Moving to Germany

It has been a long time since I have posted on this blog.  Our family, being in the Army, moved once again, this time to Germany in January 2014.  Our move here was not as spectacular as the trip to Texas, which we posted in detail earlier in this blog; however, we did visit my mom, Leslie, and Granny and Papa in Texas and Jenny's parents, Lizzie and her friends in Georgia before visiting Washington D.C. on our way to the airport in Baltimore.

In Mineola, Texas, we visited Granny and Papa before heading east to Atlanta.
Here is a picture of Rebekah with Granny at the Pizza Hut where Uncle Richard is the manager.

Daniel poses for a picture with Heather at the Rhodes Jordan Park
in Lawrenceville, where David proposed to Jenny in 1999

Kimberly meets Picaso with Phil and Myra Price in High Point, NC

The Snethen Seven visit the nation's capitol in January
before departing from the Baltimore airport

Our first several months in Germany were very difficult, getting our car from the shipping, finding a place to live and getting settled after moving around the world.  Getting our dogs here was especially difficult and expensive.  We were, however, able to visit a few places in the first year.  Our favorite place is probably Trier, where we see new things each time we visit.

The Snethen Sieben pose for a picture inside the Roman Bath House in Trier.
(Ben is not in this picture.  He must have been behind the camera.)

Kimi and Daniel play in a fountain outside of Constantine's Basilica in Trier.

Rebekah, Daniel and JJ stop for a picture at the
Lohnsfeld sign, in our village

We live in a beautiful town near Kaiserslautern amidst fields and rolling hills.  We enjoy walking our dogs in the fields and going on runs and the kids like to play at the fussballplatz, in the older part of town.  There is also a castle ruin (Falkenstein) just ten kilometers from our house.

Daniel poses in front of Kimi, Ben and JJ
at the Burgruin Falkenstein

My plan is to continue to backdate some posts.  I have posted a lot of pictures to Facebook, but while the blogging on that site is limited, I will blog about some of the more amazing trips we have been on and continue from here.  I hope that you continue to enjoy the stories we share as I continue to post about the Many Adventures of the Snethen Sieben.

Foot Surgery, Day 1

Hello.  I wanted to give everyone an update on Jenny's surgery day.  I was going to post it on Facebook, but  figured this was better.

Our pastor came by the house last night to pray with us.  He had told me in advance that he was coming, but I thought he would be here for five minutes, pray and be on his way.  He wound up spending closer to an hour and learned a great deal about our family.

A medical helicopter outside Darnell Army Hospital on Fort Hood, TX

At 9:30 this morning, we took Jenny to the hospital.  After turning in her lab-work, she checked into the day surgery on the third floor.  (For those who may not know, Jenny's foot surgery was for a metatarsal that she broke in her left foot on our move to Central Texas in October last year.  Yes, it's been almost a year.  We blame socialized Army medicine, but I don't think I'm allowed to complain.)  I asked a few questions and left my number with the nurse's desk, but I had to leave when Kimberly started chasing Jonathan around the cramped waiting room like a monster.

Jenny, sitting with Ben, Beka and Jonathan in the "too-small-for-the-Snethen-Seven" waiting room in the outpatient clinic at Darnell.

The kids and I went to Wal-Mart while Jenny was prepped for her surgery.  We bought a few things we needed, like milk and flowers for Jenny's recovery.  By the time we left Wal-Mart, it was about 10:45, so we stopped at Chick-fil-A on the way home to pick up lunch.

While we were at Wal-Mart and Chick-fil-A, I had begun texting with Patti Kirkpatrick, a lady from our church who homeschools her youngest (of five) daughter, Rebekah, who is also our Rebekah's age.  (Yes, confusing!!  I know!!)  Patti started out by offering whatever we needed today, and I was speechless.  I asked if she could come over for a little bit while I went to pick Jenny up, thinking it would be in the next couple of hours, thinking I'd be gone an hour or two.  She agreed to meet us at 12:30.

