Springy Saturday

 Saturday the sun was out in all of its glory.  The soccer field was covered with happy children kicking the soccer ball around and taking a break to get their team photos taken.
After soccer I took a walk into town to buy some bread and flowers for a dinner gathering we were going to at our good friends Fionnuala  and Wolfgang.  On my way I noticed all the new life sprouting out around me.  It is truly amazing how from nothing - dead old bushes and trees, comes life.  Every Spring this amazes me. 
Within the next few weeks we will be loaded with fresh new blooms on all of the trees, bushes and flowering beds.  SO pretty, so hopeful, so springy.

I also wore my Birkenstocks for the first time this season.  Granted I totally need a pedicure.  That red polish is from the pedicure I got just before our Turkish vacation in October.  But it felt so good to have my feet free.

The dinner at the Hoffman's was outstanding as usual and our first dinner Al Fresco of the season. Fionnuala is a vegetarian so we always know it will be something that Josie can eat and Marty will prefer.  It was a delicious lentil shephard's pie with a bulgar wheat

salad and beets.  SO SO good.  I contributed Original Nestle Toll House cookies since Marty brought back some chips on his last trip.
The kids had a ball on the trampoline and the tree house. Such a lovely Spring evening with wonderful, dear friends.

Fridays For Future

 For the past couple of weeks there have been large gatherings of students all over Berlin who are protesting by skipping school and demanding action to prevent further climate change and global warming. 
Marty and Josie attended the rally this week.  I was told by my 12 year old daughter that I should also skip class (German language class) and attend but I left it to them to represent the family.  Benjamin just wanted to skip school and had no idea what the rally was for so we kept him in school and Josie and Marty went.

Josie made a sign them morning of and even went to her first two classes of the day before hopping the train with Marty to make it to the rally.
There were TONS of people, mostly kids, with loud voices and signs and high hopes and expectations.  Marty said that Josie mostly quietly took it all in and listened intently.  This has been her MO since she was very young.  She is definitely an observer when it comes to new things.  But I think it

was pretty impactful and hopefully something she will remember.  I'm not sure if she will go to future rallys but this is her second one in less than 6th months The last one we attended together to raise our voices about the atrocities happening at the southern US border with separating immigrant families.  I'm very proud of my little activist. 

Girls Day Berlin 2019

Josie participated in a cool Berlin program called Girls Day.  A ton of business and business professionals set up this day so that girls can "go to work" for the day and be exposed to professions mostly in the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) area. 
She signed up to go to a large company called Salesforce with her two good friends, Aurora and Ella.  They mapped out where in the city it was and figured out what they would need, when they would need to leave and how they would get there. Completely independently. 
She left shortly before 8AM to bike to her friend Aurora's house.  They then walked

together to a bus stop that took them right into the heart of the city.  Salesforce is located on the famed
Kufürstendamm 
They went to a small cafe to grab a snack because they were a bit early. 
J  Josie kept in touch with just a few texts throughout the day.  She kept saying how "fancy" everything was and was super impressed by the drink fridge where they could grab drinks whenever they wanted.  She LOVED that.  They provided a pizza lunch and drinks throughout the day.  She said she loved their philosophy and mission but that it was presented in a really boring way.  Just through a variety of power point presentations.  They did make a Skype call to Rwanda where the organization has helped a school of all girls get computers for their school and have helped them become interested in STEM.

All in all it was a fun day for her but she said that next year she will go to a different organization.  She really wanted to follow a pediatrician, which is her new career goal, but she found out about the activity too late and there were no more spots available with local doctors. 

Happy 89th!! And 75th!!

I'll say it again.  The hardest part of living so far from "home" is missing out on seeing family and friends.  Especially when we miss out on celebrating birthdays and holidays.  My mom turned 75 this year.  I missed out on my 3 siblings flying down to surprise my mom for her milestone birthday in January!!  Happy (belated) Birthday Mom.  I wasn't really doing so great with the blog back then.

