More random photos...

Cam - strawberry picking - I think his belly was quite full by the time we left. We joked that instead of weighing the empty buckets on the way in to pick, they should weigh the people, and then weigh them on the way out too :-)

I think Bailey was just as full :-)

Silly Mia

I always fear those kids who think that you can't get hurt on a trampoline - CAMDEN!!!

My first ever, batch of Strawberry jam -Marmalade auf Deutsch

This was taken at a Mall in Frankfurt. They had all kinds of free kids activities set up that day. I smile at the lack of liability. If Mia were to tip over in the bucket, she would fall on cement - but there were no accidents at all :-)

Camden at a little air show that they had here in Bamberg

Mia in front of one of the gliders that always flies over Bamberg

Camden and Mia climbing at that same Mall in Frankfurt

Bowling! It is actually a little different than normal bowling. They call it Kegeln... Bryan and I bowl here with a really nice group of people each month - I am always the worst one!

Playing life size games at the Mall in Frankfurt

This one was a while back... We hiked on the border of Germany and Belgium. Using the GPS, we found the border marker (Bailey is standing on it). One side had a D for Deutschland, and the other a B for Belgium. We all stood with one foot in Germany and one in Belgium - kind of cool! Still grateful to be living on the German side of that border :-)

There are windmills everywhere here, but we had never stopped to walk under one (Camden had on a fieldtrip, but the rest of us hadn't). They are quite enormous, and provide fantastic renewable energy!

Between what seems to be millions of windmills and solar panels, Germany is trying to get rid of their nuclear plants and rely on renewable energy instead.... Such a progressive country!!

Random photos from the last few weeks ....

Camden's soccer team, taking a reprieve from the heat :-)

I thought this was so sweet. Mia made a birthday card for her friend, and included that she wished her good health - (a common birthday wish over here, but especially sweet for an 8 year old to write it :-) Sorry that the photo is sideways :-)

White wedding Balloons over the city...

Mia and her friends....

A beautiful evening - all of the flowers are in full bloom

Oblivious to the view, but having fun playing soccer...

A fun festival in Schesslitz

I though this was really cool - The camera caught Camden twice (I have never seen this before) It definitely is not "photoshopped", because I lack all skills in that department!

The grapes are slowly growing on the hill in Bamberg. In September, they will be ripe!

Gorgeous full Moon!

Another music festival in Bamberg...

Beautiful view from St. Michaelsburg

Father's Day bike ride...

Father's Day bike ride...

Swans, and a little surprise..

Little family swimming along....

So cute!!!!

We couldn't quite figure out what the baby was doing underneath the Mommas wing...

Making his way up....

A great place to take a little rest - ride on his Mommas (or Daddy's) back - so sweet!!!

There is always one Swan swimming in the river near where we live. I always actually get mad at the Swan, because she bullies the ducks a bit when we are trying to feed them. When I was running the other day, I was crossing the bridge and looked over and saw TWO swans with a little puff ball of white (a baby Swan) swimming all together. My heart melted, and I had to stop to watch for a few minutes (a little sad that my family was not there to see and no camera to boot!) When Bryan got home that evening, Bryan, Bailey, Mia and I took off on our bikes to see if we could find the Swans again. We were in complete luck, as they hadn't moved far from where I had seen them 10 hours earlier! I had never seen a baby Swan, and it was so cool to see this in nature (not in a zoo or anything). We stood watching for about 20 minutes, when all of a sudden the baby, ducked into the wing of the Swan (either his Mom or Dad), and climbed on top of her/him to get a ride on his back. It was one of those priceless moments where it just makes you smile! It was nice to see this little Swan family hanging out together :-) - adorable!!!!

Brose Win!!!!!

Even though we are 2 weeks into summer vacation (with the exception of Mia) I feel like every single day has been a puzzle trying to fit everything that we need to do into each day - I am waiting to have a day or 2 in a row of down days - hopefully sooner than later. We have had incredible weather lately, and with that comes LOTS of invitations to do things outdoors, and with 5 people getting these invitations, like I said - it is like a puzzle (especially with only 1 car).

Anyway... I have lots of pictures to post, but wanted to throw these up here first... Last Sunday evening, we went downtown to watch the winning National Championship basketball game with several thousand other folks. We got to the public viewing a little early, and we were able to scoop up a great place to stand right near the front. It was a true nail biter. Bamberg had won the first 2 games in the series of 5. If they won that night - they won it all (already having beaten Berlin, Munich, Frankfurt etc. it was a big deal). Bamberg tailed behind almost the entire game, but with 1 second to go, they were trailing by only 2 points.  The shot went up, and it was a miss, but one of our players got the rebound in the air for a dunk - IT WAS AWESOME!!!! It put us into over time and then we won the National Championships!!!!!  You do have to take into consideration that Germany is the size of Oregon (so the Nat. Championships, aren't quite what they sound - but for a little town like Bamberg to beat the big cities is very cool). What makes it especially fun, is the enthusiasm for everything in this town - including Basketball!  ***As a complete side note, they did something very cool that I had never seen before. Typically here, they always use real glasses and mugs for serving drinks. You usually pay a deposit of a few euro, but that way there is never trash. Being a sporting event, I guess they decided to use plastic cups for the drinks that were for sale (which I had never seen before here in 5 years). They still charged a .50 cent euro deposit though, which I thought was brilliant. After 3000 plus fans spent 2 hours in the town square, there wasn't a lick of trash, not to mention everything got recycled - BRILLIANT!!!!

A big sign in the square that says "Bamberg stands behind you" in support of the team...