We finished devouring the tray of nuggets --Yes, we get a small party platter because it is so much more affordable than getting everyone kids' meals; plus, I'm sure it fills them up better-- and Rebekah and Benjamin took our dogs, Chrissy and Easton, for a short walk around the block.  

Meanwhile, Patti and her daughter arrived closer to noon, fueling an increase in productivity around the house.  Rebekah and Rebekah made a good team, cleaning the dishes.  I enjoyed watching it happen.  We all pitched in cleaning the house, especially in the bedroom where Jenny will spend the majority of the next several weeks.  Ben took care of the dogs.  Patti watched the two younger boys.  Ben folded clothes.  It was a productive afternoon.

Rebekah carries flowers to the hospital for Jenny's recovery room, after her surgery.

 The hospital called at 2:31, telling me Jenny was out of surgery and that she would be in recovery for at least thirty minutes before they could release her.  My Rebekah and I came to the hospital, with a display of flowers for her.  When we got to the hospital, Jenny was extremely drowsy, so the nurse agreed to come back in half an hour. Rebekah and I read in Jenny's recovery room while she slept.  It was actually closer to an hour when a new nurse came in who decided it was time to wake Jenny up, change her out of her hospital gown and read us the discharge papers.  Before long, I was riding the elevator and bringing the car to the curb, just after the afternoon cannon fired at 1700.  (That's 5pm, if you don't speak Army.)

The nurse, Sonja, pushing Jenny to the van to go home from her surgery.

Jenny came home and we set her in bed.  While Rbekah and I were gone, two different people had brought us dinner.  We had to decide to keep the casserole (which needed to be warmed up) and eat the Bar-be-que for dinner.  (The casserole will still make a nice lunch tomorrow.)  We are extremely blessed and count it a privilege to have so many wonderful friends in this town!!  We want to say a special "thanks" to everyone who has helped this day be successful, including those who have signed up on Liz's calendar that she made, including those in my unit who have been flexible with my schedule over the next couple of weeks.

Jenny sitting in her bed at home, ready to rest for the next several weeks.

After dinner, we took the dogs for a walk.  We held our normal Bible time.  I let the kids each have one small brownie (provided with the casserole) and I put them to bed, with minimal issues once they'd settled.  Over all, we had a very good day!!

Pistachios, Caves and Family....

When I started this blog back in the summer and began logging our adventures, I never intended for this blog to end when we arrived in Texas.  In fact, the blog did not even get us all the way into Texas, ending just across the Arizona border in New Mexico.  In the future, I will try to update our family's progress as we have adapted into our lives in the Lone Star State. 

In the middle of nowhere between Alamogordo and Tularosa, NM, we stopped to see the world's largest pistachio.  The gift shop also sold local wine.

Yes, we did eventually make it to Texas, driving the long way through White Sands and Roswell (Day 28), where we met some aliens, and Carlsbad Caverns (Day 29), where I walked down the Natural Entrance with all five of the children, carrying Jonathan and holding Daniel's hand all the way down.  We met Jenny at the elevator.  She didn't feel comfortable walking through the Natural Entrance because her foot had begun hurting a day or two prior and she didn't know if she could make it.  When we met her at the below-ground gift shop, we started walking around the Big Room.  The older kids walked with me, while I took turns with Rebekah holding Jonathan.  Jenny walked with Daniel around the Big Room, despite seething pain from her left foot.

At the end of a long day, driving through wilderness, we were disappointed by Roswell's few shops that all seemed to sell the same things.

From Carlsbad Caverns, we drove south through the Guadalupe Mountains, stopping for the night in Van Horn (where we unknowingly ate at a Mexican restaurant that is a favorite of John Madden.) When we hit the interstate leaving Van Horn, (Day 30) the speed limit was 80 miles per hour(!!) until we turned northeast, up to Midland/Odessa, then east to San Angelo where we visited our friends the McSpaddens, Kevin and Nancy, who each were instrumental in our wedding.  (Nancy was more instrumental than Kevin since she played the organ while Kevin was only the preacher, twelve and a half years ago.)

