The Hill Family

I have to admit the first time I went grocery shopping here I was terrified.  I don't know why, I studied in Italy when I was 21 for six weeks and never had a problem.  The grocery stores by our apartment are small, really small.  It is pretty entertaining watching me trying to maneuver a double stroller through it.  We barely fit and when they are restocking the shelves it is kind of rough especially when one of your toddlers keeps trying to pull things from the shelves.  We can actually use the single stroller for Conley and Auburn walks, but it helpful to have the double stroller to carry groceries home.  Yes, I carry all of my groceries home, well my stroller does.  Because of this I am at the store usually 4-5 times a week and more if I need to stock up on things.  I just feel grateful that there is an elevator in our building and that I don't have to carry my groceries and children up four flights of stairs, only one.  For som...

We have now lived in Germany for three and a half years.  I have to admit that is longer than I thought we would live here, and longer than I have lived in any one place since I was seventeen.  I realized that I have posted a lot on my blog about our travels, but not a lot about how my day to day life has changed since moving overseas.  So, I thought that with the new year I would make a few posts about these changes. A major change for us is transportation.  We don't have a car.  We had plans of buying a car when we moved here, but after choosing an apartment in the city we found that we don't really need one here.  I have a pass that covers the subway, buses and trams in the center of town and Simon has a bike.  Simon rides his bike all year long, even in the snow.  It takes him less time to get to work with his bike than with public transportation.  I love my pass.  I didn't have one for a the first year, but it has reall...

I think the closest thing that we have to tradition for Christmas in our family is going to Schliersee.  Our first year of being married we decided to head to England and travel for two weeks, then we were in Florida with my family, the next year was California was Simon's family and then the past three years we have been here in Munich.  We have really enjoyed our past two years at Schliersee for Christmas that we decided to go again, and it was the right choice.                                     Here are the kids on the train.  It only takes an hour to get there and the kids loved looking out the window. While we were there went sledding, some of us liked it more than others.  Auburn loved talking about it, but wasn't quite sure after the first ride down.  Conley kept saying "more" and "mas".  We built a little snowman and made snow angels. Momm...

I just realized I haven't blogged for a month.  Last week I was sick, like didn't get out of bed for three days sick.  It was awful, but Simon and the kids were very helpful.  Because of that of Christmas fun I am behind in my blogging, so here is a recap of December. Simon was gone for most of November.  He had three different business trips, it was kind of a whirlwind.  Auburn started asking everyday if Daddy was coming home.  So, last week I took the kids to Simon's new office to show them for Daddy works.  I think it helped.  They loved it!  Although I think their idea of what he actually does all day is a little off.  We have loved having Daddy home for the entire month of December.  Here they are snuggling while watching Bundesliga highlights on a Saturday afternoon.                                     Auburn has decided tha...

So we did end up celebrating Thanksgiving this year.  On Thanksgiving evening we went to dinner at Hirschgarten with a colleague of Simon.  We had a lovely time stuffing ourselves at dinner with good company.  It was kind of funny to explain to someone else what we normally do on Thanksgiving: cook, play football, cook, watch football, cook, eat, eat, eat, take a nap, watch more football and eat some more.  I didn't take any pictures because I'm lame, but here is a picture of my kids in the laundry basket.  This is their "boat" in which they travel to their "island".  Auburn likes to recreate our trip.  It is one of their new favorite games.   I hope you all had a very Happy Thanksgiving!    

Conley is now 18 months old.  Where did that time go?  He loves cars.  He usually carries one in each hand all over the house.  He also loves anything that moves, trains, boats, tractors, etc.  He loves books.  He will pull all of the books off the shelf and read them one by one (just like his sister).  He like animals, but particularly horses and dogs.  Simon started playing the horse game with the kids and now Conley sits on anything and calls it a horse.  He calls Simon on the phone.  He likes pretty much all kinds of foods, but particularly fruits and cheese.  When he gets excited he does a little dance.  He loves his blanket.  We are bink free!  We took it away a couple weeks ago, He only had it in his crib, so going to sleep was a little difficult for a few nights.  He is talking like crazy!  Everyday he learns a new word.  He is mainly speaking English, but has started speaking some Spani...

Our little girl is 3!!!  So, her birthday was in September while we were in Indonesia.  We, as in Simon and me, decided that her birthday would be in October when we returned.  Crazy, I know, but how do you explain to a three year old that they don't get to open presents or eat cake on their birthday?  So, we planned it for the weekend that we returned.  Honestly, she didn't know the difference.  I figure later on in life she will figure it out, but hopefully she won't care.  We still did all the birthday stuff, just on a different day.  Plus she was in Indonesia, how cool is that?  We didn't do a big fancy party, maybe one day we will.  We had French toast for breakfast and her favorite tortellini with broccoli for dinner, went to the park and just had a day all for her.  She wanted a pink chocolate cake.   She was really excited about the candles and when we started singing to her. Conley enjoyed the cake as...