I’m officially a northern hemisphere girl whether I like it or not. The chance to have two years of beaches and sunshine was amazing. I don’t think we have ever spent a summer so close to home when there are so many gorgeous places to go spend the day within a 5 minutes radius. But it has taken just under a month for me to remember how much I love fall. I love wool coats, scarfs, and boots. I love it when the air is crisp and the leaves are changing. I feel so excited for halloween and then ramping up to the holiday season. It feels, looks, and smells like fall and I love it. The kids are in school full time and Jamie is at work so I am on my own during the day now. Munich has been a great place to start to get to know. It is big enough to feel like a city but small enough that while I wouldn’t claim to know it I already feel like I’m getting a sense of were things are. The U Bahn is incredibly easy to use and since parking is non existent I have been spending my day jumping on and off the U Bahn and only use the car when it’s time to drive north to pick up the kids.

Before moving I was worried about what it would be like moving to a non-english speaking country but I have found the people here incredibly helpful and friendly. I had heard that Germans can be a bit abrupt but that hasn’t been my experience at all. Everyone has been very helpful and almost everyone speaks english, if they don’t speak english they at least understand enough that we can figure things out. That has been one real surprise for me, everyone speaks at least some english. It is actually kind of embarrassing that we are in Germany and I have yet to learn any German but many people speak perfect english. It has been the little things that are frustrating. Things like parking signs, I can use my google translate app to figure out what the sign says but that is only after parking and standing outside and typing it all in, not exactly something you can do while driving by. Or trying to figure out what many of the documents we receive in the mail are. One of my biggest concerns was how the banking would work as I often have to do international transfers but Deutsche Bank has a full online banking system in english so even that has been easier that I expected.  So overall the practical side of things has gone smoothly. Although I am starting my language classes as soon as possible.

So if you were to ask me how the relocation is going I would say it is going well. We have a signed lease on an apartment with a tentative move in date. All three kids have received invites to birthday parties so they are fully in the social scene. Jamie is already traveling for work so he is off and running. But even though it is going well this is the hardest part. When I think about the move to Australia I think it was the same. Living in temporary housing is the hardest part of the whole process. The apartment we are in is perfectly fine, there is nothing wrong with it and it has everything we need. But it isn’t our things, it isn’t our new neighbourhood, we aren’t going to really stay here so everyone is just temporary. This can be fun for a week as you explore a new city but once you are doing things like homework each night not sightseeing it suddenly gets very old very quickly and you just want to settle in.

Jamie is traveling right now and Kellen suggested we do breakfast for dinner while he’s gone. But I don’t have my normal kitchen things, I haven’t stocked us up on flour, sugar, etc. I have just been buying what we need for the moment because it is temporary. Ella asked when I was going to make her zucchini bread and I had to explain that mommy don’t even have a baking pan right now. I feel like a broken record telling them once we are in our new apartment we will be able to do those things again. I think everyone is ready to feel at home and a big part of that will be getting into the apartment and then especially once our things get here. We are in the home stretch so we will get there soon.

In the meantime I’m trying to take advantage of having a couple more weeks before I start my german classes and we move into our apartment. Tomorrow I’m going to check out the modern art museum on free admission Wednesday, and every time I go out I try to take in everything around me. The buildings, the fountains, the leaves changing colours, and the blanket scarf from Zara that i had to have now that we live in a world that includes fall and winter again.