Soccer Tournament

Although soccer is a bigger deal as a whole - called futbol here - than in Seattle, it is less so at the elementary school level.  At age 7 or 8 the kids who are more intense join select and elite teams and the school teams are those that love to play but at a less intense level.  Both kids like this however it means far fewer games.  Their

practices are once a week on Saturdays and most of their practices are filled with full field scrimmages.  But scrimmages are just against your own team so not quite as fun.
On the morning of

Josie's birthday was the JFK Fall Soccer tournament.  So we all rode over for a morning of soccer.  Both kids between 5-6 games and Benjamin's team came in 2nd in the whole tournament and Josie's team is filled with girls that haven't played as much and didn't do so well.  But both kids played their hearts out, Marty

volunteered to be a referee, it was a gorgeous sunny day and it was fun to be outside for a few hours before the BIG sleepover at our house later in the evening.

Pre- 12 Family Celebration

We had a small family celebration for Josie's 12th birthday on Friday, the 28th, the day before her actual birthday.  The meal she requested was "Favorite Soup" This has been her favorite soup - thus the name- since she was 2 or 3.  It is a recipe from a Colophon Cafe.  In my 10 years of living there I went there many many times.  One time when Marty and I were early dating we went up for the weekend and stopped at the cafe for lunch.  I bought their soup recipe book and have been making their yummy soups ever since.  The soup is actually called Mexican Corn and Bean Sopa and it is the simplest soup to make.  I'm thankful her favorite meal is a simple one.
cool restaurant in Bellingham called
Marty and I both wrote her heartfelt words in her birthday card and both

teared up a bit when she was opening her gifts and her card.  She gave us both hugs, told us how much she loved us and then in her 12 year old way said "please tell me you guys aren't going to cry at my party tomorrow night?!?"  We wiped our eyes and assured her we would hold ourselves together ;-)
Marty always gets the kids VERY nice gifts.  Too nice, if you ask me.  They are typically practical so it is hard to complain.  Last year Josie got a brand new cell phone that she has taken very good care of and has not shown any signs of being addicted to it.  Benjamin for his 8th birthday got a lap top.  Josie a few

years ago got a laptop too but for some reason her several year old lap top just completely stopped working.  Marty, in his true "I give big gifts" kind of way, pulled out all the stops with a brand new Mac Book Air.  Which was received with a lot of hugs and a lot of
THANK YOU's. 

Benjamin got some collecting sleeves and a notebook to put his Pokemon cards into. He was busy with this for a good solid hour!
Happy HAPPY birthday to Josie.  She truly is one of a kind.  She has a heart of gold and is not only very kind, intelligent, beautiful and funny but truly one of my most favorite people on this earth.  I love you, sweet Josie Marie!!  You are an amazing young woman!

Dentaphobia

I have been fearful of dentist for about the past 15-20 years.  For my first 30 so years of life I loved going to the dentist.  I never had cavities and I never had to have full on braces.  When I was in 2nd grade I had chicken pox and somehow got one on the gum in front of my lower front teeth.  When it went away it left an area of exposed teeth.  They had to do a skin graph - cutting skin from the rough of my mouth and sewing it to the patch of area that had exposed teeth.  To this day I still have an area that is still white (the skin that was graphed never changed colors) so it looks like I have teeth growing out of my gums.  But even that experience didn't turn me off to going to the dentist.
When I was in my early 30's I had my first cavity filled.  For some reason my mouth does not numb the way other people's mouths do.  It turns out my nerves run differently so I felt a lot of that cavity being filled.  In my late 30's I had a root canal and similar to the cavity I was feeling a lot of what was happening.  I had to keep raising my hand to tell the Dr. that I was feeling it.  Finally the Dr. had to shoot anesthesia straight into my nerve ending.  IT WAS PAINFUL!!  So, yes, I have a fear of dentist.  After Benjamin was born and my life was crazy busy I went over 2 or 3 years without seeing a dentist.  Then I had to go for 3 separate appointments where they had to (try to) numb me in order to "deep clean".
I actually REALLY like my Seattle dentist as a person I just despise going to the dentist.  I get all worked up and I know a lot of it is in my head but I just really don't like it.
Here in Germany we have a really great dentist as well.  It is a kid's dentist primarily but they do see adults.  We all went last year and so Marty and I went recently for a 6 month cleaning,  scheduling the kids for a few weeks out because after school appointments are hard to come by.  They said I needed composites on several of my teeth which would require numbing.  They speak English fairly well, certainly better than my German but I wanted them to know that I don't numb the way most people do.  They reassured me that they have ways around it.
The day of the appointment came and I was nervous and a bit sick to my stomach. They were SO SO super kind to me.  They could tell I was nervous so they gave me a stuffed animal to hug.  Which,
even though I looked babyish, I did.  They asked me often if I was OK and rubbed my cheek and my arm often telling me it was going to be OK and how far into the process we were.  It was not pleasant, I won't lie, but it wasn't awful.   At one point she asked if I could feel it and I said yes.  She said, "well, I knew we needed enough numbing agent for a baby elephant but maybe we need enough for a full grown elephant" and she gave me more.
And although it wasn't overly painful, my face was completely numb.  It was so strange.  I rode my bike home with cheeks

