Fireworks! REAL Candles on a Christmas Tree, and a Wonderful Family Trip!

These pictures are in no particular order so here I go. This is a ruin of a castle which I thought was absolutely gorgeous in Southern Germany.





















Here is the church in Faurndau which I thought was quite cute even though it kept me up with it's bells for the first few nights!

















This was our New Years meat fondu meal. It was so much fun!



Here are our fireworks!! AND it was legal!!

This is Mira, she's pretty cute eh?

This is my current host brother Johannes and an old scale thing at their house in Faurndau.

Here are some of our Christmas cookies. They were sooo good...

Here is our Christmas tree!!! AWESOME eh??

Hey everyone. I'm back from holidays with my second host family and now I have time to fill you in on what I have been up to. So on December 22 and 23 I was at my school all day, but I wasn't attending classes I was participating in some hard core Drama rehersals. (10 am to 6 pm)We got a lot done so I was happy with it. It's starting to come together. We've worked on 33 out of the 45 scenes. (Those numbers are not typos people!) Granted many of these scenes are quite short. The play will end up being about 2 hours long. Maybe a bit longer.

So I've been memorizing lines over the Christmas break and it's easier than I thought. I thought learning lines in German would be crazy difficult, but it seems to be working. We still don't have a script so I've made my own. I also found out that my Theatre director was an exchange student for a year in England. And you know what that made soooo much sense. He has been so good to me and really helped me to fit in with the group and he's been so patient and kind. It just made so much sense...I mean not everyone that I know who has been good to me has been an exchange student. BUT the ones who have been understand some things a bit better.

On the 23rd we decorated our Christmas tree. WOW real Christmas trees are painful. I was helping put ornaments on the tree and my fingers kept being pricked by these wicked sharp needles. OWW! That is one advantage of a plastic Christmas tree haha. Although our tree looked GREAT.

The 24th in German is a big deal. We went to their Church at 3. Johannes was a narrator for the story of the birth of Jesus Christ. So we went and saw that. He did a good job and the costumes were really cute! Eberhard was also on call that day. (He's a doctor.) We were sooo lucky though, because he wasn't called into the hospital. That was really great.

We came home drank tea and ate Christmas cookies before Johannes and I had to go into the Kitchen while Katrin lit the candles. It's suppose to be a surprise. And OH YES they were REAL candles. It was soooo excellent! Then we opened presents. It was a bit of a Canadian Christmas because their daughter had sent Canadian things home for Christmas and my gifts were also all Canadian.

I received some very nice presents. From the Wagner's I recieved a taste of Germany. So now I own my own Findus und Paterson Book!!! They are the cutest stories and 2 mix German hits CD which I love! There is this one song called Trauriges Mädchen by Sven van Thom that I just love. Now the title literally means Sad Girl so now I feel that I must assure you that I am not a Trauriges Mädchen, but the song sure is good!

I also recieved a small pyramide, a Christmas Market Mug, some candies and some chocolates from my First host family. That was soo sweet. From my next family I recieved some typical wooden ornaments. And Stephan came to visit me and gave me this quote book (in German) for when I'm having a bad day. So therefore I can't be too sad!

Marie sent her family all sorts of Canadian things and she sent me a maple sucker. A taste of home. Soo sweet. So needless to say I had a wonderful Christmas. I opened my presents from my family later that evening when I was by myself it was early in the morning so technically it was the 25th.

After we opened presents we went to a midnight church service where we sung lots of Christmas songs in both English and German. It was quite nice. I've completely fallen in love with one Christmas German song. (Stern über Bethlehm.)

The next few days we stayed in Rotenburg. It's more typical to go and visit family, but Eberhard was still on call and the Wagner's family aren't that close by. So we filled our days with walks together with Mira(the sky has been blue frequently over the holidays, so I'm no longer starving for a blue sky!!!), tea, cake, playing card games, UNO, Yahtzee, and then the 3 days of Christmas celebration were over.

I also helped the Wagner's set up SKYPE so they were also able to see Marie. OH and Johannes pretty much schools me at UNO and Yahtzee. I mean sometimes it's rather sad. So he likes to play with me! Hahaha we are understanding each other more and more. But I seriously have to have some wicked luck in my love life because I have such awful luck with cards. (You know the saying no luck in cards, lots of luck in love or something like that.) I'm not saying I need that luck now, far from that, but when I get home yup that would be just fine.

