The One with Chris's 28th Birthday in Weiden, Germany


Saturday, August 3, 2013

Yes, it's true, I'm a cougar. I married a younger man. But only by 3 months :) Happy 28th birthday to my better half, the love of my life!
I was sooooo hoping our car would arrive before Friday so that we could spend Saturday, Chris's birthday, exploring and going on our very first adventure in Germany. And it DID arrive! But too late to pick up... BUT then our friends offered us their car for the weekend! Hallelujah! It's all about Chris today and he wanted to go to Weiden - so Weiden it is! It was a 20 minute drive through pretty forests and lakes and land.
We found a parking lot, put some Euros in the machine, and ventured out. My heart skipped beat after beat - we LIVE here?!?

We stopped at the first bakery we could find to get some authentic German goodies.
I don't know what it is but it was good!
We saw these tall spires and wanted to check them out closer.
Next to what I'm assuming is a church was a quaint park with flowers and this unmarked except for dates statue.
Pretty flowers and vine covered buildings galore.
Fox in front of an advertisement | Cobblestone roads.
Then we walked to the platz - it was only 9 in the morning but the place was already alive and thriving with bustling people perusing the open shops and fresh produce.
There was a wedding going on in that main beautiful building!
Another church.
Fox making friends and playing in the fountain.
A year-round Christmas tree? Hopefully a sign of good things to come during the holidays!
Picturesque.
This was spray painted in silver on the side of a wall.
A bust of Gustav von Schlör - the last Bavarian state minister of trade. | Cool building.
We had no itinerary - we just walked wherever our little feet carried us. We heard tons of birds chirping and followed the noise to an aviary!
Budgies and lovebirds and parrots - oh my!
A PINK bird!
Texture.
A little stream running through the park.
We walked across the bridge to this statue surrounded by flowers.
Then we walked back to the shops and came across a mime.
Fresh produce. Everywhere we walked we kept getting wafts of things that smelled good. Is it lunchtime yet?!
Fox saw toys outside a bookstore so of course he wanted to go in. We found this little play area in the corner and spent some time going down the slide and "driving".
Water fountain | Strolling through the town | H&M! YAY! | I want everything in this store window.
Side story: This picture is in our hotel room - it's right behind my computer and since I spend a few hours a day at my computer for work I've stared at this picture a lot in our 3 1/2 weeks here and think it looks so beautiful. I had no idea where it was.
So imagine our surprise when we turned the corner and saw THIS!
Of all the places in the ENTIRE world, and on our VERY FIRST adventure in Germany, we found this exact location! God has a sense of humor, I'm sure of it :)
I'm in love with the buildings and architecture here.
Lunch time! We got our very first bratwurst. So good.
And some kind of ham sandwich.
We saw lots of people walking around with ice cream cones so naturally we wanted in on the party!
Enjoying our cones.
There is a picture of my grandpa licking a giant ice cream cone that I really want to find and put side-by-side with this one of Chris doing the same.
Another toy store where we ended our adventure. One thing I've noticed is almost all the kid's toys are wooden instead of plastic. I wonder why?
Oh boy what a day! We had SO much fun! Watch out Germany - the Evans' are here :)

14 comments

  1. How fun!! LOVING all the photos!!!! And I gotcha beat... I am a year and a half older than Brian :)

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  2. So much fun! I am glad you are having a good time. Europe has so much history!! There are so many more older buildings and such there than here in the US. Lot of history over there!!!

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  3. So glad we finally got out and about! One charming German town down, about a thousand more to go!

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  4. What a fun day! I hope you take us there someday. Happy birthday to Chris!

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  5. I love your curiosity about german (or better bavarian ;) ) things and how everything which seems so natural to me, for you turns out to be an enormous adventure. I truly hope Germany and especially Bavaria will provide tons and tons of beautiful surprises and adventures for the four of you!

    By the way, I`d say the thing about the wooden toys, is mostly about quality. It just won`t break that easy as plastic, there are much less ingredients that could cause diseases and quite a lot is actually handmade, so that it`s unique. Just my german/bavarian guess ;)

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  6. how cute! i love seeing pics of my little town and places i'm familiar with. i'm glad you had a good day!

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  7. So incredibly jealous right now!! It all looks so beautiful, I love all the old buildings and that open market!!

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  8. Oh gosh, this post has me missing those German bakeries! So good!! And how fun, post more pictures!!! :)

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  9. Oh my gosh...you are getting me so excited about our move there next summer! Is it too soon to start counting down? It's beautiful and I am enjoying all your pics! One thing I know for sure I am putting at the top of my list...start going to the gym to compensate for all that yummy food I'm going to be eating! I know we aren't going to be in the same area but I'm still so very excited! Thank you for sharing!

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  10. this is seriously like a DREAM--Happy belated brithday to Chris! And congrats on your car arriving!!

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  11. Sylvanian Families! I literally just squealed and my husband looked at me strangely. My kids & I collect them, and they are quite hard to find in the USA unless you want to ay 4x what they are worth. We have Calico Critters here, which are technically the same thing, but the Sylvanian Families have so much more to them in terms of the variety of play sets. There's a European line and a Japanese line. The Japanese are my favorites, but there are several European sets I would like to have, too.

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  12. Thank you so much for sharing your adventures. Your writings always make me feel like I'm there myself.

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  13. Love your pics from Germany.

    Funny you say about the wooden toys!!! I prefer wooden toys and my kids prefer them. I think it is because in Germany they usually go for Steiner education which is against plastic toys and they only use wooden toys. I only buy wooden toys now as they look nicer and will last a long time. there is usually a big drama when something from a plastic toy breaks so the less I can avoid a drama with my 3 small kids the better!
    I usually go wooden-toy-crazy-shopping-mad when I am in Germany!!!

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  14. Everything looks so amazing and beautiful and cute!

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