flapping in the wind and slobber dripping out of my mouth and hitting me on the cheek.  I felt just like a dog with their head out the car window.
I tried to go to lunch with Marty but ended up biting my tongue more than eating my food so I saved it for dinner.
Oh, and for the record, because health and dental seems to cost so much less here: For the 15 composites (and enough anesthesia for a full grown elephant)  we were charged 1,700€.  Our insurance paid 1,400€ and we were stuck with just 300€ which also included my cleaning. 

Biking to Drive

I have written about this before but getting a European Driver's License here is a big deal to some.  For some people received their US license in a "non reciprocal"

state it could mean hours and hours and a bunch of €, a lot of studying and up to several tests to actually get one.  I have friends who spent nearly as much time and money as I did on my 15 weeks of intensive German lessons to get one.
Washington is a "fully reciprocal" state so for us it was just a matter of paying 35€, filling out some paperwork, waiting in line to hand in paperwork, waiting for actual license to come in, waiting in line to pick up license.  It feels offensive to even write that given how hard I know some friends have worked to get theirs.  But since it was so easy we figured, why not?!  Despite the fact that we do not have a car here nor any plans on getting one. 
Marty got his in June just before we left for our return trip to Seattle and mine arrived shortly after returning to Berlin.  On Wednesday, another beautiful, sunny day, Marty and I biked the 10 miles to the office to pick up said license.  Stood in a long line to get a number and then waited another 40 ish minutes for our number to be called.  But even writing that in a bit of an irritated tone makes me stop and really appreciate how easy this all was for me.  Especially since Marty fills out all the paperwork and we always arrive with all documents and documentation that we need. 

Tie Dyeing and Food. Always Food.

Marty had an appointment outside of our little area so we hopped the train and then ran a few other errands.  It was around lunch time so we decided to go back to an Indian Restaurant we had gone to a few weeks back with Benjamin's best friend.  His best friend's dad is from India so we defer to him to help us find

tasty Indian food.  This one hit the mark.  It was SO tasty that I had been craving for weeks.
It was another gorgeous, sunny Fall day here and we were

able to sit outside, making it feel like we were on vacation.  And yes, a lot of the time it feels like we are on vacation here.
The food was just as amazing as the first time.  And we had at least 3-4 meals worth of leftovers.

After lunch I raced back to school because I had signed up to help Benjamin's science teacher with their tie-dyeing project.

Lazy Sunday

Finally a few pics of Josie!!

Sundays here are often quite lazy.  Everything is closed.  All grocery stores, malls, drug stores, etc.  There is a quiet that comes over the town - at least in our area.  There are fewer people in cars and more on the streets walking and biking.  At first I really disliked this as I felt I would somehow need something at the store and not be able to get it.  It turns out that I've always been just fine.  Restaurants are typically open and the local produce stand under the Sbahn is open and bakeries are open in the morning.  So if I really needed something I could get it but it really was something to get used to.