The next day (Day 31) was the worst day of the entire trip.  On our way out of San Angelo, we drove to Dublin, Texas to visit the famous Dr. Pepper factory there.  When we got out of the RV, I discovered that my camera was nowhere to be found.  I texted Nancy to see if they had found the camera.  She told me that she would check when she got home from work.  So we toured the Dublin Dr. Pepper factory without my camera.  I took some pictures on my phone, but they were not nearly the same quality as if they had been taken with my Nikon D80.

Leaving the Dr. Pepper factory, we kept driving toward Dallas, but we stopped again after an emergency in Stephenville.  I had to stop pretty quickly at a traffic light when an ear-piercing shriek bolted Jenny upright from the front seat to the middle of the motor home.  The ear-piercing shriek was Ben screaming because Mario, whose cage was unsecured behind the sink, flew forward, glass crashing into the steps.  Mario, it turned out was fine, but we stopped for several minutes to sweep and then vacuum the glass out of the coach.  By this time, we were sure Jenny's foot was injured.

Finally, hitting Fort Worth in the midst of heavy traffic, we drove up to Denton and back down to my mom's house.  Mom took Jenny to the hospital where they confirmed that she did have two broken metatarsals in her left foot, and we parked the RV outside my mom's house for the night, the kids and I sleeping in her living room.  When I picked up Jenny from the hospital, we all wished we had found an RV park to stay in for the night, but the way it turned out, it was a pretty miserable way to end a pretty miserable day.

Then, (Day 32) we spent most of the morning fighting with Tricare.  They wanted us to get a referral from our primary care provider (PCP) before we could visit the specialist clinic, podiatry.  However, it was still the middle of October and I wasn't signing into post until November 10th.  A PCP wouldn't even be assigned to me until after then, at which point we could likely expect a normal two-week delay getting the appointment.  Jenny was only in a poorly-constructed brace from the emergency room.  She needed care and the clinic the emergency room referred her to did not accept Tricare as an insurance provider.

Also, on that day, we found a very nice RV park that is literally just a mile or two from my mom's house and we picked up the van.  We had Mom and Leslie, Kathy and Brian out to the RV park that night, where we'd set it up with the mat outdoor furniture so that everyone could enjoy our home.  Kathy took Rebekah home with her and Mom and Leslie took Ben and Kimi, so we were left with just the babies for the first night.

David's mother, Betsy, sitting outside the RV at Destiny RV in Corinth, TX.

The next day (Day 33), Mom watched the Daniel so that Jenny and I could have a date with just Jonathan.  We ate lunch at Macaroni Grill in Lewisville and then visited Half-Price Books.  In the evening, everyone came back to the RV park and we collected our children.  The best thing about this day was how relaxing most of the day was.

On Day 34, we attended church with Mom.  Leslie, Kathy and Brian all attended, and the music minister, Ed Miller made a point that we were all in attendance.  After lunch, we ate lunch at a Chinese restaurant that Kathy and Brian frequent, followed by the drive down to Killeen.

Since Jenny had a broken foot, Mom and Leslie offered to drive down with us, three vehicles together in caravan, Leslie driving the van, me the RV, and Mom picking up the rear in her sedan.  Aside from frequent potty breaks from Kimberly who rode in the van and had grown accustomed in the RV to going en route, the trip was relatively uneventful until we arrived in Killeen. 

The first RV park we tried to stay at was on a shady side of town.  We didn't feel comfortable, so we kept going, looking for someplace else.  It turned out that most RV parks didn't allow people to stay for only one night and we weren't sure where the park was on Fort Hood.  As it turned out, we turned around and left the Killeen area completely; I knew I'd seen a RV park in Temple that looked nice and I was intent on going back.

