Powitanie 2014! Willkommen 2014!

     December was quite a busy month for the Holbrook’s, much like it is for every family around the world. I was busy working away for the majority of the month and the weekends were filled with cookie exchanges and Christmas parties. The holidays are always so much fun! I was so excited for Christmas break to arrive; I could hardly believe it when it finally came. Rachel and Josh came up to visit us on Christmas Eve. After picking them up from the train station we headed to our friends, Taryn and Steve’s, house for dinner with our Air Force family. After dinner we came back to the house to change clothes before heading to Ely for the midnight service at the Cathedral. The service was absolutely beautiful and not as busy as I was expecting. My first time experiencing a midnight service on Christmas Eve and I loved it!  

Sam and I at the squadron Christmas party

My beautiful friend Jill

Sam and Zack...the are in a true bromance...I mean he did hug Zack first when he came home from his last deployment

True men dress up for entertainment purposes

And dance...okay so they are voted on the weeks leading up to the Christmas party and the ones with the most votes have to wear a costume to the party.

Sam and I at the Christmas party

Me and my friend Meleah

And Sam and I again

I made over 100 cookies for our friends as Christmas presents

Sam and I on Christmas Eve before the Ely service

The tree in Ely Cathedral

Hercules was forced into the Christmas spirit

Some of the amazing girls from the squadron

     We slept in on Christmas morning and then ate a delicious brunch with a breakfast casserole, cinnamon rolls, cinnamon sugar muffins, fruit and dip. After brunch we opened presents. Sam and I were so blessed by the kindness shown by our family and all of the great presents they sent! Thank you so much for taking time to make our Christmas special, even though we couldn’t all be together. I enjoyed a Christmas Day nap and we started preparing for dinner. We spent Christmas dinner with our dear friends from Bible Study. Sam made a delicious Christmas goose and ham and everyone brought sides/desserts. It was a successful dinner, filled with laughter, cute babies and of course games! 

Sam's goose and ham and everyone's sides for Christmas dinner!

Cute babies opening their Christmas presents

Their outfits were adorable

Sweet Eleanor

Emily was helping out Eleanor

We have lots of cuteness in our Bible study, though some of our cuteness has moved away :(

Group photo of everyone who came for Christmas dinner! One big and happy England family, we are so blessed.

Our Christmas morning brunch, complete with Christmas fiesta plates!

     On Boxing Day Rachel and I went to hit up the sales by shopping in Bury and enjoying a nice lunch at Harriet’s Tea Room and the boys went to see the new Hobbit movie. We shopped until we dropped and I think the boys slept through the movie. We came back to the house and snacked for the rest of the evening and just hung out. Rachel and Josh had to head back to London the next day, we were sad to see them go; it is always a great time when they come to visit.

     Sam and I got up bright and early to catch our flight to Poznań, Poland on December 28^th. The flight was smooth and everyone clapped for the pilot once we landed, I asked Sam if his landing was applause worthy and he said no, so maybe it is just a British thing to do, as it wasn’t rough circumstances to be landing in either. Anyway, we got there and headed straight to the train station to buy tickets to Berlin and then went to our hotel, and the hotel was amazing. The nicest hotel we have ever stayed at in Europe. Also, the cheapest! We explored a bit of Poznan, walking through the streets and into some beautiful churches. We experienced a real polish lunch where I ate potato cakes, they were amazing. We also had a delicious dinner, where I had salmon and everything was so cheap. On Sunday we went to church in a beautiful cathedral and walked to a lake, which was supposed to be a major attraction site. However, not much was happening there and it wasn’t much of lake. Maybe more is happening in the summer. We headed back to the old town and went into a palace, or so what we thought was a palace, but basically we just wondered around a building that has some importance, but no one was there to give tours, it was strange. After that we headed to a museum, ate more delicious food and enjoyed all the beautiful buildings. Poznań was a quiet city and not one that is a must see while you are in Europe, but it was cheap to fly into and cheap to explore, we had a great time, even though it was cold! 

