Needless to say, we love living in Germany. We love this lifestyle, we love our friends and neighbors, we love our community, and we're endlessly thankful for Isaac's educational opportunities here (a little more on that later). We wouldn't have decided to stay another year if we didn't value all of those things greatly. At the same time though, it was a very difficult, even painful, decision. It was a decision that left me in tears for an entire day last year because I couldn't imagine being so far from our families for yet another year. I couldn't imagine our soon-to-arrive new baby not seeing her grandparents for nearly her entire first year of life. I couldn't imagine all the Christmas celebrations, Thanksgiving dinners, and birthday parties we would miss. It didn't help that I was also hugely pregnant (read: hormonal) and struggling with the fact that we would be on our own, in a foreign country, for the birth of our second child in a few short months. We had to make the decision to stay quickly, and we only had about a day to decide because the April vicarage placement service was swiftly approaching, and the seminary needed to know asap if we still wanted a placement. Ultimately, after a full day of tears (me), prayers (both of us), and some serious logistics talks with our parents, we made the decision to stay. However, we also decided, since we already had round trip tickets booked for our return to the US, that we would go to the US for an extended visit between the semesters. We flew to the US in late July right after the summer semester ended. It was a little hectic with Isaac finishing up classes, packing for an almost 3 month long trip, preparing our apartment for our extended leave, and - oh yeah - a brand new baby. However, it all worked out pretty well in the end, and we had a fantastic visit back in the US. In case you missed it, I wrote an update about our summer travels here.
Initially, it was also hard to not think of staying in Germany as "pushing back our finish line". You know, that grad school finish line that everyone is aiming for. Where you finally have a real job with a real salary instead of a barely-making-ends-meet academic stipend, and a real house instead of a 1 bedroom apartment, in a place where you hope to live for more than just a year or two. Yet, with Isaac desiring to pursue a PhD in reformation liturgical studies immediately following his M.Div, and his research requiring a full fluency in German, we knew we were going to be in this for the long haul. We'll probably be lucky if we get out with only 8 years of post grad. And really, if anything, our 2 year Germany "detour" has probably pushed us a bit ahead in the grand scheme of things. Isaac is coming out not only with a full academic fluency in German, but also hours upon hours of reading and research in original German texts that has given direction and fuel to his doctorate plans. Our "slow and steady" route is also allowing us to focus on paying off a greater portion of our prior student loan debt since tuition in Germany is free. So while it took a bit for me to get my brain adjusted to the idea of staying, I'm incredibly thankful that we're here.
We never thought we would have two kids in this apartment long-term, since we were planning to head back to the US when Clara was just a few weeks old. With the change in our plans, our apartment has also transformed a bit over the past year. As a refresher, here's what our apartment looked like shortly after we arrived almost a year and a half ago. A family of 4 in a less-than-400-square-feet apartment is pushing the limits of family togetherness a bit, but we've figured out a few tricks to make it work.
We've rearranged our bedroom to better suit sleeping 4 people. Thankfully our kids are both pretty heavy sleepers (usually), so we don't have much trouble with them waking each other up. I figure it's good practice anyway since they'll probably be sharing a room for the foreseeable future!
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If you remember our toy box from shortly after we arrived last year, then you can see from these photos that we've added a good assortment of toys and books to the playroom thanks to the generosity of grandparents, aunts/uncles, friends, and hand-me-downs from other expats in the community.
This little table was passed along to us from a teacher at the Frankfurt International School who was moving to Vietnam. She also gave us Elise's toddler bed, mattress, and bedspread set. We've been very blessed by the generosity of others during our time here in Germany!
Clara is on the move and into EVERYTHING. I think I underestimated the utter destruction two kiddos can render on a playroom. Also, be sure to notice Elise in the background wearing the block basket on her head. She was saying, "Look mommy, I la la la love my hat!". These two keep us laughing!
We finally got around to hanging picture frames which we had previously avoided doing thanks to the "just one year" mentality. We have a trio of frames in our kitchen, and I've been trading out their photos to suit the season/celebration. It's such a small thing, but having things up on the walls has made our apartment feel more like a long-term home. I made silhouettes of the girls back in February, and we put up this particular trio for Valentines Day.
Elise helped me make this set for Easter while Clara napped this morning. The banner says, "Frohe Ostern" which is Happy Easter in German.
IKEA has become our best friend since moving to Germany, and it's our go-to for the little organizational things we've needed to make a small space work for us. We added these coat hooks this year upon returning to Germany, and they've been great for controlling the mass amounts of outerwear we have between 4 people. We put one at Elise's height so she can hang up her stuff and Clara's stuff. She loves being able to help and do things for herself!
One of the BEST things I purchased at the end of last year was a set of large vacuum seal bags! These have been a lifesaver since we have very limited closet space (gotta love European apartments!). The only closet in the entire apartment is in the bedroom, and all four of us share it. We don't even have a broom closet or a hall closet for coats (thus the need for the hooks I mentioned above). We do have a set of shallow 3 drawer office organizers that we use for some of the girl's clothing, but that's our only dresser type space. I've been pretty vigilant about only keeping the current season's clothing (and only in the size the girls are currently wearing) actually hanging in the closet so we have enough room for everyone's items. I still have to do something with the off-season stuff though, and the vacuum bags are perfect for keeping our items clean, protected and low-profile. A totally full bag compresses down to barely an inch thick which means we can easily slide them under our bed, stacked in a bin. This was especially helpful in storing all our bulky outerwear over the summer. I went from two of the large/tall IKEA storage bins full of coats, vest, snow pants, etc. to two vacuum bags taking up a total of about 5in of vertical space under our bed!
I won't lie, as hard as it was thinking about staying, it's even harder now thinking about leaving Germany in a few more months - leaving everything we've built here and starting over again, leaving the friends who have become like family, leaving our church and community. It's also hard not knowing if we'll actually be any closer to our families (practically speaking in terms of hours it takes to travel) than we are now. Though I can just about guarantee it will be cheaper to visit even if it takes us about as long to get there. We actually find out where we'll be placed for vicarage on April 27th!
So it's bittersweet - loving where we are now, but looking forward to our next step. We definitely appreciate your prayers as we start our preparations to move back to the US once we find out the location of our new home in April! No matter where we end up though, we're pretty thrilled to at least be on the same continent as these people:
