I know I'm really late at posting this, but still wanted to share Jay's birthday festivities! His birthday always lands around Labor Day. This year, his birthday was on the Tuesday after Labor Day. Jay had a four day weekend before that so took a trip to Poland.
Jay and his friend, Jon (who has the same birthday), left Thursday night and drove to the border. They stayed in Dresden, Germany on Thursday and left early Friday morning to get to Krakow, Poland. The toured the city for a couple days, went to Auschwitz Concentration Camp, and then climbed the tallest mountain in Poland. It took them six hours to get up and six hours to get down! Both of them could barely move when they reached the bottom! I think they both enjoyed the trip, at least it sounded like it.
Taking a break on top of the mountain before climbing back down!
On Tuesday, their birthday, we met Jon, Angie, and the boys for supper and then came back here for birthday cake! Angie made a yummy chocolate cake! We put the number 25 in the middle and then added two candles to one side for Jon and four candles to the other for Jay. It wasn't a big celebration, but we had a good time together!
Next year is the big one! It's Jay's last year in his twenties! Yikes!!
This past weekend, Jay and I went on a bike riding wine tour. We went with a group of teachers through the vineyards of Volkach. We started in this small town, and traveled through a couple other towns. We took trails through the vineyards. They were all so full of dark, red grapes. The vines were absolutely georgous! I wish I would have stopped to take more pictures.
We stopped at a couple of wine fests along the way. It was a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon in Germany.
The day that Jay's parents flew out of Frankfurt to head back home, we flew out of Hahn to head in Edinburgh, Scotland. We had tickets that evening for the Military Tattoo.
We flew in at 4:00, and took a half hour bus ride into the city. Once we got off the bus, we walked to pick up our tickets for the evening. By this time it was raining. We pulled out our umbrellas and walked to find our hostel. Once we got there and got settled, we decided to venture back out. Before doing so, we bundled up with our sweatshirts and winter coats. We walked out the door and it was pouring! We went in to McDonald's to try and wait it out. We figured we might as well eat while we were there. After waiting for awhile, it wasn't letting up. So out in the rain we went.
We had a couple of hours to waste until the doors opened for the show. We went into a few stores to look around. Since we had already been to Edinburgh, there wasn't anything else we needed, but it was still fun to look. We then went to go get in line. By the time we got there, the line was already 200 meters long. They weren't allowing people to have their umbrellas up while in line for safety reasons. We didn't want to stay there and get soaked, so we went and hid under cover for another half hour.
The ran slowed down by the time we went in. And by in.... I mean inside the gates of an open air stadium. That means all the seats were wet. We planned ahead, knowing it rains a lot if Scotland, and brought towels and plastic bags with us. We put the towels in the plastic bags and then laid the bag on the seat. That helped to keep us dry and warm.
The show was pretty good. The bands were fun to watch as each put on a show. They didn't just come out, stand, and play. They all had a theme and people to watch. We were surprised there weren't more bands. The show was only an hour and a half long, but we were getting tired of sitting by then, and we were really cold!
As soon as it was over, we headed straight back to our hostel to go to bed. We slept in the next morning, thinking we had the day to waste. When we checked out at 10:00, I looked at our flight tickets to make sure we got to the airport in time. I thought our flight left at 5:00 that evening, but it really left at 11:30! Yikes!! We sprinted out of the hotel and down to the bus station. The bus was there and waiting thankfully. It took us a half hour to get to the airport and then we ran through the terminal. We got checked in and to our gate with plenty of time. We even sat for 20 minutes before getting on the plane! After we got there we couldn't help but laugh! For some reason we have done this a couple of times to ourselves. But, we have yet to miss our flight (knock on wood).
It was an extremely quick trip, as we were on Scottish ground for only 19 hours. It was great though. We have been wanting to go to the Tattoo for a couple years now, so glad we had the chance!
We barely had time to breath this summer, let alone keep you all caught up on our lives. It was an extremely busy few months!
Let’s recap, shall we! Our summer in a nutshell.... the short version!
We left for Portugal the day school got out. We stayed there for a few days enjoying the beaches.
We came home for three days before flying to Romania for a Club Beyond Mission Trip.
We traveled a bit on our own once we were done with Club Beyond. We wanted to see the rest of the country.
When we returned home, I thought that would be the start to my summer break. Not so much! While we were in Romania, we learned that Schweinfurt would be opening a new high school at the start of the school year. So during my week off, I worked at the school all day packing up classrooms.
At the end of the week, my friend Elizabeth came to stay with us for a couple days.
We dropped her off on our way to Luxembourg, where I ran the triathlon.
The next week I worked some more at school while Jay was at work, and we taught a CPR class together.
Then we watched some boys to finish out the week! All their parents came home on Tuesday night and I was headed to the airport Wednesday morning to pick up Jay’s parents.
We stuck around Schweinfurt for a couple of days, venturing out to some local towns.
On the 30th of July, we flew out for Italy, spending a week between Rome and Venice.
Rome (We were both sick as dogs on this day!)
Florence
Pisa
Cinque Terra
Venice
We returned back to Schweinfurt for two days before heading out to Paris. I went with Jay’s parents to visit the beautiful French city. Unfortunately, Jay had to stay home and work!
We came home for a day, repacked, and then headed to Berlin for the last weekend that his parents were with us. After learning a lot of German and American history, we came back home.
All four of us packed our bags once again. Curt and Nancy packed to head back to Iowa the next day. Jay and I packed our bags for Scotland. On Tuesday morning, we drove to Frankfurt early in the morning. We dropped off Curt and Nancy, watched them go through security and then headed to Hahn for our own flight. We flew to Edinburgh to watch the Military Tattoo. This is a huge band concert with military bands from around the world. We were in Edinburgh for a whole 19 hours before flying back.
I had to be at school the next day for an all day meeting. Came home from school, packed one last time for the summer as headed to Finland the next day. We took a four day trip to try to find Santa Clause. I saw a lot of look-a-likes! What I really wanted to see was a moose or a reindeer! Unfortunately we didn’t see anything, except for some beautiful barns!
We came back home on Monday night at , went to bed, and then both went to work the next morning. It was the start to the school year for me!
And that’s it folks! Time to get back to the real world again! This was a summer of a lifetime. I would catch myself complaining from being so tired, but really, what could I complain about! In two months, I visited seven countries!
We got a notice that we had a package at the post office the other day. Neither of us had ordered anything, so we're excited to see what it was. Jay picked it up and brought it home for me. He was nice enough to not open it since it had my name on it, from mom and dad. I was super excited to see this when I opened it...
Sent straight from the Iowa State Fair! They know that I love salt water taffy! Mom even knows my favorites and took out the ones I don't like.
