Tis' the Season

We've been busy this past week. It started out with the cookie baking and then we had some friends over to make gingerbread houses (a first for us). This weekend we went back to Indiana to have our Christmas gift exchange and dinner with my family and also with my Dad's whole side of the family. It made for a busy weekend, but lots of fun with family!! And then tonight we went out to Clifton Mills with the other Hubers here in Ohio to see the lights. Very pretty!!

Christmas Cookies....

I've never really baked cookies for Christmas before. I'm not all that great at baking in general. I thought Allie might enjoy it though, so I decided to give it a go this year. We just stuck to super simple cookies. Here are some fun pictures of Allie from this morning.

Visit with Ho Ho

Our first attempt to see Santa Claus (or Ho Ho as Allie calls him) equalled two crying little girls. Our second attempt was a little bit better. I sort of bribed Allie by telling her she needed to be a good example for her newest little friends, Bethany and Melody. Then, if she was good, we could go to Build A Bear afterwards. It worked!! Avery, on the other hand, was still scared to death of Santa. The only reason she's not crying is because the guy taking the picture actually did a good job of distracting her.

Oh Christmas Tree

On Saturday we headed over to the Greene, an outdoor mall, to see Santa Claus. Our girls wanted nothing to do with him! Allie did see that her cousin, Abby, got a sucker and book for sitting on his lap so she at least walked up to him and grabbed a book from him. It was sooo cold outside that night, you can tell the girls were freezing in these pictures.
I guess going out to see Santa and his reindeer finally got us in the Christmas spirit because we put up our Christmas tree, lights and decorations up over the weekend. Allie was really excited to put up the ornaments.....Avery just wanted to take them down.

Europe Trip - DAY TEN

Our last day of the trip! We contemplated skipping these places and just staying at Ramstein another night, but decided not to in the end. We still skipped quite a few places this day because we slept in and Derek really wanted to get to Bastonge where the Battle of the Bulge was before sunset (and we didn't even take any pics there). We really didn't take many pictures at all this day because we were just ready to get home! It was a fun trip, but too much traveling and not enough relaxing. Next time we'll just have to pick a favorite spot and spend a week there.

{Trier, Germany}
Roman Baths
Porta Nigra

{Luxembourg City, Luxembourg}
Luxembourg Cemetery where General Patton is laid to rest

{Brussels, Belgium}
Town Center - they were putting this tree up the first day we were here!

Europe Trip - DAY NINE

More Romantic Road
{Harsburg, Germany}
Harsburg Castle
{Nordlingen, Germany}Remember the scene in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory where they are flying above the town after bursting through the glass elevator? Well, this is the town that's in the movie!
this is how you drive in to these little towns
{Dinkelsbuhl, Germany}very cute little town!
{Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Germany}This is another small town that still has all of its walls up that are surrounding it. It was kind of neat to see how they probably would have protected themselves from attacks and such. This town has a lot of charm and is very touristy....reminded us of Brugge in Belgium a little bit.
one of the walls
you can climb up and walk around the outer boundaries of the wall
view from up in the wall
this pic cracks me up....a bratwurst lunch!
prisoner area

{Wurzburg, Germany}Last stop on the romantic road!
Fortress Marienburg
{Ramstein Air Base, Germany}Our resting place for the evening. So nice to be able to park for FREE and get on the internet for FREE and only pay $37 for a room!

Europe Trip - DAY EIGHT

GERMANY
Most of our stops in Germany are along the Romantic Road. We chose this route because it takes us along the countryside of Germany. Being a country guy and gal at heart, we thought this would be ideal for us. We were sooo right! It's so beautiful out here with the winding roads and grassy hills and mountainsides of the Alps. A lot of the towns we go through along the route still have their gated and walled entrances that were used for protection back in the medieval times. Pretty neat stuff!

{Schwangua, Germany}
We spent a good amount of time here. This is where Mad King Ludwig II lived during his childhood and later he built a castle of his own here, the famous fairytale like castle, Neuschwanstein.

Hohenschwangau ~ childhood castle




Neuschwanstein castle





views from the castle
Mary's Bridge - where we were standing when we got our picture taken in front of the castle


After this we decided to divert from the romantic road and head up to Dachau, Germany where the first Nazi Concentration camp was.

{Dachau, Germany}
We got to the concentration camp with about 40 minutes until closing time. I know Derek would have loved to have spent more time there, but I also know he's grateful for the opportunity and time we did have to be there. Derek's grandfather was part of the brigade that was there to free the prisoners.
Freedom Through Work
gate into the camp

{Munich, Germany}
This was our resting place for the night. We actually had to drive back down south a little bit from Dachau. It was worth it to get Dachau in that night though....and allowed more time for us on the next days travels. Our hotel here used to be an apartment complex so our room was HUGE. Very nice!