Bye Bye Berlin!

After another good night's sleep for the 2 1/2 year old who slept 10 hours: he was up at 6 excited to play per his usual.  He played in 'our' room while I finished packing and straightening up the room.  We  made our way into the kitchen to get him some breakfast, trying to be quiet.  As usual, we weren't very successful;  I'm sure Christian was thinking 'just this one last morning, just this one last morning...' :)  We had almost 4 hours before we had to leave for the train back to Frankfurt, and I don't think we did anything aside from letting Tate play with his trains while we got our stuff together, showered and cleaned up a bit.


Tate and I grabbed a cab to the station, and Christian took his car.  As we whizzed past the sites we'd seen for the past 5 days I was a bit wistful.  It had been nice to see where Christian lived, how he lived to an extent and meet some of his friends.  I didn't feel like I knew him better which is what I know he had wished for.  I wished we had actually spent some quality time together in the evenings which we had not done except for dinner on Friday night, but even then we spent most of the time looking out the window while Christian pointed out the various landmarks.  That combined with his constant complaining about the cost of the evening put a damper on my ability to really engage in conversation with him.  But there's always next time...right?

At the train station in Berlin!

Once at the station, Tate was overjoyed to see his beloved 'Javier' train (remember, I named the train Javier the week prior).  He was thrilled to be embarking on another journey on Javier!  Christian arrived at the station, and we ran through the station and got on the train just in time!  


And we were off!  Tate played trains, read his books, went to the potty, snacked and had a great time.  Christian tried to snooze a bit and I tried to keep my eyes open :)  It was actually a nice ride.  Tate did get a bit fussy the last 30 minutes or so before we were due to arrive in Frankfurt at 2:30 because he was ready for a nap.  I hauled him up into my lap, and he fell asleep in my arms 20 minutes before we were due to get into our station.  Sigh.  I tried putting him the stroller about 5 minutes before we arrived and he started crying loudly, so I kept him in my arms, all the while trying to help Christian who was so awesome about this, get our luggage (my huge suitcase, my purse, my duffel bag, his duffel bag, his backpack and the stroller!) to the exit.  You only have a couple of  minutes to get yourself and your belongings off the train before it leaves each station.  We made it off the train and Tate woke up, quite sad.  


He then refused to walk or get in the stroller; he was so out of sorts and just exhausted.  I ended up carrying him and Christian dealt with all the luggage and the stroller.  Thankfully, I finally remembered I had my Beco Butterfly carrier in my stroller basket, so I threw it on, and put Tate in it.  He wasn't happy, but that was the only way we could manage and now I could push the stroller with some stuff in it.  


And then there were stairs.  Seriously...what is with this country and their lack of elevators?  Poor Christian lugged all our stuff down the stairs and I came down with Tate while he went looking for something...I have no recollection as to what.  I look back up the steps and there is a very elderly woman at the top of the steps clearly out of breath standing next to her luggage.  She was trying to get my attention for some assistance down the stairs.  This was just awful.  There was noone working at the station who could help apparently, and I guess once the porters got her off the train they saw no need to call for someone to help her navigate the station and its steps.  Christian came back to Tate and me, and  ran up the stairs to help this poor woman.  Turns out she has asthma and she was very upset, hot and confused as she had to make a connecting train.  He got her down the stairs, and we made our way with her stuff and our stuff and got her to her next train.  Christian helped her back up the steps and made sure someone was with her to wait for the train and board it safely.  Smiling the entire time!

 
We then went back up another flight of steps to meet Katha in the parking lot as she had graciously offered to pick us up.  Tate was in my arms just dazed and exhausted.  

We loaded everything into the car and took off for the 20 minute drive to Oma and Opa's house.  Tate fell asleep almost instantly (I was so grateful even though it was almost 3).

Once we got to Oma and Opa's we unloaded the car and opted to let Tate sleep as long as he wanted in the car.  (I could see him right outside the house, and with the windows down he was enjoying a nice breeze)  I hung out at the house to try to get as much of our stuff together for our trip home while Christian ran a couple of errands.  Finally around 4:15 I went ahead and woke Tate up.  He was in a great mood and immediately wanted an Oma popsicle or 2 :)  His grandparents were not there at the time, but we found the popsicles ourselves as Tate remembered where Oma had shown him they were!

Christian got home and his new boyfriend had arrived, so Tate and I got to meet Georg.  He had driven to Frankfurt just to meet Tate and me (well to see Christian of course as well).  I got Tate and myself changed and the four of us headed out to meet Katha, Sebastian and Phillip at an annual town festival called Hayner Burgfest.

Let me say that this festival in this adorably fabulous quaint town was everything we American think Germany is.  The pictures speak for themselves.  We had a really festive time, especially Tate once he found the train ride you'll see in the pictures.  I enjoyed a bratwurst and some yummy wine.  There was every kind of festival treat you can think of...cotton candy, popcorn, pretzels, schnitzel, bratwurst and BEER :)  Tate wasn't thrilled with the food which seemed to bother Christian, but this could not have been a surprise.  He wouldn't even touch the french fries Christian got for him.  But I knew Tate was bored.  All he had done all day was be cooped up in a flat in the morning, was cooped up on a train for 4 hours, then cooped up in a car for an hour and 45 minutes while he slept, cooped up in the house for another 45 minutes while we all changed, pottied and got ready, then been cooped up in his stroller on the 10 minute walk to the festival.  He's 2.  And the only time 2 year olds want to sit around doing nothing is when they're sick.  So he needed to 'do' something.  And I was happy to oblige.  I walked him around and we found the rides.  I forked over several Euros and sat back while my son had a ball!!!  

He rode this same ride on this same train TEN times.

The video is a bit all over the place, but

it's obvious Tate is having a blast!

 We made our way slowly home around 6:30.  I wanted Tate to be able to really enjoy his last night in Germany, and I wanted that for myself as well.  Once home, he and his daddy took their clothes off :) and took a bath.  Tate was in bed by 8 and out soon thereafter.  

I packed up our stuff, then met Christian on the balcony.  His parents had returned earlier that evening while we were at the festival, but his dad was now at Katha and Sebastian's babysitting and his mom was going over to 'rescue' him momentarily.  We sat outside, the 3 of us for a while, then Regina left.  Christian and I stayed outside for a bit and spent some time together.  Our conversation veered from his discontent with his job/financial situation at this point to my concerns about how we were going to try to make this 'family' work for Tate.  We shared some personal thoughts, but as we said good-night I felt we hadn't made any progress; in fact I seemed to upset him in some way or fashion as he abruptly left to go meet his sister to watch the fireworks at the festival barely telling me good-bye.  On my last night in Germany.  No sooner had he walked out the door that his iPad started just beeping constantly with the indication that someone was texting back and forth.  I took a shower and got into bed and the iPad was still going and it didn't stop until I heard him walk in the door some 45 minutes after he left.

Needless to say, my feelings were hurt that he couldn't be bothered to hang out with me my last night in Germany, leaving me alone in the house with Tate, that obviously something I said hurt or upset him to the extent he couldn't or wouldn't tell me (we did discuss some of the other women in the SMC group who have used known donors and I expressed some concern over the lack of involvement of those men, trying to state that their situations were completely different from ours, or so I hoped.  Maybe he didn't like my still using the word known donor, I truly don't know).  Anyway, yet again my feelings were hurt, so going to sleep was difficult.

But as always, listening to my sweet Tate as he breathed the sleep of very innocent I relaxed and drifted off to sleep.  We had a long day of flying ahead of us!  And it had been a really beautiful evening.  So as I listened to the music wafting through the windows from the festival off to dreamland I went!