I know I have said this before, but I will say it again.... I am terrible at keeping up with the blog. Blogging is truly a great way to stay connected, but I have found out that I am not entirely great at staying connected either. It is a good thing that I am coming home soon, so I can reconnect with everyone. Let's see...what has happened since the last update?

Work. I really like my team I work with and I like the kiddos too, but they are a lot to handle when they are all present. I don't know. It is not my favorite at the moment. We shall see.

Friday we went to Stadt Fest. I am not entirely sure what the reason was for the festival, but it was fun. That is one thing I have noticed. The Germans love to celebrate. They have festivals for everything. There is a festival pretty much every weekend in various cities all over Germany. The Stadt Fest in Mannheim had two stages set up. One at the water tower, and one in the middle of the walking district. The bands would play a plethora of music, but most of the music was circa 1980s. Fabulous. I don't know why the Germans dig the 80s so much, but they do. They were all over it and jammin' out. It was a sight to see.

Another bonus of festivals (besides the great music..haha) is the great food. Seriously. The music may not have been so good, but the food was stellar. They had anything you could have wanted....yummy grilled meats, fried bread with nutella, pizzas with potato and bacon...ANYTHING you wanted. Oh yeah...the beer was pretty good too. :) There were food/beverage tents all over! There were people everywhere. We found a primo table under one of those white tents and enjoyed a few drinks before venturing down to the second stage. It was a fun time. The best part was that no one had to be designated driver. We could all relax and enjoy ourselves without having to worry about driving. We simply hopped back on the jam-packed train and headed to post. I slept most of the way on the 20 minute train ride because I had been up since 4:30 AM. I worked the 5:30 AM-2:30PM shift since it was a training holiday. The soldiers had a four day weekend with the training holiday and Memorial Day. You would think the CDC would be closed because of this, but no. Parents are off of work and they still send their kids. Go figure.

Saturday Elizabeth and I saw Robin Hood. It was pretty good. Nothing like I thought it was going to be, but good. It was more the beginning of Robin Hood, recapping how he got started. They pretty much paved the way for the sequel. Kind of like the new Batman movies. The first one sets the stage and the sequel shows him kicking but and taking names. After the movie Elizabeth and I ventured out Stadt Fest. She didn't get to see it Friday night with us because she had to babysit. She was pretty underwhelmed by it, so we headed home for a Disney movie marathon.

Sunday we had Elizabeth's farewell to 15 party. There were about 15 of us... our little family plus another family that we have befriended along with Cathy (the dentist), Frau Karen (the German woman who teaches the German culture class to the soldiers) and some of Elizabeth's friends. The Greek people were great. Yolanda had a huge table set up for us and catered to our every need. Her husband of course fixed us fantastic food, and we ate until we were stuffed. We wore black in honor of the event. It was fun and she had a good time. Now she is 16. Yippeee!

On Monday (Memorial Day) we went to a BBQ at Paul's boss' house. It was cold outside, which was not so good, but the company was great. I actually ran into two people from Texas. Small world, eh? We had a potluck BBQ... Lenea brought her famous green beans, and other people brought other sides like salads, brownies, etc. We also got to try the most fabulous beer I have ever tasted. In years past it had been voted the best beer in the world. It definitely earned the title. It was brewed by monks in this small town in Germany about 3o minutes from us. For the life of me I cannot remember the name of the beer, but I do know that it starts with the letter K. Sorry. That is the best I can do. You will have to venture to Germany to find out for yourself! :)

Then Tuesday started a fresh, short week of work. Thank goodness it was a short week because it kicked my butt. I am in this weird place here. I put in for leave to come home for my girls who are getting married, (Oh happy day! I am so excited for them!!) but I never heard anything about it. I requested three weeks without pay since I don't have enough time saved up since I started. Then I had to change my flight, which has kind of been a blessing in disguise. Let me explain. My original return flight was for June 1. Once that date began to approach I began to look into changing my flight. The only date that was available to me was June 17. This is great on the personal aspect since it allowed more time for me to be with family and friends. This is not so great on the job aspect. They were not thrilled about me requesting even more leave. When it is all calculated out, it comes to a month. Yikes! Decision time. Do I just quit and come home, or do I feel it out with my job and see if this is even a possibility? Who takes a month off of work? Three weeks? Yes. Everyone I work with is from the states, so when they take a vacation they take a vacation. I don't know what difference that one week difference really makes, but apparently it makes a big one. Here is where my brain is at the moment:

I felt really guilty for coming back here knowing that I was leaving my mom and Jordan to go off to fill my own selfish desires. I just got the job at the CDC when I came home for John, and I didn't want to quit before I even started so I came back to Germany. I needed to do this for me. The weird part comes into play now that I am not crazy about my job and I am crazy homesick. That is kind of putting it lightly. I am in this weird spot where I am questioning my ability. Am I really cut out to work with kids? Some days I leave work and I feel so yucky about the day. There are things I could have done better, or worked harder on to have a better outcome. 30 kids is a lot to have in one room. I don't think it is a good setup for them or the people on my team. It is really stressful in there. I know the adults feel it, so I am pretty sure that we are passing that on to our kiddos making for some pretty intense moments. At times I would like to just walk out the door. Then in the next moment one of my kiddos says something off the wall and I can't help but bust a gut in laughter. They are really some sweet kids, but a few lack some much needed discipline in their home environments. Then I start thinking about the future, and I wonder how this is affecting my career as a whole. How does this look on my resume? I hate growing up. I think part of the reason I came to Germany was to kind of avoid this thing called growing up. I am coming to terms with it, and I think I am ready. I really wanted to get into the DoDs school system through the military, but that didn't work out. Now I am not really sure what to do.

