Winter and Christmas

Christmas has been an interesting time here. The biggest difference for us is being away from home and family - no big surprise. We loved it here and enjoyed being with the people. First, we had the goal to visit the home of each member, and some of the investigators, and deliver Christmas notes (which also contained the cross-stitch Sister B made for people). Most also received a small package of home-made cookies and candy (Sister B was quite busy). We also had copies of the December Liahona (Ensign) to deliver. There were many we only left items in the mail boxes, but we did get to see quite a few people.
We had our Christmas program (already in the blog) and also scheduled a special worship service (Weihnachtsandacht) for Christmas Eve. The Sunday program on the 22nd was specially planned with additional music, including some solos by one of our sisters - mostly Salzburg carols. We had hoped for a better attendance. There were only 13 of us in that meeting. The Christmas Eve service was attended only by 7 persons.

As mentioned before, we went with Derick to hear his choir sing in a local church - the Lutheran church in Atzenweiler.

This is the chapel before they started. The choir sang in the loft above us (and behind).

Sister B took this picture looking through a stained-glass window in the church.

After that we came back to our place and had a dinner of egusi and fufu, prepared by Derick. It is a traditional Nigerian meal.

the fufu is on the left, egusi on the right

You eat it entirely with your fingers.

Next I have some pictures from our other travels and visits.

We did not have much snow until after Christmas, but a lot of fog, which froze into beautiful scenes on the trees, etc.

This is looking out our window over the balcony.

The birds liked the bread we left on the balcony.

This is a clump of mistletoe. Here in Germany it is called Mistel. It is actually a parasite and a pest that damages the trees. Some trees have many clumps of the plant. They stay green year-round.

We received many cards from friends and family. Thank you very much!

The pine bows in the middle served as our Christmas Tree.

We were invited to a family a couple of days after Christmas. This is a creche (nativity scene) they had. Most everyone has these here and some are really quite elaborate.

The man also collected many old signs from around Germany. This is his Post office signs collection.

This is a Christmas tree in another member's home. They usually are decorated with only white lights, often as candles. Even when they decorate the streets and houses, they are almost always only white.

We drove past a home once and it was obviously an American, because it was very colorfully lit up with lots of inflatable images or Santa and others. It really stood out against the usual simple white decorations of the Germans. Sorry I did not get a picture.