2020 Planner and Journal

Untitled Design 27How is it already 2020? A new year, a new decade, a chance for a real fresh start and outlook. I find that one of my favorite things about the new year is a chance to break out some new stationary and planning. I’ve kept no secret my need for paper and writing. The act of physically writing my schedule, to do list, important notes, etc…it keeps my mind sane. I tend to accomplish more and remember things better as well.

2019 was an incredible year, but was also incredibly busy. It was the first year in my adult life that I wasn’t working in some form and that was a big change. This post isn’t necessarily about that (but I can do a post about that if you’d be interested?), but I did find that my planning needs changed drastically. I found that I wasn’t looking at my time in a daily manner, but rather in a weekly and monthly fashion. Using a daily planner, things were getting lost in the shuffle, and I felt just a general state of disorganization. So I switched.

This year I am using a Monthly/Weekly planner that I customized to fit my own needs. I used a company called Plum Paper, which you can find HERE, and purchased the weekly layout. My favorite part of these planners is that you can customize EVERYTHING. From what holidays and dates show, to when the weeks start, and the weekly breakdown.

Every month starts with a monthly highlights page, which I have sparingly used. This page has a spot to put birthdays, important dates, goals, and for me, my spending at the bottom. The next page is blank and I use it to track what books I’ve read that month and my rating. Then comes the monthly layout. I wish the boxes were a smidge bigger, but this works perfectly well.

Each week is given two pages. The days on the right side, and a page of “stuff” on the left. I have my weekly pages set to start on Monday (as I really got used to that in the Hobonichi set up) and I find that this is JUST enough room. If anything I try to leave these day layouts to appointments/meal plans/any specifics for that day. For all the rest of my “stuff” I break it down into two columns: weekly priorities, weekly tasks. Every week I have priorities in terms of blogging, writing, posting, etc. and every week I have the same tasks that I do in terms of cleaning and just self care stuff. These two columns break that up and allow me to know what I need to do in the course of the week, rather than just transferring tasks from day to day.

In the back of the planner I do have a meal planning kit that has a meal list breakdown, shopping list section, and quick reference information. I’ve already done really well with meal planning, but I’m hoping to streamline the process even more if I can.

IMG_8574I’ve also decided to give a commonplace notebook a shot. I am not really sure how this is going to work (as it is so much easier to just pull out my phone and jot a note down), but I really like the idea of a commonplace book. A commonplace notebook is exactly what you would think of, it’s a notebook that you always have on you and that contains anything that comes to you that you need/want to remember, whether that’s important dates, appointments, quotes, whatever. I’ll keep you posted on how this goes. I’m using this absolutely beautiful Paper Blanks Flexi Notebook for that purpose.

 

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Finally, I have a new journal for 2020. I was off and on in my journaling over the second half of 2019, doing really well with it until about September/October. I am trying to be a little bit better with this this coming year (as well know how important writing is for me) and I’ve been really wanting to use this journal since I bought it. It’s a beautiful Italian Leather (maybe pleather?) bound journal with a tie string. It’s got some lettering all throughout the cover and I’ve found it to be a really nice journal to write in. Journaling and Planning go a lot better when you actually like what you are writing in.

 

So that is what my 2020 looks like in terms of stationary! Are you a stationary lover like me? What does your planning for this year look like?

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A Bavarian Culture Evening – December 2019

Imagine…

A cold blustery evening, the sun has set. All bundled up with your friends and family by your side, in the town square you eagerly wait for the show to begin. Everyone told you that this you had to see, for not only was the show exciting, the culture couldn’t be beat. The square gets darker and soon a low rumble begins. An announcer’s voice starts to tell the story of Krampus and St. Nick. Slowly terrifying horned creatures fill the square carrying switches and sticks, bells clanging.

This begins the Krampus show that we went to this past month.

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Krampus has been set deep in the culture here and is known just as widely as St. Nick and Santa Claus. There is a troupe of performances who dress up in costume and put on a great fire show to tell the story and activities of Krampus during the Christmas Season. Before we chat on the performance I’ll share a bit of the history of Krampus that we know.

Krampus dates back to when pre-Germanic tribes practiced paganism and originally had no relation to Christmas. Krampus is described in folklore as a half goat half demon creature and beyond dating him to pre-Germanic origins, there really isn’t much more history on Krampus. Saint Nicholas became popular around the 11-12th century, with Krampus following suit in the 16th century. During the 16th century masked devils would run around acting as nuisances opposite of the St. Nicholas displays. In modern times Krampus “flies” with St. Nicholas on December 5 punishing all the bad little boys and girls (while St. Nicholas awards the good children). Krampus has horns on the top of his head, a long tongue, a face that seems to be in a perpetual howl or evil expression, chains (as an attempt to bind him), and hooves. He typically carries a birch switch and has bells somewhere on his person.

