St. Patricks Day

I am not one of those moms that goes all out for every holiday.  I'm not saying that it's a bad thing if you do that but I just don't have the creativity to come up with fun ideas for the holidays.  This St. Patricks Day I attempted a very limited celebration for the boys.  I hung rainbow streamers in their doorway so when they woke up they could walk through the rainbow, which they thought was so fun.  Hyrum made green crepes for breakfast and we also helped the boys make a trap for the leprechauns.  Nothing spectacular but I think they had fun.

The boys enjoying their crepes and green milk for breakfast.

The leprechaun trap.  The idea was that the leprechaun would see the gold on top of the box, climb the ladder to the top and walk across the box to the gold.  The surprise for the leprechaun was that the box wasn't solid all the way across, that's crepe paper with a big hole underneath.  Pretty tricky right?  The leprechaun broke through the crepe paper and fell into our box but then escaped...we'll have to try again next year:)

A Day on the "Romantic Road"

On Saturday, March 12, the sun was shining and we decided to get out and explore a bit.  We really needed to shake the winter dust off our walking shoes and hit some old towns.  The best preserved medieval city in all of Germany is Rothenberg, lucky for us it's only a two hour drive from our house!  Once in Rothenberg the main attraction, especially for 7 year old boys, is to walk around the entire city on the well preserved city wall.  There are also numerous shops to look into and a relaxing garden to run around.  We enjoyed the warm weather and the historic scenery.

A view of Rothenberg from the city wall.

Emerson and Townsend pose for a photo on the city wall.

Townsend "hanging out" on the city wall.  They can make even the most historic locations jungle gyms!

A vendor was selling fresh pressed apple cider.  We bought one glass for the boys to share but they all loved it so much we ended up buying two more glasses of the delicious juice!

We decided to take a drive on the "Romantic Road" between Rothenberg and Dinkelsbühl.  According to our favorite guide, Rick Steves, "The Romantic Road winds you past the most beautiful towns and scenery of Germany's medieval heartland...Wander through quaint hills and rolling villages, and stop wherever the cows look friendly or a town fountain beckons."  The drive was certainly beautiful.  I loved the sunshine on all the hills and driving through all the small towns where they have family run butcher shops and bakeries.  Our destination was Dinkelsbühl, a town we had heard of from other people but we had never visited ourselves.  Dinkelsbühl is another preserved medieval town with a moat and town wall circling the city.  Unfortunately you can't walk around on the wall but a stroll through the city was lots of fun.  We found a fun playground for the boys to run around and get some wiggles out before we headed home.

The cute town of Dinkelsbühl.

Mommy and Emerson pose on a bridge that crossed over the very deep moat.

Hyrum walked over to Townsend to take his photo and Townsend said, "Daddy, I just need some time by myself right now."  I think he was worn out from all the walking and just needed a little break.

Julian playing at the playground, he loves trying to run and climb like his big brothers.

We had a great day exploring old and new things and just spending time together outside in the sunshine!

Julian Turns Two!

My Little Man Jules

I honestly don't know who "Father Time" thinks he is sneaking through my days, weeks, months and now years with my little man Jules.  Julian is growing up a little too fast for my taste.  He is such a smart little guy.  He doesn't talk much yet but he is very adept at using his own version of sign language to get what he wants.  He LOVES to help me with anything I am doing, especially if it has anything to do with the dishwasher.  He loves to load and unload dishes.  He loves to load the washing machine with clothes.  He loves to "help" me vacuum by pushing the vacuum around the house behind me while I use the hose attachment.  He likes to play with his big brothers but most of the time he tries to stay out of their crazy games.  He loves to go for drives to the hardware store with Hyrum.  Now that the weather is getting a little nicer he loves to be outside.  Even when I start getting a little too cold and want to come into the house he still wants to be outside pushing his little toy giraffe around the yard.  He likes to chase the cat around and sometimes he tries to follow the cat into places only cats should go (ie: a bramble bush in our backyard that the cat likes to crawl under.  The other day I heard Julian calling "mama" from the back yard and I found him stuck amidst the prickers and thorns.  Poor guy, he couldn't go forward or backward...I'm hoping he won't try to follow the cat there in the future!)

What would I do without Julian?  He keeps me company all day while the boys are in school.  He smiles and runs to give me a hug when I have left him with daddy or a babysitter.  He likes to laugh.  He makes me laugh.  I love him from his cute little toes to his floppy blonde hair!


I have put together a little video of Julian from age one to two.  Pay special attention to how diligently he tries to blow out his birthday candles and how proud he looks when they finally blow out...too cute:)

The past few weeks

OK, so there have been many things going on these last few weeks and I just haven't sat down and wrote about them but I suppose late is better than never.

