Having a wee bit of fun the day after Christmas

I hope everyone had an enjoyable Christmas!  Dawn, Osu, and I had a great time in Dresden.  We now have a new favorite Christmas Market!  The Dresden markets were even better than we had heard and we really enjoyed exploring the different ones around the city.  We were a little surprised when we arrived in Dresden on the 23rd that there wasn't more snow in the city.  What little snow there was was dirty and rotten and not too appealing.  However, on Christmas Eve night, a new storm rolled in, ensuring that we would wake up Christmas morning to a new blanket of white.  We had a great walk around the old part of the city on Christmas morning, but didn't stick around for too long.  I knew that the drive home was going to take longer than usual due to the still falling snow.  My fears were realized when the drive that would usually take only 2.5 hours turned in to a 5+ hour ordeal.  It really wasn't too bad, just slow due to the condition of the Autobahn. 
Pictures from Dresden

On the 26th, we all decided to go have a little fun in the snow.  Here is a short video showing what we did.  (the video might take a bit of time to load - be patient!)



The original video can be found HERE

A bit of a different Christmas

First of all, we'd like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas!  We wish we could be with everyone at this time of year.  That is one of the hard things about living overseas - being away from family and friends during the holidays.  Heck, we have a big enough place now - how about you all come over and stay with us next year :) 

This Christmas, we are taking it pretty easy.  This morning we are leaving for Dresden and are staying for two nights in this fantastic city.  We only decided on this plan late last week, having heard from numerous people that the Dresden Christmas market is THE market to go to in Germany.  We actually hear this about a lot of the different markets around the country (and in France and Italy and Austria), but too many people have told us too many times now that Dresden truly is one of the special ones.  We've been to the Nurnberg Christkindlmarkt - more than a couple of times.  We did Rothenburg ob der Tauber last weekend.  We've been to Hexannager and the Regensburg markets, Salzburg, and numerous other small markets around our area.  They are all great!  But, Dresden is one we really want to check out.  When we asked each other "if you could only go to one more market, which one would it be", we both answered "Dresden".  

So, Dresden it is.  We're really looking forward to it!  We'll be returning home on Christmas day with plans to take it easy, eat a lot of food, and watch a lot of movies.  It sounds delightful to me!

Merry Christmas!

(All of the Christmas Posters I've created this year can be found HERE)

Pictures - 2010 Favorites

It's finally done.  I've gone through the thousands and thousands of pictures (something like 22,000....) that I took over the last 12 months and plucked out my favorite ones.  I know that I am still way behind on posting up pictures from the many trips we took over the year, and it will still be some time before I get to those.  In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this set of pictures.  It was fun going back through them all.  Wow, we did a lot over this past year and definitely kept busy!

To see the full set, click HERE.  A few samples below.

Jef, Dawn, and Osu above the Mer De Glace in Chamonix, France

Dawn and Osu in Dresden

Dawn in St. Anton, Austria