Blissed Out in My New Home – Across The Water

It was so strange to arrive at the Innsbruck airport and think “I live here.” Weird. And wonderful.

The trip was both worse and better than expected. The flights themselves were awesome, with Annie sleeping 6 hours on the long haul over the ocean. I think having her car seat really helped her to be comfortable. And Mom was pretty comfortable too, as we had Executive Class seats (three cheers for aeroplan). The leg-room was amazing and I could almost lie flat in the seat. The transfers in each of the airports (Chicago and Frankfurt) was hideous with too many bags, said car seat (blessing and a curse) giving me bruises on my arms as I hauled it through umpteen security checks,Â being sent to wrong terminals,Â lost stroller, too many poorly marked elevators, and on and on. But we made it with all of our luggage and some of our sanity, so I count the trip an overall success.

Our first day here was fantastic. After a midnight wake up time for Annie and I (Annie ate 2 eggs and 3 pieces of bread as her midnight snack…she is an eating machine right now), Markus let us sleep in until 10:30. After breakfast we packed a knapsack and spent the day at a local lake. We took the bus (no car, which I don’t think is going to be a problem here) and after a short walk were at a lovely man-made lake with playground, food stand, and a toddler waterslide that Annie went down about 150 times. She had aÂ rockin’ timeÂ with cousin Lilli, who is 8. I think that Annie would be perfectly happy if she had a dozen siblings…the more people the better for her. Not a likely wish to be fulfilled by Markus and I, but there is always daycare to meet friends.

Day 2 (after a bit better sleep) was also spent at a lake. This one was mainly docks but there was a shallow area for Annie and another slide to keep her happy. She played for a long time in the sandbox with the other children, so Dad and I were able to relax, read and nap. Lovely.

There certainly is a lot more exposed skin here than in NA. I think I was the only woman under 70 in a one-piece bathing suit rather than a bikini. (Maybe next summer after a LOT of Alpine hikes I’ll make the transition.) The babes and toddlers also pretty much ran around naked, while I had Annie covered up in a long-sleeved, long-legged SPF bathing outfit. Poor kid. But I’m not ready to expose her Nicole Kidman skin to the elements just yet.

Dad has Annie all day todayÂ so that I can catch up on my online communications as well as go shopping for necessities. I’m going to wait until some of those afore mentioned Alpine hikes kick in before clothes shopping, but that sure is going to be fun! Mmmmm, European clothes. Lovin’ it!

Hopefully I’ll have some pictures downloaded from the camera in the next couple of days to start sharing. Now, if I could only get the hang of this German keyboard so I can stop spelling my name “Hillarz”. Sigh.

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