Let’s get caught up; a year in review…

I’ll be honest, I wasn’t sure what I wanted my first actual blog post to be about, sure I have lots of topic ideas but I needed one to share first. My husband suggested a year in review. He said “No one will know what you’re talking about if you just jump into current things” and he had a point.
A lot has happened in the past year that will be influencing many future blog posts of mine so here I am to get you up to speed so things will make sense.

In January of 2020 my family lost someone who selflessly was a huge part of our family. He was the grandparent my brother and I never had. Yes, we had grandparents but growing up in a military family we didn’t really get to grow up around them and it wasn’t very often that we even got to see them. Bob was there for us for 14+ years of our lives and watched us grow into adults always giving us the advice we needed. It was a hard loss but one we expected.

Shortly after my parents came to visit us in Little Rock, AR which little did we know would be the last of ‘easy travel’ for anyone. Around that time my husband and I were also deciding on our one year wedding anniversary plans and I was planning a surprise birthday weekend for him at a place we had both been wanting to visit for a while. All of these things came to a quick halt when COVID came to the US.

It broke my heart that all of the things we had planned for us were no longer even an option, and the alternative was to just stay home. We are pretty much homebodies anyways but we also very much enjoy to get out and do things together. Knowing we were leaving the state and country soon there were things we really looked forward to doing before our time there was up, but unfortunately never got to do.

My husbands family also came to visit us and luckily that was when restaurants were still open and we could eat with them at some of our favorite places. Which, if there’s anything I’ll give Little Rock major credit for is some of their amazing local places to eat! If you’re ever in the area, spend a weekend trying some of the downtown places, especially FlyWay Brewery. It was down the street from our apartment and a great place for casual, fun and tasty dates!

Initially we were scheduled to move to Germany in July 2020 however, due to the virus our report date was pushed back to September 2020. This gave us a chance to hopefully see our familes again before leaving and for me to work a couple extra months. It worked out though because we found out August 2nd that I was pregnant! We had travel to see our familes already planned and were able to make the announcement in person, something very important to us!

September came and it was time for us to experience our first PCS together. Neither one of us really knew what to expect since his dad retired when he was young and I was a kid everytime we moved growing up so my responsibility was to stay out of the way. This time I was 10 weeks pregnant when we had our long flight from the United States to Germany. 10/10 do not recommend, but I survived! We directly went into a two week quarantine and as my luck would have it this is when my morning sickness and many other symptoms would kick in. My poor husband couldn’t even make coffee in our little hotel room because the smell would make me sick. He’s a trooper, especially with my scary trip to the ER. I’ve got a whole blog post about my pregnancy journey so I won’t give away any spoilers! I’ll just say that baby’s are resilient and I’ve never felt a scare like that in my life before. It wasn’t until that moment that I even knew I loved the fetus growing inside me.

After a month long stay in our hotel room then to a temporary apartment for two weeks we finally moved into our home away from home and we could not be happier! It’s a beautiful large house with plenty of space outside in a quiet area. We spent Thanksgiving and Christmas here together for the last time as a family of two and are so excited to bring our baby home here.

Since the beginning of the new year my husband has gone back to work on a full and somewhat normal schedule. By normal I mean… as normal as it can get in the military and I’ve worked on keeping things clean, a routine at home, and finishing some last settling in touches. Of course there’s lots of projects and things to always be done but I’ll keep you guys up to date as they happen.

The thing about this past year that has inspired me so much to actually start this blog though, are the lockdowns. You might be following my updates on Facebook, the news or you’re in Germany as well and are getting the updates just like I am. To sum it up; we’ve been under a lockdown here since November 2020 meaning everything is closed besides grocery stores and pharmacies. Restaurants, those that have decided to remain open are for pick up or delivery only and so thankfully there are a few stores “open” and available for online order and drive by pickup so we can still get some things ready for Baby S’s arrival; mainly just the furniture. Of course, there is always Amazon!

So basically in a nutshell, I’ve been stuck inside four walls unless going to the grocery store or my monthly doctor’s appointments and finally I decided I needed a creative outlet. Writing has always been something I enjoyed but never thought I could write anything interesting enough that people may want to read. Maybe that is still the case but this is bringing me joy so I will do it for myself. I hope it inspires others to do something they find joy in because right now in this world creating our own joy seems to the be the only way we will stay sane. What is something you have found joy in during this past year of COVID? Is it something new you’ve discovered, something you’ve been doing for a while and have no had more time to focus on, or is it something you’ve been wanting to do for a while but never did because _ (fill in the reason)? I’d love to hear from you, leave your answer in the comments!

Now you’re all caught up and I’m excited to share some more focused blog posts soon!

Until then,
Tamara