Another thing I thought would be different about my time here was making friends. I like to think that I am a people person. Not so outgoing, but really friendly. I didn't realize how spoiled I was by my friends until I got here. It is really hard to make friends for a couple of reasons. None of the Americans stay longer than 3 years because the army relocates people after 3 years. People are constantly coming and going. Also, most people are married with babies. I am not. The married thing is not what is weird...it's the babies. There not even babies really. The people who are my age have children who are anywhere from infant to six years old. The others who aren't married with babies are kind of sleeze-tastic. I went up to my uncle's unit one day and one of his soldiers was asking me all of these questions. Then he asked if I was single. I said yes, and he told me that it would be easy for me to make friends. I kind of laughed, and said, "No. I am not looking to be that kind of friend. I am not looking to be some body's booty call." See what I mean? Sleeze-tastic. My friends spoiled me. I took for granted how easy it was for me to be relaxed and just be me.

I guess I just kind of feel like a failure. I have done my best to avoid growing up. It scares the crap out of me. I am terrified of teaching and then realizing that maybe I am not cut out for it. Then what? What do I do? Working at the CDC has really tested me. I have been questioning my ability to do this. To teach kiddos. Sometime when I reflect on my day I shudder. I think to myself....wow. You could have done that so much better. I can't believe I did that, or I could have tried harder, prepared more, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Finally Friday came. We went to a Hail and Farewell for Paul's unit. They welcome new soldiers and say goodbye to the ones who are moving on. It was at this awesome restaurant, which was a ginormous keg. Who would have thought?

It was hotter than all get out inside. No AC, just fans. There were about 60 people crammed into this room. It was hot! and the food took forever to come out. I don't think the restaurant was truly prepared for us either. They had two servers to take all of the orders and bring out the food. Once the food arrived, it was just mediocre. Cool atmosphere, though.

WC=water closet, aka: the restroom. I thought this sign was funny. The little boy is headless, and the girl has no legs or facial expressions. Yikes! The Germans are tough.

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Saturday we woke to sunshine and warm weather. We decided to venture out and go to Luisenpark in Mannheim. This place was incredible. It was unlike any park I have ever been to. You had to pay admission to enter, but there was no lack of entertainment once inside. There was a zoo, water boats, restaurants, mini water parks, and several open fields for people to hang out on.

It was so overwhelming at first. We walked down this path which forked into two directions with ample amounts of things to do both ways. Luckily the path made a giant circle, so we were able to see a little bit of everything! We could have stayed all day, but after a few hours we were hungry and opted for Greek. I know. Shocking.

Ahhhh. The boats. They moved along a path under the water which meant absolutely no effort on our part. We didn't have to paddle or do a darn thing. The boat moved all by itself. It was great. 40 minutes of peace as our boat moved all by itself around the entire pond/mini lake.

The needle thing in the background is the spindle top restaurant. Apparently it has a pretty wicked view of Mannheim.

Ewww. These fish would swim up to the boat with their mouths open expecting food. I am not a big fish person, but the people in front of us were. They kept sticking their hands in the water trying to hold the fish. This of course led to lots of splashing and rocking of our boat. Good times.

After the boats we toured the park some more. That is when we ran into this piece of awesomeness.

Your eyes do not deceive you. This statue looks like a giant piece of poop. Gross? Yes, but we had a good laugh over it.

One of the many water areas. The Germans would just strip down their kids and let them frolic in the water. If you look closely on the railing on the right side, then you will see a small child's pair of panties.

Awesome jungle gym, but very frightening at the same time. Do you see the cages? Great safety precaution. No kid is going to fall off the top, but it is kind of eerie. How could I not take a picture?

Beautiful garden. It was the coolest park I have ever seen.

I almost forgot. As we were searching for the exit, we found this. Those are all pacifiers left at the park, and instead of throwing them away they have been turned into art. The Germans don't waste a thing. One man's trash, another man's treasure?

After we ate Greek we decided that there was still too much sunshine left in the day to go home. The sun stays out now until about 9:30 pm, which is great! We hopped back in the car and headed to Ladenberg. This town is so stinking awesome. If I could choose a place to live off post, then it would be Weinheim or Ladenberg. Our first time we toured the city we ate at Die Kartofel (The Potato), but this time we toured more along the river. It was absolutely gorgeous. The sun started setting along the water and it was like magic. You can't escape all of the beauty that is to be found here. Just when you think you have seen it all, there is something else that takes your breath away.

This is me being a creeper. This is someones backyard. I know. Creepy. In my defense, their backyard is too awesome not be documented. Look at it. Well this picture does no justice to it. They had rows of cabbage and various other veggies. They had all sorts of flowers. It was truly magnificent.

Today we went to Heidelberg after a morning filled with laundry. We were wanting some good chinese food and we just happened to find this inexpensive place that serves great food right in the shopping district. One thing I love about Germany, is that whenever the weather is good people are outside in it. All of the shops were closed (the only thing open on Sunday is restaurants), but people were still out walking up and down the shopping district. We ate our dinner in the "garden" which was really just a table outside. It was no garden. It was a group of tables set up on the sidewalk. Go figure. We enjoyed lots of yummy food outside in the beautiful sunshine. Then on the way back to our car, we saw this....

Go Germany :)