Friday February 11th
We picked the boys up early from school and headed toward Freiberg, about three hours away, for a trip to the temple.  We planned to meet up with some friends in Zwickau at a car museum.  They also have three boys and we figured it would be a nice halfway stopping point for our trip...boys like cars, right?  Well after two hours in the car what boys really like is to RUN and we were asked more than once by the security guards at the museum to please keep our boys under control.  I think they had fun though.  The museum had a race car game they could play as well as a "build your own car" computer game that they enjoyed.  After the museum we headed to McDonalds for dinner where they were once again extremely wild but I figured that was OK at McDonalds.  We got to Freiberg and we played some games with our friends, the Platt family and then headed to bed.

 Julian at the car museum, he wasn't too happy to be strapped in his stroller so we let him run around with his brothers after a while

 Townsend and Emerson playing the race car game at the museum

The boys found the coat lockers at the museum...what can I say?

Saturday February 12th
Hyrum and I attended a session at the temple while the Platts watched our kids and then we switched so they could also attend a session.  After the temple we had lunch at our favorite Doner Kebab restaurant in Freiberg and then we went to the swimming pool.  A fun time was had by all, especially the three 7 year olds who could go down the water slide all by themselves and they enjoyed a bit of freedom at the pool.  The trip home was wonderful because the boys had exhausted themselves at the pool and so slept most of the way home.  Hyrum and I had the rare opportunity to listen to a podcast that was actually interesting for adults, instead of listening to the audio for a childrens movie that was playing in the back seats:)

 Freiberg Germany Temple

Monday February 14th

Happy Valentines Day!  The boys were sent to school with a whole bag full of treats to pass out to their friends and they returned home with boxes stuffed to the brim with treats.  When did Valentines Day start involving more candy than Halloween?   Hyrum had taken the day off work so we could spend some time together.  We put Julian in daycare for a few hours and enjoyed a nice salad at Hotel Bohm here in Grafenwoehr for lunch.  It is so nice to sit at a table in a restaurant and talk quietly together about our day and not have to worry about crying kids or boys crawling around under the table.  Hyrum made me a fabulous dinner with my two favorite foods, broccoli and sweet potatoes! 

This is a photo of the boys Valentine boxes after they had already eaten about half the candy, I wish I would have thought to grab the camera sooner...those boxes were overflowing!

Flowers from Hyrum

The yummy dinner Hyrum made.  Stir fried broccoli with chicken and spiced sweet potatoes with yogurt dressing.

Saturday February 19th

Our Stake held a fasching party for all the primary kids in the Stake.  My calling is in the Stake primary presidency so I was heavily involved in the planning for this activity.  Last year about 30 children came to the party so we planned on about 40 children for this year.  Well, more than 80 children came!!!  Poor Hyrum was sent to the grocery store to buy more food and treats for the children.  I believe the party was a success.  The kids played games and enjoyed some yummy German sausages and krapfen (German donuts).  Unfortunately Townsend wasn't feeling too great that day and Julian was just a little scared of all the noise going on around him, so that made it a little harder to be in charge of all the activities that I was supposed to run.  Overall I came away feeling like it was a success, even though it was really crazy!

Can you tell Townsend doesn't feel great?  I was so busy running around I forgot to take any pictures so thank you Tera for sending me this photo!

Monday February 21st

The boys were home from school and Hyrum had the day off work because of Presidents Day.  We wanted to do something fun together but little Townsend still wasn't feeling well (it turns out he had pneumonia!)  We decided to go for a short walk around the Felsen Labyrinth.  The boys and I had been there a few times but Hyrum had never gone so we thought it would be a fun little trip.  We hadn't planned on there being so much snow on the trail so we were all just wearing our shoes instead of boots.  Poor Townsend couldn't really breathe very well so I ended up carrying him most of the way.  Everyone was pretty cold even though the sun was shining.  Needless to say, our hike was very short BUT we did enjoy the short time we got to spend outside in the fresh air.

Emerson broke this icicle off one of the rock outcroppings.  It was the clearest and smoothest icicle I have ever seen.

At one point Hyrum was carrying both Townsend and Julian!  What a great Dad:)

You can see the sun was shining and it was a beautiful clear day but we had to turn around before we reached the top.  I'm sure the view from the top would have been amazing.  We will definitely come back this summer!

