Frohe Weihnachten

This means "Merry Christmas" in German-  a phrase I came to know well.  Christmas day was really quaint, just how you would imagine Christmas day to be.  Lots of snow and all.  First thing in the morning, Chuck shared that his Mom had set out "Kristollen" which is another super yummy traditional German cake thing.  It could be described as a type of fruit cake, but in the States that would be considered disgusting.  Let me just tell you, this was no American fruit cake.  Kristollen is like a dry pound cake with some chunks of yumminess in it.  (Raisins?  Nuts?) Then it's covered with loads of powdered sugar.  Oh happy day. 

Chuck's Mom really is the ideal Mother-in-Law.  I love her so much.  I've learned recently that Christmas happens because of the MOM of the house.  I've seen it with my own Mom, and then I witnessed it with my MIL as well.  She was working all day to make Christmas happen.  From breakfast, to snacks, (She was always whipping some new snack item out of the pantry!  How do Moms do that?!), to drinks, to all the gifts she gave, to making the main meal, to dragging out the left overs later, and then off course, all the clean up.  Whew.  There is so much work to be done for Moms on Christmas day.  They really do make it all happen.  THANK YOU MOM! (And even though I wasn't home, thanks to my own Mama for all those years of making it happen.)

This was my first Christmas away from my family in 28 years.  It really couldn't have been more wonderful.  Opening presents with the family was truly tons of fun.  I absolutely loved seeing what gifts people gave to each other.  I love the thought that goes into each gift.  I guess that's why gifts is my main love language.  Gifts mean so MUCH to me and I enjoy watching others receive gifts.  It shows how much the family loves each other.  Since Chuck and the majority of his family are perfectionists, you should have seen the packages they created.  It's like a profession for them.  Unlike my family, we're ALL about the wonder of the GIFT BAG.

One of my most treasured gifts from Chuck's parents was a gift bag (I think the ONLY gift bag used that day, haha!) full of ornaments.  Each ornament had a story.  I so enjoyed hearing Chuck's Mom describe to us why she gave each one.  Some she hand-crafted (Poor Chuck, his wife does not have crafting skills like his Mother!), some were uniquely German, and some were made by another person.  Oh my soul.  That's right, ornaments that little Chuckie made himself as a child.  My heart just melted to the ground when I pulled out what is now my favorite ornament.  A clear plastic Christmas tree that Chuckie had colored himself, and the icing on the cake- his little Kindergarten picture glued to the front!  I could cry at how cute he was.  It was incredibly sweet, thoughtful, and generous of his Mom to give those ornaments to me.  I will treasure them always.

One final thought about Christmas day.  Tim (one of Chuck's younger brothers who lives in Germany) had his girl friend, (more to come about this topic) Anni join in the festivities with the family for the first time.  It was neat for Anni and I to share our first Christmas with the Dubbes together.  Though there was a lot of German/English translating going on throughout the day, it didn't stop us from growing more in love as a family.  Frohe Weihnachten!

Me, Mom (The Christmas Super Hero), Renate, Anni- the girls! =)
P.S.  The sweater and necklace I'm wearing is from Chuck's oldest sister, Becky.  She has amazing taste!  More to come on her later, too. ;)

Christmas Eve

Another very special evening.  I should probably stop saying that as pretty much every day we spent in Germany with Chuck's family was special.  It is worth mentioning that Chuck and I did not "sight see".  Sight seeing was definitely an option, but those types of outings don't particularly interest me.  What I desired to do was spend time with Chuck's family, doing their usual life things.  Sitting around the dinner table was my most treasured time.  We went to Germany because that's where Chuck's family happens to be from, the fact that it was a different country was just icing on the cake. 

Christmas Eve was my first visit with the church Chuck grew up with.  People that have know him since he was very young, and people that have watched him grow up.  It was really sweet to meet them.  This is the church where Chuck's dad (Dan) is a Pastor, the reason why the family is in Germany.  Chuck and I established a routine.  He would speak in German to them and I would listen for when he said "meine Frau".  On que I would say "Ich heisse Abby".  They almost always laughed in surprise that I was attempting to speak in German.  I also knew how to say "Merry Christmas" and "Thank you" which I said about a thousand times because that's pretty much the only German I was capable of.  I think they appreciated it.

So the Christmas Eve service was a "short" service- only 3 hours!  Yes, I jest.  Just wait til you hear about the following "regular" services.  =)  Anyway, this particular evening was interesting as it was my first time sitting through a German only service.  I found myself smiling and nodding like I actually knew what was going on.  HaHa!  I pretty much wandered around with a big grin on my face a lot because I wanted people to think I was friendly, even if I couldn't talk with them without an interpreter. 

What I really loved were the people that practiced their English on me.  One man in particular was absolutely adorable.  German through and through with the typical Lederhosen pants and all.  He came up to me, with his face just inches from mine and said, "Hello...How...are...you...?  Merry....Christmas."  So cute.  I loved that.

After the service, the fam trooped back home and Chuck's Mom (Tricia) made a fantastic, traditional German dinner.  Oh how I love the food over there.  You may be able to tell in the picture, but we had German potato salad (MMM!!), Bockwurst- German version of a hot dog (totally opposite of an American hot dog!) with Broetchen (those fabulous crispy rolls) and this yummy mustard stuff.  Another wonderful thing is that Germans do not use ice.  They put out the cups, and then put the drinks on the table, making it much easier.  Every body just grabs what they want.  No one has to put ice in the glasses, or take drink orders.  And, almost every drink has fizz.  Apfelschorle was one of my favorite drinks- basically sparkling apple juice.  Even the water has fizz (that I was not as big a fan of).  Then, the Dubbe tradition is to have a birthday cake for Jesus, and sing to Him.  I really loved doing that. 

