Keyboard

Sometimes it's funny how Facebook can get you things that you weren't expecting to have!  A little while ago, I had put on Facebook that I wished I had my piano so that I could play some Christmas music.  Christmas music is my favorite music to play and I missed it.  After writing that status update, a friend of mine here e-mailed me and asked if I would be interested in buying their keyboard.  They are moving back to the US in a few weeks and don't need to take the keyboard back with them.  I was very excited and looked at the keyboard on Thanksgiving and took it home with me!  It now has a home in front of one of our many windows.

Little did I know that having the keyboard would bring me an opportunity to play in front of people!  The couple who normally does music for our evening church could not make it this past week due to one of their sons having a school concert.  We would normally just cancel church, but the woman who sold me the keyboard asked it I would be willing to play for church.  I've only played with people singing a handful of times (and usually only 2-3 people singing, not a large group), but I didn't want to have to cancel church because we didn't have any music.  Thanks to my dad I was able to get some songs to play and played for church on Sunday evening. 

I am enjoying having another thing to do during the day and it helps me to relax and do something that I love!

Es Schneidt!!

For those of you who don't speak German, the title means "It is snowing!"  Apparently I was too quick with yesterday's post because this is what I woke up to today!

Wonderful Weather

Germany has had some wonderful weather lately, so I wanted to tell you about it.  I love snow, but usually prefer for it to wait until after Thanksgiving.  Germany did it perfectly!  Thanksgiving was sunny and we could see the mountains!

The day after Thanksgiving, we woke up to SNOW!!  When Brian left to go to work, he woke me up to show me the snow.  It wasn't a whole lot, but it was definitely snow.  :)  It has snowed a little bit on and off since then, but nothing too much yet.  I'm very excited for some more snow.

American Thanksgiving Dinner

Even though the Germans do not celebrate Thanksgiving, we still did!  Brian had to work (since he takes German holidays and not American ones) and I spent a lot of my day on the phone wishing my family a happy Thanksgiving.  We did have German class and surprised our teachers a bit when we wished them a "Happy Thanksgiving" (in English).  They weren't quite sure what we were talking about at first, but figured it out soon enough.

In the evening, we went to the Collins' house for Thanksgiving dinner.  There were 20 people there from America, Canada, Singapore, Zimbabwe, and Germany.  For some of the people, it was the first time they had celebrated Thanksgiving.  It was fun to share this tradition with them!  We had all very American food (nothing else was allowed!) and had a wonderful time of fellowship.  Even though we couldn't spend the day with our families, it was nice to be able to spend it with our "German" family! 

Veggie Tales Thanksgiving Wisdom

One of my Facebook friends had this as their status on Thanksgiving:

Veggie Tales says it best:

"I thank God for this day,

for the sun in the sky,

for my mom and my dad,

for my piece of apple pie!

For our home on the ground,

for the love that's all around,

that's why I say thanks every day!

Because a thankful heart is a happy heart;

I'm glad for what I have,

that's any easy way to start...

For the love that He shares

'cause He listens to our prayers,

that's why I say thanks every day."

I was struck by the simplicity and complexity of this song sung by Junior Asparagus.  It seems like the basic things that we should all be thankful for, but when I thought about the things mentioned in this song, I was reminded of these things and others related to them that I am truly thankful for this Thanksgiving while living in Germany.  I will expand on my thoughts regarding these things and encourage you to do the same in your own life and situation.

I thank God for this day

This is something that Brian and I do regularly every night before we go to bed.  We alternate who prays every night and always start with thanking the Lord for another day of life.  This sometimes seems like such a normal thing, but it truly is a miracle that we are able to function and breathe and thrive every day!  I take for granted each day that I am given here on earth, but I should constantly be thanking God for surviving another day on his wonderful creation!

For the sun in the sky

This one was so easy to be thankful for yesterday!  We had a beautiful day in Germany and could even see the majestic mountains across the lake!  I must remember that I need to not only be thankful for the sunny, gorgeous days, but also the rainy, dreary days because the earth needs those too.  I seek to rejoice in any type of weather and praise the Lord for his complex systems that keep this world turning.

For my mom and my dad

This one should continue on by saying, "and my sisters and my brothers and my grandparents and my aunts and my uncles and my cousins and my friends" (except that probably wouldn't have worked very well in the song!).  Moving to Germany has made me more aware of staying in touch with all of these people and supporting them from far away.  Brian and I feel so much support here from our families and friends through cards, letters, e-mails, e-cards, Skype calls, and visits.  We are blessed to have people who are willing to figure out Skype just to be able to see us, people who spend 98 cents just to send us a card, and even people who are willing to spend hundreds of dollars just to visit us!  We are truly blessed by our friends who are willing to stay friends even from far away when visits aren't possible.  I am thankful for friends who still want to do a Bible study together even though we have to do it over Skype.  We love and miss everyone back home!  Despite that, we have established a community of people here who are able to encourage, help, and embrace us.  We are blessed to have this group of people that has shown us God's love without even really knowing us.  We hope to get to know these people more through the next two years.

