For so long we the words we lived by revolved around the plan, the plan was six pages long and allowed us to pass from point A in The United States to point B in Berlin Germany with our family.  The funny thing about plans is that they are relatively useless.  Plans don't say good by to friends for you, they don't lift couches, leave a job you love, sell cars, rent out a house, open a bank account in Germany, or any one of those hundreds of things we had to do over the last 7 months, and it's those things that make this experience so exciting.
Admittedly, Erin and I both enjoy planning, one might even say we are good at it, but focusing on planning does have it's draw backs. It helps you avoid the goodbyes, and the realization that for many of your closest friends its going to be two long years before you will get to enjoy their company again. It's not until the boxes start to get unpacked in your new place and the jet lag starts to fly away that thoughts of your friends and your kids friends start to sink in, that the experience starts to become formative and real. 
I am a firm believer that one must struggle and be challenged to really grow. When I was younger I fell off tall things in a kayak or on skis to push this growth, now as I grow older I am attempting to do it with my family, not by the challenge of sport but the challenge of international living. 
If this experience does one thing I hope it helps my family to grow, grow closer, grow a more global perspective, and grow intellectually.

Missing our friends

Now onto the travel end of this adventure.  First I hope you will forgive me, but the days of moving, unpacking, nights with jet lagged kids have taken a toll on my memory, so I will do my best to recall the events of the last week as best I can.
Monday night our Colorado family dropped us off at the airport in Denver with tears in our eyes.  Erin and I had flown with both kids twice this summer to visit our families so we had baggage check and security down, I think we made it though both those obstacles faster then some single passangers.  We boarded a British Airways Boeing 777 and were wheels up around 8:45pm Monday July 23rd for our European adventure.  Fortunately for us the flight was undersold so we soon found ourselves in command of two full rows of seats in the center of the plane.  Between feeding Owen and Addie, a movie or two, a couple of turbulent bumps in the road we managed to squeak out a handful of hours on the 8 1/2 hour flight.  All in all I would say the flight, like most of this adventure, has exceeded our expectations.  We landed in London for a 4 hour layover, it was crowded and busy, like you would expect for a country throwing out the red carpet for the Olympics in 3 days.  As soon as we could we got on a plane and headed for our two year home. 

Owen's jet lag face

Here goes nothing!!

Addie's jet lag face

We made it!!

The wheels touched down in Berlin at about 7:30PM on July 24th.  For those doing the math at home that puts us about 14 hours of flying from our home in Colorado.  We were met at the airport by some familiar friendly faces and the mountain of bags we flew with.  Kirsten, our German friend, swept us up in her car and took us to our Berlin house.  We had only seen a few pictures of our house, and were a bit nervous with what we might find when we opened up the door.  Fortunately, our Berlin house is spacious, clean, next to very nice English speaking Germans, and located very close to a park for Addie to play in.  We quickly got our bags in the house and piled them up next to the stacks of boxes, desks, and rugs that we had bought from some people leaving the JFK school, and promptly tried to pass out.  The next couple of days were filled with middle of the night awake play times with the kids, visits to the Dr (the kids have been sick), building our minivan (a bike and trailer), and trying to organize our new life in Berlin.

Addie's new playground

People have been wondering how we are, and I would say so far we are great, better then one could expect given the things we have done, and done to our kids in the last month.  Each day is filled with its own unique set of challenges. 
If I have learned one thing from this so far it's that I am surrounded by some pretty remarkable people.  First my kids, they have faced this first hurdle with grace, humor, and joy.  Our friends, well we simply could not have done this without you, and I often wonder how we will get along for the next two years without you in our lives.  Lastly our family, thank you for giving us the tools in our youth to try and pull this thing off.

Our new car.  Addie thinks it needs a bigger trunk