Week 1 in Germany

It is not even 4 weeks that we left for Germany, but it seems so much longer. It was pretty cold here, when we left, but we had no idea what we would be in for. Our first week was cold. The carnival parades took place at 25 F, and that was the midday high! Our flight over was very pleasant. Amelia had the bassinet and Marlene and I and the whole row to ourselves. Since Amelia had not taken a nap all say, she fell asleep as soon as we took off, because I nursed her to ease the pressure on the ears. She ended up sleeping for 5 house straight! Marlene and I had a drink and dinner and settled in for a movie. That is Marlene watched "Brother Bears" and part of "Wallace and Grommit". I had the choice of 12 other movies, among the "Walk the Line" and "Capote", but Marlene kept talking me through her movie, that there was no way I could concentrate on any of them. After a while we both fell asleep and got a few hours in, until Amelia woke up. And once she was up she decided it was way to interesting in the airplane to sleep. She stayed up for the rest of the flight. In Heathrow everything went without a problem and all three of us fell asleep as soon as we were in the plane to Frankfurt. Ourfirst few days in Germany were spent organizing the big party, shopping and visiting some friends. On Saturday my uncle Wolf and my cousin Helmut with his wife Sylvia visited us in Oggersheim, since they could not join us for the baptism. We had all a lot to tell, because we had not seen each other in years. On Sunday Marlene and I went to the big Carneval Parade in Ludwigshafen. It was so cold that Marlene had to wear a coat on top of her costume, under which she already wore a ton of fleece. We left Amelia with Omi, because it was too cold for her. They took us downtown and we stood in front of the library to see the Parade come by. We arrived at section 10 and left at 61; we did not make it to the traditional 111. Marlene was fascinated by the costumes, the music, and off course the tons of candy the were thrown off the carts. We saw kings, princes, and princesses, dancing girls and witches. Rose Monday we spent the afternoon in Speyer visiting the Theysohn family and talking to Frieder (the pastor) about the baptism. Marlene warmed up to them fast and when Rebecca and Daphne, the grandchildren, came over she had finally someone to play with. On Fattuesday we went to visit Karin, Christian, and Lotte in Heidelberg, were we went to the Heidelberger Parade. It was much smaller than the one in Ludwigshafen; And the people that stood around us were horrible. One lady was so set on getting the cheap candy, that she even tried to take the ones that fell into Amelia's stroller. And she had no problems pushing Marlene over to get to candy. I have never seen something like that. altogether I enjoyed carnival very much. I had loved it as a child, but later rejected it. I watched a lot of the shows and parades on TV. It is a fascinating piece of culture. Off course the "Berliner" (jelly doughnuts) were everpresent in the bakeries.