For my piece of apple pie

This is probably the hardest one for me to be thankful for!  One of the hardest things about adjusting to life in Germany is the different kinds of foods that are here and the staples that I can no longer get.  We have had to completely adjust the way we eat and come up with different things to eat.  We have had Kraft Macaroni and Cheese brought over from the States.  Despite missing the things that I am used to, I need to remember to be thankful for the fact that I still have food to eat and the health that it gives me.  We are not starving and I must remember to be thankful for whatever is put before me.

For our home on the ground

This one encompasses so much right now!  I am thankful for a job for Brian that allows us to live in a foreign country for a few years.  I am thankful for a booming company that can make it easy to move across the ocean financially.  I am thankful for an empty apartment that was already rented and furnished by the company.  I am thankful for an apartment bigger than the one we had in Belleville.  I am thankful for quiet neighbors.  I am thankful for a nice town to live in.  I am thankful for a beautiful lake and mountains (when they come out!) to look at.  I am thankful for coworkers that are willing to help us figure things out when we can't read German.  I am thankful for a smooth transition to living here that should soon be done.  

For the love that's all around

We have found love from many different people this year, but I especially am thankful for the love shown to me by my husband.  Brian knows it is hard for me to be away from family and the things that I am familiar with, but he has shown me the most unconditional love that I could ask for.  He is patient when I am on the phone late at night talking to someone in the States.  He buys me special things at the grocery store that he knows will make me happy (and perhaps gain a few pounds!).  He lets me cry when I miss something or feel alone here.  He pushes me to do things out of my comfort zone (like speak German and go down a mountain in a cart!).  He goes to an orchestra concert even though it is not necessarily his favorite thing.  I am truly loved by my husband and I am so thankful for him!

For the love that He shares

'cause He listens to our prayers

God and his faithfulness is definitely the thing that I am most thankful for this year.  It was one year ago this weekend that we told our families that we would be moving to Germany.  There were lots of unknowns from then on, but God has always shown us his faithfulness by orchestrating everything to work in His plan.  I tend to worry a lot, but in this move, I knew that He was in control and had everything planned ahead of time.  He truly has shown His faithfulness by the fact that we have lived here for almost 4 months and are thriving where He has placed us.  He has answered many prayers in the last year also.  Not only for us, but also for those around us.  It is amazing that we have someone watching out for us that we can talk to on a personal level even though He is the Creator of the universe!  Wow!

And so...my Thanksgiving resolution this next year is to say thanks every day as Junior Asparagus does.  

Because a thankful heart is a happy heart!

Baby Blanket

We haven't taken any more trips since the Black Forest, so now we're back to normal life.  We don't plan to take any more trips before Christmas except to check out some of the Christmas markets at some of the towns nearby.  Perhaps we'll go to one that is a bit farther away.  We haven't really decided where we're going yet. 

I've been very busy knitting since I'm making some things for Christmas presents.  About two weeks ago I finished my very first baby blanket.  Brian's sister Jill is expecting a baby just before Christmas and I wanted to make her a blanket.  It was very fun to knit and totally new for me!  It was the first time I had used circular needles and the first time I had used needles that big.  Once it was done, I packed it up (along with some German chocolate!) and sent it to Jill in Florida.  She got it over the weekend, so now I can post the pictures of it.  Enjoy!

Schwarzwald - Black Forest - Triberger Wasserfall

Our last stop in the Black Forest was the Triberger Wasserfall.  This is another waterfall that we had heard about and decided to check out.  Needless to say, we were a bit disappointed by the tourism around this waterfall.  Even though you could walk right up to the waterfall, they made you pay to go past one of the booths to get close enough to see it.  It wasn't much, but we were a bit disappointed with everything that was built up around this natural waterfall.

The waterfall was gorgeous though!  It is the biggest one in the Black Forest.

There were some pretty birds around this area and they got very close to the people that were walking around.  We missed getting pictures of the first one, but we did get pictures of one of the later ones.

At Christmas time, the falls are decorated with thousands of Christmas lights.  They obviously weren't lit yet, but there were some of them up on the bridges that criss-crossed the falls.

We got pretty excited too because we actually saw an American flag!  At the tourist entrance to the falls, they had different flags flying and they had an American flag.

We only stayed about half an hour at the waterfall because we had to start driving back in order to make it to church in Ueberlingen by 5:30.  We did make it in time and got some pictures of the mountains as we were getting closer to Ueberlingen.

Overall, we had a great trip to the Black Forest!  We hope to go back to some of these places and explore them a bit more and hope to see some new places too.

Schwarzwald - Black Forest - Schauinsland

On Sunday, we awoke to another beautiful day (blue skies and sun!) and a wonderful continental breakfast (German style) at the hotel.  They had the best hot chocolate!!  We first headed to Schauinsland which is a mountain just outside of Freiburg.  While driving through the town, we found another beautiful church that we had to take a picture of out the window of the car.

