We finally arrived in Leiden! After a long journey over the Atlantic, my first time out of America, we landed on Dutch soil. We had a friend waiting there to pick us and our 7 suitcases up and take us to our new home. People asked me a lot in that first year how I could just pick up and move to a whole different country and wondered at how tough it was. Honestly, it was hard at times but also we had the attitude that it was just the start of a new adventure for us. We were newly married and starting our life together. What better way to do that than thousands of miles away from anything either of you have ever known??
We had a beautiful little apartment that we rented online...a few days before the wedding. Yep, that's right. When Dan came back for the wedding, we still did not have a place to live when we went back. The housing market is soo difficult here because it's a university town and we were blown away by the prices. Dan had looked at this apartment before, shortly after arriving but it was just too expensive for us. When we looked again, they had lowered the price and he said it was clean and in a nice location-which was more than he could say about other places he had looked into. So we went for it and I prayed that it would be livable. Thankfully, that house was such a blessing. It was in a perfect location, we had amazing neighbors and it met our needs exactly. It was a one bedroom, one bath/toilet room apartment that we made our own. I love that that was our first place together.
Life those first few months were...different. Not only were we trying to adjust to married life, we were trying to adapt to a whole different culture. It was great for our marriage because we felt like it was us against the world. We'd come home with funny stories about missed translations, crazy cultural norms, and the different places we had found. We'd spend the weekends exploring the city, looking for a bike for me, and trying to navigate life in this new country. We found an international church where we started to get plugged in at, which led to use meeting some of our great friends. It didn't take too long before we started feeling at home in our new place.
Now, all this sounds so wonderful but it definitely didn't come without its hardships. There would be days where I would leave the grocery store in tears because I had no idea what things were and where to find what I needed to cook something. Our apartment didn't have any lights when we moved in (it's common here for people to take everything when they leave, including the floors!luckily our had floors) so for a few weeks we survived by candlelight. I almost got ran over several times before figuring out the bike system here. I spent many a day in the early days sitting and watching out the window for Dan to come home from work. But in the end, it was all a part of our adventure.
We went home for Christmas that year because I was on the tv show Wheel of Fortune. Feel free to read that story here and part 2 here. Talk about reverse culture shock. I think I stood in Wal-Mart for 30 minutes, just overwhelmed at the number of choices I had! It was hard to come back after that but that was the last time I felt that way after going back to the States. Each trip after that, while it was hard to leave family, I was ready to get back to my own home with my own stuff-which happened to be in The Netherlands.
The next year was an exciting one as Dan took me to Paris for my 30th birthday, we went to Italy for 2 weeks for a conference and vacation (Sicily in particular), had friends visit me-where we traveled to Rome, Venice, and Barcelona, took a trip I won on Wheel of Fortune to the Bahamas and went back home for Thanksgiving. Oh, and it's also when we found out we were pregnant with Ellie. :) . 2012 brought morning sickness,a trip back to the US for a baby shower, a babymoon to Venice and then a trip further north in Italy to Lake Como, a beautiful baby that was born 9 days late, a trip to the northern coast of France and Belgium with a 3 week old and finally a few months of rest before jetting off to the States again for my best friends wedding-which meant traveling alone with a 3month old. We spent Christmas there again and by the time we made it back, after cancelled and delayed flights, we had less than a week to pack up our little apartment and get ready to move into a bigger one.
Right after our move, I was still exhausted and knew it wasn't just from jet lag and moving. I told Dan I was pregnant but he didn't believe me. But those 2 little pink lines don't lie! and thus began our adventure of preparing for baby #2, while having a 5 month old. Then in June we got a call that my dad has passed away unexpectedly so we hopped on a plane and went home to deal with that. That was a really hard few weeks. Finally, we made it back here and celebrated Ellie's 1st birthday and are now preparing for the imminent arrival of baby boy Caputo!
Our whole marriage has been one big adventure so far. We've had so many incredible experiences that we know we are lucky to be doing together. When I look back at all we've done, there's no doubt that there is no one else I would want to walk this journey with than Dan. He is a big part of what has made this adventure what it has been. I can't even begin to imagine what our future holds. His contract ends next May (2014) and at this point we have no idea what our next adventure will be. But I do know it will be one heck of a ride and that we'll have each other plus 2 more! to navigate it with!
Here are some pics of when we first arrived in Leiden
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