I told my son about ICE tonight. He’s almost 5.
I’m not asking for opinions on my parenting. I stand by my decision. I know it feels too young. We’re told, as parents (and I feel especially as mothers), to protect our children’s innocence. We’re told it’s our job to shield them from the horrors of the world. I thought I believed in that.
Continue readingMy son Sam got a haircut this past week.
That’s such a normal thing, and for some it’s nothing. But not for us. This was Sam’s first haircut in 2 years. It was a major change for him (and honestly, I had to get used to it too!). It wasn’t something we took lightly. Looking back, I’m pretty proud of how we handled it, and I think it’s a great illustration of the kind of parenting I’ve chosen, and will continue to choose, as he grows up.
Continue readingIf you missed part 2, where Sam and I wandered Munich and England on our own, find it here:
Late at night on September 23rd, Sam and I were reunited with Tyler, after he and a few close friends had successfully summited Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. This last part of our vacation would wrap up our time in Munich at Oktoberfest, then we had a short time in Amsterdam before our finale in France, where we hit up two theme parks back to back- needless to say, our time was packed tight! Here’s how we did it.
Continue readingPart 1 is here:
Here’s where our trip kind of gets patched together: Originally, we were supposed to be living in Munich, so Tyler’s plane tickets for Kilimanjaro departed from, and returned to, Munich. When our plans changed, it was too late to change his tickets, so we had to plan for Sam and me to be in Munich before and after. But regardless of where I was, I would be “solo parenting” for 13 days in a foreign company- which is intimidating, even with just one (incredible) kid.
When planning what I would do with Sam, I had two things in mind: First, I wanted to spend a significant amount of time in a country where there was no language barrier, to help make this as stress free as possible. That meant the United Kingdom. Second, I have a few friends who live in Europe that I wanted to see, and it just so happens they both live in the UK. With those things in mind, Sam and I planned for 3 days in Munich, then flying to London to spend the remaining 10 days in the UK.
I knew this would be challenging, and I knew my anxiety would likely show up in the stress, so I tried to fill our time with activities to keep this fun. I would say I did pretty well. I’ll share more of the challenges and best successes in another post, but here, these are the activities we filled our time with!
Continue readingWith our life plans changing, we still had our plane tickets heading to Munich on August 30th. No use wasting those, so we started planning our trip. We found ourselves in a very unique position that we were both unemployed (me by choice due to moving states, Tyler was forced since his company didn’t approve the needed PTO to move cross country and set up his new home office), so we made this trip a month long (34 days long to be exact). This trip has been kind of pieced together, because Tyler’s flights to and from Kilimanjaro in Tanzania were from Munich on the 11th and the 23rd, so we had to be in Munich at those times. So this vacation has kind of been split up into three segments- 1) Beginning until September 10th, staying in Germany but different cities, 2) September 11th-September 23rd, where just me and Sam get to adventure in Germany and England while Tyler climbs Kilimanjaro, and 3) September 24th to the end, where we party at Oktoberfest and then hit up a couple more countries before heading home. Below is part one!
Continue readingPart 1 of major life updates can be found below. Definitely read that first, to make sense of this post!
Alright, so our original plan to move to Germany was through a graduate program for me, granting me a student visa, while Tyler learns the language and gets a job. I ended up getting rejected from the graduate study program, but we decided to still move and we would both get jobs right away. We still felt it was a solid plan… until I joined a few Facebook Expat communities. I asked for some advice for our specific situation. The responses I got were incredibly informative, but they all seemed to point to holes in our plan that we hadn’t seen. The most glaring hole was that we had assumed there would be English speaking jobs for us while we learn the language. Munich is a touristy city, with an international airport, and with our experience in customer service, we assumed it was possible. We assumed wrong.
Continue readingWe are no longer homeowners.
That sentence is one we have waited for so long to be able to say. It’s such a relief. We’ve been homeowners since May 2018, and 5 years later (nearly to the day!) our first home has been sold, and we didn’t buy a new one. It’s been a roller coaster, honestly, and I haven’t really shared much because the journey wasn’t over yet. So here’s the (somewhat) short version of all that’s taken place with our first home in Fernley, NV.
Continue readingIf you’re reading this, you’ve more than likely heard the news (from Facebook, Instagram, or even Tyler’s Youtube page. Our family of three is making a permanent move to Munich, Germany, this fall! Below are the condensed reasons we’re leaving the country, as well as how this move is possible.
We’ve been seeking a way out of the country for a few years now. It started with wanderlust, with dreams of travel and exotic adventures. Moving somewhere like Europe leaves so many places to explore, cities to soak in, people to meet. Watching travel vloggers, vicariously living their life of travel, was so alluring. But I also dreamed of laying roots, and especially with Sam, a “life of travel” just didn’t seem practical.
Continue readingToday was my first “big” solo hike with Sam. We took a trail near Tahoe, at Mount Rose. 6 mile loop hiking to a waterfall and back, on the Tamarack Peak Loop. I’ve hiked with Sam before, and not too long ago we did about 5 miles with him. But this was the first time I solo hiked with him on my back. I am sore now. I will be extra sore tomorrow. But it was a great time, honestly!
That Hiking Couple 