A much darker version has Krampus kidnapping and torturing those who are bad (which is what has been picked up in America/Hollywood/Movie Producers).

There are a couple different ways to see Krampus, one is a performance (which is what we did), the second is a Krampus Run (which is something the bigger cities will hold), and the third is to run into him at a Christmas Market. The one thing they all have in common is that Krampus has no boundaries. His job is to cause havoc and mischief and he definitely succeeds at that.

When I originally heard about Krampus, I knew I wanted to go to one of the fire shows. It seemed the best way to experience the entire “effect” of Krampus. You see him both causing mischief (as the no boundaries includes the shows), but also how they work with the fire.

I’ll let the pictures from the show do most of the talking for this post, but let me just say this, if you EVER have a chance to go to a Krampus fire performance…go. It was so cool to not only see Krampus, but also see the work that they did with the fire, see the performers in their element, and feel the culture of Krampus and the Christmas Season.

He is terrifying (especially if you go up and ask for a picture- if you have any boundary issues DO NOT do this), but at the same time, there is something inherently awesome about the whole show. The troupe that we saw was Oberpfalzer Schlossteufeln e.V. and they were fantastic. They truly put on a show and they lived up to the Krampus legend.

And that was our Bavarian Cultural Evening for the Christmas season. We did combine it with attending the Christmas Market at Amberg, but the market itself was quite small so I didn’t have enough to really make a good market post on it.

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2020 Goals, Intentions, and Word of the Year

It’s the 1st of January of 2020. A New Year. A New Decade. Talk about a completely fresh start to make changes, accomplish goals, reach dreams.

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I’m not going to lie; I’m oddly struggling with writing this post. There are a couple of reasons for this, one of which being that there is just so much that I want to accomplish this year, so much I want to do and see, that it feels difficult to mark that down in just a few sentences or words. Another reason is that I’ve changed my approach to the new year this year. In years past I haven’t done resolutions (for several reasons, last year’s post described it best which you can read HERE) and while I am not doing them this year, I do have several goals that I want to reach/go beyond this year.

And with making goals comes the possibility of not achieving them. Of failing. And therein lies my other reason I am struggling.

I’ve talked about my fear of failure before and also about how I am trying to push past that and recognize that failure isn’t a BAD thing. I’m also trying to continue to recognize and remind myself that what I consider “failure” isn’t always actually failing. Since I have things that I want to accomplish this year, I want to hold myself accountable to actually doing them, rather than allowing my fear of not accomplishing it all get in my way. Thus, setting goals for the year.

Now, after all that build up, I am only going to give a broad outline to my goals. I like to play things a bit close to my chest and so I’m going to give you my little outline for the year, when I am going to be focusing on things and then keep you posted as to how they are going.

For the first half of the year I really want to focus on my website and my SEO. A Cuppa Cosy has become such a big part of my life over the past couple years (specifically the past year) and I have been mostly focused on content, developing my voice, deciding where I want to “fit”, what I want my posts to look like. I haven’t really been focusing (beyond key words and hashtags) on pushing the posts and website out far to the public. I want to settle on a good theme for the sight, optimize my posts on SEO, and get myself settled on Pinterest.

The second half of the year I want to focus on publications and putting more of my writing out in the world. I’ve been looking at maybe freelancing or submitting articles to various blogs and magazines. I want to put some of my travel photography out into the world a little bit more as well. Ultimately I would like to start looking at monetizing some of my work. Putting my thoughts and pictures out maybe beyond just my little corner of the internet. And I think that this is the goal that I am keeping the closest to my chest and the one that terrifies me the most (in terms of failing).

In other goals, I want to switch my focus to quality over quantity when it comes to content. I don’t want to put posts out just because I feel like I need to have content up and I don’t want to have blog posts that I don’t fully like to be put up simply because they need to go up. I want to make sure that everything I am posting is 100% my standards. I also want to take a little more time “away” at times. When we went away on our Summer Holiday I didn’t have any blog posts go up and I posted on Social Media intermittently and to be honest, when we came back I was so refreshed. I had a clear mind and a much better outset for the rest of the year. I want to do that a little bit more. I am not able to do that during our Winter Holiday (which we are currently on) just due to the amount of posts I have and want to share, but maybe come our Spring Holiday and Summer Holiday I might do that again. I want to have a few weeks a year that are just a breather.

On the personal side of things, I would like to focus on reading a wider variety of books this year, as well as some of the longer books that I’ve put off for a while now. I want to bring some of my reading content to this blog rather than just keeping it separate. I want to continue to cherish a love of reading with my boys as I find that is such an important part of children’s lives. I want to focus on them as much as I can because we don’t have too much longer that we are all together at home like this. I’ve been very recently introduced (or reminded) that the school years are coming and that’s a bittersweet change. I want to remind myself that it’s ok to feel happy and sad, blessed and frustrated. We are human and we don’t only feel one thing at one time.

