I will never take hanging pictures on drywall for granted again! Back home all you need is a nail, a hammer and maybe a level to hang a picture. Here, you need a hammer drill with a special drill bit for use on brick, screws, all-purpose fixings, and a vacuum to suck up all the brick dust as the hole is being drilled. Yep, you have to get it placement right the first try because there are no re-do’s here (the screws with the fixings around them leave HUGE holes… thank goodness for caulking!). We are pretty close to being done hanging things for a while- which Morgan is really excited about!
Last week one or Morgan’s colleagues invited us over for coffee with his wife at their house. When we first arrived we went on a walk around their village, Ostercappeln, with Jan and his son Jasper (who is about 15 months old.. just a couple weeks younger than Abbie!). There is a beautiful Catholic church there and a nice town square.. hopefully we can go back to look in the shops sometime. In addition to coffee we had waffles (they were sweeter than waffles in the US) with whipped cream and warm cherry sauce on top. It was delicious! After eating we sat in their backyard to enjoy the sunshine (finally!) and let Jasper play on their new swing-set. They lived in Shanghai for 5 years, so they can relate to our predicaments of living in a country where you don’t speak the language!
