Will The Volcano Strike Again???

If you've been following the blog you know that the we got stuck in Paris during the "Volcano Crisis of April 2010".  Well we are heading off to Venice today and as I'm checking the news I'm seeing that London's Heathrow Airport and Amsterdam's Schipol Airports are closed today because of a new ash cloud.  I'm starting to think it's going to be deja vu all over again. 

We are taking the laptop with us so look for pictures and stories from Venice, and be sure to see if we make it Friday when we are supposed or will we be forced onto the train again.

Volksfest

We headed out to Volksfest since the rain stopped for the day. James enjoyed a big beer and we got some Donors (roasted turkey with lettuce and tomato in a bun eaten like a pita) and some very delicious chocolate covered strawberries. It wasn't bad when we got there but suddenly we got very cold and since we had seen all there was to see (it was a pretty small event), we headed home despite Macen's pleas to stay.
This was at the end of the Amazon rainforest "ride". It was set up like a haunted house but was a rainforest theme where you stepped on stones thru water, walked on tight ropes, etc. This spinning deal was at the end and the entire reason Macen wanted to do the ride. Guess who refused to go thru the spin :) He was scared the entire way thru the whole set up. He did like the huge talking alligator out in front of it though.

Today, James and I got the "Worst Parents of the Day" award. We came upon this ride and Macen was hollering to go on it and they were getting ready to start so we said sure. Big, huge mistake! It went fast and once it slowed down, it went in reverse and went fast again. Macen hated it and was crying for Momma during the ride. I mean really, he is 3. We should have watched it once and then decided if he was capable of riding it. We asked him as we were leaving if he wanted to ride it again and he gave a solid "No". However, he did want to ride the roller coaster ride. It was a small roller coaster but it was the kind with 4 people to a bucket and it spins as you go up and down and around. He really wouldn't have liked that. Hopefully we haven't scarred him from wanting to do these rides when we he is older.

This ride was more Macen's speed. He rode it many times and he stuck with the bus each time.

Well these mugs of beer look small in the pic but I assure they were not small in the least bit. In fact, I believe they held 2 German beers which equates to 4 American beers. Everything may be bigger in TX except for their beers.

Macen wanted to do the bumper cars with dad which they ended up doing several times. He did get hit pretty hard once and flew up out of the seat but overall he had a good time on this ride.

Deployment Ceremony

The US and Germany flag along with the Regiment Colors.

Casing of the colors. The colors are cased and then unveiled once they reach their deployment destination. Once they return there will be another ceremony uncasing the colors again signifying they are home. Not a great view but we were behind a big group of people.

The ceremony was very nice, a reality check but nice nonetheless. To a military spouse, this ceremony means our soldiers will be leaving anytime now. James won't leave until next month but guys will start departing from here on out. It rained on us throughout the ceremony and once it was over, it came a little harder. Along with the ceremony there is a festival, Volkfest, going on for several days. Carnival rides, games, wurst, beer, etc. We weren't up for sticking around in the rain to experience it but we'll head back out there sometime in the next 3 days to see what its all about.

Here are some German soldiers. They stood on the field with our guys and a lot of the local Germans came out for the ceremony. There are 3 small towns immediately close to post that are very supportive of the military. Whether a soldier and his/her family to choose to live off post or get here within a time housing is not offered on post, they live in these German communities. So there is a lot of interaction between the Americans and Germans.

Regiment Run

The Regiment did a run early yesterday morning to kick off the deployment festivities. We went out to support the girls and guys running. Everyone ran with their own squadron in formation which is what you see in the above pic.

Not 3, Back to 2

We did a good job of telling Macen prior to his birthday that he was going to be 3 and it stuck...for the first couple of days. A few days ago he blatently told us "Not 3 anymore, I turned back to 2". And he is holding strong on his argument.

Happy 3rd Birthday Macen

Macen woke up on his birthday to candy train. The middle pic is of him saying "I can't believe it" It's a new fave and he followed it with "Chocolate" this time. I am fairly confident if we had give him nothing else he would have been quite content with the candy and pez dispensers.

Birthday Celebration

Opening presents he got in the mail. We saved these for the morning of his birthday.

Opening presents from us:

Dad putting together the pirate ship. He couldn't wait to play with it.

Macen had a low key birthday with candy and presents in the morning and then early evening we took him to a toy store in Amberg that he loves going to. He got some bubbles and picked out a sand toy. After dinner, he got to open more presents and eat his birthday cake. I think he had a great day!

Our masterpiece! Macen and I made the cake ourselves. I have been wanting to work with fondant and have a cake for Macen in fondant so this was my task. It didn't work out the way I wanted it to but Macen was very confident he wanted an alphabet cake. So he got it! He cut out all the letters on the bottom row. And then he placed the candy alphabet on the top all by himself. He had spotted these candy letters at the store a couple of months ago and every single time we went to the store he reminded me he wanted an alphabet cake for his birthday. So I let him buy them this week and he was so excited. He loved helping with it!

While James and I ate cake, he ate a fondant letter. Then he took off all the letters and began spelling words with them.