Our First Week in Stavanger

Yesterday marked our first full week in Stavanger and per our usual patterns, it was a pretty busy one!

We arrived in Stavanger  last Mon, Nov 12 both tired and anxious to see the kittens. We gathered all of our luggage (thankful that it all made it!) and collected the cats. We met with the Norwegian government vet to have their microchips checked and an overall inspection of their health. He reviewed their paperwork and cleared them for release. Now all we had to do was take them to the vet once more for another tapeworm round and they would be Norwegian! ;-)

We found our rental car and somehow made it to the apartment without navigation or phones and only one wrong turn. Still not sure how Jason did that, but he's pretty amazing so that must be the reason. We met Olav our realtor at the apartment to get the keys and oriented on things like trash, water heater, etc.

The kittens were thankful to finally be out of their kennels as they began exploring their new home. Jason ran to the pet store for a littler box and scratching post to make them feel more at home. They were both incredibly good and waited until Jason was back with the litter box before both jumping in to relieve themselves. Good kittens!

Zoey took off to explore some more and CeCe laid down for a nap.

They have adjusted well to the apartment. I think they are confused/puzzled every time we leave the apartment door because they never ran out the door in Houston they have repeatedly run out the door here. Our hypothesis is they believe we are keeping them confined to a portion of the "house" while we've already explained to them that this is it - no more 3000 sq ft to run around in I'm afraid! I think their favorite part of the apartment is the heated floors in the bathroom (a common thing in Europe).

Little inappropriate CeCe...no wonder you went and got yourself herpes before we adopted you. Tsk, tsk. 

Tuesday we both had appointments at the Center for Foreign Workers. This is where you are issued your Norwegian number (after it arrives in the mail in 7-10 days). Basically you are hosed until you get the Norwegian number - you can't setup a bank account, buy a car, get a cell phone plan, or anything else until it arrives so it's a good thing we were able to get in right after our arrival. We also were able to secure an appointment with our friend Heather's vet for that afternoon so the cats could get their final round or tapeworm medicine.

Wednesday was our first day in our respective offices. Jason dropped me off at ConocoPhillips on his way to Baker Hughes. We got to see some friends we already knew and meet our work groups. I attended well reviews all day and Jason got started on his online training for the new job. ConocoPhillips gave us a nice welcome basket with a bunch of non-perishable foods to help us get started on our grocery shopping.

Here are the views from our office windows (a big improvement from Jason's cubicle and my window view of the parking garage back in Houston) -

Darcy's office view

Jason's office

The office atmosphere is a bit different than in Houston. They work 8-4 and since a lot of people take the bus, they are out of there by 4. The Norwegian government also has a strong focus on family. You have to pick up your kids from daycare by a certain time or be fined. This family-first, work-second attitude makes the atmosphere very relaxed. It will take some adjusting, but I think I'm going to love it. They even have a dedicated nap room that this pregnant gal is going to have to find during my last weeks in the first trimester... :-)

What I do not love is the Norwegian keyboard that I am struggling to get used to! My apologies in advance for anyone that I email from work with massive errors.

The ConocoPhillips' Spouses Club has a Welcome Committee that sent us a care package box with some non-perishable groceries to help us get started. How sweet!

Thursday night we met Erica and Thad, along with a couple new people Anthony and Shaina, for Chilli Thursdays at Thai Cuisine Restaurant. It was some of the best spring rolls and pad thai that I've had!!

Another example of the difference in atmosphere in the office? We had a wine lottery on Friday. Yes, peeps, you read that correctly. 10 kroner buys you a lottery ticket and there are four bottles of wine to be raffled. Whoever is the lucky/unlucky person whose number is drawn first gets their pick of the wine , but also has to provide the wine for the following week's lottery. 

Friday we spent the evening relaxing and getting settled into the new apartment. Jason also spent some time looking at used cars online for us to check out at the dealerships the following day. We also learned what a bidet is used for...cat naps!

Saturday we slept in before going out to test drive some vehicles. We knew we couldn't buy one yet since we didn't have our Norwegian numbers, but we wanted to get an idea for some of the cars and what we liked/disliked. After test driving some A4's at the Audi dealership we headed over to Nissan and test drove the Qashqai. We both fell in love with it! The car had navigation, backup camera (a real plus for the tiny parking space we have to back into at the apartment!), a big sun roof, and only ~6000 km on it. Plus it was in our price range! We asked the salesmen what our options were for holding the car since we didn't have our number yet. He told us we could sign a contract and they will hold the car for you until you are ready. If you decide not to buy it you have to pay them 10% of the sales price. Sounded like a deal to us so we signed the contract and were excited to check one more thing off our long list of to-do's still! :-) Here's a picture from the sales certificate -

I dropped Jason off near the fish markets before heading back home. Megan and I made plans to go see Twilight that afternoon and since the husbands were not being subjected to go see it, they agreed to make dinner for us that night. Jason and Loren got all of their shopping done and I headed to meet Megan at the theater. The movie was AWESOME! And I'm so glad I got to see it with Megan, but I did miss not attending the midnight premiere in the US with my friend Erin like we've done for the previous movies.