On the way back, before we got to Belton, Leslie called and told us she was having some trouble with the van, that it was not responding appropriately when she pressed the gas.  We misunderstood her, thinking she was just having trouble because it is such a big car and it was getting to the end of a long day.  Arriving in Temple, we had taken the lead when we got a call telling us that Leslie did not have any power left in the van and had managed to park it in a parking lot somewhere in town.  We had to drive the RV back in a huge circle and finally found them.  (Mom had followed Leslie off the freeway.)

We had to call a tow-truck and when the driver arrived, he guessed the problem was with the transmission, giving us the contact information for a local transmission repair place.  It turned out that we wound up renting two hotel rooms for the night, one for us and the boys, the other for Mom and Leslie and the girls.  Nowhere in town had two adjoining rooms, but we did get an over-sized handicapped room because of Jenny's broken foot.

Old Friends and Baking Sun

Day 27:

Waking up so close to Phoenix, we had a schedule to keep, meeting Jenny's friend from her childhood for lunch.  So we woke up pretty early and drove off to Jenny's home when she used to live in Glendale, AZ.  I punched in the address to Jenny's old home on my cell phone and the computerized lady in the phone told us where to go.

Buckeye is in the outskirts of the Phoenix area and Glendale is probably its largest suburb, making our drive into Glendale a short trip, especially compared with much of the driving days we'd made on our trip.  When we passed Sahuaro Ranch, Jenny had met her bearings with her old neighborhood and began showing us the library, places she'd ridden her bike, Desert Palms Elementary School and her old home.  Many of the places she remembered had changed in the past twenty years, but a surprising number of places were much the same as she remembered them from her childhood.

Desert Palms Elementary has been completely rebuilt since Jenny attended in the 1980's

After getting the complete tour from her old home, we drove into Sahuaro Ranch, where they were getting ready for a Wild West Day.  We parked and got out for a short time, giving the kids an opportunity to play at a unique playground before it got too hot in the day.  They played the National Anthem from the side of the park where they were celebrating Wild West Day, and I made the kids stop playing and stand at attention till the music was completed.  

The unique playground at Sahuaro Ranch challenged our children's fitness and imaginations.

Before we left, we walked past the orange trees to look at the peacocks that walk freely around the park.  It just coincided with the check point, where they were letting people in to the Wild West Days.  We got to watch as a man in full cowboy costume checked his gun with a man dressed as a sheriff and the young teenage boy with him before being allowed into the park.  Checking his gun consisted of verifying it wasn't loaded.  The boy gave each of my kids a sticker before we remounted our vehicle.

Kimberly decides the best way to get down the slide at Sahuara Ranch.

We still had a little extra time before meeting Jenny's friend, so we went back through the tour past Jenny's home, this time with the video camera. 

Then, I programmed the GPS to send me to the Arrowhead section of town, where we were meeting her friend at Arriba's.  We parked at the outskirts of the mall parking lot and walked across the street to the restaurant.  After a short wait, Jenny's friend Mel arrived with her family.  Our family clicked with their family very easily.  We all had a great time and enjoyed great Mexican food and at the end, Melissa and Steve picked up the bill, which we weren't expecting.

The Snethens with Jenny's friend and family outside the Snethen motor-home.

After leaving Arriba's and saying goodbye to Jenny's friend and her family, we drove out to Metro Center Mall.  As it turned out, Jenny didn't really recognize anything there, but they did have a really good playground on the first floor which entertained Daniel, Kimberly and Ben while Jenny took the oldest and youngest to look at clothes.

Kimberly, standing inside an alien robot at the Metro Center playground.

Leaving the Metro Center Mall, we drove on to Tucson, where we were fortunate to find a Burger King with a lit outdoor playland.  By this time, the sun was beginning to set and playing outside had resumed the appeal that it may have lost under the intense, afternoon sun.

Daniel slides down the rocket ship at the Metro Center Mall in Arizona.