We had lots of laughs, good conversation, and just plain bonding time sitting around the Christmas Eve table.  I loved it.  Dan took this picture and I'm so glad he did. 

(Left:  Chuck, moi, Adam, Timmy, Jamie (the dog), Renate, and Mom)

Weihnachtsmarkt

Our first 2 days in Germany are a blur in my memory.  I realized during this venture that sleep is more important to me than food.  Never would I ever have come to that conclusion had I not been withheld precious hours of sleep the way we were traveling over there.  Of course, Chuck was snoozing away on the plane while I sat straight up in my seat fidgeting around like crazy desperately trying to find one possible comfortable position.  I kid you not I had a melt down somewhere around 2 in the morning, body clock time.  I was seconds away from bursting into droves of tears, ripping angrily at my cheesy airplane blanket, stomping my feet (yes I did) and about to scream (yes I felt like that) when a new movie started.  I resolved then and there that I was never going to be able to sleep again and I might as well deal with it.  Thus I realized sleep is more important to me than food- lack of sleep makes me a crazy person.  I believe this is actually a psychological and scientific fact. 

So onto happier days, once we finally got to bed in Chuck's parent's beautiful home, I slept for 13 hours straight, I believe.  Germans use these fantastic window covers called "rolladen ".  Thanks to them, not an ounce of sunlight was able to enter our room.  Blissful sleep indeed.

Our first outing was to the infamous Weihnachtsmarkt!  These Christmas markets live up to their reputation, and more! What a festive, fun, quaint way to enjoy the Christmas season.  We had a blast wandering around, stopping at tons of little stands selling German goods, and ate plenty of authentic food as well.  Including schupfnudein (potato noodles thingies), sauerkraut, bratwurst, brotchen (crispy roll), and gluhwein (spiced wine).  The gluhwein at the market was the best I tried.  They give it to you in this cute little mug.  You can return the mug and get some money back, or you can keep it- which we did.  We also ate roasted almonds which were unbelievably delicious.  We really wanted to try roasted chestnuts, but the stand had sold out.  Who knew there really were roasted chestnuts?  I thought we just sang about them for no reason. 

Since Chuck and I had been saving our pennies for quite a long time, we had the freedom to purchase little things that caught our eye.  There were stands that sold jewelry, ornaments, clothes, nick knacks, soaps, lotions, home items, and truly so much more.  It was a blast buying cute little things to remind me of such a unique cultural experience with the fam.  We found this one booth that sold items that were hand-crafted.  It was, by far, my favorite booth.  I think it was Renate's favorite as well.  We both found cute little items that we loved.  Chuck bought me a little felt flower pin that goes perfectly on my winter coat. 


This was definitely a special night.  The whole family (of those who were actually in Germany) was there together, but we split off into little groups.  Chuck and I walked around with his younger brother Adam (Sibling # 6, who will be staying in Germany until next Fall, taking online classes through Liberty), their friend Robert (who is the brother of our soon-to-be sister-in-law, Anni), and Chuck's youngest sister, Renate.  Renate and I always have fun giggling and shopping together.  She is such a sweet girl, which is fitting, since we just recently celebrated her Sweet 16th birthday.  I love spending time with her.

I am posting a picture that Chuck took of our little group right before we met back up with the rest of the fam.  I would say this night was one of the top most special nights.  It really just felt like Christmas...magic. 

2 Weeks

Our two week trip to Germany could never be captured into one blog post.  Our trip may, however, be captured in a blog post a day for two weeks.  I thought it would be fun to focus 14 posts in a row on our special trip, as well as 14 different pictures.  This is also a great way for me to stretch my writing muscles as they have been super dormant lately. 

Our journey started off pretty rough.  We realized on Sunday night (Our flight was scheduled to leave on Monday at 5pm) that my passport still had my maiden name on it.  Ugh.  After having checked and re-checked my passport's expiration date, it never occurred to me to check my own name.  As Chuck was checking our bags in online, he realized the name debacle.

God provided one solution after another and totally took care of the passport issue.    That is really an amazing story in and of itself.  Needless to say, about 3 and a half hours before our plane took off, I officially received my new (EXPENSIVE) passport.  Our Monday had started off at 5am.  We were just looking forward to "crashing" on the eight hour flight. 

Well one thing led to another and after about 7 hours we landed in Munich instead of Frankfort.  The snow was pretty bad so we were forced to wait on the plane for two hours and anticipated flying on to Frankfort.  Instead we ended up being told to exit the plane as our flight was now canceled.  LONG story short, we took a long, slow bus ride to Frankfort- which is where this picture was taken.  It is also where we did not receive our luggage.  Mine did come three days later, while Chuck's arrived less than a week before we left to come back home.  Poor guy.  He really did have the most amazing attitude and my admiration for his positive spirit grew even more.  All in all, from the time we landed in Munich until we actually reached Chuck's parent's was about 12 hours.  This picture was taken on our bus ride.  We hadn't slept for hours and our bodies were pretty miserable.  BUT, we were thankful we had each other and God certainly gave us a lot to laugh about!