Adventure Sunday

Good morning everyone! Or what ever time of day it is for you. The baby is sleeping and I have some time to do something other than nurse :) I was only 20 when I came to live in Germany. Before then I was just a person who thought little of the rest of the world. I had plans to move to the big city...Houston, TX, to work at NASA. Moving to Europe opened my eyes in many ways. I like the idea of raising my kids as citizens of the world. They have been exposed to so many cultures and places I didn't even know existed when I was a child. So, I want this page to bring a little piece of the rest of the world to those who have not had the pleasure to experience it. I'm going to post something new each week. I'd love to hear about where you live too!

This weekend was, to me, our last chance to enjoy the outside without freezing! It is still a little warm, strangely enough. So, we went up to Koenigstuhl (I can't figure out how to get the numeric keypad for an umlaut!). There is the Märchenparadies. This translates to 'Fairytale Paradise'. It is on top of the mountain and is a little playgroup/miniature theme park. In our house it is affectionately know as 'the playground on the mountain.'

What is special about this place is that it has little animatronics that tell the fairy tales. There is Rumplestiltskin, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and lots of others. These stories are scattered about the park with little rides and play areas. My boys loved the rides beause they could do them on their own without help from mom. I liked that too! It really is a small place so the rides are operated by token and you push a plunger to make them go. My 4 year old thought he was so grown.

In addition to the dozen or so rides there are a couple of play areas. One has a typical playground, a merry-go-round, a huge bouncy thing, automated swings and lots of benches for moms and dads to enjoy the view. The other play area is one of those climb around ball pits with different levels and air powered foam ball guns. That sounds way worse than it is!

If you're in the area here are the details:

Heidelberger Märchenparadies GmbH & Co. KG

Königstuhl 5a
69117 Heidelberg

Monday - Saturday
Adults 2 EU, kids 2-12, 3EU 

Sundays, Holidays & I think school out days for BW
Adults 3 EU, kids 2-12, 4EU

All rides take tokens that cost 50 cents each. I bought 30, and it was plenty. Both my kids rode everything multiple times and mom may have too :)

Below are pics that I yanked off their website. No, I still don't have a camera. On the mountain is a few other things that are worth checking out: Tinnunculus - a hawk show, an observatory, the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, 2 nature trails designed for families, and a funicular railway. Dont forget to click on the Union Jack for the English version. Bye!

Hello, Again

Hey to everyone! Wow, it has been a long time. Soooo much has happened in my little corner of the world. The main reason I have been away is that my youngest child got hurt. Badly. He seems to have made a full recovery, but he still needs an EEG to confirm. That will happen in 2 weeks. I believe we were extremely blessed! 

We were in Heidleberg (about 15 min away), and it took an hour for emergency services to take him to the hospital. The DRK (German Red Cross) got there in half an hour, and then they got an ADAC helicopter to take him to the children's hospital in Mannheim. We had a very good experience. Almost all the staff who took care of our son spoke English, and the Dr on the helo stayed with me until he was taken to a room.

I know that this is a bad picture. The one on the left is the entrance to the klinikum. It is very ornate and has huge gates. I will have to go down there to get a pic to re post. It overlooks the Nekar River. Beautiful.

Since May we have been to St. Avold, France, to the Lorraine American Cemetery, Prague, London, and Lusienpark.I will catch up on those posts later. I will participate in ThriftShareMondays over at Apron Thrift Girl. Her blog is about thrifting, reselling, and also about living healthy. On Mondays she post about what she discovered over the weekend. I will post about my finds at the market in Prague. I am about 10hrs ahead, so that will be tonight for me. 

I also want to post about learning German. Maybe a word or phrase at a time. A little is better than nothing. Maybe it could be a weekly Wednesday thing. 

I hope all of you have been having a wonderful summer. It has been such nice, warm weather lately. I can't wait for my veggies to start producing! It should be soon. They got in the ground about the 1st of June! It is crazy to plant that late, but the weather here is a trip for this southerner! 

Tschuss!