Obviously, I want to travel more. We’ve seen so much just in the short amount of time we’ve been in Europe and I can’t wait to see more of this side of the world. I’ve got some big plans to go to some new places, places we never would have thought about, places that are completely “foreign” to us. We’ve definitely got a few big trips in the works for this year, but I also want us to make use of long weekends and even overnights here and there.

Finally, I want to make sure that I am getting more quality one on one time with my husband. Our boys are getting older, I’m a little less paranoid about leaving them with other people (not that I was ever crazy paranoid about it, but it did make me a little anxious as they are a handful) and as much as we’ve really transitioned well to parenting and our family life, I think we could use a little bit more of that carefree date night feeling. It’s so important, and while we are definitely homebodies and love our at home on the couch date nights (that will never change and still happen every week), we are in Germany! We have gotten out just the two of us and done quite a few things that wouldn’t have been possible with the kids (or would have been much more difficult) and I want to do more of that in 2020.

A final note to touch on, my word and intention for 2020. I am keeping the same word and intention from last year going into this year. I really resonated with “Be Open” and “Adventure” last year and I feel like they still fit with how I want to live my life this year as well. I want to continue to be open to new opportunities, to say yes to more experiences and chances that I may not get again (this also plays into my goals for 2020). I also want to approach life with an “adventuring” outlook. We are living our biggest life adventure right now here in Germany and I want to just keep living that.

And that’s that for 2020! Do you have goals for this year? What are they? How about your word and/or intention?

 

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2019 – A Year in Review

How have we already reached the 30th of December? It seems like the year was just starting yesterday. And we aren’t even going to get into the fact that this is the end of a decade…what?! I’m still trying to wrap my mind around that one.

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2019 was quite the year over here at A Cuppa Cosy. We did an international move, lived out of a hotel and 6 suitcases for 5 ½ months, visited (as of the date of this post) 10 new to us countries, and experienced new highs and lows with two very rambunctious and active {not so} little boys. Looking back on our year for this post it’s hard to believe that this is our life now (we are going to be visiting The Vatican…what?!), but here we are.

In terms of highs, our move tops the list. In February we moved to a little spot in the German state of Bavaria. We left behind hectic, heavily populated D.C. for the rural countryside life. It was an absolute dream come true and we have well and truly made a home here. The people have been incredibly welcoming as we struggle to learn the language (German is no joke) and I feel like we have overall adjusted really well. For all the good that moving to Germany has done, living in a hotel for 5 ½ months was really hard at times. It’s tough not having your own belongings, having two boys who are used to a certain amount of space and who have a never-ending amount of energy, as well as not being able to have things as we like them.

Another high point of 2019 is the sheer amount of traveling that we have done. As I said, we visited 10 new countries and have really learned the art of short weekend trips (but we’ve also mastered long term travel too). My top place that we’ve visited is Scotland (is anyone surprised? Blog posts are HERE and HERE), followed very closely by Austria, which I’ve now visited twice (HERE and HERE). London was a dream come true (blog post HERE) as was seeing the Tulip Fields at Keukenhof (HERE). So far we haven’t been anywhere that we’ve not liked, although I wasn’t the biggest fan of Amsterdam (still enjoyed my time, just not the top of the list, blog post HERE). I’m definitely looking forward to more travel over the next two years.

We have experienced countless cultural events here in Germany including both Oktoberfest (HERE) and a Krampus show (blog post to come), but also the little festivals in between for random celebrations and Christmas Markets (you’ve seen all of these, but my top two are Gutenek and Dresden).

The boys grew…A LOT over the past year. Colton has really come into his own with his words, his likes/dislikes, and his energy level. He went to his first couple days of preschool (getting evaluated to determine if he needs/could use preschool due to speech) and he loved them. He handled drop off’s like a champ and looks forward to going every time we go. He has really started speaking properly and we are loving seeing his little personality shine (although sometimes he is a LITTLE too much like his father haha). Andrew has really started to come into his own too. He has a voice and definitely knows how to use it, as well as learning how to wrestle with big brother (and win). He has been loving going to our local playgroup and has become such a chatty social little boy. He still has a really sweet and soft side that comes out every time he comes up to give hugs or tries to help with everything. The time is passing all too quickly.

We had one really low point in the year, that I have kind of talked about, but also kind of haven’t. I had one month that I just struggled, that I just broke down. We were still adjusting to the schedule, had just come off of our long Summer Holiday, and I just really struggled the entire month. I had a couple of low days where I was incredibly low energy, crying, and in a dark place for a bit. Thankfully things balanced out and the rest of the year has been great. I say this to show that while our life is incredible here and we are so grateful, it hasn’t been a year of sunshine and daisies.