While we were standing in line to pay for our popcorn before the movie, the gal in front of us asked if we were American. Turns out she is from Georgia and just moved to Stavanger a couple months ago. Her husband was offshore and she decided last minute to come see the movie and was surprised to hear English around her. Megan and I introduced ourselves and visited with Ali for a bit before the movie. She sat close by us and afterwards we invited her over for dinner at our place since we knew they'd be plenty. Even more ironically she lives in the same apartment complex that Megan and Loren live!  We had a terrific dinner (the boys cooked AMAZING salmon, asparagus, and mashed potatoes!) and gorged ourselves on some American candy Jason and I had brought with us. We exchanged information and hopefully will get to see Ali and meet her husband sometime soon! 

Sunday we visited the Stavanger International Church. There are only three English-speaking churches here so our options are pretty limited in the way of worship. We enjoyed the service and the people we got to visit with there and plan to attend again as well as visit the other churches over the following weeks. 

We had a lazy Sunday afternoon relaxing and trying to learn how to use the washer and dryer. It's the little things. :-)

Monday my office shipment arrived and when my admin escorted the movers to my office, she also suprised me with a bouquet of Welcome flowers. Seriously!? This place knows how to make you feel welcome!

Our first full week ended with taking a Newcomer Orientation Course through the Stavanger Chamber of Commerce. We got a lot of good information on things to see around Rogaland (the district that Stavanger lies within), tips/tricks for grocery shopping and suggestions for stores to  shop, and learned a lot about the social healthcare system plus other odds and ends which will be especially important for me to know as I plan to have our baby here.

Now we are getting ready for our Expat Thanksgiving Celebration tomorrow night with as many traditionally American foods as we can get our hands on!

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Our Last Week in Houston

We had so much going on the last week and a half that we were in Houston! From goodbye celebrations to preparing for packers to saying goodbye to our house.

The first goodbye celebration was my work going away on Thursday, Nov 8. My sweet admin, Jane, got a beautiful cake and my coworker Jim embarrassed me with a variety of stories he'd collected over the past year. I know he wasn't supposed to be invited... ;-)

Friday night was our CEPC going away celebration. It was hosted by three amazing families - the Meeh's, Henderson's, and Harris'. We've grown to love all of these families so much over our time at CEPC and we are so grateful to have such terrific friends. Dave went all out making his delicious homemade bread and gumbo! 

And the cake that Alicia made - oh my goodness! She went all out making her own fondant and pomegranate icing for this delicious chocolate with chocolate and chocolate with strawberry filling cake. She even decorated it as the Norwegian flag!

Catherine and Cindy put together a Texas album with pictures of everyone that attended. They also had people write notes to us to go along with the pictures. 

We also surprised everyone at the party by announcing that we were expecting! Here is a picture Catherine got of Jason as he was making the big announcement. Needless to say there were a lot of shocked faces amongst the crowd that our rolling five years was up! :-)

Saturday we drove to La Grange, halfway between Austin and Houston, to have breakfast and say goodbye to Monica and Tom. We've enjoyed riding in the MS 150 with them and getting to know them over the past few years. We were excited to tell them we were pregnant as well! Unfortunately I was kind of a picture-taking failure our last weeks so I didn't get one of the four of us before we left. :-( Maybe I was in denial still about us leaving since it still hadn't hit us yet. 

Sunday we said goodbye to the rest of our CEPC family. Pastor Crimmins announced that we were leaving and had us stand up and it totally made me cry. We have loved CEPC and grown so much spiritually over the last four years. It breaks our hearts to leave our church family, but we feel better prepared to be a light for Christ because of the strong foundation we've built there. 

That night we had dinner  and announced our pregnancy with our Family Dinner friends. We've enjoyed getting to know them and have weekly Monday night dinners with this group. We headed to the Melting Pot and enjoyed amazing fondue! We got a group picture, but the dark lighting made it pretty blurry. :-/ 

Monday was our final day at the office! Both of us made rounds of goodbyes to friends and coworkers and shared the news that we were expecting with everyone. I sent out an email at the end of day thanking everyone I'd worked with in Houston for the experience and included our "We're Moving/We're Expecting Postcard".

