Fasching

Fasching is the German equivalent of Mardi Gras/Carnival/Carnivale. They have been celebrating for awhile now, but with Lent beginning on Wednesday the celebrations have reached their peak. We traveled to Heppenheim, Germany, on Sunday to attend a Fasching party at our friends, Donna and Dave's house. Their little town of Heppenheim has a huge parade every year for Fasching so they wanted to have a party in conjunction with the big parade. It was pretty crazy--it was in the afternoon and the weather was pretty soggy, but there were tons of people in the crowd. For Fasching all Germans dress up in costumes, ranging from silly to crazy. At the parades the floats throw anything from candy and ice cream bars (wrapped, of course) to pretzels and popcorn. We even ended up with a little packet of foot wash...don't even know.

It was our first real long distance trip in the beloved BAV (seriously it is awesome!). Heppenheim is about 3 1/2 hours away, over on the western side of Germany. It is not too far from where we lived near Heidelberg a few years ago. As I said before, the weather left a lot to be desired but the parade was fun and it was a pretty raucous atmosphere. Gus didn't take to the parade at first. The crowd was loud and as with all German parties there was lots of loud techno music. He warmed up eventually, especially when he saw kids in costumes. Due to the weather, Max had to sit this one out in the BAV, but he came out later for the party.

There were a few other babies/toddlers at the party at Donna and Dave's house so Gus had a good time "playing". Donna and Dave have a 5, almost 6-month-old son, Colt. Gus was really interested in Colt and liked to rock Colt's carseat while Colt sat in it. Also present were a 13-month-old boy and 15-month-old boy and Gus towered over them both. But he seemed to enjoy the company.

I included a few pictures from our trip in this slideshow--enjoy!