I have to say that now with over a year of it,  I love the quietness that typically accompanies a Sunday here.  On this particular Sunday, since the kids were sleeping away, I walked to a local coffee shop to get a cup of coffee and some bread.  We both got some work done, read an then walked to the Sbahn to meet the kids as they were getting off the Sbahn returning from their sleep over the night before.  Once we got down off the platform, Benjamin says he is STARVING.  There happens to be a currywurst stand open so we stop and Benjamin eats the wurst and Josie eats the fries.  We walk home and have a few house of chilled time - all of us reading- before talking off for a friends house for dinner in Kleinmachnow.

I met Gillian through a German forum while we were both still living in the States and trying to figure out things about Berlin and schools, etc while still living our old lives.  We bonded and then ended up living about a 15 minute bike ride away from one another.
They served up some of the YUMMIEST food!!  It truly hit everyone's hot buttons.  So SO yummy.  Gillian and Andy have two kids similar ages as Josie and Benjamin.  The kids hit it off and the adults had a nice evening of conversation.  What a treat to have such good friends.  Thanks, Hargreaves!!

Proper Date Night

Marty and I spend an inordinate amount of time together since moving to Germany.  For the most part both of us are quite happy about it.  We joke all the time that people here must think us strange as we are nearly always together.  We both drop the kids off in the mornings. We know that only one needs to go but for me it is a nice bike ride, it gets me up and out and I love kissing the kids goodbye at school and watching them walk in happily.  To be truthful, Josie is nearly always already inside the building by the time I get there.  The three of them leave about 5

minutes before I do because I like to put all of the breakfast things away and have a couple sips of coffee in peace before leaving.
But Benjamin still welcomes a long hug and a kiss before we confidently and happily walks into school each day and in the past few days even looks back just before we walks in to wave at us.  One day last week I got there just after he had walked in and missed my kiss and wave.  Being the dork that I am I ran in and up to classroom as he was walking in and snuck one in there.  I know these days are fleeting!!
Marty and I go to lunch together nearly every day and normally even squeeze in a long walk or bike ride together.  So it isn't like we don't have "dates"  even if they are day dates or just quality time spent but on Saturday both kids were

invited over to sleep over together at friends.  Marty and I dropped them off around dinner time and then decided to try an new area for dinner.  The mom of the kids friends, Katy, had recommended an area in Schoneberg that had a ton of restaurants.  We decided to just walk around the area and find a place.  Old school, the way we would have long ago. On the way to the recommended street we walked by a movie theater which was playing BlackkKlansman.  A movie Marty had wanted to see.  I'm not up on any of the new movies - other than the ones that are based on books that I've read but I was game, especially after finding out that it was in Original Language so English with German subtitles. 
We walked on a found several awesome restaurants. We couldn't decide, overwhelmed by choice.  Since arriving we have definitely tended toward Vietnamese, Indian, Greek or Italian food.  All of it delicious.  Then I remembered that I met a friend of a friend from Seattle very near where we were but the first time I had just had coffee.  However I remember seeing the food menu and thinking it reminded me of Chaco Canyon - a very overpriced, healthy, yummy cafe near our house in West Seattle.  We opted for Mattea and were not disappointed.  We had a leisurely dinner outside, despite the 30 degree temperature drop the day before (literally the temperature went from a high of 90 on Friday to a high of 60 on Saturday - the first day of Fall.  On schedule just like a German time piece!!)  After dinner we walked by an ice cream place that the Seattle friend had recommended and it was really the best ice cream we have had since in Berlin!

On the way back to the movie theater we stopped by the house where David Bowie lived with Iggy Popp back in the 70's.  I can't remember the last time we saw a movie and especially can't remember the last time we saw on so spontaneously.  It most definitely must have been before kids.
The movie was really good.  It was heavy and hard at many moments.  The topic - obviously, the KKK would never clearly be an easy topic but the directors did a good job of breaking up the heavy stuff with some lighter, funny stuff.  It was really eye opening to watch this movie in another country.  Even though there were times that the KKK was being made fun of or there were other

humorous moments the underlying truth that racism is so rampant STILL in the US is sickening.  At the end of the movie they play a live scene of a KKK rally and white supremacist groups and it was really sickening.  I was in tears and just sickened by how bad this issue still is in the US.
We biked home and weren't in bed until well past midnight.  A long, proper date night.  Aside from the movie being difficult to watch it was a wonderful night.

