Belgian Beer and Margraten Cemetery

Karen and I recently made a trip to my favorite Belgian Beer store and took a detour to Margraten, I've been wanting to go for some time. It was a nice, bright sunny day, but still quite cold so we didn't stay long! The sun was so beautiful over the countryside, we just had to stop and get a picture.

The cemetery was sobering, to see all those white crosses and read the names. We walked through to the end and back, but I'd love to go back sometime when it's warmer and just walk around. It's so quiet and it really makes you think about the sacrifices that are made by the military. I'm glad those brave men and women are honored in Europe still. It's too bad we don't show them that much honor in our own country sometimes!

We ate lunch at the Mother Goose Restaurant, my favorite!! I just love their cheese plate, except for the smelly cheese. We didn't go in the smoke house afterward because there were some teenagers hanging around and it would have ruined it. Karen is such an easy/fun travel companion, we'll be doing a lot more in the weeks to come as it warms up!

KARNEVAL 2010

What a great party at Karen's in Langbroich! The amazing thing this year at the parade was a leprechaun float with two male leprechaun's doing something that leprechaun's shouldn't do. Even the German's were caught off guard and were covering their

kids eyes. You'll have to call or write to me if you want to know what it was, it's not appropriate for this family friendly blog!

We all posed in front of this giant tire, it seemed like a great idea at the time. Just so you know, the bottle of alcohol in my hand was not for me to drink, I was pouring it for the members of the parade who had shot glasses around their necks. It's pretty normal for kids as young as 12 to be part of the parade and drink beer. By Sunday night at my town they were all drunk and exhausted!

Jim and Rich decided to join the Pippi Longstocking group for a little dancing to Cotton Eyed Joe. They twisted and twirled right down the road! Nice dancing guys:) It has been amazingly cold and wintery here. Even my neighbor said she hasn't seen this much snow since she was a kid! Last year I don't think I even wore a coat for the parade and this year we had gloves and hats. I was definitely tired the next day though and only stayed out for my town's parade until I had greeted all my neighbors, then headed home to hot tea and warm kitties!!

Polish Pottery Trip

Amber and I had to try to make the most of her last few months in Germany. We both had been wanting to make the trip to Poland to shop for pottery and see the sights. She found the most amazing guesthouse to stay at, the Blue Beetroot. The story goes: there was a time that alcohol was banned. farmer of this place used to smuggle alcohol underneath the beets that he took to market. One day the cart went out of control and rolled into the lake, beets, alcohol and all. Occasionally, a beet will float to the surface and magically it is soaked through with alcohol. Regardless of the truth of the myth, it was a beautiful place to stay. I'm not sure I've every shopped so much in my life! We must have gone to about 7 different shops. Most of them had new stuff, but some were very close in their patterns and it was a bit boring after awhile. That didn't matter though because we just had so much fun together filling my entire care with pottery. I even had the chance to speak Korean with a couple of women who were shopping! I listened in and once I determined they were speaking Korean I snuck in the few words I knew....it was so cool to speak Korean in Poland!

On our way home we stopped at Buchenwald concentration camp. It was a bit out of the way, but we both agreed it would be worth it and boy was it ever. It was extremely sobering to walk where so many had died. It was also exhausting because all the exhibits were in German and I had to spend so much time translating. We finally just stuck to looking at the pictures. The ironic part was all the letters that were written in English were translated into German, but not vice versa. At Buchenwald the most moving aspect is the zoo that the Nazi soldiers built just outside the fence.

The "prisoners" were a zoo on one side and the animals were a zoo on the other side. The animals were probably fed better when you consider the deplorable conditions the people were forced to live in. Also, it is situated on a hill so it was impossible the villagers below didn't know what was going on above them. Yet when the camp was liberated and the villagers were force to walk through, many of them were astonished at what they saw.

Beja, Portugal

Okay, I know I'm bad about updating and this is actually from quite awhile ago, but I had the opportunity to go to Beja, Portugal and it was gorgeous! It's not a place we normally get to go for trips so I jumped at the chance to be on the crew. We had great missions and even better freetime. We just walked downtown, although it was quite a hike.

We visited a castle in the center of town....I know, how amazing, a castle in Europe! It was cool because you could see from the top of it and there was a bull fighting ring down the street. Also, there was a Geo cache sight on top of the castle as well. I'm not really into the geocaching scene, but one of the guys was so we went to find it. Apparently there were quite a few in the area, but I only found the one. I was, of course, there with a really great group of people who were willing to take lots of pictures and go see all the historic sites with me!