I also cooked for my family again. So that was fun. And then on Monday 29th we headed to Southern Germany. They have an old house in Faurndau which has been passed down through Eberhard's family. So we drove 4 hours there.

Over this trip Johannes and I played a lot of Uno and Yahtzee and I wish I could report that my luck improved. It didn't lol. The house they have in Faurndau is really cool because it has a lot of old furniture and things to look at both in the house and stored in the attic. Eberhard and Johannes told me lots of stories and showed me pictures and showed me around the attic.

We went to Stuttgurt twice. I bought Twilight in German. Call be crazy, but I'd rather be called ambitious. Haha. So I'm going to start trying to read that. I figured that since I knew the story and the English version isn't too complicated that I could have a shot at understanding this. So it'll take me some time and I'll have to sit right beside my dictionary, but I am optimistic. I also bought a German Grammar exercise book which I'll get started on right away too.

We went to an Art Mueseum in Stuttgurt and looked at the works of Henri Matisse. It was a really neat display and I enjoyed it. Deneige I would be interested to hear what you think of his work, or if you have heard of him before.

I experienced the worse customer service of my entire life at the Art Mueseums Cafe. These people were absolutely unbelievable. There was this huge table reserved for 3 o clock and it was 3:45 when we got there. They insisted they were going to keep it reserved even though there were lots of people wanting to come in just for cake and coffee. Not a meal, just a quick cake and coffee. So we had a lot of trouble with them about that. Then when we finally got a table and that party with the 3 o clock reservation ended up coming 45 minutes late. Unbelievable... THEN when they brought Johannes an empty class for his Coca Cola it didn't look like it had been washed. When Eberhard pointed this out to the server he didn't even blink and started to walk off without a word before saying...Well is there anything else? WHAT? So that was a joke.... the cake and coffee were good, but WOW...

On New Years in Germany, only for a few days before, you can buy fireworks. So everyone buys fireworks and makes their own fire work show. SOOOO SWEET! So we were on this hill overlooking a big city near Faurndau and at midnight we set off all of our fireworks and I could look 360 Degrees around me and see fireworks all over the place. Granted there were more infront of me than behind me, but it was so amazing I had no idea where to look. We also had meat fondu and that was sooo much fun. Poor Mira wasn't really thrilled about the fireworks though..

We visited some friends of the Wagner's on New Years day and they were delightful. Ralph is a friend of Eberhard's. He took us to a bigger city near by called Ulm and we looked around there in the evening. It is the most beautiful city. I really would like to go back there!

We also went to another city Tübingen the next day and did a bit of shopping. We had a good time. I think Southern Germany has more character than in Hessen. Definetly better shopping opportunities!

The next day we explored a ruin of a castle and visited Katrin's parents in a town called Horb. It was a nice day, but another late night. And then we left on Sunday. We went back to Stuttgurt to see a film over the artist we had looked at earlier in the week and then we drove home.

We got back late and I did some work on my Rotary presentation. It was all finished but I had to type up the German version. On Monday Johannes and I went sledding because there was a decent amount of snow here. He hurt his back a little and my right thumb is a mess...It is bruising pretty bad. Ooopppsss...It's also quite swollen. It was fun though!

Then I put the finishing touches on my presentation, had tea with Katrin and Eberhard and then in the evening I gave my Presentation about Canada and myself to my Rotary Club and may I add. Completely in German. It went well, needless to say I was nothing short of terrified. And to be really honest I remember the begining and the end of my presentation, but barely anything in the middle. I was concentarating so hard. The club was impressed and Katrin said that I looked quite cool and reserved when I presented.

I'm glad it's over though! Phew! Today I went for a long walk with Katrin, Mira, Johannes, and we ate lunch together and I've been catching up on all my computer stuff, e-mails, blogs, all that good stuff.

So I think I've given you a pretty good overview of my life up until now. I hope your holidays were great and I want to wish YOU reader a Happy New Year and all the best for 2009. I'll be in touch! Take care.