Monthly Archives: July 2016

Germany with Kids: Technik Museum Speyer

Posted in Travel, Uncategorized by

If you are in the Heidelberg area and you have kids who are into trains, planes, and automobiles, then make your way to the Technik Museum Speyer! It is worth the detour!

Unless, of course, you have a fear of heights, as I do 🙂  All the airplanes are mounted high in the sky, and you climb circular staircases to get up to them. There is even a Boeing 747 about 6 stories off the ground. Those stairs were a bit easier … until you got to the last set. I just couldn’t do it! But PER and the boys did!! Hippo even went with PER out on the wing! Yup you can just walk out on the wing of the 747 SOOOOOO high off the ground!! Don’t worry, though, there is fencing to keep you safe!

The kids liked the planes best of all. But inside, you can also see vintage cars, an old train, and even a space shuttle! They also have an IMAX theater. And there is a cafe where you can get lunch.

Is it good for kids?

You bet! It’s a kid’s paradise! Unless they aren’t into mechanical things. Our boys aren’t even all that into cars and such, but they loved this museum!

What about the cost?

For just the museum, the tickets are free for children 4 and under. Ages 5 – 14, tickets cost €13. Adult tickets cost €16. If you want to do the IMAX film, there is a combination ticket, too.

Where is it?

It’s about a 25 minutes west of Heidelberg.

Traveling Abroad, Part I: On the Plane

Posted in Travel, Uncategorized by

Not only are we traveling by plane to Europe, but we have a 4 to 5-hour drive once we arrive. So I pack the kids’ backpacks with activities to keep them busy on the plane. And then I pack another set of things in one of the suitcases. It takes a lot of organization!

I try to sneak in German where I can. But there is a mix of English and German materials. I didn’t actually create any of the things below. But there are still some good resources!

Some of the things in the boys’ backpacks are the same:

  • a set of headphones in the backpack (We got these headphones that are meant for kids.)
  • a couple of snacks
  • a set of pajamas and nighttime diaper/pull-up
  • an extra set of clothes

But then they have different things to keep them busy. Here’s what’s in Hippo’s backpack:

  • a folder with coloring pages that I printed (some with Van Gogh images, since we might go to the museum in Amsterdam; some German ones I found here)
  • books – Hippo chose two (Bist du meine Mama? and Das kleine Glühwürmschen)
  • a drawing pad with plain paper
  • a foam giraffe sticker kit (from AC Moore)
  • an activity pad
  • 2 Dover Little Activity Books
  • 2 busy bags
  • box of crayons
  • pencil case with colored pencils (the case is personalized, but I wiped out the name on the picture)
  • a pencil case with a pencil, sharpener, and eraser

He has two busy bags:

  • a dinosaur puzzle (This is from the Melissa & Doug set that comes with 4 puzzles. I made a colored photocopy of the finished puzzle, so he would know what it was supposed to look like.)
  • stickers (I cut up some card stock and folded it, so he has something to put the stickers on. There are also several Dover Little Sticker Books.)

Froggy’s backpack is a bit bigger and so it is stuffed with a bit more!

  • a folder with coloring pages that I printed (some with Van Gogh images, since we might go to the museum in Amsterdam; some German ones I found here)
  • a drawing pad with plain paper
  • a foam giraffe sticker kit (from AC Moore)
  • 2 puzzles: alphabet & the US (in a 2-gallon Ziploc bag)
  • a magnetic game similar to Chutes & Ladders (also in a large Ziploc bag)
  • a sticker book – World Atlas
  • mini pinball game
  • 3 books (Mars, Planes, & Die kleine Raupe Nimmersatt)
  • Dover Little Activity Books
  • Carlsen Sticker-Malbücher (I found these at a bookstore in Frankfurt last year)
  • 2 busy bags
  • box of colored pencils
  • pencil case filled with markers (we had to really pare these down – he wanted to take every color!)

He also has 2 busy bags:

  • stickers (Again, I cut up some card stock and folded it, so he has something to put the stickers on.)
  • a set of strip puzzles – you have to first figure out which pieces go together, but they are color-coded and numbered at the bottom (I found them in the red dot section of Target)

Are you familiar with busy bags? Do a quick search on Google or Pintrest and you’ll find innumerable ideas from a whole variety of mommy blogs. Last year, I ordered a case of 24 pencil cases with mesh windows and zipper closures for about $29 on Amazon. (I had bought a bunch at a dollar store the year before, and the zippers broke almost immediately, so I thought this was a pretty good deal!) One activity goes into each busy bag to help keep things organized. I keep them in a small closet near the mud room, and we only use them on our travels.