Friday After School Friends

Benjamin has been asking to have more friends over after school and it warms my heart.  There really is something about a house full of kids that makes my heart happy.
On Friday he had planned to have his friend, Clayton, over and then his other friend, Leopold, needed a place to go because his mom had a meeting.  I thought for sure Benjamin would say two friends is too many but he said, "well, why don't they both come over."  So they did. 
We all rode home together from school on our bikes and there is something so special about seeing your kids so happy.  I don't have a picture but my heart was bursting watching him happily ride down the street, bike path, park and then sidewalk to our house with his buddies riding along with him.  They were laughing and talking about books and school and soccer the entire way.

When we got home they went in the backyard and played soccer and then came up for snack and a game of Settlers of Catan - the game we won at the Fun Day School raffle.  I'm thinking we should make it a weekly event.  Fun Fridays Forever. 

Oh and Benjamin is now starting on the 4th Harry Potter book.  He was ready for it several days before his school library day so I decided I'd check it out on my library account.  When I went to check it out I laughed out loud at the sight of it.  I had forgotten that this book was an enormous, nearly 700 page book!  This should take him awhile but with the way he is devouring books lately it probably won't. 
I need to document this because I know in the future Josie will ask where are the pictures or stories about her and I will have to remind her that she WOULD NOT allow photos to be taken of her at this stage in her life.  She is also a reading books (both in English and German) at such a rapid rate.  She has already finished 2 German books and several English books since school started.

Supper Club - Super Friends

Last spring before we left for Seattle we got together for dinner at a fabulous Greek restaurant with new friends.  Our connection was a bit interesting.  The other couples each had a child in Benjamin's 2nd grade class but we ended up meeting other ways.
Juli and Luke have two boys - Henry and Leo and Henry was in Benjamin's class last year.  Anja and Kyle also have two kids - Maya and Rory and Maya was in class with Benjamin and Henry.  I had met Anja at one of the first parent meetings of the year and was struck by her warmth and cheerful personality but our paths never really crossed again.

Juli and Marty took the Positive Parenting Class in the Spring and became friends and then realized that both of our boys had been in the same class together all year.  We went to their house for a lovely lunch and then I also went to their house for the Royal wedding.  
Juli suggested we all go out to eat and we had one of the best nights with the other two couples.  Not only was the food delicious but the conversation easy and fun.  I remember we laughed a lot and left thinking "we must do that again and soon!"
When we got back from Summer vacation Juli and I were talking about different restaurants around Berlin that we wanted to try so we came up with having a "Supper Club" and trying them out together.
Our first official Supper Club was Wednesday night.  And it was Super.  Because it was a weeknight and our resident babysitter (Josie) isn't so good at getting Benjamin to go to bed we decided to stay close to home so we could be home to at least get them to sleep before 9:30.   It was another gorgeous summer (although the calendar says nearly Fall) evening so we ate outdoors in still upper 70 degree weather at 7PM with sandals and shorts. We ate our our relatively new in town Vietnamese Restaurant.   We love it here and go probably a bit too much.  But thankfully everyone else loved it too.  And the laughter flowed.  We laughed until we cried.  Unfortunately because of travel and work schedules our next Supper Club isn't scheduled until December!!

Summer's Last Hurrah... Maybe

On Tuesday I had my first Positive Parenting Class led by my good friend, Fionnuala.  Marty took her class last Spring and really liked it.  A lot of the things he told me about the class I had already learned - although didn't necessarily practice - from my many years of co-op preschool.  However, I've been feeling like there has been more fighting in our house than I'd like and not really sure how to deal with our disagreements and really not overly happy about how I'm parenting.  When Fionnuala said there was an open spot in her upcoming class I decided to sign up.  I have to admit that I wasn't immensely excited about it.  I know I had heard the info and didn't want to commit a morning a week to it.  But I'm happy to report that after my first class I'm super happy that I signed up. Parenting is such an important part - the biggest part- of my life and it is really good to be reminded of the issues we all face and gather tools to deal with things more positively and undoubtedly better.  My other classmates (11 of them) are all JFK parents and I really enjoyed meeting them.  We have 6 more classes and a book to read.  I'll report back if my parenting has improved.  I know when Marty went last spring he was made so much more aware of things and even changed some of his parenting for the better. 

