Salzburg

While the Elder's were her we also spent a beautiful day in Salzburg. It was beautiful. We first went to a palace a little bit outside of the city. The kids loved running around and everyone enjoyed the beautiful spring like weather and beauty.

 Hailee and James while we were waiting to meet up with the Elder's. The kids had a great time throwing in rocks, flowers, and sticks into the river. The weather couldn't have been better, lots of sun without being hot.

They also have the Sound of Music gazebo on site. It wasn't originally here, but was brought here in the 90's. It seemed a lot smaller to me than in the movie and I found out the inside scenes were filmed in Hollywood and they just used this for the outside scenes. I think I need to watch the movie again to compare.

 I was expecting the gardens to be very formal like other palace gardens I've seen. There was quite a large beautiful, more formal garden, but then as we went around the other way we saw the 'fun' part of the garden. There was an amazing playground set and lots of wide open spaces which people were using to enjoy the spring like weather.

 James loved this rope bridge. It terrified me, he was up quite high and walking across a few ropes tied together. Hailee was even a little nervous, but once she heard her baby brother had already gone across she had to do it as well. The play structure was amazing. I'm pretty sure half of the things on it you wouldn't find on a US play structure...way too many chances to get hurt. I do wish there were a few more fun thing like it by our house in Oregon.

 We did make it in to downtown Salzburg. Adelaide and Hailee got to do a little window shopping. They are two girls who are quite a like, just 4 years apart in age.

James got to play his favorite game of chase after the birds. I love hearing his laughter when they fly away from him.

Munich

We recently had some friends from the UK come and visit us. It was truly lovely having them and now we're all sad that they've gone, although James doesn't have to guard his toys anymore. Any ideas on how to get a two year old to share?

Saturday we took the train in to Munich. The weather was hot and it was a little crowded, so it wasn't the best time to see Munich, but I think we all had fun. Our friends have a little girl that is just 6 months older than James. She is absolutely adorable, I really wish I could take her home with me. I had forgotten how different Hailee was at this age compared to James. Adelaide reminded me a little bit of Hailee. At one point we were sitting in a church listening to the choir practice for Easter services and Adelaide turns to her mom and says "Mommy, I do not wish to be here anymore." James turned and looked at me and said "I ready." I'm pretty sure James won't quite be to that point in 6 months either. It was just amazing to see how much she was talking.

We also introduced the Elder family to Bratwursts. We couldn't come all the way downtown and not have a bratwurst or two. James loved his and when the bread was getting in the way he just took it out and finished it up. Hailee also loved the fresh strawberries the Elder's bought.

It's not all fun and games

So life is pretty great here in Germany. There is so much to see, do and experience, but unfortunately there are also times for working. Todd has to work during the week, but Hailee as well has school assignments to get finished. Hailee is lucky enough that they don't take her all day to do and we still get some time during the week to have fun. When we have company we tend to get a little behind and have to catch up. Hailee for the most part has been so great at doing her homework and James for his part and done his best to distract her.

 Thankfully our landlords/neighbors have taken it upon themselves to spoil our children rotten. They brought over their train set from when their kids were little and are kindly letting our children borrow them. James is in heaven and sometimes he lets his sister alone so she can get her work done. But sometimes the trains are a bit of a distraction for her as well.

 And every once in a while Todd will get home before dark and there is time to walk to our favorite ice cream place for a fun little treat. Overall there isn't much to complain about here. We feel pretty lucky every day.

One night in America

Todd's cousins have been in Germany for almost two years. We were so thrilled to find out we would get to see them a little bit while we were here. They are a few hours from us, but it worked out one weekend that they were driving back to their house after Spring Break and would be spending the night in Garmisch about an hour from our house. Dave got us on base and we got to stay in a resort used by our military.

It was like crossing the border to the United States. It was really uncanny. I had never before been on base before and it was just about as American as you can get. Everyone spoke english (not a huge change from Germany, but weird that english was all you heard), the food was American, and everything was in dollars. The hotel room itself was very American as well. We had just gotten done staying in a couple of different European hotels and there is quite big difference.

 Hailee had a ball swimming with Sophie. They are only a few days apart in age. We are hoping they come back to Washington when they are done in Germany next summer. It will be fun to be a few hours drive away instead of a continent and ocean away.

