Seiffen, Germany

For Veteran's Day weekend we visited Seiffen, Germany. We were originally planning to  visit Bolesławiec, Poland but neither of us were really looking forward to the long drive. Seiffen was a couple hours closer. In addition, I had to miss the spouses' club trip to Seiffen so it made sense to switch our plans and go together. 

Seiffen is known as the place where traditional German Christmas decorations like Nutcrackers, arches (or Schwibbogen) and pyramids originated. The locals, back in the day, were miners but after the mines were closed they had to find new ways to make a living. Their skills translated well to woodworking and thus the wooden decor and toy industry flourished. 

I did not really know what to expect from the town. It's a pretty small town without a lot of tourist information available. I had seen some pictures from a couple of the spouses who went on the spouse club trip, so I had a little bit of an idea but experiencing it in person was totally different!

Throughout the town you can find these really beautiful lights showing popular designs. This one is showing the angel motif. I'll talk about that a little bit later. Whenever we travel, we like to pick up an ornament for our Christmas tree. Our ornament from Seiffen is a mini version of one of these lights. 

We brought Suzie along with us on the trip to avoid having to find a pet sitter on a weekend when a lot of the military community were also traveling. Because of Suzie, we ended up on some walks we might not have taken otherwise. Charles took this picture on one of his solo walks with Suzie. 

We stayed in one of the apartments at the Spielzeughof. The location was perfect as it was just up a hill from the main drag with all the shops and restaurants. It was so peaceful! This little nutcracker lives in the apartment and was a nice piece of Seiffen to admire during our stay. 

Every European city has a church and this is Seiffen's. We did not check out the interior, but walked around the outside a bit on one of our walks with Suzie. You can purchase arches, pyramids and more that feature this church. The arch I really wanted had it on there. Unfortunately, the store employees were not sure if it was compatible with 110v so we chose not to buy it. I'll have to do some research about that and maybe purchase it another time.

On the main drag in Seiffen we saw lots of little huts like these serving anything from gluhwein, snacks and wooden decor pieces. This grouping was outside of the the restaurant (Holzwurm) we had dinner on Saturday evening. It was especially cute in the evening with the stars and string lights on. Our dinner was delicious, so I highly recommend making a reservation for when you are in town. 

I finally experienced gluhwein while visiting Seiffen! Gluhwein is a hot, mulled wine drink and can come in a variety of flavors. The first day in town I had a white wine with Amaretto version that was my favorite! I didn't snap a picture because it was served in a Styrofoam cup (not Instagram worthy). I also had some from a local bakery to accompany a pastry. That one was my least favorite. Our third cup, pictured here, was from one of the stands in town. We thought about keeping the mugs, but unfortunately they were from the 2019 Seiffen Christmas market and we didn't think it would be worth it. We returned for our 3 Euros back. 

Nestled amongst the shops and restaurants in town were large examples of the many pieces you can buy in the stores. This one shows the angel and miner. These were popular back in the day and you can still find them in the windows of the local homes. They can be illuminated with regular candles, battery powered candles or electricity. In the background of this picture, you can also seeing a couple in the top left. They move so they get closer and closer until they kiss. There is even a kissing sound that accompanies it! 

We purchased quite a few things on our trip. Seiffen had all the things my heart was dreaming about when it comes to German decor, especially for Christmas. We spent our first day in town visiting lots of shops (and there are LOTS of shops); we took pictures of pieces we liked and made a list of our top priorities to make sure we did not blow our budget. The next day, we went back to the shops to make our purchases. When we were planning our trip, I was worried that a three day weekend was going to be too long, but it was perfect as we were not rushed to make our purchase decisions and had plenty of time to visit as many shops as our hearts desired. 

One thing I wasn't necessarily planning on getting were the angel and miner. We saw so many cute ones throughout town and this is the set we decided on. I especially like the miner from this set (pictured below) because of his fancy coat tails. 

We have a Nutcracker collection that is displayed all year long. We went into our trip desiring a taller Nutcracker since our others are roughly the same height. Well, as you can see, we ended up with one that is quite a bit taller than our others. Charles wanted one that had the miner symbol on his hat and there were a few to choose between. 

Smokers are also a popular item in the shops. We have a couple that Greg gifted us with from his time living in Germany and we have two small ones that we bring out for Christmas. When we saw the beekeeper, we had to have him! Charles also loved the toymaker so we brought him home, too. 

We purchased a couple other pieces that we will put out for Christmas including a pyramid and a pinecone that is decorated with tiny pieces like a shepherd and sheep. It was very unique!