I woke up at 6 am and started getting everyone and everything ready. We were loaded and ready an hour later and on our way. We easily found parking underneath the Cathedral and layered everyone up and braved the cold and crowds.
The Cathedral is easily the most impressive and beautiful church I've seen in Europe yet. Breathtaking. We took turns walking through it alone without our three children because as soon as we pushed the stroller inside the dome, Otto started screaming I want to go outside!
The adult outside with the children was rewarded, however, with a small man playing Christmas carols on a flute and tambourines on his feet. We rewarded him with 2 euros. And then a stranger rewarded Otto and Aksel with two giant chocolate Sinterklaas.
The Holdaways soon arrived and we commenced our Christmas-marketing with buying ornaments, eating our way from stall to stall, letting our children ride ferris wheels and carousels, eating some more, walking through a historical and beautiful old city and then realizing we had stayed 30 minutes too long and rushed back to the car to drive home.
Ben and I kept talking about how magical it would be to walk through Christmas markets in Germany without children, idling at each booth, really taking our time to pick out treasures, savoring each bite of food, and then casually walking to the next market breathing in the mistletoe and fresh garland wreaths. And the elf village. And the real live Christmas gnome selling wine.
The Germans do Christmas right. It's handmade. It's enchanting. It's magnificent. Everyone should experience Christmas in Germany. And everyone should experience it with Germany experts like the Holdaways -- they make great tour guides and food recommendations.
Luxembourg also has Christmas Markets.
Last Saturday we convinced the Packers to ride a bus downtown and walk around the Luxembourg City Christmas Market.
It's amazing to see other children sit happily in a stroller or walk calmly down a street and listen to their parents or eat the dinner their Dad bought for them or get off of the carousel without melting down. I wouldn't know what any of those experiences are like, but I'm really happy for the families that do.
Ben and I got a sitter one night and went downtown and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves at the market. We took our time eating our potato cakes, spice cake, sausages and drinking hot chocolate. We were both ridiculously excited about the little blue mugs that came with the hot chocolate for 2 extra euros.
Unfortunately, the Luxembourg Christmas Market is like China Town compared to Germany, but it was still magical. Especially because no one was melting down.
Our kids are still too young to realize we don't have lights on our tree (because they're soooo expensive and just not worth it) and still too young to really grasp what Christmas means, but they've sure figured out the chocolate advent calendar and how to put 95 percent of the ornaments on 5 percent of the tree.
I love Christmas time. I love getting new ornaments in foreign cities and countries. I love seeing a really good friend and former BYU roommate on a regular basis. I love Germany. I love street food. I love watching my children run around in beautiful city squares. I love how many pictures strangers (asians) took of me and my children in public today. I love cookies from Nuremberg. I love European licorice.
I really love Europe right now.
No comments:
Post a Comment