By the time we left Tucson, it was completely dark and we decided to drive on, driving toward the waning gibbous moon as it rose with an amber hue over a mountain in front of us.  It was truly a beautiful sight!!  We kept going past the New Mexico border and on to Deming.  It would have been about a normal day's drive if we had started earlier in the day, but, arriving after midnight, I plugged us in and didn't even attach the hoses, knowing we probably wouldn't be there long enough to really need them.

Wildlife count to date:  2 moose, 21 bears, 7 rabbits, 9 deer, 16 squirrels an elk, a kitten and a coyote.

Into the Desert

Day 26:

The next day, we readied the motor home to be back on the road.  Having a week-long rest from driving, we pulled out of the parking lot and drove to the rental dealer, where we waited for about thirty minutes for him to show up, after calling the two numbers on the door.  Finally getting that accomplished, we were able to get on the road, taking the 91 up through Riverside to the I-10, where we began across the desert.

The kids watched movies in the cabin while we crossed the desert.

Our first stop was at Joshua Tree National Park, after a large ascent along the highway.  The engine was burning hot and it needed a break, but the road to Joshua Tree was closed due to dust storms in the area.  So we continued on.

Unusual foliage in the desert.

At the next exit, we found the General Patton Museum and decided to go after getting gas at the Chevron station.  I swiped my card and it did not work, so I went inside and asked the attendant to charge me for $40.  

Before I'd finished filling up with gas, the fraud department of Alaska USA was on the line asking if all my recent charges were valid.  The one I couldn't recall was the $126 charge to Chevron.  After talking to them for almost half an hour, I found what the charge came from.  When you swipe your card at the pump, most gas stations run a one dollar transaction, just to make sure you're not overdrawn on your account before you pump.  I'm fine with that.   Apparently, in March 2011, Chevron decided to change it from a one dollar charge to a $126 charge, more than it will let you pay at the pump for either a debit or credit transaction.  I decided not to shop at Chevron again.

Moving on, we crossed into Arizona and aside from the engine running hot and the cabin being hot, it was a relatively uneventful day.  Jenny wanted to show us Glendale, where she grew up as a kid, but we decided to save that for tomorrow, stopping in Buckeye, a western-most outskirt of the Phoenix area.

Jonathan, outside the pizza-joint in Buckeye, Arizona.

We checked into an RV park just minutes before they were about to close the office, stopped by a pizza-joint and let the kids swim in the pool until it closed at 10pm.

Downtown Disney

Day 25:

While waiting for the girls to get up, the boys played with newly acquired toys from Disneyland, a lightsaber and a tron disc, in the space between our sites.

The next day, everyone slept in, except for Daniel who had fallen asleep in the stroller before we left the park.  I had tried to get him on Star Tours at the end of the day, but he just wanted to sleep.  After we finally did wake up, we ate breakfast in the picnic table next to our home, before driving to Downtown Disney, basically to see what was there.  Our biggest agenda was to make sure that Kimberly got a proper birthday meal, since we kind of skipped that while we were in the park.

Kimberly arrives at Downtown Disney.

At Downtown Disney, we get three hours of free parking, plus an additional two hours if we got our ticket stamped at a restaurant or at the AMC movie theater.  It took us a little while to acquaint ourselves with the area.  We wanted to see Disney stores and they were mostly generic name-brand stores, like Fossil and Lego.  The restaurants were all themed, but none of them specifically Disney.  The only one we recognized was the Rainforest Cafe, right at the entrance.  Then, we started seeing some places a little more Disney themed.  

Ben, at the Lego store in Downtown Disney.

There was one place called D-Street, where I was tempted to buy some StarWars art work that was kind of expensive.  They also had these creepy four-inch-tall characters with mouse ears.  The appeal to these characters was that had them in all different themes and they only sell them at Disney parks, making them collector's items.  You didn't know what character you were going to get until you opened the box.  They were essentially like trading cards.  I thought about getting one in the StarWars theme for $11.95--a  whole box was over $300, but you were guaranteed to get a rare figure--but I decided against it in the end.

