The Barron Bunch

Monday, April 1, 2013

Day 4: Train to Koln

We had been looking forward to going to the Christmas Markets in Koln...

We were up and at the train station....it was a chilly morning!

The kids and Pete Pete

At the station...

Enjoying the train ride...

Arriving in Koln and greated with the amazing cathedral...

And, of course, rain! We got very good at using umbrellas....

Because the markets were quite spread out, we climbed aboard another train to take the journey to the markets....

But, first stop....The Chocolate Museum and Factory....

Lots of history and Ella enjoyed reading all about it...

G G and Nannie....

Time for samples...

This was the most amazing chocolate EVER!

Fresh chocolate from this giant fountain...

The lucky kids kept getting called back over by the lady to get more samples...the adults were not that lucky

Watching how the chocolate gets made...

Some amazing and intricate chocolate sculptures...

Ella was so excited to see the Mayan number system....she had learned all about this in school

Teaching her grandparents and friends all about the numbers...

Kit Kat bench....take a break

The guest speaker of the day.....Logan

can you see his little face peeking over?

And a well deserved stop in the chocolate cafe....

YUM!

Look at the ship shop in the market...

Silly Paul...such a playboy

Waiting for the train to take us back to another market...

Logan and G G

The kids in front of the cathedral...

Heading into the market...Such wonderful sights, smells, and sounds....

Logan enjoying his ginormous pretzel...

A nice cup of gluwein to warm us up...

Ella made a friend...

enjoying fries in the market...

another view of the cathedral...beautiful

Christmas trees everywhere!

It was like being in a Christmas card....

We took the earlier train back and went out to dinner....

Fun with my hat...

Who would have thought my hat was so fun?

Pete Pete's turn...

Such a great day....Absolutely perfect!

Day 3: Shopping, relaxing, and knitting

We had a little girls morning out (minus Ella who wanted to stay and play at home)

So GG, Nannie, and I went shopping for a few hours...

Thought Paul would like this seat next to his grill back in AZ....

I wouldn't mind having this giant chair by the pool...

Ella was ecstatic when we got back to the house because it was time to learn to knit...

What a wonderful teacher she had, her great-grandma

She listened and worked hard....

Logan was busy eating and playing with his new friend, snowy

Look at her first project... a cute purse! Wonderful job!

Logan's project was the picture for Muntz which was proudly displayed in the kitchen...

Another wonderful day....

An early night preparing for our adventure the following day!

Day 2: to Roermond, Holland

We love that in just a short 15 minute drive we could be in Roermond, Holland.....

Such a beautiful place with great shops and beautiful buidings....

And my most FAVORITE bakery in the whole world!!!!

The cherry turnover is ahhhhhh-mazing!!! (kersh flappen)

And onto the shops and my hubby found his favorite...

Fries in Holland...Logan was hooked too!

And ice cream....this place is amazing!

The cathedral...

Lunch time...loving the straw stache'

Nannie and Logan....

Loved all the Christmas trees everywhere...This one was GIANT

Family pic in the square...

earlier they even had a farmer's market with Paul's favorite salesman selling 'juicy, juicy oranges!"

Quick stop at Albert-Hein on the way home...a great grocery store

Love all the different fun foods you can find

Did I say how happy we were that we made this trip????
And even better....GG and Pete Pete arrived this night....

First Day in Germany

Nannie and Muntz had one more day of work before their holiday so once we finally woke up (quite late) we decided to head to the school to their carnival....

We bundled up and off we went....

Here is a pic of the kids in front of Nannie and Muntz's house...

Ella by the German sign for school....Schule (shoo-la)

And Logan...

We found Muntz at his table....

This was Logan's favorite game and he was quite good at it...

He won about 6 candy necklaces...

Ella got her nails done nice and fancy...

more games...

Back from our walk....

So happy to be there....Ella taking full advantage of a foot rub from Muntz...

Love her expression

Sunday, February 17, 2013

2 flights and 13 hours later...

We made it!!!!

We left Phoenix at 9pm and arrived in Germany at 6pm (10am our time) the following day...

The kids did great and we all slept for most of the first flight...

Heathrow airport in London was another story!

After landing, we had to take a bus to another terminal, a tram, and THEN we got held up in security for a bag check after waiting in a super long line with only one lane open for bag checks!!! We were watching the time tick by and knew our gate was closing in just a couple of minutes...

Paul told the man who was searching the bags and he said he would ask the others waiting to see if they minded if our bag was checked next so we could make our flight and they all said, "YES, they minded"!!!! are you kidding me????

At that time, I went to stand in the British airways desk line to see if he could call the gate and tell them we were coming....guess what he said, "No, I can't"!!!!

AHHHHH!!!! Paul finally got through the check and took off running!!! I was just behind, running with the stroller, carry ons, and the 2 kids...Ella was in tears because she wanted to get to Germany...

After a 5 minute run and 2 flights of stairs (super fun with a stroller), we made it to the gate to meet Paul and the nice crew who had waited for us!!! Thank goodness!!!!

We hurried onto the plane wiping our sweat and collapsed into our seats for the hour flight!

We all couldn't have been more excited then to finally see Nannie and Muntz waiting for us in the Dusseldorf airport...

All of our bags, carseat, stroller, and the 6 of us filled up 2 cars as we headed to Nannie and Muntz's house!!! Yipeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!