Heidelberg

Over Memorial Day weekend, Joe and I wanted to go explore Heidelberg.  Our kids did not want to go walk around another boring town, looking at churches and castle ruins.  What?!  Whatever, we went with out them.  Who needs dumb kids anyway?  JUST KIDDING!

We did, however, enjoy our day sans kids.  Heidelberg is another really beautiful German city.  There used to be a military base there not that long ago.  Some of the people in our ward were at that base until it closed, and then moved here.  We thought we would have really liked living there ourselves.  Heidelberg is a popular tourist spot, so there were a LOT of tourists there.  We heard several different languages, and Joe found some people speaking Arabic to practice with, and then some Spanish speaking people - he always finds people to practice with ;)

We went straight to Heidelberg Castle first.  It's part-way up the mountain from the town, so there are some great views from there of the town and the Neckar River.  We tried hiking up first, but kept hitting dead ends.  Then we stumbled into the tram, and took that up instead.

 The castle, built from a former fortress in the 16th and 17th century, is mostly in ruins.  It used to have big beautiful gardens surrounding it (now just big grassy areas).  Both the castle and gardens were mostly destroyed in the Thirty Years Wars, and only somewhat restored.

 Mark Twain wrote about Heidelberg castle, specifically the split turret (pictures below) in A Tramp Abroad - "A ruin must be rightly situated, to be effective. This one could not have been better placed. It stands upon a commanding elevation, it is buried in green woods, there is no level ground about it....One of these old towers is split down the middle, and one half has tumbled aside. It tumbled in such a way as to establish itself in a picturesque attitude. Then all it lacked was a fitting drapery, and Nature has furnished that; she has robed the rugged mass in flowers and verdure, and made it a charm to the eye. The standing half exposes its arched and cavernous rooms to you, like open, toothless mouths; there, too, the vines and flowers have done their work of grace....Misfortune has done for this old tower what it has done for the human character sometimes – improved it."

 There are a couple of interesting things inside the castle.  First is an apothecary museum.  It was pretty interesting, but we couldn't take pictures, and there were no free samples ;)

Second is the Heidelberg Tun, the world's largest wine barrel.  It was built in 1751 to hold all the wine that was paid as taxes from the local wine growers.  It is about 23 feet high, 28 feet wide, and holds over 58,000 gallons of wine. It was really hard to get a picture of this thing.

 After the castle we went down to walk around the town.  There was the university library.

The Kornmarkt, with the Grain Market Madonna fountain in the middle, town hall to the side (right)...

...and a nice view of the castle above.

 The Church of the Holy Spirit in the Marktplatz.

 This church was started in 1398, but it took about 50 years to build.

 The tomb of Prince-Elector Rupert III (the founder of the church) and his wife (?) are inside.

 From the Marktplatz we went to the Old Stone Bridge (1788).  Below is the Medieval Bridge Gate.

 The Neckar River

 Beautiful view of the Old Stone Bridge, with Heidelberg Castle in the background.

We think the poor kids missed out on a fun day.  We showed them the pictures, but I don't think they regretted anything.  Kids.

So, so, so late

As you all may know, I'm always late in celebrating Joseph's birthday each year (poor kid), but usually I don't have that problem with the other kids (what's up with that?).  This year, however, Alex is getting the butt-end of the deal.  And it's super sad because this was a special birthday - the big 8!  He was supposed to get a big party.  Hasn't happened.  Madelyn reminds me almost every day (thanks for that Madelyn).  Alex doesn't remind me.  I'm not entirely 100% sure if he cares, or if he is just entirely 100% patient.  He's a good kid.  I might get around to it one of these days.  Maybe I could do a combined party for him and Madelyn, whose birthday is in about 1 1/2 months.  It could work.

Anyway, one thing that we did NOT forgot or put off was his baptism.  Yay us!  My dad and Lynn were here for it, and that was really special.  The whole family participated.  Joseph said the opening prayer, I played the piano and Lynn led the music, Dad gave a talk on baptism, Cora gave a talk on the Holy Ghost, Joe performed the baptism and confirmation, and Madelyn gave the closing prayer.  We had a good number of friends show up (which meant the world to me), and the only hiccup was when the Sister Missionaries accidently drained the font ALMOST all the way (BEFORE the baptism), because the water they had been filling it up with was too hot.  Oh well, we filled it up as much as we could (started a little late, and had both talks before the baptism).  You know, you can still baptize someone in water that only comes to your knees ;)

 

Here are 8 things to know about Alex:

1.  Alex loves Legos.  For his present Alex wanted Legos.  He got a helicopter set and got to work on it right away, and was VERY proud of the finished product.  My kids hate it when their Lego creations get destroyed.  They are like Lord Business in the Lego Movie, because I think they would rather super glue everything to keep it that way forever.

 

2.  Alex loves sandwiches.  Not like the kind you make at home, like peanut butter and jelly or tuna fish (although he will eat those).  I'm talking about the fancy kind.  For his birthday dinner he was feeling a little nostalgic and wishing he could have the giant sandwiches from Compagno's in California, like last year. He settled for Charley's Grilled Subs at the food court.

3.  According to Alex, though, his favorite food is BBQ ribs.  This is news to me, but I guess it's not too surprising if he's remembering his Uncle Antoine's ribs ;)

4.  Alex is theatrical.  Another exciting thing that happened right after his birthday was that he was in a short play.  Alex was in the Drama club this past quarter, and they put on Frozen Part 2.  He played the assistant to the prince.  It was what you would expect from a drama club at an elementary school - I could barely make out anything they said, and most of the kids didn't know their lines anyway - but hey, it was a fun opportunity for Alex, and I was glad to be there to support him. (He's on the left in both pictures, with a black shirt and dark jeans).  He's definitely not shy about being on stage.

 

5. This year Alex has started to think that he's too big for my kisses....sometimes.  Sometimes he'll still come to me and want to cuddle, or give me a kiss and a hug (please don't let that ever stop!).  But even when he doesn't want to, I am always quick to tell him that because I gave him life, I will always be able to have as many kisses as I want.  And then I steal those kisses.  I think he thinks it's a game, and we both win ;) 

 

 6.  Alex says that he wants to be in the military when he grows up.  I just think he idolizes Joe ;)

 

7.  Alex continues to develop his artistic skills, and continues to impress me with his abilities.

 

8.  Alex, in one word - Happy!  He's just happy, and that makes me happy.  And I just love that kid to death!

Spring

My new favorite season is Spring.  I've always been partial to Fall, but Spring is winning me over here in Germany.  I was so excited to see the first signs of spring when we got back from Denmark, I started taking pictures of "weeds" as Cora calls them.

I'm sorry, but a flower is a flower (right?), and the lawns are covered with white, yellow, and purple ones.

The buds on the trees got me even more excited.

And I had no idea they would turn into this!

I bought planter boxes and flowers for my balcony as soon as I could, and after several weeks they still make me smile every time I look out the window.

Another great thing about spring - all the birds, which are plentiful around my house because of all the trees.  I was, however, surprised to see a lot of these.

They are Indian ring-necked parrots, not native to this area, but in the 60's a few of these imported birds escaped captivity and made their home in Wiesbaden park.  Since then, they've multiplied and spread out.  This is a crappy picture, but they are really pretty.  Here's a video of one (It's long - all parrot videos are long.  I bet you didn't know that.  I know that now because I was looking up parrot videos, and they're all long.  It's not like you have to watch the whole thing.  I won't even care if you don't watch it at all.  But here it is anyway).

But I would say that one of the best parts of spring here (other than the weather) are these beautiful, bright fields of yellow that you see all over the countryside.

At first we thought it was mustard, but apparently it is rapeseed, which is used to make canola oil, animal feed, and bio diesel.  Germany is the 5th largest producer of rapeseed in the world.  In any case, it is BEAUTIFUL!

Yes Virginia, There is a Mood Ring

I know that the title of this blog post is confusing, but you'll have to wait until the very end to figure it out.  I chaperoned a field trip with Madelyn to the German Gemstone Museum and the Steinhaulenberg (Stone Mountain Haule) Gem Mine in Idar-Oberstein. Essentially, this post has a lot of pictures of rocks - consider yourself warned.

The museum houses over 10,000 exhibits, including rough rough and cut stones (every kind you can think of) and artfully crafted sculptures and engravings.

 

I loved the sculptures and engravings.

 Diamonds anyone?

They have two world record holders in the museum, which they seem to be pretty proud of.  First, the smallest cut balls of opal

And second, the largest cut ball of stone (Jasper), or at least it was at one point

 

 

 The kids got to do a craft after the tour of the museum.  Madelyn made a necklace.

Then we were on to the mine, the only European gemstone mine that is open for visitors.  This mine was the reason for the foundation of the Idar-Oberstein gemstone manufacturing, but commercial stopped in 1870, and now the mine is dedicated to hobby mineralogists and gemstone lovers from all over the world. The main things mined from here were rock crystals, amethysts, jasper and smoke quartzes.  There's a lovely walk to the mines, and then a tour inside.

 

 Hard hats are a really good look for me, said nobody ever.

  Underground lake/pond

 Their largest amethyst deposit.  Unfortunately it's behind glass now because people kept reaching up and breaking off pieces of it.  So rude.

 Dinosaurs Foot

 Fern garden

 I thought this was interesting - Miners knew where to dig for more because the deposits were mostly tear-drop shaped, and the pointed end would point to more.

 These are some of the chisels that were used.

At the souvenir shop, Madelyn chose a mood ring, as did over half of her classmates.  When I explained to some of the kids that mood rings are actually a reflection of body temperature, rather than a dictation of their mood, you would have thought that I had told them that Santa Claus wasn't real.  I'm not kidding.  Dirty, dirty looks.   I hope I didn't ruin their whole fieldtrip experience (palm to forehead).  Oh well, I liked it.

And speaking of rocks, Madelyn has started a rock collection, and it has grown rather quickly.  Rocks, people.  Not cool stones/geodes/gems/etc. that you buy at a shop.  Just plain old rocks she gets outside, all of which look the same to me.  I don't know what she sees in them, but I let her keep them in an old tin Hello Kitty lunchbox that she has.  I hope she grows out of this soon.  The box is only so big.