Thousands of fans came out to support the team (the actual game was played in the arena about a mile away, but the "public viewing" was in the town square....

An unbelievable nail biter!!!

In over time - We won!!!!

Such a difference....

Tuesday was Camden and Bailey's last official day of school for the summer. It is especially nice because last year they only had a 3 week vacation (their German school didn't finish until Aug. 1st, and the American school began the 3rd week in August) It is only the 2nd official day of vacation, but for now, they are relishing their new found pause from life :-). Mia on the other hand is still in the thick of it, with over a month and a half to go  - so different....I've been meaning to write about another "huge difference" that I get such a kick out of... that of field trips. When my 14 year old went on field trips this year - we had to sign our life away. They needed contact numbers, emergency numbers, signatures, chaperones etc..My 8 year old, on the other hand, doesn't even get a note coming home saying that she is going on a field trip. She comes home and tells me they are going to the theater or something and then tells me how much money (if any) they need-  and then that is it - off they go. One day on her field trip, they came back a little late, and as they walked back from the center of the city, students could leave to walk home on their way (instead of walking back to school first). No chaperones, no signatures, no notice. The old me would have had a problem with this, but now I LOVE it! She has such capability to be responsible and all of the kids always rise to the occasion. There are never problems at all. The kids know how to act, and they don't need chaperones - very refreshing. So, another funny thing... I was talking to my friend who has a child the same age as Mia, but in a different German school. Her child went on a field trip to a fish farm (of course - no chaperones). The funny thing is, they let all of the kids take off their pants (boys and girls) and walk through where the fish swam. I laughed so hard at this, when she reminded me that this would probably have made the headline news in US. The teacher would have been arrested and maybe even lost her certification to teach.  It is such a different world - here it is no big deal - so funny!

I love this photo - Bryan took it in the car the other day...It reminds me a little of what I wrote about above - 2 roads that look exactly the same, but yet are so different!

Sporting Excitement!!!!

Bailey had the opportunity to go to Bonn, Germany with her new Cheerleading team last weekend for the Meisterschaft (the Cheering Championships for all of Germany). They took a bus from Bamberg and stayed in a Hostel there, and had a fantastic time. Her team got 7th place. She wasn't able to compete because she is new to the team, and wasn't there to qualify with them, but none-the-less had a terrific time supporting them, and not to mention a fun weekend away :-) Unfortunately, I have no photos, as I am usually the paparazzi, but this time was not there :(. In other sporting news excitement, Bayern Munchen Fusball (soccer) won the treble this year, by clinching the 3 "majors" - finishing up with the Champions League win the other weekend in London- VERY EXCITING!!!! It is also super exciting because our Basketball team (the Bamberg Brose Baskets) made it to the National Championship finals once again (they beat Bayern Munich (the Basketball team) in the 7 game-semifinals). Usually in the final game, they have public viewing in the big square downtown - so it should be a lot of fun!

Phantasialand

"Phantasialand" is a really fun amusement park located outside of Cologne. The European theme parks don't have quite as much liability, and so sometimes it is refreshingly less stressful. Several of the rides were like nothing we had ever seen before. There were literally no lines at all, which was fantastic.   We discovered that our; shy and often quiet oldest child is a complete daredevil going on any and all rollercoasters, spinny rides etc., our outgoing and sometimes crazy son is a bit more reserved and cautious than we would have thought, and our youngest has a little bit of a dangerous side to her that we didn't know about either. We had a really fun time!

We went on this ride about 5 times. It was a game where you had to aim and hit things and you would rack up a score -of course we were just a tad competitive :-)

No LINES!!!!!

The water ride...poor Mia was too short for this one :-(

They even had facepainting
included in the ticket price!

Cam and Mia jumping on the trampoline

Nurburgring

One of the famous things that was near where we stayed was the Nurburgring. I had never heard of it, until I saw an American commercial for a car that mentioned that it had been tested on the "famous Nurburgring." I had thought they had said "Nuremburg" which is not far from Bamberg, but this place is near the Belgium Border. It is a World Famous race track for formula 1 cars (not Nascars). There are 2 very interesting things that stand out to me about this track. #1 - The track has many turns, and is designed like a road, not a race track, like you normally think of. #2 - What really amazed us was that anyone can pay to ride on the track (we could have even taken our Van on it if we wanted to). The really crazy thing is, you can even race other normal drivers on this crazy course. With the very limited liability in Europe, they allow for you to do this. We read that 3-12 people die each year on the track (not the professionals, but the average joe's that come to try and race). Camden and Mia weren't too interested in it, but Bailey was really intrigued and thought it was fascinating! For a euro each, they allowed us up into the grandstands by ourselves to watch the "average joe's" race - a very interesting experience!

Waiting for the racers to come by

Check that out!

If you don't have your own car (or you don't want to ruin your own car) you can rent a race car too - this car was a rental...

You can barely see the red car, but this was the first hair pin turn - lots of the racers skidded, and we thought for sure we would see a few bad accidents....

When the people first lined, I said to Bryan, "There is no way they are going to let these average people race" - but sure enough, that is exactly what they did! It could have been me in my minivan too :-)

You can barely see the hairpin turn coming, but it was crazy to see these people racing around it!

The cars were all different..some were race cars, some were small normal cars, some were rental cars, some were new, and some were quite a bit older....

This is the map of what the track looks like...

When we were pulling out of the parking lot, this tractor trailer was blocking us (we were one of only a handful of people there, so they must not have realized we would need to get out). The Maserati company must have been bringing in cars to test for time on the track.