Back to the zoo

At the end of January I started hosting a Kinder German class at our house each Monday. There's a lady who teaches Kinder German in the Child Development Centers on post so Sam asked if she would be willing to teach a small group in our home. We've kept it pretty small, so it's just 4 little girls at this point, but has been a lot of fun.

  There are two other moms and we've gotten to be pretty good friends which has been really nice because friendship does not come naturally to me.  Part of it is knowing that most of the people I know are moving on.  Most people are only here for 3 years so it just seems like too much work to make good friends to have them leave in a year or two.  The other part of it is just pure laziness, I think. Being a friend is a lot of work for me.  I'm naturally very introverted and it takes a lot out of me to work on being a friend.  ANYHOW...all that to say it's really nice that it's worked out that the two other ladies and I have become friends.  We're together every week so it has been easier to get to know them.

We decided to take a break during the summer and reconvene in September.  Sam's parents will be here in just a couple of weeks then we have company coming in June.  I'm planning to go home to Alaska for 4-5 weeks in July/August.  One of the others had planned to be gone for 4-5 weeks too. So, it just made sense to stop the classes until we're all back together. 

So, back to the pictures in this post...Kim is one of the moms that comes to Kinder German.  She has a little girl, Sydney, who just turned two.  Elly and Sydney play so nicely together and I really like Kim.  They are contractors, which means they do not have the time limitation that many other civilians over here have on them.  I love this because it means they could be here for years just like us, which makes going through the "hassle" of being a friend worth it because she doesn't plan on leaving in a couple of years. 

At the beginning of March, Kim and I decided to take our girls to the zoo.  We love the zoo!  It's so nice having annual passes and being able to go enjoy the day and not feel like we have to cover the entire area.  Sydney and Elly had lots of fun together!


I had to go check on the baby gorillas again and they were awake this day!!  I was so excited!  They were adorable and I could have stayed and watched them for hours.  The girls wouldn't have been so excited about that though so we watched for awhile and moved on.