Pinewood Derby

Townsend and Emerson have been participating in Tiger Scouts this year.  This was their first pinewood derby experience...and mine too.  I grew up in a family with 1 boy and 7 girls, I really have no idea about scouting and all the things that go along with it.  Thank goodness for Hyrum.  The boys chose the design they wanted for their cars but Hyrum did all the work.  I'm hoping they can help a little more when they get older but right now I just don't want my 7 year old using a band saw!  They helped sand and paint a little bit but the credit really goes to Hyrum, what an amazing Dad!

Townsend's car on the left, Emerson's car on the right

Emerson with his car on race day.

Townsend with his car on race day

The boys claimed a perfect spot to sit and watch the races

There were about 30 cars racing that day.  After about 1/2 hour I thought, surely we are almost done, when I asked a friend of mine when the race was over she said, "oh, this usually lasts about 2 hours."  What?  I had no idea.  Hyrum had to be sent out to the gas station to buy some drinks and snacks to help keep our energy up for the long haul.  Townsend's car came in 1st place for his age group and then 3rd place overall.  He was so happy and excited when his car kept winning.  Emerson had a bit of a hard time being happy for his brother.  His car did pretty well and won some of it's races but didn't end up placing at all.  We tried to tell him that lots of other boys didn't win at all but he just wanted to be angry that his brother won and he didn't.  Sometimes it's really hard having twins!

What We've Been Up To

I haven't posted in a few weeks so I have a bit of catching up to do.  It's not that I haven't been doing anything it's just that it takes motivation to sit at this computer and upload photos and attempt to write something witty.

We went to Spielemax (a toy store in Weiden) with some birthday money Oma had sent for the twins.  Townsend bought himself a skateboard and Emerson chose a package of 6 bakugan's (if you don't know what these are you must not have young boys at home!)  Julian found this stroller and pushed it all around the store while we were waiting for the boys to decide what they wanted.  I couldn't help but buy it for him in the end, he loves it so much!

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Hyrum let me have a little mini break from the kids for a few days the weekend after the boys birthday.  I LOVE having Paige within driving distance!  It makes it so easy to arrange for me to get away for a bit.  We enjoyed Indian and Thai food as well as relaxing on the couch with Oreo truffles...mmmmm so good!  This is a picture we took up at the castle ruins in her town of Hohenecken.  I love you so much Paige, thanks for always making me feel so welcome and for showing me a good time:)

Daddy and Julian

Mommy and Julian

Family photo

We are Durtschi's and what this means is that when the sun comes out we go hiking.  Today it was a sweltering 48 degrees so we packed the kids in the car and hiked up to a castle ruin outside the city of Kemnath, about 30 minutes away.  The boys loved climbing all over the ruins and enjoyed being outside in the sunshine.  Julian actually really likes the baby backpack and didn't mind hanging out in it for the hike but once we were at the top he wanted to get out and run with his brothers.  His favorite thing is splashing in puddles and so he had a fabulous time with all the melted snow puddles.  I truly love living here in Germany where we have access to so many wonderful hikes just minutes from our home.

The boys are SEVEN

For the past few weeks Hyrum and I have tried desperately to convince the boys they didn't want a birthday party.  We offered to take them on a small trip, to take them to a movie, to buy them something fancy...nope, they wanted a party.  I suppose after avoiding throwing an actual birthday party for my twins the last seven years I finally decided I should just do what they want and give them a party.  In the past we have had a few family friends over for cake and ice-cream with a strict "no gifts" rule but I think the boys have been invited to enough birthday parties now they have actually caught on to the fact they have been getting a bum deal.  So, two class parties and one big combined party later, we are all still alive and our house is still standing. 

Cakes #1 and 2

I brought in cake for the boys classes today.  Emerson wanted vanilla with oreo cookies and Townsend wanted chocolate with strawberries.  It was kind of crazy to organize it all.  I had to be in Townsend's class at 1:00 for his snack time and then Emerson's class at 1:15 but I think all the kids enjoyed the cakes.

Townsend wearing his birthday hat and enjoying his snack

Emerson and his birthday hat having cake with his class

Cake #3, for the evening birthday party.  This one was half chocolate and half vanilla.  Those are supposed to be number 7's all over the cake but they are kind of sloppy...I'm not known for my craftiness:)

They played a few games (duck, duck, goose and some other relay games)

They opened some gifts...

Then we smashed a pinata to bits!  Here is Emerson getting ready to take a swing

Townsend takes his turn at whacking the pinata

I'm pretty sure the boys had a good day.  The friends that came over seemed to have a fun time and there was PLENTY of food.  We ordered 8 large pizzas and a whole sheet cake...what were we thinking?  I'm also pretty sure I don't want to do this again anytime in the near future...good thing their birthday only comes once a year!