So this is the palace we wondered into in Poznań

One of the many beautiful churches in Poland

Poznań, amongst the oldest cities in Poland

One of our delicious lunches in Poland

The sunset view from our hotel room

A college of arts I do believe

This memorial represents the protests in 1956 that took place in the town square of Poznań

The disappointing lake

We weren't sure if this bridge was Poznań's version of the Locks of Love in Paris or Rome, but we decided to photograph it

The church we attended on Sunday

The front of the church

Riding on the tram through Poznań

Apparently the statue of this woman with the buckets is famous, so I had to take a picture with it

My Polish Salmon dinner

Another view from our hotel room

And again, from the balcony of our hotel room where I may or may not have accidentally locked it to where we couldn't close the window within the first five minutes of being there

A church in the old town

Old Town

One of the museums we visited

The coolest nativity scene I have ever seen. It moved

Polish potato cakes

On the plane

      We headed to the train station on Monday for a two hour ride to Berlin, Germany. The train was a bit strange because you walk on and instead of seats being right there we had to go into our own little compartment with six seats. Once we arrived in Germany we went straight to our hotel which was also very nice. Not as nice or as cheap as the one in Poland, but still great. You never know what you are going to get when booking hotels, so that is why I am always excited when they are nice. Berlin was so much fun. The city is amazing. The history of the entire city is just amazing. From the remains of the Berlin Wall to the Reichstag and the Brandenburg Gate, it was amazing to see so much history in one capital city. Berlin also knows how to throw a rockin new years eve party with a fireworks show at Brandenburg Gate. This makes the list for the top ten cities to visit on NYE. Sam and I ate a delicious five course meal for dinner on NYE at an Italian restaurant before heading to the Brandenburg Gate for the firework show. It was an unforgettable time. People were shooting off fireworks all over the city, in the middle of the street, everywhere. As we walked back to the hotel we had to watch where we stepped because there were fireworks by our feet, everywhere. Berlin was an absolutely amazing city, I think I will let the pictures speak more than me, but I recommend visiting this city if you have the time. Especially if you love history! 

The Berlin metro...not always timely but still fun

At the Berlin Wall

The metro stations had interesting artwork

Built in 1961 the wall cut off West Berlin from East Berlin and separating families until it came down in 1989 (the year I was born in case you want to feel old ;) )

The Berlin Wall

The Wall again

And again

The Ten Commandments in German

The cross is there for all the people who died whilst trying to climb over the wall

The list of names of all those who died

Driving through the city

Driving through the city

Ready to start the day

The Brandenburg Gate, located in the western part of Berlin's city centre and the former city gate, built as a sign of peace from 1788 to 1791. The gate suffered much damage during WWII and was restored in the early 2000's.

We found an open, turn-able Ferris wheel ride and Sam was freaking out.

I moved next to him to take this picture and we tilted, during this picture Sam is saying "take the picture, take the picture, hurry, we are going to die"

Sam looking nervous for our Ferris wheel ride

You see they are like disks and sometimes the workers would spin you...luckily they didn't do that to us but Sam was afraid they would, he is a scardy cat when it comes to rides. He doesn't care for roller-coasters either, no fun!

The Ferris wheel near Brandenburg Gate

So we decided to go to the top of the Reichstag Building, but we had to wait an hour in the freezing cold to get tickets, so we got bored and took selfies (self portraits for those of you not hip to the lingo the kids use these days)

Another selfie in line

The Reichstag Building, Sam being silly and jumping, see the dome in the back? That is what we were trying to go up into

The Reichstag Building was opened in 1894 and housed the Diet until 1933 when it was severely damaged in a fire. It wasn't used after WWII and it wasn't until the 1960's that this building was partially restored. The complete restoration began after the reunification of Berlin in 1990, the complete restoration of the building/ the reopening of the building was in 1999 when Parliament began meeting there again. Today Parliament still meets in this building to make laws and other governmental things. Albert Einstein is amongst one of the many famous people who have attended a meeting in this building.