After class I told Marty we had to squeeze in one last swim in Schlachtensee before the cold weather hits.  It was predicted to be 88 degrees (September 18th!  Crazy) so we rode our bikes there, blew up our tubes and swam and paddled and relaxed for over an hour.  The first dip in was quite cold but the air temp was so warm you got used to it quickly.  

After our swim we deflated the tubes for good.  I doubt we will have time for another swim before the weather finally changes for good.  Then we rode our bikes to the little Italian restaurant enroute back to school to pick up Benjamin.  I really REALLY don't want to say goodbye to summer but when I finally do I have to remind myself what a phenomenal summer this has been.  6 SOLID months of sunshine and warm weather.  Summer/spring of 2018, you will go down in history as one of the best. 

Weekly Food Find #2 (FAIL)

Sadly, we had a food find fail last week.  I was so excited at the thought of a once a week - or as often as we can squeeze it in- new food find.  We hit the jackpot with our first food find - Mezem was a homerun!
Last week we had to return to the eye Dr. where Marty will be getting custom made contact lenses.  I never knew this was a thing but with his high eye prescription along with a newly diagnosed astigmatism, the over the counter lenses that he and I have always bought do not work for him anymore.   So, thankfully, there is a place here in Berlin that makes custom made contacts just for your eyes.  He opted for soft and unlike the current monthly wear soft that I'm wearing or he had been wearing for years these new ones last for 6 months.  And as you can imagine they cost quite a bit more.  With the purchase of the contacts it requires him to go back frequently in the beginning to make any necessary adjustments. 

Thankfully, Mezem is within walking distance.  When we set out that morning we both had the thought of returning to Mezem for lunch after the appointment.  But while I was waiting for him I had an epiphany.  We always find a good spot and then just keep going.  But what about all the uncovered awesome restaurants in Berlin.  We certainly aren't going to find them by always returning to our favorites.  So with my hope of a new week food find, we spotted a vegetarian Asian place as we were walking to Mezem. 

 I mistakenly thought the name sounded familiar  (Zen House) and a restaurant a friend had recently recommended.  It was OK despite the great reviews on Trip Advisor and the fact that the place was full of customers.  Marty had "meatballs" that were kind of like falafel and good.  But we already have a great falafel place.  I had soba noodles and they were a bit bland. Like I said, it was good but I won't be back and I won't be recommending it to friends the way I did with Mezem.  Oh, well.  If we didn't try anything new we would always be at the same restaurants...which we typically are.  Win some lose some.  Marty has another eye appointment next week.  I'm debating.  Should we just go back to Mezem or roll the dice again.  Oh, what stresses I have in my life right now. 😄

Fun Day @ JFKS 2018

Fun Day really was FUN. Everyone was right.  It was much MUCH better than Fun Run.  Unbeknownst to us until just a couple days before, Benjamin's Lacrosse team was set to have a game, thankfully at JFK, the morning of Fun Day.  Marty, Josie and I all had quite full schedules that day as we were each assigned to an area to help set up, man all day and then help clean up.  Josie was actually set to be at about 4 or 5 places throughout the day.  Incredible that she was able to keep it all straight.

So at 8am Benjamin and I set off to get him to the Lacrosse game.  I loaded my bike basket with everything we ALL needed for a long day at school. 
Benjamin's Lacrosse team is mostly older

kids.  The 16 year old team nor the 12 year old team at JFK have enough players so they pull the 8 year olds up to play in games.  The size difference is quite comical.  The other

teams are mostly 12-16 year olds so our poor little 8 year olds look like babies!  But they played and lost but he had fun.  Benjamin is number 5 by the way.
Marty and I would take breaks from what we were doing to run over to catch a few minutes of game play. 
My friend, Fionnuala, brought along a lot of Mexican themed decorations so we set in decorating our booth and prepping the margaritas. Our booth was right in the thick of things and facing the stage which made it all the more fun.

