Long time no post!

Hey all,
I am so, so bad at remembering to do things. I guess since I last updated my blog our life here has gotten into full swing.
As of this month, we have been in Germany 8 months! That is so crazy! Let me see if I can recap the last few months for you. We are still working with Club Beyond as leaders and are anticipating a fun trip to Austria with them later this month! We really love working with the teens here! It is something we have really felt a passion for, and so far we have met some pretty awesome ones! We have been trying to explore while still trying to keeping to our budget….it’s sometimes hard to remember that the Euro is more than the Dollar, so sometimes we get a little mixed up, but we have been enjoying ourselves none the less.

I have taken the position as Chapel Worship Weader here for the protestant service and that has been keeping me busy as well as helping out PWOC with music as well. It has been interesting becoming the leader of those things and it has taught me to keep my schedule a little more balanced….though, I am still working on that. Our lives are pretty busy and it is hard to find time to go travel. It has definitely been a lesson on how I shouldn’t over commit myself…One of these days I will get it right! Joe is still working as a chaplain assistant and we love all the people we have met through that! I love, love, love meeting new people so this army life thing is awesome because of that, but I also really hate saying goodbye to people and that is a necessary evil that comes with this lifestyle. We have met so many people and have said goodbye to so many also in this short 8 months of being here!

Some of the adventures we have been able to go on these last few months include going to lots of local fests during the summer and fall, I have taken two trips to Poland, we’ve explored some of the small villages and larger cities near us, going to the Ludwigsburg Pumpkin Festival, explored castles, my friend Soley visited and we explored around, we went to the Rhine River and explored a castle there…its hard to remember all of them! We also did a lot on post so far as well. We have done some trips with Club Beyond, helped with VBS, Helped with the Harvest fest, and lots of other small things!

It is Christmas time and we have been trying to explore the wonderful Christmas markets we have heard so much about before we got here. They are just as magical as people said they were. The Ghuhwein is delicious! It is like a mulled, spiced wine they serve to keep you warm while you are out at the market! This year we have been to 3 and hope to hit up a couple more before the season is over. We did get to take our first trip back to the states this past week and a half. We are so happy we were able to go back for Tom and Tina’s wedding! We love Tina and are so happy she has joined our not so small family!

We were able to see Joe’s mom Alice while we were there. She is currently in a nursing home and we really need your prayers that she can start getting some rehab treatment started so she can start making a full recovery. She is responding well sometimes and not so well other times. It was hard for us to see her there. We hadn’t seen her since we first left to come to Germany and she was fully healthy so it was a weird shock for us, especially Joe. I am so thankful we were able to spend lots of time with her. We miss her always asking us what we are up to and what our pictures where of. We miss her laugh and smile! I can’t wait for her to get better! Please, please continue to pray for her! God does miraculous things and I know he can make her better!

We were able to see the whole family which was great! sometimes it’s hard to get such a big family together all at one time so when we do, It is always awesome!!! Since we left we gained two new nieces and they are both as cute as can be!!! It was so nice to see all our nieces and nephews. They are so much fun to be around!

Now that we have been to back to the states, there are a few things I didn’t miss….billboards all over the place, bad roads, that awkward crack between the bathroom stall and the door….haha, the litter on the highways, and the slow speeds while driving.

but definitely missed being close to family, Chick-fil-A (lol), not AFN TV, things open past 8pm, Hobby Lobby, and Old Navy!

We hope to be able to explore next year a little more outside of our immediate area and hopefully to a few different countries while we are at it! We also hope some of our friends want to come and explore with us.

We are looking forward to this next year and I promise I will try my hardest to post more regularly. (Maybe if someone or some people could remind me that would be awesome, hehe) This post is hard because there is so much to cover because of the 6 months I missed!!! We will keep posting to Facebook so look for pictures and updates there! We love it here and really hope we will have friends come visit so we can share this beautiful place with them! Just let us know! Well until next time!

-The Scibbe!

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Settling In

Hey guys!

So we have officially survived our first month here in Hohenfels. I just thought I would give you an update on what is going on. 🙂

We are definitely beginning to settle into our schedules and routines. Joe has been working from the time we go here and he is basically done in processing so we are hoping his schedule will begin to lighten up a little. I have joined a couple groups and am volunteering also. We have a home group bible study on Monday nights which we really enjoy. We just began a study on Tim Keller’s book “Meaning of Marriage”. It is a book Joe really likes and I am excited to read through it with other couples. On Tuesday mornings I have been going to PWOC (Protestant Women of the Chapel) and we are going through Revelation. There is only one more week until we end for the summer, but I have enjoyed being a part of this great group of ladies so far! I can’t wait to start up again in the fall. The big commitment Joe and I have made when it comes to volunteering is with Club Beyond. It is associated with Young Life, but is basically the Military version. We have group on Thursdays which is open to middle and high school kids to come hang out, have dinner, sing some songs, play games have a little chat, and just get to spend time with them. There is also a small group we do with them on Wednesday nights. It is a chance for us to help teach the kids to get a better understanding of the Christian life and how to learn and grow in it on their own. There is also a girls bible study on Tuesday mornings and a boys bible study on Tuesday evenings.

