Sunday in Germany

Today is our 3 week anniversary of being in Germany. This morning we took the housing contract to the housing office for approval. Our landlords had to fill it out then we take it to housing for approval, then we sign and it becomes official. Well, there were a few things that need changed on it, so we'll have to go back to sign, but it's nice to be moving on toward getting our house. We only have about two more weeks at the Romerhof. It hasn't been a bad place to stay and the people there are very nice and helpful, but it will just be nice to be in a place of our own even though we won't have furniture for a couple of months after that.

Yesterday, Sam and I had a really nice day. We checked out the chapel on Patch Barracks and really liked it. The Protestant service is at 11:00. The people were very friendly and we were happy with the service. We were done with church at about 12:00 and decided to go for a drive. To me, that's still a daunting proposal. I'm getting pretty comfortable driving to Patch, Panzer and to the Romerhof, but going further is still a little intimidating. Anyhow, we drove toward Sindelfingen (I think??) and took a road there that led us to this little village. We ended up stopping and having lunch at a little Italian bistro and ate outside at tables set up on the cobblestone sidewalk. We really enjoyed that. It felt very European to us. Sam said he felt like he was in an American Express commercial - ha, ha But we did really enjoy it.

Later on, Sam wanted to see if we could make it to Plattenhardt, where we will be living. This was our first time on the Autobahn, but he did great. We got a little irritated with each other and it took us awhile to find the house, but he did. We had no problem finding the village, but then there are so many little road that it took awhile to find the road that the house is on. It's very hilly in Plattenhardt and the roads are narrow. It's a really cute little village.

Someone at Sam's work let him borrow two bicycles, so we took a ride and found which path led to Patch Barracks. Sam road his bike to work this morning. There are beautiful bike/hiking trails all over the place here. It's really easy to be outdoors and we've been having wonderful weather. It was probably in the 70's yesterday. From what I hear we better enjoy it because sooner or later the rain will return. Something that I've noticed here that is beautiful is the flowers. Even in people's yards there are tons of little flowers. It's really beautiful. Daffodils, poppys, tulips, pansies and lots of other small flowers. These pictures were taken in a park we were walking in, but even in private yards you see a lot of flowers.

Daffodils along side a fence

Flowers in a park

Well, that's about all I have for today. More later.