The Snethens walk through Downtown Disney

 

One thing we were looking for was a recording of a bunch of old Disney music, from Snow White or Sleeping Beauty or even The Little Mermaid or Beauty and the Beast.  We were frustrated at Disney 365 because they only had one CD and it was just the pop-Disney music from today, but they suggested the World of Disney, which was just down the way.  When we got there, all they had was more of the same.  They did have a complete soundtrack to the Lion King, but that wasn't really what we were looking for, either.

However, the World of Disney store, which was the last store before the park entrances, was the largest store by far.  Divided into four sections, we could have spent our parking allotment in any of the sections of the store.  In the first section, it started with toys and post cards, magnets and things, but ended up with all kinds of knick knacks and some useful things, too.  This was the section of the store where the DVD's and CD's were located.  The second section was devoted to artwork.  On one side of the store, hung paintings and the other side had dishes with every media of Disney art imaginable in between.  In the last two sections hung mostly apparel, first for kids, then for grownups.

Kimberly, at the Rainforest Cafe.

 

Once we'd left the World of Disney store, we decided we needed to eat lunch.  But on the way back to the Rainforest Cafe, we stopped at a vendor who made the names out of Disney characters.  A sign hung on the kiosk with Kimberly's name and she loved it.  Rebekah also wanted one.  Why did we have to pick names that were so long?  In the end, we decided to get all four of them done, since we'd already gotten Ben's name in StarWars characters at Legoland.  The man told us the signs would be ready at 4pm.

Kimberly and the Volcano

Stopping at the Rainforest Cafe, we were directed past the fish to the upstairs where we were finally seated.  We all ordered too much food and fortunately had boxes brought in the end, rather than eating it all.  Then, we ordered the Volcano, which was essentially three brownies piled up with a mountain of ice cream, enough for everyone to get some and no one to feel he'd been shorted.  Getting my parking ticket stamped on the way out of the store, we decided to wait until 4pm.  (Our five hours would expire at 4:27.)

Daniel learned a lot about the bird outside the Rainforest Cafe.

Leaving the cafe, Jenny walked back to the vendor to wait for the names, stopping back into the World of Disney store to see if they had a shirt she liked.  The kids and I watched a bird demonstration before walking back toward the vendor who had sold us the names.  Another vendor stopped me along the way, seeing Kimberly's hair.  "Can I draw her, just for fun?" she said.

"No, thank-you," I replied and walked on.  We didn't get much farther down the street when I realized it was actually a good opportunity, since we weren't sure how much longer Kimberly's hair would last.  "How much does it cost?" I asked.  She quoted me a price and it seemed reasonable, so we sat Kimberly down and the artist, named Millie, drew a perfect representation of Kimberly while we waited for those names to get done.

Kimberly being drawn by Millie in Downtown Disney.

 

In the end, it was after four and the names weren't finished.  So we decided to come back and get them later in the night and we walked back to the car and find a nice beach to spend the sunset.  We drove to Huntington Beach, but on the way, clouds started to roll in.  By the time we got there, it was 100% overcast and a cold  breeze came in from the ocean.  I decided to see if we could find a place to park, just for fun.  Maybe we could see some waves.  The kids really wanted to make a sandcastle.  At the State Beach, parking was $15, which seemed a little high, but the thing that detracted us from stopping the most was the yellow gate shut across the roadway to the parking lot.  It was closed.

So we turned around and drove back to the RV park, where I dropped off Jenny, taking the kids back to Downtown Disney where we finally got the names we had ordered.  Downtown Disney was a lot different at night, with musicians along the street and crowds of people filling in every square inch, making it difficult to maneuver  the stroller among so many people.  Retrieving the names from the vendor, we left the street for good and returned home in time to go swimming in the pool and watch the fireworks from Disneyland on our last night in LA.

Returning to the RV park, our kids watched fireworks from Disneyland from the pool.