Garmisch, Germany

We spent Martin Luther King Jr. weekend in the German Alps with our friends Melanie and Adam, and Mandy, Greg, Sam and Jack. We stayed in the American resort, Edelweiss, in Garmisch, Germany. It was a wonderfully relaxing weekend! We ate American food, watched TV, swam, and of course hung out with friends! To top it off, we had an amazing view from our room of snow-capped mountains.

On Saturday,we drove toLake Eibsee and were able to walk on it because it was thoroughly frozen. Being on the lake we had a beautiful panoramic view of the mountains surrounding the late. In the evening, we went on a torch-lit tour of the Partnach gorge. All of the waterfalls in the gorge were frozen and we were able to see some amazing formations. Unfortunately, there was no other light except from our torches, so we didn't get very many pictures. We thought about going back the following day, but it was dreary and cold and we decided to just relax instead! After the tour we warmed up with coffee and hot chocolate. Also, Melanie, Adam, and Carrie split the biggest cream puff you can imagine, while Kurt enjoyed warm apple strudel! As we were finishing dessert, the entire restaurant was serenaded by a yodeler.

Here are some of our pictures from the trip:

Garmisch

Thanks for an awesome birthday trip Kurt!

Exciting News!

For those of you who don't know, 2009 is going to be an exciting year for us! We're looking forward to the birth of our first baby around Memorial Day. We recently found out that the baby is a girl and couldn't be happier!

Here she is at about 20 weeks:

And here is Carrie the same day:

Happy New Year!

We had a nice, quiet New Year's Eve. After a delicious dinner with Melanie and Adam, we played a few games of Settlers while we waited to ring in the 2009. A little bit before midnight, Kurt and Adam had fun setting off firecrackers in the back yard...perhaps a bit too much fun from Melanie and Carrie's perspective ;)

At midnight, we all got bundled up and went out to the front of our house and the guys set off some fireworks and then we all watched our neighbors set off fireworks. New Year's Eve here is crazier than 4th of July in the States, EVERYONE has fireworks! We were even able to see some of the fireworks being set off in downtown Mainz!

In the early morning (7am!) Kurt and I went to pick up Maureen who decided to make a spontaneous trip out to visit! When we got back to our house, we had Melanie's egg casserole for breakfast and relaxed a bit while the boys played video games. In the afternoon, we had a pork dinner followed by the first games of Settlers of the 2009 (which Maureen won!)!

Since Maureen was only here for a few days, took her to some of our favorite places. We went to Heidelberg and Rüdesheim on Friday and then went to Strasbourg on Saturday. Although it was bitter cold, we had a great time! It was fantastic hanging out and being able to catch up in person for the first time in about 2 years!

So far 2009 has been wonderful and we're looking forward to the rest of it!

Frohe Weihnachten!

Merry Christmas Family and Friends!

We had a wonderful Christmas week with friends.

On Christmas Eve, Mandy and Greg hosted a potluck dinner for about 25 people. All the food was delicious and we had a great time catching up with friends. There were also 6 toddlers and babies which made the evening even more fun!

Christmas day, we had a relaxing morning, waking up late and opening gifts. In the afternoon, we went to Dan and Kristi's for a delicious dinner with several friends. We had a great afternoon catching up with friends and interacting with 3-year old twin girls!

On Saturday evening, we continued to celebrate the Christmas season at Mike and Susan's annual party. Mike prepared an amazing food spread again this year and we had a great time socializing.

As you can tell, we have a wonderful group of friends out here, we don't know what we would do without them. Of course they don't replace our family and friends back home, we miss you all a lot and hope you had a wonderful Christmas!

Here are a few pictures from our Christmas:

From Christmas 2008

Marché de Noël in Alsace, France

We spent the weekend of 12 December in Alsace, France with Melanie and Adam. Alsace is a region of France right over the French-German border. We originally booked this trip back in the summer because several friends recommended a quaint B&B to us. Since the B&B is booked pretty far in advance, we decided to go in December and tour the Strasbourg and Colmar Christmas markets.

The B&B, the Ambiance Jardin, was even more picturesque than we imagined. The rooms were amazing and there was a common area complete with a fireplace where we were able to read and play games in the evenings! The breakfasts were delicious as well, fresh bread, fruit cobbler, and café au lait. In the back of the B&B there is an amazing garden. Of course nothing was blooming now, but we were able to imagine that it would be beautiful in the spring and summer.

