Autumn-ey

fall.has.begun {and i love it}

Autumn is by far my favorite season! And Garmisch most definitely is looking 'fallish' lately . I just love it! All the trees are either naked or have yellow or red or orange leaves. It's absolutely beautiful here. This was what I look at when I walk to/from the gym:

I was so excited about the world turning all fall-ey I made a cute new bulletin board at school about it! My kids did some art thing in art class so I displayed it. Speaking (typing I suppose) of my kids, we went to the Munich zoo today! It was so fun! It was supposed to be miserable weather in Munich, but it ended up only being a bit sprinkley and wayyy overcast. Which of course, being the fall lover from Phoenix that I am, I thoroughly enjoyed it. My class consists of 5 girls and 4 boys. Two of the boys had their mom's with them as chaperons and one of my girls was absent (vaca in Italy!). So my mentor teacher, the principal and I took the 4 girls. So easy to keep up and keep track of only 4 of them, especially being girls. So much more mature than boys! Here goes for the pictures of the kiddos.

This is my entire class {minus one}

The girls in front of the monkey exhibit {yep, she's picking the monkey's nose}

Now for my favorite animals :)

Giraffes! So cute!

Zebra!
Cute cute cute :)

We saw lots of monkeys!

A couple of these monkeys were nursing their babies and the babies were grabbing onto them as the moms run around {look closely under the monkey}.

Okay. So i've been to a few zoos back in the states just like everybody else. But this zoo, was beautiful. It looked like a legit forest with animals in it. I didn't see many cages and fences but exhibits. Most of the outdoor exhibits had no, i repeat no fencing around them. They had electric fences so they couldn't run away.....haha no. They had a big ditch around the edge of the exhibit so they couldn't get out. Seemed a little more humane, well as humane as keeping animals away from their natural environment can be. Here's a few pictures of around the zoo.

Garmisch Hockey

hockey.is.fun!.

Last night I went to a hockey game here in Garmisch with my teacher's husband and my nau supervisor. It was so much FUN! I love sports. I love watching them! I feel like I haven't been to a sporting event in such a long time, which made it all that more fun. Especially since it's hockey. I always have fun watching hockey. My favorite part of the game is watching all the fights. BUT here in Germany, fights are not allowed during the games. Which I thought would be a slight disappointment, but it really wasn't. Everybody in the crowd was so into the game which made it even more fun to be apart of. Every time we would score a goal, they would hold up this big ol' flag and people in the crowd would wave flags that they had brought to the game while this loud music played. Here's a video.



Here's a couple more pictures of the game and my dinner (I've been told by the best friend {tessa campbell} to take pictures of all the food I eat, so i do and here it is):

More brats and beer!

Today was a good day. I made it the entire day without putting 'real' clothes on, I got to stay in sweats for a full 24 hours. Reminds me of living in Flagstaff with my Christine. Also got lots of cleaning done around my apartment; also filled out big kid job applications. When I say big kid I mean I filled out job applications to be a first grade or a fourth grade teacher. Whoa. Tomorrow will be spent at school. Bulletin boards, grading, planning and organizing. Honest to goodness, I'm excited for it. Field trip to Munich Zoo on Tuesday with my kiddos... yay!

-Linds

Oktoberfest in München!

Oktoberfest.was.ridic.

This past weekend {September 25 & 26^th} I went to Oktoberfest up in München (Munich) for the 2^nd time! I went to O-fest the weekend before this one, with some girls (+ one guy) from NAU who are also student teaching but are in Aviano, Italy. The day before I left I turned my camera on at school because my kids were doing something fabulous {as always} and all it did was say ‘lens error’. Needless to say I was more than bummed about my broken camera the day before I left for another adventure. Anyway, after the train ride and the 1.5 hours of stressful waiting for the student teaching crew we all met up and had a great time at Oktoberfest! I don’t have pictures of that weekend, but of this weekend here goes the stories and pictures:

Tourist much?

My NAU supervisor came to Garmisch this past week to watch me teach for a couple of days. After this, we met my Vilseck girls for Oktoberfest. There were so many rides, food booths, beer booths, beer tents and souvenir shops. Sadly {also a little funny though} I saw more than a couple people being taken away on stretchers, falling asleep on the dirty ground or leaning {sleeping} against a booth. And in one instance, there was a man spooning a trashcan, asleep. My fav's while I was there was the bratwurst & the rides!

I had an absolute BLAST with everybody.

One of the 'happy' people. Leaning up against a food booth, passed out.

Trying on hats {notice the lederhosen next to me:) }

We got to spend the night in Munich which gave us Sunday to tour a little big before heading back “home” {can you believe I’m calling Germany my ‘home’…insane}. Today our plan was to go to Haufbrauhaus. Haufbrau is a beer and this place is a restaurant bar that is famous! Before we went there we walked around Munich and found a cute little farmers market with all sorts of veggies, meats, bread, and cheeses and knitted things. Then we headed to the Haufbrauhaus and drank some beer and ate some food. This weekend was the weekend where all the Italians came to Oktoberfest. So glad we had our professor there with us. The 5 minutes he was not with us, about 7 creepy Italians creeped on us. Good prep for Rome in 2 weeks :) Anyways, here goes for the pictures!

Haufbrauhaus!

I know it's dark, but the Haufbrauhaus is SO incredible inside! {google it!...now!}

Student teachers :)

Prost!

Rome in 2 weeks :) Home this weekend! Excited for some much needed down time in Garmisch.

-Linds

Austria!

Salzburg.was.beautiful.

So this past weekend {september 11} I took a day trip to Salzburg, Austria [can't believe I get to take day trips to European countries!]. It ended up taking about 4 1/2 hours to get from Garmisch to Salzburg. I had to head north to Munich, then back south (passing Garmisch) to Salzburg. BUT when I finally got there, I was really surprised to see a city. If you didn't know, Salzburg is where they filmed the Sound of Music. And anyone who's seen that movie knows how beautiful Austria is pictured. This is what I was expecting when I got off the train. Instead I was greeted with tons of construction and city noise. But I was determined to get that 'Sound of Music' feel while I was there. So I took a chance on a bus tour that lasted two hours and took us around the major parts of Salzburg. I knew that this tour bus was a good idea because there were many older people on this tour {and you know that these people spent weeks planning this trip while I spent a matter of minutes}. This bus allowed us an hour at a stop of our choosing. It was fun to see the fast tour of the city, but my 2nd favorite part of this day trip was a castle we saw. It was on these beautiful grounds, the gazebo scene from 'Sound of Music' was actually here. I didn't have time to find it though :(. BUT I did get some beautiful pictures.

A view from the bridge while driving on the bus

Here was a beautiful garden.

Front of a castle

This was the side of one of the castles

I absolutely love this picture. I love how everywhere here there are beautiful parks with benches everywhere and people actually use them to sit and enjoy the day!

Onto my favorite part of the trip...of course....food. On our way to the train station to leave Garmisch we didn't stop at the Bäckerei for just coffee and a croissant, no way. We go those plus an entire baguette, a thing of salami, and drumrollll......a half a stick of butter. It was THE best lunch on a train I think I'll ever have. And the Austrian dinner/dessert was wonderful too :)

hmmm dinner :)

and of course...apple strudel :)

I'm a little behind on my blogging with being so busy teaching. Next blog.... Oktoberfest!

-Linds

J'adore Paris

Paris.was.fabulous.Let me just start this blog off with saying I fell in love with Paris. I absolutely loved the city. I traveled from Garmisch to Paris with a friend I met who works at the school here. He & I thought the hardest part of this trip was going to be getting from school to the train station. Our lovely secretary, Marianna, offered to drive us to the train station. We got there about 20 minutes early. We took a bus from Garmisch to Murnou and a train from Murnou to Munich central station. Now that I've said this, let me begin the list of things that went wrong en route to Paris, in Paris, and on our way out of Paris.

1. We knew we needed to take the S Bhan 1 to the airport. We waited for it, it didn't come. We asked a person who worked there and he pointed to a train that was about to leave. So we hopped on the train. We sat down and were talking for about 25 minutes when I looked up and saw S4 on the sign. I said: "Uhh. I don't think we're on the right train" We immediately jump up with our bags and wait to get off on the next stop. As he was telling me a story of how he missed a stop once because he didn't press the button to open the door, we missed the stop because we didn't press the button. We finally get off...on the last stop. On the completely opposite side of the city of where we needed to be.
   
2. We waited a good 25 minutes for the S1 to get us to the airport. Realizing that it was about 1:15 when we got on the right train we were praying to make our 2:05 plane. We finally arrived at the airport's train station. The marathon began. Since I had already checked in I ran through the airport through security like a crazy person. I got to the gate which had no person and no plane. Saw another gate with Zurich (our layover) on it, I spoke to a lady who informed me the plane left 12 min. prior to departure. I was there 5 minutes prior to departure. i.missed.my.plane. After some tears and being told I would get no money back for a new ticket and my return flight was canceled, I had to go find Matt. Took me about 20 minutes to find him. Now comes the very undetailed list of mishaps and adventures.
3. We had to buy all new tickets roundtrip to Paris.
4. I left my very cute h&m coat at the Munich airport.
5. I made my friends go crazy (they waited for two hours in Paris instead of me being in Paris an hour before them).
6. The train ticket machine would take none of our 6 cards we tried to give it to get tickets.
7. There was a bomb scare two train stops ahead of ours when we were on the metro.
8. Woke up 2 1/2 hours late to leave for the airport back to Munich.

Now that I've gotten that out of the way I can tell (show) you my beautiful trip.

1. Arc de Triomph
   
2. Eiffel Tour
3. Notre Dame
4. Sacré-Coeur (and when I say I saw this beautiful place, I actually mean I took a nap below it on the grass because I had no energy to climb any more stairs after going all the way up Norte Dame.
5. Moulin Rouge
6. Food :)
7. Museums (for free!)
8. Other fun things. . .

Needless to say I had to choose amongst literally over 800 pictures. Wish I could show you each and every one, but that's not happening. This will have to do for now!

-Linds

Well well well

Well well well. Haven't been blogging for quite a while it feels like. I should be writing a lesson plan right now, but my mind is exhausted and it won't think about place value. Lately I have been feeling like I'm much older than 21. Right now, it's 2058 (that's 8:58 non military time) and I am flabbergasted that my eyes are still open. I don't know how people can function with less than 8 1/2 hours of sleep each night. Oh well.

ANYWAY, today is the first day I have internet in my BOQ's. GOD IS GOOD. Honestly, my life is completely different here now with it. I feel like I'm a part of the world again. I now don't have to work around the rain (I wold catch the free wifi at the coffee shop here on base and the only place I can get it is outside). So life here on base. Right now it's been pretty busy with school and stuff. But the biggest news that I have is the day after tomorrow (Friday September 3rd) I am going to PARIS! I am meeting 3 girls that I flew over from the states with. I have a half day at school on Friday and the day off on Monday, so it's perfect! Even better... I found a person to travel to Paris with! YAY :) That is what I was most nervous about, traveling on my own. Again, God is GOOD! Well my brain can't function must more than this so I'll leave you with a few new pictures.

-Linds

The chapel where I go to church (look at the Zugspitze in the background!)

My 1st German beer!

The first part of my walk when I leave my side of the base (that wall is the edge of the other side of the base).