Laura Beth in Germany

The time between Christmas and New Year's has been relaxing. Fabian has been off work & we got to watch lots of Doctor Who and cook a few meals together, and spend time with his family too. Armed with our new Christmas presents from Sullivan, Fabi, his brother and I headed out to the local soccer field to practice batting and catching last week! Clemens plays tennis, and I think that gave him an edge. It was a lot of fun & we successfully broke in our new equipment (see before-and-after balls below). A few people stopped to watch us, since baseball isn't a common sport to come across in Germany. Eventually a man and his dog came out to the field and were playing catch as well. We headed home because it was getting dark, and we didn't want to take the risk of confusing the dog and get our new baseballs stolen. But yay for sibling bonding time! Yesterday we went with Katja and the other Fabian (Joos) to Stuttgart for some post-Christmas sale shopping and to e...

  Got a new 'do today! Shortest I've ever had it. Lisa should be proud ;)

Wishing everyone a wonderful "Heilig Abend" (Christmas Eve). We've got our fish in the oven and we just finished cookies and coffee. Now we have a small moment of silence before the family arrives for dinner. Then we'll attend midnight mass - also at 10 p.m., just like in Missouri ;) and open presents after the "Christ child" brings them (not Santa). Love & warm greetings to all of you! Laura Beth

Happy announcement: two packages have arrived from the U.S. this week! We had to pick them up at the Zollamt (the customs office) in Ludwigsburg, because the officals tax you on anything sent into the country that's over a certain weight and value - 45 Euros, or about $60 bucks. There have been continued problems with the postman. Aside from putting my letters in our neighbor's newspaper box, he keeps complaining that my letters are incorrectly addressed! So I've made a little chart which explains how Germans write/read the numbers 1 and 7. Please refer to this when addressing post to me! Thanks to everyone who has sent me Christmas cards as well. Shout out to Uncle Don, Candice, Paige, Grandma, and the Webster U. Student Ambassadors - you are all displayed on the nook in my dining room!

Being my first real Christmas away from home, I was not able to snatch extra decorations from my parents. So being craftiness & quirkiness have been lifesavers. I thought perhaps some people might get a kick out of my decorations, so I've documented. No Christmas tree this year - but there is a pointsetta, next to which I've placed a chocolate Sankt Nikolaus. To the left we have a red cemetery candle in a candy dish, surrounded by miniature baubles. To the right we have a Jägermeister shot glass as a candle dish, tied up with a Christmas ribbon. The next few ornaments were actually small gifts in the Advent Calendar I recieved from Margit - small wooden stars made of genuine tree bark. We hung them on the door handles of the monstrosity.    Next, we have a succulent that went crazy on me, an apple from a local farmer that we picked in October, three more hand-me-down baubles tied with Christmas ribbon, and the lovely prayer card th...

Last night was the Messiah Singers' Advent Concert! See if you can spot me among the Altos. Photo credit goes to our audio guy, Andy Kausig. We sang in the town of Murr - for those of you who've been to Gross/Kleinbottwar, it's one of the bus stops on the way to Marbach. It's a historical church in the middle of town, but quite small. All the seats were full by the time the concert started, and I think they took chairs from the community center to seat people in the back as well. We sang a variety of German and English songs - some with the band, some a capella. My favorite, hands down, was "We Pray" (probably also the most traditional American gospel  song we sang, too. Go figure). Here's a sample of the song on YouTube. You'll have to just imagine us clapping, stomping and dancing. Also, the girl behind me  rocked an improv solo during the chorus. Fabi, Hansi, and Margit came to see us sing, and of course the Brosi family was scattered amo...

It's snowing! It's snowing! I'm quite enthusiastic about this winter wonderland. I haven't seen the likes of this in St. Louis for years! But the temperatures haven't been steady enough to keep it on the ground. We get snow or sleet in the morning, then the sun comes out and melts everything by afternoon. All the necessary preparations for the season are complete - filled up our antifreeze, salted the stairs to our door, put winter tires on the car, and decorated the apartment for Christmas. I'm having a hard time keeping the poinsetta alive, so I put decorations around my succulent instead. Work is going smoothly. I still don't have too many hours, but the 2 students I have are wonderful. Their names are Gretel and Brigitta (can you get more German-sounding?) and they are such sweet ladies! Today Brigitta gave me a hug at the end of class and said "English lessons, MANY fun!" Don't worry, we'll work on that grammar. I'm getting more ...

Christmas is everywhere here! Last week due to Berlitz training, I missed out on gathering fresh greenery in the forest with Margit and her friends. But luckily, I caught up with her on Friday and was able to get a crash course on homemade wreath-making. Margit came home with about 5 different types of evergreen branches. Beginning with a straw wreath base (found at any local craft store), we cut small, 3-5 inch long pieces of greenery and wrapped them thickly & tighly along the base, securing them with thin metal wire. The next step was to decorate! Margit and I sat at her kitchen table, Christmas ornaments and decorations sprawled around us, and chose things to adorn our masterpieces. Mine is only one foot in diameter, so I chose small items - miniature cinnamon sticks, pine cones, golden stars, small baubles. Margit had about 3x more "wreathspace" to worth with, so she used ribbon, orange slices, red ...

The past two weeks of training were tough, and there was a LOT of new information and techniques to learn, but as of November 29th, I am officially certified as a Berlitz English teacher! Training in Stuttgart was for all the new teachers in Southwestern Germany, so the trainees lived everywhere from Saarbrücken to Heidelberg. Everyone was so interesting! Our trainer was a Scottish gal in her late 20's. Since my 12 new coworkers are all native speakers of either English or German (a requirement to teaching for Berlitz), we had people from Singapore, Texas, Cornwall, Liverpool, Arkansas, Atlanta, Detroit, and even Greece.  I was the 2nd or 3rd-youngest of the group, but everyone bonded like there was no age difference at all. The Berlitz ideology is very effective - teach grammar only in the context of how your students will use it; never teach grammar rules in table form. Though teaching method sounds basic,...