Up Close to the Liberty Bell

After the wedding, we had an extra day in Pennsylvania before Matt flew back to Germany and MK and I went on to DC. We hopped a train to the historical center of Philadelphia and went to visit the Liberty Bell. Normally, to visit the Liberty Bell you have to pick up timed tickets at the Information Center and then wait for your turn with a few hundred other tourists. On this day, we walked right into the visitor center without a ticket and was able to get up close and personal with the Liberty Bell.
We also went to Independence Hall and saw the places where George Washington and John Adams were sworn in as Presidents; George Washington's personal copy of the Declaration of Independence and Thomas Jeffeson's copy of the Constitution. This wasn't very interesting to MK but Matt and I could have stayed all day. We also took a ride on a horse carriage and realized that we could use another day to see all the historical sites of Philadelphia. Sadly, we didn't have the time but would love to go back again some day.
More posts coming later about mine and MK's trip to DC and Virginia Beach!

The Wedding

We just returned from our nephews wedding in Radnor, Pennsylvania near Philadelphia. The entire Fitter clan came from various places to see Aaron marry Stephanie. Our MK was a flower girl. She has been waiting her entire life to be a flower girl and her wish finally came true! Above, she dances the night away with her daddy. Below is a picture of her $85 updo. I made an appointment at the hotel beauty salon to get her hair done for the wedding. I never asked how much an updo would cost, my mistake. However, she looked beautiful and felt like a princess.

A picture of us before the wedding. The location was the Radnor Country Club in Bryn Mawr, PA. Just want to say thank you to Aaron and Stephanie, the Wilson's and the Kaplan's for a wonderful weekend!

The Lemonade Stand

Remember when we were kids and you had the bright idea to set up a lemonade stand? And you were happy with the few bucks that you made? And then you had to split that few bucks with your siblings or your friends? And you were still happy?

We had a community yard sale this past Saturday and MK and the neighbor girl Delaney showed entrepreneurial skills and opened a lemonade stand. I donated some banana muffins and chocolate brownie muffins and Delaney's visiting grandmother donated chocolate chip cookies. The girls were up at 8am with lemonade and snacks ready to go for the hordes of customers that were going to come through!

Well, we didn't have hordes of customers and most of the families that were participating in the yard sale never broke $100 that day. But, MK and Delaney brought in $102!!!!! At a lemonade stand!!!! Of course, there were a lot of sucker neighbors who grabbed their lukewarm lemonades and tossed in a few bucks, too.

So, MK and Delaney split their $102 and then MK was most disappointed when she found out she had to pay some overhead expenses. All of $8.

Here she is making a sale to a sucker, I mean, customer!

Toulouse, France

I realized that I have never written about our day in Toulouse, France. If you read an earlier blog, you'll know that we were stuck in Toulouse for an entire day before we could fly out. We made the best of the day by storing our lugguge at the hotel, taking a free shuttle from our hotel to the airport and then catching a city center bus from the airport to the downtown area. Not many Americans visit Toulouse so the French assumed we were British. When they found out we were Americans, they were very surprised and delighted and then started asking lots of questions! So forget everything you've heard about those rude French! It is simply not true................

When you are an American travelling in France, there is only one place to eat lunch; McDonald's!
No really, this was the last day of our vacation and we were broke and looking for a cheap place to get something quick to eat.


I wish I could remember the names of all the places we visited. This is the first Cathedral we stopped by. It was closed for lunch so we had to come back later. Look at that tower; this was very typical for the towers we saw around Toulouse.



On our walk, we passed a small park with some play equipment. It must have been lunchtime for the Toulouse kids because it was packed with student groups. MK wanted to play on this merry go round and these French teenagers were happy to oblige as long as Matt kept spinning them around, too!

This stop was another old church and former monastery converted into an art museum. Here we take a break in the inner courtyard where monks used to take daily walks. The museum featured architectural items from the various churches in Toulouse from the different time periods. The statues and columns were mostly from the 14th and 15th centuries. There was also a modern art gallery featuring impressionism and post-impressionism works and marble statues. What impressed me the most was all the school children groups. When you grow up in a city next to a world class art museum, you get to take daily field trips with your art teacher and practice drawing the art that you see.Every city in Europe has a city center, or markplatz, or town square. This is the Toulouse city center and the building is a former royal residence. The town hall is located directly across. Toulouse was a delightful little detour on our travelling home day. If you're ever in the area, stop on by!

