I love how this picture shows typical German patchwork countryside with small red roofed villages here and there.
So funny…
Ryan, Megan, Emily’s friend - Ally, Emily and Matt 
After the castle we decided to check out a nearby town. Love this courtyard, tower and house… and I love Field Trip Thursdays!
Emily and Makenzie met each other in primary last summer and both ended up in Ms. Brown’s 2nd grade class this last year. They became pretty good friends pretty quick. They just loved that they had each other all day everyday. By midway through the year Ms. Brown had nicknamed them “Giggles and Chuckles”. If they even looked at each other they’d erupt into hysterical 8 year old giggles. It was pretty contagious to watch, but I’m sure it got kind of old at school all day long. Ms. Brown was a good sport to put up with them.
It wasn’t long before they were BEST BEST friends. {They are certain they knew each other in heaven.} Unfortunately our time in Germany only overlapped one short year and Makenzie just moved back to the states. We had Makenzie over for some extra long - extra fun play dates during her last couple of weeks, but they still didn’t prepare these girls to say goodbye. After many many ‘last’ goodbye hugs we dropped Makenzie off at the guesthouse for their last night in Germany. Both of their eyes were watering when we turned to go. Then Emily cried the whole way home. She said she couldn’t remember ever being this sad.
Sadly we are getting used to the hurt of leaving or being left by good friends. It just comes with being in the military. But instead of ‘losing friends’ we like to think that we’re collecting friends. And right now, Emily has a beautiful new one to add to her collection. Thank you for being Emily’s very best 2nd grade buddy. We miss you already, Makenzie!
Friday Chris was pre-call and so he had the day off. We caravanned with the Chuggs 2 hours to get to the Playmobil Park. The kids were so excited. We haven’t been since exactly a year ago! The pirate ship section is always a big hit. I just love German parks.
For lunch we ate at one of the cafeteria style Playmobil restaurants. The bill seems astonishingly high, until you realize they’ve charged you a deposit for each plate, bowl and trays. We made sure we didn’t lose any and counted them all before taking them all back. It’s pretty smart, actually. Everybody cleans their own table really well. There was lots of food to choose from. I had delicious chicken with apple sauce and fried potatoes. Most of the kids ate pizza, pasta or fries, with a fork of course.
With our energy back at full we galloped right on over to the Wild West.
We hadn’t seen this section last time we came. Like everything else, it was adorable. There were tons of kids mining for gold in the sand area. Real ‘fake’ pieces of gold that you had to search for and collect in your gold chest. Mostly my kids were happy to go down the slides, run from animal to animal, and ask for pictures to be taken by this or that.
The Noah’s Ark section had a ton of water tables and all water Playmobil toys available for the kids to play with. All the kids loved it. Matthew would not turn around or look up once. Too busy!!
Dino Land had ropes ladders and rope bridges and waterfalls… oh, and dinosaurs to climb all over.
Maybe Cole is mad because he wishes he could be naked like all the other little German kids we saw playing in the water. They snuck into some of my pictures… but I won’t post them.
