Leaving soon

Wow. I can't believe it. I'm leaving Heuchlingen next Friday for Frankfurt, and then flying from Frankfurt back to the US on Saturday (hopefully--if not, then Sunday). It is so weird that I have been here almost an entire year. It really has gone by SO fast. I know in the beginning it felt like it was dragging forever, but after a month or two and once I'd gotten settled in, it just flew by. I've been packing and re-packing and adjusting for the past couple days or so, trying to get everything under the weight limit, and the weird thing isn't how empty this room looks, but how the same it looks. Most of the stuff in this room isn't even mine--it just kind of all belongs to the aupair room. I mean, obviously all the clothes and stuff are mine, but you can't really tell they're all gone, since they were in the closet. It's sort of cool though. I'm leaving my mark too. I'm leaving some of my books behind, some maps from places I went, even some clothes. A little sad that that's all that will be left here of my year.

In a weird way, this feels just like last year, except I'm not nervous at all. I'm making another huge change. Sure, I'm a little bit anxious about starting graduate school, but mostly I'm just excited. I think maybe the reason is, I managed to move to another country without knowing anyone (OK, I sort of knew the family) and rather apprehensive about planning travel on my own, and now I'm leaving a country that feels like my home, leaving behind good friends, and leaving Europe having traveled to 14 countries on my own. I feel like I can do anything now! I'm not worried about making friends in Athens. It'll happen. I'm also much less worried about putting myself into uncomfortable social situations (aka, situations where I know no one). This year has been full of uncomfortable social situations, in a foreign language at that, and I survived.

So, I told myself I would write about some of the fun moments with the kids the past couple weeks, because I don't want to forget that stuff! I only have a little bit more time with them.
--Giggling with Johanna over her "stinker sand". She always "cooks" with sand in her play kitchen outside, and when she drip-dropped the wet sand on top of her "food", it looked like chunks of poop. She of course thought that was hilarious! She adorably said, "Du bringst mich voll auf Lachen!"
--Building a marble chute with Johanna to send the marbles down. Both of us were entranced by it for a solid half hour.
--Playing Chinese checkers with Dominik
--Playing UNO Extreme with both of them
--Making a "Fußball Blume" with Dominik out of the leftover soccer ball cutouts
--Looking in the animal book with Dominik

I'm sure I'll think of some more, so I'll post them when I think of 'em.