One of my intentions for 2019 was to be open. Be open to new opportunities, new adventures and to say yes more. I think that I’ve actually really accomplished that. I’ve tried to be more spontaneous this year, and just go with whatever happens as it happens. My word was Adventure and we have most definitely had some of those. Overall, I think this was one of our best years and I know that we are in store for so many more.

So, that was basically our 2019 in a nutshell. A move, lots of traveling, a very happy couple and two wild boys. Our not-so-perfect perfect life.

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Christmas Market Breakdown – Schloss Gutenek 2019

Untitled Design 22Ah, our final Christmas Market post. I have one more Christmas related post (all about Krampus!), but this is the last Christmas Market post and I have saved the best for last. Schloss Gutenek was my favorite Christmas Market that we went to this year (followed closely by Dresden) and I cannot wait to share this market with you. It’s one that I think everyone should try to go to (in the area at least). It’s one of those small but perfect markets, that weaves you through various courtyards and castle alleys. To me, it is the quintessential German Christmas Market experience. I think it rivals Thurns & Taxis in Regensburg (read about that one HERE), although I liked this one a bit better and cost wise it was a bit cheaper.

Schloss Gutenek – The Specifics

As a castle (yep a little history first…), Schloss Gutenek is first found around the 12th century, although the current set up is dated the 19th century. The property and buildings have bounced around various royal families, finally settling with the Gymnich family.

Schloss Gutenek has only been holding this Weihnachstmarkt for 10 years (so a newbie!) and it is only open during the weekends. It is actually classified as a medieval market and features not only the stalls of a Christmas market, but a tented section that has character actors and artisans making their wares. You can watch the craftsman work away to make the perfect item. There is also both camel and horse rides, as well an old-fashioned crank ride for children.

The market itself winds its way through the entire castle grounds, so you not only get to see the market, but also bits of the castle as well. I would say that most of the stalls were hand crafted or unique items, with only a couple (at the most) stalls featuring mass produced items. This particular market also had a couple of enclosed areas where you could sit and drink a beer (from Weltenburger kind of a fun bit to see after visiting the Abbey!) and enjoy your meal of snacks.

The real highlight was standing in the darkened evening with only the lights of the stalls and lamps to see, glühwein in one hand, pastry in another, with a  crackling fire in front, and Christmas Music from a live musician. It was heavenly and I just want to relive that again and again and again.

This was another market that we didn’t actually buy anything at, aside from food and drink, keeping the mug. Again though, we ate some real delights. One of the stalls had a donut selection that was incredible. Donuts here are not quite the same as they are stateside, but they are just as (if not more) delicious. Robert went for a full selection, getting a piece of each kind, while I stuck with staples- chocolate, cinnamon sugar, original, raspberry, and a fried apple chunk. It was absolutely delicious and hit all the right spots. Robert also picked up a pulled pork sandwich which contained pork that was roasted for 2 hours (you could see the spit turning) and featured a select group of spices. He said it was delicious and well worth the price.

It might be a smaller market, and not as exciting as say Dresden would be, but I found this market to be my favorite of the bunch. It was small enough to not be super overwhelming or duplicates, but not too small that you felt it wasn’t worth the time. The ambiance was incredible, and the food was spot on. Everywhere we looked was just Christmas embodied and this was just the perfect reminder that sometimes smaller and more “intimate” can be better. I highly recommend it if you are in the area.

 

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Christmas Eve Boxes 2019

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Ah, our tradition continues for the third year 🙂 I always loved the idea of Christmas Eve Boxes, of building the excitement for the big day, of having a special little something the night before. Every year the Christmas Eve Boxes contain two distinct items and one or two additional items that change every year. In this shorter blog post, I am going to be talking about what are in our boxes this year.

Starting with our two standard items…

Christmas Pajamas. This is a staple and one that I absolutely love. We usually stay in our pajamas halfway through the day on Christmas Day (we’ll see about this year as we are opening up our home to others) and I love the whole idea of matching pajamas. My husband hates this idea, so he passes (he actually passes on the whole Christmas Eve box as a general rule), but me and the boys get something either matching or coordinating. I try to keep these more “winter”, less Christmas and this year our Let it Snow shirts are my favorite!

A special Christmas Eve Book. This is the other staple of our Christmas Eve Boxes. I LOVED the tradition in Iceland of sharing a book on Christmas Eve and then staying up late into the night reading your book. The moment I heard about this, I knew I wanted to incorporate it into our Christmas Eve (Jolabokaflod-which has an interesting history, see my Social Media tomorrow for that!). The boys get to stay up a little later and we do a movie watch, so I figured adding a book into the boxes was perfect and so far, they’ve loved it! I try to pick the book that fits into what they’ve been liking the year leading up to it and try to keep it with Christmas. This year Colton is getting a dinosaur one, Andrew is getting a train one, and I am getting a collection of three Capote stories.

