Relaxing!

Today is the last day of David's vacation before he returns to work tomorrow. It has been wonderful having him home for an entire week to enjoy all the fun and chaos that is Christmas in house full of boys.

Sadly there continues to be no snow so the new sled sits unused in the corner by the tree. The sun is shining and the sky is blue. Very unusual from what I have seen of Germany. Usually it is grey and cloudy almost all the time. David says at least once a week, "This is what Seattle was like." Even with the sun shining today it is cold, too cold for this south Texas girl. In the picture above the circles in the grass are ice the boys pulled off the sand box. It filled with water and no one bothered to empty it.  Now with the cold spell it is full of ice.  

Yesterday we made a detour on the way to the commissary. Dave and I drove up high into the Taunus to see if the snow fields up high had escaped the thaw last week. No such luck, the area where we played before had muddy looking piles of snow here and there. We did find that one of the roads that has been blocked every time we have gone to play in the snow was open so we drove up a bit higher and found ourselves on the highest peak, Grosser Feldberg at 878 meters. We found snow up there and were initially excited but when we stepped out of the van it was cold enough to take our breath away. The thermometer in the van said it was -6 celcius but that sure didn't take into account the wind. We walked around for about 10 minutes taking pictures and when we climbed back into the van David had ice in his mustache. Brrrr! 

Today we are just being lazy. There have been a few half hearted attempts at cleaning but most have been abandoned long before completion.  I am reading a book. The boys, including Dave, are playing with the new racetrack Santa brought. The house seems to echo with the sounds of zooming cars and giggling boys, punctuated with the occasion sound of cars crashing. David has already put in a request for a track extension kit for his birthday. I think this may become the new obsession around here.  Check out the video below to hear see and hear the fun.