We are about 2 weeks away from our trip to Germany and Austria.  My mom and I are going with Esme and Nova to see my sister in Frankfurt, our Doblinger cousins in Regensburg and finally, spending a week in Salzburg. 

Nova and my mom will have birthdays while we are there but Nova wanted to celebrate early with friends and family.  She had a spa party with her friends yesterday.

Then today, we had a steak dinner as a family to celebrate with macarons for dessert. 

She got lots of great presents including a Stanley that she picked out.  She and Esme also got a pre-trip gift from us – instant cameras.  These were fairly inexpensive on Amazon and the replacement paper is cheap.  It prints on receipt paper using the same technology. 

Nova and I watched about an hour of German etiquette and basic German phrases to prepare for our trip.  She wrote down a bunch of the phrases and words in her travel journal and I put down the etiquette tips in mine.   We learned that it’s considered bad luck to wish someone an early birthday in Germany!

Nova then spent some time adding some of the pictures she took with the camera today to her travel journal. 

We have a very busy 2 weeks until we leave.  Next week we have girl scout camp all week which means going to the bank to get Euros and doing other last minute travel prep this week.  I have been making “curtain clothes” for the girls for our trip to Salzburg (if you know, you know).  I finished one dress and have one more to go.  I’ll be sure to post separately about the curtain clothes!