We’re combining two weeks into one because we’ve been so busy, but it’s also been so quiet. Matt’s had a challenging couple of weeks at school and work has been really busy for me. I also had to finish testing for my CDFM certification for work and I spent every extra minute studying and then taking the three proctored exams. The kids have been busy at school and with their clubs.
Brooklyn’s been busy with NJHS fundraising for money and supplies for Ukraine. The whole base here has been doing so much fundraising and collecting of necessities for Ukraine, they’ve actually had to put limits on what can be donated because they don’t have the capability of shipping it all. It’s been really awesome to see so many people wanting to give to others.
Two Friday’s ago, we made an effort to finally get out of the house for dinner. We tried out a Chinese buffet that we’d driven past a million times on the way to the dog kennel. The place was HUGE! The buffets just kept going and going. They even had a Mongolian grill and a chocolate fountain (not together)! One thing we’ve noticed about all of these all-you-can-eat buffets is that they are also all-you-can-drink; including alcohol. And like the food buffet, there is a drink buffet where you serve yourself your own beers and wine- makes the expensive price a little more worth it!
Saturday, we ran errands all day. We had ordered oil for our home tank on Friday and they agreed to deliver Tuesday. In typical German fashion, they were early. They called about an hour before we had dinner plans on Saturday. Suffice it to say, the bill was ridiculous! We needed 3500 liters of oil so I’ll field anyone who wants to guess how much it was.
Luckily, we made it to our dinner-barely! We tried out a new (to us) Italian restaurant called Zum Rad in Sindelfingen. We had a great night, and probably too much wine.
This week is Fasching aka Karneval aka Mardi Gras in Germany. Typical Fasching celebrations include parades, costumes, and street parties. Most of the big celebrations have been cancelled this year due to covid but one of my friends sent us a link to a celebration in Rottweil, which is about an hour south of our house.
On Sunday, we made the drive down and walked around the town for about an hour. The town was very cute, but mostly empty. All of the activities were still posted on the town’s website so I figured it was a last-minute cancellation. We stopped and had pizza for lunch and decided to drive home. The town was really cute; the architecture is actually quite different from the usual half-timber so it was a welcome break. And, we had a good lunch so the trip wasn’t wasted. But-I did have to laugh when I saw peoples’ pictures of the Fasching parade on Facebook the following day, on Monday, because I had gotten the day wrong!!!
On the way out of town, we drove past the Rottweil tower, which turns out is an elevator test tower for Thyssen Krupp. The line to get in was over an hour long and Ryan hates tall buildings so Matt and I decided to save this for my Friday off.
Anddddd before we knew it, it was my Friday off and we were back at the Testturm. There is an elevator you can ride to the tallest observation deck in Germany. They play a couple of movies about the elevators that they are testing at the tower and it’s construction. It really was more interesting than I’m making it sound, but writing about an elevator tower is actually just as hard as it sounds.
The second best part of Friday was that I finally got my hair done after over two months!
Saturday, we did a guided tour of Esslingen with the same awesome tour guide I took a tour with in May. The tour was just as good this time and Matt and the kids finally got the see the beautiful city. It was freezing! But also still so sunny and pretty. Ryan kept warm walking about 10 miles further than us because he walked in circles around us the whole time lol. After the tour we had the most delicious, huge pizzas at L‘Osteria in Esslingen.
That night we headed back to our favorite steakhouse, Abaccos, for a group dinner with friends; followed by a couple biers at the Paulaner Brauhaus.
We wrapped up the weekend on Sunday at the mineral spa in our town, Mineraltherme Böblingen. It was amazing! Rooms and rooms of hot pools and saunas, and even more heated pools and whirlpools outside. We will definitely be back but unfortunately, you aren’t allowed to bring your phones in so you’ll have to check out the pictures at the link: https://www.mineraltherme-boeblingen.de/start
A couple of observations: First, everyone had clothes on, which is weird for Germany. But, a friend told me they have “textile-free” days and to watch out for them! Second, the locker room was co-ed, even with the kids. Luckily, no one was naked. It was very respectful, everyone did their changing in changing rooms that were between all the lockers, and we never felt uncomfortable (except when we had to ask for help because we forgot which locker we had put our stuff in). Third thing: all the women had men blow-drying their hair. Like, these husbands knew how to do it and obviously do it all the time. Where can I sign Matt up for these German-husband-hair-blow-drying classes?
The final activity of the weekend was dinner with my co-workers at Da Pippo’s in Dagersheim.
So there we have it: two weeks of a lot of eating out and a couple side trips in between. Next weekend, we were originally planning to go to Berlin but have decided to stay a little closer to home and are doing a trip to Nüremberg!
Gilcrests Abroad 