This post is a little late in coming. But I needed to write this to finally cap off and finish our big adventure in Germany.
In March of 2012, Frau Plassmann, our Landlord, came and visited us and told us that she wanted to sell the house we were living in. After thinking about what to do, we decided to move back to America. It was so hard to find a house the first time around with having 5 kids. And I personally did not want to go through that again. And even if we found a place to live, would the kids have to switch schools? I did not want that. And how long would we still stay? One maybe two years? Well, then it was not worth the financial part it would of taken to move, as that is also very expensive in Germany.
The draw back: Not all of us were going to move to America. Without a job, Gardner needs to stay behind. Gardner decided it would be best if we moved to Utah. With me being alone with the kids, I would have family support there.
The end of April, I flew out to Utah to house hunt. Ended up not finding anything in our price range that was decent enough or big enough. Everything that was big enough had major damage to the house. So I looked at new homes, one that still needed to be built. Ended up deciding to build a home with Richmond American Homes in West Jordan. And ended up building a home right next door to my sister, Julie.
In July, I took Shantal, Spencer and Hannah to Paris. It is somewhere Shantal wanted to visit since we lived in Germany and we never made it there. So the day school got out, we drove to Paris and spent 2 nights there. We climbed the Eifel Tower, saw Notre Dame,and got rained on the whole time. It would of been nice to see the Eifel Tower when it was dark out and it was all lit up. But our hotel was so far away, and after long days, I was just too tired.
Shantal and Spencer spent two weeks in Sweden for a Youth Temple Trip. They both came home and said it was not the last trip they thought it would be.
The kids and I moved to America on August 19th. We flew on Air Berlin from Dusseldorf to Las Vegas. In Las Vegas, we had a 5 hour layover. In Las Vegas while waiting for our next flight, almost all the kids were sleeping. And once we were on the plane, every single kid was out. The flight attendant came by and was shocked. But by that point, the kids had been up almost 24 hours.
We spent the first three months living with Julie and Roger while our house was being built. And finally on November 7th, we closed on our house and we were able to move in.
The kids are thriving at school and adjusting really great. We skype and talk with Gardner as often as we can. And Gardner came out at Christmas for three weeks where we had a great time together. We surprised the two younger kids at school when Gardner arrived. They were so surprised to see him. Emma ran up to him, with a huge grin on her face, and jumped up on him. Just melts my heart to watch the video.
We are hoping that Gardner will find a job soon and join us here in America. It is just not the same having him there.
There are things we all miss from Germany. Our friends, chocolate, the
autobahn to name a few. But I am so excited that my kids have the
opportunity to get to know their cousins and their Grandmas and
Grandpas.
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