The last day of 2019 had us on the road to Berlin. After a quick stop to drop stuff at the adult hotel we arrived at Carlie’s around 4:00pm. The reunion was awesome. The kids were so excited and happy to be all together again. They all hadn’t seen each other since before Car and Dan moved to Berlin. We parked the vans and said good riddance for a few days as we enjoyed taking the S-Bahn and U-Bahn for a couple of days.

Next was the most beautiful Christmas Market we visited in Germany. It was situated between two domes and each of the white tents had a beautiful, glowing, golden star on top. And the Christmas Tree rivaled Rockefeller Center—it was magnificent.Gwen wandered the whole market with the fingers tangled in Josh’s scarf and he loved it. Grandma gave each of the kids 20 Euro when we walked into the market and the little kids had it spent in no time flat. They were fascinated with these little metal boats powered by candles. They all decided they MUST own one.

After seeing them everywhere, we finally decided to try roasted chestnuts. I’m glad we tried them, but I don’t think anyone was overly impressed. Except Gwen. She loved them. Mave was attached to Halle’s hip and both of them couldn’t have been happier about the situation.After the market we went back to Dan and Carlie’s.  Carlie had purchased about a million delicious german candies, cookies and gummies for us to indulge on.  Then it was time to light off some fireworks. As soon as dark hit, the city was going nuts with fireworks everywhere. It was so fun. We went out by Mave’s kita and did fireworks in the courtyard. Dan found these amazing GIANT sparklers that were incredible. And the kids all loved when Dan and Cole had a wizard duel with the Roman candles.We had no idea what waited for us at midnight. We went out on the bridge behind Carlie and Dan’s apartment to watch. When the countdown began (in German) and the clock struck 12 the ENTIRE CITY erupted into firework. I have never seen anything so amazing. Every part of the sky was lit up and the fireworks continued for hours. I can’t even explain how cool it was. We were all in awe and just couldn’t stop laughing. It was a once in a lifetime experience for sure! I’m so glad we got to see it.

All the kids slept at Carlie’s for a giant cousin sleepover. We pulled out mattresses and stuck 4 kids on the pullout couch. They had the time of their lives! And luckily they were tired enough that when it was time for bed they didn’t give Car and Dan too much trouble.The adults made their way back to the hotel at Alexanderplatz and on the way we saw a giant apartment fire about 4 stories up. It was insane. It engulfed the entire apartment and was spreading to the one above and below. We never knew for sure what happened but we expect it was a rogue firework. We walked by the next day and the whole apartment was just a charred shell. I guess there are consequences to fireworks going off with abandon.