This past weekend we got to go on a middle school service trip with Club Beyond. We really enjoyed it. We went to a camp ground on one of the bases near us and slept in tents. (I think I am getting too old to sleep on the ground…haha) On Saturday we got an early start and went and picked up trash in the PX parking lot. We had a competition for which group could pick up the most trash. The Hohenfels girls won!!! WOOHOO!!!! then after that we have a club meeting (songs, games, lesson) and then went to a German children’s home to play and do fun things with the kids there. It was a really great time of service and fun. I was in the group that was outside and played sports with the kids. Later that evening we had dinner with them and had a little club meeting just to show them what we do! It was really fun and the kids seemed to really like hanging out with us. We went back to the campsite and had our own club meeting and played some games then went to bed. It was a really long day! We packed up and went to Chapel Sunday morning. When Joe and I got home (probably around 530ish) I could barely keep my eyes open! I went to bed at 730 that night and slept all the next day basically! Whew. Seriously though. We really enjoy being able to volunteer with them and can’t wait to continue doing so!

The weather here has been basically the same as Seattle. This week we have beautiful weather!!! upper 70’s and 80’s! Bring on the summer!!!

We are finally getting our household goods on Friday!!! I can not wait! I am spending today and tomorrow cleaning so there isn’t a mess when even more mess is about to be here…otherwise I think I would go crazy. 🙂 I really can’t wait for our stuff to get here. It has been a good lesson on living with the bare minimum though. We are so blessed with all the things we have and it just reminds us that our treasures are really not the things of this world but our eternal reward in heaven!

Going without all of our things really has made me realize what I really take for granted…they may sound silly, but the things i found myself missing over and over again are:

a garbage can, laundry basket, real shower curtain, books, more than just one pot for cooking and basically more surface space.

Oh well, haha. Somehow we managed to make it without these things and we will finally have them back on Friday.

We became the new owners of some house plants which I love! I see them sitting in the corner and they bring just a little more cheer and color to my day! Yay! We are also going to start dog sitting. This way we can love other peoples dogs AND we are making it easier on others to travel! Its a fun way to get some dog time in without having one our self! We would like to get one at some point, but I think we will wait until we get back to the states!

On top of all the exciting things going on in our lives we really need you guys to being praying.

Joe’s mom Alice had an aneurism the night before Mother’s day this year. She has been in the hospital since. She has had surgery to fix the aneurism which was successful. They have had her under sedation on and off since then. After the surgery the doctors were watching for artery spasms, which commonly happen after aneurisms. she had one and she went into surgery to fix that which went well also. They gave her some medicine to raise her blood pressure to help with the artery spasms. Unfortunately the medicine they gave her was affecting her heart. They had to put the breathing tube back in and they put her back under sedation. Her heart and liver enzyme levels are going back down, which is great news! She is also having her blood pressure meds lowered and her sedation slowly removed again. Please pray with me for more progress tomorrow!! We are currently waiting for her to start responding to the doctors commands again which will hopefully happen soon. Meanwhile, his dad, Rick, got pneumonia which obviously isn’t good because he is the only parent at home and we need healthy! Please please please keep the family in your prayers. There is a need for healing, comfort and rest for the whole family. It is hard for Joe to be away from them right now, but we are just praying fervently for healing to begin. God hears all our prayers. We have to keep trusting him in all things!

Thank you to all those who have been praying the family! It’s amazing to know there are people literally praying all over the world! Keep em’ coming!

We will keep everyone updated on Alice, Rick and the family and our life here in Germany! Talk to you guys soon!

Robyn

Greetings from Hohenfels

Hello!

These last 2 weeks have been a whirlwind! We made it to here to our base about 30 hours after we left Chicago Monday Morning. We got here on Tuesday evening and were immediately met by some of the Chaplain Assistants and a Chaplain that Joe will be working with. They bought us dinner at the little bowling alley we have here on post and we sat and talked. It was so nice to meet them right as we got here and get the low down about how things work here. We got to our hotel room and it was so small, but all we wanted to do was sleep, so we just crawled into bed and did just that.

One of the Chaplains and the office assistant got us some general food things so we wouldn’t be hungry in the morning. this was so nice because i didn’t even think about it until we woke up the next morning really hungry. haha

We got here right during the busiest weeks for the Chapel office. The week of Easter is a busy time with tons of services and cleaning to make sure it looked nice for the services, so the kept Joe pretty busy. He has also been doing a ton of in-processing too. I think it was good that we were busy right off the bat because it helped us get on a sleep schedule so hopefully our jet lag is over.

