Germany

Here we go again. Not making any promises with this blogging ordeal. Just thought I'd write a little about what's been up in Germany.

Our household goods were shipped June 4th from Minnesota and showed up at our new home on August 13th! It's so nice to have all our home stuff. I had waffles for breakfast this morning just because I could! We really don't like our German washing machine. It doesn't get clothes clean and its super small. I can barely fit one of Levi's uniforms in the washing machine. But as much as we don't like our washing machine, we are loving our German dishwasher! Gets everything perfectly clean and no water spots to speak of. Totally impressed.

Today is garbage day, which is what I actually wanted to write about. I should have taken pictures but I'm already writing and don't want to run down to the street. So, Germans are big on recycling. Imagine your 'American' garbage can (the black or green plastic thing you set out by the curb on garbage days) and cut it down in size by about 40%. That's the size of our garbage can. No big deal, right? Well, garbage is only picked up every other week. So that small garbage can of ours has to hold 2 weeks of garbage in it. Which is where recycling comes in. The other weeks are recycling weeks where you take your recyclables (mostly paper and plastics) out and the recycling man picks them up. So if you don't recycle you'll be hurting a little for garbage space because your garbage can lid is 'supposed' to shut all the way. We have become very good at making sure recyclables get washed out and put in recycling!

I'll try and post a few pictures soon! Looking for my camera cord.... It should be in one of these boxes.

Weekend pick me up

 Coffee is my fail-proof beginning/mid/end of week pick me ups. I went on a bit of an iced coffee kick a few months ago and have finally perfected my recipe. It's delicious, and super easy. Sure to brighten any day. Even my husband (a life long coffee lover) frequently asks for MY iced coffee over going to Starbucks :) (he may be a little biased)

So here is my wonderful, tasty, easy, and fairly low calorie iced coffee recipe:

These are our favorite ingredients. This almond milk is 

very tasty and the french roast instant coffee is dark and flavorful

12 oz cup

2-3 teaspoons of instant coffee (or two packets if using single serve)

2ish teaspoons of white sugar

1/8 cup of warm-hot water

Mix until dissolved

Fill cup with desired amount of ice

Fill cup 3/4 full of vanilla almond milk

Top off cup with water (you don't have to do this, you could fill it all the way with almond milk but I think it gets too thick that way.)

Optional: coffee creamer of your choice! (we like to put just a little splash of vanilla coffee creamer in ours)

Mix, enjoy, de-stress, and look super hip on the way to your local library!

**Note** Yesterday I posted this blog from my blogger app on our ipad. I was NOT impressed. I wasn't able to move the pictures where I wanted them to go. Other than the picture part it wasn't terrible. So I deleted it and rewrote this morning. I think I would use it if I wasn't posting pictures, but personally I think pictures are the most fun parts of blogs :)

Excess and moving

Something I've been thinking about a lot lately is being a 'minimalist'. I don't want to label it or be legalistic about it. There have been some book suggestions from friends that I'm planning on checking out.

This is something Levi and I have been talking about ever since we packed up our house back in August. We had only been married 13 months and we realized we had waaayyy too much stuff. It probably wouldn't have mattered so much if we weren't moving. But we are moving. And we will likely be moving again in 3 years. And maybe again 3-4 years after that. And maybe 3-4 years after that. You get the idea. Military life. Military life and having a lot of stuff do not go well together. Unless you really don't mind packing and unpacking.

After packing up our entire house in August (and taking numerous bags to good will) we decided the less we have the happier we will be. And we plan on sticking to that plan as well as we can.

Microwave update and others

Back to the microwave! That week I kept track of my microwave use. I used it 8 times in total. 4 times to cook frozen veggies. Twice to reheat my coffee and twice to melt butter. I could have used the stove to melt the butter and cook veggies. The coffee I suppose I could have thrown out and made fresh but that seems plain wasteful. All in all I think we use the microwave pretty minimally. I'm not sure if we will have a microwave when we move. I guess it doesn't matter one way or the other.

This weekend we went to Oklahoma City. We spent the morning and most the afternoon at the zoo, ended up getting awesome tea at this odd Asian place, at Chipotle, and saw the Hunger Games! It was a relaxing weekend, which was just what we needed.

I got out the bike last Friday. I'm not sure why I haven't been using it more. Probably because we've been running. We took a week off running and never really got back on track. We've been keeping up with going to the gym but running has decreased to once or twice a week. So I got the bike out Friday and did a fun 20 miles. It felt good to spin my legs for a bit. I did another 15 miles today (sore butt!). I'm looking forward to biking more and hopefully alternating it with running (and continuing to go to the gym). It's starting to feel like summer here!

7th grade

There are people in your life you will never forget. Acts of kindness that make an impact for life. High school was not easy for me (not academically speaking). The first hour of the first day of seventh grade I awkwardly showed up to class 15 min early. There were only a handful of people in the classroom. I remember being so nervous. I was the kid in a plain t-shirt, no make up, baggy pants, unpopular and unknown. Our high school was a blend of 3 smaller elementary schools. Mine being the smallest with only 12 kids joining the 125 total kids in our future graduating class. I only knew one kid from my elementary in the class and I knew I didn't want to sit next to him. In the back there was a girl with short brown hair, camo shorts, reading a book. I remember asking her if I could sit next to her and her saying yeah. I don't think I sat next to her for more than 20 minutes before we had a new seating chart but I will always remember how relieved I felt went I sat down next to her. I had made my first friend.

The Microwave

After having a very good friend share this link with me I'm going to keep a tally of my microwave use for the week. The microwave has never had a huge appeal for me. When I went to college the apartment I lived in didn't have a microwave and I sure wasn't going to buy one. So I went without. But I'm curious as to how often I use it now.

After reading multiple books and blogs about hair care, last weekend I decided to actually start trying apple cider vinegar in my hair. So far I'm pleased with the results! But my-oh-my do I ever need a trim! My split ends are looking awful.

Fun Weekend

 Ever have a day where you want to run away? Start the week over? Find the deepest darkest hole and hide? Feel like the biggest schmuck in the world?

Yup, happy monday to me.

Saturday was a WONDERFUL day. We went to check out the adoptable cats at petsmart, and said hi to the cat that looked like Harriet. Then Levi took me out for chips and salsa at Qudoba! I thought that was a fun treat and he said he had two surprises for me!! What? Me? Really?? The first surprise was getting to go see Act of Valor at the movies! We even got a snack to share :) Act of Valor was really good but I have to say parts were a little hard to watch without feeling choked up. After the movie we stopped for a second treat! Levi took me to the cutest place to get a glass of wine and a cupcake! What a great husband :)

I also got the book I won on Saturday! There are so many fun projects in here, I can't wait to get stared!