Narrensprung 2016

On Saturday there was a "parade" through our town called "Narrensprung"...we had seen the banners advertising it and had no idea what it was about or what to expect, but it was SO fun!

There were over 40 groups that danced/marched/played in this "parade"...They travel the country leading up to Lent as a way to celebrate before Lent begins..there was tons of music and each group had a saying that they would shout and the crowd was supposed to shout a certain response back. They threw confetti everywhere, Mary playfully got a bunch in her face and Chris got some shoved down the back of his shirt!! This stuff was everywhere, seriously...just when I think I've swept and vacuumed the last of us up more shows up and our house. We were all covered! Our hair, shoes, everything!! 

 The costumes were incredible, we were a little worried that Mary and Emily would be scared of the detailed wooden masks, but overall they were pretty chill about it...the candy that these freaky masked characters were handing out definitely helped! ha!

 

                                      

Chris got "tagged" by one of the groups. The look on his face when someone was coming at him with bright red lipstick was PRICELESS!!!

The whole event was about an hour and a half long and we had so much fun with some friends we met from the kids school...it was such a fun Saturday afternoon!

Our trip home

We were So excited to fly home for a visit the day after Christmas. An international flight with four kids is about as fun as you think it is...but it is SO, SO worth it!!! 

I got to sit next to this cutie on our flight. She and I were in the middle row of the plane, Chris and Mary were a row ahead of us on our left and Allie and Michael were side by side about two rows in front of me on my right...Yeah, not ideal but when you're flying as a party of 6 and you're outnumbered by kids you do the best you can. I was crazy impressed with how well Allie and Michael did on the plane and it was so amazing to have two kids totally independent. I know every flight will be different, so I considered this one a solid win!

We flew to Detroit and spent the first few days at my parents house. My sisters were both there when we arrived and the kids could hardly wait for the car to stop moving before they jumped out and loved on everyone! Allie and Gemma were the best, I wish I would have gotten a video of them seeing each other, but I swear my heart will never forget. It was precious!

We arrived on Monday night and jet lag was ROUGH...the whole house was awake by 3:00am Tuesday morning...my poor parents!!! We all slowly got adjusted to the time change, but we had lots of early mornings! 

Michael's birthday is December 28th and we had a big party for him at Hartfield Lanes in Berkley for all his buddies from school (and Allie's too!) 

We drove to Spring Lake to spend some time with Chris' family and ring in the New Year...the kids had a BLAST With their cousins...I don't know how I don't have any pictures from our time there!!! I'm usually pretty camera happy, but I think this trip I was just "happy" and enjoying all of our family time together...that being said, I'm kicking myself now and I will do better next time we're home!!

We tried to see as many people as we could, but there just wasn't enough time. The days flew by WAY too fast and we didn't have the chance to see some of our closest and dearest friends. Thank you everyone for being patient with us and understanding...the kids are finished with school for the summer on July 28th and don't go back to school until September 11th..we haven't booked our flights home yet, but I'm hoping to fly back to MI on July 29th. I don't want to waste a minute of our summer vacation!!! 

Christmas 2016

Happy New Year, everyone!!

We hope you all had a Merry Christmas and a wonderful break with your families...

We celebrated Christmas here in Germany with our little family, then flew back home to the US for a wonderful visit with family and friends!

We loved, loved, loved, loved, L O V E D getting to explore the different Christmas markets near us...it was so fun to walk around, shop, explore, and drink glühwein or two! How I had never heard of this delicious mulled wine is beyond me...I mean, if I get nothing else out of this entire experience I've been introduced to glühwein so I feel OK.

My mom was here when the markets began just after Thanksgiving. Our German tutor was so sweet and offered to take us to one in Ravensburg one afternoon/evening. 

My mom and I enjoying some glühwein in Lindau sans kids. 

We went back to Ravensburg another afternoon with friends to check out their special children's bakery where the kids got to make and decorate their own cookies. 

Waffles with powdered sugar at a Christmas market is a totally acceptable meal in my book when Chris is out of town...No-one was complaining 

Allie and Michael participated in their schools Christmas program and it was SO COOL to see them up there with everyone singing...we may not have understood a thing that was being said (hopefully we won't be saying that next year!!) Chris and I were BEAMING watching them...they were having so much fun...it was really awesome to see!!
The video (and sound!) quality isn't the best, I apologize.. but you get the idea. It was super cute to see our little American kids singing their hearts out in German.

We went right back to our apartment after this and kicked off our winter break. We had a super low key Christmas Eve just hanging out, baking cookies for Santa and making pizza that night while we watch a Christmas movie.

Christmas morning was so fun this year, and I hope I always remember the image our all four kids walking into our room in a single file line to wake us up. I'm not sure how many more years we'll have "believers" in the house...Allie will be 9 in March so I'm guessing we're on borrowed time with her and the whole "Santa" thing.

Santa brought sleds for everyone, as well as new backpacks for Allie and Michel. The kids here have these HUGE backpacks and our kids have had their eyes on them since they started school...I could not bring myself to purchase them, but when they asked Santa for one guilt totally got the best of us and we caved. It's amazing how something so small can mean so much, but they really wanted to have the same kind of backpack as everyone else. 

We had breakfast, then packed up for our road trip to Frankfurt. We flew out of Frankfurt the morning of the 26th and decided to drive the 4 hours (well, 5 hours if you're the Bailey family and need to add a 40 minute pit stop into the mix because #kids) on the 25th and stay at a hotel at the airport. In hindsight, flying out of Frankfurt did save us quite a bit, but it was SO BUSY...and having to drive the 4 hours back home after our overnight return flight was not something any of us were excited about...seriously, Chris is a rockstar. I passed out in the car and he got us all home in record time.

We're back to school and I'm trying to use to start of a new year to really get into a more structured schedule and routine...I feel like our first few months here just about survival and "figuring it all out"...we still have A LOT to figure out, don't get me wrong, but I want to keep the momentum moving and make this experience as positive as possible for our family!