This last week I was able to attend a welcoming class called Hallo Hohenfels. I met a bunch of other wives that just got here and we learned so much!!! we learned about all the programs they offer on post, volunteer opportunities, a little bit of German language basics, local etiquette in Bavaria and other parts of Germany. On Wednesday we took a trip to one of the local little towns called Velburg and to a bakery and butcher shop and a lovely little restaurant and had delicious German food!

These are pictures of what the room looked in the restaurant. it was interesting. haha

We also went to möbelhof which is the German equivalent to IKEA. It was awesome! I want to go back once we have all our things and buy some area rugs 🙂

On friday, the last day of our class, we took a train ride to Regensburg. It is a lovely and very historical city near us (only about a 15 minute train ride from Parsburg which is like 10 Minutes from post). We learned how to ride the train to different places and how to buy tickets. We went on Good Friday which is a huge Germany holiday, so all the stores were closed, but we went to lunch at an Indian restaurant, and were able to walk around some of the most amazing churches I have ever seen. Then we walked around the city some more learning about the amazing history it holds!

On Wednesday of this week we moved into our apartment on post.It is so spacious and with our tiny amount of borrowed furniture it seems so empty. I can’t wait to get our stuff so we can fill it and make the echoing go away. haha. please pardon the mess haha we had just kind of put things down wherever while we organized. 🙂

I have no idea what we are going to do with all the room in our bedroom, my sister-in-law suggested cartwheels 😉

I can’t wait to decorate when all of our stuff gets here! I will definitely be posting pictures of the after product!

This next week we are going to be doing a cuture college class and going to Nuremberg. Then on friday we are going with a group to go lederhosen and Dirndl shopping. (we are just window shopping) but it should be a blast! I will keep you all informed on what we are up to! We love it here and can’t wait to explore more!

until next time!

Robyn

 

 

Preparing for the move!

Well, we have finally made it to crunch time. When we found out about this move 5 months ago, there was so much time between then and the move, but now that we are 7 days out from the movers coming and 13 days from leaving Washington things are starting to get a little more hectic! The last week or so I have been going through everything and creating a huge give away pile! It feels good to lighten our load. We had a pre-move consultation with the moving company today and things look great! I am continuing to organize all of our things so it will be way easier for the movers to pack things when they get here.

Yesterday I was feeling really great about my organization and productiveness and really thankful for the fact that things seem to be going so smoothly when I found another ant infestation. We had some in our bedroom a couple weeks ago, but they sort of just left. We thought we were in the clear, but I found then coming in from our floorboard where our carpet and our tile floor meet in out living room/dining room. We quickly bought some traps and cleared the bookshelf they are hiding under.

I haven’t seen as many lately, so maybe things are looking good. God knows! I have decided that they are such a minute problem for now that I am not going to really let them upset me. they are quarantined to their corner with a box of black pepper around them, so hopefully they just stay there.

(That is pepper…not ants. lol)

We went through all of Joes army gear to find the things he needed to return back to CIF (Central Issue Facility).

He has about 80% of his clearing done on Fort Lewis, so we are almost in the clear to leave. This week is going to be a week of cleaning our apartment as much as we can and continued organization.

It hasn’t quite hit me yet that we are going to be leaving the only places and people I have really ever known here in the PNW and the Midwest . I don’t think it will hit until we are on our way to Germany. When we got married, I asked God to guide us to where He wants us to be and I really didn’t think that was going to be outside of my comfort zone, but here we are, leaving for Germany. (which is WAY outside my comfort zone!) We are so excited for the wonderful traveling opportunities this opens up for us, that would probably, never otherwise happen. We already have a travel list started! we are excited for England and Italy the most, but are looking forward to seeing and experiencing all the different cultures that will be around us. We fly to Indiana on the 27th of March to see Joe’s family. We will be there until the 7th of April when we leave for Germany!!! Please keep us in your prayers as we hit the stressful stage of the move, that things go smoothly, travels are safe, and that we continue to look to God for guidance, comfort, and assurance in the season of change! Thanks a lot! I can’t wait to get there and experience Germany! Be prepared for lots of pictures and blog posts!!!

Robyn

Very First Blog Post and Preparing For Our Move

Well, here goes nothing!

As many of you know, Joe and I are headed to Germany in a couple months. Some of you have told me to start a blog so everyone can keep up with what we will be doing over there, so here it is. We are currently in the process of getting all the paperwork and technicalities worked out for our first PCS as a married couple. Joe has been stationed in Alabama before, but this will be a bit different, because not only does he have me to take with him, but we are moving internationally. This will be the first time for both of us living in another county and we are so excited! We have been getting lots of advice and tips from others that have been so helpful. We are looking forward to the adventure this will be. We promise to keep everyone informed on the things we do and find. I think this will be such a great way to share all the things we see and learn while we are there! We are thankful God opened this door for us. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity and we are so excited to see where God takes us and leads us! Please pray for us as we prepare for this BIG move. There is a lot that goes into it. Thanks for reading this and I will be sure to keep it updated!

Robyn