Taking care of the boy for a while

 So, Fernando has a pretty amazing job offer in Leipzig, Germany.  It is a research position, which is what he'd rather do more than teach.  There is a possibility that Eva would be offered a position there also.  This would be at the Max Planck Institute.  The only catch - the position is only guaranteed for 5 years but they said the chances were good it would be extended 5 more years.  There are as many cons as there are pros to taking a position over there.  So, we'll see what happens. 

The Max Planck invited Fernando and Eva to fly to Leipzig to check everything out over there before making a decision.  Fernando and Eva decided to take them up on the offer, and on Tuesday, October 4, we went over to Fernando's house to take them to the airport.  After dropping them off at the airport, we went back to Fernando's house and set up our stuff as we'll be living in their house for several days.  We picked up Leo from school that Tuesday, brought him home and then got him ready for his soccer practice that evening.   

After practice, we stopped at Inferno's Pizza for dinner and that was nice sitting outside enjoying good pizza - well, it would've been excellent if it hadn't been for all the flies!

We took him to school the next morning and picked him up that afternoon and then it was the beginning of his school's fall break.

On Thursday morning, we took a trip with Leo to New Braunfels to visit the Children's Museum there.  What a drive that was!  Going from Fernando's house down I-10 to Loop 1604 was fine but things went downhill once we got to Loop 1604.  We must have crawled through traffic pretty much the entire way on 1604, and then of course on I-35, until we practically were in New Braunfels.  Leo had fun in the Children's Museum but we found that there really is very little there for kids who are older than 4 or 5.  Fortunately, there were 3 places in the museum that he enjoyed very much so it was all worth it.

He loved chasing the balls as they were launched out.  His other favorite place was a water play place and then a place where you could feel like you were in outer space.  It was SO dark in there.  I even bumped into a wall in there.  If you didn't keep your hand along the railing, it was so easy to get disoriented.  It's a little unnerving inside there, but it's also very exciting and really does give you the feeling of floating in space.

After the museum, we drove to the Alpine Haus to have lunch.  We had a very nice German lunch there and Leo thoroughly enjoyed eating in a "fancy" restaurant that was inside a house!  

After lunch, we walked to Naeglins Bakery and Leo was thrilled to see so many delicious pastries, doughnuts, cakes and pies on display and all in one area.  We bought him a special doughnut and then we walked back to our car and we let him have two bites of his doughnut and then we said we'd wait till we got home to have the rest.  The drive home was so much better.  Then we all enjoyed tea time back at the house.  

That evening was another soccer practice.

On Friday, we took Leo to Andretti Indoor Karting and Games.  We thought that'd be a lot of fun for him to drive the go-karts but it was a little too intimidating for him.  The helmet was huge, and the track, there was no way to tell how long it was.  Thankfully he was the only one on the track at the time he went, but he did one loop and decided he was done so we got him out.  After that, we played a few of the games in there and then he took his accumulated tickets and got some little prize.

Saturday, Leo had a soccer game which we thoroughly enjoyed watching.  They lost the game but even so, it was a very intense game.

After the game, we packed up all of our stuff and took Leo over to our house so he could spend the last two nights there before Fernando and Eva get back.  

On Sunday, we went to a really nice Food Truck park near Boerne and had an early dinner.  It was so nice sitting at the table outside in the really nice atmosphere of that Food Truck park. 

Then we went to pick up Fernando's car from his house and then we went in two cars to leave Fernando's car at the airport.  Fernando and Eva would be coming home later that evening.  Too late for all of us to meet them at the airport.

On Monday, we took Leo home after lunch.  So we had Leo for almost a week and were very grateful to be able to spend so much time with him.  

Fernando brought Leo over to our house again on Friday evening,  The 14th.  He is taking Eva to the airport again on Saturday morning.  She has a job interview in Sweden, in the same town near where her sister lives.  She will return on the 18th.  

On Saturday, October 15th, we went with Fernando and Leo to a San Antonio FC soccer game!  That was something we just decided to do on Friday, and sometimes those last minute spontaneous things are so much fun.  We had a great time at the game.  We found parking, had a not too bad walk to the stadium and then waited in line to go through security.  I thought they'd take my backpack from me, or make me put it back in the car, because there was a sign saying which items were acceptable to bring in, and a backpack wasn't one of them.  But no, I put my backpack in the bowl and they just tagged it and we were on our way.  We had great seats for the game and Leo just absolutely loved all the excitement.  We are so glad we did this last minute thing.  The exciting game, (score ended 2-2), watching the intense action and skilled footwork on the field, the fireworks when our team scored a goal, the thrill of being in the crowd, doing the waves, stomping the bleacher floor, getting concession food, and the massive fireworks display when the game was over, all of it was so interesting to him.  We plan on going to the very next game.