A special gift. This year we are attempting something a little different for the special gift. Last year I gave them a little plushy animal, but this year we are doing mugs. I picked up these two adorable toddler sized mugs that are customized for each boy (with dinosaurs!) to include their names and then one for me as well. The hope is that we will make hot cocoa that evening, and all enjoy it in our mugs. Not sure how this will actually go, but I’m crossing my fingers for it going well.

And that’s all in our Christmas Eve boxes! I was thinking about putting a little match box set of cars, but they got those for St. Nicholas day, and we are doing quite a bit more than normal for Christmas and Birthday’s this year, so I figure this will be fine. As always, we will be watching How the Grinch Stole Christmas, A Charlie Brown Christmas and reading our books on Christmas Eve.

Do you have any Christmas Eve traditions?

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Christmas Market Breakdown – Dresden 2019

Untitled Design 22Dresden was one of those somewhat last-minute decisions that was a surprise for me. It’s no secret that my husband isn’t the biggest Christmas Fan (I regularly adoringly refer to him as The Grinch), but he’s been surprising me this year with the Christmas Market fun. He has happily gone to several of them, enjoying and ranking his time at each one, and then by surprising me with a weekend in Dresden. I figured Dresden would be another year, but after our not super great time at Rothenburg ob der Tauber (HERE), I think he felt like we really need to end on a good note.  Oh boy, did we end on a good note…

Dresden Specifics

Where do I even begin? Dresden is the home to 12 (yes 12!) Christmas Markets throughout its city and we went to a total of 6 (we did wander through 1 partially open one as well, but not counting that). I am going to break each market down in sections to make it easier to navigate this post. A couple of things to note before we really break everything down though. Most of the markets this year opened the last weekend of November and closed the 23 of December. The Stallhof is open until New Years. Due to the dates passing, I am not going to put the specific dates and times for each market, just the general dates in the previous sentence. Since Dresden is one of the more popular and well-known markets it will be crowded. Finally, some of the things that Dresden markets are known for (and that are typically sourced directly from a business in the area, rather than mass produced) are Christmas Pyramids, Smoking Figures, Pottery and Glassware, and of course, the Christstollen (the desert that the main market is known for). There are various Parking Lots throughout the city and parking, while a tiny bit difficult to find on the first day, wasn’t overall a huge problem for us.

The Striezelmarkt

The biggest Christmas Market (and oldest) is The Striezelmarkt. This is the oldest Christmas Market in Germany, dating back to the early 1400’s. The name is unique (normally Christmas Markets are Christkindlmarkt or Weinnachtmarkt) and it comes from the name of the German Christmas Cake, Hefestriezel. This market is in the center of the historical portion of Dresden and overtakes the entire square. The entrance of the market is also a stand that you can walk to the top of to take in the entire market scene. If you look off to the left you will see the world’s tallest Christmas Pyramid (14 meters tall). This is easily the biggest Christmas Market I’ve ever been too and contained such a variety of goodies from food and drink to Christmas pyramids, nutcrackers, and jewelry. There was also quite a few rides for the kids, with a Ferris wheel (which I highly recommend- such a fun way to see above the market and it was fast), two level carousel and train ride (there was more than that, but those are the one’s our boys rode). It was…incredible. The Christmas Market of all Christmas Markets and definitely earned it’s “largest and most popular” title.

Christmas Market on the Neumarkt

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This was the second market we stopped at and it’s actually an Advent Market. It is located at the base of the Church of Our Lady and is a fairly spread out market (it’s not like the typical rows, rather a wider pattern). It seems a bit small (especially after going to The Striezelmarkt), but it has a unique little market charm. It has a quaint older carousel and quite a few of the handcrafted booths. One of the things that I loved about the smaller markets is the more handcrafted booths. With the rest of the markets (exception being Augustusmarkt), there are a lot more of the smaller businesses with homemade items and less of the big business stalls.

Weinnachtsmarkt at the Frauenkirche

This was a hectic market. This particular market takes place on the street following from the Neumarkt square. It’s a somewhat narrower street, and definitely more crowded with people. It begins just below the Frauenkirche and ends at the terrace overlooking the river and bridge (it stretches along Bruhlsche Gasse). It features around 45 stalls selling pottery, glassware, food and drink, and other regional specialties. This is a nice compact spot to wander through on your way through the various markets.