 James had a great time with Uncle David who was also there. We had forgotten to bring our swimming suits so we were very grateful he was willing to take James in the water. James needs a full time baby sitter in the water since he has no fear of water.

The first American television our kids have seen in over a month. It was almost weird to see a TV with English channels. It was so fun to see the Layer family and so crazy to feel like we were back in the US.

Saying Good-bye

Saying good-bye is always the hardest part about having visitors come. The day everyone left we were sitting in our very quiet house and Hailee said, "I wish visitors could stay for like a month or so." It sure would be nice, but even though they had to go, it was nice to see them.

 James is missing Aunt Kristen throwing him around and playing with him. I really wish I caught his face when she was doing this. He loved it.

 The last night, before they went home, James was running around without his clothes on and he went up to grandma and said "I told." (I'm cold) He didn't want to get his clothes on, he just wanted to snuggle under the blanket for a minute.

 Hailee and James love their aunts. They have a lot more aunts than uncles and they think they are so much fun.

 This was taken at the beginning of the week. By the last day it was hard to get smiles since everyone was sad they were leaving. The kids had so much fun with family in town.

Dornröschenschloss Sababurg

Also know as Briar Rose or Sleeping Beauty's castle to the Brother's Grimm. To finish out our Fairy Tale adventure we booked a night at Sleeping Beauty's castle. We weren't really sure what to expect. I was hoping for an authentic castle experience and not a hotel built inside the castle walls. When I booked it there was only one room left so that is what we got. After a slightly disappointing day chasing fairy tales and finding some fun things, but nothing truly magical, Sleeping Beauty's Castle couldn't have been better.

It was beautiful and we stayed in the very top of the tower. That night we read some stories together and the last one we read was Sleeping Beauty (Briar Rose from Grimm's Fairy Tales).

In the story the prince goes past the kitchen and up a lot of stairs to find a room at the very top with the sleeping Princess. Hailee just knew that we were in Sleeping Beauty's room. She woke up several times in the middle of the night so excited because she was sleeping in the real Sleeping Beauty's bed. It could not have been more magical for our little girl.

I don't know how many stairs it took to get to our room, but there were lots and lots of staircases.

 Our little Sleeping Beauty. She was so thrilled to find so many things from the story actually in the castle.

Our own little Rumpelstiltskin. James enjoyed the tower as much as Hailee did.

The other fun part of our stay was dinner. The menu was only in German and we decided to try a few local favorites. It's quite a bit north of Bavaria so it was fun to taste a little of the local flavors. It was quite different than we were used to. We had wild boar sausages and spatzle, onion cake (which was more like onion pie), and smoked trout. It was so fun to try something new. Hailee was excited to eat like a princess.

Fairy Tale Road

My parents went off on their big tour of my dad's mission and different countries (I think they went to five or so in 10 hours) and the kids and I stayed behind to rest a little. I was feeling bad about not going until Hailee started crying over lunch because she wanted spatzle...really crying. It was good to get a little rest before we caught back up with them.

We decided to go on the Fairy Tale Road...or at least hit part of it since it's over 500 kilometers. I did my research and unfortunately the fairy tale road wasn't all that it said it was. We started at the home of the Brother's Grimm. In my research I learned the Brother's Grimm traveled around this part of Germany gathering up old legends and writing them down. I have a few places mapped out that I thought Hailee would like...Little Red Cap, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty and Rapunzel.

All the way Hailee read the Fairy Tales all along the way. In preparation for Germany and our child's reading habits we downloaded a bunch of books on our ipod and netbook that she could read. We decided that even a suitcase full of books wouldn't be enough for the two months we were here and electronic versions would probably be the easiest way. She misses snuggling in bed with a book (as the netbook isn't quite as nice), but for two months she's doing pretty good.

 Steinau an der Strasse was the childhood home of the Brother's Grimm. They had a Museum in their home and a bunch of fun statues and things for the kids outside. Here is Hailee kissing a frog, although she informed me that the princess never kissed the frog, she just threw him against the wall and it broke the spell. Not nearly as romantic as the other stories make it.

Here is Snow While and the Eight Dwarfs. Little Stinky jumped into the picture.

