Biosphere House in Dahn

We went on a final road trip in June with the Plumleys before they headed back to America. In Dahn we visited the treetop path, some 20-40 meters above the ground. At the end there was a slide that took us to the bottom. We followed this up with a walk and some lunch. I managed to injure myself trying to see how far I could sprint in 10 seconds. As my Dad said, I am not 19 any more. :-(

Flowers in the Meadow

A big ol' dragonfly

We found mounds of ants!

Stacey and Andrea watch the kids sliding

Wending through the treetops

Stairs down from the viewing platform

The view from the top

A long way down!

Stacey

Pete and Noah

This week was the Viking festival in Adventon near Osterburken. Adventon is a permanent medieval village, where the founders want to make a historical village to use as a site for events like these.


Hungry peasants, Ursula, Kathryn, Aiden, and Noah.



Here come the Vikings! Their leader announced that they were there to sieze domestic animals, such as women and children.



The melee! After the last man was left standing, he would annouce that the warriors were not yet ready for Valhala. He would then command the dead to rise. The process would then repeat itself.

Playmobil Park in Nuremberg

We went here with the Plumleys.


Kids behind the waterfall.


Stacie climbing around.


Ursula descending into the maze.

A visit to Auerbach with the Plumleys!


The Odenwald


The view over the Rhine Valley

Here at the end of the month, we took time out to celebrate Thanksgiving. We celebrated with the Ami-Stammtisch at SAP. This year we had enough vegetables and more importantly, enough pumpkin pie. Unfortunately Andrea and I both came down with colds. The next day kicked off the beginning of the Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas market) season.

Both Andrea and I had to drag ourselves out of bed and work for two hours setting up the booth for the PTA of the kids' school. We had enough time go home and warm up before we had to drive out there again and watch Ursula perform in her Orff Ensemble with her classmates. We grabbed a quick bite to eat at the bakery and came home in time to drive Kathryn back to the Weihnachtsmarkt for her to take her turn at booth duty at the PTA booth.

Sunday we celebrated the 1st Advent. We invited over the Plumleys. We sang a few Christmas songs, ate some cookies, drank some tea, and had some live performances. Ursula on her guitar, Kathryn on the recorder, and Pete on his trombone.

Halloween was pretty low-key this year. Ursula went on a night-time walk with us. Kathryn met with some of her friends and had some actual success at trick-or-treating. I carved a sad-looking pumpkin.

We also went to the Viking exhibit in Speyer with the Plumleys and had a very nice time.