Church and a Fall Festival

We went to church for the first time this morning. We drove as we were not sure exactly where it was, but we should be able to walk it on walking paths in about 12 minutes. St. Marien/St. Mary's was very small, stark and contemporary. There were maybe 100 or so people there for the English Mass and some were familiar from school and the American Women's Club. A folk group provided the music and most of the songs we recognized. The regular priest is American, but today we had an Asian fellow who spoke very good English.

Two big surprises -- everyone did self-intinction (dipping the host into the wine yourself), which I thought was a big no-no (you don't want wine dripping on anything). I panicked at the last moment and didn't dip. And, the kneelers were bare pieces of wood. As I kneeled there with my knees in pain, I figured I was doing penance for having missed so many weeks of church.

The only English masses in the Frankfurt area are held at a larger church in the city, and then also at our little church. We are very lucky to be so close.

Our little town was having their fall festival this past weekend, so we went this afternoon. It cracks me up to see the difference between how Germans and Americans handle things. There were 3 rides: bumper cars, kiddie cars and those swings that go around and out.

There was no line for the bumper cars (or dodgems as I called them growing up in Massachusetts). People stood all along the edge (there was no "safety" border) and when the ride stopped, it was a mad rush of people to claim a car. Then as the kids rode around, they would swipe at their friends hanging out along the edge or try to hit each other with swords they had won at a game booth. There was nothing to keep little kids from running out onto the floor, and sure enough, I saw one toddler get several paces out until her dad ran out and got her.

In a way, it's kind of refreshing to see things handled in a less than orderly fashion; in another way I find myself holding my breath, waiting for something bad to happen.

Rebecca rode on the kiddie cars. First she rode on the firetruck, but she really wanted to ride on the train and the horse. When I picked her up off the firetruck, she started pointing and yelling with urgency, "Choo-choo!" and then made that sound of horse hooves - you know, clicking you tongue, because she cannot, of course, say horse. Rebecca kept pointing at the train and horse, yelling over and over, "Choo-choo! Click, click, click! Choo-choo! Click, click, click!" I told David later that she sounded like she belonged to one of those African tribes that uses clicks in their language. Some amused glances were cast her way.

Détente

Things are finally starting to calm down at school. The after school activities were causing most of the headaches, with me, often in tears, running around the school with Rebecca on my hip, trying to find out where the kids were supposed to be. The school should have given us a list of the activities they were accepted into 2 weeks ago, but they never did. The kids were starting to get reprimanded for not being at the right activity, but no family at the school had gotten confirmation of which activities their kids should be attending.

In the end, Micaela has juggling, tennis, swimming, yoga and guitar. James has soccer and kung fu and Emilie will do gymnastics and swimming. After all the craziness, they ended up getting pretty good activities. Soccer practice for James has been going better, not great, but better. We just found out we need to submit a bunch of paperwork, including a health certificate, for him to be eligible to play in a game.

For the first few weeks, I was wondering why I wasn't running into more Americans on the playground after school. It turns out many Americans have their kids take private buses to and from school. I have met some moms now, and when I ask them if dealing with school issues gets easier, they all say the same thing: "No, but you get used to the chaos."

Eine spinne

I think we have found the culprit. Rebecca still woke up yesterday morning with a bite on her back, so last night the kids and I searched her room. There, under Emilie's loft bed, tucked up in a corner was a spider, one with a tiny body, but long, spindly legs. I told James to crawl under the bed and "Kill it till it's dead!" James reminded me that if he killed it, it would already be dead.

There were no bites to be seen this morning, so everyone is keeping their fingers crossed that we got the right bug. Just the thought of that thing creeping around the room every night...ewwww!

Emilie said something funny today. She asked me, "When will our visit here be done?"

Höchst

A colleague from David's office invited us to join his family for a Sunday afternoon in Höchst, a town I only knew for its huge chemical plant. It is more well known for its historic old city center. We enjoyed a picnic at a crowded park along the Main River and watched barges pass by. It took a while for the kids to warm up to each other (their two children didn't speak much English) but soon enough, Emilie and the little girl were off to the playground and the other kids kicked around a soccer ball. The grownups chatted about the challenges of living in a foreign country and burned off some calories chasing after Rebecca.

