Germany, Part 1

We set off bright and early on a Friday morning to drive to Folkstone, England to catch the chunnel crossing- over to France. We had never done this before with a car so we were not sure how it was going to be, but it was actually super easy. We had made reservations for us at a certain time that afternoon but ended up getting there several hours early due to lack of traffic! We were allowed to switch to an earlier train which was awesome- it meant getting to our hotel a lot sooner than expected that night! (Always good when you are traveling with three, four and under!)

The picture below is just from our car waiting to drive onto the train. They give you a letter of the alphabet to hang on your rear view mirror and you just follow the signs, then drive right on to a train. It was double decker, but we were on the bottom. It was just basically a shell of a train that you drive all the way through and then park. It takes about 35 minutes to cross under and you are allowed to get out of your car during that time. It worked out great because we bought lunch and then were able to eat it while on the train, and I was able to feed Addison which meant one less stop!

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We arrived at our hotel and quickly got some dinner. A lot of European hotels are small and only hold a few people, so we had to have two separate rooms. I was not too thrilled with that but what can you do? Nothing. Just get over it. So Addison and I took one room and Marc graciously volunteered to have the big girls with him. Neither one of us slept much because Addison was all over the bed, rolling around and snuggling up against me. Marc said that Bailey was all over the place too and he didn't get much sleep. Here is Addison at about 10:30pm. She was wired! I was trying to read and do my Esther study by the bathroom light, but she was just too happy for sleep!

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The first part of our trip was for a conference with our sending organization. We stayed at a nice hotel for a week, had lots of meetings and got to visit with friends we have not seen in years!

Our good friends who live in Italy. We went to university together and he and Marc have known for 20 years- another story for another post!

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This sweet girl I met for the first time this week, but I went to elementary school with her big sister- and funny enough, her sister and I got married on the same day, same year and her husband came last year to lead worship for another conference. Small world!
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The Borders, a very sweet couple that we have enjoyed getting to know over the past few years. They live in Hungary! Their daughter is a friend of ours too, and she and her husband live in France! Her blog is one of my favorites!

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Our good friends, Chad and Amy and their little baby girl Lauren! She was born a month after Addison in Paris! How many of you can say you were born in Paris? Anyone?

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Addison and Lauren hanging out. Amy and I switched babies for a few minutes and Lauren was so lightweight- well relatively. She's probably in the normal weight range for a 5 month old! Ha. They were checking each other out and even had a little conversation, it was really cute! (Please excuse my fat arm! Ugh!)

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I mentioned before about the wonderful week we had- the teaching and seeing all our friends was just so refreshing! We really needed it. The girls were in VBS all day while we were in meetings and they too had a great time. Cerys especially has been talking about what she learned and singing the "Boomerang Express" song! It was a huge blessing to have our children taken care of all day, we are VERY grateful for the teams that came over to do that! It's sure nice of them for them to take their vacation to come babysit! :) Thank you Ladies! (And Dr. Mac Brunson and his wife Debbie- they worked in the baby room in the mornings!)

After this week was all finished and we said our goodbyes- it's never easy but part of our life now- we drove away to start our family vacation!

Stay tuned!
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