Anthony Benedetto

That is who we saw in concert last night - TONY BENNETT! He was amazing. Let me back up a little and tell you why we went. Jenna became obsessed with him a couple years ago and we found out that my Grandma and Grandpa had their first date at a Tony Bennett concert. So my parents found out he was coming to Jones Hall and bought some tickets to surprise my Grandma with. She was so excited when she found out where she was going. It was perfect, minus the fact that Jenna couldn't come into town - we missed you J. OK so moving onto the concert. Tony has still got it! 85 years old and he was still doing turns, rockin some dance moves and of course he's still got his pipes. He sang a song with no instruments and it was phenomenal. Now, let me tell you his musicians were just as entertaining to watch. They had some amazing talent. We were all bouncing around in our seats and clapping our hands to the music. All in all we had a great night.

Playing catch up

So, I do realize that it has been forever since the last post but I say that every time so I will just move on. You know I am sorry – right?!? A lot has happened since November: Thanksgiving, Christmas, a fun family tailgate at the A&M and Baylor football game, New Year’s, our 4 year wedding anniversary, Valentine’s Day, my 27th birthday and so much more. The biggest thing though was our vacation! The last post I wrote said that we booked a trip to Germany and Prague well since then we have gone and come back. I did keep a journal while I was there for each day but I will spare you the specifics. I will tell you a little bit about each city we visited.

We started off in Munich. It started out with just 4 of us (Katie, Josh, Danny and myself). We arrive in Munich at 7am on a Thursday, found our way to the hotel where we hiked 5 floors to get to our room because the elevator was only meant for the skinniest person in the world and of course I needed to walk up stairs every night after walking all.day.long. All joking aside it was nice and I probably did need the extra walking with all the German food that we ate. Those people do not eat light, they are all about the potatoes, bread and meat. Anyway, let me get to what we did in Munich. When we first got there we went on Third Reich tour where we pretty much walked the entirety of Munich in two hours. This was interesting but I don’t remember very much because I was pretty much a zombie from the plane ride that I was unable to sleep on. That afternoon we discovered the Hofbrauhaus, which Danny was pee his pants excited about! They had an um-pa band and all, it was pretty great, food was good, beer was great but the people watching….oh the people watching was fantastic. The next day we rented a car and drove just outside of Munich to the Dachau Concentration Camp. Now that was an experience that I will never forget, gives me chills just thinking about it. After that we came back and just finished walking around Munich and taking in the town.




Next we drove a couple hours to Schwangau, home to the famous Neuschwanstein castle (aka Cinderella castle). This was by far the best hotel that we stayed in, it had a spa and everything. We were hoping for a bit more snow so we could go sledding but unfortunately, the snow was mostly gone. There was still one ski slope open but we just didn’t have time. The castle is only 1/3 of the way complete, King Ludwig dies before it was done and no one has ever finished it. It was by far the most ornate castle I have ever seen.


We left there and headed to Oberusol, home of the Frankfurt International School and our friend Kelsey who just so happens to teach there. This is where Erin and Justin joined us and now it is a trip of 7. Kelsey showed us around the town, her apt and the school. We had the most AMAZING meal that night, I still have dreams about it, it was that good! Don’t worry there is a picture of it below. I don’t remember what it was but man, yummy! From here the 6 of us took a couple day trips while Kelsey had to work. The first day we went to Rothenburg (aka the Christmas town). This was one of the few cities that did not get destroyed in WWII. Everything is so old and quaint there. I LOVE this town. We pretty much shopped til we dropped here for everything Christmas. We weren’t allowed to take any pics in the actual Christmas shop which was very sad because it was amazing. That night we went on the Nightwatchmen Tour which was informative and quite humorous.





Next we headed to Rudesheim where we were hoping to do a lot of wine tasting. Unfortunately, when we arrived we found out that we had to make reservations so were just able to go to one winery as well as a brandy distillery (??? Don’t know what you call those places). It was interesting and fun. But just a warning, if you ever go there they have town bells that pretty much ring constantly. They sound really pretty but they just keep going and going and going, kinda like the energizer bunny.



It was time to make the party of 6 into a party of 7 and head out to Prague. We woke up uber early, took a couple trains, saw a guy get arrested in our train car, sprinted to the bus that we almost missed (side note: don’t make Germans mad or get them off their bus schedule, it is bad news) and arrived in Prague, in the rain, with no idea how to get to our hotel. Once we found our hotel we ventured out into the romantic town. We headed to the town square to start off where there is all kinds of delicious food vendors, fun crafty vendors, etc. There was a crazy old, pointy church in the middle which was so pretty. We saw the astronomical clock which was pretty cool, crazy that people were able to create something like that hundreds of years ago. We tried to go to the Jewish Quarter but by the time we arrived everything was closing so we will have to do that next time. We did make it out to the Prague Castle where it snowed on us for about 15 minutes. It was huge! We decided to walk back over the Charles Bridge had such pretty views of the city. There were all kinds of bands and vendors lining the bridge which made it a lot of fun to walk around. We finished it off by having dinner at Hard Rock Café. I know, I know, you are thinking “why would have American food in Prague when you can have it anytime you want when you are home” I will tell you that we did try Czech food and we were not fans.





Before you knew it, it was time to part ways again and the party of 7 became a party of 2. Danny and I stayed while everyone else went back to the good old USofA. We flew to Frankfurt and stayed there. It was so nice because it was time for us to unwind and talk about everything that we had done and see thus far. We took the train to the shopping area and just walked around. The weather was great that day and everyone was out. After walking around the town and in the shops we ended up going to the roof of the “mall” where you can sit outside and drink coffee and just look out over the town. It was soooo nice. We then found this great place and ate dinner. You walk in, grab a card that looks like a credit card, stand in line and order your own pasta where they make it in front of you. They then swipe the card, give you your meal and you sit down and eat. There are different potted herbs where you just grab some and put it in our pasta or pizza. So fresh and so yummy!




Then it was over. It was a great trip. It was really nice to be able to visit with Kelsey and see where she lived and the places that she went all the time. Bad news for Danny though, now I totally have the travel bug. I am trying to convince him to go to Italy in the fall if anyone is interested let me know…..