holiday so everything was closed.  We hope to hear that they have the pack n play but I am sure that is unlikely.  Which means we have to buy a new one.  Our first night here we were exhausted.  We got to our apartment, then we were off to dinner.  The lady at the front desk told us that we should go to the grocery store since Wednesday was a holiday. So we were thankful and went to dinner then were planning to go to the store.   Dinner was lovely, but Ivy was too tired so we scarfed our food and headed to the store. The lady didn't tell us that the store closed at 8. Seems like everything closes at 8 which is fine.  However, we had no milk for Ivy and nothing was open.  We went to bed and shockingly even Ivy slept until 9:45.  I actually woke her up since we were told continental breakfast was until 10. We got there and they did not have breakfast.  So we decided to walk to the grocery store just to make sure it wasn't open. Thankfully there was a bread shop open next to the grocery store. They gave us milche (milk) and we got some tasty treats.  We went back and slept for 2 more hours then ventured off into the city. We had a great first day even though it was short.   We took Ivy to the park and walk along the river and ate some delicious dumplings for dinner followed by Gelato for dessert. I need to charge my battery on my new camera which I will do in the morning. If I can get my self together I will start posting pics tomorrow or Friday.  I will try to update as much as possible. Its late so I am off to bed.