House Stuff, Care Packages and Randomness

We are still plugging away unpacking boxes and finding places for all our stuff ... the house is starting to take shape but not "picture ready" yet. :o) Until I get pictures of the rest of the house I thought I'd share some of the unique things (though, common in Germany) about our house.

Windows: I love the windows and doors here! What makes them unique is that they tilt open and swing open depending on how you place the handle. The "tilt open" is a neat feature but takes you by surprise the first few times ... you think the window or door is falling on top of you! I guarantee that any visitors we have will holler the first time they try to open a window; thinking that it's actually falling on top of them.

This is one of the doors leading to the patio ... I yelled opening this one the first time!

Toilets: We are used to exterior tank toilets with a handle to flush; European toilets look like a seat sticking out of the wall and have a panel as a flusher. This is standard here but is unique to us!


Kitchens: Generally speaking, the kitchens here are pretty small ... particularly in the older German homes. We lucked out with a spacious kitchen but the appliances and sinks take a bit to get used to! Our sink is SMALL! I didn't know how the heck I could actually wash anything in it at first but I've adapted. The fridges here are very small as well and most homes don't even have freezers, though we lucked out with a freezer. It is common here to "buy fresh" daily so they don't need big fridges to accomodate a stockpile of food. The military loans "american-style" fridges to help ... we keep ours downstairs in our "laundry/stock room".

This is a standard dinner plate I put in the sink for a visual reference.

The part we find the toughest to adapt to is the lack of room for condiments. We keep the lesser used condiments in the downstairs fridge.

"I'll buzz you in": Pretty common here but something you normally only think about in up-scale homes in the U.S. We have a intercom and buzzer system to let people in the house. We have one on each floor so that no matter where we are, we can communicate with the person outside and buzz them from where we're at. Cool!

Al and I have fun playing with this.

My mom is awesome about sending "care packages". This one was for Kelty so I let him dig out the gifts ... he was pretty interested in the box and peanuts. After emptying out the box he spent a good 30 minutes sweeping up the peanuts and putting them back in the box. Here's a little video ... thanks Nana and Papa!

Here are a few photos of Kelty over the last few days ...