Reyes Family Time: It's Christmastime in Germany!

We left for Germany on Thursday, December 20. Our flight left in the afternoon, and Miriam did very well on the flight. We were extremely lucky that we ended up with an empty seat next to us (in the bassinet row, nonetheless!) and Miriam got to sit in her own seat for some of the flight, and she slept in the bassinet for other parts of the flight.

Once we got there, it took all of us almost a week to adjust to the time difference (9 hours ahead of WA). Miriam was up from 1-4 most nights, which means one or both of us were up as well. Even though she was tired, she did really well whenever we went traveling and was a happy girl during the day.

The first couple days we were there were a true German cultural experience. We went out to eat at a German restaurant, visited several different Christmas markets, and took the train to Saarbrucken (a town about an hour away) to go shopping. One of the things I always look forward to about Germany is the food, especially the kind served at Christmas markets. Mario always goes for the bratwurst, while I tend to prefer the chocolate covered fruit, crepes and baked cheese. Miriam really loved the chocolate covered fruit and the crepes...pretty much anything with chocolate.

We had a relaxed and fun Christmas Eve/Christmas day. Christmas Eve we opened some presents, decorated cookies, had finger foods and went to the candlelit service at church. Christmas day we slept in late, had coffeecake for breakfast, opened stockings and more presents, and then had a big (smoked) turkey dinner later that night.

The day after Christmas is always a day to putz around the house, enjoying Christmas presents and eating leftovers, and also getting in some post-Christmas sale shopping. (I always buy wrapping paper and bring it back in my suitcase.)

Mario and I were in Paris from Dec. 27-29 while Miriam stayed with Grandma and Grandpa. I'm going to make a separate post about Paris, complete with pictures.

For New Year's Eve, we did a little bit of shopping at the Polish pottery store, visited a couple Germany grocery stores (to buy firecrackers!) and went to a Chinese buffet for dinner. We spent a couple hours at the Chinese buffet, and Miriam's favorite dishes were the fried rice and the ice cream/fried bananas.

After dinner we went home and sat around the fire pit in the backyard and watched fireworks. Miriam fell asleep and I only made it until 10:30, but we did get to see some fireworks before we went to sleep.

We flew home on January 2nd. It was a bit of a rougher flight, since it was in the middle of the day and Miriam was much less inclined to sleep. She wanted to play and eat M&Ms the whole time. Overall, we had a wonderful, fun-filled time in Germany, and it is amazing to think about all the things we packed into our short 2 weeks there!

Some pictures from our Christmas vacation in Germany: