Hey Girl! Watcha Doin?

June Favorite #3 (Show):  Who's that girl?  It's Jess!  Ok, why did I wait so long to start watching this??  We always watch Glee as a family, but when New Girl starts I'm usually getting Kahlil ready for bed.  Yea, I could've recorded it, but I've always been bad at following any shows, so I end up doing a marathon on dvd.  Thankful that the Ramstein library has Season 1 and for friends I can watch it  with who randomly repeat funny ass lines, "Caroline!  I still loves you, I do!" and "Heyyyy, sailor!"

 

What's not to love about Zoey Deschanel?  I loved her ever since she played a blond in Elf, but she's definitely skyrocketed on my list of favorite actresses with her bangin' bangs, great style, and musical talent.  The rest of the cast is just as hilarious and loveable.  I feel like we all have a bit of every one of their personalities, which is why it's such an accessible show. 

And how about that dope a#% loft?!?! Be still my heart.........

Finding the Silver Lining in everything: Mental Illness Awareness

June Favorite #2 (Movie):  Most quoted movie by my Germany fam: definitely Pitch Perfect, but my favorite that I thoroughly enjoyed while having a quiet night doing laundry was Silver Linings Playbook.  Being a psych tech, this movie really caught my attention.  The novel written by Matthew Quick is about a teacher named Pat, played by Bradley Cooper, who did time in a mental institution.  The story takes you inside his very distorted but tender mind, troubled with bipolar disorder and depression. 

 

The moral is that life may not always go as planned, but you can always rebuild a positive attitude.  If you're careful to read the signs, you'll find the silver lining in everything.  With an all star cast including Robert Di Nero, Jennifer Lawrence, Bradley Cooper, and Chris Tucker this movie had me in tears of joy and pain.  It reaffirmed my belief that people with mental illnesses and disabilities are gifted, although misunderstood and unaccepted by society.  Not your typical romantic comedy, this movie raises awareness on the reality of mental illness, and I just think that is great.

The Sound of Music

Today marks one month of being in Germany!  My next few entries will be a small recap of a few of my favorite things during the month of June, or should I say "Juni".

June Favorite #1 (Music):  I'm so happy to have friends out here who love music.  We were pleasantly surprised one night when we discovered that we enjoy a lot of the same songs, which have quickly become our anthems.  Enjoy! 

"Call Your Girlfriend" by Robyn.  There is no way to describe how much this song and video makes us smile!  

 Here's a cover of the same song by youtube sensations, Lennon and Maisy.  We even learned to do the cups beat, which leads us to pretty much every performance in the movie Pitch Perfect!

Here's just one of the many awesome performances, "Since You've Been Gone"

  And last but not least, Tori Kelly's cover of Frank Ocean's "Thinking About You".  I absolutely LOVE this girl. 

Stay tuned to hear about our adventures in learning to play music.  Guitar.  Ukulele.  Tambourine.  Egg shaker.  Maybe even a triangle and cow bell. 

*I don't own rights to any of the videos on this blog

Finally getting over the jet lag... I think...

It's been about two weeks since we have arrived in Germany, and by "we" I mean the coolest, most hilarious, supportive, hard working crew I have had the pleasure of working with.  In many ways it seems like we've been here a lot longer.  We pretty much hit the ground running in both work and play, but at the same time I'm still learning my way around.  Not a day goes by that I don't think to myself what a great opportunity this is.

Not gonna lie though, the first week had it's moments for me.  For one, flying east of California through multiple time zones took it's toll on me.  It was raining, and I immediately got a cold.  For the life of me I could not sleep more than an hour per night no matter how exhausted I was.  It also didn't help that I was (and still am) missing my boys back home.  That's pretty much the hardest part, but thankfully I have the best boyfriend who makes time for us to chat online as much as possible.  I even got to view Kahlil's kindergarten graduation ceremony today via internet!  It was such a blessing!

