Mainz Christmas Market SURPRISE!

As I promised yesterday, I will fill you in on the great surprise of the weekend.  (I’d say of my life but I’m still not sure anything will be able to top Barcelona.)

Early Saturday morning my family went to the Mainz Christmas Market and met our friends, the Joneses.  We love this tradition and enjoyed several of them together last year.  As soon as we arrived and met the Aimee by the nativity, she told me that Cory had had to run to the car for a second.  When he returned Aimee told me she wanted to get our family picture because this was the last time we’d be at the Mainz Market.  (I haven’t told Aimee this yet, but I suspected something was up at this point.  But what I thought she was doing was trying to get our picture to frame for a going-away gift.  I was a little off…)

As we stood and posed as a family of six, taking up half the sidewalk, dozens of people walked by, through the picture, and we just kept smiling, hoping she’d get at least one with all of us smiling and no strangers flying by.

If we didn’t have the pictures to prove it, I’d never believe what happened next. One person came up and just stood there, and it took several seconds before it hit me… I recognized that person… and it was JESSICA!

And about that time I heard Zak, and the rest of the market faded away.  It was just our three families and the strangers, lights, and vendor booths were gone.  We were so completely surprised and amazed that 1) our friends had flown in from England and 2) that they had, yet again, totally surprised us!

Here are a few pictures taken of those moments:

1.  Just the Hamricks

2.  You can see all 4 Hills but we have not noticed them yet!

3.  We’ve noticed them, but what we’re seeing hasn’t registered yet.

4.  There it is…At this point we made a huge scene and I am sure all the Germans in the area were quite amused by the noisy, large group of Americans acting way too excited to be at a Christmas Market.  If only they knew the story…

I got to introduce everyone to weiss glühwein… it was a hit!
This surprise was also a long time in the planning and required the other two families to sacrifice a lot.  The Hills returned to England this morning before I was even out of bed… that was an early flight (and I did sleep in, I admit).  Cory had an early morning getting them to the airport.  There were so many people involved in making this happen, and to all of you, THANK YOU SO MUCH!

I’ll share all about our weekend, tomorrow.  For now, I must get some form of exercise because I’ve spent the last three days eating.  And tonight Matt and I are going on a double date with some friends we’ve never had the pleasure of dining alone with.  We waited too long, that’s for sure, but Greek food is on the menu.  Exercise now, eat later!