Valentine's Day in Paris!

Jesse and I have wanted to go back to Paris ever since we took a whirlwind trip there back in August.  So Jesse decided we should go for Valentine's Day!  It was fabulous!!!  Not too cold, and not too crowded!  We went to Paris Monday morning on the ICE train.  For those of you who don't know what that is, that's the really fast train!  We got to Paris from Kaiserslautern in only 2 1/2 hours!  It was wonderful!!!  No sitting in the car for 4 1/2 hours, no going through toll roads.  Just get to the train station (which is only 15 minutes from our house), get on your train, and 2 1/2 hours later get off your train in the middle of Paris!  We got to Paris at a little before 10 am, and started sight-seeing.  We had already done some of the big things last time (i.e. went up the Eiffel Tower), so we just wanted to relax and look around.  One of the really cool things we did was going up the Notre Dame tower!  That was neat!  We went to several different places that day too!  And that night, we went to watch the Eiffel Tower sparkle!  I think it's my favorite thing!

 At the train station EARLY in the morning.

 Notre Dame

 My favorite Gargoyles!                   View from the top of Notre Dame.

 The Eiffel Tower is so pretty at night!

I can't rotate it because it's a video.  I just need to learn to stop videoing vertically...

The next day (Tuesday), we went to Place de la Concorde, and walked down the Champs Elysees to the Arc de Triomphe.  It was nice to just walk down the street, go in some stores, and just enjoy the city!  And we found the Louis Vuitton headquarters!  Yes, we went in the store!  No, we did not buy anything :)  Before our train home, we went back to the Eiffel Tower (got a million pictures of it), went to the Pantheon, had a crepe, and saw a rainbow!!!

 Place de la Concorde

 Champs Elysees                           Louis Vuitton Headquarters!

Arc de Triomphe

Eiffel Tower!!! 

Pantheon (this is not a church)            Pantheon with a rainbow!!!

Church behind the Pantheon with a rainbow!

It was a great trip!  Best Valentine's Day ever!!!  To see ALL of the pictures, look on Facebook!!!

What we've been up to in 2011

We've spent the past month kind of relaxing (we needed it after all the running around we did over Christmas...)  Jesse has his work routine, and I'm getting ready to start substituting at the elementary school on base (as soon as they're hiring again).  But other than that, we've had a couple of things going on.

I'm still teaching the "Cradle Roll" Bible class.  That seems to be going pretty well!  After having a few weeks off due to the holidays, we've started our ladies' Bible study back up.  And Jesse's still preaching away :)

A few weeks ago, we drove over to a town (very close by) called Kusel.  We went to visit the castle there, Burg Lichtenberg.  It's the castle in Kusel! (say that 5 times fast)  It's a pretty neat castle.  It's free to the public, and very pretty!  I can't wait to go back in the spring or summer, when all of the flowers will be in bloom!

And I have to add pictures of my most recent cake.  Our friend Greg had a birthday last week.  My friend Amanda and I made him a cake!  He wanted Underdog, so he got it!  He said it was the coolest cake he's ever had!

The Cake Creators

The birthday boy with his cake!

It was nice to do a cake again.  I hadn't done one in a while.  There will be more to come!

Happy New Year! 2011 is here!

This year, we celebrated New Year's Eve German style (minus all the beer...).  We had some friends come over to our house, ate some food, played some games, and popped some fireworks!  We started our fireworks a little before midnight.  But at midnight, all of a sudden, you would have thought you were in the middle of a war zone!  All around us, fireworks started going off.  Apparently, most of the Germans wait until the stroke of midnight to start their fireworks.  And they must all have the exact same time!  It was so neat.  Everywhere we looked there were beautiful fireworks!  Very cool!!!  We had a good time!  Happy New Year!  Here are the first photos we took in 2011!

 Welcome to 2011!!!

A Texas Christmas!

We are back in Germany now.  Christmas in Texas was GREAT!!!  All 6 of them (that doesn't include the one we had for ourselves here in Germany...).  We were home for 2 weeks.  And it was a busy 2 weeks at that.  We were traveling non-stop.  And Jesse was working while we were there.  He preached both Sundays that we were in Texas.  I'll give you a run-down of our travels, and then put some pictures.  It's going to be highly condensed, otherwise it would be forever long.

We got there on Monday, 13 December.  First stop, Chick-Fil-A!!!  Where we saw the Chick-Fil-A cow dressed up as Santa!!!

Tuesday, the 14th, we drove up to Longview to visit with our friends, Larry and Terra Camp, and meet their adorable little boy, Titus (who fell in love with me, and is my new boyfriend- hehe).  We had a great couple of days with them.

We drove back to Houston on Thursday, the 16th, after having lunch with our friend Mike Thomley.  We drove straight to the new FreeBird's that they opened up in Baytown.

Friday, we went to the west side of Houston to go to our nieces' Christmas party at school.  They were SO excited that we were coming.  We stayed for a little bit, then took them with us to Beaumont, and to Chuck-E-Cheese!  They had a blast!!!  We're the coolest aunt and uncle!

We stayed in Vidor for the weekend.  Saturday was Christmas at Ma-maw & Pa-paw's with my whole family.

Me and Mini-Me :)

Ashton and her Mini-Me :)

Sunday, Jesse preached at Vidor both services, and we had our Christmas with the Thompson side that afternoon!  It was a really fun weekend.

Monday, the 20th, was the LaRue Christmas.  Ashley and Adam had gotten some pancake mix that we used that morning.  It was a delicious "Christmas" breakfast!  Ashley and I even put out milk and cookies for Santa Sunday night!  We had a really good time opening presents and spending time with one another.

 Cookies for Santa, and "Christmas" breakfast!

They liked their presents from Germany!

 Silly boys...  :)

That week went by really quickly.  We had dinner with the Noonans, went to Bible study at Alief, had dinner with Jessica and J-Kil, went shopping, I had a girl's day out with the nieces, and then went to spend Christmas with my family.

They both got haircuts

 Getting their nails done!

Thursday night, the girls stayed with us, and we made snowman cupcakes!

 Making the cupcakes.

 They really liked making them!

We spent Christmas Eve at my sister's house with our family.  We got to go out and see how my parents' house was coming along, ate a yummy dinner, opened presents, and played with the girls.

Uncle Jesse pushing the girls in the swings.

The cat really liked to climb in the bag full of wrapping paper...

They liked their German sign!

Cupcakes on display on my new Cupcake Tree!

Christmas day was fast and furious.  We got to see what Santa left for the girls, went to Groves to have Christmas with my other side of the family, and then went to visit Jesse's family in Groves.  Fast and furious, but great all the same!

Grand-mother & Grand-daddy with their German sign

Sunday, Jesse preached at Eastside, and had quite the audience for it!  Lots of family!

Monday was full of errands; mailing boxes to ourselves here in Germany, returning a few things, and getting ready to leave the following day.  We did have the pleasure of going out to the Murffs' for dinner.  We always enjoy spending time with the Murffs.  Wonderful people!!!

Tuesday morning we drove to Galveston to drop our car off at the port, had breakfast at IHop, then drove to the airport.  And here we are, home again.  It was a great, and busy, couple of weeks.  It was wonderful to see our family and friends again, but it's good to be home (I hate living out of a suitcase).

We are getting ready for our New Year's Eve celebration tomorrow!  I hope everyone has a wonderful New Year!!!  (this post ended up being long anyway... sorry)