And Hansel and Gretel in the Gingerbread house. Hailee loved seeing these little statues. A lot of the stuff in this little town was closed on Friday and there weren't any puppet shows going on (we were a little ahead of the tourist season), we still had a pretty good time. I was hoping to find a cool book of Grimm's Fairy tales or some cute figurines for Hailee, but even though their website told us there were all of these things, we couldn't find them in the town at all.

By the time we went to Little Red Cap's town (who on their website had so many pictures of little traditional red caps and the Brother's Grimm) and found just a cool old church and nothing to do with Little Red Cap I was getting a little discouraged. There wasn't a lot in these little old towns...a few postcards, a nice bakery, cool old buildings and little else.

Sometimes mom just doesn't understand

James woke up from his nap hungry. This isn't a real unusual thing as he usually snacks from the time he wakes up until he goes to bed. We headed off downstairs when I decided to check my email to see if I had gotten anything from our recent travelers saying they made it home. James decided that was taking way too long and decided to take matters into his own hands.  This is what I found when I went to get him his snack.

 He had opened four yogurt pots and had just grabbed a spoon when I found him. My first thought was...How am I going to cover these back up so they don't go bad? I had just run out of plastic wrapped. Then I sat down to take a few pictures.

 He worked his way down the line of yogurt pots and finished all but the last little bit of the fourth. I'm pretty sure the thought that most cross his mind in times like this is...."My mom sometimes really doesn't understand." I'm sure he thought he might starve to death. It wasn't like he hadn't eaten anything all day either. For breakfast he ate cereal with Hailee and finished a whole bowl of oatmeal with me. Then for good measure he had a few bites of leftover dinner. For lunch it was the same thing. He ate and ate.  Todd keeps telling me that he is going to shock me when he hits his teenage years. If it's already starting this young I'm already worried I'm going to have to go shopping by the truckload.

Finally

I'm finally catching up.... I have a few more to do, but here are five or so posts to get me a little more caught up. It will probably take me another day or two to get the rest of my pictures done. The hard part about five people taking pictures is narrowing which ones to post.

The hills are alive...

...instead of being alive with the Sound of Music, it was more like Singing in the Rain. Our luck was too good to hold. We had gorgeous weather for too many days, we were bound to have a rainy one. The day started out lovely. It was so fun to take a train, I think it's the best way to travel, and James agrees with me. It was nice to watch the beautiful country side go by and be able to visit with everyone. The US needs more trains, although I'm not sure the landscape is nearly as picturesque as Germany. Every little place I've seen is just so neat, clean, tidy, and pretty. Anyway, back to Salzburg, the train ride was awesome.

James loved watching out the window and running around between people.

 About five minutes after we got to Salzburg it started raining on us. Luckily we were a little prepared and at least the children stayed dry for the most part, my feet on the other hand were another story.

 But we are Mortensens afterall so a little rain didn't ruin the whole day for us. We still got in some sightseeing, singing and shopping. What more could you ask for on a rainy day in Salzburg.

By the end of the day we made it back to the train. This is the typical end of a day on vacation. James on the other hand slept while we shopped and was ready to enjoy the train ride home. It was quite an adventure.

Neushwanstien Castle

James had a rough night with little sleep so my family and Hailee went off on an adventure to Neushwantsein and Hailee got to discover first hand a Mortensen vacation.The only complaints she had were here feet were a little sore by the end of hiking all over the place. She had a lovely time with her grandparents and aunts.

She might think her mom and dad way of traveling is just a bit boring, but it did take her two days of resting to recover from the 4 days of going the Mortensen way.

Harrenchiemsee

You know King Ludwig II may have been a little crazy, but he sure knew how to pick great places to build his castles. A private island on a beautiful lake was a beautiful setting for Herrenchiemsee. James thought the best part was the boat ride over. It was a beautiful day in a very beautiful part of Germany. The castle itself was based on the palace of Versailles, only 1 wing was actually completed before his death, and he only spent 10 days there. The tour guide told us he brought 30 servants with him just to light all the candles in the hall of mirrors.

 James' favorite part was definitely the boat ride.

 Kristen and Hailee walking to the castle. So far it's the only castle we've been to that hasn't required a hike to the top. It was a lovely little stroll through the woods.

 Hailee, Grandpa, Kristen and Emily in the front of Herrenchiemsee.

The view to the lake.