Tag #8

Church (11-26-05)
We actually set an alarm for this morning to make sure we'd make it to church on time. Man it was hard dragging my lazy butt out of bed. But, we made it.

The church is actually just a block away from my MIL's apartment, so Der Deutscher spent the morning with her while we attended services.

It's a small church, Der Advent Kapelle, with about 40 registered members. Maybe 20 were at services this morning. Lots of music/singing. JBP and I really enjoyed that. (JBP is running around singing about the Salvation of My Lord as I type!)

I was also surprised at how much of the service I understood. Yet another reminder I understand more of the local language than I can speak.

The congregation, as I expected, is mostly middle aged and elderly folk. Evidently the youth are all out on "missions". Der Deutscher says the SDA church has a reputation similar to Jehovah's Witnesses here for door to door evangelism. I have my doubts about the effectiveness of such in-your-face methods, but this is not my country and not my church.

There was only one family with children of any age, a two year old little girl and a five week old boy. The mother is Polish, the father German. He spoke quite good english and we conversed for some time after services were over.

The thing that frustrated me the most was during Sabbath School. I understood enough of the discussion that several times I had something I wanted to add. Unfortunately, by the time I'd figured out how to say it the group had moved on to other things.

The most interesting thing about the service was the lack of a 'sermon' as such. The pastor, or it may have been just a chief elder I'm not sure, just read an essay in a magazine written by Ellen G. White. It was informative, about the power of words and being careful what you say, but I'm not sure as to the purpose of reading it.

At the end of the service, they opened closing prayer up to anyone who had something to pray about. I liked that, although JBP was getting antsy by the time they'd finished.

After church, we were going to walk over to my MIL's apartment, but a nice couple insisted on driving us. Getting to the car and driving over actually took longer than it would've taken to walk, but it made them happy.

Der Deutscher, JBP and my MIL then went out to eat for lunch. Since it was Sabbath, I went back to my FIL's house, where we're staying, and napped. (Yes, in case you hadn't figured it out yet, my in-laws are divorced.)


Snow
Yesterday, it was snowing when we woke up. Der Deutscher called it MOI snow, or Melt-On-Impact. Nothing stuck.

Today it was a different story. The snow was coming down much thicker and actually stuck around. It was a very wet snow, so although some stuck around, it still mostly melted and never got very deep. Just enough to make life annoying without making it difficult or impossible.

However, this evening on the news we learned the snow caused power outages in just this state to some 250,000 homes. Sounds like the good old US of A to me!

JBP was quite excited about the snow and couldn't wait to get outside. He immediately started trying to make snowballs out of it. Because it was so wet it packed well.

The problem was, there was so little that after about two snowballs he was into the dirty snow. So, we made him stop. That's when he started turning his head up and trying to catch the snowflakes on his tongue.

Der Deutscher looked at him and asked, "What are you, a kid?"


Weihnachtsmarkt
We hit the Weihnachtsmarkt again tonight. JBP got to ride the carousel, again. I picked up the last gift I planned on buying for a friend who's pregnant. (I'm down to just 11 euro for the rest of the trip, although Der Deutscher says he's still swimming in money. I think his mom contributed. More chocolate! Yum!!!!)

JBP really wanted to go ice skating, but Der Deutscher doesn't know how and my ankles aren't strong enough for ice skates so JBP had to give that dream up.

We did splurge on some sweets, little cakes called poffertjes for JBP and pineapple rings fried in a cake batter and topped with cinnamon and sugar (ananasringe) for Der Deutscher and I.

JBP wanted cotton candy again but we told him he'd have to wait until tomorrow night. So I guess we're going back to the Weihnachtsmarkt at least one more time. Which is good, because I keep forgetting the camera and want to get some pictures of JBP there. He has soooo much fun. Plus, there's all sorts of yummy looking food I have yet to try.

Last time we went, I gave him 5 euro to spend on whatever he wanted. He got a cheap toy and some candy. Tonight he wanted to keep wandering around the Weihnachtsmarkt, that is until he realized he had no money to spend. Suddenly he was 'nearly frozen to death' and wanted to go home.

Nimitz' Lady