Daniel's Baptism

Vivian and I are delighted to say that Daniel got baptized today! He's been wanting to do it for years now after he professed faith back in Hawaii. One of the neat things was that all of his classmates from sunday school got to come down to the service and witness the ceremony too. That will be great for their discussion over the comming weeks too!

Rottweil

We took a short day trip to Rottweil[Wiki][City], the German state of Badden-Wurtenburg's oldest city. It's a charming little town with a lot of history, nice murals, beautiful churches, and of course, point of origin for a famous dog breed. However, here's some advice if you are coming to visit: While it's a lot more interesting than the little village we live in, there are too many other things to see to make it down this way again.

Boy Scout Lock-in

The local troop sponsored a lock in with the boy scouts where they also invited the Webelos to join them as a part of the transition to Boy Scouts. Matthew was excited to be in the mix with the bigger boys. There was two main events for the evening, climbing on the rock wall and dodgeball! The air was just dripping with young testosterone!

Climbing the rock wall...

Dodgeball!

Ug.... I had a hard time sleeping on the hard floor, but the kids all seemed to fair a lot better than Matt's old man!

Straussbourg, France

It often amazes us how close things can be here. We took a short day trip to visit Strasbourg[Wiki], France, only a couple of hours away.

I thought the most intriging stucture was its sandstone gothic Cathederal, Cathederal of our lady, which in addition to wonderful pipe organs, also has a very fascinating and unique astronomical clock.

One unusual building is acually a bridge. It has a long hallway that goes from one side of the river to the other. As you walk from one side to the other, there are rooms filled with statues, I thought I saw something about storage for a nearby museum. You can also go to the top of the bridge building for a beautiful view of the oldest part of town, where the River Ill splits and forms the inner island. That's where I took the panorama at top with the boys.