When we got to the bottom of Schauinsland, we discovered that you could either hike up it or take a cable car to the top.  Since there were other things we wanted to see that day and we had to make it back to Ueberlingen for church at 5:30, we decided to go the shorter route and take the cable car.  We hope to go back someday and perhaps hike the mountain because there were some great trails at the top too.

We had great views from the cable car and once we got to the top.  We even saw some yellow trees!  They were actually evergreens that had yellow-ish colored needles.

There were some good places to take some pictures, so I had to take a few of Brian since I had the camera.

While we were sitting and looking at the city of Freiburg (the city you can see behind Brian in the picture above), we saw this bird come.  We figured out that it was a woodpecker and I actually got a picture of it!

We then got to the top of the mountain and found a lookout tower to climb.  It was my favorite to climb since it was quite high and was quite windy, but we made it to the top and got some great pictures!

A little ways from where we were, there was a sun observatory.  You couldn't go up to it, but we got a picture of it from above.

We had a great view of the mountains and could even figure out which was we live from where we were because they had a map of the different mountains from where we were.

We then walked around some of the trails at the top of the mountain.  There were lots of different wooden statues, so we had to take pictures of them!

We then spotted this stone statue/monument in the distance and had to figure out what it was.  When we got to it, we were pleasantly surprised to find that there was writing in English on it!  It told the story of some English boy scouts that got lost on the mountain and 5 of them died from exhaustion.

After taking in the view another time, we headed back to the top of mountain and had lunch in the restaurant there before heading back down the mountain and on to our next stop.

Schwarzwald - Black Forest - Todtnauer Wasserfall

After having lunch in the parking lot where we had parked, we made our way to the Todtnauer Wasserfall (waterfall).  We saw the city of Todtnau on the way and decided we would go back there after seeing the waterfall to check out the beautiful church that we saw from the road.  When we found the waterfall, we had to walk a little ways from where we parked to get to the waterfall.  There were some fun wooden carvings along the way.

We then found the waterfall!!  It was absolutely gorgeous and the sun had decided to come out, so it was even more beautiful!

There were these fun wooden lounge chairs by one part of the waterfall and I decided it would be an excellent place to read but, unfortunately, I didn't have a book with me.  :(

Brian took a picture of a girl from South Africa/South Carolina, so she was kind enough to take one for us.

You could walk up a path that zigzagged up the waterfall and crossed over bridges several times to the top of the waterfall (which was much farther up than I thought!).  There were some great rainbows by the falls because of the shining sun.

Brian found one of the infamous German slugs and had to get a picture of it.  This is what we get here when it rains instead of worms on the sidewalks...yuck!

We then headed back to the city of Todtnau to see some of the strange and beautiful things they had in the city.  One of these was this random stone sword pointing out of the top of a big rock.

They had a pretty cool looking cemetery also.

They also had a beautiful church!  This was definitely the newest church we have seen here in Germany, but it was still beautiful!  I loved the green color of it.

We then did something that I'm still not quite sure that I believe that I actually did.  We had seen this strange track coming down the side of the mountain outside of the town with a chair lift going up next to this track.  We wondered what it was, so we found it and discovered it was a track, similar to a roller coaster, that people were going down on little carts either individually or in pairs.  Brian really wanted to ride on it, but I wasn't so sure.  I hate roller coasters and this was very much like a roller coaster except that I would have control of the speed.  For some reason (probably because I love him!), I told Brian that I would ride on the thing with him. 

The first step was taking the chair lift to the top of the track.  I had never been on a chair lift before and was not a huge fan of it!  I was definitely not very excited to be riding this thing in the hard wind and hung on for dear life all the way up.  Do not be deceived by the slight smile in this picture...I was not happy!

We did get a nice view of the Todtnau church from the top of the track though!

We then took the ride down the track.  We decided to go on separate carts because I wasn't so sure that I would like the speed that Brian would take down the track.  Brian went first (which was good!) and I followed him.  I never saw him though because I was going so slow down the track.  There were people behind me and they had to keep stopping because they wanted to go faster than I was!  Since we both rode, Brian only got a few pictures of me at the end.

I think this was Brian's favorite part of the trip because it was what he told everyone at church about the next day!  We found out that these alpine coasters are pretty popular in the Alps, but this was the first one we had ever seen.

We then kept driving toward Freiburg.  We ended up stopping at a little parking area on the side of the road because there was a beautiful view of the sunset and there were quite a few people flying kites in a nearby field.  We didn't stay long though because it was super windy and very cold!

We then made our way to Freiburg and found the hotel that we had found online.  Once we figured out where to talk to someone there, we found that they still had an open room and a place a dinner.  Dinner was a bit awkward though because we ended up sitting next to Germans and we're never quite sure how to handle that.  The hotel was great for the night since we were both quite ready for bed after so much fresh air!