And the only thing I truely miss is Jared...

Day one:

Friday, March 13, 2009
Sarah and I left for the airport, after only having five hours of sleep because we stayed up late to watch a basketball game with six overtimes. Wow! We tried to sleep on the plane, but they kept waking us up to feed us. First is was a snack, then dinner, then breakfast. No one I know eats dinner five hours before they eat breakfast... I hate flying, but I can honestly say this was the smoothest landing that I have ever endured. I didn't even know we were so close to the airport until I looked over out the window and the ground was right there and we landed. We sat in the middle of the middle row next to two big people. So moving around was pretty much impossible.

Day two:

Saturday, March 14, 2009
I am not sure where the one day ended and the other one began. I'll just start at when we arrived at the airport. We arrived and cleared customs super fast and looked at the clock and it was 6:15am and the Sperows weren't getting there until 8. YIKES. We both felt so tired and so BLEH after being in the same position for so long. However, after some people watching and a nice walk outside in the 30 degree day, we woke up. The people are really fun to watch over here.

The Sperows picked us up at 8 and drove us to downtown Frankfurt where we walked around the old flea market (thing tables and tables of the most random things... phones, camera, cutting boards, shoes, carpets, tin boxes, dice... it went on and on and on). Then we went to the old town part of Frankfurt and saw the town square!!! Oh my goodness, Germany is adorable. We had coffee at a little shop with a crazy owner named Luegi. He was Italian and had a son that set a Guinness Book of World Records record and other tale tales. Very amusing. Click to see a bad translation of a story about him and a video. Click story for the story and video for the video.

From there we went to Mainz, the home of Gutenberg. First we got lost in these crazy back streets (like you see in car chases in the Bourne movies, but much cooler because we are actually there!!) and for about half and hour we drove in circles because of our crazy GPS system. It was hilarious. Being with the Sperows is so much fun (Aunt Suzanne and Mom, you should definitely come visit soon. They treat you so well and know all these cool places to go, but not quite how to get there so ever day is an adventure and we get to see random little roads by mistake - I personally think they plan it - heh, but it is awesome and you should come!). We finally found the place we wanted to have lunch and we had sausage and soup and bread. So good! Man, the food is good around here. Mrs. Sperow gave us some of her Snitzal. Oh, wow. It was amazing. We toured Guetengerg's museum and read all the English words. We saw three REAL Gutenberg Bibles (SO COOL!) and some that were hand written and even older. I was fascinated by the security system. heh. It was really awesome. And we walked around the old town and all the neat little back streets and cool old houses. I can't even explain how adorable these towns are. So awesome.

Finally, we ended the day by going to Worms and just got to the Cathedral (they have an old one in almost every town) in time to see inside and see the crypt with old dead people from 900. Crazy. We walked around the grounds and the old town there and got our pictures taken at the memorial with Luther's famous quote (in German) on it. So great! The memorial had many of the reformers. And we got ice cream (which was also great) and then we came home. I walked where Martin Luther walked!!!

It is rather gray here and kinda flat. But the old towns have so much charm and history. Can you believe we saw a Gutenberg Bible and got to walk where Martin Luther walked?!? How is that for an awesome day. Well, I think it is dinner time. And then I think it is Apple Strudel time. Tomorrow we are having lunch at a castle and I am totally ordering schnitzel (because Mrs. Sperow let me try hers today - put it on my plate and told me to try it - heh, Jared it is great, we share food!! :) ) tomorrow. And for dinner we are having vanilla ice cream with hot raspberry sauce (called Himbeer). Yum.

P.S. Did I say that the Sperows are awesome and so much fun to be around. It is great to see them after so many years and actually get to talk to them. I was too little to actually hold real conversations with them when they left. They have treated us so well.

P.P.S. I got my first wedding gift today. :) They gave me one of those German things that has the fan blades and spins around. It has a nativity scene on the bottom. I can't wait to display it at Christmas. It will always be one of my favorite Christmas items, along with my runner that I made. I will get to tell my kids all about my trip to Germany and about the Sperows and how neat they are and how glad I am that they are in my life. God is so good to me. He has blessed me with so much. I don't thank Him enough. Just being alive is exciting and I am so grateful for the chance to travel around and with such cool people. Sarah is the perfect traveling partner. She makes traveling so easy. I love it. I love her. I can't believe how much great stuff I have seen and how much more we are packing into this trip. London is three days! I am so excited about that.