And on the 26th of March, Marty's dad, Dietrich, turn
ed 89! Sorry we were not there to help celebrate.

Play Dates

Benjamin continues to have friends over after school.  He normally bikes home with the kids who bike to school (Clayton, Leopold, Zeke) or walks home with the friends who live a bit further away and take a public bus to school.
Lukas is a friend he had in class last year and they have remained friends this year even though they are not in the same class any longer.  Lukas is a cool kid.  He has 3 brothers (2 older and one younger) Lukas walks home with us, Benjamin riding along slowly on his bike.  The two get along super well.  They can go from playing (their beloved 30 minutes) of Minecraft to lying on the floor discussing their strategy and houses and tools in their Minecraft worlds to punching each other and wrestling to plopping on the bed while each reads their own book.  They really need little to no direction or interference by me. 

Then I walk Lukas to the bus stop and he hops on happily and confidently and rides it clear across town by himself.  The level of independence that this city gives kids at such young ages is really awe-inspiring and impresses me nearly every day.

FULL Weekend Friends, Food and Fun

We aren't always the most social people and relish in a weekend where we have no plans.  However this past weekend was one of the fullest and most fulfilling we have had for awhile. 
On Friday, Benjamin's good buddy, Clayton came over after school and then we had decided to go to our favorite Indian restaurant for dinner.  Normally we can't go out to eat on the weekdays because Marty has to work until at least 6:30 and then it makes it too late to head out but since the US changed their clocks ahead 2 weeks ago we have been enjoying Marty getting done with work an hour earlier. 
Once we had decided on Nirvana (or fave Indian place) I remembered that Benjamin's new friend, Zeke and family are moving within a few minutes walk from this restaurant. On a whim I sent his mom and my new friend, Gayla, a text asking if they wanted to join us.  And as it turned out they were heading to their new apartment that night to show the kids so they gladly accepted.  There were 9 of us (5 kids) and they all ate and laughed and played games.  So much so that we were shushed several times by other customers.  We are quite used to this as we are a very loud family and for some reason Germans are painfully quiet - on the bus, on the train, in restaurants, in stores.  They are either quiet or grumbling but even in their grumbling they are quiet about it.

On Saturday both kids had soccer and it was one of the first really sunny, somewhat warm spring days.  Then we headed to the Zoo.  The main playground was closed for construction AND all the animals were caged in the petting zoo because a lot of them had new babies.  But we made the best of it and it was nice to be outside in the not freezing temperatures.
We headed back and the kids and Marty grabbed a burrito at our pseudo Chiptole restaurant.  I was meeting two friends for dinner.  I rarely go out without the family.  We had a reservation at 6PM and when I made it they said they were so full that I could only have the table until 8PM. 

Turned out they had enough space and they didn't kick us out and we ended up staying there until nearly 11PM. 
Sunday we rode our bikes to a local park and we played frisbee and then our friends Gillian, Andy, Ollie and Maddie came over for a pasta dinner at our place. 
We had one full weekend but were all filled up food, friend and fun-wise.

Odds and Ends

I know I said that I wasn't going to try to recap the past 3 months but I thought I'd share just a few pics and videos of the past couple of weeks.
On Mondays and Fridays Benjamin has a friend over after school.  On Mondays it is Leopold and and Fridays it is Clayton.  On those days I let them ride their bikes home on their own.  I know kids all over the world do this and I mostly trust that they will arrive home on time and in one piece but I do often look out the window awaiting their arrival. 

 The past few weeks we have started family dinners with Julie, Micha and Frida.  SO much fun for all of us.  Frida is an adorable dog and the kids absolutely adore her.  Micha and Julie are cool too 😊

 Benjamin's reading is off the rails.  I really cannot keep enough books in his hands.  He read all of these during Marty's two weeks in Seattle.  Crazy.  He finishes a book about every 2 to 3 days!!!

