Life happened.

I know I haven't posted anything in a while but I felt like I needed some time off. Lately I haven't had much free time, yet I haven't done much.

Allow me to take you back and tell you what happened these past few months..

In July we took a trip to attend a conference in Boston and then stayed an extra week to visit the big apple. I loved getting to revisit this city and got to knock a lot of items of my NYC bucket list.

Once we got back from our trip, Avi went back to her last week of school, and my cousin came to visit.. but I kinda screwed up and Avi ended up missing the last day of school (we took a day trip to Berlin instead).

We had all of August free, and we took advantage of this (and a wedding in our hometown) and went to visit our family in Mexico.

We had a packed two weeks in Mexico, during which we were able to catch up with a lot of friends, visit the BBVA Stadium and Avi took an intensive swim course, she was able to get the basic done, but she still needs to learn more.

On August 19th, we visited a Zoo, Bioparque Estrella and also celebrated my dad's birthday with him and all his kids.

In September I had quite a few appointments, first one being Avi's first day of school, and the first day of first grade is a big day in the German's lives.

We got to go see Liebe Stirbt Nie (Phantom II) before it left Hamburg.

My in-laws came to Germany for the first time, they stayed here for a week, during which we went to Berlin, Schwerin and the Fischmarkt.

They left three days before Pablo's birthday since his sister was expecting a child around that date.. the baby happened to be born the day the arrived in Charlotte!

Instead of throwing Pablo a party to celebrate his 29th birthday we took two separate trips in October. Avi and I went to Braunschweig to visit some friends that just moved there while Pablo went to visit a friend of his at Würzburg.

Towards the end of the month Avi had two weeks off for Herbstferien (Fall Break). We spent it with friends and sleepovers.

On November 1st, (after Avi's two weeks off from school) Pablo went on a guys trip to Dublin. He returned Nov 4th to find a house full of friends celebrating Avi's birthday. The surprise party was needed, she said she didn't have a good day at school (for the most part), so it was nice to have her friends here to cheer her up.

For the first time in four years we did the Laternenumzug with snow! It felt like winter that day, especially since they were selling Glühwein at the fest.

Another friend of Pablo's came to visit this month and we took him around Hamburg and visited the recently opened Elbphilharmonie.

The snow went away and the Weihnachtsmarkts are open for the season, we went to the one in our area the day it opened.

 And we've been taking advantage of the nice-weather days and teaching Avi to ride her bike.

So yeah, that's what's been going on, have you missed me?