Tour de Parks

Saturday, May 11, 2013

We love all of the bike paths around Germany! We will really miss traveling around town on bikes...that is when it is warm and sunny. On rainy and/or cold days, I am ready for a car! We also love the little parks that are scattered all around - in the cities but also in the little villages. On Friday while Tracy worked and Micah went mountain biking with two kids from his class, I took the three younger boys on a long bike ride. One of our stops was this playground with the spiderweb looking equipment. We ended up playing tag and had so much fun that we wanted to come back with the whole family. So on Saturday in between the rain drops of the afternoon, we spent some time "touring" the area near the Leine River. It is a pretty place to ride bikes as there are paths on both sides of the river. It's the path we have taken to Bovenden in the past. Along this path are several little play areas for kids. We stopped at each and every one!

Tag on the Spiderweb Tree...or Eiffel tower or Christmas tree or rocket...we gave this
cool playground equipment multiple names and decided that we might like to have
one of these in our yard. Tag is a bit dangerous on this thing though!

The rules were that you couldn't touch the sand under
the equipment and when you were "it", you could tag
with your hand or your foot. This helped those of us
that were taller not have to move quite so fast as we
could more easily reach someone that way.

Izzy Dizzy? This thing is at an angle so when you come around that bottom
part, it about throws you off. It's a lot more challenging than it looks. I took
pictures so that I could keep from throwing up - one time around was enough
for me to know when to stop.

All four boys going at once...when someone falls off,
they need to move out of the road quickly or will be
landed on by the next one dropping. Flying off, rather.
After one time around, we stopped and moved the bikes
farther away from the sandy area. Just never knew for
sure how far one little kid would sail!

The older two boys even got Tracy going for a bit!

Joel, Micah, Josiah and Noah (l-r)

We were excited that each time we came to a new park area, we were the
only ones there. Hence, we could get a little crazy! Tracy kept saying, "I
think we better leave now. We haven't had to go to the hospital yet."

They got this going high enough to see their heads above the red bars.

The Baseball Park - Our very own Yard!

Last fall, we discovered the baseball park near Kiessee. It is a beautiful ball diamond with luscious green grass. We don't have any yard area with our apartment so having a green space to go to that is wide open like our yard in Youngsville is really nice. Now that it is warming up some, we have started going there again. Warming up being relative. Most days are still hovering in the mid 50s.

Not many Germans play baseball so the field isn't used that often. In fact, we had such a gorgeous day recently on a Monday that we spontaneously went down to grill burgers. Side note - they were the best burgers we've eaten since leaving North Carolina. While we are there, we often play pickle, soccer, ultimate, football...anything the boys feel like doing. This particular Monday, we decided on Ultimate and were in the middle of a game when people began showing up at the other side of the field. Ended up being Göttingen's Ultimate team. They kindly invited us to play with them and we politely declined! They looked professional in comparison to our little family game. All that to say, the field isn't used much for baseball so usually it is a safe bet for enjoying a "yard" for a while.

Kaufland sells disposable grills that we buy to take with us. Usually, it is
Brats as they are easy to cook but this time, I made hamburgers - it was a
tight fit for that size of a grill but oh-so good! We always camp out right
beside one of the dug-outs as we've had to seek shelter from the rain on
more than one occasion. 

Joel enjoying dinner on the dug-out bench.

~ Ultimate Frisbee ~

The boys developed a game they call Monkey-in-the-Middle with the
soccer ball. Three of them form a triangle and have to pass the ball around
without the monkey kicking it away from them. It is fun to watch them
play. We've played this as a family and then the Monkey also gets to use his
hands to stop the ball as it can be difficult to get out of the middle otherwise.

Noah better pay attention or he will soon be the monkey!

One thing the boys have loved about playing sports at this field is that they
can go barefoot here. Their feet are so tender now that they wear shoes every
day! They are wondering how long it will take them to toughen up once home.

Leila and Harald

Saturday, May 18, 2013

One evening in October, our family rode our bikes to the other side of the Innenstadt to help move a colleague of Tracy's into a fourth floor apartment. Close to 80 stairs to climb. I counted. We hoofed it up and down those four flights of stairs many times that evening. Desiring to thank us for the help, Harald and Leila wanted to cook dinner for us once they got settled into their new home. We planned to go one evening in January but alas, we all got sick.

