Hey there! We're still alive. It's amazing how much work it is to come home from vacation!! I had hoped to get all of my Germany pictures posted before we left, but alas, there are a few more still to work through. During our last week in Germany, things were pretty hectic. We had errands galore: returning all of our goodies to the thrift shop, mailing those last few souveniers and of course, trying to figure out how to use the remains of our groceries without buying more that would waste. I think we ate frozen french fries, spaghetti and frozen chicken wings one night- definitely some interesting combos.
The biggest stressor of the week was trying to figure out how to repair the "pleather" arm chair that my 5 year old used as a canvas for her smiley face artistry. This unfortunate event actually occurred quite a while ago, but we had yet to discover a way to solve the problem. And it was beginning to eat at my stomach lining... every time I walked by that chair I got sick to my stomach and began to imagine what kind of terrible charge it would create on our final hotel bill. You may wonder why I would be SO worried about one little chair. Well, some American neighbors at the hotel got into a little tiff with management because they had cats living in their room. These cats poked very tiny holes in the tops of the fabric chairs that surround the table. The hotel tried to charge them
$500 euros (that's about $700) to re-upholster 1 chair!!!
So, when little miss Daphne decided to draw a smiley face (about the size of a nickel) on the arm chair, Matt and I about had a conniption! We tried alcohol, lysol, nail polish remover, magic erasers, perfume, hand sanitizer, nail polish the same color as the chair... the list goes on and on.
After our multiple futile attempts, we just decided to let whatever will be will be. We just crossed our fingers that they wouldn't notice this tiny infraction!
On Monday night, we decided to make one last tourist outing for our FHE activity, so
we headed back to downtown Stuttgart, the location we visited during our first week as well.
This time we headed out with the Abercrombies and had a picnic of sorts... and then we headed back to the same ice cream shop for some of the same ice cream we had that first night! Yum!
Then we walked through Stuttgart's Wine Festival. Since we aren't much for wine, it wasn't particularly exciting for us, but we did get to hear Men At Work's "Land Down Under" on the accordian! And see Tori jammin' out to that fabulous musical performance. (Pardon my ridiculous dancing next to the stroller- oh and the part where I drop ice cream all over myself!)
And of course, we had to get a few photo opps at the downtown Stuttgart sites...
Tori got pretty tired of riding in the stroller, so she decided to take the diaper bag for a walk...
The real excitement came on the way back to our cars... We were trying to find our way back to where we had parked and ended up having to cross the street where the sidewalk was very narrow. We ran across with our strollers and fled to the other side of the very busy and curvy street only to find that on the other side, there was no sidewalk and no way to the other side- just a wall. So we had to rush along the wall with all of our little children, trying to find a sidewalk... we were hurrying so fast and everyone was saying things like , "Stay as close to the wall as you can!"-- Isaac and Daphne were hugging the wall like little secret agents, while Matt ran with Tori and poor Liz and I were trying to keep the strollers away from the cars! We finally made it safely to the other side of the street- we all breathed a sigh of relief!
And THEN... we made it back to the parking garage of the SI Suites, our home in Stuttgart. I don't think I have mentioned it before, but the parking garage there is ridiculously small and the spaces are insanely packed in together. I mean, if there is another car parked in the space next to you, you absolutely have to climb out of your car throught the opposite side. Getting out of a parking space there is like making a 16-point turn. I always felt my body tense up a little when it was time to park or leave the parking garage. So, after our interesting evening in downtown Stuttgart, we arrived back to our nice, snug parking garage.
Of course, the only two decent parking spaces were taken, so we were trying to get into the last available teeny-tiny parking space. Our rental car has a really cool rear view camera, which Matt always uses to the max and I mean, he gets as close as he possibly can- we're talking, millimeters. So, he was rolling back and watching the video camera shot, rolling further and further back and he could see the chest-high cinderblock wall behind us. Finally, he rolls back and very, very lightly bumps the plastic bumper attached to the wall. We were both a little surprised, but not too worried as we just barely bumped it. Then, we both looked into the screen to see the entire wall collapse!~We sort of freaked out. To say the least. And yes, I did say that the wall collapsed.
We decided just to park somewhere else- very far away from the elevator and the wall and we went upstairs to our room. Matt got his clothes changed and took the long walk to the front desk to tell them about the wall. Honestly, if we had been anywhere in America, we would just run right in and tell the owner of said property what happened. Unfortunately, the fact that we were in a foreign country in a hotel where they charge 500 euros to reupholster a rinky dink IKEA chair, we were both overwhelmed by the thoughts of how much they were going to charge us for a brick wall!! Poor Matt was so distraught and I felt so sick that this had happened! Matt, slowly and deliberately made that long walk down the plank to the hotel lobby.
When he arrived there, he asked to speak with the manager, and very carefully explained what happened. The manager replied, "It collapsed?!" And then she decided that she had better go see the wall in question. As they walked out into the parking garage, the manager saw the wall and gasped, covering her mouth with her hand. Matt, obviously, was getting very nervous right about now... his heart about to pound out of his chest. He was trying to explain how slowly our car was moving and that the wall must have been very weak to have fallen over from such a small bump. And as he rushes through this explanation, the manager says, "sigh. Well, actually, we had a report earlier tonight that someone ran into the wall." Just then, that other driver came down to the parking garage to take photos of her tragic accident. The girl (who was also American) told Matt that after she hit the wall, the bricks had shifted over about 3 inches. SO, after all that drama, it turns out that we just happened to bump a wall that was just waiting to fall over. So, one crisis averted.
We went on to endure the rest of our week, racking our brains for a way to repair the worrisome chair. The morning before our room inspection, I was combing Daphne's hair in the bathroom and Tori reached up and grabbed a bottle of my red nail polish and threw it across the room, hitting the tile wall. Of course, it shattered and bright red nail polish exploded around the room. Seriously. It's like there was some sort of a cosmic force working against our ability to pass that room inspection. But one trip to the commissary, 6 hours and a few gallons of nail polish remover later, the bathroom looked just about as good as new.
And then, less than 24 hours later, a representative from the hotel came and walked through our hotel suite and gave us a passing score!! Yay! It was like the weight of the world was lifted off my shoulders. We were so grateful for this little extra blessing to help us finish off our final week.
They are so awesome! Complete and total blackout for your room any time of day.
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We have gotten so used to going on these amazing trips together- I guess we'll have to get used to backyard cookouts when we get together at home!