Whenever we fly we practice Emergency Procedures so we will know what to do if the real thing ever happens. We decided to have a photo shoot. This is what our oxygen masks look like. With them on we are capable of still talking on the radio so even if we have a fire or loss of pressure we can still safely control aircraft. Not that we ever would have to do this in real life of course, but it's important that you practice it as often as possible so if the time EVER comes that you need to do it for real you won't hesitate.

Luxembourg

As we headed into PCS season we had to ramp up our trips and tours.  One of the places on many peoples list is Luxembourg, so Rhonda, Amber, Ryan and I decided to take a weekend and go.  Okay, you all know I'm very type-A, but I really dropped the ball on this trip and did hardly any prior planning except to make sure the GPS was charged and ready to go.  I did look up Luxembourg on the internet the day before we left and read it is the place to go vacation after your vacation.  That was definitely the case!

When we arrived we did a quick tour of the city.  I wrote down some sites worth seeing and we just followed the signs and enjoyed the sunlight.  At one point though Amber bit the dust on a curb and we decided that was enough for us!  When we booked the hotel it made it sound like it was really close to downtown...not so much.  It was out in the middle of nowhere, but we were tired so we quickly checked in and got settled.  We went out to get dinner at a great Chinese restaurant and then settled in for a little movie action on the laptop, the bed just fit us!

The next day we had a bit more energy and I was able to pose for this shot.  For future reference it is better to just follow through with a jump shot like this because it's really hard on the wrists to stop!  This gate was so quaint and, at least for me, a favorite spot to walk through to enter downtown.  We had no agenda and it was nice to just wander around, enjoy the weather and people watch.

The absolute only priority we had on the entire trip was to make it to the American Cemetery.  I am so glad we did, it was really moving and sobering to be there among the graves of so many brave men and women.  One of the reasons we made sure to visit was because we'd missed the chance to visit the cemetery in Normandy and we wanted to get pictures for Chuck.  I can't say I know how it would feel to just anybody to visit this place, but for me I was extremely moved and I could feel the sacrifices they made in their fight for freedom.  It was just one more reminder that I am where I am supposed to be.

Chief Chuck

Right after the Czech trip we celebrated Chuck making Chief, what an accomplishment!!  I'm so proud to be your friend and I know you will be the most awesome Chief ever!!  I know Amber will be a great Chief's wife too, she's demonstrated over and over that all those young wives just flock to her for guidance.  I hope you guys don't forget the "little people" as you move on!

 The kids will have a lot to live up to, but you girls continuously surprise me with you maturity.  You are great daughters no matter how often your dad is able to say it and Tate is growing up to be just as obnoxious....I mean great as his daddy!

Turnov, Czech Republic Service Project 2009

 

My first Club Beyond Service Project definitely convinced me I want more!!  While the awfully  long bus certainly left something to be desired, even it was not all that horrible with the great people on board.  Here you can see Ryan, Stephanie and Mark "enjoying" the ride.  That is NOT 5 O' Clock shadow on Ryan and Mark has the ability to sleep anywhere, anytime.

     

We did all kinds of work in the Czech Republic from teaching English, playing with preschoolers and tearing out bushes, to running a carnival for about 2000 schoolkids! 

         

This little girl was at the preschool, the kids were so cute and I had no idea I would need so many games to fill 1 and 1/2 hours of playtime!  We did ring around the rosy, parachute play with balls and duck, duck, goose.  The kids showed us a version of duck duck goose they play with a little stick.  In the Czech Republic, during Easter, the boy goes around with a braided switch and hits the girl.  If the girl likes him she gives him a sweet treat, like chocolate or candy, if the girl doesn't like him she throws cold water on him!!  The kids would carry the switch around and lightly hit another kid, then chase them around.  Also, they gave us cake and tea while they played a little chick game where the teacher is the momma hen and has to hunt for her little chicks:)

   The second photo is at a castle we visited, Stephanee and Casey are "confessing" to Paul, the most awesome sound guy in the whole world!!

   After the preschool we spent some time on ESL classes with 15 year olds.  It is actually quite difficult to get teenagers to talk, no matter what country they are from.  We had an interesting time with one of our translators who spoke better Germany than English so I had to translate English to German so she could translate it to Czech!  Bethany, Casey, Stephanee and Erika did an awesome job even though it was well outside their comfort zone.

        

On one day we did a short version of our normal "club" night, the picture on the left is Chris, Caleb and Will demonstrating the proper stance for Hunter, Bear, Ninja.  On our last day we were mostly outside and in the church that sponsored us.  In the right picture Bethany and Casey are carrying away sticks from the bush from hell we pulled out of the ground.  The pic on the bottom is Pam and Erin's group with Catherine, Jillian, Ari and Sierra working their tails off at the Carnival.

All in all the trip was amazing, exhausting, rewarding and fulfilling at the same time.  I will do another post of just some more pictures later, but you can tell from these that we had a blast!