Below are pictures of the B&B:

Bed and Breakfast

We stopped in Strasbourg on Friday afternoon. We have been to Strasbourg before and really like its relaxing atmosphere. The Christmas market had a lot of things that we don't normally see in the German Weihnacht markets. We made the trip complete with panini and crepes!

Here are some pictures from Strasbourg:

Strasbourg Christmas Market

Friday evening, after we checked into the B&B, we found the only restaurant in the tiny town to be closed. Relying on our GPS, we found an Italian Trattoria about 10km (6 miles) away. As we're driving, over country roads we realized, too late to turn around, that we were getting on a ferry and crossing back over into Germany! We drove all the way to France and now were going to have dinner in Germany?!? Of course, the trattoria no longer existed, so we ended up having schnitzel and kase spatzle at a German restaurant for dinner. *sigh* =)

On Saturday, we went to Colmar, Eguisheim, and Kayserberg. They are all picturesque towns. While we found the Colmar market to be mostly meat and wine and the smaller towns to have tiny markets, we really enjoyed the scenery. We would like to go back in a warmer season to walk around more and see more of the area.

Here are some pictures from Colmar:

Colmar Christmas Market

A few from Eguisheim:

Eguisheim Christmas Market

And a couple from Kayserberg:

Kayserberg Christmas Market

Madrid and Toledo, Spain

We celebrated Thanksgiving with Adam, Melanie, and Ashley in Spain this year. We spent the majority of the weekend in Madrid and took a day trip to Toledo.

On Thursday, we went to the main train station and found a beautiful rain forest inside! We had a lot of fun watching hundreds of turtles in one area of it. In the afternoon, we wet on the New Madrid Free Walking Tour. We've done New Europe walking tours in other cities and highly recommend them. This tour, was described as being about 2.5 hours long, but ended up being almost double that! The tour took us around the city, pointed out historic buildings, gave us an overview of Spain's tumultuous history, and took us to a tapas/sandwich restaurant. The restaurant definitely added quite a bit of time to the tour...but it was warm inside so we didn't mind too much!

Here are some pictures from Madrid:

Madrid

On Friday, we took a train to Toledo, which was less than an hour away. Toledo, is an ancient walled city with a large Moorish influence. We had a lot of fun walking around, taking pictures, and eating tapas. After we arrived back in Madrid, we had a traditional Spanish meal for dinner including paella and fish.

Click here for pictures from Toledo:

Toledo

On Saturday, Kurt and Adam spent the morning at Star Wars - The Exhibition while Carrie, Ashley and Melanie went to the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, a modern art museum. There are a lot of pictures of the Star Wars exhibit in the picture album below. Unfortunately, we were not able to take any pictures in the museum, but we did see many pieces by Gris, Dali, and Picasso, including Picasso's Guernica.

The Star Wars Album:

Star Wars Madrid

Although not a traditional Thanksgiving, we had a wonderful time with our friends. We did miss seeing our family and hope everyone had a good day!

Boleslawiec, Poland

The weekend of 18 October, we caravaned with a group of friends to Boleslawiec, Poland. The sole purpose of the trip was to buy handmade pottery! Since it was a longer trip, about 6 hours, we stayed in Dresden, Germany, on Friday night and were on the road between 6 and 6:30 on Saturday morning so that we were sure to be shopping by 8. We got to see a beautiful sunrise as we were entering Poland. Luckily, we had a couple experienced Polish pottery shoppers with us, and we were able to hit between 8 and 1o shops before they closed by mid-afternoon.

A bit overwhelming at first...so many patterns, styles, and qualities of pottery to choose from, but we quickly started making purchases. While some people come home from Poland with entire new dish sets, we went with two goals...several serving dishes for ourselves and the majority of our Christmas shopping done. We are proud to say we accomplished both of our goals! (Probably the first year ever that about 95% of our shopping was complete before December!)

We stopped for lunch at a really cute restaurant and had traditional Polish food for lunch...including pierogis, which were amazing! Although we didn't have a lot of time for sightseeing, Kurt and Melanie explored the main square in Boleslawiec, on our way out of town on Sunday. They said it was really pretty and took some nice pictures.

Click below to see our album from the weekend: