Twentythird Week in Germany

Monday morning we got the girls off to school. My mom started to get all of her stuff together and get her things packed. That afternoon, I had to meet my German teacher downtown Bonn to do his shopping. It was kind of a test of the vocabulary I had been learning so far. My mom and Avery and Bryn decided to come along. It was quite embarrassing at times. My mom wanted to get Avery a book at the book store so with about twenty people in line behind me, my German teacher said, "Great, can you get your mom's purchase gift wrapped." I felt so bad because there were people behind me rolling their eyes when I asked, but she was lighting quick with the gift wrapping. It turned out okay. I think I passed. We got a pumpkin when we were in town so the girls carved it with my mom after Bailey got home from school. We had dinner and then my mom did this crazy mock Halloween thing for the girls. She brought costumes for them, put them on them, and then she went from door to door inside our house and waited for the girls to say trick or treat. She tried to look different at every door. It was quite humorous for the videographer, namely me. I am so glad I got some video footage of that.

Tuesday morning, we dropped the girls off at school and I drove my mom to Dusseldorf to the airport. We fought through a ton of traffic to get there by 10:30am. I went home and started doing the laundry.

Wednesday was Halloween. Bailey was allowed to dress up at school, but Avery had to wait until evening. She helped me make the Halloween cookies for the party that night. We went to another American family's house for a party that evening. It was quite nice. No trick-or-treating really happens here, although we did see a few people out walking home from the party. My mom brought Halloween costumes for them so Bailey was a queen, Avery was Cinderella, and Bryn was a princess of some sort. Here, the girls are with a friend from school.

Thursday was All Saints Day, so the girls had both Thursday and Friday off of school. we had been debating all week whether we were going to go somewhere for the long weekend. We were very slow to get up and going on Thursday morning. So, we decided to go to Sauerland and visit Burg Altena. The age of the castle is disputed. Two legends say 1000 or 1108, but the actual first record of it that we have is from 1122. However old it actually is, the town and the castle were very cool.

Friday, we were all up and ready to do something around 9:00am so we decided to go to Strasbourg for the weekend. Greg and I had been there before, but I had forgotten how charming the city really is. The weather forecast said it was supposed to be warmer than Germany so we were looking forward to not wearing coats. It wasn't quite that warm but at least it wasn't raining. Friday afternoon, we went to the Cathedral which is supposed to be one of the best examples of late Gothic Architecture, and holds one of the largest astronomical clocks. We walked around town for a while to see if we could find the boat launch. We had lunch at a place called Super Hamburger, it was quite good I must admit. The girls found a playground that they begged us to stop at to play. Of course we gave in. I really feel like they have been very tolerant of our urging to go place after place and see thing after thing.

Our hotel was a little ways out of the city so we could fit in one room. We grabbed some dinner and stopped at a grocery store to get milk for Bryn. We picked up some things for breakfast the next morning as well. That night was a nightmare. The kids were full of extra energy, I guess we didn't walk it out of them. They were jumping around, including Bryn who had just downed two sippy cups of milk. She really, really loves milk. then, she proceeded to throw it up on me. Why do kids never throw up on dad? we got her and me cleaned up and Greg put on a movie thinking that would calm them down. I don't know what they put in those super hamburgers but whatever it is, no thanks! They still didn't lay down and go to sleep for a long time. And, poor Bryn, she was just uncomfortable. I was afraid to give her more milk in case that was the cause of her stomach upset. But, in hindsight I think she just made herself motion sick from all the flips she was doing and in the night she was just hungry. I finally gave in early in the morning and opened a new carton of long life milk to give her a little. It made life easier for all of us. It was, however, another night of musical beds. At one point, Greg and I were in one twin with Bryn in between us while the other two sprawled out in the Queen bed.

Saturday was finally here. The girls were very excited about doing the boat tour(see boat picture above). We drove straight there and got tickets for that first. It was nice, and we went through locks which the girls found especially cool, plus we learned quite a bit about the city. We spent some time in Petit France after the tour, where we ate crepes and bretzel au sucre for lunch. We had our first roasted Chestnuts ever from a street vendor. Our girls have now changed the Christmas song to...

"Chestnuts roasting on an open fire, yuck, jack frost nipping at your
nose..."

I think they are an acquired taste. Never-the-less, our time in Strasbourg was nice. The weather was a bit warmer on Saturday which also helped. We thought about stopping in Heidelberg on the way home, but we thought that may be a little too much for this trip. Next time. We got home early evening, so we had some time to wind down before bedtime. It was a very nice week.