Stallhof Advent Festival (Medieval Market)

This was one of my favorites within Dresden. This is a medieval market and truly lives up to that name from everything from your entrance tickets (cut to two by a costumed character with a spike or executioners’ blade), to the stalls, to the performers on the stage- it all is straight out of the medieval times. The culinary treats are not only German, but from various parts of Europe (including Russia!) and the wares up for sale are all handcrafted and relating to the time period. Handmade mugs, iron pieces, jewelry, leather bags, you name it, they probably made it. It also features a tub that you and some of your friends can enjoy a little wash in if you so desire, performances throughout the day, and an arrow contest for the little ones. There is a cost to this market, but I found it to be a reasonable price and it was a market I won’t be forgetting any time soon.

Augustusmarkt

This is a newer, modern market that is located in the “New Town” of Dresden. Each stall is adorned with white tents and golden tinsel, with various decorations in the middle of each section of stalls. I will say- it seemed like this market was heavily food and drink featured, with other stalls containing mostly mass-market items. There were a few unique stalls, but I wasn’t super impressed with this market. It does have a historic Ferris wheel and a carousel at the outset (on the Horsemen side), but otherwise this market was a hectic collection of food and drink with a few stalls in between.

Two Smaller One’s

While walking we wandered through several other smaller markets that I didn’t fully catch the names of (sorry!), but just added to the magical air. That is the beauty of going to a city like Dresden, a city that goes all out for Christmas, you can just wander around and you’ll find little markets here and there. There is something very special about seeing a city pull out all the stops during this festive season. Even if there wasn’t a market, there seemed to be Christmas Tree’s, Holiday Decorations, and a certain cheer everywhere we looked.

We didn’t actually really buy much of anything this past weekend of markets (surprise!). I picked up one present for a friend and then just the mugs for the drinks, of which I got 4 total. HOWEVER, we did eat…and we ate well. We picked up bratwurst sandwiches, donuts, hot cocoa with rum, Verpoorten, and glühwein. Everywhere we looked there was something new and delicious to try and it was all somewhat different. This was one of the few cities where the markets offered more than just the sandwiches, crepes and trdelniks- we saw people eating soups, salads, and other full meals.

Honestly, I loved Dresden. It’s my second favorite set of markets that we attended this year (the blog post on my top is coming!) and I just felt like everything was incredible. I mean it helped that I loved the city of Dresden too, but the markets were well worth the hype. They are definitely bigger and busier (so plan accordingly), but highly worth it. You can easily do several in a day, although I would definitely recommend two days if you are wanting to hit more than two or three of them. In one day, you can definitely hit Striezelmarkt, Neumarkt, Frauenkirche, and Stallhof. The only market that we didn’t make it to, but debated on quite a bit, was the Winter Lights Market on Prager Strasse.

Have you been to Dresden’s Christmas Markets? What were your thoughts?

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Christmas Market Breakdown: Rothenburg ob der Tauber 2019

IMG_2766Rothenburg ob der Tauber is easily one of the most popular spots in Germany to visit, to recommend to visit, to fall in love with, to spend a day walking in; It’s just one of those spots. It is a town that is medieval in nature and look and has somehow become devoted to Christmas, with Christmas shops being open year-round and its Christmas Market being one of the most popular ones. I had visited Rothenburg a couple weeks prior (which you can read about HERE) and my expectations were very high…

Rothenburg ob der Tauber Specifics

Rothenburg ob der Tauber’s Christmas Market is within the walls of the medieval town, starting at the main town square and wrapping through the Rathaus and to the smaller side square and churchyard. The market itself is open 11/23/2019-12/23/2019 opening around 11AM daily. I think there are around 70 stalls total in the market (which makes our opinion a little…weird, but more later). This market has been going on for about 500 years and hasn’t changed much over those years.

In my personal opinion, this was a bit of a disappointment in terms of Christmas Markets and I don’t know that I can accurately say why. I think that there was a cumulation of a couple of different factors that honestly made the day a bit of a disappointment. I’ll break it down and then let you decide your own thoughts as to whether you want to visit.

***Clarification—VISIT Rothenburg odT, however decide if you want to visit the Christmas Market or not***

The market itself is a bit smaller and the stalls were…not oddly laid out, but could have been better. I felt like the layout could have been better, mixing up the vendors and displays. It was oddly packed in that there wasn’t a lot of people in the actual market square or along the stalls, but A LOT of people right at the entrance or down the main road. This made it really kind of annoying to navigate into the market and then made the market itself feel a bit…empty (both in people and with the stalls). The actual stalls were full of really cool goodies and they have a whole handcrafted market in the hall of the Rathaus, BUT between the crowd being oddly dispersed, the layout coming off a bit strange, and the crummy weather that we experienced it just wasn’t one that we loved.

All of that combined with my own previous trip to Rothenburg odT, which took place in the only “off” season that they have and was a quiet, calm day (again- read that HERE), just put a bit of a different spin for this market. When you compare it to the others that we’ve already been to, we definitely preferred more.