Before we knew it, it was dinner time, so we made our way past the castle wall which dates back to the 1300s and had a delicious meal at an outdoor restaurant in the square. I had Mexican wiener schnitzel. How's that for an interesting combination?

Sneaky bug

We have been noticing for the past few weeks that Emilie and Rebecca are getting bitten by bugs. The bites are about the size of a nickel and look sore, though the kids don't seem affected by them. One day Rebecca woke up with 5 or 6 bites on one arm and sometimes there are bites on both of their cheeks. Rebecca often has a bite on her back, right where pajama top meets pajama bottom. At first we thought that they might be bites from the bugs we see outside in the evening, or even bugs flying into their room at night. German homes don't have screens and our windows have been propped open to allow fresh air in. The thought had occured to me that there might be bugs in the rental mattresses we had been using until this week. I have killed many spiders in our home, but haven't noticed any other bugs.

Today, Rebecca woke up and had another large red bite on her cheek and several bites on her arm. Then at about noon, she came downstairs and her right eyelid had ballooned to the point where she could barely open her eye. It looked puffy, nasty and red, but she didn't seem bothered by it. She looked like Rocky Balboa in the ring.

David took her to a clinic where the nurse said, "Yup, it's some kind of insect bite," but she couldn't tell what kind of bite it was. She gave David an antihistamine prescription and a child's suppository, which he kindly let me give Rebecca later. Germans believe in using suppositories to by-pass the stomach so there is less vomiting with medicine.

Now the problem remains of where these bugs are coming from. They were in the rental furniture, are coming in from outside or else they came over with our furniture in the moving container. We changed all the bedding and looked around but didn't find anything.

By bedtime, her eye looked better, but I can't get the image out of my mind of some nasty creature crawling around our house at night, stalking my tender little children.

And yet more unpacking

Today was the day to roll up the shirt sleeves and get down to business. There is still plenty to be unpacked. I worked very hard for a few hours, then did what any sane woman would do: began to feel overwhelmed, made a cup of tea and popped a Jane Austen film into the DVD player. My mood called for Sense and Sensibility.
I mean really, what would you rather be doing: screaming in frustration at Marianne for refusing Colonel Brandon's attentions or unpacking box after box of items that we really don't need anyway?... I thought so.

Before our things arrived, it was not a rare occurrence for me to suddenly realize that I had been staring off into space for a 1/2 hour. I had read the books we had brought twice each, there was no easy way to communicate with friends back home, the only TV I could truly understand was CNN International and you can only watch that for an hour before it repeats itself. I would literally stare off into space.......................ahem, but now our belongings are here so there are plenty of books and things to occupy us. At some point, I hope to set up my scrapbooking supplies and get all caught up with our photos.

Just one more picture of the yummy Alan Rickman:

Unpacking

The workers were back today to unpack boxes and set up furniture. David and I had watched a fairy tale on TV recently, where a poor man kept getting goaded into making bad trades (Tauschen! the townsfolk would chant: Trade!). Today, I needed one of the workers to switch bookshelf pieces. He couldn't understand what I was indicating with my gestures, so I pointed to the two pieces and declared, "Tauschen!" He got it.

It's great to have the kids' clothes and toys, and our books and CDs, but I was surprised at how happy I became when unpacking cleaning supplies and paper products. I had made an ill-timed shopping trip to BJs warehouse (like Costco) the week before we found out we were moving. We were loaded up on food, toilet paper, floss, Windex, washing detergent, etc. and we weren't sure what would make the trip over. David, on his trip back to Atlanta, saw that the packers refused to pack any food or cleaning agents, but he wasn't sure what they packed either.

It was like Christmas, finding Swiffer sheets, shampoo and conditioner, dryer sheets, toilet paper, soap and Ziploc bags. That meant fewer things I had to buy at the store!