Links to products are provided purely for your convenience. I receive no compensation for the mention of products.

Koffer Packen: Kids’ Packing List

Posted in Getting them to read more, Travel, Uncategorized by

Koffer Packen GitA-page-001

Last year when we went to Europe, I found some great packing lists for kids online. But of course, they were all in English! (See for example: this one from Lemon Lime Adventures; or this one from Stuffed Suitcase with images for non-readers.) They worked great for our preparations last year. But this year, I just had to make my own!

Here is what they look like:

 

 

There are three packing lists:

  • Kleidung (Clothing)
  • Toilettenartikel (Toiletries)
  • Rücksack (Backpack)

You can download all three of them here: Koffer Packen GitA (PDF)

Only the Kleidung page has images. I haven’t decided yet if I want the images on there or not 🙂  For Hippo (age 3), the images make sense. But if the goal is to get Froggy (age 6) reading as many German words as I can put in front of him, then the pictures may be doing him a disservice. We haven’t actually done the packing yet, so I’ll see how it all goes! If I think they could use some adjusting, I’ll edit the pages and repost.

Save

Travel Games for Germany and the Netherlands

Posted in Games, Travel, Uncategorized by

We’ll be heading back to the Netherlands and Germany this summer. We fly in and out of Frankfurt and then have about a 5-hour drive to and from the Netherlands. So in addition to packing things to keep the kiddos busy on the airplane, I have a separate stash of things to keep them busy in the car.

I just finished creating a set of cards that can be used in a variety of ways. You can play Memory, I Spy, Go Fish. Or laminate an entire sheet and mark off the things you see with a dry erase marker (did you know they make washable ones?!) or a small post-it. There are two pages of various items – one for each of the boys (that way there is no competition over who sees what first!). And there is also a one-page set of just vehicles. At the end, there is an additional sheet to help count up a few of the things you might see on a long drive.

2016-07-04 15.37.23

Items included are:

2016-07-04 15.38.09

The vehicles page includes: das Flugzeug, der Bus, der LKW, das Fahrrad, ein gelbes Auto, der Bagger, der Traktor, der Kipper, das Motorrad, der Hubschrauber, das Feuerwehrauto, & der Zug.

I’d love to hear how you use the cards!!

UPDATE- August 2016:

Froggy really enjoyed the game of looking for items on his page. Hippo lost interest after finding just a few. We went with the option of covering the found items with post-its (the 1 7/8″squares worked perfectly):

2016-07-21 16.47.19

UPDATE – July 2017:

We will be taking the scavenger hunt with us again this year! But I also found another, longer hunt – with only German words! – at another blogger’s site. Check out THIS POST for more info!

UPDATE – May 2018: 

I have made a new version of my Road Trip Scavenger Hunt! This one is adjusted more to traveling by train, but it could work well from the car, too! Check out THIS POST to get the new FREE download!

A Few Summer Tools

Posted in Getting them to read more, Uncategorized by

What a whirlwind it’s been since school ended! Just the week before the last day, Froggy broke his arm! He’s been amazing, actually. After the initial pain wore off, he was such a trooper! And he’s hardly complained a bit about being in a full arm cast. Luckily, it only hast to be on for 3 weeks. Then hopefully we’ll move on to something a little easier….

In the meantime, that meant no swim lessons! And I decided not to sign him up for any camps, since I didn’t want him overdoing it. What to do instead?!

Well, I made up a kind of guide for our week. There are a few things to be checked off each day. And then I made three more lists: things to do at home/inside, outdoor activities, and outings. I posted those on our cork board in the kitchen. No excuses for being bored around here! (Before I wrote them out, I went over them with Froggy to see if there was anything he absolutely was not interested in.)

Beneath the lists is our Wochenplan. In addition to that, I made up a reading log, so he can keep track of what he reads each day, for how long, and who does the reading (in prep for 1st grade, the teachers asked the children to read 10 minutes per day, but it didn’t matter if the child read or was read to).

If you’d like to use these two plans as a template, you can download them here:

Wochenplan blank (Word document)

Was lese ich in der Woche blank (Word document)

You may notice that the books on the list are either in German or Dutch! We are trying an experiment I read about on someone’s blog: no English books for the summer!!! By the last day of school, I had packed up all the English books. There has been a bit of grumbling from Froggy, but he’s going along with it. Hippo doesn’t seem to mind at all. The only exception is that I left out a few books about Germany and the Netherlands, since we’ll be heading over there for two weeks this summer. So far, we are seeing improvement in Froggy’s reading and pronunciation!

Any questions or ideas to add? I’d love to read your comments!