Sankt Wendel Weihnachtsmarkt

A lot of my friends have been telling me their favorite Christmas market is the Sankt Wendeler market.  It only runs for one week so we had to catch it before it went away.  The big girls had a lot of homework, so they stayed home while Trek & I ventured out with the younger kiddos.

The first thing we tried were chimney cakes.  I've heard people talk about chimney cakes, but I've never had one.  They take dough (like crecent dough) & wrap it around a wooden spool & stick it over a bed of hot coals where the dough is rotated until it become golden brown.

When they pull the dough off the spools, they are hollow (like a chimney) & extremely hot, causing smoke to come out of the top (like a chimney).  Then they are rolled in chocolate, sugar & cinnamon, or nuts.  We got one chocolate & one cinnamon/sugar chimney cake.  Both were DELICIOUS.

Sankt Wendel is an adorable little city about 35 minutes from us.  I had never been there before & now I'd like to go back & explore a little more.  It's a great little city.

There was a whole gnome village at one end of the Christmas market where you could visit these adorable little houses depicting scenes from the life of a gnome.  (We were laughing because the "at home" house had a lady gnome taking a shower completely NAKED as well as an entire "bath house" with SEVERAL naked gnomes.  Isn't it amusing how something that is taboo in one country is so normal in another?)  But it was an adorable little exhibit to walk through.  The kids thought it was cute.

The kids each bought some crepes with their own money.  Crepes are a favorite of the Potter kids.

I found heaven in a bowl at one of the booths.  I've always love bratkartoffeln (fried potatoes & onions) in German restaurants, but this little place added bacon & sausages to theirs & let me tell you, it was heaven on earth.  I'm still having a hard time chewing things with my new braces & back teeth bumpers, but this was soft enough to eat & I ate the ENTIRE bowl.

We had a great time exploring here & will definitely visit this Christmas market again next year.  It's a great one for kids!

Weihnachts Party

So I'm the Squadron Spouse Group Leader here at our squadron in Germany.  As the spouse group leader I plan family parties & monthly activities for our Spouses.  One party I've really been looking forward to is the kids Christmas party.  I wanted it to be German tradition oriented so we made it a Weihnachts Party & we made sure to do it on December 5th which is the night Saint Nikalous visits.

I didn't take very many pictures because I was trying to run the evening, but it was a big success & we had a lot of fun.  We had balloon games & a karaoke machine playing German Christmas music at first, & then Saint Nikalous came to visit & took all the kids on a walk through to forest to search for treasure (chocolate coins).  When they came back, Saint Nikalous had made bags of chocolate, nuts, & fruit for each of them.  We then served some hot chocolate & let the kids do 3 Christmas crafts, build gingerbread houses, & then had dinner which were brats on Brotchen rolls & German potato salad.  It turned out really really well & I'm glad everyone enjoyed themselves.

Craiger spent a LOT of time on his gingerbread house & it turned out beautiful.  I was very proud of him.

The whole night was a blast & I'm really grateful I was given the opportunity to do this party.  I had the help of another wonderful spouse who has become like family to me.  I'm looking forward to many more parties in the future.

December Magic

There's just something magical about December & everything that comes with it.  I look at our beautiful Christmas tree & am SO thankful for all that I've been blessed with over the years.

We had a church Christmas party & the kids got to visit with Santa.  My kids are so funny.  They always ask Santa to "surprise them."  He always does & they always love it.

And on December 5th, we got a very magical visit from Saint Nikalous.  In Germany Saint Nikalous visits the good children & fills their shoes with fruit, chocolates, & nuts.  My kids washed their shoes really really well & put them next to the door & sure enough, Saint Nikalous visited them with chocolate santas, kinder eggs, an apple & orange, & a bag of peanuts.

All of which they demolished & devoured in seconds.

I absolutely love sharing German traditions & holidays with my kids.  It's so important for my kids to learn the language, customs, foods, & culture of the area we live in.  We love it here.

Burg Lichtenberg Medieval Weihnachtsmarkt

So by now you know how much I love Christmas Markets & how I have a need to visit as many as I possibly can. . . so after we got home from our trip. . . 2 days in Europa Park plus 2 hours in France exploring, I made my family put their suitcases in the entryway & we hopped in the car for ONE MORE Christmas market (that makes 6 in one week for me)!  This one we had to go to because it was only for 2 days & I didn't want to miss it.

Burg Lichtenberg is the castle by our house that we got our Harry Potter pictures taken at & where I had my piano recital.  I love that castle so much, so to know they were doing a medieval Christmas market for one weekend only, I knew we had to go see it.

It was SO COOL.  It wasn't a typical Christmas market with modern goods. . . this was a medieval market that sold weapons, renaissance clothing, oils & old fashioned foods.  It was SO interesting & unique.

There were lots of little places that kids could do things like an archery field where they could practice shooting bows & arrows.

Everywhere you looked, people were dressed in medieval costumes & were speaking in different accents.  The kids loved it.

Taya especially loved the live animal pen in the center of the castle.

There was an amazing fire juggler too.

And there's just something to be said about the magic of a castle lit up on a German hillside at dusk.  We are SO blessed to live in this beautiful area.

We had a blast.

Strasbourg, France Christmas Market

Europa Park is actually quite close to Strasbourg, France & we had to drive through Strasbourg to get home.  Since Strasbourg is home to the largest Christmas Market in Europe, we of course had to stop by.

Strasbourg is a beautiful city.  It's very old & the architecture is absolutely remarkable.

The old church in the city center gave me goosebumps.  It was gorgeous.  It towers over the city & it's bells sing their melancholy tune on the hour.  I could have explored that church for hours.  Words & pictures just don't do these European buildings justice.  They are really a sight to behold.

This Christmas market was massive.  There were probably over 300 little shacks selling food, goods, crafts, lights, etc.  We only spent about an hour & a half there, & we barely touched the surface of it, but I did get me some French Macarons & some hot cocoa in a mug.

The kids enjoyed donut holes & nougat & licorice ropes.  Christmas markets are SO fun.

It was a fun little stop on our way home.  I was very excited to add a few more Christmas market mugs to my collection.

Beautiful City, Beautiful Christmas Market, Beautiful Church, Beautiful Family Time.