With our experience being what it was, we didn’t really eat a lot. I snagged some cocoa and Robert had a sausage sandwich and that was it. We did a little bit of shopping, although more so in the store fronts than in the market (which is something that I discourage during Christmas Markets, but it was what it was for this one). I picked up my Glühwein incense smoker and a Rothenburg odT wooden ornament. We also picked up a pickle ornament, which has a little tradition in Germany attached to it (basically it’s hidden and who ever finds it first gets a present and good luck for the upcoming year). Of course, I got the Rothenburg odT mug.

I still think that everyone should visit Rothenburg ob der Tauber, BUT I wouldn’t make the Christmas Market your sole reason and event for your day. I would either skip or combine it with everything I suggested in my previous post. I would be interested to hear from others if they’ve been, their thoughts and opinions. I think for us the weather (cold, windy, and rainy – the most not ideal weather) was the biggest killer of our day so I just wonder if we just had an off experience. I hate that we didn’t love this one :(, so leave your thoughts down below!

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Christmas Market Breakdown: Nuremberg 2019

IMG_2708Oh Nuremberg…a romantic (ish) city with quite the history, was there ever any doubt that the Christmas Market would be spectacular? I had heard several of things about this particular market (which we will get into as we go on in this post), the least of which was about just how popular the market is. We decided to visit the Nuremberg Christmas Market as a Girls Night. A train ride in (so no worries on the drinking front), a couple of drinks, a lot of shopping, and an overall good night was had by all.

 

 

 

 

To start with…The Basics

Nuremberg’s Christmas Market is one of the oldest markets in Germany’s history, dating back to the 16thCentury! It also has several traditions, including a post war prologue for the Christkind, the food and drink offered at the market, even the stalls are the old-fashioned striped roof stalls. The market itself is open from 11/29/2019-12/24/2019 from 10AM to 9PM. While we didn’t experience the crowds (we went on a Thursday night that had wacky weather all day), I would recommend getting there right when it opens if you are going with young children or a larger family.

Nuremberg Specifics

Basically, Nuremberg has one main market with a couple of smaller off shoot markets. The market is in their Old Town Square with Frauenkirche and the Rathaus as a backdrop and The Beautiful Fountain on the outskirts of the market. It’s very compact in this main square as there are around 165 stalls total in the main Christkindlmarkt. You can see how it could become very packed full of people very quickly, but we got incredibly lucky and didn’t have any crowd issues. We were able to take our time walking up and down the stalls and make our purchases.

There are two other immediate market offshoots and those are the Sister Cities Market (with 22 international stalls) and the Children’s Christmas Market. Walking up just a little further will get you to the Original Regional Market, and there is also the Craftsmen’s Courtyard, which is a little closer to the train station area. There is also the Feuerzangenbowle which is the largest punch bowl in the world.

Out of the offshoots, we peaked very briefly at the Children’s Market, which features a nice number of children’s rides and we walked through the Sister Cities Market.

I would highly recommend the Sister Cities Market, not only is it really cool to see and taste different offerings from around the world, it also provided a nice little dose of home with an Atlanta booth (as well as us questioning how the rest of the world sees the States). This little market was a highlight of our time there.

Of course, one of the highlights of any Christmas Markets you attend is the food and drink and Nuremberg was no exception to that. Nuremberg is known for its Nuremberg Sausage and the 3 in a bun or Nuremberger. IMG_6927This is exactly as it sounds, 3 of the Nuremberg sausages (which are about the size of your finger) in a bun. It is actually incredibly delicious and was a highlight of our evening. We also managed to snag some Apfel Glühwein and Hot Chocolate’s. One of my friend’s got Baileys in her Hot Chocolate and said it was delicious, so that is on my list to try (it was for Nuremberg, but I ended up passing at the last minute). We also got the world famous Lebkuchen, which is a gingerbread style cookie. In my absolute honest opinion of Lebkuchen…I would like it if it didn’t have this weird papery bottom to it. If it was just the standard cookie it would be delicious as it’s quite full of the spices and flavorings.

In terms of shopping, this particular trip was hit or miss despite what my purchases say. It’s one of the disappointments that can come with the larger markets, more mass-produced products, less individual crafted items. In the case of Nuremberg, I would say that each aisle had relatively the same products (displayed differently) with only a handful of local, unique items. I did do a bit of shopping picking up an incense smoker (which ended up having quite the story behind it!), a bookmark, a ring, and a smoker house for my little German Christmas Village. I also did manage to snag two of the Christmas Market Mugs.

I do want to touch on one item that you may want to purchase, an item that is unique to the Nuremberg Christkindlmarkt…the Prune People. These are little “people” made out of prunes and walnuts (I believe). They are only at this particular market and we only saw two or three stalls devoted to them. I’ve included pictures above so you can see what they look like, but did not end up purchasing one.

