Settling in . . . in Regensburg

I'm a little bit of a control freak.  And despite what my bedroom looked like as a kid/teenager -- and Chopper's too I might add -- I really don't like chaos and mess.  So when we move somewhere, I will let the kids watch movies or play on electronics for hours on end while I unpack and get everything in place.  And if we need anything to make it all work, I like to get it right away so I don't have piles of stuff laying around.  I think it bugs Chopper but he goes to work all day so maybe not too badly.

So our stuff arrived on Thursday and Friday and on Saturday I said -- let's go to IKEA!!  There are several in Germany of course and fortunately, it's pretty much the same (except for the teeny tiny parking lots -- yikes!).  Chopper was a very good husband and said ok.  So we went.  It's in a beautiful city called Regensburg about an hour away from us and we decided to go see some of the sights after we did our shopping.  The kids were NOT suitably dressed and there was some rain and chilly wind that made them not so happy about the walking around but we had a good time anyway and I'm glad we made a day of it.  Then the next week while Chopper was gone, I put everything together and finished the house!!  The bookcase leans and I had to take a chair apart to fix it but I didn't do too badly!!

Probably the crowning jewel of Regensburg is St. Peter's Cathedral.  It is a really beautiful building that I could give more information about if I could find my pamphlet!  Turns out that Regensburg is one of the stops for riverboat tours so they had pamphlets in English and there were tour groups walking around as well.  It also turns out that this is a fun city to get lost in!  There was a plethora of small, cobbled alleyways with cute little shops.

Ok it's been a little while so I can't remember the name of the river either!  This is ridiculous of course but it's not the Danube or the Rhine or anything.  But still.  I am just really not doing this justice!

It was windy and chilly so we didn't go all the way across, especially with the kids in t-shirts and shorts.

 Actually, a woman in our ward lived in Regensburg for several years and does a guide tour about once a year.  This year it was raining and Megan was sick so we didn't go (it was about 3 weeks after we arrived) but she is a plethora of information on this place and I need to get some from her!

 Its hard to see, but this was an interesting statue

That was weird on the back -- I think the animals are coming out of him.

Ok I really should have edited these first but now that they're uploaded I don't want to go back and do it.  This is King Ludwig I

Love cobblestone streets!  Especially when they're in patterns!!

Chopper likes taking pictures of the relics and deceased people in Catholic churches.  We have lots of wonderful friends who are Catholic but I honestly don't think I quite understand this tradition.

Now this cathedral was finished in the late 1800s I think -- it was started much longer ago than that -- but to even think of the work that goes into erecting a building of this scale and carving all the stone is just exhausting.

There are keys everywhere.  This is actually above a shop, but the whole city has a lot of keys because the cathedral is named for St. Peter who received the keys of the Priesthood after Christ ascended to heaven.

This is not in the church -- it was in a government building.  More keys of course.

I think this is one that we'll go back to for more history -- only an hour away!!