Though it rained all day the 18th, the skies cleared off just as we were leaving to
go to their place so we enjoyed a lovely sunset from their balcony. This is
looking back into the Innenstadt - St. Johannis' steeples on the left and St.
Jacobi's steeple on the right.

Joj and Noah played soccer in the garden area behind their house.

The garden area is shared by all of the residents of the house so it was nice
for the boys to be able to play there for a bit after dinner.

~ Harald, Leila, Beth, Tracy ~

St Paulus Kirche is just a block from their place and can
easily be seen from their balcony.

Lilacs are one of my absolute favorites and are VERY prevalent in
Germany! I love how often we smell them when outside b/c of how very
many bushes there are.

Noah wrote a paper on St. Johannis Kirche for school so
is a wealth of information about this church! He was to
bring a 2-3 page rough draft to school that was going to
be edited during class. He worked a lot on this and only
had a page and a half. Without showing his teacher his
work, he asked if this would be enough. Frau Frank
insisted that he do more writing. He was quite stressed
out finishing this draft and then, when he showed her
his work, Fr. Frank told Noah that he used the wrong
paper! The 2-3 pages was to be on a special kind of paper
they use in class that has extra spacing. Noah ended up
having about eight pages worth of material!

A closer shot of the steeples as the sun began to set...long about 9:30! We
allowed the boys to go home and watch a movie while the adults visited
longer. As they were preparing to leave, I told them to head to bed around
9 or 9:30. Harald and Leila laughed as it was already that late! I haven't
gotten used to the long days and am sure it will feel like returning to winter
when we go home. The days are really long as we approach June 21st! This
has made bedtimes difficult as it just feels like we are sending the boys to
bed so early. Makes waking up nice though - birds are singin' early these days!

When Tracy and I got home, this was on Noah and
Josiah's bedroom door handle. He made this in class
but hadn't shown it to us yet. His teacher found these
photos for Noah's project! I love how she has gone
above and beyond these last few weeks for him!

The Beauty of Spring

~ A collection of spring photos all taken within two or three blocks from our flat ~

~ Corner of Lotzestrasse and Bürgerstrasse ~

~ FKG - Kleiner Felix ~

~ Bürgerstrasse near our church ~

I just really like the architecture of this building so took a shot from
another angle.

~ Stegemühlenweg ~
One of my absolute favorite streets to walk down in Göttingen - so
European in look and feel! This photo is taken from Walkemühlenweg.

~ Stegemühlenweg ~

~ Stegemühlenweg ~
This tree reminds me of our Tulip Magnolia.

~ Corner of Riemenstrasse and Stegemühlenweg ~

~ Riemenstrasse ~

Another Rainy Day

When Deborah left, the clouds and rain returned. We begged her to return and bring back some NC sunshine and warmth. Instead, we felt like we returned to winter - dreary, wet and cold. So in order to pass time, the boys came up with an indoor basketball game that worked. Generally, we work very hard to not be too active inside because we have people living below us. So instead of playing three-on-three full court basketball, the boys came up with a way to play P-I-G quietly.

The game started with just these three - the blankets are to soften the sounds.

Then Tracy joined in as well. They were using a little
ball that someone gave Noah on the playground.

They even started calling how it had to hit the bucket.

Ringer!

Joel chose to use his own handmade basketball from
crumpled paper and orange duct tape.

Sometimes it's the peepers that getcha!

Mr. Slick attempts to come up with something that can't be repeated.

And this is how they kept the bucket in place on the chair - all of the
doorstops are in the bottom of the bucket. Worked like a charm...and
thankfully didn't fall off once or that would have been a LOUD crash.

Micah played guitar for them while they played P-I-G.

The End of the Long Hair!

Saturday, May 18, 2013

Josiah and Noah had been growing their hair out so as to look more European. Originally, they both thought they would wait until we got back to Youngsville to get it buzzed but the longer it got, the more annoyed they were with it! This made me rather thankful, I must admit. Though they wanted haircuts in early May, they also didn't want to go to school with really short hair as they were worried about teasing. So we waited until we pulled them out of school for the year to cut these long locks.

Sporting a Top Gun kinda look!

He does look European with this length!

Too cool for words!

As I cut Noah's hair, he asked for a mohawk. And he got
one...for five minutes!

Some might think this looks more European than the long hair!

I took plenty of "before" shots and forgot to take one of the finished product! So below is one from when Terry and Emily Beatty came to visit the following week.

Though taken about five days after the haircuts, this
shows the drastic change. They both complained that
their heads were too cold without the mops.