He's so silly!  He was the last kid to get his diploma, and he did a little dance.  If my nose looks red, it's because I was crying like a baby!!  Where did the time go??

After the ceremony I almost felt like I had to say goodbye to my son all over again because he went to San Diego with his dad for the rest of the Summer.  It was hard enough to leave him and Ryan, but just knowing that we are all apart is a bit tough to swallow.  It makes me more motivated than ever to make the best of my time here in Germany.

It is amazingly green here

So far we have been immersed in our work and haven't traveled outside of the local area.  We've been able to check out A LOT of restaurants, which have all been dee-licious, but seriously, we have all agreed that we have been eating way too much!  One can easily spend money and gain weight out here!  So, the exercise and diet plan will be put into action tonight... err... maybe Monday... Just kidding, going to run at a nearby jogging trail and go from there.  I know I won't be able to avoid eating yummy food out here, especially when we travel to neighboring countries, but during the work week it shouldn't be too hard as long as I discipline myself.  I will be recording my fitness progress as well as documenting our travels, but for now check out the feasts we've been having!!

An assortment of MEAT and POTATOES.  Pretty much a staple dish.

Schnitzel and Kroketten (fried mashed potatoes). SO GOOD!

Waffle with fresh berry sauce and creme... I know it sounds pretty normal, but it was amazing.

Not what it looks like... This is actually a dessert!  Spaghetti Eis -- OMG so good! I want some right now!

 This is just SOME of the meals we've had.  More to come!!!!  For now, I'm just glad that I'm finally over the jet lag, so I can focus more on what I came out here to do.  This song explains how I was feeling last week.  Wishing Kahlil, Ryan, and the rest of my family and friends a Happy Saturday.

I get so emotional, baby

Ain't it shocking what love can do?!  Not really.  What's shocking is that despite my bouts of anxiety and heart wrenching Facebook updates during our "2 weeks 'o FUN" leading to my last day in Cali, I didn't get overly emotional about my recent assignment to Germany until I got here...  yesterday, to be exact.  I put on a strong front from the day I was notified I'd be mobilizing all the way up until I checked into my living quarters.  It's Europe, after all!  Why be sad, right?

I cannot tell you how amazing it has already been, and I've only left the base once so far to have dinner (a Chinese restaurant of all places, lol!  Trust me though, it was different.  For starters water is NOT free.  In fact it's rationed out here.  And check out my fortune in Deutsch!  Cool, right?!) 

Translation: Your intuition shows you the right way

What's not so cool, obviously, is being apart from my loved ones.  Even the possibility of moving up in my career as a psychiatric technician had to be put on hold (a nursing recruiter called me TWO days before leaving to meet with her).  

Timing is everything.  You thought I was going to say that things happen for a reason.  That too.  I've learned that time is not something one can always manipulate to get to the places in life that you want to go.  Like the "time" I purposely volunteered to tour Korea for a year so I can get stationed in Germany (my #1 overseas preference).  It's hard to believe that was six years ago.  I didn't end up PCS'ing here because I chose instead to give up my career in active duty to raise a child that I am currently thousands of miles away from -- the very reason I am emotional today.  The irony!  I am now in the land I have always wanted to live, without the one person that taught me HOW to live.  I guess things really do come full circle.  And really, if I hadn't gone to Korea, well, Kahlil wouldn't have been conceived haha!!  Reason indeed.

The military BRAT and military "spouse" haha, holdin' it down without mama.

 I still struggle with the uncertainty of my military career; like whether I'm cut out for it, but I definitely am proud to say I continue to serve because I just want to serve.  Plain and simple.  Being out here allows me the opportunity to really do what I was trained to do as a Medical Logistician in an aero evacuation unit: to help bring people back home.  As a "loggie" we don't exactly get patient contact, but with programs like The Wounded Warrior Project, I hope to be involved in such a way that I can reach out and help a wounded service member.  Even just to talk to them, or help carry equipment, or hold their hand and pray with them.