My mom and Jeff arrived Monday night from Oklahoma City to help us get ready for the packers. Jeff got started that night working on inventory and it was a good thing too because we worked all day Tuesday and Jason didn't get the final lists sent out until after midnight to the packing company. We had to inventory everything and give an approximate value for insurance purposes. Let me just say - we have a lot of stuff! 

Wednesday morning the packers arrived to get started. They were super efficient and made incredible progress just the first day! 

Zoey wasn't bothered at all by the movers and in fact entertained them when she played with their packing papers and jumped into their boxes. CeCe on the other hand... we got really scared after the packers first arrived because the doors had been open and we couldn't find her anywhere. We searched the entire house and started looking outside before Jason finally found her. And you will never guess where! 

Apparently the cats had torn a hole in the box springs of our bed and Jason noticed that it was sagging more than usual... They made a kitten hammock and CeCe was completely inside the box springs!! We had to coerce her into coming out after the movers were gone. She wouldn't budge before that.

Wednesday while we were being packed, we decided to make the pregnancy announcement "public" via Facebook.

The packers finished up Thursday around 5:00 pm and Jason hit the road to take his car to his parents house in Colorado. He drove all night, stopping only to take an hour and a half nap, before arriving Friday mid-morning. 

Friday I finalized the cats' preparations with our International pet person. She got the kennels labeled and ready and gave us copies of all the paperwork we needed to provide to the Norwegian government upon arrival. The cats were ready to head to Norway now!

I picked Jason up from the airport Friday night and we ran final errands Saturday morning. We had a very teary goodbye after lunch with my mom and Jeff. We love them so much and their help this week enabled us to get everything done that we needed. We couldn't have done it without them and I am going to miss my momma tremendously, especially during the pregnancy. And once again, picture fail at taking one of the four of us. :-(

Saturday afternoon we headed down to League City to spend the night with Jacob, Steph, Sydney, Jaiden, and Peggy, a good family friend. We enjoyed getting to spend the evening and the following morning with our precious niece and nephew! Sydney is at such a fun age and we enjoyed playing with her. Jaiden is such a smiling and happy baby! It was hard to say goodbye to them and we are going to miss so much as they grow!

Jason and Sydney opening our goodbye gift from Jacob and Steph. It's a cute picture frame with their Halloween pictures and it's already on our end table in the new apartment!

Sunday morning we headed back to say our final goodbyes to our first home and gather all of our luggage and pick up the cats. 

Goodbye backyard and garden that we spent so much time harvesting - 

Zoey had a particularly rough time saying goodbye to her ice maker... we still haven't figure out how to break the news to her that they don't have ice in Norway...

Goodbye first house! You were a great one and we were blessed to make four years of memories in you. :-)

We sure did travel light for this trip...

We made it safely to Stavanger on Monday, Nov 12 with all our luggage and both kittens! Blog post to come about our first week here in Stavanger!! :-)

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Little Bean's First Gifts!

Once we found out we were pregnant, we were amazed at our friends and families generosity!

My mom got me an amazing side pillow to sleep with and I'm excited for it to arrive in our sea shipment and start using it!

My friend Leah gave me this sweet baby stuff, including our little ones first toy kitten and Texas culture!

Cindy got me "What to Expect When You Are Expecting" and the Thurmans got Jason "What to Expect When Your Wife is Expanding"

My sweet friend Maryam somehow found time between taking care of her newborn baby girl Ella to go shopping and buy me a few of the favorite things she's loved so far - 

And if you remember my sister-in-law Steph surprised me the Mayo clinic guide to a healthy pregnancy when she first guessed that we were pregnant before our Big Reveal (read here).

My mother-in-law Lisa sent a present home with Jason. A scrapbooking book for moms.

 Thank you everyone for the amazing gifts! I apologize that I don't have thank you notes yet to write you personal ones yet.

The next big thing to tackle was maternity clothes. Since everything is so expensive in Norway, we decided I should do some maternity clothes shopping before we moved to try and get most of the things I would need. Fortunately, this is where moms come in and are the best!!

My mom had already purchased and brought with her some cute dresses, pants, jeans, and tops to get my collection started! Add to that a few Zulily purchases (a dangerous website shopping website!) I had already made and our shopping trip to Motherhood Maternity, Katy Mills, and the Galleria while my mom was in town and I am now completely (hopefully) set with everything I'll need!  

Know what's super awkward when maternity clothes shopping? Having to use that fake belly because you aren't really showing yet... cute outfit, awkward fake belly... 

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