Week 133: Visitors & The Beginning of Christmas Season

We had a super busy week as Burger, Heather, and their family were still visiting with us. We made the most of our time and visited more Christmas markets and collected even more mugs.

Monday, we were all exhausted from our weekend in Luxembourg and Strasbourg. Luckily, I was able to work from home while everyone else was resting. We had a huge spaghetti dinner at the house and then the adults headed to the Esslingen Christmas market while Brooklyn and Ryan babysat.

The Esslingen Christmas Market is half traditional market, and half a medieval market. It had rained heavily earlier in the evening, which meant that luckily, the market had barely any people, where last year it was so crowded, you could barely walk. By the time we arrived though, it had stopped so we were able to stay dry at the same time.

We walked around and listened to the medieval bands, did some shopping, and enjoyed a couple of gluweins and hot chocolates. I collected three more mugs during the evening!

Tuesday, it started snowing again and for the first time this year, accumulated a little bit. Everyone was ready to get out of the house though so Matt and the Cusin family headed into downtown Stuttgart and visited the Stuttgart Museum of Illusion. Our family actually tried to visit the Museum back during Covid when you needed a reservation but we were turned away due to it being overbooked. Matt and the group really enjoyed it; it only took about an hour to see and they came away with a lot of good pictures. Afterwards, they visited the huge Milaneo Mall and the Stuttgart Library, which are both right next door. It was a great afternoon that we hope to be able to repeat as a family sometime soon.

Tuesday night after a huge taco dinner, and despite the now, bitter cold, we headed back into Stuttgart and walked the Stuttgart Christmas Garden at the Wilhema Zoo. It was freezing so we had most of the place to ourselves. We stayed warm by drinking gluwein and hot chocolate and despite starting a little late, we managed to reach the end by closing time at 9:30.

Wednesday, Matt and Burger visited both the Mercedes and the Porsche Museums. Big accomplishment to get through both in one day! Of course, neither took any pictures!

Wednesday night, it was still bitter cold, but we visited the small Christmas market in our town, Boblingen. Since it is a smaller market, it is only held over one weekend each Christmas season, usually the first weekend of Advent. The past couple of years, that has fallen over Thanksgiving while we’ve been out of town. We lucked out this year though since Thanksgiving was early and since we are here, we got to attend for the first time. The market was so cute and was fairytale themed. Multiple parts of the market were decorated according to Brothers Grimm fairytales such as Rapunzel and Hansel & Gretel. There was live music and lots of stalls run by local organizations selling food and drink. It was a great night!

On Thursday, Burger, Heather and the kids were able to visit the Grinch on base during the day.

That evening, we headed to Hohenzollern Castle, about an hour south in the Swabian Alb. Our family has visited before, but never at Christmas. The castle was decorated on the inside with beautiful Christmas decor and a different themed tree in each room. Outside, was a small Christmas market, and a light display that played along to music. While we were visiting, it began to snow. It was so pretty, almost magical.

Friday, we woke up to four inches of snow and it continued to snow throughout the day. We knew that snow had been a possibility in the forecast, but it had all but been called off the night before for our area so it was a pleasant surprise. We hung around the house while the Cusin family prepared to go home the following day.

Friday evening, we headed back on base to visit the Frosty Fest. At the fest, they had set up food and gluwein stands, as well as market stalls set up for small businesses to sell their crafts. We ended up with so many mugs! One thing Frosty Fest did not get right was that you received a brand new mug with every purchase of gluwein. You could not turn in the old one for your deposit back and got no discount for not using it. As much as I love collecting mugs, I did not need 6 Frosty Fest ones, come on guys! LOL! It was pretty cold so we ended up stopping in the Bowling Alley to visit with Santa, and then the kids stayed and played a game of bowling.

After the bowling was over, we returned home and had a birthday cake for Michael, who will turn seven next Tuesday.

Brooklyn was gone most of Friday as she visited Dachau Concentration Camp. All high schools in Germany are required to make a visit and while the US Schools are not subject to this rule, it is still honored. The 10th grade did a unit on the holocaust and read Night by Eli Wiesel before the visit. While it was not a ‘fun’ fieldtrip per se, Brooklyn said she learned a lot and felt the meaning of being there. And again, while it wasn’t ‘fun,’ we are glad that there are opportunities like this to learn so close to where we live.

Saturday, we said our goodbyes and returned the Cusin family back to the Stuttgart Train station so they could begin their journey home. It was an awesome visit for us; we really enjoyed catching up and showing our friends around our temporary home.

Brooklyn had left at 2:30am to catch the bus for the high school’s first wrestling match in Vilseck, almost three hours away in Bavaria. She actually asked us to come to see her in action and to meet the other managers and players so we of course, could not pass up this opportunity. As Ryan offered to stay home and care for the dogs, Matt and I headed out after we got our friends on the train. Due to the snowfall in Bavaria, it took a little while to get there. We stayed and watched several matches and caught up with some friends who are parents of some of the wrestlers.

The match was still going at 5pm but starting to wind down so Matt and I got back on the road to head home. We made a pit-stop in Rothenburg ab der Tauber as their Christmas Market had just opened that day and we wanted to check it out since we were in the neighborhood.

Rothenburg is known as being one of the most charming towns in Germany with its completely intact medieval wall and completely half-timbered old town. It definitely lived up to its reputation, even though the market was relatively small. We did manage to get some new gluwein mugs, although we were disappointed that they had the years of 2018 and 2019 printed on them. It was freezing, actually below freezing at about 20F, but we still managed to do a little window browsing at the stalls, picked up some snacks, and listened to some carolers before heading back to the car and towards home. We were home by 10 and in time to meet Brooklyn’s bus at the high school.

We fully intended to rest on Sunday, but when we woke up, we saw the sun shining and a beautiful blue sky so decided we needed to get out of the house. Sometimes the rainy days are a blessing in disguise as they end up being the best times to catch up on rest and things around the house. We decided to take advantage of the beautiful day, even though the temps were still in the 20s.

We headed a short ways into the Black Forest, less than an hour from our house, and visited the Christmas Market in Calw. This market is one of the smaller ones so is only open for the one weekend. We have driven through Calw several times, but never actually stopped. We were pleasantly surprised by an adorable town with a fully half-timbered old town. The market was also great; there were so many hand made items, while the bigger markets have switched to more mass-made items. The food and drinks were so good as well- Matt and I had steak sandwiches for our lunch and then spiced eggnog. We had seen the whole thing in about two hours and headed back home.

We ended the weekend by watching Home Alone, putting up our own Christmas decorations, and an early bedtime!