I know being temporarily apart from Kahlil is more of a positive thing than negative.  Although it aches to hear him talk and see him via internet play, dance, and make silly faces at a 15 second delay because EVERYONE in the building is online, I know that really it's all good.  I'm lucky to even have access to such luxuries.  I'm in good hands.  He's in good hands.  His and my adventure have just begun.  Any great adventure comes with challenges, fun, and GOALS.  We were briefed today to set goals for ourselves during our time here, and that is exactly what I intend to do.  Spirituality.  Education.  Career development.  Travel.  Even beauty and fitness.. like forreal, forreal...  A busy mom tends to let herself go.  But now's the chance to bring sexy health back.  And of course, blogging.  Lots more time to myself to be able to put my thoughts down.  Very therapeutic.  You should try it.

Sent Kahlil his first snail mail.  I especially love the stamp, as standard as a U.S. stamp gets, but means so much.  I sincerely am thankful to the service members who truly sacrifice down range. 

Funny how my blogs went from being about furniture and plants to this ha!  Mixing it up as always.  I think it's safe to say LoftRemix will be evolving a great deal in the next few months.  It's been a while, but here's Whitney performing in Europe.

 

Beautiful Mistake

We had been lagging on getting a dining table to replace the desk, yes desk, that we were using at the loft (ghetto functional).  But DANG, dining tables are EXPENSIVE!  Even second hand, a good one that we'd be happy with both functionally and aesthetically could easily be the most expensive piece of furniture I have ever purchased.  I played with the idea of refurbishing an old table, but the ones I found and liked were pricey too!  So I suggested DIO: doing it ourselves.

skonahem.com

I had my eye on this for a long time dreaming of the day I'd have the space for something this big.  Salvaged wood + legs from Ikea + some screws = genius!  Ryan thought it was a great idea too...... for an outdoor table.  I swear in the three weeks that we've lived together, he's been winning most of the design decisions!!!!  Did NOT expect that AT ALL, but I'm not mad because it turns out he has a lot of awesome ideas; subdued and neutral, but combined with my ideas I can honestly say that we both can't wait to come home and just do stuff to the house.

Men at work

After eating on the living room floor on a spread-out towel for three weeks (we fancy), we finally picked a dining set we both agreed on.  It kind of came to us by accident while shopping online for an "armchair".  The chairs in the online brochure had arms on it, go figure.  The best part was that the price for the entire set was well below our budget.  What I we didn't realize was that it was an outdoor set.  Womp womp.  No wonder it was so cheap, but cha know what?  We bought it anyway, and we LOVE it!  

 

(Terrible pic from my phone)  There's not much to see at the moment, but once we stain it it'll get all dressed up with place mats.. maybe a table runner.. some flowers.  I'd say shabby chic, but that sounds too feminine lol.  Must be Ryan-approved.  I joked that I was subconsciously drawn to an outdoor table because of his comment about the first table, or perhaps because it looks like my blog background haha!  We had our first meal on it tonight... McDonald's!  We are so fancy, I can't take it.

Would love to read about your beautiful design mistakes!

K Bye!!

Ahhh-xygen

Ryan and I both love the hardware store.  One section we've been spending a lot of time in is the garden center.  Seriously, we can't stop thinking about plants!

Meet Susie, the succulent.

I've recently learned that a home should have 10-15 plants in order to improve indoor air quality, which is far more polluted than outdoor air. YIKES!  I cringe at the thought of having had only one indoor plant at the loft and the occasional vase of flowers.

Falling deeply in love with terrariums.  Until I can build the one of my dreams I potted the cutest little succulent that cost less than $3 at Home Depot.  Vase and rocks $1 each from the dollar store.

So far we only have five plants, but at the rate we're going we'll probably have a jungle by next month haha.  Not only do plants remove toxins, it's the easiest way to add beauty to a room and is good for the soul.  Taking care of them gives you a rush of well-being.. a sense of joy and healing.
 

Susie and Fernie Mac

Deep breath in... ahhh-xygen.

K bye!