After Benjamin's lacrosse game he came over to help.  I thought, well, OK, you can take money and make change.  He really wanted to make the drinks.  I didn't think this would fly.  I mean, he is 8 years old.  In the states there wouldn't even be alcohol on school grounds let alone an 8 year old serving it.  But Fionnuala said, "Ah, why don't you let him" So, with her approval - I still don't full know what is accepted here, I gave in and he had the BEST day serving up drinks.  He would ask the customers "with or without salt?"  if they said with he would take a slice of lime and rub it around the rim of the glass and then dip it into a dish of salt.  Then put the cup under the slushy machine to dispense the margarita.  He had it down to a science and happily served drinks all day.  He took breaks here and there to go buy food or play various games at the other booths. 

Josie came by a few times to get money and check in.  The kids together took our winning raffle tickets to claim their prizes.  We ended up with the board game "Settlers of Catan"  all in German and we have never played in English so we are still trying to figure out the rules.  We also got a desk organizer, a ball point pen, a sketching notebook and a gift certificate for brunch for 2 adults a nice hotel in Berlin.  Overall, not too shabby for our 30 Euro worth of raffle ticket purchases.

I snapped a shot of
Josie while she was signing
with her choir on Fun Day

Marty manned the stage all day announcing various musical talents.  Some of the bands - mostly parents of kids who attend the school- were fabulous.  When there wasn't a bad, Marty played music from his specially created JFKS FUN DAY music mix. 
Everyone seemed to have had a really great time and even though this wasn't the schools biggest fundraiser it still brought in over 10K Euro for the school.  Not too bad for something that is fun for the whole community. 
They have already tried to book Marty for Fun Day 2020.  Will be interesting to see if we are still here then!!

Pre Fun Day Work Days

Last Spring dedicated volunteers started organizing Fun Day.  I didn't really know what Fun Day was as it is an every other year event.  Off set by the other other year Fun Run which our kids participated in last September.  Everyone kept saying, "Oh, Fun Day is SO fun!"  Fun Run is just about raising money but Fun Day is a blast.  So I thought I should probably help out with such a cool event.
They said they needed a DJ and MC for the stage where they would have live music.  Normally I do not volunteer Marty for things without him being there but I knew this was right up his alley.  At the time they talked about having a Prosecco Stand and my good friend, Fionnuala, volunteered and then looked at me to see if I wanted to help and I said, "sure!"    Shortly after we

volunteered to do this they changed the stand to be margaritas and then I was super happy that I volunteered to man this booth.
So then we all take off for summer but thankfully the people in charge were still organizing it all because nearly everything was set and coordinated when we returned in August.
One of the big things is a raffle.  A team gathers a TON of donated prizes (in this case 500+) from local businesses and then the winning tickets get to claim their prize at Fun Day.  The two women who signed up did a fantastic job of acquiring all of these prizes over the summer but one had since gotten a full time job and the other was invited to an amazing trip to Iceland to see the Northern Lights.  That left a big

whole in man power.  They asked me if I could help which I did and it was actually pretty fun.  I sold raffle tickets at the Elementary and High Schools during lunch time.  It was really a treat to be at school while our kids had lunch so I could see a part

of how their day goes while they are at school.  Josie, again, was a NO PHOTOS, girl.  But Benjamin and his buddies happily smiled for me while they ate their lunches together.

It was fun to see the kids get so excited about opening up their raffle ticket (high school aged and Elementary alike) which they normally did very excitedly right at the table where I was selling the tickets.  There were 500 winners and then probably 2,500 losers so they had a one in five chance of winning.  Our kids

each spent 10 Euro and each opened one winning ticket.  Later in the week I gave them another 5 Euro each and they both ended up with one more winner each.  So, as a family we had 4 winning tickets.  I have to say it did feel exciting.

At the end of the week of raffle sales and the day before Fun Day the same group of dedicated volunteers met to gather all the prizes that had been acquired and were stored in different places throughout the school.  The prizes were all wrapped - yes, over 500 prizes wrapped- although some gift certificates and things just put into a colorful envelope or a simple ribbon tied around it.  Then a sticker with a number was put on each prize which would then correspond to the winning number on the raffle ticket.  The prizes were lined up and then ready to be handed out.

The booths and stage were set up on Friday night for Fun Day and everything was nearly set.