Hanging out on the mile long street by the Brandenburg Gate that was decked out for NYE

The stage where every person performed in German

The Reichstag building

Brandenburg Gate

Another Christmas Market we stumbled upon, mainly to use the toilet because we are Christmas Market pros and we know they have toilets

Some of the big buildings you see in a capital city

Riding the bus

Liver and onions...actually very delicious

My mulled wine and Sam's beer.

Checkpoint Charlie

Checkpoint Charlie, the best known crossing point between East and West Berlin

They still have guards there today, which you can pay to take a picture with

Checkpoint Charlie stamps, neat!

A beautiful church

A beautiful church with a Christmas market and big Christmas tree

Another big nativity scene

I believe this was a museum

The Berlin Cathedral, it is beautiful we didn't go inside as it cost to get in

The canal behind the Cathedral

Fernsehturm, also known as the Berlin television tower. You can go to the top and get a 360* view of the city. Sam and I split up he went to a nearby museum while I went to the TV tower. However, it was 3:00pm on NYE and both were closed. We tried to come back on New Years Day, but both had a two hour wait and we had a train to catch. Sad day, but part of traveling during a holiday.

Our 5 course Italian meal. This was an accident. I was smart enough to know we should have a reservation somewhere on NYE so I booked a place online which emailed me back saying it was a set menu and it was going to cost like 60 euro per person and we had to pay half upfront to keep our reservation. So we canceled and I made a reservation at this place which had nothing about a special menu and we heard nothing about it. Until we got to the restaurant and discovered it was the same thing....so we just embraced it as a wonderful meal and unforgettable dinner for NYE, the time we spent close to $200 on one meal thanks to the exchange rate.

A salmon and shrimp starter

Then soup, I got a cream of something. No idea. No one in the restaurant spoke very good English. But they spoke German, Italian and french really well...

My main which was beef

Sam's main which I don't remember what it was

A cheese course...so yummy

And a dessert

This is the Berlin Victory Column which is a monument designed in 1864 to commemorate the Prussian victory in the Danish-Prussian War

This is actually where we stood to watch the fireworks on NYE. Our dinner lasted longer than expected so we didn't arrive until 10:30, and by then they had closed off access to the Brandenburg Gate, but we were okay with that because one million people where crammed into the mile long stretch by the gate and we were further out and still by a cool historical monument. The only problem was that there weren't toilets around, but I got creative and found a wooded area...hey when in Europe do as the Europeans

So many fireworks

Happy New Year! Sam and I have now rang in 7 new years together. NYE is the one holiday we have never spent apart, which in this AF life is a miracle! This NYE is one of the most memorable we have had together and I am so thankful to have been ringing in another year with my love. 2014 has started off great so far and we spent the first part of it together and traveling, couldn't ask for more! 

I took a picture of this because this was the scene all over the streets. Fireworks, champagne bottles, bottle rockets going off, you name it and it was there. However, the next day the streets were completely clean! I was amazed

I guess I should say the main streets were clean, this area still had some firework debris

This is Charlottenburg Palace. The palace was built in the late 17th century. I don't remember who but some King had it built for his wife as her summer home...what a great husband!

This palace was also damaged during WWII and restored.We enjoyed touring it though

This church was built in the 1800's I believe. It was damaged during a bombing in WWII and as you can see the damage was never restored. The first floor of the church was converted into a museum and this is now a famous historic tourist site in Berlin.

     I have a feeling 2014 is going to be the best year yet! We had a great time traveling Poland and Germany and ringing in the new year with Germans, Italians, Brits, and people from all over the world. I cannot say enough how blessed we were in 2013 and how much we look forward to taking more adventures and everything that 2014 has in store for us! Thanks for reading!


Amanda