Christmas Lessons

Today, Mom, Dad, and Granna came with me to SMG to experience my school and my classes. One of the classes they visited was Frau Riehl's 7th grade class. I broke the students into three groups, and assigned Mom, Dad, and Granna each to a different group to discuss Christmas traditions with the students, thus allowing them to practice talking to native English speakers. The students learned a lot about Christmas in the U.S., and my family members got some insight into Christmas in Germany. Afterwards, we sang Christmas carols and songs, both in English and German. I've attached a couple of video clips of the students singing "Stille Nacht" (in German) and "Rudolph, The Red-Nosed Reindeer" and "Jingle Bells" (in English).

Christmas Markets

I love everything about Christmas- the lights, the sounds, the decorations, the church services, the Christmas story.... The weeks leading up to Christmas day are perhaps my favorite time of year. Although I will be missing out on some of my family's Christmas traditions this year, such as visiting the little Christmas village in Foley and driving around Monroeville looking for houses that are exceptionally well-decorated, there are a number of things that I am getting to see and do this year that I have never experienced before.

Going to Christmas markets is one such new experience. Essentially every town of any decent size has one, and I've been to three different ones so far. They are somewhat like the arts-and-crafts festivals that take place in various cities around the United States throughout the year. There are activities for children, live music, and stands selling food, and many different booths set up where different vendors sell their wares. Some of the vendors are selling hand-made goods; others are simply reselling commercially available products. Unlike the arts-and-crafts festivals, though, these markets run essentially concurrently and generally last around a month. Many of the booths are extremely decorated. The entire market is lit up with Christmas lights and stays open after dark. It's a lovely experience and a great place to do Christmas shopping!

Lighted sign for the Wormser Weihnachtsmarkt (The Worms Christmas Market)

Advent Calendars

One of my family's Christmas traditions when I was a kid was an advent calendar that told the Christmas story. For those of you who don't know, an advent calendar is something with 24 numbered flaps, one for each day in December before Christmas. You open one flap per day, and each one has something different under it. My family used the same one every year. Each December night, Robert and I knew we could look forward to opening a flap on the advent calendar and hearing mom read us a Christmas bedtime story from the book "A Story a Day until Christmas."

Since advent calendars are not particularly popular in the United States, I never had one of my own. Last year, I was excited to find one at Wal-Mart in Tuscaloosa, although I was rather disappointed to find that it had a piece of bad-tasting chocolate under each flap rather than a line from the Christmas story.

Recently, I was very pleased to learn the advent calendars are enormously popular in Germany. They are everywhere! There are Lego advent calendars, Milka chocolate advent calendars, and ones filled with an assortment of other surprises. I eagerly purchased one produced by the German company Playmobil.

Playmobil's advent calendars are intended to be assembled by parents for their children, so I had to put it together myself. I really don't remember which items are for which day, though, so opening it should still be a lot of fun. Even though November has barely begun, I can hardly wait for December (and day 1 of the calendar) to arrive.

The box...Doesn't this look like fun?

My advent calendar