Mary's rant on ignorant people who should keep their uninformed thoughts to themselves

Recently, a "friend" posted a video on the bulletin section of myspace page. I started a myspace page as a way to keep in touch with the many cousins and other relatives I have out there. This particular "friend" is the babydaddy of one of my cousins. For those of you who don't know, a "babydaddy" is the father of your children whom you are not married to.
The video he posted was the seventeen second youtube video of two marines on patrol in Iraq who threw a defenseless puppy out over a ravine. His title for this posting was "our us army at its finest". I wrote to him to let him know that these two individuals were not US Army but instead were two US Marines and both were disciplined for this action. One was expelled from the marines and the other disciplined and demoted. His response was "marines or army, they are still out there protecting our country, or whatever."
And here's my response: While I am not going to get into a debate on myspace with a half-grown kid about the US Military and its service I will state my thoughts here. Yes, just like in any organization, group or society there are a few bad apples that will make the rest of the organization look bad. For those two marines who made a poor choice and did not represent the military very positively, there are hundreds and thousands of honorable men and women in uniform who are serving this country well. There are thousands of our soldiers out there going on patrols, being shot at, getting bombed, losing limbs, losing eyesight, losing their lives and all so you can have the right to make fun of them.
So while you feel safe in your homes across the midlands, just remember this: Terrorism has knocked on our doors and it was called 9-11. These same terrorists and their "friends" will not be happy until all infidels are wiped out. If you are not sure who the infidels are, that would be all Christians or people who believe differently than them. The US military's presence in Iraq and Afghanistan is fighting for our freedoms at the source of the problem. Would you rather our soldiers were fighting terrorism at our borders? Or how about letting them hijack a few more planes and wiping out 3,000 civilians in say Kansas City or Omaha or Oklahoma City. I didn't think so. So, while you sleep snug in your beds at night, and smoke your illegal drugs, and father children out of wedlock, just remember this, these guys are out there protecting you and your rights a half a world away. They are separated from their loved ones for months and fifteen months at a time. They come home with missing limbs, hearing loss, vision loss and traumatic injuries inside that you cannot even imagine. The memories of things that they saw and did while on patrols will haunt them for their rest of their lives. So yeah, "marines or army, they are still out there protecting our country, or whatever."

The Convent with her name on it

Here she is...........our little sister in waiting.

MK and I attended a Mother/Daughter retreat in May at the Schoenstatt retreat center in Schoenstatt, Germany. MK was most impressed by all of the Sisters she saw. We attended Mass at the Adoration Church with about 300 Schoenstatt Sisters. We sat near the front and during the whole Mass, she kept looking behind and smiling at all the nuns. This was an amazing site for her to see!

The interesting thing about Schoenstatt Sisters is that they are a secular society and do not take Consecrated Vows. Instead, they take Secular vows and are thus not really "nuns" but secular sisters. They can leave the order at anytime they wish but few do. These women just glowed with joy!

When it was time to leave, MK did not want to. She asked Sister Angela, our guide, how old do you have to be to a nun. Well, its still a toss-up between being a nun and having three children someday!

Girl Scouts and Berchtesgaden

Call me crazy, but I just spent the weekend with 18 girls between the ages of 10-12 in Berchtesgaden, Germany. We sold those cookies last February and bought ourselves a bus to the Hinterbrand Lodge for the weekend, see below. The Hinterbrand Lodge is an Army owned facility open to student groups from Europe. It's free and completely self-catering. We had to bring our own food, cleaning supplies and bedding but couldn't have picked a better location for a bunch of Girl Scouts. The Hinterbrand Lodge was built in the 1920's and sometime in the "30's taken over by the German Nazi party. A man named Dietrich Eckhart hid here in 1926 from the Weimar Republic. Later, Hitler later dedicated the second part of his book "Mein Kampf" to this man whom he considered his mentor.

Our plans included visiting the Eagle's Nest, Hitler's hideaway in the Alps; the Berchtesgaden salt mine tour, and hiking around the Lodge. We worked on GS Badges and had a fabulous weekend!

The girls returning from a two hour hike and the Hinterbrand Lodge on the top of our hill. We were at 3200 ft.

Who needs an alarm clock when you can wake up at 7am to the noise of cowbells? We ran out of our Lodge to see and hear the cows being herded to a different pasture.

The view from the balcony of my room. Breathtaking! Would you ever want to leave?

Later, we took off on a hike around the Lodge and found the cows! We tried to talk to them but they didn't speak English, only German!

A view from below of the Eagle's Nest. We spent the morning hiking around the top of this mountain. There was still LOTS of snow and I was constantly screaming at the girls to "Get off the snow!" The highlight of this trip for me was having lunch on top of this mountain with its 360 degree panoramic view.