 I haven't exercised here apart from my normal walking/biking/hauling that one must do when they don't have a car.  Marty bought me a fitbit for Christmas.  Before when I measured my steps on my phone I nearly always had over 10,000 steps for the day but knew that I didn't always have my phone on me so knew it wasn't counting all of my steps.  With my fitbit I'm normally closer to 20,000 steps per day.  Crazy actually. As much as I'd like a car on some days - normally if it is rainy or I have a lot to carry, 9.5 times out of 10 within 3 minutes into my bike ride or walk I so appreciate the gift of being able to get out in the fresh air, get exercise just in my daily routine and that I'm healthy enough to do it.

Saturday soccer and play dates.
Both kids had soccer on Saturday morning.  Then afterward Benjamin was invited over to Louis' house for spaghetti and meatballs  lunch.  He was thrilled as I haven't made meatballs since Josie became a vegetarian over 3 years ago. And then they went to the local arcade to play pinball.  Again, he was in HEAVEN.

After Josie's soccer practice, her friends, Ella and Maya went with us to get her a new pair of shoes which she so desperately needed.  I remember my mom saying that I was really hard on shoes and I remember thinking, well I'm just walking in them. How can I be hard on them.  Well, Josie is VERY hard on shoes to the point where the soles just separate from rest of the shoe. But with her friends were were in and out of the store in 5 minutes. Now that is my kind of shopping.  Then to lunch at our favorite Asian (Vietnamese/Thai) place across the street. 

 She is constantly roller blading these days!!

 Benjamin was invited to a jump house for his friend, Tesh's, birthday.  Not only was the jump house fun but then they served huge, delicious looking burgers and fries for lunch!!  He was very excited.

 The rollerblading continues...

Marty got back after 2 weeks in Seattle and it was like Santa arrived!!!!  Haha!  He brought an entire empty suitcase with him, filled it while there and then brought it back.  Pancakes and peanut butter for days... weeks, months!! 

SPRING

Happy first day of Spring!  I could not be happier about this change of season.  As is evidenced by my lack of writing on the blog for the ENTIRE winter season, it was a rough one for us.  In the big picture it really wasn't that bad.  We just were sick, one of us or all of us, for the entire winter.  We are rarely sick and dare I say it, I'm even less than rarely sick.  But this winter hit us hard.  Most people say that their entire first year of living abroad they are sick.  Thankfully that didn't happen to us but it did hit us in full force in year two.
And is the case for most things in life, starting is the hardest part.  So this will be my first of many more posts on the blog.  I torment myself when I get so far behind as I hope that this blog serves as a diary of sorts for our family and I've missed an entire season.
There were highs (friends, family, trips to Sevilla and the U.K.)  and lows (being sick, getting the flu, having bad colds, getting hit by a TRUCK!!)  and they will perhaps come out in future posts but for now, Happy Spring.  Hoping to be better about posting in this next, hopefully healthier season.
And today, the 21st of March it is currently 6:45 PM and it is NOT dark. That is huge.  It is nearly dark but not really dark yet.  Marty is putting on a bike basket for Benjamin in the waning hours of daylight.  He has been requesting a basket for months but it is a bit tricky because if you have a bike basket you have to be careful about how you get on and off your bike.  Josie and I both have baskets but we have that old lady type bike with the low bar that you can pass through. You do not need to throw your leg over the back. Throwing the leg over the back is not possible with a bike basket.  But Benjamin assures us that he can handle mounting and dismounting his bike through the middle.
My bike basket since being hit by a truck has been a bit unstable and finally after a strong wind when my bike fell over the basket is "kaputt" finished/broken.  I've only had 2 days without a bike basket and I have to say that I can not do my life here without a basket.  Thankfully the part that broke off from my accident is under warranty and now I just have to wait for the small part to be shipped. Silly thing but I really REALLY miss my bike basket.  OK.  that is all for the first day of Spring 2019.