I'm in Germany!

I had two very good flights bringing me to Germany today. In Minneapolis, I had a rainbow out the plane window for my send-off. How fitting. We flew up over Lake Superior, Nova Scotia, Greenland, Ireland, England, and then The Netherlands, where I had a couple of hours lay-over. Over Ireland I saw the stone fences separating the farms (so charming). Approaching England, I saw at least 7 freighters. Next we were either over northern England or Scotland. I saw an airport that may have been Preswick, Scotland.

Off and on there was cloud cover, so I watched the movie Hotel for Dogs. It was cute and had a good ending. I slept about 3 hours total, so I'm a bit wiped.

I thought I had been in Schiphol Airport, Amsterdam, years ago, but either it has changed A LOT, or my memory of it has faded. It's huge - long, long run ways. There are canals running through part of the airport. We landed an hour early, so I figured there was time to shop. But I hadn't counted on having to go through customs and security, which took extra time. I did look in a few stores, but only bought a couple of things. Hans had seen a toy called Girders and Panels when he was there last fall and suggested I look for that for Josiah's 5th birthday, coming up on the 19th, but the lady at the toy store said they didn't have it. She hadn't heard of it.

The flight to Stuttgart was only an hour. It was cloudy over Amsterdam, but cleared off as we made our way over Germany. I think I saw the Rhine River, but can't be sure. I love the red clay rooftops. Rachel, Josiah and Annika were there to meet me. Josiah came running up saying, "Grandma! Grandma!" Annika was shy at first. She's a little young yet.

We've been home a couple of hours - boy, it's smelling good in here - Rachel is making dinner. The kids are quietly playing. I've had big hugs from both of them. It's such a joy!