On the whole we had such a wonderful time at the Nuremberg Christkindlmarkt. It’s definitely a market that you need to get to early to avoid crowds, understand that there will be a lot of heavily commercialized items, and just have very few expectations outside of a good time. I would take the train if you can and avoid trying to find parking, and then walk from the main train station to be able to hit all the markets (which is easily do able in a day trip). At one end of the main market there is a stairway that leads to a restaurant, but also gives you a good vantage point over the top of the square. While it wasn’t my favorite of all the markets we’ve been to so far, it definitely ranks somewhere in the Top 5.

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Recommendations and Tips for: A Weekend in Prague

Untitled Design 19We recently spent a couple days wandering the streets in Prague and I fully fell in love with the city. It has the perfect balance of history, culture, art, and music. It is a city that is full of life and love (seriously- my husband got all sorts of romantic during our short time there). It also happens to be a city that we fully plan on re visiting as there is so much to do and see. Today I am going to share some of the things that I think you should definitely see along with some tips about navigating the city. If you’d like a catch up on what we did you can see my post HERE. If you’d like tips specific to Christmas Markets in Prague, click HERE.

Recommendations

Prague Castle- It shouldn’t come as a surprise that I am recommending a trip to the castle. I love visiting castles as they usually are not only the focal point of a city/town, but also have such a rich, often turbulent history. Prague Castle is no different, plus it has the added bonus of being currently in use and it’s cathedral having been recently finished. I would head up towards the afternoon/evening so you can watch the sun set on the city. Then, for an added bonus, walk across Charles Bridge and see how the castle lights up across the water.

Old Town Square- I would recommend a morning wandering around Old Town Square. At the heart of Prague, this square offers churches, history, and shopping nearby (if that’s your thing). Make sure you pay attention to the ground as there are a couple special tiles on the ground in the square marking spots. There are two churches right around this square to go in as well and they both should be visited.

Charles Bridge – This is the pedestrian Bridge that connects Old Town Square to Lesser Town and Prague Castle and is a fun walking path to go between. There are quite a few monuments and statues on the bridge, as well as a couple to touch for good luck. If they are open, you are able to climb up into the towers and see a “birds eye” view. As I stated earlier, I would recommend walking the bridge in the evening so you can see the city light up and the castle across the river.

Jewish Quarter—This is a must see and is quite easy to navigate through. The important thing to know is that the entire Quarter is closed on Saturday and you will not be able to visit anything during that time. Otherwise, the synagogues typically open around 9AM for visitors and you need tickets to get into both the synagogue, the museum, and the old cemetery. You can stop at any of the souvenir or gift shops that are labeled to purchase tickets for the entire quarter. There are a couple different ticket options and I believe Audio Guides are included in most of them. I would definitely recommend stopping into as many of the synagogues as you can during your visit, as well as the Old Cemetery.

Prague Astronomical Clock – This one, quite honestly, is a miss. I wouldn’t go out of your way to watch the glockenspiel as it really isn’t worth fighting the crowds. If you happen to already be there, then go ahead and watch, but don’t make a special trip.

Honorable mention to Lesser Quarter if you have the time as well as Wenceslas Square. There are a couple of spots that I wish we would have gone and look forward to going back to see those spots (up in the all the towers and churches and some other food spots). When we go back, I’ll do another couple of posts giving more details.

Tips

Tip #1: Crowds. Prague is a very popular tourist destination and that leads to crowds. Honestly, I knew there would be crowds, but I didn’t feel like it was overwhelming (like Amsterdam was). To me, the crowds were just…the crowds. I would recommend to just keep moving with the crowd.

Tip #2: Use public transportation! I’m a huge proponent of using the local methods of transportation and Prague has a really great system. It is really easy to navigate, relatively inexpensive, with great options for ticket timelines (i.e 90 minute, 24 hr, 72 hr, etc.). I was very impressed with it while we were there.

Tip #3: Parking. Since you’ll be walking or using public transport during your time in Prague, you’ll need to find parking for your car. Parking in Prague is definitely a struggle. So many spots are reserved or not able to have parking, or are just too compact to comfortably park in. There are a couple spots to park in that you can pay for, The Palladium (which has convenience for Old Town Square), the main Train Station, OR you can use an app called Mr. Parkit which has spots that you can reserve all over town. They have both indoor and outdoor options and they all come with reviews and information. The benefit to using Mr. Parkit is that you reserve a spot, so you can come and go as needed (if you are staying to night or a couple nights this is helpful). The app itself is easy to use and once you’ve reserved a spot it’s easy to get in and out.

And that wraps up my recommendations and tips for Prague! I know I’ve said it a million times, but I loved Prague and I cannot wait to go back! Have you been to Prague? Any additional tips or spots to go?

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