10 Years in Ireland

This day ten years ago I started an adventure. An adventure I didn’t think would end up me starting a new life in a different country ten years later. When I was only 19 years of age, I decided to leave my home country Germany behind and learn the culture of another country. This was going to be Ireland. At home I did a bit of research. I heard that it would be a great opportunity to work as an Au Pair. In the end I found a lovely family on greataupair.com who had a boy aged 7.

My massive suitcase was packed and my mum and I drove to Berlin airport. The allowance for Aer Lingus was 30kg at the time but they allowed you to go over that a bit. I think I ended up carrying 32kg but I am not a 100% on that. Somehow I have a number 40 in my head. It was time to say my goodbyes. Luckily Ireland is only a 2 hours flight from Germany so I went over to see my family multiple times including Christmas of course.

When I arrived at the airport, I was greeted by my hostmum. They only lived 20 mins down the road from the airport, a town called Malahide. I minded the boy for a year. It involved many tasks. I don’t want to go into much detail but I wrote a blog post about it a while ago if you are interested, read about it here.

During my Au Pair time I learnt a lot. When you leave your home at the age of 19 you don’t know much. I didn’t know how to cook, I didn’t know how to use the washing machine etc. I had to become independent.  Overall I managed quite good in fairness and learnt it all one step at a time. I knew a few Au Pairs in and around Malahide from a language school we went to. We met up a few evenings in our favourite pub Gibneys in Malahide.
It’s mad how you can bump into people, but my hostmum’s friend got an Au Pair from Germany a few months later and she introduced me to her… This was Karo who I mentioned a good few times on my blog who is now my bestie. Mad isn’t it?

Of course I cannot forget to mention our crazy times. Most of us were mad into a boyband called Westlife. Some of you may know them. Anyway, they were quite successful during that time and we all spent so much time going to all their concerts, even flying to London for a few days. Au Pair life can be handy sometimes I guess.

A year passed and I had to decide what I wanted to do next. I applied for jobs but was unsuccessful at the time. In the end I decided to work for another family in the same town. We are into the year 2008 now. I went home for a few weeks to see my family that summer.  When I came back, I moved from Dublin to Sligo, from East to West. A few of my friends moved into an apartment and there was a free room for me to stay in. 3 weeks on I got a job in a local super market. It wasn’t the job I hoped for but it was a start I guess. I remember our wild nights at the weekend or during the week when no one had to work. It was great craic and something I will keep in memory for a long time.

I also moved into my own rented apartment which was kindly paid by my mum. It was a lovely apartment I have to say. A friend of mine moved in with me as it had 2 bedrooms. I only ended up living there for 6 months though. My mum and I celebrated Christmas together in my place.

During that Christmas period I also met my now other half/ best friend… 21st December in fact. It was so random. I was out with the girls for a few drinks (You can probably gather from this post that I went out A LOT before I had children) but as you do I had a bit too much and decided to go home. At a corner I met hubby, he walked me home and the rest is history.

In early April 2009 I got my first car. Hubby got it all the way from Waterford and brought it up to Sligo for me. That’s love. We had some fun times with that car. It didn’t last too long. There was water coming into the passenger seat but I still drove around in it. Even to an outdoor concert in Sligo with my mum. Good memories. The engine blew up in the end and we got rid of it.

In May 2009 hubby and I moved together. He only just bought a house before I met him, that’s timing isn’t it?
I was without a job then. I couldn’t put up with my job in the grocery store anymore. Hubby was so nice and told me I could apply in his company. You can imagine how the interview went with his colleague. I am still working there today and love my job.

We settled down in those years. First we got a cat, then we started talking about having children, we got engaged in October 2011 etc. Matthew came along in August 2012, then there was Chloe in February 2015. So many events happened in just 10 years. There is probably way more I can tell you and I could probably go into great detail but I don’t want to bore you with that.

Our future is looking bright. We are moving to another town due to work circumstances. Hubby is working a lot in Dublin every week since our company was bought which leaves me minding the kids on my own 3-4 days a week. It can be tough. He also misses seeing the kids all the time. For that reason we decided to move to Naas, Co. Kildare which is basically on the border of Dublin. We bought a new built house there. At the moment we are quite busy going through the process of selling our own house and signing the contract on the new house at the same time. I had to decide on the kitchen and tiles in the last week or so. We should be moving in October I’d say. The kids are already signed up in the new creche and I hope it all goes smooth and they get used to it pretty quickly.