Day 158-Lara's baptism

   June 10-Joslyn discovered this morning that the Zahnfey leaves a Euro for a tooth under the pillow.  Since a Euro is worth about $1.25, this is better than the usual dollar coin she gets for teeth in the United States!  Joslyn also had left a note with the tooth to ask the Zahnfey some questions.  While the Zahnfey apparently could read the questions, he decided to answer in German, so Joslyn had to have her dad translate it for her.

   We took a day off from tourism for the day and lived the day in the life of a native.  We and Elisabeth drove to Rötgesbüttel, which is between Hannover and Wolfsburg, to attend the baptism of her granddaughter, Lara.  Lara is the daughter of Jasmin and Elisabeth’s son, Mike-Mario, who is only a year older than Shan and Sally and with whom we have had a fair bit of contact over the years.  Mike and Jasmin also has a son, Pascal, who is three years old.  It was great to see Mike again and to meet his family.  We congregated at his house, along with Heike’s family (including her adult son, Daniel), Jasmin’s family, and other friends and then we walked over to the Lutheran church. 

   The service was short with a few songs.  The place and the setting could have been any rural Protestant church that was built by the early settlers in the western U.S.  The only two differences were that this church was built from stone and that German was the language used.  After the baptism, we walked over to a restaurant where we enjoyed a fantastic meal of fine German food, including a soup of asparagus, egg custard, and small pasta; a main course of asparagus, schnitzel, potatoes, and French fries; and a dessert of ice cream cake with fresh strawberry sauce.  It was mighty tasty. 

The minister, Jasmin, Pascal, Mike, Lara, Jasmin's friend, and Heike.

Joslyn and Spencer are talking to Daniel, but the rest of us are smiling.



Mike had a couple packs of beer coasters opened for the kids (and adults) to play with.

Everyone had fun.

   We returned to Mike and Jasmin’s, where we sat around and visited all afternoon, while the kids jumped on the trampoline and played around in the backyard.  Of course, Jasmin had also made four more different types of desserts, so after a while, we dug into those and had some coffee as well.  All of us, that is, except for Sally, who rapidly came down with the stomach flu during the course of the afternoon.  Thankfully, she did not need to do much more than sit around, but it was still not much fun for her.  It got worse, though, when we drove back to Elisabeth’s, since the jostling car made her stomach cramp even more.  We took Heike home, and stopped at her place for a short while, which was a welcome break for Sally.  She took some ibuprofen at that point and the rest of the drive back to Elisabeth’s was not as bad.  When we got back, she went directly to bed, while the rest of us had some ice cream with some delicious raspberry sauce.  Then, the kids went to bed and my folks and I sat around and talked to Elisabeth for a short while.

Robin, Heike, Lutz, Diane, Spencer, Norm, Alex, Shan, and Joslyn.

 

Elisabeth, Heike, Mike, Pascal, Jasmin, and Lara.